The Coroner's Daughter

by Andrew Hughes

  Father would compose his lectures in the parlour at night, and would often ask me to retrieve books from the library, to track down some obscure reference or case study, so much so that I came to know the location of every volume, and at least some of their contents.

  A gust of wind caused the sleet to swirl, and grey flecks alighted on the oily surface of a puddle like ash from a bonfire. Father was late, as usual, and poor Liam was sitting out in the weather. If I invited him into the carriage, he would refuse, so I got out instead.

  He looked down at me. ‘What is it, miss?’

  ‘Father has probably become lost in conversation with a student or some old professor,’ I said, the side of my bonnet fluttering against my cheek. ‘I shall fetch him.’

  I turned and leaped over the puddle, climbed the steps and pushed open the heavy wooden door.

  The noise of the wind and clatter of hooves was replaced by a cool, shadowy hush. Trainee surgeons walked through the corridors, satchels and books clasped beneath their arms. Some turned their heads to look at me, for not many girls my age would have been seen in those halls; not many girls at all, except for those carried in lifeless on stretchers.

  I followed a passageway that led to a set of double doors. A young man approached, opened them and slipped inside, giving me a brief glimpse of tiered benches rising into the gloom, and the corner of a table in a bright pool of light. I also caught a snatch of my father’s voice before it was shut out again. I climbed some stairs in the hallway that led to the upper tiers, pushed one of the doors ajar, and crept through.

  Several students sat in the benches before me, but none looked back to see my entrance. Others were dotted about in shadowy rows that filled the circular hall. There were large windows just below the ceiling, the shutters opened in such a way that grey light fell upon the dais at the front of the hall, where oil-lamps and candles illuminated a narrow worktable.

  Father stood behind it, his coat removed and shirtsleeves rolled up. A man lay on the table, naked except for a piece of sack-cloth covering his face, and with a gaping hole in his torso, the skin folded back on each side like white linen. I had often seen bodies brought to Father’s workrooms, but none like this, none so exposed and undone. I was ready to back out of the room, return to the shelter of the carriage, but I stayed to hear what Father would say.

  He referred to the man as ‘this poor fellow’, and described how he had mistaken mercurial salts for a powder to cure persistent headaches. ‘No foul play was suspected,’ Father said, ‘but if any of you are faced with a similar case, there is a test to establish the presence of poison, in this instance mercury.’

  He lifted a glass tube containing a muddy liquid and swirled the contents about as if it were a glass of claret. A sample of bile, blood and mucus taken from the man’s stomach.’

  With metal tongs, he placed the tube over a spirit lamp, allowing the pale yellow flame to lick against the glass. A pungent smell of garlic filled the hall. After a few moments, the fumes began to coat the inside of the tube in a white substance, and when Father held a copper strip above the vapours, it acquired a silvery hue.

  ‘If we just look hard enough, gentlemen, if we use the proper techniques, then the truth can be found. Not only that, it is indisputable, and no cleverly formed questions can possibly cast doubt upon it.’

  The tip of the copper glinted in the lamplight. It was so pleasing to think that such tiny particles of mercury, dredged up from the dregs of a man’s life, could leave such an elegant indicator. I looked around the theatre, expecting the students to be enthralled by the demonstration, but they slouched in their seats, drowsy and indifferent. Father hadn’t spoken for a few moments, and I noticed him peering upwards towards the back of the hall where I was standing. He frowned and straightened his lips, but then looked down, perhaps conscious of others following his gaze. He replaced the tongs and the copper, and took a piece of cloth to drape over the body. But then he hesitated, for the cloth wasn’t large enough to hide both the internal and external organs. Before he could choose which was the more indecent, I slipped out and made my way back to the carriage.

  The rain had let up a little. Liam clambered down and opened the door, and I told him that Father would be a while yet. After a few minutes, students began to emerge from the college in ones and twos, lifting their lapels against the breeze. Father was among the last to leave. He walked towards the carriage slowly, spoke with Liam, then opened the door and climbed in to sit beside me.

  He didn’t say anything as we set off, just rifled in his satchel to arrange some papers. He closed the buckle and propped the bag on the seat opposite, while I looked at the passing houses.

  I heard him take a breath, and say, ‘Abigail—’

  ‘I had no idea that the test for mercury could produce such a clear result.’

  Abigail, what were you doing up there?’

  ‘Father, I only went looking for you. I didn’t know that you would be working with a cadaver.’

  ‘But why would you stay for so long? You know that you cannot come to places where such things are displayed. It is just not—’

  ‘Fair?’

  ‘Proper.’ He still wore the scarf I had given him that morning, and he loosened it around his neck. ‘What if others had seen you?’

  ‘I’m sure they could have coped.’

  ‘You know what people are like. Why risk having them say that you are fixated by such morbid subjects?’

  ‘If I were a young man they would say I was fascinated by them.’

  A stray dog ran alongside the carriage for a while, snapping at Newton’s legs, and I heard Liam yell at it.

  Father said, ‘You know that I have always been proud of your curiosity.’ He removed his hat and placed it on his lap, then tossed it on to the seat next to the satchel. ‘It is a great consolation to be able to share my interests with you, but there are other, more important things that I must consider. Especially now that your mother is gone. Your reputation, your future, even matrimony.’

  ‘Father, please—’

  He held up his hand. ‘I am just mentioning it, for you to be aware. There is no need to discuss it today.’

  We remained silent for the remainder of the journey. The rain turned mizzling, then stopped altogether, though the road was still muddy as we approached the house.

  I said, ‘Father?’ and he looked at me. ‘Are there other tests like the one you carried out today – tests to detect the presence of poison?’

  He said that there were. Though they varied, depending on whether the poison was mineral or vegetable.

  ‘Will you show them to me?’

  ‘If it stops you from sneaking into the anatomical theatre, then yes. After all,’ he said, reaching for his hat, ‘all the tools we need are here.’

  The long grey hours of the afternoon slipped by, and the fire dwindled in my room. I took the page from Miss Casey’s Bible and laid it flat on my desk, examining the message and signature once again. I thought of showing it to Father, but after our last conversation I did not think he’d appreciate the means by which I’d found it. Besides, what could I say? That because Miss Casey was knitting clothes for her child, she couldn’t have murdered him? What did it matter if some gentleman inscribed her Bible? It could have been anyone. For all I knew, it may have been sitting in her drawer gathering dust for years.

  From my window I could see the weathervane on the steeple of St George’s Church. It had been bent in the storm last week, stuck facing south-west as if mutely pointing towards some unseen threat. At the bottom of the yard, Liam and Mrs Perrin’s son Jimmy were rolling a wheel into the stables to make a repair to the cadaver cart. Father and Ewan were still in their workrooms, and would likely remain until evening. That just left Mrs Perrin and Kathy – a parlourmaid who had been part of the household for three years – but they were both hard at work in the kitchen and would leave me undisturbed until the call for supper.

  I donned my kid-leathe
r half-boots and the navy pelisse that I usually wore to church, and descended the stairs, listening for any sound of movement. After a final check of the house, I slipped into the street. The sun was still up, visible only as a glare in the clouds above the trees in the park. The curved wall of the Rotunda faced our side of the square, its entrance only a few hundred yards away.

  Usually if I was out of the house beyond this hour, it was in a carriage with Father by my side and Liam riding in front. If I walked the streets it was only to accompany my family to church, or Mrs Perrin to the Moore Street markets. Now I felt as if people were regarding me, taking stock of my age and the cut of my coat. In the distance, a man came shambling forwards, stooped and seemingly bound in chains. It was a seller of dog collars, the circular bands all linked together, strapped around his torso and hanging from his belt. A terrier scampered along behind him, untethered and seemingly the happier for it. As he passed, the man raised his hat to me, revealing a freckled, bald pate.

  I stopped to wait for a carriage to trundle by. Someone took hold of my wrist, and I twisted about.

  Ewan’s face was full of concern. ‘Miss Lawless, where on earth are you going?’

  My relief was fleeting, tempered by an irritation that I’d been followed and that my plan was being jeopardized. I took a breath and disengaged my arm. ‘Why were you skulking behind me?’

  ‘I was on my way home for the evening. My rooms are in Great Britain Street.’

  ‘Well, you should continue there.’

  ‘Does your father know that you are out of the house?’

  I straightened my mouth and remained silent.

  ‘I must escort you home.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m going to the Rotunda.’

  Ewan looked over my shoulder towards the hospital and frowned. ‘Are you unwell?’

  I held his eye a little longer, and told him that I wished to speak with Miss Casey.

  ‘But . . . that is not your responsibility,’ he said. ‘It’s not your place.’ He lowered his voice in an attempt to be authoritative. ‘We must return immediately.’

  ‘I am certain she didn’t kill her baby on a whim, Ewan. Something or someone induced her to do it.’

  He paused, perhaps because his name was spoken so earnestly. ‘Miss Lawless, you must know that this is impossible.’

  ‘I am going to the hospital. Unless you intend to lead me back by the arm.’

  ‘Then I shall have to inform your father.’

  ‘Do as you wish.’ And with that, I checked that the road was clear and hurried across.

  The wide foyer of the Rotunda echoed with the footsteps of midwives and orderlies. Tall windows cast scant light upon the mosaic floor, and the timber rafters above were lost in shadow. Expectant mothers walked to and fro, or waited in chairs that lined the walls, a few attended by older women, others surrounded by gaggles of young children. I went to a counter situated in the corner and waited for a clerk to glance up. His wide forehead tapered to a narrow chin, and there was a hairline crack in the lens of his spectacles.

  ‘I wish to visit Miss Emilie Casey,’ I said, then wondered if my use of the honorific had been indelicate. The man opened a ledger and scanned a list of names beginning with C.

  ‘There is no mention of her,’ he said. ‘When was she admitted?’

  ‘In the past few days.’

  He turned to the back of the book, where there was a jumble of shorter lists for the surgical and infectious wards. One in particular had only two names, which I could see from my side of the counter: Mrs Longsworth and Miss Casey.

  ‘There,’ I said, pointing to them.

  The clerk looked up. ‘That patient is not allowed visitors.’

  ‘It’s very important.’

  The spine of the ledger creaked as he closed it over, but he said nothing.

  ‘I would not keep her long.’

  ‘There is nothing I can do,’ he said. ‘Why do you wish to see her?’ His eyes narrowed, as if a thought had just occurred. ‘How did you even know she was here?’

  A voice over my shoulder said, ‘Well, which room is she in?’

  Ewan had spoken in a distracted manner while looking down at a pocket watch held open at his side.

  ‘I am trying to find out,’ I said, ‘but this gentleman will not tell me.’

  Ewan frowned and stepped up to the counter. ‘And what is your name, sir?’

  ‘Gray.’ The man let his eyes drift over Ewan’s clean-shaven cheeks and willowy neck. ‘May I ask yours?’

  ‘I am Mr Weir, the assistant coroner for north Dublin. I need to see a patient on a matter of some importance for a forthcoming inquest.’

  ‘Yes,’ the clerk said. ‘So this lady said. But that particular patient is—’

  ‘I know who she is, Mr Gray. Emilie Casey from County Wexford; suspected of the murder of her son in the home of Mr Nesham last Sunday evening, and confined here due to postpartum haemorrhage and infection.’ He placed his satchel on the counter.

  ‘I was about to say, that the patient is not—’

  ‘We don’t have time for this. Is Dr Labatt here?’

  The clerk glanced over the rim of his glasses. ‘He is on his rounds.’

  ‘Send for him.’

  ‘He’s too busy.’

  ‘Of course. But I shall carefully explain the reason for the imposition.’

  They regarded each other, and I hoped Ewan would not be the first to look away. Behind us, a hungry infant began to cry, the noise echoing in the vaulted ceiling. The clerk opened a notebook and began to write. ‘Mr Weir, was it?’ He waved the top of his quill towards me. ‘And who is this?’

  ‘My assistant.’

  Both the clerk and I raised an eyebrow.

  ‘This girl?’

  ‘Would it have been more appropriate to bring a young man?’

  Gray considered this, shook his head and made a further note. He said, ‘Miss Casey is in recovery ward B, on the third floor in the western colonnade.’

  I fell into step beside Ewan as we climbed the staircase. He kept his eyes straight ahead, but a colour had crept into his cheeks.

  ‘Thank you for coming back, Ewan.’

  He said, ‘Your father will send me home when he finds out.’

  I was about to reassure him, but then a nurse passed on the stairs and we fell silent. Once she got beyond earshot, I said, ‘Who is Dr Labatt?’

  ‘The assistant master here. He’ll be teaching a class in Trinity when my new term begins in the autumn.’ Ewan glanced at me. ‘If I am allowed to attend. I knew the clerk wouldn’t want to deal with him. He has a severe reputation.’

  We reached the third floor and Ewan began to move off to the right. I stopped him by touching his elbow, pointed and said, ‘It is this way, I think.’ An arched corridor stretched before us, with wards on both sides. The air was stifling, filled with the smells of unwashed bodies and unemptied bedpans.

  Each room contained about a dozen beds, with simple wooden cribs at the foot of each. Some of the women appeared sickly and cold and were swaddled in blankets; others were flushed and feverish with the covers drawn down; and a few sat propped up nursing their new-borns. The corridor was busy, and though one or two midwives glanced at us, none bothered to stop.

  We reached Ward B. Ewan waited at the door and told me not to be long. The room was dimly lit, with patches of damp on the whitewashed walls. Only two of the beds were occupied, but I could tell Emilie Casey at once, for she was the one manacled to the bed frame. She lay with her hand resting on the pillow due to the short span of the chain. Her pretty face was tear-streaked, with sandy hair brushed back on both sides, and her eyes were pressed closed as if in prayer.

  I had never been this close to someone accused of murder, and wasn’t sure what to expect. Some mark of guilt perhaps. All I saw was a sickly young woman in a tangle of sheets. She could have been any grieving mother.

  I spoke her name and she opened her eyes. My light bonnet was si
milar to those worn by the nurses, though the dark pelisse would have appeared unusual. Emilie squinted and shifted back on to her elbows.

  I pulled a chair to the bedside; the harsh sound of its legs scraping on the tiled floor made her flinch. Are you feeling all right?’ I said. ‘Would you like anything?’

  She glanced around the room, and then at the bedside table. ‘Some water.’ Her voice was hushed, the soft t barely audible.

  I poured her a cup, and the water spilled from the corner of her mouth as she drank, running from her chin on to the bedclothes. She panted, then placed the cup on the edge of the table beside the glass jug.

  She said, ‘Who are you?’

  I was about to tell her my name, but thought better of it. ‘We have never met,’ I said. ‘But Martha asked me to check on you.’

  ‘You know Martha?’

  ‘I was speaking with her this morning.’

  She still regarded me with wary and weary eyes.

  ‘Did you see the child?’ she asked.

  For a moment, I thought she meant her own, but she was talking about Lucia. ‘Yes,’ I said, and then remembered something. ‘Martha despaired because she wouldn’t go down for her nap.’

  A half-smile crept over Emilies lip, but then she covered her face and wept quietly into the crook of her elbow. Just as I was about to lean forward to offer comfort, she whispered, ‘Lucia was the only one I told.’

  I imagined her playing with the girl in the Neshams’ nursery, and, amidst the baby talk and prattle, confiding in the toddler that she would soon have a child of her own. Did she really believe that the Neshams would allow her baby to be raised in their household; that Lucia might have looked upon the new-born as a half-brother, or at least a playing companion?

  ‘What were you going to name him?’

  This time Emilie remained silent, and I thought that I’d said the wrong thing. With her manacled hand, she began to scratch at a loose flake of whitewash on the wall. Crumbs of grey mortar sifted to the floor.

  ‘When I was a girl in Gorey,’ she said, ‘I had a smaller brother. His hair was almost white, and whenever the wind blew in the thatch he’d cling to me in the dark. He died when he was only three. He was called Morgan.’ She brushed some of the dust that had collected at the side of her bed, and then lay still. She no longer seemed able to cry.