The Coroner's Daughter

by Andrew Hughes

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘Miss Casey did not make any initial shallow cuts, as people usually do because they misjudge the effectiveness of the blade.’ He frowned and said, ‘Really, cutting one’s wrist is a poor method for suicide, unless submerged in water, because of—’

  ‘The coagulation of blood.’

  He glanced at me. ‘Quite.’

  Beside that, Father had written, Both cuts severed the ulnar artery . . . beginner’s luck?

  Ewan traced his hand down the page. The nail of his index finger was blackened with ink so he used his middle finger instead. Gathering of pulmonary fluids and congestion in the brain. But Father had written by way of explanation: See Labatt’s notes: patient sedated throughout her stay because of persistent hysteria.

  ‘When I spoke with Emilie,’ I said, ‘her lethargy was no more than could be expected of one bed-bound for a number of days. In fact, she seemed alert and guarded.’

  Ewan finished reading through the notes. ‘I think your father had doubts about this case. I am surprised that he would recommend a verdict without being completely certain.’

  I thought of the men who had come to visit the night before the inquest. It could not have been a coincidence that Mr Nesham and Dr Labatt were among them. ‘Perhaps it is because of us,’ I said. ‘He knew that if the matter was investigated further, we would have to be questioned.’

  ‘But so be it, if there is a possibility that Miss Casey did not take her own life.’

  Downstairs, we heard Father call out to Liam in the stables, and then his footsteps sounded on the staircase.

  Ewan glanced at me. He closed the ledger and hurriedly placed it back in the cabinet, while I moved away from his desk to stand in the middle of the room. He pulled the shutter down with a clatter just as Father came into the office.

  He paused on the threshold when he saw me, and then looked at Ewan who had lingered beside the cabinet.

  Before he could speak, I said, ‘There you are. I’ve been searching the house all over.’

  Father frowned. ‘I was in my chambers, as usual, attending to correspondence.’

  ‘You mustn’t have heard me knock. Never mind.’ I turned to Ewan. ‘I am sorry for the intrusion, Mr Weir.’

  ‘Not at all.’ He nodded towards my father and said, ‘Good morning, sir.’

  As I slipped towards the top of the stairs, Father stopped me and said, ‘Why did you wish to see me?’

  ‘Oh. It can keep.’

  ‘If you turned the house upside-down then it must be important.’

  My mind went blank. Ewan used the moment to move back to his own desk and take his seat. Still I was at a loss. It could be anything: some announcement, or concern, or favour.

  ‘My piano lesson,’ I said. ‘Mrs Meekins is expecting me again this morning.’

  ‘I haven’t forgotten.’

  ‘And I was wondering if I could walk there myself instead of taking the carriage – it’s only a few minutes after all – and then go into Henry Street to buy a new bonnet?’

  I thought the question served its purpose rather well: as a request it was plausible enough, and it would give me the opportunity to leave in an apparent huff when he refused. But instead he looked at me and said, ‘You may. Just wrap up against the cold and be home before lunch hour.’

  He seemed to note my surprise, for he smiled. Perhaps he was glad that his daughter was eager to do something that his wife at one stage couldn’t countenance. All I could say was, ‘Thank you,’ while feeling sorry for having deceived him.

  4

  Tentative notes from Mozart’s ‘Turkish March’ drifted from the salon of Mrs Meekins. An elderly servant brought me to an adjoining parlour, and she told me that her mistress would not finish the lesson with her current appointment until that day’s piece was played without fault. Given the amount of times the music was interrupted by the whack of a cane and the tuneless hum of piano strings, that seemed likely to be a while yet.

  The maid knelt before the hearth, placing individual lumps of coal on the fire with brass tongs as if their use was carefully rationed – a thriftiness that seemed at odds with the general decor. Little in the room was understated: the blue-and-white-striped wallpaper, the gilded frames of portraits and mirrors, the flecked marble chimney piece. A book lay on the table beside my chair: The Mirror of the Graces – Hints on Female Accomplishments and Manners by ‘A Lady of Distinction’. I turned to a random page in the first chapter.

  Fine taste in apparel I have ever seen the companion of pure morals; while a licentious style of dress is as certainly the token of laxity in manners and conduct. To correct this dangerous fashion ought to be the study and attempt of every mother, of every daughter, of every woman.

  I closed the book and tossed it back on to the table, where it landed with a thud and slid on the polished surface. The noise made the housemaid start. She replaced the guard before the fire, rose with discomfort and took her leave.

  A bookcase stood in the corner, but the titles it contained were no more agreeable: On the Moral Influence of Etiquette; The Polite Letter Writer; The Young Wife: Duties of Woman in Marriage. There were several volumes of Debrett’s Peerage, and the most up-to-date edition of The Dublin Directory. I took it down and opened it. Father was noted among the city officers in the first few pages: Coroner for Dublin North – Michael Lawless, 4 Rutland Sq. How easy it would be for anyone to find our address. I was about to replace the book when another name entered my head: Longsworth.

  That was the woman who shared Emilie Casey’s ward; her name had been written out in Mr Gray’s ledger. If anyone could have been witness to what occurred that night, it was her.

  In the alphabetical roll under ‘Nobility and Gentry’, three Longsworths were listed: two barristers and a silk-mercer, living in well-to-do streets south of the river. I thought again of the surgical ward in the Rotunda. It was unlikely that those men would allow their wives to be treated in such a place.

  In the directory headed ‘Merchants and Traders’, only one Longsworth was mentioned, and she was a woman: Longsworth, Maria. Button and Trimmings merchant, Pill-lane. The address wasn’t far, just tucked in behind the Four Courts. I looked again at the door of Mrs Meekins’ salon. Inside, the latest attempt to complete the Mozart piece faltered in its opening bars.

  The skies darkened as I walked through the city, threatening a downpour that never arrived. Beyond Sackville Street, paths became narrow and choked, with side-alleys offering glimpses of listing masts and snapping sails and the new iron bridge arching over the Liffey. Seagulls wheeled in wide circles over the dome of the Four Courts, just visible between the eaves of the tenements on Pill Lane. On the street, women gathered outside their houses in twos and threes, chatting together with shawls gathered against the cold. A street-trader stood on a corner, stoking the fire of a portable stove. She was an old woman, one hand propped against her back as if nursing an ailment. A round pan contained a pile of assorted nuts with their edges blackened, though it was hard to tell if that was the result of roasting or decay.

  When I got near she called out to me, ‘Nuts for a farthing.’

  ‘No, thank you.’ I was about to pass, but then I paused and said, ‘I am looking for a shop along this road, a haberdashers called Longsworth.’

  The woman waved her spoon about to dispel the smoke. ‘Shop’s closed. Maria hasn’t been well.’

  ‘Do you know if her baby lived?’

  She glanced at me, and seemed to take note of my clothing for the first time. ‘Yes, though I heard it was a close-run thing. She’s only back from the hospital these past few days.’ The woman pointed towards the end of the street. ‘Her shop is down there a ways, across the road.’

  A hanging sign over the door of a narrow two-storey house bore the Longsworth name. A man was peering through the darkened windows between cupped hands, the brim of his hat pushed back by the cane he was still holding. He was looking beyond the boxes of buckr
am and button-moulds that were visible in the window display.

  I said, ‘Is the shop still closed?’

  He lifted his head to look at me, and his thin lips stretched as he smiled.

  ‘I was just wondering that myself.’ Then he rapped the window with the top of his cane, so hard that I was surprised the glass didn’t crack. ‘Do you hear that, Mrs Longsworth? You have a customer. And here the doors are shut.’

  ‘No, I didn’t want to buy anything.’

  This time he thumped the front door with his fist, and shouted, ‘It’s little wonder that no money passes the tills.’ He peered through the glass again, then stood on his tiptoes. ‘Do you think I can’t spot you skulking behind the counter?’

  I was about to back away, for this quarrel was not my concern, and at least I had found where she lived. But the man’s manner was so brutish.

  ‘Perhaps she has no wish to see you.’

  ‘Oh, no one wants to see me. No one likes it when old Fitch comes to call. They know I won’t leave without what’s due, isn’t that right, Maria?’

  Across the street, women had come to their doors to watch. I told the man that Mrs Longsworth had not been well.

  He felt along the edges of the window frame, brushing away flakes of green paint, then stood back to look at the upper floor. ‘There’s hardly been sight of the sun for six months,’ he said. ‘And noxious vapours fill the air. If every invalid was forgiven their arrears, then Mr Purser would be severely out of pocket.’

  ‘Mr Purser of Mountjoy Square?’

  He frowned at me, and seemed to realize that he should not have mentioned his employer’s name. I didn’t know the man, but the Purser family had a pew in St George’s.

  ‘I doubt that he would approve of his debts being collected in this manner.’

  ‘You’d be surprised.’

  ‘Well then I doubt his wife would like it known that a new mother, one barely out of hospital, was being hounded. Lady Purser has such a reputation for charity. It would be a shame if her friends were to find out.’

  He gripped the top of his cane to hammer on the door again, but then paused. His gloves were too big for him, and the brown leather at the tips of his fingers folded back. He placed the cane on the ground, twisting the tip slightly in the dirt, and pulled his brim lower.

  ‘This day week, Mrs Longsworth.’

  Mr Fitch brushed my shoulder as he walked past. He didn’t glance back, even when he turned into a side street towards the river.

  I heard the scrape of bolts being undone, and the door was pulled ajar. Mrs Longsworth leaned out to ensure that the man had gone. She looked at me and said, ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘We really are closed, though, unless it’s something simple . . .’

  ‘I wanted to ask you about the girl who was in your ward in the Rotunda,’ I said. ‘The girl who killed herself.’

  The sound of an infant’s cry came from upstairs. Mrs Longsworth held the latch and seemed ready to make an excuse, but then took a step back and said, ‘Come up.’

  She led the way through the stalls of her shop, past the raised flap of a wooden counter and up a cramped stairway. The room above was low, with a fire burning in the hearth. Clothes hung from a line that spanned the walls. There was a crib beside the kitchen table, and another child sat on a hearthrug: a young girl in a simple dress who combed the hair of her doll. Her mother leaned over to kiss her forehead, saying, ‘He’s gone, love.’ Then she went to the crib to soothe the baby.

  The little girl came to stand before me and asked me what my name was. When I told her, she said, ‘I’m Maggie.’

  She didn’t say anything more, but neither did she move away.

  ‘Do you like having a new sister?’

  She thought about it, her eyes focused on the middle distance. ‘She cries a lot. And she made Mammy sick.’

  ‘That wasn’t her fault. You are very lucky. I wish I had a sister.’

  ‘You can have her if you like.’

  Her mother said, ‘Maggie,’ while placing the baby back in its cot. I took a pin from my hair, which had a yellow buttercup made from tortoise-shell, and gave it to the girl. She smiled as she took it, brought it back to the fireplace, and fixed it in the hair of her doll.

  The baby’s eyes were still scrunched and her lips pursed, but all of a sudden she settled, and her face became placid. I wondered if a child that age was able to dream, and if so what images did she see. ‘She looks beautiful and healthy,’ I said.

  Her mother nodded. ‘The midwife had given up hope.’ She pulled a chair from the table and sat down, and I could tell by the stiff way she held her side, and her wan complexion, that she was sore and wearied. She didn’t offer me anything, or invite me to sit, which was understandable seeing as I’d arrived at her doorstep unannounced.

  ‘Is your husband here?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘You manage the shop by yourself?’

  ‘When I’m able.’

  There was a silence then, except for Maggie softly talking to her doll in a sing-song voice.

  Mrs Longsworth said, ‘I’d expected someone to ask me about it before now.’

  ‘About Miss Casey?’

  ‘I didn’t know her name.’ She leaned across the table for a cup of water, which was just out of reach. I handed it to her while sitting down. ‘But you remember she was in the room with you?’

  ‘Angela was only a few days old. And I wasn’t well, trying to sleep as much as possible because of the pain. Nobody told me what that girl had done, but I could guess.’

  ‘Did she talk to you?’

  ‘No. I could hear her often enough, weeping.’ She swirled the water in her cup. ‘On the day it happened, a young lady came to the ward to speak with her.’

  ‘That was me. I came to see her.’

  She frowned. ‘It was you?’

  ‘Emilie got upset, and the doctors restrained her.’

  ‘Yes, her shouting woke me.’

  A gust outside sent a puff of smoke into the room. Mrs Longsworth got up to check on Angela, even though the baby hadn’t stirred. When she sat back down, she said, ‘Later on, I don’t know the time, it was pitch black, a man came in carrying a candle. Perhaps he was one of the porters . . .’ She glanced at Maggie. ‘But I’d been told to watch out for men like that.’

  ‘Did he go to Emilie?’

  She nodded. ‘He stood over her for a minute, then one by one he unbuckled her restraints and laid them on the floor. She was barely conscious. He came to me and said that the doctors had to give everyone some new medicine, to help us rest, to take away the pain, and he offered me a vial. He even helped me sit up so I could drink it.’ She closed her eyes, and I could see her knuckles whiten over her mug. ‘I didn’t think that I would be so yielding.’

  ‘Could you see his face?’

  ‘Not very well. When he was near the candle I could see one of his eyelids drooped halfway down. It seemed he couldn’t help it.’ She lightly dragged at her own eyelid with the tip of her middle finger.

  ‘He had ptosis?’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘The lazy eye.’

  ‘Yes, that is what he had.’

  ‘What did he do then?’

  ‘I could feel myself drifting to sleep, but I saw him leaning over the girl’s bed. He laced his fingers through her hair, and cradled her head while he brought the vial to her lips. Her eyes were open, but she didn’t try to stop him. After that, I don’t know. I woke up in a new ward. I didn’t even know the girl had died until a few days ago.’

  ‘You didn’t tell anybody?’

  ‘I just wanted to take Angela home. Besides, nobody asked, until you arrived.’

  She rubbed both hands over her eyes and down her face, leaving white finger marks on her red cheeks. ‘Maybe it was nothing,’ she said. ‘Maybe he did work there.’

  ‘Did you see him in the hospital again afterwards?’


  She looked into the fire and shook her head. Maggie came over and showed her mother the doll with the buttercup in its hair.

  ‘Look, Mammy.’

  ‘It’s very nice. Now give it back to the lady.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘It is a gift.’ A church bell began to toll for midday. I said that I had to go, and thanked her for speaking with me. As she walked me to the door I mentioned that a friend and I were going to need material for some ball-gowns. Perhaps I could leave an order with her.

  Mrs Meekins had not been pleased to find me missing from her drawing room, but I arrived back soon after, full of apologies, and the lesson went ahead. Afterwards, I returned home to find a carriage waiting outside the house. It had delicate scrollwork around the door frames and a gig lantern of polished brass. There was no sign of a driver, and it was odd to see such a fine vehicle unattended. When I went inside, Mrs Perrin was coming out of the dining room, bearing a tray with a few china plates. She said, ‘We have visitors.’

  ‘I saw.’

  ‘They’re having lunch with your father. He wants you to join them.’

  I asked who it was while draping my coat and bonnet on the banister, but she hadn’t caught their names. She looked at me and put her tray down. ‘Abigail, what happened to your hair?’

  ‘I . . . may have lost a clip.’

  She took one of her own hairpins and held it between her lips, then smoothed a tress over my ear and set it in place. She stepped back and regarded me critically, brushing a thread from my shoulder.

  ‘Don’t keep them waiting.’

  When I entered the dining room, Father and his two guests stood up from the table. I recognized the younger man: James Caulfeild, the son of Lord Charlemont, who would host the ball next month. Clarissa had always admired James, and I could see why. He had an open countenance and light-blue eyes. The other man was older, his mouth straight and stern, though it relaxed into an engaging smile when Father introduced me. He was Professor Reeves, the Royal Astronomer, who lived on an estate in the foothills of Dublin. I had read some of his papers, and knew that his house had a famous observatory built years before.