The Cabinet of Dr Blessing (The Dr Blessing Collection Parts 1-3): A Gothic Victorian Horror Tale

by Rollins, Jack

  Nine.

  Once more in her room at the Seraphim, Mary could not believe it! A murder suspect right there in front of her. McEwan would be furious. She could hear him berating her now, “How did you not see it? The man was aroused by your attention – no moral disinterest, he was practically flirting!”

  And even though Mary knew that McEwan would have delivered harsh words to her, she had the urge to write to him and tell him everything that had happened. Perhaps his rebuke would be tinged with jealousy, for Mary had to admit, there was something in her that was drawn to the doctor. Even though at the time, she had believed he was a priest.

  Shame! Mary thought. I would seduce a priest. Even in her most private darkest thoughts she would never have considered it until the man was in front of her. But he is not a priest, therefore not unobtainable. A doctor. No. A murder suspect. A murder suspect and possibly a vampire. Therefore unobtainable.

  Why would I think like this? Mary almost screamed at herself. She was once more reminded of the shameful part of her nature, unlocked by her training. His eyes, his innocent eyes! She could not stop thinking about him.

  Innocent. He had not the cold eyes of the vampire. He had been flustered.

  He had been flustered not because he was a priest faced with an attractive woman, he was flustered because the only reason he had to be there was that he knew Haddon was meeting someone. He had gone to find out whom.

  The chance meeting on the street with that burly man had clinched it. Haddon was dead. Blessing had found a message, or had been told, that Haddon was meeting someone. He had been daring, or stupid, to pretend to be the priest.

  But no, I had revealed my hand, she admitted to herself, I made it perfectly clear I didn’t know the person I was meeting. How bold of him to follow that up immediately. She had known, when she said the word ‘doctor’ and he reacted, she had known, but the large man confirmed it. She had not wanted to believe. Not wanted to believe he was a killer. He was so… gentle. He seemed so decent.

  She trembled to her core. The doubts set in again. I was trained, she thought, trained to see through people, to see through the façade of decency – right to the corruption in their hearts. But I couldn’t see it in him.

  Sleep did not come easily. Her mind was losing its rigidity, its discipline. Ever since Paris. That damned Dr McEwan, he has awakened something in me! And now this damned doctor. His eyes, his gentle, innocent eyes. And a new thought: I have to save him.

  Mary woke to another filthy London morning. On the street, an argument had developed between a patterer and the doorman of the Seraphim.

  “-away from here!” the doorman boomed.

  “-just trying to make a living like anyone else!”

  “-not that sort of place. No place for you out here! You stand wherever you want, but not outside that hotel. Not that one.”

  Mary observed herself in the washstand mirror once more. Her soft eyes. Her delicate features. She still looked like a teenager.

  She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply. The mission. I must fathom this mystery before my training is destroyed. The mission.

  She looked into the mirror once more, and Black Mary noted her own features, jaw set, cheeks taut beneath her hard eyes. She bathed and dressed and secreted her weapons.

  A breakfast of soft-boiled eggs and toasted bread with two cups of tea prepared her for the day.

  She considered the facts as she looked out onto the bustling street. First, the priest suspected Dr Blessing. Second, Dr Blessing had discovered the priest’s meeting. Third, Blessing now knew that the priest was an informant for an organisation charged with hunting creatures who had the capacity to drain a human of his blood. Fourth, Blessing had assumed the identity of Father Haddon. Fifth, disturbed by the conversation, Blessing had fled the coffee house. He did not fight, did not protest, he fled. Leading to sixth, Dr Blessing is afraid.

  Mary suppressed the swell of pity. Reminding herself of McEwan’s letter, she whispered, “Remain Black Mary.”

  Thinking back to what the bulky stranger had said on the street, Blessing allegedly tended to a man in Belgravia. It was probable then that his home or practice, if he operated out of a separate office, was in Belgravia. It seemed unlikely that a doctor would be separated from his private clientele by any great distance.

  Mary waved the porter over and placed a shilling in his palm. “I am not feeling quite myself today. I have heard of a Dr George Blessing, who is very capable and who operates near here. Would you be so kind as to gain his address for me?”

  “Certainly, madam. But I must say, there happens to be a doctor here in the hotel; he arrived last night,” the porter offered helpfully.

  “Thank you, but I have heard that this Blessing is a man of remarkable skill,” Mary replied.

  The porter bowed his head and backed away a couple of steps before hurrying off to the reception desk.

  Before half an hour had passed, the porter had managed to obtain the home address of the doctor, and Mary was on her way.

  The midmorning sun barely penetrated the foul black shroud over the capital, and Blessing’s street appeared a grey, dull place to Mary. She mounted the steps to the Blessing household and rapped on the door.

  The young maid answered the door, showing such courtesy as was due a woman of class.

  “I apologise for arriving unannounced,” Mary began. “I wonder if I might find Dr Blessing at home?”

  “I am afraid not, m’lady. He must have set off for the hospital early this morning.”

  “The hospital?” Mary asked.

  “Yes m’lady. He attends a hospital to see to the needs of poor folk.”

  This jarred distinctly with the image of a killer. Mary pressed on. “I wonder then, if I might impose two requests. The first, if I could speak to Mrs Blessing, even for only a few moments, it would do me the greatest good. The second, if while I speak to Mrs Blessing, you could write for me the address of this clinic; I feel that a portion of my recent inheritance might assist Doctor Blessing’s quest to bring care to the poor.”

  The maid, knowing that the doctor would not wish to turn away a potential investor, immediately invited Mary into the reception. She wrote out the address of the clinic immediately, in a clear, competent hand. In the parlour, Mary was introduced to Mrs Blessing, who, the maid assured her, had been quite unwell of late.

  What burden could weigh so heavily on the doctor’s wife, I wonder? Mary thought to herself.

  “Please, sit,” Mrs Blessing offered.

  Mary sat close to Mrs Blessing and glanced about the room. There on the wall, a painting of Mrs Blessing and her husband – certainly the man she had seen at the coffee house. “A lovely portrait,” Mary commented.

  “I thank you, Miss…”

  “Brigham. But please, call me Mary.”

  “Only if you call me Margaret.”

  Mary instantly took a liking to Margaret, although her pallor and shallow breathing gave away almost immediately an addiction to laudanum. Mary noted the two small vials on the side table, one of which appeared to be empty. Would the doctor leave his wife with laudanum, or was it perhaps paregoric?

  “I have to inform you, Mrs Blessing, I fear your husband has become involved in some sort of… trouble.”

  Margaret’s eyes widened for a moment, but she quickly regained her composure. “Should I send for some tea?”

  “No thank you. I fear I have not much time.”

  “It would be no trouble. I shall call for Lily.”

  Mary reached for Margaret’s hand and applied an even, gentle, reassuring pressure. “Please, Margaret. George is in trouble.”

  Tears broke free and streamed down Margaret’s cheeks. “I know. I know.”

  “There, there,” Mary said, shifting over to the sofa, wrapping an arm around her. “It is not too late for me to help him. But you have to tell me as much as you know. It is difficult for me to explain to you how I know, and how I can help him, but you must
trust me for now. I can understand him and can get him the help he needs.”

  “He has been carrying out experiments, on himself, I think. He locks himself in the hospital all day and his study all night. Sometimes I hear him screaming in the study. Sometimes he screams in his sleep. It all started… was it two years ago? Three? I have lost all… There was a woman, a girl. He tried to help her, but she died. I think she died horribly.”

  “Yes?” Mary pressed.

  “And my husband was never the same after that. He threw himself into research. I think he desperately wanted to stop anyone else going through the same agony. But, somewhere along the way… I lost him. I lost my husband.” Margaret sobbed and turned to look Mary in the eye. “Promise me,” Margaret said, wringing her hands, “promise me, that you will bring my husband back to me. The old George. My silly old George.”

  Margaret fell back across the sofa and descended into tears once more.

  His study, Mary thought. I have to get in there.

  Mary left Margaret in the parlour and entered the reception. She could hear Lily in the kitchen. Mary glanced up the stairs and saw a double-door off to the right. She mounted the stairs and moved lightly so as not to draw attention to herself.

  She crept across the landing, keeping her feet on the large rug to mute her footfalls. Her fingers found the door handles. A charge ran through her, she could feel that this was it. The answers were behind these doors.

  She turned the handles.

  Locked.

  She heard a handle turning.

  The front door.

  Mary rushed to the top of the stairs and looked down.

  The front door opened.

  There he was.

  Looking straight at her.

  She smiled and immediately a spear of pain stabbed through her mind, causing her to stagger a step or two.

  He turned and fled, taking full advantage of the distraction.

  “Doctor Blessing, no! Wait! I only wish to talk to you!”

  Mary raced out onto the street and saw him vanish into the anonymity of the crowded street. Behind her, the front door closed and she heard the locks click home. “Margaret! Please, I want to help him!” Mary pleaded. She knew it was useless, for Margaret loved her husband dearly and anyone who could frighten him from his own home was not welcome there.

  She caught a glimpse of Margaret closing the parlour curtains, a vacant look on her face.

  Mary had seen that look on faces before. The laudanum could have caused that look, but it appeared to Mary, that Margaret was what De Omori referred to as “in thrall”, a state of hypnosis brought about by vampires.

  She moved out of sight of the Blessing household and pondered her next move as she walked. De Omori would want a progress report, but she had no evidence, and no plan of action. It was then that she noticed the headache had passed. It had been a fleeting, momentary shock, rather like an attack. Whatever was in the study was powerful enough to stop her in her tracks and if it held a person in thrall, then everyone in that house was at risk. A direct attack from her would result in avoidable deaths. De Omori would not be happy for her to proceed without a carefully considered plan if a supposedly respectable family hung in the balance.

  What has that Doctor done? Mary wondered, glancing back at the house. What has he let loose?

  Ten.

  It had taken me hours of walking the streets of London, to work up the courage to return to the house. My only concern was Panacea’s safety. I had walked my street several times and sneaked in through the back door, with one of my surgical blades at the ready.

  I moved through the rooms of the ground floor with a candle to guide me. Everything was as expected. I noted that the front door was fully locked and bolted. I crept to the study and found the lock was fastened and secure. Upon entering I found everything as it should be.

  Panacea woke to my presence. I stroked the glass case and left her alone, hoping that she would not punish me for my cowardice. It had been close. Mary had been feet away from her.

  I lay next to Margaret, a wreck of a man. The shadows of the room seemed to form a great net, closing in on me, ready to drag me into the murky depths with Henry. The grind of tooth on Father Haddon’s bones seemed to fill the silence and mark the seconds until I would be caught.

  From her sanctuary in the study, the child poured ideas into my brain, tried to calm me, tried to harden me to the fear. She drew forth in me a courage I would not otherwise have known. The grip of anxiety around my heart was replaced by the feeling that something was trying to escape me, trying to rise through my ribcage, desperate to break loose.

  A poisonous dream rolled through my brain, like mist. More than a dream – an idea! To leave, leave before the net dragged me down. But no, I thought, no. How can I leave her? My precious Margaret! I have caused her such harm; I have been such an absent husband and she deserves so much better.

  I had never heard Panacea’s voice. She could speak no words, but by God how she could take my vocabulary and rearrange it in my head for me. She told me what to do. Should I fail to comply, or resist her, or displease her in any way, she had perfected a method to make me obey.

  In her sleep, Margaret reached for me, as she had on so many other nights. She frequently dreamed that we had a child together. Sometimes the child was a baby, sometimes the child was Niamh, but whichever form the dream took, it often instilled in Margaret a… desire. For three years I had been making excuses, or had avoided sharing our marital bed altogether. “George give me a baby,” she muttered.

  I ignored Margaret’s advances - but they had been noticed by another. My words became reassembled in my brain once more and a suggestion formed. I cried out, “No!”

  Margaret woke with a start and caressed my face. “George, what is it? George you are sweating.”

  The pain that I experienced at that point is very difficult for me to describe to you. I once heard of a terrible suicide. A gambler, who could not face his family to tell them of his terrible losses, placed his head down on a railway track and allowed himself to be run over. In an instant, the wound would have been so traumatic as to kill him before any pain registered within the man. But what I want you to imagine is that it did not.

  Imagine the moments as the wheel first struck the head. Imagine that the train is moving very slowly, and that the wheel mounted the head instead of crushing it instantly, and for a few seconds, the weight of the train is pressing down, cracking, crunching, bursting the skull and brain. Imagine then that the train keeps moving and the head, magically intact once more, is struck by the next wheel, and the next and the next. Imagine then that the gambler survived, stood up, and could remember the sensation of each impact and each agonising, excruciating second.

  Panacea inflicted that pain on me until I staggered from my bed and out of the room. Moments later I had returned.

  Margaret had settled in her normal sleeping position. Her hand reached for my side of the bed and she moaned, wondering where I was.

  She shivered at the shuffling of the bedclothes and moaned – this moan had taken on a different tone to the last – she was aroused. “I knew you would change your mind,” she whispered.

  Margaret arched her back as a ripple of pleasure rose through her.

  Even in the dark I could see and feel the white, clawed hands working up Margaret’s thighs.

  I held my breath in anticipation of what was to follow, but not content with this course of action, the creature wanted to enhance her pleasure with one final act. She made my hands reach for the candle and matches at the side table. I struck the match and as the flame took hold and the light grew in the room, I noticed Margaret’s attention shift to the source of the light.

  Her face was carved in a moment of terror, to be frozen that way in my memory forever, when she realised that it was not I who was beneath the blankets.

  She tore back the bedclothes and saw the white flesh reflecting the orange of the candle glow.

&n
bsp; I dropped the candle and the flame spluttered out, not burning hot enough to withstand the fall. As Margaret took in the huge gasp of breath that preceded a scream, I was upon her. My whole weight crushed down on her, fingers clasped over her mouth, squeezing her head to my breast.

  Then in went the teeth.

  The sun was rising, casting light on a new route, a new plan. I peeled myself from the sheets and made ready for the day’s tribulations.

  I left Margaret to lie there. I looked at her and for the briefest moment sickening pain rose through my stomach and my heart felt like it was falling. Almost immediately I was dragged out of guilt, incapable of remorse. I was reminded that this was right – this was the only course of action. Margaret’s demise had been entirely necessary for our survival. She was holding us back…

  A theory had taken hold in my mind. Haddon was connected to the mysterious woman, but if he also knew Charlotte and Henry, then he may have shared his information or suspicions with the widow. Was Charlotte aware of this woman’s presence? With Haddon out of the way, was Charlotte the one who directed the woman to my house?

  Before I knew it, I was striding through the reception at the Burton mansion, yelling at the top of my lungs for the lady of the house.

  One of her lackeys emerged and said, “Ahhh, Doctor Blessing. How lovely to see you. Mrs Burton is on the terrace…”

  I did not listen to the rest of his sentence, but raced through the cold marble-clad hall to the parlour and through the parlour to the large glass doors, which opened onto the terrace.

  Charlotte lay across a chaise, enjoying what sun could penetrate the London soot. “George, you are the last person I expected to see.”

  “I do not doubt it.”

  “What do you think of the view?” Charlotte asked, waving a hand majestically over the landscaped gardens.

  There, by the pond and fountain, stood the brute himself, with two accomplices: one larger even than him, and the other a skinny rake of a man.

  “I do not care for it a bit,” I responded.