A Duty to the Dead

by Charles Todd

  He shook me off. “Harry, speak to me, for God’s sake, speak to me.”

  “If you wait any longer, he’ll die.” I reached out and took the shotgun away as his hands flexed open, trying to help the wounded man. I put the weapon behind me, and Dr. Philips was there, I could feel his grip above mine, then he stepped back. I held on to Booker’s arm. “What rank was he? Do you know?” I asked Dr. Philips in a low voice.

  “Er—lieutenant, I think.”

  “Don’t stand there staring, Lieutenant Booker! Here, take his shoulders, I’ll get his feet.”

  He seemed to rouse himself, looking up at me, then telling Harry it would be all right, there was help now.

  And then between us, we lifted the wounded man I couldn’t see, and Booker started out the door and down the passage with him between us, urging me in his turn to hurry, hurry.

  Confused as we entered the passage by the stairway, Booker hesitated.

  I said, “That cot. Over there. Doctor! This case is critical.” We put Harry down at the foot of the stairs, with Dr. Philips hovering in the background.

  “Well done, Lieutenant. Look, here’s someone to see to Harry now. Sit down over there—yes, out of the way.” I led him to a chair against the opposite wall, put out a hand, and Dr. Philips set the needle into my palm. “Here, you’re exhausted. You must be calm when you see him again. Let me give you this—” The needle went home, and Ted Booker started up. I thought for an instant he was going to strike me. “Steady, young man, or I’ll make you wait outside the tent,” I said harshly, the voice of Matron and not to be trifled with. “Now sit down and be quiet while we do our work.”

  But he shook me off, still calling to Harry.

  Dr. Philips came up, took his arm as I had done, and said, “Soldier, you’re in the way. I can’t work—sit down. See, you’re distressing the wounded man—”

  I turned my head to stare at him—it didn’t sound like Dr. Philips’s normal voice at all. It sounded like a medical orderly giving orders. We had found ourselves swept up in Ted Booker’s nightmare, playing our roles to an invisible audience.

  Booker, distraught, clung to him. “Harry—” he began.

  “Harry’s in good hands. You mustn’t let your men down, you know. Good example and all that.”

  We finally got through to Booker, and then he sat down on the floor and began to cry, holding his dead brother in his arms and rocking him like a child. It wouldn’t be long now before the injection took effect.

  I said softly to Dr. Philips, “The shotgun. Get rid of it.”

  He turned to do as I’d asked, and I bent over to touch Booker’s shoulder.

  “Lieutenant. Come in here, out of the rain.”

  Ted Booker got up, stumbling a little, and let me lead him toward the dining room.

  Halfway there, he twisted free and went back, calling for Harry. But his words had already begun to slur, and it was just a matter of minutes before he was half conscious and easily led up the stairs to the nearest bedroom. We got him onto the bed, his shoes off, his collar loosened, and a blanket over him against the chill. By that time he was out, and snoring from the drug.

  Dr. Philips said, “Thank you for your help. You must have done this before—you got through to him.”

  I couldn’t tell him I’d never dealt with such a severe case before. Not alone. But I’d learned from Dr. Paterson not to interrupt whatever world the patient inhabited. It was easier to enter it, and use it to help.

  “They’re accustomed to the sisters. They usually mind well enough.” I was suddenly very tired, a reaction to the tension we’d been under.

  “One of these days, he’s going to do himself a harm. He thinks he got his brother killed. Most of the time he’s all right, but today something set him off. His wife sent the man next door to call me. He was as bad as I’ve ever seen him.”

  “He’s in torment,” I said. “And it won’t go away. You can’t keep him drugged.”

  “No. I’ll take the shotgun home with me and bury it in a closet. I should have thought of looking for a weapon before this, but truth is, I didn’t know it was even in the house until today.”

  We sat down on the two chairs in the room, one by the window, and the other near the bed. Dr. Philips looked as tired as I felt.

  “A long night?” I asked him.

  He roused himself to answer. “A difficult delivery, and another biding its time. There’s no doctor in the next village. I work there as well, when I’m sent for. Where did you serve? France?”

  “I was on Britannic.”

  “Good God. That explains why you’re visiting the Grahams. Arthur Graham died on that ship.”

  “Yes, I was there.”

  “A putrid wound, from what I hear.”

  “The doctors tried amputation, but the infection had advanced too far.”

  “Yes, sadly, once it has got a grip, there’s not much hope. Arthur was a strong young man, but that seems to make little difference.”

  “Did you know Arthur well?” I asked him.

  “I came here just before his first leave. Dr. Hadley had died. From overwork, if you want my opinion. Another doctor I know suggested I take over his practice. Because of the need.”

  “I’m surprised you aren’t at the Front.”

  “Yes, well, I’m not fit enough to go. So they tell me. I have a heart condition.”

  “And yet you’re working yourself into exhaustion. Because you feel guilty about not serving?”

  He smiled. “You are to the point, aren’t you?”

  “I was hoping to find someone who could tell me more about Arthur Graham. I took care of him when he was wounded, and I got to know him. So I believed then. I realize now how little that was.”

  “Wrong person. Dr. Hadley, now, had been the family physician for most of Arthur’s life. He could have told you about measles and falls from a horse and whatever else you desired to know.”

  I smiled. “I’ve met Jonathan and Timothy. But there’s another brother, isn’t there? I’m sure Arthur told me he had three brothers. I was reluctant to ask—he might be dead.”

  “They don’t mention him. Apparently he did something rather dreadful and was sent away.”

  “To prison?” I asked, taken aback.

  “No. He’s in an asylum. If you came down on the train, you must have passed it on the road here.”

  The house ablaze with light. “How awful for the family.”

  “Peregrine is the eldest, a half brother to the younger three. A tragedy that we can’t cure minds.”

  My father had told me that Ambrose Graham’s first wife had died in childbirth. Peregrine would have been her son, then.

  “But what did he do?”

  “He’s said to have killed someone. One of the old spinsters here in Owlhurst, Mrs. Clayton, told me all about the family skeleton. She said he strangled a girl in a moment of passion.” Disconcertingly, he grinned.

  “Small wonder no one mentions Peregrine.”

  “I have to take most of that with a grain of salt,” he added in apology. “By my calculations, Peregrine was hardly more than fourteen when it happened. Mrs. Clayton is a wonderful old gossip, I love her dearly, but she has a lively imagination, fed in part by senile dementia. Still, he was banished from Owlhurst at a young age, and in the dark of night, according to what I’ve gathered. Would you care for some tea? It’s the one thing I can manage, along with toast. If my cook left me, I’d starve to death.”

  Ted Booker was deeply asleep. After making certain, we went down to the kitchen and Dr. Philips found the tea things, blew up the fire in the stove, and soon had the kettle on the boil. It was fairly decent tea, and I told him so.

  Afterward, we went to sit with Ted Booker for another half hour, then Dr. Philips stood up, stretched his shoulders. “I’ll leave you here, shall I? Until I can find someone to replace you. He won’t be any trouble for several hours. He’ll be dry as a desert and have a thundering headache when he wakes up.
” He took my hand. “Thank you for volunteering. I hope I haven’t upset any plans Mrs. Graham may have made for your entertainment. How long are you staying?”

  “Just the weekend.”

  He nodded. “Wretched beginning to your visit. But there you are.”

  And he was gone, his footsteps echoing on the stairs. I looked out the window and saw he had the shotgun under his arm, broken open.

  I went back to my chair and made myself as comfortable as I could, listening to Booker’s heavy breathing, thinking about his anguished obsession with his brother’s death.

  And in the silence, I also considered what Dr. Philips had told me about Peregrine.

  “A tragedy that we can’t cure minds…”

  Arthur’s words came back to me then.

  Tell Jonathan I lied. I did it for Mother’s sake. But it has to be set right.

  What had to be set right? Had Arthur objected to his brother going to the asylum instead of prison but said nothing? Was that it? But if he’d gone to prison, surely he’d have been hanged. No, not that young—

  I knew little about prisons, but enough to understand that an asylum might well be a better choice for a deranged man. Perhaps the authorities had tried to spare the family the nightmare of a trial and conviction by sending Peregrine to where he might—or might not—get the treatment he needed. At least there he was no longer a threat to anyone. He wouldn’t be the first nor the last to be put away in that fashion.

  I shivered, remembering the lights in every room. Was a madhouse better than hanging?

  Only Peregrine could answer that. If he understood at all what he’d done and what choices had been made for him.

  And then it occurred to me that I’d worried about trouble with a girl—and in a way, perhaps my instincts had been right. But in a far different sense than I could ever have guessed.

  Had the dead girl’s family been considered? Or had their wishes, their feelings, been swept away in the rush to protect Mrs. Graham and her children from scandal?

  Belatedly, faced with his own death, had Arthur suddenly come to realize that they hadn’t been consulted, that they had been wronged? He would have wanted Jonathan to recognize that revelation as well. At the same time, he wouldn’t have wished for this to distress his mother—and he must have felt that he couldn’t confide the family skeletons to me. Or to paper.

  If the girl had come from a poor family, what recourse had they had against the Grahams and their money or influence?

  I found myself feeling a new respect for Arthur.

  I’d been sitting in that same uncomfortable chair for another half hour, wrestling with my own thoughts, when the outer door opened and a voice called tentatively up the stairs, “Where are you?”

  I stepped to the door and answered quietly, “Who is it?”

  “I’m Sally Booker’s mother.”

  “We’re in here. The bedroom nearest the stairs.”

  She came up, heels clicking on the treads, a small, gray-haired woman with lines of worry on her face. “Is he all right?”

  She peered in the room, then sighed. “I don’t know what’s to become of him. He was the most wonderful young man. I was so happy when Sally married him. And now look at him.”

  “He can’t help it,” I said, in defense of Booker.

  “Yes, I know that. It doesn’t matter, does it? He’ll never be the same, and Sally is at her wit’s end. I feel so deeply for both of them.”

  “Are there any children?”

  “Yes, a boy. He’s away at his cousin’s, thank God.”

  She took a deep breath, then said, “I’m Marion Denton.”

  “I’m Elizabeth Crawford. I’m here to visit the Grahams. And Dr. Philips commandeered me to help.”

  “Yes, that’s what Dr. Philips told us when he looked in to let us know how Ted was faring. Thank you for your help. I don’t know how we would have managed. The doctor said it was easier with a woman here. That surprised me. Sally isn’t able to cope with Ted in these moods.”

  “She’s his wife,” I said simply. “That’s harder.”

  “True.”

  Ted coughed, and then moaned a little in his sleep.

  “He doesn’t rest at night, you know. That’s the roughest time for him.”

  “He lost his brother, I understand.”

  “They were twins. I’m told it’s harder with twins.”

  She came in to take the chair that Dr. Philips had occupied, and we sat in companionable silence for a time. Then she said, “How did you come to know the Grahams? Are you a relation?”

  “No, I was a nursing sister on Britannic, when Arthur was brought onboard. I was with him when he died.”

  “I was fond of Arthur. A very nice boy, who grew into a very nice young man. Timothy and Jonathan seemed to collect trouble the way a dog collects burrs. They’re closer in age, of course, and what one couldn’t think of, the other could. Their father died when they were very young. It isn’t surprising they ran a little wild. Mrs. Graham’s cousin did what he could to manage them, but they were headstrong. Of course they turned out well enough, I must say. I thought for a time that Sally might choose Johnnie or Tim. I didn’t know Peregrine well. The family always claimed he was a little slow. A little different. But I never saw it myself. Still, his tutor despaired of him, and he must know better than I.”

  She turned to stare at the man on the bed. “So was Ted a nice boy. I was that fond of him, and he was a good husband to Sally. Look at this house—he saw to it that she wanted for nothing. And now she can’t bear to come here, to him. She’s begged me to send him back to hospital, where they know what to do with his kind. Maybe it would be best after all if he used that shotgun. I don’t know what peace he’ll ever have.”

  I was shocked. “He can’t help but relive his brother’s death. He feels the burden of responsibility. It’s not something one gets over easily.”

  “But that’s the point, isn’t it? His brother is dead. It’s time to move on and live for his wife and son.”

  “It’s not that easy—” I repeated, trying to make her see that his memories were beyond Ted Booker’s control. But she had no experience of war or any other horrendous event that shocks the mind, and her callousness was in defense of her daughter. I might as well have been talking to the wall.

  She turned to me. “What’s not easy about remembering your family? The boy is afraid of him, and Sally’s told me that when she promised to love him in sickness and in health, there was nothing said about madness.”

  “It isn’t madness. Shell shock is an affliction of the brain.”

  “I call it madness, to sit in a dark room and talk to the dead and threaten to use that shotgun. I tried taking it away once, but he came raging over to my house and demanded it back. And I was afraid to say no.”

  “It takes time.”

  “No, it doesn’t. He needs to brace up, like a man, and say good-bye to his brother and remember he’s still alive, with a family looking to him for love.”

  I lost my patience. “You weren’t in the trenches with him, Mrs. Denton. You don’t know what it’s like when one mistake kills dozens of men right in front of your eyes, where a simple lapse in concentration means you’re hanging on the wire, dying, and no one can bring you back without dying beside you. You don’t smell the dead with every breath and know that some of what’s nasty under your boots were your friends before they were blown to bits.”

  She replied righteously, “Yes, that’s all very well, isn’t it? That’s in France, where such things happen. This is Kent, and he must learn the difference.”

  It was useless. Instead of trying to persuade her, I suggested that she have a long talk with Dr. Philips to see what could be done to help Ted Booker cope.

  “He doesn’t have any answers, except for the powders he gives Ted that make him like this—asleep and useless for hours at a time. How is he ever to earn a living and support a wife and child, I ask you!”

  “Perhaps
you and Sally ought to visit such a hospital yourselves, before deciding where your son-in-law belongs,” I suggested. I trained in one, and it was heart wrenching. But this woman could only see her daughter’s misery, and the anguish that drove Ted Booker into the past was as foreign to her as the monkey gods of India or the typhoons that killed thousands in the flat deltas below Calcutta.

  The outer door opened, and Dr. Philips’s footsteps rang on the stairs. He came in, looked at the two of us sitting there in a huffy silence, and then crossed to the bed to examine Ted.

  “Be careful he doesn’t choke,” he said. “He can’t fend for himself just now.”

  “Yes, I’ll be careful.”

  “Mrs. Graham is very upset with me. She wants you to come back to the house straightaway. ‘She’s a guest,’ she tells me. ‘And not here for your convenience.’”

  “Surely you’ve found someone to sit for a while. He’s harmless, poor man, as he is.”

  “Yes, I’ve found someone. But she’s nearly as frightened of Ted as his wife is. She needs the money, and so she’ll come.”

  “What’s to become of him?”

  “Back to hospital, I fear. Mrs. Denton here and her daughter have had enough. I can’t say that I blame them, but Booker is my patient, and I had hoped that in surroundings he knew from before the war, there was comfort.”

  “What set him off this morning?”

  It was Mrs. Denton who answered me. “It’s their birthday—his and his brother’s.”

  I felt a wave of sadness. Poor man.

  I went on, out of compassion, “I’ll sit with him a little longer, if you like.”

  But the doctor answered with a shake of his head. “Mrs. Graham will nail my medical degree to the church door, if I leave you here a moment longer. Can you find your way back? Or do you need a guide?”

  “No, I’ll be all right. Stay with your patient. Good-bye, Mrs. Denton. I hope that all will be well with your daughter’s marriage before very long.”

  She thanked me, and I went down the stairs and into the street. The wind was at my back as I walked, and I looked at the houses on either side of the Bookers’. Arthur had told me that this was once iron-making country, and so it had prospered. But the trees that fed the furnaces had gone long ago, and now it was pasturage for sheep and fields of corn and hops that kept the villages flourishing.