The Scream of Angels

by David Haynes

  “I need to go home, to bed,” he mumbled to Blair.

  “Yes, you look a little green around the gills. We’ll go into the garden for fresh air. Come on.” Blair led him out of the riotous cabaret just as the orchestra struck up Orpheus in the Underworld for the third time.

  At first, Bishop thought he was under the power of a potent narcotic when he saw the elephant in the garden. He pointed at it, unable to speak.

  “Yes, the elephant,” Blair laughed, “a relic from the Great Exhibition. Now come and sit.”

  “There are people going inside!”

  “Yes, there is a nightclub inside where they take opium.”

  “Then we must join them!” Bishop attempted to pull Blair toward the elephant.

  “You have experienced sufficient firsts for one night, friend. I fear the delusions a night at the pipe will bring may become nightmares given our earlier experience.”

  “Nightmares do not frighten me. I relish them.”

  Blair became serious, “Nevertheless, it is one step too far, even for me. Come sit over here and we shall talk.”

  In comparison to the interior, the garden was deserted. A scattering of couples gazed into each other’s eyes against the backdrop of an empty stage.

  Blair lit a cigar, “I too came here to write, Bishop. Did your father tell you that?”

  Bishop shook his head. His father had spoken fondly of Blair and their association but Bishop doubted whether his father knew the man at all. If he had he would not have placed such trust in his guidance.

  “Your father and I have been friends since we were children. Of course our lives have taken different paths but he is still my friend and forever shall be. I know people who can help you get started here, for as you have seen it is quite unlike the stiff formality that London requires. We are in golden age and you must use it to your advantage. What is it you write about?”

  “I write about death and I write about murder.” Bishop wobbled on the bench.

  “Then I know just the man!”

  *

  Her scream had been pitifully short, but necessity dictated it should be so, necessity and circumstance. He removed his coat and placed it carefully on the stand. Experience had taught him to be careful with his tools, and his prize. The procedure was not one shown in any book and it took more force than he had expected, at least initially. Now, though he was skilled enough for it to be no more a challenge than slicing an apple.

  He took the small jar from his pocket and placed it on the shelf beside the others. Some were starting to decompose badly. Even the preserving properties of the chemicals could not prevent it happening. Yet there was always the chance to replace them; there was always that. And when they were replaced, they would be exchanged for those of greater import. He passed along the line, taking each one in his hands, swirling the discoloured liquid inside. Fragments of cartilage bobbed about where they had become detached from the trachea, softened with time. Each one produced a different pitch, a different scream, and each one possessed a unique face but there was more to come. A choir was all very well but conversation was difficult when all they did was scream. Soon he would hear the others and converse with them as only a gentleman can.

  He collapsed in his chair and removed a cigar from the silver box. He twirled it between his bloody fingers giving the blood an opportunity to season the tobacco leaves. He took the spirit lamp and lit it, savouring the taste. They were not the fine cigars sold by James Fox of St James Street in London, but they were not at all bad.

  Now, where was he? Ah yes, a story. He picked up the book and stared at the bloodthirsty cover before reading the title aloud, “The Surgeon of Slaughter by Robert Bishop. Now then Mr Bishop let us see what variety of lunatic this surgeon is.”

  The sound of his mutilated choir screamed in the darkness. It was blissful.

  *

  A sweet, gentle melody drifted into Bishop’s dream. The words were in French but they sounded as though they should mean something beautiful. Then, on came the pain. Sharp and shocking at first, then constant and nauseating. He groaned and opened his eyes. How he had arrived in his bed was a blank, as was the manner of his undressing.

  His mouth was parched but the thought of climbing the stairs to fetch water from the well was too much.

  ‘I shall die here,’ he thought and tried to sit up. Where had he been and what had he done?

  A loud rap on the door made him jump. “Go away, Blair!” he shouted. “I am too ill to leave my room.”

  The knock came again, louder and more insistent. “I said go away!” He took a deep nauseating breath and stood. His trousers lay over the back of the chair at his desk, but for Blair, his semi-nakedness would not matter.

  “I am poisoned,” he opened the door but was not greeted by the cheerful face of his friend but by the tall figure of a well-dressed gentleman. “Yes? I mean who are you?” Bishop stuttered, embarrassed at his undignified appearance.

  The man removed his immaculate top hat, “You are Robert Bishop?” He spoke the words with such a heavy accent that Bishop barely recognised his name.

  “I am Robert Bishop, yes. May I ask your name and purpose, sir?”

  “Of course. I am Inspector Devaux of La Sûreté Nationale; the police. May I speak with you?”

  “Of course. Please,” Bishop stepped back to allow the Inspector entry. “I apologise for my appearance.” He quickly pulled his trousers on and buttoned his shirt.

  “Your associate, Monsieur Blair kindly left his card with an officer last night. He, in turn directed me here.”

  “You have spoken with him then?”

  Devaux nodded, “Yes, although his condition is far better than yours. May I?”

  “Yes of course,” Bishop pulled the chair away from the desk so Devaux could sit. His clothes were immaculate and his moustaches neatly clipped yet his face was lined with a lifetime of anxiety and too little sleep.

  “I would offer you coffee, Inspector, but as you can see I have not had the opportunity to fetch water.”

  Devaux shrugged, “It is not a problem. You have been in Paris long?”

  “No sir, but if you have indeed spoken to Blair you will know the answer to that question.”

  “He said a great many things but I would sooner hear them from you myself.” His reply was curt.

  “I was not trying to be rude, sir. I was merely trying to save you time.”

  “Please just answer my questions, Monsieur, and I will leave you to your day.”

  “Just a matter of days. That is all.”

  “And your business here?”

  “I am a writer. I have come to write.”

  Devaux smiled, “Ah yes. It seems the whole world comes to Paris to enjoy La Belle Époque. You are also a physician, yes?”

  “You are mistaken. Mr. Blair is often confused about such matters. I did not complete my studies and I am no doctor.

  “Monsieur Blair was not the source of my information. The assistant at the cabaret told me of your actions when you discovered the body.”

  Bishop had been unaware of anyone else watching him other than Blair. “I was too late to do anything.”

  “Yet you gave her comfort as she passed; at a time when her friends had deserted her. Many people cannot bear to look on a victim of a crime such as this. Let alone touching them or holding them.”

  “She had already passed when I found her,” Bishop paused, he had never considered the notion that she had been utterly alone when she died. “You mean to say nobody has identified her? No-one?”

  “This is correct. Now, what can you tell me about how this unfortunate event occurred?”

  “I’m not sure I can offer you a great deal of information. The chamber was in darkness and then there was a scream. We were at the rear of the room, Inspector. Whatever happened to that girl, took place beyond my own or Blair’s vision. By the time we found her everyone else had gone.”

  “And yet you were the only one to offe
r assistance.”

  “I suppose I was, yes,” Bishop was starting to feel a little uncomfortable. “The girl was dead long before I got to her and whoever did it knew what they were looking for. They didn’t just murder her, they took something from her; part of her body.”

  “Do you read the newspapers, Monsieur Bishop?” Devaux changed the subject calmly.

  Bishop shook his head and said nothing.

  “In London there is a man who commits atrocities such as this. It would appear he came to Paris with you.”

  The dead girl’s face flashed before his eyes. The beauty of her warm lifeless body in his arms. He spoke slowly, measuring his words carefully. “If you are here merely to test me, then I will answer no more of your questions. I was with Blair and we were at the rear of the room when she was murdered. He will vouch for me.”

  The Inspector rose to his feet like a weary horse. “Yes, Monsieur Blair; a drunk and a libertine. Fine company, to keep.”

  Bishop was becoming angry now, “Sir, who are you to question the quality of my company? Unless there is anything else, I would ask you to leave.”

  Devaux replaced his hat slowly and with care. Perhaps his demeanour and appearance were as much to do with deliberation as they were to do with weariness.

  “Thank you for your help, Monsieur Bishop. Should I need to speak with you again, I know where to find you. Good day.”

  Bishop slammed the door behind him. In was inconceivable that he should fall under suspicion, utterly ridiculous. And yet, was it really so preposterous a notion? He had imagined the act and written about it with elegance and excitement on numerous occasions. “Outrageous!” he shouted into the empty room.

  At least the exchange had shaken him from the morbid lethargy in which he had awoken. It had raised the spectre of the previous night in more detail than he might otherwise have recalled after consuming so much liquor. He sat at his desk and started to write.

  *

  Bishop could not remember a time when the dark thoughts were not present in his conscious or unconscious mind. As a child, the terrible, disturbing nightmares resulted in violent outbursts which he felt unable to control in his semi-conscious state. Night after night he would wake in the darkness, screaming, flailing and weeping at the terrors which threatened to overcome his delicate mind. It provoked a response from his father which was as frightening as the dreams themselves.

  “I cannot see you suffer this way son,” his father had said. “I do not understand your anguish for I have no knowledge of medicine. I am ill equipped to help your mind. We will find the very best care for you and you will be well again. Your mother and I will pray for you.”

  With that last comment from his father, he was taken to a place he now knew was a madhouse. It was not the gloomy coffin of a lunatic asylum but something far more discreet. There, within the walls of the private hospital, he was treated. Was it treatment or was it torture? He knew not, but the demons would not be quietened. Not even under the sadistic touch of Dr. Cunningham’s instruments would they be silent.

  And yet, Cunningham had listened and his instruments were not manufactured in some distant factory. His instrument was his voice. He had heard every single moment of every single bloodthirsty nightmare in all its gory disgrace. There had been questions then, probing questions about the dreams, forcing him to re-live them for the third time. By then, with the repetition they became nothing more than diabolical whispers from the inferno.

  Cunningham no doubt helped. He did not cure, for there was no cure, but he encouraged Bishop to understand, and to live with these thoughts. His almost lascivious enjoyment of the content was initially bemusing but later became a customary and expected response. Indeed, such was his delight that Bishop found himself embellishing the nature of his thoughts somewhat. This granted him additional freedom of thought, which other patients did not enjoy, for their medication subdued them entirely. What Cunningham chose to do with these thoughts, was a matter solely for him.

  “What did you see in your dreams last night?” Cunningham would ask.

  “Murder and mutilation, and wild men with blood in their hands.”

  “And of what matters do you think this morning?”

  “It is the same thing.”

  “Who is performing these murders, Robert?”

  “My father, sir. My father and I.”

  “And tell me the manner in which you would like to murder me?”

  And on it went, every morning. And then every night, as if to add spice to Bishop’s dreams, Cunningham would come to his room and sit at the foot of his bed. They would speak of mutilation and death as if they were discussing the weather, such was it the norm.

  Cunningham’s future was ultimately doomed when, during a meeting with Bishop’s father, he offered an opinion on the cause of his illness. Conjecturing that poor mental health was often a genetic misfortune was indeed unfortunate when speaking to a man such as Walter Bishop. Cunningham and Heath House were ruined inside a year.

  What eventually became of Cunningham was not known. Although in all likelihood a man such as he would have found employment in the asylums at Bethlem or St. Luke’s. There, his instrument would not have been the urging timbre of his voice but the cold steel of an ice pick and a procedure known as lobotomy.

  Cunningham’s healing methods had been unconventional, avant-garde and inadequate but they had given Bishop a skill; an ability to tell stories in all their hideous detail. The stories were gruesome, horrifying and intense but this was what society yearned for and he was more than capable of providing them what they desired.

  Upon his discharge, for that was what his father called it, Robert was declared well again. The violent outbursts and blasphemous chorus of wails ceased. The cause of them continued but Cunningham had done his job, just not as Walter Bishop had envisaged.

  *

  Yet again, the day passed in the blissful execution of what Bishop considered perfect prose. He stopped writing only twice, once to fetch his bread and cheese from the old lady on Rue St. Andre-des-Arts and once to relieve himself. During both occasions the words were written silently in his mind.

  The tap tap, tapping of a cane on the cobbles in the courtyard beneath meant only one thing.

  “Oh Bishop!” Blair’s voice called up.

  Bishop did not want a repeat of the song and dance routine from the previous evening so he opened his little window and leaned out.

  “Come up and spare us all the singing won’t you!” He closed the window.

  Blair seemingly bore no ill effects from the previous evening’s adventures and he strode into the room excitedly, “Did the Inspector call on you this morning?”

  Bishop was less excited, “Yes it was a most disagreeable experience. He seemed to be insinuating that I was involved somehow; that we both were,” he paused remembering the inspector’s comments about Blair, “and he did not speak particularly well of you, either.”

  Blair slapped his thigh and laughed, “Ah yes, Inspector Devaux and I have met before, although in less relaxed circumstances, I might add.”

  “I do not wish to know about that, Blair. Now, I hope you have not come here to drag me round Montmartre again for as you can see my body will not tolerate it.”

  “Yes you do look a little washed out, but do not fear, I have no intention of dragging you around anywhere. I would like to take you to meet someone who will bring you fame and fortune; where your talents can be truly appreciated.”

  “This is the gentleman you spoke of last night? Where is he?”

  “Dress and shave first and then we shall go. You cannot attend such a meeting looking like this.”

  Victor Cresswell

  The omnibus was Blair’s preferred method of travel and he insisted on using it again to reach Pigalle. The bus rocked and rolled all the way into the city and when it paused to take on the extra horse, they disembarked.

  “Where are we meeting him?” Bishop asked.

  “In th
e theatre of course. First we must watch the show,” he paused, “again. Bishop. We are returning to Le Grand Guignol. My contact is the owner and he is always looking for new talent. As you saw, the material is repulsive yet compulsive and your talent makes you a perfect match. Such is his dedication to his craft that he lives in a small apartment above the theatre. The only time he leaves is to drink champagne in a café.”

  Bishop’s stomach fluttered at the thought of watching the grisly amputation again. Vomiting on three subsequent nights would simply not do.

  The streets were once again filled with the raucous din of La Belle Epoque. He was relieved Blair did not attempt to drag him into one of the many cafés they passed. Although, he did try to persuade him to have his portrait sketched by an impoverished looking artist sitting quietly on the street. Bishop doubted he would ever grow used to it; the noise, the laughter and the vivid colours of the ladies’ hats and silk gowns were theatrical in the extreme.