The bushes at my left rustled. I saw a flash of white. But whether it was moonlight or the white of the woman’s dress, I could not tell. The child continued to cry, from far ahead on the path. My blood froze when I heard a giggle from behind some tombs nearby in the darkness.
I heard the mendacious undertone of the giggle, and I sensed that I was being watched—by more than one person.
Max! My heart pounded as I looked around. I half-expected to see some shadow creeping down a tall monument. Of course—he had lured me here to kill me. I could fight him, but I had no weapon, no knife.
Get the child and leave, I told myself.
As I continued quickly down the path, not familiar with this portion of the cemetery, a tree branch scraped my face. It was painful; my cheek burned.
The child’s cries seemed closer, and I breathed a sigh of relief when I came around a sharp twist to the path.
A moonbeam illuminated Christabel, seated alone on a stone bench near a grave. She was still crying, barefoot and confused.
There was no sign of the woman anywhere.
“Chrissy,” I said, trying to sound calm and unworried as I lifted her into my arms. “Come with me.”
I almost screamed when the bushes beside me rustled.
“Abbie,” I heard whispered from the darkness behind me. The voice was soft, breathy. And if I had not heard my name spoken, I might have thought it was a rush of wind through the leaves. The hair on my neck rose.
Christabel continued crying as I put her face into my neck and began running back toward the entrance of the graveyard.
I stopped, frozen, when I saw a figure blocking the path ahead. It was not Max, but a woman. She was not the dark-haired woman I had seen earlier—this one was older, around forty years of age. She wore a heavy wool black dress. Her blond hair was pulled back into a knot at the back of her head. She looked dignified, attractive, as if she might have been one of Grandmother’s guests at a cribbage game.
But I did not continue forward. I stayed where I was.
The woman walked toward me, sharp leaf shadows cutting across her white face … her mouth smeared with blood.
The giggle from behind me rang out.
They were closing in on me.
I ran down a path to my right, praying that it would take me to the entrance.
It did. I saw the open gates ahead.
A man stood in front of the gates. When he saw me, he began walking toward me. He was tall, older. He wore some kind of uniform, probably a constable’s.
“Help!” I yelled, running toward him. He turned to me. It was then that I saw a thick drop of blood slide down his chin.
I sprinted, panicked now, down yet another path, my heart pounded vigorously. I had no idea what I was going to do. Christabel screamed in my arms. The tombs and monuments offered many hiding places, but they were useless to me if the child continued to cry.
I heard crashing through the branches behind me.
I had to face my pursuers. I had to fight them, even though I knew now that I had at least three pursuers. Yet I had no idea how to defend myself with the child in my arms. So I continued running, deeper into the cemetery. We would be trapped soon.
I felt my elbow grasped in a painful tight grip.
Nearly dropping Christabel, I swung around to kick the person away.
“No!” I yelled loudly.
I felt both relief and shock when I saw it was William. I had found him unexpectedly once before, last year; I knew that he often walked around London, even late at night after work, when he was agitated. The Highgate area was one of his favored routes.
“What the bloody hell are you doing here?” he said, panting, looking quickly at myself and then at Christabel.
“Did you see them?” I asked rapidly. I heard no noise now. Saw no one.
“Who?” William said, staring at me as if I was crazy. “And why do you have one of the hospital’s children with you?”
“We have to get out of here!” I said, ignoring him and running in the direction of the entrance.
I saw and heard nothing unusual as we left the cemetery. There was no sign of the man or the two women. When we stepped out onto the street, William shut the gates behind us.
My heart still raced. I clutched Christabel closer.
“What is happening here?” he demanded
“Never mind! We need to get away from here. Fast. Now.” I kept imagining a white bloody hand reaching out, through the cemetery bushes, from behind the tombs.
William and I walked several blocks in irritated silence. When I finally faced him, as I fumbled to take off my own coat and wrap it around the child—she was shivering violently in the wet night air—William spoke, incredulous and furious.
“You never answered my question. How did she get here?” He pointed angrily at Christabel. She still heaved with sobs and clutched me as she sucked her thumb.
I told him what happened. I fought to control my breathing—I felt such panic, it came out in sharp clips. “It was Mariah, I am almost certain. I saw blood on the other woman’s mouth and on the man’s mouth. They”—a chill ran through me—“were not like living people.”
William still looked incredulous.
“I don’t know what you saw, Abbie. But what you are describing to me—insane murderers, vampires, walking dead, whatever—seems impossible. However, someone might have tried to kidnap the child. This is serious. I will return her, talk to Josephine, try to determine what precisely occurred. I’ll alert Scotland Yard if necessary. But the rest of your story, Abbie, is simply not possible.”
I stared at him, unbelieving. William seemed cold, detached. He was looking at me as if I were a madwoman. And how could he say this after having seen the horror, the seeming impossibility, of that murderous group of immortals known as the Conclave?
Still, I kept my voice calm. “I’m not sure if you heard me, William. I am not a hysteric; neither do I suffer from an overactive imagination. You should know me better than that. I do not comprehend all that I saw, but I saw it, nonetheless. It was quite bizarre.”
William’s dark eyes flashed indecisively for one instant, but out of surprise, concern, or confusion I could not tell. Then his gaze narrowed. “Abbie, this is not rational thinking.”
“What are you saying?” I hissed. “After all that we have been through! I didn’t see Max, but apart from what happened in there, I know that he is likely still around. Somewhere. It is not as if we have nothing to fear.”
My mind scrambled. I was trying to make sense of what did not make sense. My nightmare of Mariah … what I had seen tonight … the vision of the lamia. None of it appeared to be connected to Max or the Conclave. And yet … somehow it felt centered around me. I seemed to have been lured here, tonight.
Then another thought arose. Perhaps I truly was mad? After all, William had not seen my pursuers. Yet someone had brought Christabel here; she was in my arms. Although why had they seemed to disappear once William showed up? My head pounded.
Christabel had now fallen asleep on my shoulder. I held her against my chest, draping my coat around her.
William said nothing. His look now was sharp, reproachful. I had never before felt such a distance between us.
“Are you saying that you do not believe me?” I asked.
He paused. “Yes, in fact, I am. I do not believe that you are intentionally embellishing or lying. I do believe that you saw whoever took the child enter the graveyard; you became confused in the darkness. Your mind played tricks. It happens, Abbie. There was no one in there. I’ve had a difficult day at the hospital, and … ” He ran his fingers through his hair, then looked away, agitated. “I was out walking. It was when I passed the West cemetery entrance that I heard you cry out. I saw no walking dead, no blood-smeared faces.”
I felt incensed, confused.
“Max has probably gone abroad,” William added. “You know how he is. He has probably forgotten about us by now … ”
Astonished, I sincerely hoped that he was merely trying to annoy me, that he was being cruel because of our falling out. Max was brutal, relentless, and William’s seeming oblivion to this went beyond foolishness. I feared for William. My mind raced. Our history with the Conclave, my lamia vision, what I had just seen in the graveyard—something must connect all of this. I felt as if I was missing something directly in front of me.
William took Christabel from me. “Let me escort you home, and then I’ll take the child back to the hospital and deal with this matter.”
“I can find another carriage myself.”
“It is late.”
“Do not follow me.”
I turned around quickly so that he could not see the hot tears stinging my eyes.
Nine
Rain poured in great sheets outside my window the next morning. I stood, already dressed, and prepared to start my work at New Hospital. Although it was springtime, I felt a blanket of terror descending upon me. It felt thick and unrelenting. Reason could not persuade me that I had not fallen into a web, into some terrible game.
I jumped as a sharp hand squeezed my shoulder.
“I am sorry, Miss Arabella. I did not mean to scare you.” Ellen’s voice came out raspy, dramatic, her bulbous eyes rapidly searched my own. I had seen that look on Ellen’s face many times. She was greedily searching for a listener for her gossip.
I needed an umbrella. I focused on locating my umbrella in my closet so that I could leave. I was in no mood to listen to Ellen’s chatter.
“You have not heard yet, Miss?” she exclaimed in a sharp whisper as I pulled the umbrella out from behind a pair of boots.
“I have not yet been out of my room, Ellen.”
“Do not tell Lady Westfield that I’m talking to you about this. She has forbidden me from speaking of it—awful nonsense, she called it. But I thought you should know, since you’re goin’ out and all.”
“What is it, Ellen?” I sighed wearily.
“The word on the street is all about them two murders in Highgate Cemetery last night.”
“What?”
“Shhh! Remember, the missus threatened to sack me if I talk’d about it anymore in ’er house.”
“Tell me what happened,” I demanded in a whispered hiss.
“They were murdered. Eat’n! Their throats ripped out. Their insides chewed all up. Devoured.”
Now that Ellen had my full attention, she relished in the drama of her story.
“It was grave-robbers, resurrectionists, what were murdered, low sorts from what I’ve heard. Two men—they were found this mornin’, and the ’hol Highgate neighborhood is risen up, scar’d and angry.”
I felt nearly overwhelmed now, remembering the blood-smeared beings from the night before. Nonetheless, I tried to remain composed.
“It sounds, rather, as if a lion escaped from the zoological gardens.”
“No, it’s cannibals in London! And I, for one, am feared for my life.” Her eyes widened even further.
“Grandmother is correct, Ellen. You should not speak of such nonsense.”
Silencing Ellen as she began to protest, I told her to tell Grandmother that I would now be working at New Hospital instead of Whitechapel Hospital. I certainly did not feel like discussing anything with Grandmother. As I descended the stairs toward the front door, I heard the clatter of Grandmother’s knife and fork striking against her china plate. But I left without speaking a word to her. I resolved to send a note to Simon later today, letting him know about my decision.
Before going to New Hospital, I decided to ride through Swains Lane. After last night, and the news from Ellen, I was determined to visit Mariah’s grave site to see if it was undisturbed.
That was, if I could get past the curious crowds. It was no later than six o’clock in the morning, and in spite of the rain, a small but crushing group of journalists and others stood outside Highgate Cemetery. Constables were working hard to barricade the entrance.
There would be no possibility of penetrating through the pressing crowd, but I watched as a small group of medics arrived, stretchers and medical bags of supplies in hand. The bodies must not have been removed yet. I wondered if Dr. George Bagster Phillips, the mortuary surgeon, would be performing the autopsies on the bodies as he had done for the Ripper case.
Quickly throwing aside my umbrella and pulling my cloak’s hood up with purpose, I attached myself to the six medical workers who had just exited their carriages and were confronting the small crowd. I quickly told one of the nearby constables blocking the gate that I was from the mortuary; he looked at my black dress and pinafore, typical nurse’s attire, and nodded. I was, after all, a hospital worker, and under the circumstances, no one questioned me further.
The inside of the cemetery seemed almost as crowded as the outside. Constables seemed to be everywhere as I moved forward with the tiny cluster of medical workers.
We were ushered toward the tombs in the Egyptian Avenue section. They stood out from the foliage around them, giant, chalky. A small path split off from the main one; it was the path leading to Mariah’s grave. But at the point when I might have easily slipped unnoticed in that direction, I decided to press on with the main group, toward the spot where the bodies lay. I could not shun this opportunity to see firsthand what had happened the night before.
The first sign of violence in the scene was a bloodied handprint, rust-brown in the rain. The print stood midway up a looming, tall grave shaped like an angel. The granite being held a sword in one hand; the angel’s other arm was outstretched, the palm upward in an inviting gesture of protection and peace. It was as if the fleeing body-thief, in desperation or perhaps in panicked repentance for disturbing the dead, had appealed to the useless stone being.
Almost immediately after passing the blood-stained tombstone, I came upon the murder scene. A photographer was taking the crime photos—blinding all around him with great white flashes. Some of the medical workers stood by with the stretchers; others, and a few constables, held umbrellas over the bodies. Every single one of us covered our noses with handkerchiefs. The slaughterhouse odor, even in the rain, was overwhelming. Even with the cloth over my nose, I felt my stomach convulse a couple of times.
Dr. Phillips crouched over the two corpses to begin his initial medical examination. I listened, averting my eyes from the bodies—ragged wounds at their throats, open caverns in their stomachs.
“Two males—one early twenties, other late forties. Possible relatives,” I heard a familiar voice saying to the crouching Phillips.
Abberline! I pulled my hood further around my face. I did not want the Inspector to see me. He would know that I did not belong with these forensic workers. And I did not wish to speak to him, particularly given my experiences with him in the past.
But for the moment, at least, Abberline knelt near Phillips, all his attention consumed in the scene before him. His voice came out loud and gravely. “One source has already identified them as a father and son, Felix and Thaddeus Cruncher—though I would like to verify this further. We will make efforts to locate families later today. A cemetery worker discovered the pair at four thirty this morning.”
“The stage of rigor mortis shows me that they have been lying here all night,” Phillips said in dry assertion. “Death occurred sometime between eight o’clock and ten at night.”
I stepped a few feet away, worried that Abberline might decide to look up and see me. Furthermore, I needed the distance, as the smell suddenly seemed more pungent. The tiny flies swarmed even amid the rain, and their buzzing roared unrelenting in my ears.
I heard Abberline point out the “bite marks” on the throats and chests.
There was a long silence and
I heard Phillips give a tremendous sniff. Without seeing his expression, I could not decide if the sound came from boredom or deep reflection.
“Have you located the kidneys, livers, and hearts of the victims, Abberline?” Phillips asked suddenly.
“No, we have not.”
“When I perform the autopsies, I’ll determine whether more organs are missing. All of these wounds appear to have been made by human teeth, nails, and hands. I see no evidence of any knife cuts.”
“So the attacker was human?” Abberline asked.
“Most certainly,” Phillips said. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him, with a small pair of tweezers, place something in a small jar held by an assistant. Using a small cloth strip, he began swabbing at one of the wounds on the younger victim.
“Abberline,” Phillips said, peering closer into the wound, “at least two attackers were involved here. Do a thorough check of the nearby asylums for missing persons. I doubt that your men will locate the organs.”
A throat cleared. “Why is that?” Abberline asked.
“Because I am surmising that the organs have been consumed,” Phillips said, standing and wiping his hands upon a nearby rag. From the tone of his voice, he might as well have been answering a question about the type of tea brand he preferred.
“Guess we won’t have to worry about watchin’ out for them resurrection men around here no more,” one constable near me whispered to another.
Consumed. I felt the strangest mixtures of emotion. Horror, at the thought that I had been in the cemetery possibly mere minutes after these murders occurred, overwhelmed me. That I had been pursued by the murderers, that they had somehow managed to take one of our children from the orphanage. It was an impossible but apparently real atrocity. What was this? Who were those bloodstained people who pursued me last night? Oddly, also I felt a bit of stark, dark amusement at how quickly Ellen had attained accurate information about the murders.
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