The Resurrectionists

by Kim Wilkins

  “Okay. No problem,” she said. And calculated in her head that there were only ninety-seven hours to go.

  The bulb blew in the back room on Monday evening, just as Maisie was making some headway with a box of promising-looking papers. She had developed an understandable prejudice against candlelight by this time, so had left things as they were and found a game show to watch instead, intending to return to the task the next day.

  Busy daydreaming about Sacha and looking through Sybill’s photo albums for more pictures of him (unsuccessfully), she forgot about the back room until Tuesday afternoon. Given that sunset was by then only a few hours away, she reluctantly dressed herself in heavy clothes and walked down to the village to buy a light bulb.

  It was a particularly calm afternoon for a change.

  Usually, Solgreve was being battered by rimy gusts as early as two p.m. Today felt different; still, the air almost fragile, as though it would break if: she spoke too loudly. She walked the mossy cobbles until she came to the grocery store, bought her light bulb, wove through a narrow alley and back out to the main road. Not the faintest sliver of pale blue lightened the sky above her. The cemetery on her right seemed to stretch into infinity. She glanced at the church office, and wondered if Reverend Fowler was in there, doing his church business. She had sensed something that was almost friendliness from him on Christmas Day, albeit a strange, tight-lipped friendliness. Ninety-eight. He was way too old to have the energy to be nasty.

  Her forehead tingled with cold, almost as though crystals were forming on her skin. At the same time she noticed a tiny patch of pale white on her glove. She brought it close to her face to inspect it. Another fell onto the black goatskin. She caught her breath.

  Snow! Snow!

  “Oh, my god!” she breathed, excitement welling up high into her throat. She checked the arms of her overcoat. Tiny snowflakes were dropping onto her. She looked up at the sky, could see nothing. Down at the ground. Here and there, flakes were falling. She spun around, looking all around her. The flakes were growing bigger now. She caught a few in her gloves, examined them, tried to figure out their patterns.

  She walked slowly, eyes wide like a child, watching the flakes settling on the road, nestling in the grass. By the time she arrived home, her front garden had a speckled layer of white across it, snowflakes were caught in the hedgerows. She almost couldn’t bear to go inside, but it was simply freezing outside.

  “Tabby, it’s snowing!” she cried, wishing she had someone to tell. Cathy was out of reach, Adrian would be fast asleep, and Sacha wouldn’t be impressed. He’d probably seen it a hundred times before.

  Night was approaching and she had to change the bulb in the back room before dark. She dragged a chair from the kitchen down to the room, and placed it under the light fitting, careful not to rest any of its legs on the loose board. She climbed up on it and changed the bulb without any problems, but before she climbed down from the chair she noticed the ceiling hatch. Presumably used to access electrical wires or heating ducts or some other thing she didn’t understand, but directly parallel to the loose floorboard.

  Look up.

  Maybe Sybill’s note on the bottom of Georgette’s diary hadn’t been a reminder to look up something in the history books. Maybe it had been a simple instruction. Look up.

  Carefully, she moved the chair across a short distance, climbed back on and with eager hands reached for the hatch. It pushed up quite easily. She wished she had a torch so she could see the old beams in there. Or even see if there were spiders or other creepy crawlies because she had to reach a hand in and feel around before her fingers brushed a smooth cylindrical shape. Her hand closed around it and she carefully brought it out of the ceiling. A dim glass canister, which quite clearly had inside it some rolled up sheets of paper.

  “Excellent.”

  She left the ceiling hatch pushed slightly off-centre, climbed down again, checked the light, and took the chair back to the kitchen where she prised the lid off the canister and pulled the papers out. She recognised the handwriting immediately: definitely Georgette.

  She moved to the lounge room and lit the fire. Outside the single streetlight had just flickered into life on the main street, and she could see the snowflakes, falling heavily now, lit up as they dove past. In late afternoon shadows, her front garden was now under a blanket of white. So strange to see it falling so heavily yet hear no sound. She still had a bottle of wine left over from Christmas, so she poured herself a glass and made herself comfortable. The photo of Sybill and Sacha was still face down on the table, and she used it as a coaster so she wouldn’t be tempted to pick it up again.

  She sipped her wine and tried to roll back the curled page edges. Smoothed them out in her lap, cosy in her firelit lounge.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Monday, 21 October 1793

  Charlotte lies next to me, bleeding, yet still I find it hard to feel sympathy for her. I know she will not die; in fact she sleeps now, and looks as peaceful as any Babe. It is late evening. Virgil and Edward are gone to work, though I wish both were here. The wind is especially gusty tonight, and despite the fire and my warm gown, I am cold right at my core. I sometimes think the wind here will drive me mad.

  But I started to write of Charlotte.

  She came to me last week and swore me into her confidence. “What I am about to tell you, you must not tell Virgil and especially not Edward. It is for women only to know. Do you promise?”

  Foolishly, because I was curious to know her secret, I promised.

  She nodded, satisfied. “I must procure a miscarriage,” she said.

  I was so shocked I could say nothing.

  “Don’t look at me with your big, innocent eyes as though you’ve never heard of such a thing. Women have done it for centuries, Georgette.”

  “But Edward…” I managed to say, finally. “Is the child Edward’s?”

  “Of course it is Edward’s. Do you think me a whore?”

  “But should he not know?”

  “He doesn’t have to bear the brat. The decision rests solely with me.”

  Realising that it was pointless to disagree with her, I asked, “How do you need my help?”

  “I will be sick. Rue and angelica make me nauseous.”

  “You have done this before then?”

  “Once, some time ago.”

  I know it is wicked to judge others, Diary, so I will just say that Charlotte is so very different from me, and I simply cannot understand her.

  In any case, her home remedy did not work, though it made her very sick. Despite many long walks and, judging from the noise issuing from their bedroom most nights, much vigorous lovemaking, the tiny babe clung to her womb assiduously. I tried not to be smug, but I suspect that I was, with my smiles and my false concern.

  However, Charlotte was determined. This afternoon, while Edward and Virgil were across at the village pump fetching water, she begged me once again for my help. “I have to do something most unpleasant, and I wonder if you’d mind being there for me. I have no-one else.”

  I agreed, but not because her supplications had moved me. No, I’m ashamed to admit that I enjoy watching Charlotte ruin herself. It helps me to feel fortitude in my own convictions. And makes me feel rather more superior.

  Under the pretence of taking an afternoon walk, Charlotte and I left the house. We walked down St Mary’s Lane and past the cemetery towards the church. When Charlotte led me down a side-lane to the old abbey I stopped.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “We have already arrived,” she replied, untying her bonnet.

  “But we are nowhere.”

  “Are we?” She removed her bonnet and gloves and handed them to me. “Hold these for me. I will be perhaps a half-hour. I may need you to help me home, so please stay and wait for me.”

  I nodded mutely, and she headed towards the abbey. I had not the slightest idea what she intended, as the abbey is really only two crumbling wa
lls on a corner, an old spire, and a jutting foundation here and there. She went to the old spire and kneeled as though praying. The next thing, she had disappeared into the ground!

  I gasped, hurried over. On closer inspection, an iron door was visible in the earth, and this was the Gateway through which Charlotte had passed. I found shelter from the wind behind the closest wall of the abbey, and there I sat to wait, wondering what on earth was down there that could help Charlotte solve her problem.

  Nearly two hours passed before Charlotte returned. I had spent the time partly in curious speculation and partly in growing anger. How dare she leave me here not knowing where she had gone or what she was doing? I had even weighed up the idea of going to Edward and telling him what was happening, and then letting him sort out the problem. But I did not. I waited, and when the door shot open and Charlotte appeared, I was glad that I no longer had to make the decision.

  I walked over to her, more to see what was beyond the door than to help her. But I could see nothing except blackness, and Charlotte, pale and shaking, leaned on me heavily.

  “Georgette, please take me home,” she gasped.

  “Are you all right?” I asked, handing her bonnet and gloves to her.

  “No, of course I’m not.” She pressed a hand low into her stomach.

  “What has happened?”

  “Just take me home. I’ll explain it all then.”

  With Charlotte leaning on me, I made my way along the lane and up to the main road. We moved slowly, for Charlotte was quite clearly in pain. When we were about one hundred feet from home, Charlotte suddenly stumbled and fell. As her skirts spread out around her, I noticed spatters of blood on her petticoats.

  “Charlotte, you’re bleeding.”

  “Yes, I know.” She pulled her skirts up to her thighs. The skin was smeared with blood. “But I will be fine. I merely need to rest.”

  I looked around to make sure that no carriages or other villagers were nearby to see her, and quickly smoothed her skirts down. “The miscarriage was successful then?” I asked. I’m ashamed to admit that I did so in an imperious tone, and that this made Charlotte cry.

  “Please…” she sobbed.

  “Here, let me help you up.” I put a hand under each of her arms and pulled her to her feet, then helped her to the cottage. Edward, sitting with Virgil at our dining table, shot out of his seat the moment he saw her.

  “Charlotte, what is wrong?”

  “Do not worry yourself, Edward,” I replied evenly, never slowing my pace for a moment. “Charlotte has had a little fall and hurt her knee. I shall take care of her.”

  But Edward followed us into the back bedroom – the tiny room where they slept together, even though unmarried – and Charlotte had to demand that he leave.

  “Really, Edward, I’m fine,” she managed to say as I helped her onto the bed. “I’ve hurt my knee and grazed my shin, but I should be happy if only Georgette took care of it.”

  “Are you bleeding?” he asked. “Would you like me to call a surgeon?”

  Charlotte grimaced, and waved Edward away. “I will require no surgeon. Leave me be.”

  Edward nodded once and then left, and I closed the door behind him. If only he knew what Charlotte had been up to, he probably would not have been so full of loving concern.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to tell Edward what has happened?” I whispered. “He is training as an apothecary after all.”

  “No. Edward shall never know. And nor shall Virgil, so don’t be thinking to tell him either.”

  “Of course not. I gave you my word.”

  “Here, then. Help me off with these clothes.”

  I helped to undress her, to clean off the sticky blood and wrap her lower parts in some old towels. When she was clothed in a warm nightdress and safely beneath the covers, I could not constrain myself any longer.

  “Charlotte, what is beneath the door at the abbey?”

  She sighed and leaned back against her pillow, her red curls loose around her. “Once again, you must not tell anybody what I tell you.”

  “I promise.”

  “There is a doctor living in the foundations of the abbey.”

  And then the conversation between Virgil and Edward which I had overhead a fortnight ago came back to me: a fitting lair for a monster.

  “Doctor Flood?” I said, breathless.

  Charlotte looked at me sharply. “Yes. How do you know? Has Virgil told you about him?”

  “No. I overheard a conversation between Edward and him. Do you know what work they do for Doctor Flood?”

  Charlotte shook her head. “No. I think they help him with his experiments.”

  “He lives underground? Is it cold? Dark?” I was, and remain, completely horrified. I cannot forget how Edward proclaimed him a monster, how Virgil had spoken with the tremor of fear in his voice.

  “He has a light as anybody has, but no fire. It is terribly cold in his rooms.”

  “How do you know of him?”

  “I knew of him before Edward and Virgil. When first we came here, the three of us, eighteen months ago, I had reason to procure a first miscarriage. I asked a local woman if she knew who could help me, and she directed me to Flood. On that occasion I had only to swallow some herbs to make the child move.” She put a hand over her stomach again. “But this time he had to use other methods.”

  “What did he do?”

  “Could you bring me a glass of brandy? I wish that I could sleep.”

  “Will you tell me what he did?”

  “Of course. But bring me some brandy.”

  I did as she asked, reassuring Edward that she was feeling much better, and it was just the shock of falling which had made her so pale. I returned with a glass of brandy. She drank it greedily then lay back, eyes closed.

  “Charlotte? You promised to tell.”

  Her eyes snapped open. “Yes, yes. You are very eager to hear this, Mrs Marley. Does the idea excite you?”

  “No. I…” This was so typical of the appalling things she said that I was hardly shocked. “My interest is in the doctor himself, not the details.”

  “Very well. Listen, and be glad that womb of yours hasn’t quickened yet.”

  “I should be glad to have Virgil’s baby,” I protested. “I should never procure a miscarriage if –”

  “Shush. Now listen. Once you climb down the stairs that lead from the abbey, you have to walk a hundred feet in the dark, feeling your way along the walls until you can see the glow of light under the door to his chamber. You knock and he comes to let you in. He is a tall man, old, but I’m not certain how old, with pallid skin and grey eyes and a little grey hair. He wears a long red coat, buttoned down the front with gold buttons. Another door beside leads to a secret chamber which I have never seen. He lives and works in the first room. He has pots and potions, gadgets and specimens on every surface. The room smells strange: earth and ointment mixed.”

  “Is he a sinister man?” I asked. “Is he a monster?”

  Charlotte laughed. “No. He’s just an old man who knows things. If I were afraid of him I certainly shouldn’t have gone to him for help, should I?”

  “What did he do?”

  “He cleared a bench of experiments and helped me onto it. To examine me.”

  “You mean…” I could hardly bear to think of some other man approaching those most delicate, most intimate parts of my body.

  “Of course, down there. How else was he to remove the baby? And because the oral solution of herbs had not worked, he inserted a paste on a long piece of smooth metal. Almost immediately it began to burn, deep inside. He ordered me off the bench, and told me to walk around the room vigorously. I did so, and he went back to his experiments, almost as though I wasn’t there. He has snakes and spiders in jars – huge spiders, from tropical places – and in one corner an actual crocodile, preserved, which he brought back from China.”

  “How appalling.”

  “They’re all dead, G
eorgette, they can’t hurt you. After about an hour of pacing, the baby started to move. He helped me to push it out – it was just a tiny blob of blood really – and that’s when I came back upstairs.”

  “Did it hurt?”

  “Yes. The paste burned me inside I think. But I’m sure I’ll recover. I can feel the bleeding slowing down.”

  “Perhaps you should sleep now,” I said.

  And she did, while I sat next to her in Contemplation. Outside, night was approaching. I watched the last weak thread of afternoon sun shiver and fade into dark, lit a rushlight, and Charlotte has not woken since. I saw Virgil and Edward off an hour or so ago, then came back here to write.

  I am frightened by the idea of this Dr Flood. I wish that Virgil didn’t work for him. I know he is a poet and I would not take that away from him, but sometimes I wish he would learn a trade so that our existence was not so precarious. He has never again mentioned a maid-of-all-work, and I suspect we simply cannot afford it. My hands are becoming rough and raw from the chores I must do. And I simply hate having Charlotte here. I dislike her so very much, and her behaviour today merely confirms my opinion of her. I have found myself on more than one occasion today wondering how much better things would be here if she bled to death. But she won’t die. People like Charlotte never do die of misadventure; rather they go on to live long and interesting lives, absolve themselves of their sins on their deathbeds and probably progress to the happy hereafter. It’s hardly fair. I wish that she and Edward would soon leave. Then perhaps I can persuade Virgil to find a different kind of job while he waits for his poems to be published.

  Thursday, 24th October 1793

  All is quiet once more in our cottage, Charlotte and Edward are gone at my request. What an awful, painful, tumultuous week I have had to endure. Good riddance, good riddance, Charlotte Andrews. May you have nothing but bad luck from this moment on, for you are nothing but a whore. No, worse than a whore, for at least a whore has the good sense to charge money for her debauchery. And to do what she did only two days after she had been in Flood’s cold chambers, deliberately miscarrying Edward’s child! May she die and rot.