Doctor Death

by Lene Kaaberbøl

  “How long are you planning to stay here?” I asked, because I could not really see how it benefited her to sit in the préfecture’s tower instead of in a cell in the cellar. Except, of course, for the fact that her current position gave her the option of shooting me.

  “Be quiet,” she said, examining the drum of the revolver. I followed her movements and wished I had enough knowledge of firearms to guess how many shots she had left. All I knew was that the constable’s handgun would be of Belgian manufacture, and that was only because I recalled a heated debate about whether that was unpatriotic when there were “excellent weapons of French manufacture” available. The number of cartridge chambers in the cylinder had not come up.

  She sat down across from me, with only a slight stiffness to her movements, and pulled her legs up against her chest. If the arthritis had slowed her on the flight up the stairs, I had not noticed. When there was something she wanted, Imogene was apparently more robust than she looked. She let the revolver rest on one knee. It did not point precisely in my direction, but that was not necessary. The room was small; there were barely three meters between us. She would hardly need to aim.

  We sat in silence for a while. The warmth I had achieved by working with the boxes slowly seeped from my body, and the cold came creeping in instead.

  “Do you love your father?” she suddenly asked.

  “Yes,” I said. “Why do you ask?”

  “I loved my father above all else,” she said. Her thin shoulders drooped a bit, and I suddenly sensed the overwhelming exhaustion that bore down on her. “My mother was a hard and critical woman who thought more of my cousin Ferrand than she did of me. He lived with us, you see. She called him her ‘son of the heart’ and always took his side. But Papa . . . I was his little girl. He defended me. And when I became ill the first time, he dragged me around to scores of doctors and wise men to find out what was wrong.”

  “What were the symptoms?”

  “I had some attacks . . . fever, headache. And sometimes . . . I just disappeared. As if my body was still there but I was gone.”

  “Absences.”

  “Yes. That is what they called it. But they could not say why it happened. Nor why I sometimes had cramps. Some said epilepsy, others brain fever. None of them were right. It was the wolf that came to me, and I could not keep it out no matter how carefully I locked the door in the night.”

  “Was there no one who guessed it was lupus?” I asked.

  She did not answer.

  “Why are some people taken ill and others not?” she said instead. “What do you think, mademoiselle? Is it God’s will or is it bacteria?”

  “I believe more in bacteria than I do in God,” I said. “Why would He wish to make us ill?” God took your mother, chérie. My relationship with Him had never quite recovered.

  “Perhaps God works through the bacteria,” she said. “Have you ever thought of that? Some bacteria are in the shape of tiny crosses, others like rosaries. Do you think that is an accident?”

  “You say that—you who have been examined by the great Louis Pasteur!”

  “Precisely because of that. Monsieur Pasteur guessed that it was lupus, but not even he could say where it came from. There are no lupus bacteria with which one can become infected, mademoiselle. Why, then, does God do it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “He does it to teach us something. That is the only thing that makes sense. When I had to struggle against the wolf for seven years, it was so that I might get to know my enemy, so that I might learn how to detect the presence of the beast—in myself and in others. God had a purpose with me. He used seven years to create a perfect tool, and you, mademoiselle, have ruined everything in a few days.” The gun jumped in her hand, and I unconsciously pulled my hands up toward my heart, as if I could protect myself against the bullet in that way. But there was no shot.

  “I did not know God’s plan for you,” I said. “Perhaps if you explained . . .”

  “Do you think I am a book you may read when you are bored? No, not so, mademoiselle.”

  She got up abruptly. At the same moment, there was a singing explosion, and the glass in one of the other windows was shattered. Tiny sparkling shards were blown in all directions and fell to the floor with a silvery tinkling.

  Imogene Leblanc lay on the floor, but she had not been hit, and she still had the revolver in her right hand. She inched her way across the floor on her stomach until she could shove the barrel into my side.

  “Take off your dress.”

  “What?”

  “With or without a bullet hole, Mademoiselle Karno.”

  I did as she said. My fingertips slipped on the tiny pearl buttons, and I could barely unbutton them, but I managed to at last.

  “Lie down on your stomach.”

  I obeyed that order as well. Bits of broken glass moved beneath me and stuck to the skin of my naked arms. I felt her knee against my corseted back but could neither see nor sense what she was doing before she let me go and allowed me to sit up again.

  She had taken off her own dress and put on mine.

  “Now it is your turn,” she said.

  Its fit was looser than mine, with a pleated waist and a high-necked lace-bordered collar. And black, naturally, where mine was a restrained, subdued purple. It did not fit me very well. When I was finished, she smiled.

  “Get up,” she said.

  Only now did I understand her intention. If the sniper in the other préfecture tower got me in his sight, he would pull the trigger. He would shoot the black-clad female figure, not the purple, and would no doubt regret his mistake and perhaps even be tormented by it afterward. But that would not help me very much.

  “That is murder, mademoiselle.”

  “Not at all. It is a test. If God finds you worthy, He will not let a random bullet bring you down.”

  “You are mad!”

  “Get up, mademoiselle. Or I will shoot you this instant.”

  “I cannot see that it benefits you . . .”

  “No? Let me paint you a picture. A clever marksman hits the target he is aiming at. A young woman in black tumbles from the shattered window and falls onto the cobbles of the square below. Where do you think everyone will gather? Where do you think everyone will look?”

  “And then what? Even if you get away—what then? Where will you hide? How will you survive?”

  “God will not throw away the tool He has spent such a long time creating,” she said with rock-solid conviction. “Get up!”

  I continued to sit.

  She fired. The shot went through the black skirt right by my thigh and hit the floor. I screamed and pulled my leg all the way up to my chest even though I had actually understood that I was not hurt, that she had missed on purpose.

  “Damn you!” I cried.

  “No, mademoiselle. I belong not to the devil but to God.”

  I thought that was debatable. With fierce gestures I began to rip the hairpins from my pinned-up hair.

  “What are you doing?”

  “If you really believe God is on your side, it makes no difference,” I said. “I just want to give Him a fair chance to take my side instead.” Though we were both dark haired, there was a difference. My hair was more auburn and straight while hers was wavy. I hoped the difference would be enough to at least make the sniper hesitate and take a second look.

  She let me do it. I shook the last pin free and then levered myself into a squatting position. I considered for a brief moment whether a small silent prayer would make any difference, but I did not think so. This was not a game of God’s devising; the outcome would be determined by human observations and decisions, and cold, raw chance.

  I rose slowly to my feet.

  A shot screamed by me. I remained standing. Now he had to have seen it, I thought. Seen that it was me and not her.

  But Imogene had no intention of waiting. While the echo of the rifle shot was still rolling across the préfecture’s roof, s
he aimed the revolver directly at my chest and pulled the trigger. I sensed it and had time to feel a moment of outrage that she was cheating.

  Then I realized that she had not hit me.

  I think she was still waiting for me to fall. When she understood that it was not going to happen, she pulled the trigger again.

  This time there was just a dry little click. The chamber was empty.

  I had absolutely no experience with physical fighting but decided instantly that it was time to change that. I threw myself at her and toppled her backward. She was clinging to the revolver, and I could hear from the repeated clicks that she was still trying to shoot me and apparently did not grasp that she had run out of ammunition. I grabbed her by her wavy hair and started to pound her head against the floor, and I did not stop until she lay perfectly still.

  I still believe more in bacteria than in God. But it is a fact that when the Commissioner nine minutes later picked up the Belgian Warrant revolver from the floor, there was still one bullet left in the chamber.

  V

  November 1887–September 1893

  The wolf came to her when she was fifteen.

  Until then Imogene had thought that the most important thing in life was whether Ferrand really liked her or just pretended to because it would suit everyone if he could take over Les Merises one day. Beyond that, her greatest concern was whether Sister Beatrice had discovered that she had cheated on her Latin with Veronica and had written some of the difficult words on the inside of her arm. She was looking forward to going home for Christmas, and she hoped Bijou would have her puppies before then so she would have time to see them, even though her father had said that it probably would not be until January.

  It was a cold, wet day. The wind came howling in from the northwest, full of rain mixed with tiny sharp hailstones, and it was more or less impossible to go outside. The sisters had allowed the youngest to play in the dining hall and had arranged for the older girls to keep an eye on them.

  They played The Wolf Is Coming with the little ones. “The maid goes into the dark forest, picking berries, picking berries . . .” She and Veronica were the forest. It was starting to hurt a bit to stand with her arms raised in this way, especially because that irritating little Camille slowed down the game by trying to sneak to the back of the line so that she would not have to go through the forest.

  “Camille,” said Imogene, “come on!”

  “I don’t want to,” wailed Camille. “I don’t want to play this stupid game!”

  “All the others do,” said Veronica. “Why are you so special?”

  “But I don’t want to!” The girl held her arms behind her back so the others in the line could not take her hands.

  “She is scared,” said the new girl, what was her name? The one with the soft black hair and the big doe eyes. Cecile.

  “She is not a baby, is she?”

  “Why do I have to play?” whined irritating Camille. “It is just a stupid game and I don’t feel like it.”

  “Camille is afraid of the wolllf, Camille is afraid of the wolllf . . .” A few of the others began singsonging, and the game threatened to dissolve.

  “That is enough!” said Imogene. “Cecile, Anette, take Camille by the hand. Then we will start again.”

  “But if she does not want to?” It was Cecile protesting again.

  Imogene had a headache and her neck hurt, and she had just about had it with the stupid girls who would not follow orders.

  “We cannot all expect special treatment,” she barked. “Get going, or I will tell Sister Beatrice! Do you want to be confined to your room again?”

  Cecile bit her lip. Then she whispered something to Camille, and Camille took her hand.

  They began again. “Father Wolf, he is in the dark forest, prowling here, prowling there . . .”

  Imogene did it on purpose. There was no getting away from that. She had a headache, and her neck hurt, and she was grumpy and annoyed. It was clearly on purpose that she drew out the final lyrics.

  “Father Wolf in the dark forest is hungry for little girl pie. When the little maid does not come home, Oh, how her mother must cry, must cryyyyyyyyyy . . .”

  Camille tried to stop, but Anette was not having any of it. With a shriek she threw herself forward and pulled Camille with her.

  “Willy-nilly. You’re in the wolf’s belly. Rip, nip, nip, you’re dead!”

  Imogene and Veronica transformed themselves from peaceful trees into hungry wolves, and it was Cecile and irritating Camille who were caught. Camille screamed shrilly and loudly as if a real wolf had caught her. Cecile did not make a sound.

  Imogene and Veronica threw them on the ground and began to “eat” them. With hard fingers, they pinched and nipped them, and they were quickly aided by the rest of the “wolf pack.” The two victims tried to protect themselves by curling up and pushing the pinching hands away, but the superior force was too great.

  “Eat them, eat them . . . ,” shouted Imogene. “Mmmmm. I think I want to eat a leg!” She grabbed hold of Camille’s lower leg with both her hands and pretended to sink her teeth in.

  “Stop it! Stop it!”

  “Yum, yum, yum . . . Father Wolf is hungry.”

  She nipped a few more times while Camille writhed and wailed and tried to get away. Then Imogene suddenly received a hard shove in the side.

  “Leave her alone!”

  Somehow Cecile had got away from the others. She was the one who had shoved Imogene. And Imogene’s irritation turned to real anger.

  “You are wolf food,” she said. “You have nothing to say. Hold her!”

  And then the whole pack threw themselves on Cecile. For them it was still a game, though a slightly rougher version of it.

  “Come on, Father Wolf,” said Veronica, and held out one of the girl’s arms to Imogene. “Eat her!”

  Imogene stuck her head all the way into the girl’s armpit and pretended to tear her to pieces. She snarled and growled for all she was worth. And the rest of the girls screamed and giggled gleefully.

  It was only she and Cecile who knew that it was not all in fun. That Imogene had suddenly given way to a desire she did not understand herself and had closed her teeth around fabric and skin and flesh and had bitten as hard as she could.

  It had happened at that moment. She could not understand it any differently. Even though weeks passed before the first marks appeared on her own body, that had to be the moment when the wolf entered her for the first time and filled her with a hot, burning sensation in her head, neck, chest, and abdomen.

  It was irritating little Camille who tattled, of course. Cecile never said a word.

  Sister Beatrice brought them both, Imogene and Camille, to the convent church and made them kneel in front of the Madonna.

  “Camille,” she said, “show Imogene the marks.”

  And then Camille had unbuttoned her dress and pulled up her chemise with a well-practiced martyred expression. Her shoulders, upper arms, and stomach were covered with yellow and blue marks made by the pinching fingers. There must have been thirty or forty.

  “Imogene, I am disappointed in you. As a dux, it is your role to correct and care for the others, not to lead the way in a rough game like this. I hereby remove you from your responsibility. And now kiss each other as a sign that you forgive one another as good sisters and friends ought to.”

  They exchanged cool friendship kisses, one on each cheek. Camille tried to look pious, but her triumph shone through. Imogene burned with shame, outwardly as well as inwardly.

  She made an effort to show that she repented and improved. She got up extra early to help the little ones make their beds and get dressed. She tested them in their catechism and comforted the ones who were homesick, and she was especially attentive to Cecile and Camille. She labored so hard over her own schoolwork that even cranky Sister Francine praised her. Still the headache did not go away; it became worse. An odd weakness had invaded her arms and legs, and no matter
how much she slept, she was always tired.

  At the beginning of February, shortly before Candlemas, she discovered a circular mark on her shoulder. It was red and swollen and very sore. The next day there was yet another, this time on her breast.

  Constance, with whom she shared a room, noticed it almost at once. “Who bit you?”

  Imogene knew that her face was turning bright red. “No one has bitten me,” she said. “It just . . . appeared.”

  Constance giggled. “Oh, all right. If you say so. But I would not take any more walks alone with that cousin Ferrand if I were you.”

  “It has nothing to do with that!”

  “She is just jealous because she does not have a beau,” said Veronica. “Pay no attention to her. But you had better show that thing to one of the hospital sisters.”

  After what Constance had said? No, thank you. She was not about to do any such thing. Not even when more marks appeared, one on her upper arm, two on her chest, one behind her right ear. She rose early to bathe in cold water before the others got up, and took care never to show herself uncovered. And she prayed and prayed, so intensely that it was noticed, though no one knew what she was praying for.

  For it was the wolf that bit her. The wolf that came to her in the night. Its eyes glittered in the moonlight, its fur soft and prickly at the same time, its tongue coarse and warm. When her headache was at its worst, she could see it. Sometimes only as a shadow and other times large as life in the middle of the room, with wide-open jaws and pricked ears, and claws that clicked against the floor. She usually closed her eyes and prayed. She curled up, pressing her knees against the wall; she pulled the blanket tightly around her like a suit of woolly armor. Nothing helped. Its warm breath made her skin flush; its tongue rasped against the inside of her arm, across the round point of her shoulder, behind her ears, and down across her neck and bosom. She could not keep it away. She could not keep it out.

  And one day she collapsed in full daylight, right in the middle of the evening meal, where everyone could see. Veronica provided her with a detailed description afterward. How she had suddenly fallen backward and had lain there shuddering with cramps so that her body danced across the floor, with blood around her mouth because she had bitten her tongue and cheek, and spasms so violent that her rhythmically kicking legs had toppled both the bench and the table.