Unsettled by the direction of her thoughts, she reminded herself firmly that Dr. Rome was her employer, a man from whom she might learn a great deal. Yes, he was beauty doctor. But his credentials were indeed impressive. That afternoon she had helped him hang half a dozen framed diplomas on the wall of his private office, tangible proof of his training and competence. Even her father hadn’t so many certificates!
Yet as Mr. Chapman had rather indelicately questioned the other night, why would a doctor waste the efforts of all his training on something as inconsequential as beauty surgery? Certainly it might be the money. Her father would have been lucky to make a hundred dollars in six months’ time. Most of his patients were poor; he not only treated them without thought of remuneration but often was forced to pay for the medicines they needed from his own pocket. She remembered suddenly how, at the Hennessys’ banquet, Dr. Rome had referred to the work of a doctor as the medical arts. That was it, of course! He did in fact strike her as the artistic type; he had that dark broodiness about him, and she had noticed more than once the gracefulness of his long fingers. She had tried to imagine them holding a blade, making a cut, molding and shaping and creating something pleasing to the eye, like a sculptor fashioning a bust from clay. If Dr. Rome thought of himself as an artist, and flesh as his clay, then it was perfectly understandable why he would become a beauty doctor. There was nothing wrong in it.
She thought again of Isabelle Hadley. Her first success as Dr. Rome’s foil had given her an unexpected sense of pride. Already she had started to embrace her new role with more enthusiasm than she would have imagined. Why shouldn’t she? Such enthusiasm was surely better than the awful dispiritedness that had plagued her for so long, ever since her father’s death.
Besides, she enjoyed the sense of collegiality she shared with Dr. Rome. Yes, she was only an office girl, but he treated her with respect and occasionally spoke to her of medicine and surgery and how far it all had come in recent years. She remembered how effusive he had become last week when the autoclave was delivered to the office. He’d explained in great detail about the steam sterilizer. It was one of the most important inventions of the late nineteenth century, he’d said, and many problems could be avoided by sterilizing instruments before they were used in patients. When he’d unpacked it from the crate, he’d told her how—
She sat up suddenly, every nerve in her body on alert. The delivery! How could she have forgotten to tell Dr. Rome about the man who had stopped by the office after he’d left for the day?
Hastily, she lit the lamp, jumped out of bed, and began dressing, all the while replaying the conversation in her mind from late that afternoon. It had been so strange. She was locking up around five o’clock when a squat, unkempt little man suddenly appeared on the doorstep. She immediately noticed his nose, which was large and misshapen with a red, bulbous tip. Assuming he was a prospective patient, she gave him a card and instructed him to call the office in the morning for an appointment.
With obvious impatience, he crumpled the card in his hand. “You can’t get in touch with him?”
“Well, I might—”
“Yes or no.”
She refused to answer, too put off by his rudeness to respond. Who was he to speak to her in such a manner!
“Just tell him Shark said to look for a delivery tonight, same time as before,” he said without waiting. “Got it?”
“What kind of delivery?”
“He’ll know. Tell him midnight, just like he wanted.”
“Midnight! Forgive me, but that’s ridiculous. Nobody makes deliveries at that hour.”
“Look, lady, I ain’t got time for parlor games. I make a lot o’ deliveries. The day ain’t long enough for all of ’em. So I work late. The doc says he don’t mind. So just tell him, all right? And make sure you don’t forget.”
Pulling on her boots, she recalled again his dissipated look, the malicious twist to his lips, the wrinkled gray sack suit, and the shabby bowler perched precariously on his wide head. A shiver of revulsion ran through her. A rendezvous with such a fellow, alone and in the dark of night, was the last thing she wanted, but now there was no choice. She would conduct whatever brief transaction might be necessary and leave the delivery for Dr. Rome to find in the morning. He would never have to know how irresponsible she’d been in failing to inform him.
She went to the door and stepped outside. The air was cool and slightly crisp. The stars, covered by a haze of clouds, provided only scant light, but the glimmer of electric street lamps made up for any deficit. She climbed the half dozen stairs from her room, then the short flight to the office entrance. She unlocked the door and entered.
Inside, it was pitch-black. She felt her way to the desk and lit the lamp. Her eyes scanned the dim interior. The room in which she was growing accustomed to spending her days seemed somehow foreign at night, its sense of comfort reliant on sunlight streaming through the tall windows that now were shrouded in velvet drapery. She looked to the dark hallway leading to the operating room and Dr. Rome’s private office and for some reason felt a vague apprehension, as if something sinister lurked beyond her small circle of light, something that waited only for her.
Brushing off her fears as best she could, Abigail sat down behind her desk to await the arrival of the man who called himself Shark. He would regret it mightily if he dared insult her again. She would report it to Dr. Rome, and he’d not stand for it. He’d find someone else to handle deliveries, someone who kept better hours.
With that mildly comforting thought, she leaned her head against the high back of the chair and closed her eyes. Before long, she was slouched down, asleep, until jolted awake by a single sharp knock. Immediately alert, she jumped up and hurried to open the door, anxious to be done with the entire matter as quickly as possible.
Shark was dressed in the same shabby suit he had worn that afternoon, the same gray bowler balanced uncertainly on his head. Abigail could smell the liquor on his breath as he addressed her in a harsh whisper.
“Where’s the doc?”
“He’s running late. I’ll take the delivery.”
“You?” His eyes narrowed.
“I’m Dr. Rome’s assistant. It’s my job to take deliveries—all deliveries,” she added for emphasis. How annoying this fellow was!
He looked her up and down. “Well, all right. But he needs to get started pretty soon. Before the chloroform wears off.”
“Chloroform?”
Now he regarded her with renewed suspicion. “You sure the doc knows you’re here?”
She recovered herself quickly. “I told you so already, didn’t I?”
Shark turned around and let out a low whistle. A horse-drawn hansom pulled up and came to a stop. The driver jumped down and positioned himself next to the passenger door. Shark’s eyes scanned up and down the street. He gave a quick nod, and the driver opened the cab door, reached inside, and lifted out a long bundle covered with a sheet.
“Look out!” Shark pushed her out of the way as the other man, with his strange cargo, swept past. Shark followed him toward the back hallway, yelling, “Give us some light, for Christ’s sake!”
Reaching the hallway, Abigail tugged on the pull switch and, having deduced the intended destination, went ahead to the operating room to do the same. The two men entered behind her, and Shark motioned for the driver to lay the bundle down on the operating table. If there had been any question as to what it was, the scuffed brown shoes sticking out from under the sheet left not a trace of doubt.
Shark looked at her expectantly. “You got the cash?”
“Cash?” She hadn’t thought about the possibility of having to pay for something. “I thought this was to be on account,” she replied lamely.
“On account! You think I’m a feckin’ banker or somethin’?” Shark glanced at the bundle, which lay perfectly still on the table, as if he were considering whether to grab it and go. Abigail would have been happy for him to do so, already convinced tha
t whoever was under that sheet most probably was dead. But she had come this far. She had to do her job.
“You know Dr. Rome is good for it.”
Shark thought for a moment. “Tell him to have it ready when I get back.”
“You’re coming back?”
He leered at her again. “Just tell him to have it ready.”
He nodded to his accomplice, and then, as quickly as they had appeared, they were gone. Abigail remained motionless, listening to make sure they closed the front door but too frozen with fear to move an inch. Finally, she forced herself to take a few steps toward the table. Warily, she reached out and pulled back the top edge of the sheet. Before her was the placid face of a child probably no more than twelve or thirteen years old. Dragging the sheet down a little farther, she could see the rise and fall of his chest beneath his tattered shirt.
Thank God, he was alive!
Emboldened, she yanked off the entire cover and searched for any sign of blood or trauma. There was nothing. He seemed to be peacefully sleeping. Then she remembered what Shark had said about chloroform. The child had been drugged! He could come out of it at any time, and then what? What would she say to him? What would he do? Might he have been kidnapped, transported here against his will? But why?
There were so many questions running through her mind. It was inconceivable that the boy would be brought here unless Dr. Rome had somehow arranged for it. Yet Abigail could not think of any reasonable explanation for why he would.
It occurred to her then that perhaps Shark was trying to blackmail Dr. Rome, setting up what was supposed to be a routine delivery and then putting him in a compromised position from which he could extricate himself only with a cash payment. Yet a midnight drop-off hardly seemed routine, and Shark made it sound as if he’d done this before.
There was only one thing she knew for certain: Dr. Rome would have to be summoned, and it had best be right away.
Reluctantly, she made her way into the hall and toward the back stairs leading to Dr. Rome’s second-floor apartment. She hesitated at the bottom, wondering how difficult it would be to wake him, thinking how awkward if he came to answer the door in his nightshirt! But there was no time for indecision. Resolutely, she hurried up the wooden steps. At the top she paused, listening for any sound of activity inside. It was perfectly still.
She knocked once, gingerly. Then again with a bit more force. She waited thirty seconds or so and then, with the heel of her palm, she banged on the door as hard as she could.
“For God’s sake, wait a minute!” she heard from inside.
A moment later the door opened a crack, and Dr. Rome peered out at her. “Miss Platford! Do you have any idea what time it is? What are you doing here?”
She tried her best to sound calm. “I’m sorry, Dr. Rome, but you’ve got to come down to the operating room. There’s a boy there. He’s—he’s unconscious.”
“What!” It was hard to tell whether he was shocked or angry. “I’ll be there in a minute.” The door closed.
Filled with a renewed dread of the disaster that surely loomed ahead, Abigail ran back down to the operating room to check on the boy. He hadn’t moved. Pityingly, she gazed down at him, a sweet-looking lad wearing the typical uniform of a street urchin, torn overalls and a shirt of coarse cotton, dirty and badly frayed at the collar and cuffs. A checkered wool cap was the only item of apparel that appeared new—likely snatched from some hapless vendor or from the head of a more fortunate child. His face had that unmistakable look of the Irish, upturned nose and freckles across the cheeks. His hair was reddish brown, stringy, and too long; his ears protruded from beneath it.
Abigail had seen plenty of youngsters like that when she volunteered at the parish soup kitchen, poor immigrant children forced to fend for themselves—weary and hungry and already hardened by life’s heartlessness. She had once dreamed of helping them as a doctor. They were the very ones to whom her father had devoted the entirety of his practice—those habitually ignored and pushed aside and trodden over as if they didn’t matter.
There was the clatter of boots on the back stairs, and the next thing she knew, Dr. Rome was standing beside her, breathing heavily as he looked down on their young visitor. He felt the boy’s pulse, lifted one of his eyelids.
“Is he all right?” Abigail asked hesitantly.
“Yes, yes, he’s fine.” He turned to her, his expression dark. “And what are you doing here?”
“I came to accept a delivery. I’m sorry—I—” She regarded the boy uneasily. “I never expected it would be something like this.”
“I imagine you didn’t. In the future, I would prefer that you inform me when any deliveries are expected. That is your job, you know.”
“But, Dr. Rome—” Perhaps she had no right to question him, but some kind of explanation seemed in order. She was there, after all, and whatever was going on, she had inadvertently become part of it. “I’m sure you can’t be in the habit of receiving comatose children in the middle of the night. And who, exactly, is this fellow Shark?”
“There are some things you don’t know and, frankly, would be better off not knowing.” He eyed the boy on the table. “I need to get started on this young man.”
“Get started! What do you mean?”
“Let me make this brief,” he said sternly. Clearly his patience was wearing thin, but there was nothing Abigail could do about it now. “A beauty doctor is like an explorer without a compass, without a reliable map. As I’ve told you before, there are very few who will admit to doing the kind of work I do. My medical colleagues don’t talk about it; they like to pretend it’s beneath them. So how do you think I must learn my craft?”
“But you studied beauty surgery in Europe. You performed it with the masters.”
“True, but techniques become outdated quickly. Others come along to replace them. Sometimes I have no choice but to find out for myself what works best in my hands. You wouldn’t have me experiment on one of my own patients, would you? On someone of means, someone whose result will be admired or, God forbid, disparaged by those in the higher echelons of society? Because remember, Miss Platford, my success depends on a sterling reputation among that very class of people.”
She was beginning to understand what he was saying, though that didn’t lessen the shock of it. “So this boy—you’re going to operate on him?”
“Look at his ears!” He waved his hand around the boy’s head. “Now, would you want to go through life with ears that stuck out like that?”
“But has he agreed to this? Why didn’t he just come into the office by himself? Why was he delivered by that man, that Shark—and unconscious?”
Dr. Rome placed his hands firmly on her shoulders and leaned in close. His breath was hot and slightly stale with the remnants of smoke and liquor. “Others would pay a fortune for the operation I’m going to give him for nothing! It’s not as if he’ll be harmed by it. His life will be much better, I promise you.”
He stepped away from her. “You have to realize, Miss Platford, the field of medicine has always been like this. For every new treatment, every important breakthrough, someone had to be the first.”
“But I thought surgeons practiced on dead people—or pigs.”
“One can do that, of course, and I’ve done it many times. But nothing compares with living tissue, especially for a beauty doctor.”
Looking again at the boy, knowing the innocent cruelty of children, she could imagine how much teasing and bullying he’d taken because of those ears. But still, someone must be held accountable.
“What about afterward? How will he be taken care of?”
“He’ll be fine.”
The boy stirred on the table.
“Get me the chloroform.”
By the tone of his voice, she understood it was not a request; it was a command. Still, she hesitated, unsure what to do. If the boy had indeed been kidnapped, did she wish to be an accomplice to a crime?
“Get i
t now!” he ordered.
Abigail hurried to the medicine cabinet, found the bottle of chloroform and the mask, and brought them back. He placed a few drops of the liquid onto the cloth and held it over the boy’s nose and mouth. “This is the end of our conversation,” he said, not even bothering to look at her. “And since you’re here, you might as well assist me with the surgery.”
“Assist you?” She was incredulous. What could he be thinking to ask such a thing of her!
“Yes, isn’t that what you’ve really wanted all along? To work beside me in the operating room?”
She was barely listening to him now. What if the boy had been kidnapped? She considered whether she should go to the police. She had nothing to fear. She’d done nothing wrong—not so far. But now Dr. Rome wanted her to help him operate. Someone could easily find out. She might even go to prison.
She looked at the boy and felt a surge of sympathy. And yet, what Dr. Rome had said was true. He would surely benefit from having his ears fixed, and it was doubtful he could ever afford such an operation. And the other part, about her—that was true as well. She had thought about what it would be like to watch him operate on Miss Hadley. But she had not dreamed of asking him to let her assist. She knew nothing about beauty surgery. The responsibility was too great. What if she made a mistake?
“I know the circumstances of all this seem strange to you,” Dr. Rome continued, still pressing on the mask, “but I assure you it’s not an unusual occurrence. No harm will come to the boy. He’ll be better off for it, as I said. One day, he’ll be grateful. Try to imagine when he finds a young lady he wants to marry, and he need not fear her rejection because of his unsightly ears.”
Again, she barely heard him, but this time because she was back again in her father’s office, kneeling on the cold tile floor, holding him in her arms, weeping. The sound of blood pounded in her ears.
“Miss Platford? You’ll need to give me an answer. Either you’ll help me or I want you to leave immediately. Go back downstairs to your room. We’ll discuss things in the morning. It may be that you’re not a good fit for this practice after all, but I’ll do my best to help you find something else. Perhaps a sales position somewhere. You seem to have an aptitude for that.”
The Beauty Doctor Page 6