Beloved Poison (32 page)

‘What is it?’

‘It’s best you look for yourself, sir.’

‘But can’t you just say what it is?’ said Will, irritably. ‘I’ve just come from the place. What urgency can there possibly be?’

‘A body, sir. A corpse—’

‘There are hundreds of corpses,’ said Will. ‘All equally offensive to the eyes and nostrils. I’m sure it can wait.’

‘There’s hundreds, yes sir, but not like this,’ said the man. ‘None of ’em’s like this.’

I
had not visited the excavations in the churchyard for a couple of days and I could hardly believe what I now saw. Will had directed the proceedings with meticulous attention. The gravestones had been stacked like dirty dishes against the church, and a deep trench sliced into the earth following the line of the churchyard wall. It ran from one side to the other, six feet deep and ten feet wide. The occupants of the trench had been removed systematically, one layer at a time, as far as this was possible, as some disorder was evident the deeper the excavations went. They had been set out beside the trench to be loaded into carts and trundled away across the city. But it was clear that the number of bodies and bones were more than the carts could manage, and a great mound of rags and corpses had risen up on the greensward beside the excavated pit.

‘Initially this mound comprised only the most recently disinterred,’ said Will as we approached. ‘But getting rid of them has involved one delay after another – carts, cabs, people, animals – the streets are choked with obstructions, and the rain has caused nothing but delays and accidents.’ He sighed, and passed a hand across his eyes. ‘The number of bodies removed from the ground far exceeds the number who might conceivably be taken away in one day. And so the corpse mountain grows daily in size, and disorderliness.’

‘Surely the trench is almost empty,’ I said.

‘It’s only one trench,’ replied Will. ‘We’ll have to dig at least four of them to empty the earth. And the ground is little more than bones, with soil squeezed in between.’

I peered into the pit. The sticky clay walls were studded with human remains, like chunks of suet in a Christmas pudding. At the bottom, more bones, rags, skulls and bits of wood protruded.

‘And we’ve not reached the bottom of this one yet,’ said Will gloomily. ‘The ground is clay. It’s not sufficiently aerated to permit rapid decomposition, though now that everything is exposed to the air – not to mention the flies and the rain – what the clay had arrested is now taking place with horrible swiftness.’

‘But there must have been quite a number of empty coffins,’ I said. ‘The resurrectionists will have been unable to resist the allure of so many fresh corpses so close to the anatomy rooms. St Saviour’s was well known amongst the medical students for its ready supply of bodies.’

‘Pity they didn’t take a few more. It would have saved me from doing it. And not only that, but your medical students seem to have dumped back into the graveyard those body parts they had no use for. We found an entire collection of random legs and arms and skulls, all bearing the unmistakable imprint of knives.’ He shuddered. ‘Like the remains of a giant’s banquet.’

‘Fe, fi, fo, fum,’ I said.

He did not laugh. ‘And skulls with holes punched in them.’

‘Trepanning,’ I said.

‘Over and over again in the same head?’

‘Practice makes perfect,’ I replied. ‘Dr Magorian’s anatomy school is famous. His students are the best for a reason.’

‘Some of the men have left,’ said Will. ‘They refused to work amongst the dead.’

‘Three more of ’em ’ave gone now, sir,’ said the foreman. ‘Since we found this.’

‘Found what?’

‘Down ’ere.’

We followed the foreman down the ladder to the foot of the pit. Boards had been laid across the bottom, so that those working in the depths were not wading through a soup of mud and corpses. As the pit deepened, so the boards were moved down. The mouldering coffins and their occupants were dug from the earth, loaded into tarpaulins, and hauled up to the surface by ropes. It was crude but effective, and progress had been brisk despite the number of men who had left.

The pit itself stank. Even I, so used to the stench of the city and the infirmary, was obliged to put my handkerchief over my mouth. Above us, the excavated remains rose against the thunderous sky in a great slag heap. On either side of the pit, dressed in oilskins glistening with water, the workmen had gathered. Covered in clay from head to foot, their faces invisible within the dark cowls of their hoods, they looked down at us like some silent brotherhood of muddy friars.

At the bottom of the pit, an oilskin lay on the ground beside a cache of spades, ropes and tarpaulin slings. The foreman pulled it aside.

Joe’s face was white against the dark earth.

‘Who found him?’ I said.

‘Me,’ said the foreman.

‘Here? Has he been moved? Was he lying like this?’

The foreman nodded. ‘No one saw him at first. We were pegging out the next section, loading the carts . . . other things. No one likes coming down here. But then I came for a tarp, and I saw him.’

‘Was he covered, like this?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Was it concealment, or respect that had prompted the use of the tarpaulin as a shroud? But Joe was an urchin, a thief and a child of the slums; what respect would a murderer have for one such as that?

The area about the body was a mass of footprints and churned mud. It looked as though every workman on the site had filed past to take a look and no distinguishing marks were visible. I bent down. Joe’s face was turned towards the sky, the rain falling upon it like tears. How young he looked. He had told me he was twelve years old, or so he reckoned, but he looked to me to be no more than ten.

‘P’raps he fell,’ said the foreman.

‘Perhaps,’ I said. It seemed unlikely. The boy’s limbs were positioned neatly at his sides, and the tarpaulin had been drawn over him. Had the murderer climbed down into the pit with Joe’s body over his shoulder? A man might perform such an undertaking. A woman might have to throw him down, and then climb down after him to arrange and conceal the corpse. I would have to examine him to be sure. Joe Silks might be small, but I’d bet anything he’d put up a fight. And he was fast too, and wary as a fox. The peelers had been after him more than once, and Joe could give all but the most determined of assailants the slip. How was it that he had been caught in the first place? Unless he had known or trusted his attacker.

There was little to be gained from leaving Joe where he was. I bent down and wrapped him in the oilskin that had formed his shroud. His body was limp, the flesh of his cheek cold as marble against my fingers, the muscles only just growing rigid. Had Will and I led the murderer to him, that day in Prior’s Rents? I could not escape a terrible sense of culpability. And yet, weeping over him would not help us find his killer. I could not afford the luxury of guilt and remorse; I had to be calm, to think rationally and clearly.

‘I would guess he’s been dead six, perhaps eight hours,’ I said. ‘But it could quite easily be longer.’

‘That would be between twelve o’clock and two o’clock in the morning.’

‘Who on earth would be up in the graveyard at that time?’ I muttered. ‘What are the chances that anyone saw or heard anything?’

Will said, ‘I can think of someone. Dick Wrigley. The sexton. The churchyard is his kingdom. Nothing happens here without him knowing about it. He watches the excavations every day. Poor old fellow can’t understand what’s going on – he’s about a hundred years old and must have been here since the place was surrounded by fields. He talks about the past and the present as though they were both the same thing. It’s a bit peculiar, but once one gets used to it it’s not so bad.’

I knew Dick Wrigley, and I did not hold out much hope for a coherent discussion. I had not spoken to him for years. Occasionally, when I was weeding my mother’s grave he had skulked into view amongst the gravestones. I had nodded, and uttered a word – ‘morning’, ‘afternoon’, ‘evening’ as the occasion warranted. The sexton always replied with silence, a creeping sort of bow, and a knuckle to the forehead. I could not remember ever having held a proper conversation with him. Would the man be able to help us? I was doubtful, but Will seemed positive.

‘Dick’s fascinated by the whole excavation,’ Will went on. ‘I went to see him before we started. I thought he might be upset at the desecration, but he seemed oddly excited. He appeared with his own shovel, in fact, though I can’t think when he last had the strength to use it. Asked to help. I said surely he was more used to seeing bodies going
into
the ground than watching men take them out again. He said I’d be surprised what he’d seen in that churchyard over the years.’

‘Let’s hope for the best,’ I said. ‘Though it’s quite likely the old fellow has lost whatever wits he once had.’

‘Give him a chance,’ said Will. ‘Besides, who else do we have?’

The sexton lived in a tiny cottage that looked as though it had risen up from the putrid ground like some giant fungus. Built in a corner of the churchyard, its walls were green with moss, the windows covered by rotten boards, the thatched roof slick with a slimy layer of wet soot. A crooked chimney pointed heavenwards, oozing thick black smoke. I knocked. The door felt soft beneath my knuckles.

‘Dick!’ shouted Will. ‘Dick!’

The door opened.

Dick Wrigley had a face like a dried fig. He peered up at us from beneath a gigantic tricorn hat, his wrinkled throat wrapped in a grey ragged kerchief. He appeared to be shirtless, but wore an old blue military-looking coat, stiff with dirt and grease and evidently made for a much larger man. It was fastened up to the neck with bits of string and a motley collection of random buttons. His boots were hardly visible beneath the hem of his coat, though from what I could see of them they were held together with strips of cloth and tar.

Will greeted the old man cordially. They shook hands, Dick’s face aglow with pleasure. I wondered when anyone but Will had touched his hand, or shown any interest in him at all, and I felt wretched. It would not have taken much to visit the old chap now and then, and yet I had never bothered to do so. I shook his hand too. The ancient bandages that bound his palms were damp and sticky. I tried not to shudder.

As soon as the door to Dick’s hovel closed behind us, I wished we had stayed outside. The place was repulsive – filthy and low ceilinged, rank with mildew and smoke and the stench of burnt food. The table was fit only for firewood, and the chair (upon which Will sat as guest of honour) leaned drunkenly. The hearth was a blackened pit set into the wall of the cottage, the coals mean and brown and discharging a trickle of acrid smoke. I felt instantly unclean.

‘Been here for ever,’ Dick was saying in answer to something Will had asked. ‘Born here too.’ He jabbed a tortoiseshell fingernail at me. ‘I know you. You’re Jeremiah Flockhart’s lass.’

‘Lad,’ I said.

‘That what you tell ’em, is it?’

I slid Will a glance, but he was looking in disgust at something slimy on the table top that he had leaned in, and he didn’t seem to have noticed. ‘Were you out in the graveyard last night, Mr Wrigley?’ I said.

‘Who’s Mr Wrigley?’ cried Dick, suddenly looking fearful.

‘You are, sir,’ said Will. ‘Your name is in the parish register.’

‘But I’m Ol’ Dick.’

Out of the corner of my eye I could see Will smiling at my exasperation. ‘Well, Old Dick,’ I said. ‘Were you out in the graveyard last night?’

‘I’m
always
out there.’ He spoke as though my question was the stupidest thing he had ever heard.

‘At night?’

‘Course at night!’

‘Did you see anyone last night?’

He grinned, revealing empty gums. ‘I
always
sees ’em when they come,’ he said. ‘It’s them young doctors. They come to dig ’em up. The ones I just put in the ground.’

‘That was years ago, Dick,’ I said. ‘There are no resurrection men now. I’m talking about last night.’

‘Frighten ’em with me lantern, I do,’ said Dick. ‘And me dog.’