Beloved Poison (36 page)

‘I need to know the truth,’ I said. ‘I don’t expect you to come here and pretend that all’s well.’ I put my head in my hands. ‘
Why
did I take that salve?’ We stood without speaking. ‘How’s my father?’ I said after a moment. ‘Does he know I’m here?’

‘Yes.’

‘Can he come to see me?’

‘I doubt I’ll be able to keep him away.’

‘And how does he seem?’

Will shook his head. ‘Your father is not what he was, Jem.’

I rubbed my face to keep the tears away. ‘Dr Bain,’ I said. ‘He holds the key. We must ask ourselves what Dr Bain knew. When he looked at the coffins, that first time in the apothecary, he turned pale. I assumed it was because Dr Catchpole had just split his head open, but perhaps it was something else.’

‘You think he’d seen the coffins before?’

‘Possibly. But let’s put that aside for now. Dr Bain takes the coffins. Why? To examine them? To prevent anyone else from having them? Whatever the reason, there was something familiar about them, something
wrong
, and Dr Bain knew – or at least suspected – what it was.’

‘You knew him more intimately than anyone—’

‘But there was plenty I did
not
know about him. You recall that night when we were at his house? When you uncovered the hook, the rope, the mattock? The tools of the resurrection men. He must have been one himself.’

‘You had no idea?’

‘None at all! Though many students were obliged to procure their own bodies for dissection – there was no other way to learn.’

‘Old Dick said as much,’ said Will. ‘He said it was “always medicals” looking for bodies.’

And so it was. The resurrectionists had passed into history as reckless and uncouth men, but that picture was far from true. ‘I don’t judge Dr Bain too harshly if he became an expert in digging up the dead,’ I said. ‘But I do say that he most certainly had secrets, perhaps ones he too would have liked to keep hidden.’

‘And there is also his second visit to Lily,’ said Will. ‘She was quite clear about what he said. “Not again. Not this again.”’

‘Which confirms that he
had
seen the coffins, or something similar, before. But
where
? And
when
?’

‘Not recently,’ said Will. ‘It can’t have been recently as the boxes were old. Perhaps before he came to St Saviour’s?’

‘He’s always been here. His father was a scrivener on St Saviour’s Street. He died when Dr Bain was a boy—’ I stopped.

‘What is it?’

‘
Hoots toots mon
,’ I murmured.

Will looked perplexed. ‘I’m sorry?’

‘Edinburgh,’ I said. ‘Dr Bain studied at Edinburgh Medical School before he came to London.’ I gripped Will’s hand through greasy bars of the grating. ‘I must see my father. Dr Bain lodged at the apothecary – years ago, while I was with the wet nurse in the country, after my mother died. He was a student, and had just come down from Edinburgh. My father must know something about that part of Dr Bain’s life – why he left that city. Edinburgh is the finest place in the world for a medical education. Why would one leave before one had finished, especially when one was as capable a student as Dr Bain?’

I ripped off a hunk of Mrs Speedicut’s pound cake and took a bite. It was as dry as sawdust, as I knew it would be. But it tasted of home.

In the afternoon, I was told I had another visitor.

‘Special treatment,’ said the warder. He grinned at me. ‘He paid ten guineas for it too.’

I was taken into the ward where I had spent the night. A dozen men were sitting on benches before a smouldering fire, the sleeping mats and blankets rolled away. Against the wall, standing far from the others, was a tall, thin, old man. For a moment I wondered who he was, he was looking at me so strangely. And then I realised. ‘Father!’ I sprang towards him.

For the first time that I could remember, he held me to his heart. ‘Ten guineas, Father?’ I mumbled the words against his chest.

‘I would give all I have to hold you without the impediment of bars and locks.’

He was skin and bone beneath my hands. I had seen him only two days previously, but in that short time he had aged. His illness, compounded by care and worry, had eaten him alive. Its progress had not been arrested by Dr Hawkins’s efforts, and it was apparent that he had not slept for days. I could not blame him, or Dr Hawkins, for trying to find a remedy, but I could not find it in my heart to pretend that I saw anything in his countenance but death.

He took my face in his hands and kissed my forehead. His eyes were filled with tears. Then he said, ‘Things are worse for you than you realise, my dear.’

‘But I’m guilty of nothing but trying to discover who murdered Dr Bain.’

‘I know.’ He stroked my hair. ‘I know.’

We sat together on either side of a trestle table. Around us, men gambled and swore, fought and shouted. The place was ill lit, and in the darkened corners shadows moved and grunted. My father looked about, appalled. ‘How in Heaven’s name did we end up like this? You to hang, me to go mad.’

‘Let’s not think of it,’ I said. ‘But I must ask you some questions.’

He rubbed his eyes. His skin was grey, papery dry and flecked with dark flaky patches. It cleaved to his skull as though all moisture had been sucked from him. His eyes seemed huge, pale and anxious in their dark-ringed sockets, the lids membranous above gaunt cheeks and lips puckered and drawn.

‘Father,’ I said. ‘Can you remember when Dr Bain shared your lodgings? When he had my room at the apothecary?’

‘Of course. He was a student. One of Dr Magorian’s most promising.’

‘And before he came to London he studied at Edinburgh, didn’t he?’

‘Yes. But he didn’t finish his studies there.’

‘Did he ever talk about the place? Did he ever talk about why he left and came to London?’

My father looked at me in silence. All at once his eyes were vacant. It was as if his spirit had left his body and walked away, leaving nothing but an empty husk. ‘Father?’ I said. He glanced from side to side, his features resolving into an expression of alarm and perplexity, and I realised that he did not know who I was or why he was there. I had never seen him look so startled, so afraid. ‘Father.’ I took his hand. ‘It’s Jem.’ All my life he had been stern and self-assured, a tall taciturn man, austere, unforgiving, disappointed. But he had been strong; resolute and decisive. Over the preceding weeks I had watched those attributes slowly diminish; standing by hopelessly I had seen him become a different man – vague, undecided, lost.

‘Fight it,’ I whispered, holding his hands between my own. ‘Do not give in to it.’

He blinked, I felt his fingers respond, and I saw in his eyes that he had come back to me – for the moment. ‘I cannot,’ he whispered. The tears ran down his face too now, dripping from his chin onto the filthy straw.

‘You must.’ I spoke sternly, the way he spoke to Gabriel. ‘Father, you
must
help me. You
must
remember. Did Dr Bain talk to you about his time in Edinburgh? What did he tell you? What did he say? What happened when he was there? Why did he leave?’ I took him by the shoulders. ‘Father!’

My father swayed in my grasp like a reed. ‘Dr Bain?’ he said. ‘He was only with me for a short while. After your mother died; while you were away.’

‘When? When was he with you?’

He shrugged, too tired to speak.

‘You were married in 1824. I was born in ’25.’

‘Then he was there just after that, ’21 and ’22. He helped in the apothecary while he completed his studies. He was very able, very knowledgeable. Hard working too. He helped me with the prescriptions, and I gave him food and lodgings. We were company for each other in the evenings. It suited us both well enough.’

‘And you must have talked?’

‘His parents were dead. His father had left him very little money and he used what he had to go to Edinburgh, and to pay for his studies. But he was very poor. It was a difficult time for him, he said. But he was an able student and he found work soon enough, in the anatomy rooms at one of the extra-mural schools. And better lodgings.’

‘Who with? Who did he live with in Edinburgh, did he say?’

My father rubbed his eyes with his fists. I could hear his eyeballs squelch and squeak. The sound turned my stomach, but he seemed to have entered a trance-like state and on and on he went, his fists screwing into his eye sockets. I took hold of his hands and pulled them away from his face. For a moment, there was that look of confusion again.

‘Who did Dr Bain lodge with in Edinburgh? What work was he required to do?’

He sighed. ‘I’m sure he will have told you himself. You knew him better than anyone.’

‘But I did
not
know him, Father, his past was a secret. He never mentioned it – and I had little reason to ask.’ I hesitated. ‘He was a resurrectionist, wasn’t he?’

My father nodded. Suddenly his mind seemed to clear. His sentences became lucid and steady. ‘You cannot judge him,’ he said. ‘They were not all Burke and Hare, you know. Many of the students were obliged to procure their own corpses, and there was a sore need for dead bodies in the anatomy schools. It’s no use dissecting a dog and thinking it might prove a useful template for understanding the human body. Books, specimens, wax preparations are of limited use. A man must dissect for himself if he is to comprehend, to value, human life. Dr Bain always knew the importance of that. He gave himself, his own body, to medical science. He always said he was to be given to the anatomists after death.’

I remembered the relish with which Dr Bain had been dissected – dismembered, unravelled, and pickled by Dr Graves. I doubted whether Dr Bain would have considered himself justly used.

‘Which anatomy school did he work in?’ I said. ‘What caused him to leave?’

‘He worked for Dr Magorian, and found lodgings there too.’

‘Dr Magorian was in Edinburgh?’

‘Yes.’

In all the years I had known him, Dr Magorian had never mentioned Edinburgh. At that moment I wondered why I had never asked before. ‘Tell me about Dr Magorian,’ I said. ‘About Edinburgh.’

‘Dr Magorian came down from Edinburgh, over twenty years ago now. He brought Dr Graves with him, and Dr Bain, though Dr Bain was only a young man and not qualified. Dr Magorian had already made a name for himself as a surgeon. Obstetrics was his interest, along with anatomy and surgery, and he had done well for himself in Edinburgh. Dr Graves had been his dresser.’

‘And Dr Bain?’

‘Dr Bain was still a student. He had begun his training in Edinburgh when he was little more than a boy. Dr Magorian had recognised his ability and had encouraged him, finding him work in his anatomy museum and as a demonstrator while he pursued his studies. But, naturally, there was something expected in return.’

‘Subjects?’

‘For anatomy, yes. Dr Graves had a certain relish for the activity, so Dr Bain told me. Dr Graves is strong and quick. No one was faster at getting a body from the ground. It was not something for the weak or faint hearted, and they worked together – Dr Graves and Dr Bain.’

‘And Dr Magorian, the great teacher in the ascendant, awaited their finds with his knives out and his students gathered.’

‘I suppose he did,’ said my father.

How blind and stupid I had been. If I had known about this I might have been able to stay ahead of the game; I would have been quicker to recognise the links between past and present. But then my father had never been one for talking – not to me, at any rate. ‘Why didn’t you tell me this?’ I said.

‘You didn’t ask. Dr Bain and I often talked together, back then. He was good company. I knew that what he told me was not to be talked of. And I can keep a confidence – you know that better than anyone. Besides, I’m telling you now.’

‘So what happened? Why did Dr Bain leave? And Dr Magorian and Dr Graves? They all came to London together. Why?’

My father shrugged. ‘Dr Bain was never clear about it. There was something about those final months in Edinburgh, some details that he chose to miss out. Murder was implied. Dr Magorian, Dr Graves, Dr Bain were all implicated.’

‘How? What happened?’

‘I have no idea.’ My father closed his eyes.

‘Think, Father. Dr Bain must have said
something
.’

‘He said it was all in the past, something not to be talked of, and that’s where it would remain.’

But Dr Bain was wrong. It was not in the past. It was there, now, amongst us. And it was about to lead me to the gallows.