The Anatomy of Death (5 page)

Refreshed and feeling human again, she sat at her dressing table in her silk kimono and brushed out her damp hair. Upon brush stroke number twenty-three she heard rapid steps on the
stairs. By stroke number twenty-eight her door was flung open after a knock of such brevity it might not have happened at all.

“Dody!” Florence exclaimed, rushing to her sister’s arms. Dody stood up and clasped her tight, marvelling not for the first time at the enormous personality that exuded from a frame even more petite than her own. Florence held her at arm’s length and inspected her. “You look lovely and you smell delightful, not at all ghoulish. I must say, Annie got me quite worried when she said she found you on the doorstep smelling like a rotting whale.”

“How very creative of her,” Dody said. “I doubt she’s ever smelled a rotting whale in her life.”

Florence threw herself across Dody’s bed and lay on her stomach with her chin propped in her hands, her eyes unnaturally bright. “Tell me all about it then—what are your plans?”

“Nothing’s really changed,” Dody replied as she returned to her dressing table. “I’m going back to my old post at the women’s hospital, but with my new qualification, I’ll be employed now and then by the Home Office for autopsy consultation.”

“On the dashing Dr. Spilsbury’s recommendation, I take it?”

Dody felt the heat rise in her face. She turned back to the mirror so that Florence would not notice. “He’s married, you know, Florence,” she said quietly.

“That won’t stop him, from what I’ve heard.”

“But it will stop me. I can’t see the harm in admiring him from afar; he is quite easy on the eye. But goodness, Florence, when I told you what I thought about his looks, it was just a passing comment, the result of one too many glasses of hock—you might care to forget I ever said it.”

“Very well, I will pretend you only spoke about him professionally.”

“As I did, if I recall; perhaps you were too squiffy yourself to remember. They say he’s the real-life embodiment of Sherlock Holmes. You should read about how he solved the Crippen case; it was quite brilliant.”

“I have been—one can’t get away from it. The papers are having a field day with the wretched man due to hang next week. Anyway …” Florence paused.

“What is it?” Dody asked.

“Well, I’d be worried about Dr. Spilsbury if I were you, Dody; that kind of life-and-death power can only go to a man’s head. I do think he sounds awfully conceited.”

“Really, I have never thought of him as conceited. Anyway, he is merely the cipher. It’s the science that convicted Crippen.”

Dody was disappointed; it was not the reaction she had expected from her younger sister. When had Florence become such a cynic? Unwittingly, she found herself continuing in a defensive mode. “And despite what you might think, Spilsbury hasn’t given me any preferential treatment at all. A young male doctor on my course was also granted similar privileges with the Home Office. We are both being employed to share some of Dr. Spilsbury’s load when the need arises. We don’t have his expertise in the laboratory, naturally, but we can perform the less demanding autopsies for him.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” Florence’s tone made Dody prickle. It seemed she couldn’t win. Opportunity was either denied to her because of her gender, or given because of it. It annoyed her that Florence of all people could not see that sometimes merit was also taken into account. Dody loved Florence more than
anyone in the world, but it didn’t mean they always shared the same opinions. Sometimes she wondered if they shared any at all. Perhaps this was because of Dody’s time spent in an English boarding school while the rest of the family still lived in Moscow. Their parents, expecting to move back to England sooner than they had, had sent her ahead of them, hoping to ease her into the English education system. Florence, seven years younger than Dody, had been a child of eight when the family returned to England. She had been schooled at home and remained under their parents’ influence until she came of age and moved to London.

Dody continued with her hair, counting the brushstrokes from where she had left off, regarding her sister in the dressing table mirror. With her graceful features, large violet eyes, and abundance of dark hair, Florence had proved irresistible to young men. Her stand on moral purity and her aloofness in male company seemed only to make her all the more alluring to them. When Dody had left for Edinburgh, there had been many hovering in the wings for the first indication that the ice maiden was beginning to melt. Dody was not sure if the thaw would ever happen. Florence had declared vehemently that she would never marry, that this was the only way a woman could gain even the smallest amount of power over men.

Her uncompromising stance was due, Dody had no doubt, to the influence of Christabel Pankhurst and other extreme suffragettes. Dody had sympathy with the suffrage movement—how could she not? She had experienced for herself the slings and arrows when she dared to storm the bastion of men’s learning, the subtle and not-so-subtle attempts to put her in her place as she rose to the top of her year in medicine. Still, she preferred the quieter approach, to put her head down to
the work and carry on regardless of opposition or obstacles, making herself invisible where she could. The stridence of the militant suffragettes with whom Florence had cast her lot was not at all to her taste.

Florence chatted on: Was it time they invested in a motorcar, or should they continue to make do with the coach and pair? What sort of hours would Dody be working? Would she be able to accompany her on a visit to the new Selfridges department store? And, “Dody, now you’re home, we’ll have to employ a lady’s maid again; Annie can’t possibly cope with the two of us as well as her parlour duties.”

Dody observed the wrinkle on Florence’s brow, the way her fingers worried the edge of the coverlet. It was clear her sister had a lot more on her mind than domestic arrangements. “I managed perfectly well without a lady’s maid in Edinburgh,” she said. “All I require from Annie is that she sees that my clothes are properly laundered.”

“But what about your hair?”

“I have to wash it so often these days, a loose bun is the only style practical for me and I can do that myself—the alternative is to get it all chopped off.”

“Next you’ll be joining the Rational Dress League.”

“Oh, I haven’t the time for leagues and such. I’ll still get Annie to help with my hair on special occasions.” Dody smiled. “Don’t worry, I won’t let you down.”

“Oh, very well then,” Florence sighed. “We should set an example, prove that we are a lot more than just wealthy young ladies with too much time on our hands—not that you fit into that category, of course, but that’s what some of the newspapers are saying about us. They say if we want to change the world, we can’t continue to live the idle life of the upper
middle classes and employ other people’s daughters to be our servants. Well, at least we’re making a start. As Poppa says, social change always takes time.”

Dody swivelled on her stool to face the bed. “You’ve been very brave, darling, asking me about my plans, telling me things that I know must be of little consequence to you right now.” She leaned over and took her sister’s hand. “But I know all about it, Florence. I know about Catherine’s death, and the riot, what you’ve all been through.”

For a moment Florence couldn’t answer. She buried her face in the coverlet. “Don’t make me cry, Dody. I feel as if I’ve only just stopped. It won’t be long before the others arrive and I don’t want to appear all red and blotchy. Everyone’s upset; it’s not only me. Anyway, you shouldn’t call it a riot, as if that’s what we set out to do. It was an orderly march. The police and crowds of hoodlums who seemed to be acting with them began the trouble.”

Dody got up from the dressing table, leaving her sister to collect herself. She would finish her hair when it was thoroughly dried and she was dressed. She moved into her dressing room, leaving the door open, and gathered her undergarments. After examining her corset for a moment, she shoved it into the back of her wardrobe. If Florence saw her struggling to get into that unaided, she would only start on again about their need for a lady’s maid.

“The note you passed on to me through Rupert,” she said, slipping into her combinations, “was a summons to the mortuary. When I got there, I discovered they wanted me to perform an autopsy on Lady Catherine to determine her cause of death.” Dody quickly buttoned her camisole and pulled up her knickers. Selecting a trumpet skirt and high-necked
blouse from her wardrobe, she returned to the bedroom to finish dressing. She found Florence tracing the patterns on the bed’s floral coverlet with her finger.

“The police killed her,” Florence said softly. “That’s what you found out, isn’t it?”

Dody hesitated, silk stocking halfway up her leg. “No, I’m afraid I didn’t. I had to tell them I knew her. The coroner needs to find someone else.”

It took a while for Florence to register what Dody had said. She swung into a sitting position. “What?” She slapped her hand against the bed. “You allowed Catherine’s autopsy to be conducted by someone else? A police toady? Do you realise what you’ve done? You’ve thrown away a God-given opportunity of proving police brutality. We may never have another, because they’ll be doing their damnedest to keep their results squeaky clean. Do you realise some newspapers didn’t even report her death? Why is that, do you think? The government is suppressing the truth, that’s why.”

“Florence, please, that’s enough.” Dody was taken aback. She hadn’t expected Florence to react quite so violently.

“No, Dody, just whose side are you on?”

Dody stepped into her petticoat, and quickly finished dressing. She chose her words carefully. “It would have been unprofessional of me to continue, Florence, I couldn’t, I …”

She was saved from further explanation by a tap at the door. Annie came in to announce that the first of the visitors had arrived, a Mr. Hugo Cartwright.

“That’s Catherine’s nephew,” Florence said, looking at the fine gold watch on her wrist. “He’s early.”

Hugo Cartwright’s early arrival was a godsend. Florence managed to compose herself in front of Annie, giving her
instructions to see that tea was prepared for the guest. When Annie had left, Florence was back in command of her good temper. “I’m sorry, Dody, my nerves are quite shot,” she said. “I’m sure you did the right thing. The committee will be interested in talking to you, though—do you think you can manage them? It might be a bit of an interrogation, especially when they discover your connection to the Home Office. Everyone’s upset, blaming each other for what went wrong at the march. Sometimes I think there are more factions in the WSPU than in the parliamentary Liberal and Conservative parties combined.”

“Don’t worry, Florence; the ladies of your committee don’t frighten me one bit.”

Florence smiled. “My fearless sister.”

“But I’m not sure if I’ll be able to see them for long, if at all. I have another engagement: tea with Rupert at the Copper Kettle.”

Florence paused to regard her sister. “You don’t sound exactly thrilled at the prospect. Did he tell you he’s endeavouring to become left-handed? He thinks left-handed people are more artistic. He feels that with constant practice he will be able to change the circuits in his brain.”

“Oh Lord.” Dody laughed. The eccentricities she had once found so entertaining in Rupert now seemed little more than affectation. How quickly the heart changes its tune once it has decided.

Florence shrugged. “Ah well, you got yourself into it, you’ll have to get yourself out.” When it came to matters of the heart, one thing Dody could always rely on was cool-headed advice from her sister.

The plain cream blouse she’d selected needed some colour.
She reached into her satin jewel box for her Fabergé brooch with its pattern of tiny white, blue, and gold flowers, and pinned it to the high collar.

“That’s a very pretty outfit,” Florence said. “I’m relieved to see you don’t always wear a suit and tie.”

“Hardly a suit and tie, just my professional clothes.”

“Yes, but some people seem to think we should make an extra effort to dress in a feminine fashion, and I tend to agree. We don’t want to give the WSPU a bad name, or let the opposition think that we are…well, you know,
that
kind of women.”

Dody couldn’t help but laugh. “But the union contains umpteen numbers of
that
kind of women. Why, Emmeline Pankhurst’s chauffeur is
that
kind of woman—I’ve never seen her in anything but men’s clothing!”

“Yes, but she’s not in the Bloomsbury group, is she? We at least try and maintain some standards.”

“Is this one of the factions you are talking about?”

“Now you mention it, I suppose it is, although I was mainly thinking about the militants and the nonmilitants. Which reminds me, Mrs. Fawcett was around earlier. She came to give me a reprimand—a severe reprimand—said it was all our fault that the march got so out of hand. You remember her, don’t you? She calls herself a suffragist, not a suffragette, and she’s been trying for twenty years to convert politicians to our way of thinking over cucumber sandwiches and tea and, of course, has got absolutely nowhere for her pains.”

Because of her sister’s involvement in the WSPU, Dody had not been able to distance herself from it in the way Millicent Fawcett had. Though she had not expressed her opinion to Florence in so many words, Dody agreed with Mrs. Fawcett. The WSPU’s militant actions were harming the chances of
female suffrage by alienating the MPs who would be voting on the issue. She had little time for the whip-wielding suffragette who had attacked Mr. Churchill of the Home Office while he stood on a station platform with his wife. Those acts did nothing to endear the suffragettes to the general public, previously the source of their greatest supporters. Public opinion was turning against them.

“Of course I remember Mrs. Fawcett; she’s Elizabeth Garrett’s sister. The woman lives in the past—won’t use a telephone or a motorcar and still dresses like the old queen. When I last saw her, she was wearing a ridiculous lace hanky on her head.”