The Anatomy of Deception (5 page)

“Quite a story,” said Turk.

“Yes.”

“And so,” Turk continued, “you became a doctor to provide better treatment to strangers than your father had received. You are an admirable fellow.”

“Do you consider sarcasm obligatory?” Like the Professor, I was prepared to give Turk a certain latitude, but I would not be made the butt of offensive wit.

He sat back, looking hurt. “Not at all. I was being quite sincere. I think of you always as an admirable fellow.”

“And a prig.” But my irritation had passed. Turk had an uncanny facility to behave rudely without engendering lasting enmity.

“An admirable prig then.”

I shrugged. “As you wish. What about you?”

Turk’s smile vanished. “Me? Carroll, there is no me. I am a creation.”

“A creation?”

“Yes. Just that.” Turk’s eyes went cold. “I am a creation of the base instincts of two people I never knew, and of the guilt and cruelty of others.”

“I’m sorry for asking,” I said. “It must be painful to speak about.”

“Painful? Not painful at all,” Turk replied casually, regaining his demeanor as if the previous moment had not occurred. “Merely facts. Someone like Osler might consider it scientific truth. But it turned out not to be truth, because, in the end, I’ve become a creation only of myself.”

I thought of my reading, my practiced speech and dress,
my deportment … were we not all creations of ourselves? “I suppose that’s the best way to be,” I agreed.

“The only way.” He drained his glass and signaled for another. “And my creation fully intends to enjoy his life in wealth and comfort.”

“Wealth and comfort have their place, certainly,” I said. “But so does excellence. You could be a fine doctor.”

“Are you implying that I am not a fine doctor now?”

“Not at all. You are obviously highly intelligent with excellent medical instincts….”

“Better than yours?”

“I don’t know.” I considered the question. “Perhaps. You certainly have many qualities that I admire.”

“Thank you.”

“But I have something that you don’t seem to,” I persisted.

“And what might that be?”

“A love of the profession … a desire to heal. Perhaps that is what makes me such a prig in your eyes. We can do things in medicine today that would merely have been dreams even fifty years ago. I want to take the best advantage possible of every innovation, master every new technique.”

“Bravo,” Turk replied. “A fine speech worthy of an admirable fellow. So, what you are saying, Carroll, is that being a doctor is
important
. For
special
people in society. A higher calling. With a higher morality.”

“I feel privileged to be a physician, not superior. Morality has little to do with it.”

“In that I agree. Osler is your model, I presume.”

“One could do far worse. Dr. Osler is committed to medicine and the good it can do.”

“For its own sake?”

“For the sake of his patients.”

“His patients?” Turk leaned back. His face had flushed from the beer. “You really think Osler doesn’t care about making money? Then why did he come here in the first place? Weren’t there enough patients in Canada?”

“He came for the opportunity,” I said heatedly. “It was an honor to be asked to come to Philadelphia.”

“A very lucrative honor,” he retorted. “And if he gets a more lucrative honor somewhere else, he’ll go there.”

“No, Turk. You’re wrong.”

“Anything you say.”

I decided to change the subject, to try to determine whether Turk’s invitation had anything to do with his odd behavior in the Dead House, but I was clumsy in execution. “No, I apologize,” I said. “Perhaps you’re correct. Who can know the mind of another? To that very point, I certainly hadn’t expected Dr. Osler to send us all home so early this afternoon. I wonder why he did that.”

Turk shrugged, but our eyes met and for an instant I had a disquieting glimpse of the anger, of the smoldering intensity behind his mask of nonchalance. It was not the beer—this was not a man who would easily be rendered stupid by drink—but I had touched something and for a moment he could hide neither his malignity nor his curiosity.

“Perhaps he had theater tickets, too,” he said, recovering again almost instantly. “He might be sitting next to us tonight, in fact.”

“No,” I pressed. “There was something decidedly odd in his manner with the final cadaver. You must have seen it.”

“Not really,” Turk replied, his eyes sweeping the crowded room. “I expect that he just didn’t want to cut up someone so young and pretty.” He removed his watch from his vest pocket. “It’s time to be going,” he announced.

I thanked Turk again for paying the bill and followed him back through the restaurant. We repaired to the hansom and journeyed south and farther east until, after about ten minutes, we reached our destination, the Front Street Theatre. I again was surprised by the plethora of carriages in the street.

There was a good deal of milling about on the sidewalk under the marquee—no one who could help it ventured into a street where so many horses were idling. The atmosphere
was gay and boisterous, quite unlike, say, the Arch Street Theater downtown, where Mrs. Drew demanded decorum even if one had come to witness a comedic revival of Augustin Daly or a Dion Boucicault melodrama.

Turk jumped out of the hansom, gesturing for me to follow. We barged into the lobby, forcing our way past any number of our fellow theatergoers, each of whom, in turn, was endeavoring to force his way past those in front of him. The crowd was a remarkable polyglot—everything from common louts to finely dressed swells, and even a few couples in evening clothes. I’d heard that many otherwise fashionable members of society came to theaters such as this to mix with the more common elements of society, but I’d thought the tales apocryphal. I no longer felt so ridiculous in my suit and hat although, taking Turk at his word, I suspected those in better dress—like me—were at some risk of their possessions from pickpockets who had undoubtedly intermixed themselves in the throng.

Turk pulled me off to the side, where a sallow-faced man with slicked hair in a dilapidated cutaway coat was standing in front of a doorway.

“Ah, Mr. George,” said the man with a small obsequious bow and a distinct burr to his speech. “So nice to see you again.”

Turk produced two tickets, which the man examined. “Box number three,” he said. “Up the stairs on the right.”

“Mr. George?” I asked Turk as we climbed to the mezzanine floor.

“No one knows anything more about me than they need to,” he replied absently. He stopped and took me by the elbow. “To people down here, I’m just ‘George.’ I would appreciate it, if we happen on any of my acquaintances tonight, that you remember that.”

“Of course,” I agreed.

Turk found our box and we took the two front seats. As he had predicted, the cushions were worn and lumpy. The once-
burgundy velvet coverings had weathered into a dull brown and the floor had clearly not been swept in some weeks. Over the railing, I could see the crowd below, mostly those of lesser means, shuffling in their seats with anticipation, more like a bacchanal mob than theatergoers awaiting the evening’s entertainment. The orchestra was a squalid bunch whose instruments appeared to have been rescued from the ravages of some great flood or earthquake.

Soon the house lights went down, the arc lights at the foot of the stage went up, and the musicians began to play. The sense of expectation in the air was distinctly primal. The curtain rose to reveal two lines of female dancers, one at either side of the stage, and at their appearance the audience broke into a cheer that sounded to me like a lascivious whoop. The dancers wore short, bodicelike dresses, purplish red stockings that ran in a crisscross pattern up to the middle of their thighs, and shiny black shoes. They danced with frozen smiles, and all were heavily rouged. Holding the front of their dresses up to reveal their legs to the bottom frill of the bodice, the women ran at each other, passing in the middle of the stage.

The audience encouraged every move with a cheer. Although the dancers exhibited scant artistry in their gyrations, there was an odd allure in the way these women flew about the stage; leaping and prancing, robust and ungainly. Finally, they formed a line, each dancer draping an arm over the woman to either side of her, and then kicked their legs in unison to the rhythmic clapping of the crowd below. The scene was at once repellent and fascinating.

The show lasted little more than an hour. The dancers were superseded by a female singer, and then a number of brief scenarios, each featuring a woman and sometimes a man in abbreviated garb, and each with a prurient theme. When the dancers returned to the stage, my eyes were drawn immediately to a tall woman with red hair and long, lean legs, who moved with a lithe grace absent in her peers. I was surprised
that someone of such beauty and distinction was forced to work in Bonhomme’s Paris Revue. Once or twice, she glanced up at our box and flashed a small smile.

“Well, Carroll,” said Turk, after the show had ended and the gaslights had come up. He was forced to lean close to me and raise his voice to be heard over the raucous applause and wild yells for “encore” from the crowd. “What did you think?”

“It was very … lively.”

“Tell me,” he asked, “did you like the dancers?”

“Quite talented, I thought,” I said. There was no harm in being polite.

“They are talented, to be sure,” Turk replied. “Do you remember the tall one with red hair? We’re having drinks with her. You are, I mean. She’s best friends with my date.”

I tried to stifle a grin. My experience with women might be woefully inadequate, but it was certainly serendipity to be thrown together by circumstance with the very woman one had been admiring in secret.

When we arrived at the stage door, ten or fifteen men were already waiting. A few appeared disreputable, but most seemed reasonably well-off. Many were older, in their fifties at least.

After about ten minutes, the cast began to emerge. The one with red hair was named Monique, Turk informed me, while he awaited Suzette. I spotted Monique immediately, walking with a dark-haired woman at least six inches shorter than she. Both waved excitedly when they spotted Turk and hurried in our direction.

“Hi, Georgie,” cooed Suzette, who could only have been French if Ireland had been shifted to the continent. She took Turk by the arm. “Let’s go. I’m parched.” She squinted up at me. “Ooh. This must be your good-looking friend. Lucky Monique.”

Monique sidled up and took my arm. She had full lips, a small, turned-up nose, and emerald eyes, an odd assortment of parts that went together well as a whole. “I am a lucky
Monique,” she confirmed. “And what might your name be, good-looking friend?” Her voice was husky and sensual. She was apparently from the same part of France as Suzette.

“Ephraim,” I said, taking a hint from Turk and giving as little information as possible.

“Well, Ephie,” trilled Monique, “let’s be going then.”

Turk led us to the ever-faithful liveryman and gave him directions to someplace called “The Fatted Calf.” The ride was brief, but we were four in a seat meant to accommodate three. To the giggles of the women, we squeezed together, Monique’s arm thrown over my shoulder. She was uncorseted and I could feel the supple line of her breast against my chest.

Even from the street, The Fatted Calf emitted a din. The man at the entrance, an enormous, pink-faced ruffian with thick muttonchops, smiled at Turk convivially and swung open the door. As soon as we stepped inside, what had been a muddled roar became more distinct as loud conversation and hoarse laughter.

There was another man at the entrance to the large room, similar in look and bearing to the giant outside, only half his size. He yelled hello to “George” and led him through the packed tables. A film of dust hung in the air, diffusing the light and giving the room a translucent, netherworld haze.

As we negotiated our way forward, we were unable to avoid jostling those seated at the tables on either side of us, but no one protested. Many of the patrons appeared to be seamen, most of the lowest stripe, although I was sure that rogues of all occupations were amply represented. A goodly number of cheap and heavily made-up women were interspersed throughout the bar, and caused the room to reek of an odd mixture of sweat, stale beer, cigar smoke, and flowery perfume.

Suzette kept both of her arms grasped around Turk, pressing against him, and Monique took the same attitude with me. The soft flesh of her breasts and thighs now fully rubbed
against me and I felt the beginnings of arousal, which, even in these circumstances, was highly embarrassing. Monique noticed it as well, and pressed even closer. As much as I wanted her to continue, I hardly wanted to announce my condition to the other patrons. I kept looking forward, following the other two, hoping it would pass before it became more obvious.

Finally, we reached an empty table at the far corner of the room, one which ordinarily would have been barely comfortable for two. Monique released my arm, and, mercifully, the fullness receded. Turk slipped a coin into the small man’s hand and I thought it ironic that someone would pay to get a table in this establishment.

A thickly rouged young woman in a plunging white blouse and black bodice appeared immediately to take our order.

“Let’s have champagne,” decreed Turk gaily. “Ephraim here has generously offered to pay.”

I hadn’t, of course, and I suspected it would be costly, but it seemed only fair after the expense Turk had gone to for the tickets and dinner.

“Indeed,” I said, “champagne it shall be.”

Monique reached out and clasped my hand. “Oh, Ephie, I knew you’d be nice.”

The bottle seemed to be at our table the next second. We toasted to life, and drank. The “champagne” had a tart, acrid taste, but none of my companions seemed to care. The first glasses were downed almost instantly, even mine, and then seconds. Soon, the bottle was empty. Another swiftly replaced it.

Monique, who admitted she was not French, claimed to be nineteen. Like Turk, she had been raised in an orphanage, where she had danced so avidly that the administrators had actually engaged an instructor to teach her the rudiments of ballet. She had shown promise and, two years ago, had gone into the world to seek employment with a dance company.