The Angel of Highgate (32 page)

“I’m just closin’ her up for the night,” Charlie said. “Bit late if yer lookin’ for a stroll about the grounds.”

“Actually, it’s you I’ve come to see.”

“Me, sir?”

“Yes, I need some advice.”

Charlie chuckled at the thought. “Don’t rightly know what advice you’d been wantin’ from the likes of me, sir. I ain’t exactly had much heducation.”

“No, I think you’ve had exactly the education I need,” Thraxton said.

Charlie slipped the chain loose and swung the gate open.

“I’m just about to start me rounds, if you don’t mind taggin’ along.”

“No, that would be perfect.”

Encompassed in a halo of light from the lantern, the two men meandered together around the two main paths that looped the cemetery.

“Is there something you’re wantin’ to ask me about, sir?”

“Yes, but it seems ridiculous now.”

“Might not seem that daft to me.”

“You said your wife is buried here?”

“Yessir.” The sexton raised his lantern higher to throw a wider circle of light around them. He nodded toward a stand of modest gravestones tilting this way and that.

“Right over there, by the oak trees. She was a lover of trees, my old gal was.”

They strode on in silence. Thraxton grappled with how to phrase the next question as they passed beneath the pharaonic arch and entered the Egyptian Avenue, an echoing tunnel lined with tombs. Their shadows shuddered eerily along the tomb doors as the lantern jogged against the sexton’s leg.

“The first time we met, you said that these paths were sometimes walked more at night than during the day.”

“Did I say that?”

“I have never forgotten it.”

They stopped outside one of the tomb doors.

“I talk a lot of rubbish sometimes, sir. Livin’ on yer own does things to yer head.”

The sexton pushed the tomb door open and entered. Thraxton followed. Inside, a lead coffin sat atop a bier. The sexton set his lantern down atop it and began to rummage in his coat pockets.

“No. I don’t think it was rubbish. You spoke about walking the paths and losing yourself in conversation with your late wife.”

The sexton fished a number of items from his pockets and arranged them on the leaden lid: a long hat pin, the broken stem of a clay pipe, and a box of Lucifer matches.

“It’s not talkin’ to the dead that’s the difficult part,” the sexton said. “It’s the listenin’. Most people don’t know how to listen. You listen wiv yer head, you don’t hear nuffink. You listen with the heart.” The sexton put a hand to his chest, his eyes lambent. “Then you’ll hear.”

Thraxton watched as the older man took the long hat pin and started to drill into the top of the lead coffin, twisting the pin back and forth.

“What exactly are you doing?”

The sexton paused.

“Oh this, sir? Regulations call for all above ground burials in the city of London to enclose the casket inside a lead coffin.”

“I see.”

“Only problem with that is, after the body gets a bit ripe, the unhealthy vapors given off start to build up inside. Sometimes they’ll balloon the lead out until the coffin explodes.”

Disgust rolled across Thraxton’s face.

“Yeah, nasty,” the sexton agreed. “Very nasty indeed. I should know… it’s me what’s had to clean it up a time or two.”

He continued twisting the hat pin until it penetrated the lead and then worked it around in ever-widening circles to enlarge the hole. As he drew the pin out, Thraxton could hear the faint hiss of escaping gas. The sexton quickly pushed the narrow end of the broken pipe stem into the hole, and then struck a match. The invisible gas lit with a
whumph
and a weirdly luminous flame danced in the air above the coffin.

“My God,” Thraxton muttered. “The human body rendered into flame. We literally become the phoenix!”

R
obert Greenley staggered up from the horsehair couch and shambled stiffly to the small writing table. A week had passed but his face was still swollen and bruised from the beating he had received at the hands of Mordecai Fowler. He drew out the chair, wincing as he settled into it. He grabbed a stack of correspondence and began shuffling through the letters, reading the return addresses.

Knuckles rapped at the parlor door.

“Come.”

The door opened and Thraxton strode in. Greenley looked up and saw who it was, but did not acknowledge him and went back to perusing the letters. Thraxton stood looking down at Greenley, waiting for him to speak. When it was clear he did not intend to, the Lord addressed him: “Mister Greenley, sir.”

The older man gave no indication he had heard anything.

“You know what I have come here to ask you.”

“The answer is ‘no,’ to any question or favor you may ever ask of me… no.”

Thraxton seethed, but held his tongue, trying to compose himself. After a long pause Greenley seemed to feel the weight of his stare and looked up. “Oh, I have no doubt you feel I should be grateful to you, but it was your interference in our lives that precipitated this whole affair. Aurelia was coming to see you in wanton defiance of my express command. The other night—your daring rescue—changes nothing. I fully intend to seek satisfaction against you in the courts.”

“Aurelia is not your property,” Thraxton said, anger rising in his voice. “She is her own person, born with free will and her own mind. And you are not God to command her, me, or anyone else!”

The letters spilled from Greenley’s quaking hands. “You dare to speak to me like that in my own house?” Greenley hauled himself up from the writing desk, snatched a poker from the fireplace and shook it at Thraxton. “I’ll cut your black heart out! To think that you were creeping into my house, using my daughter for your whore while I was sleeping in my bed!”

“I cannot undo what has been done… but I can make it right.”

“Make it right? You have stolen a flower from my garden. I should beat you to a bloody mass, but I know that dragging you through the courts will injure you more.”

Thraxton faced him calmly. “Now I know who you are. The quick fists. The explosive temper. The fact that there is no liquor of any kind in the house. You once were me, weren’t you? At a younger age? A bare-knuckle fighter. A drinker. A whorer. You see in me everything you once were. That is why you hate me, because I am everything you despise in yourself. No, not despise… fear.”

Greenley’s face turned black with rage. “By God, I will smash you!” He lunged at Thraxton, swinging the poker, but Thraxton grabbed it. Greenley strained to wrestle it from Thraxton’s grip, but the younger man held firm. Finally Greenley gasped, let go, and staggered back, glaring at Thraxton with pure hatred.

“She carries my child,” Thraxton said in a quiet voice.

Greenley’s head tremored, all color drained from his face as the words knocked the fight out of him. He staggered back and fell into an armchair, suddenly very old and frail.

Thraxton stepped nearer. “I know the man you were, because I was that man, also. But I have been changed by a woman who saved my life—your daughter. I understand your jealousy, because it is born of the love you have for Aurelia. But consider this, a woman once saved your life—Aurelia’s mother. I ask now that you allow your daughter to save mine. Will you give us your blessing?”

Greenley’s head had drooped as he listened to Thraxton’s speech and now he shook it slightly. “Never!”

“Not even to protect the reputation of your own daughter, to spare her the disgrace?”

“No!”

“To ensure your grandchild is not born into the world a bastard?”

Greenley’s hands shook as he covered his face.

“Will you give us your blessing?”

Greenley did not move or speak for several minutes, until he spoke a faint, barely perceptible, “Yes.”

Thraxton swallowed and drew in a long breath. “Thank you.”

He turned and left the room.

Greenley slumped in the chair for a long time, unmoving. But then his shoulders began to heave and a keening sound ripped from his lips as he broke down and wept.

* * *

Augustus Skinner’s heart was about to burst. He had just hobbled up four flights of stairs, leaning heavily on his cane, and in his weakened state he was sweating and dizzy. Fortunately, some kind soul had positioned an old and lopsided chair at the top of the dark stairway and now he dropped heavily into it, gasping for breath as he waited for his heartbeat to slow. From the chair, he had a clear view down the hallway to the door of Doctor Garrette’s office. Skinner had made the journey out of desperation, after the doctor had ignored his repeated summonses. Although his pride balked, Skinner’s craving for laudanum was the stronger.

He would beg if need be.

Just then, the door opened and Silas Garrette stepped out into the hallway. He drew a key from his coat pocket and locked the door, then turned and walked straight toward Skinner. For a moment, the critic thought of calling out to the doctor, but something held his tongue and he leaned his face back into the shadows. Garrette walked straight past, oblivious to his presence and tripped down the stairs, settling the white top hat on his head. Long after he disappeared, a distinctive odor swirled in the air—a choking chemical whiff.

Skinner limped to the office door and stood looking at the name stenciled on the glass: Dr. Silas Garrette. Even though he had watched the doctor lock the door, he took hold of the knob and tried to turn it. Locked. He felt a surge of heat as the sweats overtook him. A single pane of glass separated him from the laudanum he panged for. A giddy notion seized him. He raised his cane, ready to smash the glass.

“Waiting for the doctor, are you?”

Skinner started, nearly fell, barely managed to get the cane beneath him. A large woman with a face like a bulldog and asthmatic breathing to match wheezed in the hallway next to him.

“Yes. I’m a tad premature for my appointment.”

The porcine eyes rolled up and down Skinner, taking in the crooked stance, the way he leaned painfully on the cane.

“Bad leg, I see. Touch of the rheumatics?”

“Shooting accident,” Skinner lied. “Quite painful.”

“Ah, very regrettable.” The woman chuckled inappropriately. “Can’t help much standing about then, can it?”

“Especially after all those stairs.” Skinner rubbed his right hip for emphasis.

The woman laughed again, eyes vanishing into slits in the doughy folds of her face. She nodded several times, and then seemed to reach a decision, producing a brass ring jangling with keys. “I am Mrs. Parker. I have the pleasure of being Doctor Garrette’s landlady, don’t you see? I am certain the doctor would not mind if I let you in. Therein you can rest your leg while you wait.”

“Very civil of you, madam.”

Mrs. Parker unlocked the door and led the way inside. She waddled around the office which bore all the trappings of the medical profession—a desk, an examination table, a skeleton dangling from a hook in the corner—having a damned good snoop, obviously as curious as Skinner to see the inside of the office.

“I understand the doctor mostly makes house calls as I don’t ever recall seeing any patients come to the office. Do you not think that is… unusual?”

“Is that correct?”

“Yes. As a matter of fact, you are the only patient I have ever seen.”

“How interesting.”

The landlady chuckled, her eyes roving around, taking everything in. Finally she seemed satisfied that her premises were not being destroyed or dismantled and bumbled out, chuckling to herself. Augustus Skinner waited a few moments to be sure she was not going to return and then limped around the office, exploring for himself. It looked pretty much the same as any doctor’s office he’d been in before, but then he noticed the smell: that same chemical aroma that clung to the clothes of Silas Garrette. His nose led him to a door at the back of the room. It was locked, but in his haste to leave, Silas Garrette had left the key in the lock. Skinner felt sure he would find medical supplies within, including the laudanum his body ached for. He turned the key and stepped into a dark room that reeked dizzyingly of chemicals. Fumbling in his pockets he drew out a box of matches.

When he struck the Lucifer, he was not prepared for the ghastly things the flame summoned from the shadows.

* * *

Dust motes twirled in shafts of supernal light filtered through the faces of saints and angels hovering on the stained glass windows. Tenuous wraiths of smoke from the many candles that burned twirled up to the vaulted ceiling to join the dance. The organ groaned into life and sprung open the church door, throwing in a slab of light. Constance Pennethorne stepped from the glare, dressed in a glowing gown of white shot silk fashioned by Worth in Paris, a bouquet of Night Angels clutched in her hands. The music swelled and the congregation surged to its feet as the bride glided down the aisle on the arm of Mister Wakefield.

The bridegroom, Algernon Hyde-Davies, waited at the foot of the altar, his blonde curls shining in the light. His Best Man, Lord Geoffrey Thraxton, stood by his shoulder. All eyes followed the bride’s majestic progress down the aisle—all except for Thraxton’s, which stole a furtive glance toward the rear of the congregation where somewhere, invisibly, Aurelia watched, marooned in the deepest, darkest shadows the church could offer.