The Devil's Grin - a Crime Novel Featuring Anna Kronberg and Sherlock Holmes (20 page)

He opened the door and wished them a good evening. All four left without protest.

~~~

When
Anton came home the following night, he found the tall man awaiting him. Anton swallowed, closed the door quietly, and pressed his back against the wall.

The tall man looked haggard and pale. He must have lost a considerable amount of weight. His cheeks were hollow and dark shadows showed under his eyes. Anton avoided the man’s eyes and instead focused on his brow or preferably any other spot in the room.

The tall man had noticed Anton’s searching look and said lightly: ‘I’m spending most of my time in workhouses. The food there is neither sufficient to sustain even a child, nor does it taste like anything but paper mill sewage.’ He tried a smile, then. ‘But that is of no importance now. Do you know Mr Samuel Standrincks?’

Anton shook his head slowly.

‘
He is the chairman of the Holborn Union board of guardians. During the last week he met with several members of the
Club
.’

‘
The
Club
?’ interrupted Anton, accidentally looking into the man’s eyes and regretting it the same second.

‘
I
n lack of a name I called our network of criminal doctors the
Club
,’ he waved his hand impatiently. ‘I could overhear a conversation between Standrincks and your dear Dr Stark. A so-called health examination in all of Holborn Union workhouses will be conducted in one week time. The
Club
is about to choose their test subjects.’

The tall man looked expectantly at Anton, who didn’t move a muscle. After a short moment he continued: ‘Did you know that Standrincks, as chairman of the board of guardians, is paid by the government? The board usually sees very little of the workhouses, they receive reports from committees they appointed. The pay for the committees comes directly from the chairman, who also receives the reports and picks the committee members. Every piece of information the board receives is first filtered through Standrincks. And all reports from the board are first passed through Standrincks before they reach the government.’

‘
Why does one need a board then?’ muttered Anton sarcastically.

‘
Precisely! It
s sole purpose is to show that the government cares for paupers. They are receiving money and take part in meetings. But as everything goes over Standrincks’s desk, their decisions are futile. Needless to say that I will dedicate some time to Mr Standrincks and see whether the government is involved in any way. By the bye - how is your research for the
Club
going?’

Slowly, Anton shifted his weight from one leg to the other and answered: ‘I am testing the tetanus vaccine on animals. They also want a cholera vaccine, but we lack suitable patients to isolate the germs. I am expecting the
Club
to deliver one soon, though.’

Anton noticed that the tall man went rigid. It was probably the coldness in Anton’s voice, so he modulated it a little: ‘We are now reaching the limits of testability. Only after testing them on human subjects can we say for sure that the vaccines are working.’

‘
You will suggest it?’ The tall man’s voice was now as cold as Anton’s.

‘
I may have to. Their actions are still legal.’

‘
They are tailing you,’ s
aid the tall man, cautiously changing the subject. Anton pulled one corner of his mouth up and answered: ‘I know. I’m the newest addition to the
Club
. They need to make sure they can trust me.’ After a short pause he added: ‘It’s not good you are here.’

‘
You underestimate me,’ growled the tall man.

‘
You underestimate me, too.’

‘
I don’t think so. But what you are doing, Anna, is not healthy.’

Anton gave a short hard laug
h: ‘Look into the mirror!’

Chapter
Fifteen

Three days later
, Stark called at Anton’s quarters in the late evening to inform him a suitable cholera specimen had now been delivered to his lab.

Although Anton
had known this moment would come, he was not prepared for its arrival. He stared across his room at the small window. The knowledge that ordinary life bustled on behind the dark rectangle, gave him a little strength.

‘
How has it been delivered?’ h
e asked and
it, it, it
echoed in his brain, bouncing off cold walls like the shrieking of bats.

‘
Female from Dundee, delivered with a brougham,’ answered Stark in a bored telegram style.
Anton made a mental note - Dundee was more than four-hundred miles north. How far does the
Club’s
network reach?, he wondered.

‘
The cabby is a reliable man. We have had used him for other... tasks.’ Stark scratched his chin. Anton sensed the gaping cleft within the man, who did not quite trust his young colleague but had been ordered to share sensitive information with him. ‘He was well paid and instructed not to listen to any noise she made. We told him she is insane and seriously sick,’ explained Stark. He seemed to loosen up a little and chuckled. ‘The man must have whipped his horses like the devil, has never made it down here in such a short time!’

Then
he clapped his hands in delight and Anton felt the heat rising inside his chest. But he told his heart to be still and his breath to come regular. In his brain, though, he went berserk: he beat Stark unconscious and tied his arms and legs with a rope. Then he would infect him with cholera and wait a few days. After the disease had turned Stark into an intestine expelling wreck, he would leave him outside in the cold, lying in his own shit and vomit, without food, water, or even a consoling word for his remaining days. A trial would be the least thing Stark would have to worry about.

Fighting for the appropriate amount of curiosity a
nd ease in his voice he asked: ‘Dundee, you say? That’s far away. Who prepared her for the transfer?’

Here,
Stark
stopped for a few seconds, obviously pondering whether he was allowed to share this information, too. After a moment he gave in: ‘A colleague from the Dundee School of Medicine.’

Anton made another metal note. The
Club
had a medical doctor working for them so far away from London. How much further did their tentacles reach?

‘
Did y
ou take precautions?’ Anton enquired.

‘
Of course we did!’ c
ried Stark indignantly. ‘She has no family, no one will miss her. The driver believes she will re
ceive special treatment at our school.’ A smile played around
his
angler fish death trap. ‘Do not worry yourself, Dr Kronberg. No one will ever know.’ He grabbed Anton’s shoulder and shook it lightly.

Anton wondered how a man
could exude so much hypocrisy and not drop dead of shame. ‘Excellent. Has the cab been cleaned thoroughly?’ Avoiding the transmission of the disease was the one thing that kept Anton sane at the moment. Trying to prevent the worst, was what he focused on, while his heart was aching like a rotten tooth.

‘
Certainly!’ exclaimed
Stark, letting go of Anton’s shoulder to wave his hand. ‘Its interior had been disinfected by your assistants. They also cleansed themselves and are now using your new invention - those masks, in addition to coats and gloves when they deal with the woman.’ Stark was now notably irritated by the interrogation.

Anton nodded approvingly and walked over to the door. ‘I will have to extract the germs before or right after the subject dies,’ he said and grabbed his coat from the hanger. Stark did the same and together they took a hansom to London Medical School.

Only a
few minutes later, both men walked into Anton’s laboratory. On the floor lay a soiled and frail looking woman, half covered by a thin blanket. Although she was too weak to move, her hands were bound behind her bac
k.

Anton felt himself splicing in two. He knew he had to remain here, appear calm and calculating. But all he wanted was run away and scream. He
inhaled quietly and put himself back together again.

Both men approached the dying woman. Her breathing was shallow, almost gone.

‘
Leave me alone. You don’t want to watch this,’ noted Anton dryly, and
Stark
appeared to have the exact same thought.

~~~

Her ribcage started to heave convulsively, and she opened her eyes in panic. Her unsteady gaze found Anton kneeling on the floor close by. She opened her mouth, but could not speak. Her eyes were pleading. He ripped off his gloves and took her cold and shrivelled hands into his.

‘
I am so sorry,’ he whispered while
feeling utterly useless.

Her legs started twitching - t
he loss of fluids and minerals caused her muscles to contract uncontrollably and painfully. He sensed it then and wished he could be the one to be taken away now. But that was ridiculous. No one could haggle with death.

Anton took both her hands into one of his now and
stretched to take a bottle of ether from the shelf above him. He poured a large amount onto a handkerchief. She smelled it then. Anton gazed at her, asking for permission. She smiled weakly and he pressed the stinking cloth against her mouth and
caressed her soiled hair until long after her heart had given up fluttering.

~~~

Anton disinfected his hands, arms, and face. He put his gloves on, his mask, and his rubber apron. He inserted a narrow tube into the woman’s rectum
, connected the other end to a large syringe, and extr
acted about a quarter of an ounce of dirty greenish fluid.

C
arefully, he spread drops of it onto plates of solid culturing medium his assistants had prepared for him. Half of the Petri dishes were kept under the exclusion of oxygen, the other half with air contact. Anton didn’t know yet whether cholera germs where strictly anaerobic
or not.

He poured the remaining fluid into a beaker and heated it to 80°C for twenty minutes. After it had cooled down, he fed it to half the mice and rabbits. He marked them by shaving a bit fur off their bellies. No one would notice, he hoped. If he was extraordinary lucky he could have a cholera vaccine ready in a few days without the
Club’s
knowledge. Maybe it could help save a few lives. Maybe it could pay for what he’d done.

He prepared a letter - a small piece of parchment in a cheap envelope, which he would mail the next morning to Mr Sherlock Holmes, Baker Street 221B.

“
Guilty of abduction, torture, and neglect of an unidentified female cholera victim, diseased today at London Medical School: Dr Gregory Stark, Dr Jarell Bowden, Assistant Mr Daniel Strowbridge, Assistant Mr Edison Bonsell, and an unknown medical doctor from the
Dundee School of Medicine
. Guilty of murder of the same woman: Dr Anton Kronberg.”

Chapter
Sixteen

On the following evening a
t six o’clock, Dr Jarell Bowden called at Anton’s quarters.