The Resurrectionist (20 page)

I
AM WITH
G
RAVES
in the kitchen by the fire when Caley enters. Across the table Graves looks up, and in his face I see he is fearful. All night he has been silent, and restless, but until now I have given it no thought.

‘Where is she?’ Caley asks, advancing on Graves’s chair.

‘Who?’ Graves starts up and backs away.

‘Do not lie to me.’ Caley grabs Graves’s collar and throws him back down. Though Graves is the larger man by half a head, I see the strength in Caley’s arm.

‘What is this?’ I ask, starting to my feet.

‘He has betrayed us,’ Caley says. ‘Telling old Barker he has a body he would sell.’

‘No,’ Graves whimpers, ‘I would have divided it with you.’

Caley shakes his head. ‘Where is she? What have you done with her?’

Graves begins to weep, and all at once Caley pulls a knife from his belt and holds it to his throat.

‘Do not defy me,’ he says, forcing Graves down onto his knees.

‘Please,’ babbles Graves, ‘I did not mean it, it was an accident.’

Caley presses the knife harder to his throat. ‘I will not ask again.’

‘Mercy,’ Graves cries. Caley lets go and Graves stumbles to his feet, one hand fumbling at his neck to check it is intact. Still weeping he looks from Caley to me and back again. Caley takes a step forward, lifting the knife again. Graves backs away.

‘No,’ he says, ‘I will show you.’

He takes us to the cellar, where a girl lies in the coalscuttle, one arm cast back unnaturally, her hand knotted tight in what looks like pain. She is young, and pretty too, though black with coal. Her face is scratched, and her mouth hangs open, but there is no other sign of death. Yet as Caley and I pull her loose we see the back of her head has been bludgeoned in, the skull a filthy mess of broken bone and clotted blood. She is stiff, and we must break the rigor of her limbs, twist them back into some semblance of peace. Behind us Graves has ceased his weeping, and though he will not come close, he addresses us as we work.

‘You will pay me for her, won’t you?’ he snuffles. Caley turns to him then looks away again, his face and arms filthy with the coal.

‘I should give you nothing to teach you honesty,’ he says.

Graves points at me. ‘Yet he shall have half for bearing her to the damned anatomists?’

‘Aye,’ Caley says, then smiling, he reaches into his coat.

‘Here,’ he says quietly, drawing out two sovereigns, ‘take these now and let this thing rest.’

Sulkily Graves extends a hand, but as he does Caley grabs his wrist and pulls him close.

‘Betray us again and it will be your body we sell,’ he hisses, his mouth hard against Graves’s ear.

I
N THE SKY
the moon hangs like a pale eye. My skin shivers, alive to the whispering around me. Too much opium again. The night is cold, yet I linger in the streets. I feel a rupture in the surface of the world, and the running forth of what lies beneath.

I come upon him on the street outside a tavern by Clerkenwell Green.

At first he does not see me, but as I approach he turns, and begins to cower, and I know something is wrong.

Two men are with him, weavers perhaps, and they watch me suspiciously.

‘No,’ he whimpers, ‘don’t let him near me.’

As he speaks one of the men approaches me, Graves cowering behind him.

‘Graves,’ I say, ‘why are you hiding from me?’

‘Because you mean to kill me,’ he says. His words make me nervous, but I look at the two men and shrug.

‘He is a friend,’ I say. ‘I mean him no harm.’

‘He says he knows the whereabouts of some
resurrectionists,’ says the larger of the two men, his tone implying that I must be one of these men.

I shake my head. ‘He is a fool with the drink,’ I say. Looking past them I smile at Graves.

‘Come now,’ I say. ‘Are we not friends?’

Graves stares at me for a moment, and then lurches to his feet.

‘It’s not him I was afraid of,’ he says in a wheedling voice, sounding more like a child than ever. I look at his protectors one by one.

‘I think it would be better if he were inside,’ I say. ‘It is a cold night and he might come to harm.’ For a moment they stand before me, as if undecided, then without a word they step aside, and I take Graves by the arm.

‘Come,’ I say as brightly as I can. ‘I will help you home.’

In the moonlight the snow seems to shine, dark footprints lying in it like pools. As we walk, Graves takes my sleeve. ‘I cannot help myself,’ he says. ‘I am damned, we all are.’ I want to slap him, for this idiocy will betray us, if it has not done so already. Instead I march him down the narrow alley to our door. I am not sure what I intend, beyond leaving him here and seeking out Caley. But Caley is already seated within. Seeing him, Graves cowers back, but I will not let him flee, and push him through the door, close it behind us.

‘Where did you find him?’ Caley asks.

‘In a tavern,’ I say, ‘pleading for his soul.’

‘Has a dog a soul? Caley asks, watching him, and all at once I know I have not seen all of this. But then he surprises me by coming up to Graves, and taking his arm solicitously.

‘Sit,’ he says. Graves allows himself to be led by Caley to his seat by the fire. There, Caley offers him a drink, and briefly all seems repaired between the two of them.

‘You must be careful,’ Caley says. ‘If we are discovered all of us will hang.’

Graves snuffles into his drink, staring at the two of us. ‘For what you have done you deserve to hang.’

‘You have done it too,’ I say.

Graves looks at me. ‘Perhaps I have,’ he says, ‘but at least I’m not a damned resurrectionist.’ Then he giggles, the idiot sound incongruous.

Behind him Caley has taken up something in his hand. Perhaps Graves sees my eyes move, for he begins to turn, but even as he does Caley raises his hand and brings a chisel plunging down. It cannot take more than a second, less perhaps, but it seems to occur so slowly that its various parts can be unpicked: the look on Caley’s face, the movement of the blade up, then down, Graves’s recognition of what is to come; and then, even as they slip apart, they seem to pull back, collapsing inwards, in a sudden rush, only to meet in the sickening crunch as the knife pierces Graves’s skull.

Graves does not slump or fall, instead he gives a choking cry and stumbles to his feet. At first I think I must have misunderstood somehow, that the implement has glanced off, or struck somewhere unimportant, but then I see the handle sticking from his head at the back, the blade sunk several inches deep within.

‘Oh no,’ cries Graves, groping behind him with his hand. ‘What have you done?’ Seizing the knife he closes his hands upon it, as if not quite able to believe what he has found.

‘Give me up,’ Caley hisses. ‘Give me up would you?’

‘I never gave you up,’ says Graves, ‘and now you’ve killed me.’ He has his hand wrapped about the handle, but he cannot bring himself to try to pull it loose. Blood has begun to bubble from the wound running down to stain his collar.

Swivelling to look at me, Graves holds out a hand.

‘Please,’ he whimpers, ‘help me. Draw it forth.’ He lurches suddenly, and his face contorts, tears leaking from his squinting eyes and down across his cheeks. Once again he
looks at Caley, then with a sudden motion starts towards the door. For a space of seconds he fumbles with the latch, trying in vain to open it, but then Caley starts after him, catching him around the neck. Though he moves more slowly, stumbling and swaying as if drunk or drugged, Graves still has strength enough to throw him off.

‘Help me,’ he pleads hopelessly, ‘help me,’ tears streaming from his face. Looking at him I realise I no longer care what happens here, all that matters is that it be done, and moving calmly and without haste I take up the poker by the fire. As it strikes his lifted arm the force of the blow reverberates through my own, and lifting it I strike again, harder now, hitting him across the face. Still he does not fall and so I strike again, and then again, and at last he stumbles to his knees, and I follow him, beating him with it as one might whip a dog, over and over and over again, until at last he falls forward on his face and is still.

W
E TAKE
G
RAVES
to Brookes’ house. It is folly, to take a body mutilated thus, but Caley will not be swayed from it. His face set so pale and furious, I am afraid of him as I have not been in many weeks. We hurry down through the shrouded streets, the smell of the river heavy, dank and sulphurous, Caley driving the barrow mercilessly.

Brookes is asleep when we arrive, and so it is his prentice who shows us in. When Brookes appears he is in his nightshirt, as he often is, its filthy folds billowing about his fleshy form. Seeing it is us he nods and rubs his hands together, and I am reminded of the kindnesses he has shown to me. Time seems out of joint tonight, the smell of Graves’s blood upon my skin.

‘You knew I was short?’ he asks, his little eyes studying us.

‘Buy this one,’ Caley says, ‘and cut him close and small.’

Brookes looks at him curiously. ‘Let me see him first,’ he says. All at once I wish to be away from here, out of this house, and I lift my eyes to the roof of glass above.

‘You have some learning,’ Brookes says, watching me,
‘have you heard tell of the Hindu’s belief that life is not a thing lived from end to end but a circle, in which we die only to be born again, over and over?’

I shake my head. ‘A strange belief,’ I say, and Brookes nods his head.

‘Perhaps,’ he says, ‘perhaps.’ He puts out his hand and draws back the cloth to reveal Graves’s face. The mouth lolled open, the squinting eyes half closed in death. I am struck by the sadness of Graves being there, of the stilling of his foolish laugh. Poor Graves, I think, tears welling up, uncontrollable. Brookes has paused, Graves’s chin held in his fingers. Slowly he lets his hand fall, the back of it brushing the chest beneath the arm. Still warm, I realise, and must hold myself unless I laugh. With his other hand Brookes touches Graves’s mangled face, then pulls back a scrap of scalp where the chisel entered. For a long moment he stares at it, then slowly, carefully, he withdraws his hand and wipes it on his nightshirt.

‘Go,’ he says. ‘Take this with you.’ Though his voice is level I hear the way he must work to keep it thus.

‘Why not?’ Caley demands, stepping closer as if to threaten him. Brookes turns to look at him.

‘I will pretend you did not ask me that,’ he says, drawing the sack back up over the ruined head.

Only at the door does he speak again.

‘Do not come here again,’ he says. ‘I will not have you in my house.’

I hear the impact like a dull thud, and turn. At first I cannot tell what has made the sound. Behind me two men stand, a large mirror held between them, halfway between the door and a wagon filled with furniture. They have heard it too, and for a moment we all stand, gazing about.

Then I see it. The small corpse dark upon the freshly swept cobbles. The men’s eyes follow as I bend to touch it. A swallow, its neck broken, wings lolling loose. At once I know it has flown into the mirror, winging into its own reflection in a hastening arc, only to strike those glassy depths. I lift its broken body, so small it can be held in one hand. Still warm, the tiny heart only just stilled. A small thing a life, so easily broken, and all at once I begin to weep, while above me the men place the mirror on the wagon, and one, with a rag from his pocket, wipes the small mark the bird has left upon the glass.

I
DO NOT REMEMBER
how I came to be here. It is as if I am slipping out of myself, like a lens falling out of focus. I cannot go back to the house, for Caley is there, and I know he would see it in my eyes. I am by the river, where I used to walk with Robert. I have had no word of him, and miss him. All day I have been walking. I have a decision to make, although in truth I know it is made already. The only question now is how it is to be done.

He is not hard to find. The fog is already thick, so he only hears me when I am hard upon him, stepping out from behind to call his name. He wheels around, one hand moving to his belt, his white eye staring blindly.

‘It is only me,’ I say. He looks as if he thinks to kill me there.

‘Run away, boy,’ he says. ‘You have no business here.’

When I do not move, he takes a step closer.

‘Did you not hear what I said?’

‘I would speak with you,’ I say.

‘What could you say that I would want to hear?’

‘Intelligence,’ I say, ‘about the murder of Lucan.’

At the mention of Lucan’s name, Craven stiffens.

‘You say he is murdered?’

‘And anatomised,’ I say.

In one sudden movement Craven lunges forward, grabbing my collar and forcing me to my knees. Though he is thin he is quick, and strong, and before I can fight back he has produced a knife and has it against my eye.

‘Who did it?’ he asks.

‘Caley,’ I gasp, and at my throat his grip tightens.

‘And you?’ he demands. ‘What part in it did you have?’

‘I was a witness,’ I say, ‘but not a party.’ Craven holds me there, the knife quivering an inch from my eye. With the fog behind him he seems shrouded in a jaundiced light.

‘Why have you come to tell me this?’

‘Because I would see some justice.’

Craven nods, and lowers the knife.

‘Why should I trust a traitor?’

‘I owe Caley nothing,’ I say.

Craven lets me get to my feet.

‘Speak then,’ he says. ‘Tell me what you intend.’

S
HE IS SLEEPING
when I knock upon the door.

Though Mary’s instincts are to turn me away, she admits me. I am not sure what I think to do: wake her perhaps, ask for some absolution. Yet once I am there in her room, I am unable to touch her. It is dim, the soft light of the evening against the drapes. Outside the air is still, and cold, but in here it is warm. She lies upon her side, as she always does, one arm outstretched, her face downturned, one half obscured by the pillow. Where do we go in sleep, I wonder. The self turned inwards, only to find itself absent, lost amongst the inner shapes of its dreaming. I am so full of the wrong of this thing, with the knowledge of my part in it. Yet as I look at her I wish I could say to her that I will make it right somehow, that all that has been done can be undone. I am tired, and would lay myself beside her. After a time, a minute, maybe more, she murmurs, and stirs, pushing herself over onto her back, turning her face away from me, and quietly I step away, out the door and am gone.