The Bone Garden: A Novel (7 page)

What she saw was the Grim Reaper himself.

Her voice mute and choked with terror, she stumbled backward and almost fell as she hit the bottom step. Suddenly the creature swooped toward her, black cape billowing like monstrous wings. She whirled to flee, and saw empty lawn ahead, roiling with mist. A place of execution.
If I run there, I will surely die.

She pivoted to the right and sprinted alongside the building. She could hear the monster in pursuit, its footsteps closing in behind her.

She darted into a passage and found herself in a courtyard. She ran to the nearest door, but it was locked. Pounding on it, she shrieked for help, but no one opened it.

I am trapped.

Behind her, gravel clattered across the stones. She spun around to face her attacker. In the darkness she could make out only the movement of black on black. She backed up against the door, her breaths coming out in sobs. She thought of the dead woman, and the waterfall of blood on the stairs, and she crossed her arms over her chest in a feeble shield to protect her heart.

The shadow closed in.

Cringing, she turned her face in anticipation of the first slash. Instead she heard a voice, asking a question that she did not immediately register.

“Miss? Miss, are you all right?”

She opened her eyes to see the silhouette of a man. Behind him, through the darkness, a light winked and slowly became brighter. It was a lantern, swaying in the grasp of a second man, now approaching. The man with the lantern called: “Who’s out here? Hello?”

“Wendell! Over here!”

“Norris? What’s all the commotion?”

“There’s a young woman here. She seems to be hurt.”

“What’s the matter with her?”

The lantern swung closer, and the light dazzled Rose’s eyes. She blinked and focused on the faces of the two young men who were now staring at her. She recognized them both, just as they recognized her.

“It—it’s Miss Connolly, is it not?” said Norris Marshall.

She gave a sob. Her legs suddenly went out from under her and she slid down the wall, to land on her rump against the cobblestones.

Seven

T
HOUGH
N
ORRIS
had never before met Mr. Pratt of Boston’s Night Watch, he had known other men just like him, men too puffed up on authority to ever acknowledge the undeniable fact, recognized by everyone else, that they are stupid. It was Pratt’s arrogance that Norris found most annoying, right down to the man’s walk, his chest thrust out, arms swinging in a martial beat as he strutted into the hospital dissection room. Though not a large man, Mr. Pratt gave the impression that he thought he was. His only impressive feature was his mustache, the bushiest Norris had ever seen. It looked like a brown squirrel that had sunk its claws into his upper lip and refused to let go. As Norris watched the man taking notes with a pencil, he could not help staring at that mustache, picturing that imaginary squirrel suddenly leaping away and Mr. Pratt giving chase after his fugitive facial hair.

Pratt finally looked up from his pad of paper and regarded Norris and Wendell, who stood beside the draped body. Pratt’s gaze moved on to Dr. Crouch, who was clearly the medical authority in the room.

“You say you have examined the body, Dr. Crouch?” asked Pratt.

“Only superficially. We took the liberty of bringing her into the building. It did not seem right to leave her lying there on the cold steps, where anyone might trip over her. Even if she were a stranger, which she is not, we owe her at least that small modicum of respect.”

“Then you are all acquainted with the deceased?”

“Yes, sir. Only when we brought out the lantern did we recognize her. The victim, Miss Agnes Poole, is the head nurse of this institution.”

Wendell interjected: “Miss Connolly must have told you this. Didn’t you already question her?”

“Yes, but I find it necessary to confirm everything she’s told me. You know how it is with these flighty girls. Irish girls in particular. They’re likely to change their story depending on which way the wind blows.”

Norris said, “I’d hardly call Miss Connolly a flighty girl.”

Watchman Pratt fixed his narrowed gaze on Norris. “You know her?”

“Her sister is a patient here, in the lying-in ward.”

“But do you
know
her, Mr. Marshall?”

He didn’t like the way Pratt was studying him. “We’ve spoken. In regard to her sister’s care.”

Pratt’s pencil was scribbling on the pad again. “You are studying medicine, is that correct?”

“Yes.”

Pratt eyed Norris’s clothing. “You have blood on your shirt. Are you aware of that?”

“I helped move the body from the steps. And I assisted Dr. Crouch earlier in the evening.”

Pratt glanced at Crouch. “Is this true, Doctor?”

Norris felt his face redden. “You think I would lie about it? In Dr. Crouch’s presence?”

“My only duty is to uncover the truth.”

You’re too stupid to recognize the truth when you hear it
.

Dr. Crouch said, “Mr. Holmes and Mr. Marshall are my apprentices. They assisted me earlier this evening on Broad Street, at a difficult delivery.”

“What were you delivering?”

Dr. Crouch stared at Pratt, clearly thunderstruck by the man’s question. “What do you think we were delivering? A cart of bricks?”

Pratt slapped his pencil down on the pad. “There is no need for sarcasm. I simply wish to know everyone’s whereabouts tonight.”

“I find this outrageous. I am a physician, sir, and I have no need to account for my activities.”

“And your two apprentices here? Were you with them the entire evening?”

“No, we were not,” said Wendell, rather too casually.

Norris looked at his fellow student in surprise. Why offer this man any unnecessary information? It would only feed his suspicions. Indeed, Watchman Pratt now looked like a mustachioed cat at the mouse hole, ready to pounce.

“When were you not in each other’s company?” asked Pratt.

“Would you like an account of my visits to the pisspot? Oh, and I do believe I took a crap as well. How about you, Norris?”

“Mr. Holmes, I do not appreciate your foul brand of humor.”

“Humor is the only way to deal with questions as absurd as these. We’re the ones who
summoned
the Night Watch, for God’s sake.”

The mustache twitched. The squirrel was now getting agitated. “I see no need for blasphemy,” he said coldly, and slipped his pencil into his pocket. “Now then. Show me the body.”

Dr. Crouch said, “Shouldn’t Constable Lyons be present?”

Pratt shot him an irritated look. “He will get my report in the morning.”

“But he should be here. This is serious business.”

“At this moment, I am in authority. Constable Lyons will be advised of the facts at a more reasonable hour. I see no reason to rouse him from his bed.” Pratt pointed to the draped body. “Uncover her,” he ordered.

Pratt had assumed a nonchalant pose, jaw thrust out in the attitude of a man too cocky to be rattled by anything so minor as the sight of a corpse. But when Dr. Crouch pulled off the sheet, Pratt could not suppress a gasp, and he suddenly flinched away from the table. Although Norris had already viewed the corpse and had, in fact, helped carry it into the building, he, too, was shocked yet again by the mutilations performed on Agnes Poole. They had not undressed her; they scarcely needed to. The blade had slashed open the front of her dress, laying bare her injuries, injuries so grotesque that Watchman Pratt remained frozen and unable to utter a sound, his face as pale as curdled milk.

“As you can see,” said Dr. Crouch, “the trauma is horrific. I have waited to complete the examination until an official could be present. But all it takes is a cursory glance to see that the killer has not merely sliced open the torso. He has done far, far more.” Crouch rolled up his sleeves, then glanced at Pratt. “If you wish to see the damage, you’ll have to step up to the table.”

Pratt swallowed. “I can…see it well enough from here.”

“I doubt that. But if your stomach is too weak to handle it, there’s no sense in your getting sick all over the corpse.” He pulled on an apron and tied the strings behind his back. “Mr. Holmes, Mr. Marshall, I’ll need your assistance. It’s a good opportunity for you both to get your hands dirty. Not every student is so fortunate this early in his education.”

Fortunate
was not the word that came to Norris’s mind as he stared into the gaping torso. Growing up on his father’s farm, he was no stranger to the smell of blood or the butchering of pigs and cows. He had gotten his hands dirty, all right, helping the farmhands as they scooped out offal and stripped away the hides. He knew what death looked like and smelled like, for he had labored in its presence.

But this was a different view of death, a view that was too intimate and familiar. This was not a pig’s heart or a cow’s lungs that he stared at. And the slack-jawed face was one that, only hours ago, had been suffused with life. To see Nurse Poole now, to look into her glazed eyes, was to catch a glimpse of his own future. Reluctantly, he took an apron from the wall hooks, tied it on, and took his place at Dr. Crouch’s side. Wendell stood on the other side of the table. Despite the bloody corpse that lay between them, Wendell’s face revealed no revulsion, only a look of intent curiosity. Am I the only one who remembers who this woman was? Norris wondered. Not a pleasant human being, to be sure, but she was more than a mere carcass, more than an anonymous corpse to be dissected.

Dr. Crouch soaked a cloth in a basin of water and gently sponged blood away from the incised skin. “As you can see here, gentlemen, the blade must have been quite sharp. These are clean cuts, very deep. And the pattern—the pattern is most intriguing.”

“What do you mean? What pattern?” asked Pratt in a strangely muffled and nasal voice.

“If you would approach the table, I could show you.”

“I’m busy taking notes, can’t you see? Just describe it for me.”

“Description alone will not do it justice. Perhaps we should send for Constable Lyons? Surely
someone
in the Watch has the stomach to do his duty?”

Pratt flushed an angry red. Only then did he finally approach the table, to stand beside Wendell. He took one glimpse into the gaping abdomen and quickly averted his gaze. “All right. I’ve seen it.”

“But do you see the pattern, how bizarre it is? A slice straight across the abdomen, from flank to flank. And then a perpendicular slice, straight up the midline, toward the breastbone, lacerating the liver. They are so deep, either one of these cuts would have caused death.” He reached into the wound with bare hands and lifted out the intestines, painstakingly examining the glistening loops before he let them slide into a bucket at the side of the table. “The blade had to be quite long. It has sliced all the way to the backbone and nicked the top of the left kidney.” He glanced up. “Do you see, Mr. Pratt?”

“Yes. Yes, of course.” Pratt was not even looking at the body; his gaze seemed to be fixed, almost desperately, on Norris’s blood-streaked apron.

“And then there is this vertical slice. It, too, is savagely deep.” He lifted up the rest of the small bowel in one mass, and Wendell quickly positioned the bucket to catch it as it came tumbling over the side of the table. Next came other abdominal organs, resected one by one. The liver, the spleen, the pancreas. “The blade incised the descending aorta here, which accounts for the great volume of blood on the steps.” Crouch looked up. “She would have died quickly, from exsanguination.”

“Ex—what?” asked Pratt.

“Quite simply, sir, she bled to death.”

Pratt swallowed hard and finally forced himself to gaze down at the abdomen, now little more than a hollowed-out cavity. “You said it had to be a long blade. How long?”

“To penetrate this deep? Seven, eight inches at the least.”

“A butcher’s knife, perhaps.”

“I would certainly classify this as an act of butchery.”

“He could also have used a sword,” said Wendell.

“Rather conspicuous, I would think,” said Dr. Crouch. “To be clattering around town with a bloody sword.”

“What makes you think of a sword?” asked Pratt.

“It’s the nature of the wounds. The two perpendicular slashes. In my father’s library, there is a book on strange customs of the Far East. I’ve read of wounds just like these, inflicted in the Japanese act of seppuku. A ritualistic suicide.”

“This is hardly a suicide.”

“I realize that. But the pattern is identical.”

“It is indeed a most curious pattern,” said Dr. Crouch. “Two separate slashes, perpendicular to each other. Almost as if the killer were trying to carve the sign of…”

“The cross?” Pratt looked up with sudden interest. “The victim wasn’t Irish, was she?”

“No,” Crouch said. “Most definitely not.”

“But many of the patients in this hospital are?”

“It is the hospital’s mission to serve the unfortunate. Many of our patients, if not most, are charity cases.”

“Meaning Irish. Like Miss Connolly.”

“Now, look here,” said Wendell, speaking far more forthrightly than he should have. “Surely you’re reading too much into these wounds. Just because it resembles a cross doesn’t mean the killer is a papist.”

“You defend them?”

“I’m merely pointing out the defects in your reasoning. One can’t possibly draw such a conclusion as you’re doing, merely because of the peculiarity of these wounds. I’ve offered you just as likely an interpretation.”

“That some fellow from Japan has jumped ship with his sword?” Pratt laughed. “There’s hardly such a man in Boston. But there are plenty of papists.”

“One could just as likely conclude the killer
wants
you to blame the papists!”

“Mr. Holmes,” said Crouch, “perhaps you should refrain from telling the Night Watch how to do its job.”

“Its
job
is to learn the truth, not make unfounded assumptions based on religious bigotry.”

Pratt’s eyes suddenly narrowed. “Mr. Holmes, you are related, are you not, to the Reverend Abiel Holmes? Of Cambridge?”

There was a pause, during which Norris glimpsed a shadow of discomfort pass across Wendell’s face.

“Yes,” Wendell finally answered. “He is my father.”

“A fine, upstanding Calvinist. Yet his son—”

Wendell retorted: “His son can think for himself, thank you.”

“Mr. Holmes,” cautioned Dr. Crouch. “Your attitude is not particularly helpful.”

“But it is certainly noted,” said Pratt.
And not forgotten,
his gaze clearly added. He turned to Dr. Crouch. “How well acquainted were you with Miss Poole, Doctor?”

“She administered to many of my patients.”

“And your opinion of her?”

“She was competent and efficient. And most respectful.”

“Had she any enemies that you’re aware of?”

“Absolutely not. She was a nurse. Her role here was to ease pain and suffering.”

“But surely there was the occasional dissatisfied patient or family member? Someone who might turn his anger on the hospital and its staff?”

“It’s possible. But I can think of no one who—”

“What about Rose Connolly?”

“The young lady who found the body?”

“Yes. Had she any disagreements with Nurse Poole?”

“There may have been. The girl is headstrong. Nurse Poole did complain to me that she was demanding.”

“She was concerned about her sister’s care,” said Norris.

“But that is no excuse for disrespect, Mr. Marshall,” said Dr. Crouch. “On
anyone’s
part.”

Pratt looked at Norris. “You defend the girl.”

“She and her sister appear to be quite close, and Miss Connolly has reason to be upset. That’s all I’m saying.”

“Upset enough to commit violence?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“How, exactly, did you happen to find her tonight? She was outside, in the courtyard, was she not?”

“Dr. Crouch asked us to meet him in the lying-in ward, for a fresh crisis. I was on my way here, from my lodgings.”

“Where are your lodgings?”

“I rent an attic room, sir, at the end of Bridge Street. It’s on the far side of the hospital common.”

“So to reach the hospital, you cross the common?”