Devoured (Hatton & Roumande) Read online

  As Hatton talked, Roumande had dried his hands and was now sitting at a trestle table making notes. Roumande wrote quickly and fluently, embellishing facts with his own comments. He sometimes observed what Hatton’s eyes missed, so intently was the Professor delving into the crevices and cavities.

  ‘So, Inspector, she was definitely murdered. But the ammonite is a strange choice, don’t you think? There was a poker in the grate, and also on her desk I noticed a huge glass ball, used as a paperweight.’

  Adams was pensive. ‘It may have been the nearest thing to hand, if the murderer was disturbed. It’s blunt, heavy, and would have been easy for a woman to grab. But it would have required some strength to crush a skull like that. And Lady Bessingham didn’t cry out. Perhaps she knew her attacker, as you say? All grist for the mill, Professor. But can I light up now, or would you prefer I went outside? I think Mr Broderig could do with a puff.’

  Broderig smiled weakly at the Inspector. Hatton nodded that they could go ahead, knowing more tests would be required, and at this, his heart began to pound. Not because ideas immediately formed. But because they might. Was this the chance to prove without doubt the power of forensics?

  Because for too long now, life in the pathology department had been a struggle. But he saw the opportunity for improvement all about him. Not for nothing had he spent years away from friends and family. Edinburgh first, to train in the rudiments of medicine. Three years as a physician, with his father’s blessing, but then his bolder switch to surgeon, which did not rest so well.

  ‘Butchers! That’s what your mother would say if she were still alive. One up from a meat shop.’

  ‘For pity’s sake, Father.’

  ‘And why Scotland, for heaven’s sake? We are not averse to self-improvement, but a surgeon, Adolphus? There are better opportunities in medicine. Lucy’s Jeremiah, for example …’

  Hatton had shaken his head as they’d walked the lanes in Hampshire. Yes, he knew his sister was engaged to what his family thought to be a proper doctor, but his mind was made up. The intricacies of muscle, organs, sinews which made up the molecular puzzle of Man was all he was intent on. Forensics, a word barely understood outside the mortuary room, would come later.

  Roumande walked briskly to a large enamel sink at the back of the mortuary room, where he picked up the bar of carbolic and lathered his hands, the acidic stink rising up into the air. Taking a nail brush, he carefully scrubbed away any traces of the victim’s flesh from his fingers. He’d hung a shaving mirror, at the request of Professor Hatton, and peered at himself.

  Unlike Hatton, not so young any more, and he was tired. But he knew this was where he belonged. This was where he was most himself, if he could dare think such a thing. Madame Roumande would have laughed at such thoughts, and as he looked at the little cadaver now, just a calico form, he felt chastened, thinking of his own five children. And though he had jested about it, his lodging rooms were a long way from the rookeries. Not geographically speaking, granted, but in every other way. His house was cosy and paid for on time, once a month, every month, and had been for years. His oldest boy was twelve. His eldest daughter, barely ten. He shook his head in disgust and reminded himself to ask Adams why the child had come here yesterday with not even a question. And she was not the first they’d seen like this. Unlike this Lady Bessingham, whose death would be more than noted. She would be investigated, contemplated, eulogised even.

  ‘Are you coming out into the yard, Albert?’

  ‘Like you, Professor, I’m not a great partaker of tobacco, but I could do with some air. By the way, I’m interested to know what you make of our Inspector.’

  Hatton smiled, indulging his friend. ‘I think he’ll do well enough, and more importantly, we’ll earn some badly needed guineas for our coffers. Who knows? An annual income of five hundred a year? Perhaps, even a Scotland Yard retainer?’

  ‘So, you think a permanent contract with The Yard is possible, then?’ Roumande turned the collar up on his coat. ‘It would certainly help. Our supplies are as low as ever. But do you know, Professor, his face is familiar to me. I’m sure he used to work in Spitalfields, though perhaps it’s just his likeness I remember from the crime pages. Do you sometimes get that sensation, Adolphus? Of thinking you have met someone before, but cannot place them?’

  ‘Every time I look in the mirror, Albert. But come, you’ll scrub your face away. Did you hear Mr Broderig say he’s a collector? Can you imagine? He must have seen some incredible things. He must have travelled far and wide.’

  ‘Indeed,’ said Roumande, ‘I wasn’t aware it was a profession, but thought it more of a hobby. But then, unlike you, Adolphus, I’m not an educated man. I know little of that science.’

  Outside the air hummed and the yard gate moaned. The four men gathered in a round, stamped their feet, and kept their heads down, shielded by their hats from icy blasts.

  ‘Aaah, Professor,’ Adams spoke first. ‘If you don’t want baccy, have a nip of this. Mister Broderig brought it.’

  Broderig, still pale from the autopsy, said, ‘Go ahead, Professor. In Dayak, it’s called tuak. Rice wine.’

  Hatton was intrigued and took a gulp from the hip flask thrust towards him. ‘It’s the right stuff in this weather. Thank you, Mr Broderig.’ Broderig nodded and beckoned Roumande to take some.

  ‘I hear you’re a specimen collector, Mr Broderig,’ said Roumande. ‘I was saying to the Professor that I didn’t know it was an actual profession.’

  ‘It’s my chosen vocation. I’ve recently returned from Borneo, less than a month ago. Lady Bessingham was one of my principal patrons.’ Broderig knocked back a slug. ‘We wrote to each other when I was on my travels. Our correspondence should be somewhere in the house. Perhaps you have seen these particular letters, Inspector? They are very personal to me, and they were distinctive, written on parchment from the depths of a tropical forest.’

  The Inspector shook his head at this. ‘No, Mr Broderig. We found nothing along those lines. Parchment, you say?’

  Broderig, his face clouding with thought, repeated, a little more agitated, ‘As I said, they are private and all that I have left of her. I will want them back again, as soon as possible. Are you sure you have looked everywhere?’ He bit his bottom lip, clearly worried as to their whereabouts. ‘Searched every nook and cranny of the house?’

  ‘You’ll get them back if we find them, Mr Broderig. But speaking of correspondence, do you know if she wrote to any other scientists? I understand she courted controversy when it came to ideas. Do you know a little more of what your father referred to last night?’

  But Broderig had turned away and was looking back towards the morgue, lost for a moment before shaking his head and saying, ‘I really do want those letters back, Inspector. She would have wanted me to have them. My poor Katherine …’ He pushed his hand towards his mouth, his lip trembling, his voice lowered. ‘I have dissected many things. I have seen death, but what we have just witnessed …’

  ‘We can talk later, Mr Broderig. If this pains you.’

  He shook his head. ‘No, Inspector, I’m here for this. But please …’ He gathered himself and turned back to face them. ‘You asked me, did Lady Bessingham court controversy? There was one piece of work, but I was abroad at the time. It involved a Dr Ignatius Finch and the topic was the Nature of Man. His conclusions upset her, but controversy is a debatable thing, because it really depends which side of the fence you sit on.’

  ‘You mean Science or Religion, Mr Broderig?’ Hatton was beginning to think he understood this man.

  ‘Exactly, Professor. He’s based in Cambridge now. I’ve never been to any of his lectures, although rumour has it, like me, he’s an avid collector of butterflies. I had a mind to show him one or two of my specimens, but I’m in no mood for it now. I don’t have the heart.’

  ‘Please, Mr Broderig, come out of the wind, sir.’ Adams steered him towards a small outhouse used for stacking tools. Hatton and Roumande
followed and the four men huddled even closer.

  ‘I’m uncomfortable offering an opinion on a man I barely know, but Katherine often had soirees when she was in London, scientific gatherings, and I understand he attended one or two.’

  The Inspector lit a cigarette. Hatton, intrigued by this talk of science, urged him, ‘Please, Mr Broderig. Tell us all you know.’

  ‘Very well, Professor, but it’s little. Dr Finch, I believe, is working on a radical theory of transmutation. The idea being that we are all animal. That we share the same instincts, good and bad. His theorising is, of course, an extension of other people’s work, but apparently going a great deal further than many would dare. Lady Bessingham wrote to me in Borneo and made mention of his thinking, which I understand saw him drummed out of University College. Katherine was rarely shocked but she seemed greatly upset. I suggested that if she was unenamoured with his thinking, she should simply cut him off. After all, it’s the patron’s prerogative.’

  Hatton nodded, feeling his face redden, because the same had occurred to his work in forensics, many times.

  The Inspector randomly lit a Swan. ‘Well then, perhaps we should see this Dr Finch, if he’s as controversial as you say he is. And to Cambridge, of all places. My old stomping ground, but we cannot just go hurtling into a college, unannounced. Perhaps, Mr Broderig, you would be prepared to take us there and make a formal introduction? As Lady Bessingham’s friend?’

  The young man nodded. ‘I studied at Trinity and I would be happy to help.’

  The Inspector sucked up the last dregs of his tobacco. ‘I’d better get back to The Yard. The Commissioner’s already on my back about this missing maid, and there’s work to do if we’re going to keep this out of the press.’ He turned to Hatton. ‘Report on my desk tomorrow, Professor. I have more than my superiors to answer to on a case like this.’ Adams pulled his coat around himself a little tighter against the bitter chill. ‘And perhaps you would like to join us on a short trip to Cambridge, if Mr Broderig can arrange it? It would be a good opportunity for us to get to know each other a little better.’

  And heaving the whining gate open, Adams and Broderig headed off down the road, soon disappearing into a flurry of white.

  Hatton turned to Roumande, peering under his frosty brim. ‘That gate needs oiling, Albert. Perhaps another one of your begging letters wouldn’t go amiss? We could do with a new one, frankly. It’s embarrassing, and hardly demonstrates us at the helm of our profession. Well, never mind. It’s almost noon and we’ve a heap of work to do, but we’ve been offered an opportunity here. I really think so.’

  The day in the cutting room was finally over and Professor Hatton’s walk was against the wind. Up ahead, the lights at Number 14 Gower Street were welcoming as Hatton looked at his pocket watch again. The filigree face of his gold Swiss timer said it was just gone ten and that Mrs Gallant would still be up waiting for him, although her other tenants would be out in restaurants, gentlemen’s clubs, or already asleep. Hatton sometimes wished for a life that was more conventional than the one pathology afforded. Or so he told himself on these long walks back from the morgue. He could have taken a carriage, but walking allowed time for contemplation and reminded him that there was indeed a world outside St Bart’s, where people lived. Where they argued, laughed, raised families, had passions. He saw the results, but did he really live that life himself? Not yet, he thought. But maybe one day, soon.

  He turned the key in the lock to be met by the usual greeting of Mrs Gallant’s King Charles spaniel baring its teeth and snarling at him.

  ‘He likes you. He really does, Professor. Shall I take your coat, sir? I’ve got some soup ready. Stop it, Archie. Really, the dog is very bad. Aren’t you, Archie, dear?’

  Hatton’s smile was weak and he often gave the dog a sharp kick, but not in full view of the owner, who this evening was wearing a full-skirted brocade of orange tartan. She’d worn it specially, because Mrs Gallant loved Professor Hatton only second to her dog, and often wondered to herself that if she was ten years younger, or perhaps twenty, and a dress size smaller, or perhaps several, he might one day sweep her up into his arms and declare, ‘Mrs Gallant, it’s more than your economical soup I’m after.’ But luckily for Hatton, no such thought had ever occurred to him. He was oblivious to her head tilts, her dips, her special favours, and the jealous stares of the older tenants at the lodging house, who he thought were very welcome to her.

  ‘No soup, Mrs Gallant. Not tonight. I ate at the morgue.’

  Professor Hatton went upstairs and closed the door behind him. Somewhere along the corridor a piano could be heard. Keys played, off scale.

  His bachelor rooms were comfortable enough. One room adjoining another, the latter room benefiting from a huge sash window, a desk, an easy chair, but very little else save his medical journals.

  He ran his finger along a shelf until he found the thing he was looking for, which was a small wooden box. No Strombus gigas or anything so impressive, but to Hatton this box had no need for grand dimensions to be of value. It simply was so.

  He opened it to reveal a shell, too delicate for words. Too delicate for touch. Nestled in cloth, an angel coloured nautilus which, with barely a thumb press, would shatter into a thousand pieces. A crystalline wafer, gone. Dead, like the creature who had once lived there, and beneath the shell, a small piece of paper. Not a love letter, but a list of facts, written in the bold hand of a child. Not much older than the girl today in the mortuary he’d been, when on a glorious day one summer, he’d found the shell washed up on Wittering Beach. Professor Hatton smiled to himself at the memory, but at the same time was troubled. To smash a woman’s skull? To hear it shatter? And for what? Hatton knew the dangers of being a freethinker. Lady Bessingham had been writing before she died; forensics had proven it. And Mr Broderig had grown so agitated when he spoke of their correspondence. He’d been pale from the autopsy, of course, but it was more than that. Broderig seemed worried, a little desperate even. So, thought Hatton, putting the nautilus back in the box, where were the letters now?

  Sarawak

  June 4th, 1855

  Dear Lady Bessingham,

  The mail boat arrives this afternoon and so I decided to sit down once more and put pen to paper. Suffice to say, you would not recognise me, dear lady. I am already liberally freckled and my hair is turning blond. I have grown a fine set of burnished whiskers to give the impression that I know more of this collector’s trade than is entirely true. Whiskers, the longer the better it seems, have two excellent uses in this climate. Firstly, they impress upon the Dayaks that I have some age and some authority. The men are practically hairless and cannot grow a beard. Secondly, the whiskers keep the bugs and flies off my chin. Because if there is one thing I cannot get used to, it is the biting and infernal scratching which is part of my life here along the marshy banks of the Sarawak River. And I have been warned, if one does not take the right precautions, the impact on my body can be grave indeed. I have therefore followed the advice of my friend and companion Mr Emmerich Mann (who, by the way, is a very erudite German) and taken to swallowing quantities of powdered quinine, washed down with generous amounts of rice wine.

  Perhaps I should describe this place to you? My house is quite basic. Built on stilts to keep the rains out, its sides are made of ironwood. The floor creaks deliciously under my bare feet as I pad about, and as this hut was once a rice store, it is embellished with some wondrous carvings. The Dayaks believe that rice has a soul and that they must worship it to keep evil spirits away, and so you see, I am protected not just by my little talisman but also by the twisted serpents which curl around the roof.

  The hut sits on the edge of a forest by a river which curls towards a pearl-white beach. And what better place to immerse the intellect and soul? The river gives me endless pleasure, and I often sit here and watch bright-green butterflies settle on the ground fluttering their petrol wings in unison, like some orchestra of colour. There are anci
ent turtles in the river and dolphins which rise and click, as if they’re laughing at my open-mouthed amazement.

  But perhaps the most bizarre of my neighbours, Mr Mann aside (I jest here, madam), are the mudskippers (Periophthalmodon schlosseri). Are they fish? Or are they lizards? They have gills but live above the water, and astonishingly walk along the land. They are fish that walk. This is the truth, and it is a truth which begs a question. When God created the mudskipper, could he not make up his mind?

  And I wonder if these little fellows would travel well, for I’d love to take them back to England so that we could all admire their qualities. They are four inches long, or thereabouts, and have the face of a fish. Their bodies are slimy and wet, and they have fins and tails, but spend much of their time hopping from place to place or wiggling through primordial splendour.

  Nature isn’t tamed here, as it is in Ashbourne. It bursts out and clamours. It creeps, weaves, and glistens.

  From time to time, I wander the mile into Sarawak, a great sprawling stretch of bustling buildings and people, so different from my forest. And it’s here that I get my provisions and have been able to build up quite a comprehensive collection of equipment which I will be taking on to Simunjan. I have now in my possession a sturdy camp bed, a compass, a selection of fish hooks, a barometer, ammunition, a gun, and, of course, spirits for preserving the specimens I hope to capture upriver.

  Armed with your letters of introduction, I was invited to a party held at the gardens of the British Consul. The gathering was most enjoyable – delicious pastries, English tea, dainty sandwiches, ladies dressed in flounces beguiling one with idle chit-chat. Pleasant enough but more interesting, a small, rather ramshackle collection of Dutchmen caught my eye, for they were scribbling in their notebooks and chattering animatedly about something in the foliage.