The first letter that had been carved into the flesh was a sharp-angled
“C-A-R-I-T-A-S,” Quill said, “in case you were wondering.”
“I can spell, damn it!” Hawkwood stared at the cuts. “What I don’t know is what the hell it’s doing there. Is it even a word?”
Quill said calmly, “I believe it’s Latin.”
“Latin?”
“It means charity.”
Hawkwood turned.
Quill gave what could have been interpreted as an apologetic shrug. “Latin studies; one of the consequences of a classical education, though a necessity when considering a career in medicine.”
Hawkwood returned his attention to the body.
“This is not something I’ve come across before,” Quill said. “You?”
Hawkwood found his voice. “Not like this.”
“Like this?” Quill countered sharply.
“When I was in Spain, the guerrilleros used to mutilate the bodies of dead French soldiers as a warning to others.”
“They wrote messages in the flesh?”
“No, usually they’d cut something off. Noses, fingers, cocks. It scared the Frogs shitless.”
“I can imagine,” Quill said, adding pointedly, “Not quite the same though.”
“No,” Hawkwood agreed. “Not quite.”
Quill let out a sigh. “But bad enough.”
“Yes.”
Quill held Hawkwood’s gaze. His expression was even darker than it had been before.
“Did you find anything else?” Hawkwood asked, wondering what other horrors might be lurking.
“No,” Quill said. “Mercifully. She was not violated – not as we understand the term, at any rate, though my examination did reveal that she was no stranger to coition.”
There followed a moment’s pause then Quill chewed his lip and said pointedly, “Fore and aft.”
Offering a contrite shrug for having used the phrase, the surgeon made a face. “Your suspicions regarding her likely profession would, therefore, appear to have merit.”
“Then cover her up, for Christ’s sake.” Hawkwood stepped away from the table, allowing Quill to draw the sheet over the body. He turned back. “Forgive me, I didn’t mean to snap.”
“No apology required,” Quill said.
“I want him,” Hawkwood said. “I want the bastard who did this.”
“Him?” Quill said.
“Him. Them.”
God help us if it’s a “her”. What kind of woman would do this to another?
“Ah, but it’s not just the ‘who’ though, is it?” Quill said. “It’s the rest of it. And I’m afraid I can’t help you with that conundrum. My responsibility extends only as far as determining the cause of death, not the persons or reasoning behind it. My domain is the ‘how’. The ‘who’ and the ‘why’ are your department.”
Thanks to Magistrate bloody Turton, and a sexton with a conscience, Hawkwood thought bitterly.
“That’s not to say I’m not intrigued, of course,” Quill added, “as a medical man. But it ain’t my field. You want an answer as to why someone should carve anything into some poor woman’s belly, you don’t need a surgeon; you need a mind doctor.” The surgeon cocked his head. “Know any mind doctors?”
Hawkwood stared at Quill. Quill stared back at him. “What?”
“As a matter of fact,” Hawkwood said. “I believe I do.”
It had been winter when Hawkwood had last visited the building and there had been a heavy frost on the ground. It was winter once again, or at least the tail end of it, and while the weather was not as harsh, it was immediately apparent that the intervening months had not been kind, for the place appeared even more decrepit and run down than it had before.
Segments of the surrounding wall looked as if they were about to collapse, while the trees, which, during the summer, would have formed a natural screen, appeared to be suffering from some form of incurable blight, with many of their lower branches having been lopped off by the neighbouring residents for use as domestic kindling. Moorfields, the area of open ground which fronted the building, had all the characteristics of a freshly ploughed pasture. Subsidence, having bedevilled the site for decades, had taken a more drastic toll of late and the ponds which had formed in the resulting depressions had almost doubled in size. Most of the iron railings that had once ringed the common land had disappeared.
The twin statues were still there, guarding the entry gates: both male – one wearing shackles, head drawn back; the other reclining as if having just awoken from a troubled sleep. Their naked torsos, stained black over the years, were splattered with ash and pigeon droppings. Steeling himself, Hawkwood ducked beneath them, crossed the courtyard and headed for the main door. Tugging on the bell pull, he waited. The eye-hatch slid aside and a pale, unshaven face appeared in the opening.
“Officer Hawkwood, Bow Street Public Office; here to see Apothecary Locke.”
“You expected?” a gravelly voice wheezed.
Hawkwood had anticipated the question and raised his tipstaff so that the brass crown was displayed. “I don’t need an appointment.”
After a moment’s hesitation, the hatch scraped shut. The sound of several large bolts being withdrawn was followed by the rasp of wood on stone as the door was hauled back. Hawkwood took a quick gulp of air and stepped through the gap. The door closed ominously behind him.
Welcome to Bedlam … again.
The last time he’d called upon Robert Locke, the apothecary’s office had been on the first floor. To get there, he’d been escorted through the main gallery, past cell doors that had opened on to scenes more suited to a travelling freak show than a hospital wing. The sight of distressed patients – male and female – chained to walls, many squatting in their own filth, and the pitiful looks they’d given him as he’d gone past, had stayed in the mind for a long time afterwards, as had their cries of distress at spying a stranger in their midst. He was considerably relieved, therefore, when, this time, the unsmiling, blue-coated attendant avoided the central staircase and led him down a dank and draughty ground-floor corridor towards the rear of the building, the uneven floorboards creaking beneath their combined tread.
While the route might have altered, the smells had not. The combination of rotting timbers, damp straw, stale cabbage and human sewage were as bad as he remembered and easily equalled the odours at the bottom of the grave-pit and the stench in Quill’s dead house. It was further indication – as if the exterior signs had not been proof enough – that Bethlem Hospital had reached its final stage of decomposition.
This