The Anatomy of Death Page 18

  “Hurry up then,” Florence said. “Before the bristles dissolve.”

  They held the lanterns close as Jane etched out the letters with a steady hand onto the green. The air around them became filled with the sharp tang of smouldering grass.

  Even Florence had to admit that Jane’s dedication to detail was worth the frustration—the words VOTES FOR WOMEN! were so meticulous, they could have been printed in The Times. Perhaps, she thought, one day those words really would make the headlines. She hoped she would be alive to see it.

  Daisy clapped her hands. “Do you think the PM’s really going to see this?”

  “Do you never listen? He’s playing golf here tomorrow morning, girl. He won’t be able to miss it,” Jane said.

  Florence waved her hand for silence again. “All right, girls, well done—to the clubhouse now. Jane and Daisy, I want you to scout around the building to make sure there are no signs of life, within or without. Check the storage sheds around the back, too, if you can.”

  The two women lifted their skirts and walked briskly towards the gravel parking area and clubhouse beyond.

  “We’ll leave everything we don’t need behind,” Florence said to Olivia as they bent to lift the trunk, much lighter now without the bottle of acid, the water drum, and the bucket.

  The clubhouse loomed magnificently out of the darkness, its Grecian-style front entrance glowing in the moonlight like a temple. How fitting, Florence thought, that one group of oppressors should pay homage in this way to another. She smiled to herself—this lot of oppressors were in for a surprise.

  They placed the trunk carefully at the top of the steps and began to assemble the explosives according to Derwent O’Neill’s instructions. With purple, green, and white ribbons, they tied bundles of dynamite to each of the front pillars and embedded the blasting caps. Then came the tricky part of twisting the blasting caps to the detonator wires. Derwent had made them practise this at Olivia’s flat wearing gloves. At the time, it had gone quite smoothly, but the real thing proved far more of a challenge with nerves and the cold making their hands shake.

  “I wish I could take my gloves off,” Olivia complained.

  “Well, you can’t. Remember what Derwent said about fingerprints?”

  “Sounds like a load of codswallop to me,” Olivia said, soldiering on.

  At last the caps were connected and Olivia began to unravel the spools, trailing the wire first across the parking area, then the defiled eighteenth hole, and finally over the rough towards a small copse. Florence followed behind with the oak detonation box, the last of the objects from the discarded trunk. When studying the plans of the golf course earlier, she had estimated the distance from the front entrance to the copse to be about eighty yards. To her disappointment, she discovered it was closer to a hundred.

  “Blast,” she said. “I’d hoped to use the copse for cover when we detonated the explosives. I should have come during the day and measured it for myself instead of relying on those silly plans.”

  “In this bastion of male supremacy, that would have been harder than what we’re doing now,” Olivia said. “One whiff of woman on the wind and they’d probably have set the hounds on you.”

  “I’m jolly glad they don’t have any hounds. Ah well, no harm done, the place seems deserted enough.”

  They felt more confident now they were away from the clubhouse. With steadier hands, it took only a few seconds to wind the wires under the butterfly screws of the detonator box.

  The moment had almost arrived. Florence’s heart leapt with excitement. All they needed was for Jane and Daisy to return with the all clear. She crouched next to the box, eyed the T-bar, and smiled at Olivia through the shimmering light of the lantern. “Who’s going to do the honours?”

  Olivia reached into her pocket. “I have a penny, we’ll toss for it when the others join us.”

  “What can they be up to? They’re taking an age.”

  “Maybe they found a cat?”

  “Or a canary.”

  A sudden commotion from behind the clubhouse cut short their nervous laughter. Raised men’s voices—shouts and shrill whistles—and then the terrible sound of a woman screaming.

  “Oh my God, they’ve been caught—Daisy! That’s Daisy screaming! What are they doing to her?” Olivia gasped.

  Florence extinguished the lantern and pulled Olivia down to a crouch at her side, holding tightly on to her arm as she struggled to get away. “You won’t do any good,” she said urgently. “You’ll only get arrested, too—remember what Christabel said, we cannot let ourselves get arrested! We are needed on the outside of the bars, where we can do some good.”

  “Hang Christabel, Daisy needs me!” Olivia shook her off and ran from the edge of the copse.

  “Stop, Olivia, please stop!” Florence whispered after her, but in moments the sound of Olivia’s screams joined those of the others. What were they doing to them? She felt terrible holding back, but there was nothing she could do to help them; it was pointless to even try. And the idea of disobeying Christabel’s orders was almost as abhorrent to her as the thought of being arrested again. A Black Maria crackled over the gravel and pulled into the parking area. It must have been waiting close by. Then she realised: It had been waiting for them. Someone had given the game away. She watched with horror as her three friends were bundled into the back of the police vehicle like sacks of coal.

  There was a shout from the portico; the dynamite had been discovered. Silhouettes of uniformed policemen scurried about, lamps casting flickering shadows up the Grecian pillars. Florence watched as a man reached out to grasp one of the bundles of dynamite; saw another pull him roughly back. She swung her gaze to the detonator box. The raised plunger seemed to call out to her. In her head she heard Derwent’s soft lilt: “It’s just a matter of pushing it down, simple as that.” As if pulled by a magnetic force, her hand moved to the box and rested lightly on the T-bar. The mission could still be a success, just a little pressure …

  She pulled her hand back. She couldn’t do it. The men were too close. Their plan had been to blow up an empty building. She could not wilfully injure a fellow creature, even if they were the damned police.

  There were more shouts; they had found the detonator wires, and several police were running towards the copse.

  “Oh, bloody hell!” Florence yanked the wires from the detonator, kicked the box onto its side, and set off at a crashing run through the tangled undergrowth.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  “This might sting a little,” Dody said as she applied the antiseptic to the angry scratches on Florence’s cheek.

  “Ouch—Dody, you did that on purpose!”

  No more tears, dear Florence, please, Dody silently pleaded as she leaned over her sister on the bed. Florence had had far worse injuries than this on the hockey field and not so much as uttered a squeak. “Why should I hurt you on purpose, silly goose?” she said.

  “Because of what I’ve done.”

  “I think you’ve suffered enough from the consequences of your actions, don’t you?”

  “I suppose you’re going to tell your new friend all about this now.”

  “New friend?”

  “That man Pike, the policeman you kept in our house for two nights, the one Annie did all the running about for, and the one, I suspect, that you sneaked to about our operation.”

  Dody clenched her jaw. It was all she could do to restrain herself from increasing the pressure on Florence’s cuts. “Don’t be ridiculous; I knew nothing about this operation of yours other than a suspicion you were all up to something with Derwent O’Neill.” She threw the damp swab into the bowl and began to pack up her equipment, clattering and clanking the enamel bowls together. “If word reached the police, I assure you, it was not from my lips. You never told me what you were planning, or where or when it was to be, which is just as well, because with the benefit of hindsight, perhaps it would have been a good idea if I had told the chief inspe
ctor.”

  Florence leaned back into her pillows and stared at the ceiling in silence.

  This was unusual; her sister always liked to have the last word. As Dody finished putting away her equipment, she thought back to her conversation with Pike by the fire. He had probably known about the operation then; his sergeant would have brought him the information along with his things. Pike’s words of warning had been calculated to sound generalised, but he must have been hoping she would read more into them. Perhaps she would have if she’d known exactly what was going on.

  Florence creased her brows and said in a small voice, “No, you’re right, of course you wouldn’t sneak. I’m sorry to have said such a thing. My head’s in such a muddle, but I do believe you, honestly. And Dody, I’m sorry I was such a pig the other night.”

  “That’s all right, Flo. We were both a bit distraught.”

  “Someone betrayed us, though; the police were tipped off, ready and waiting.” She turned to the clock on the bedside table. “The girls will be in front of the magistrate soon. I must be there to give them moral support.”

  She attempted to swing her legs over the bed, but Dody grabbed them and pushed them back.

  “No, Florence, please don’t go, I beg you,” she cried. It seemed as though she were forever having to restrain people from rushing about before they were ready.

  “If you go, all you will do is betray yourself. Have you looked in the mirror? There are cuts and bruises all over your face, and your foot almost torn to ribbons.”

  Florence made no more attempts to leave the bed. “I lost my shoe crossing a stream,” she said miserably, “and then had to walk half the night to get home.”

  “You forgot your hat, too, by all accounts. No wonder no self-respecting cabbie would pick you up.”

  “A tree branch whisked it off and I didn’t dare stop to retrieve it.”

  “The police probably have it by now, and might even manage to trace it back to you. You can’t risk an appearance at that court.”

  Florence pressed her palms to her eyes. “I feel so awful. I’ve run away and left them to a fate worse than death itself.”

  “You were following orders.” Dody softened her voice. “Sensible orders, too. Besides, darling, you’ve done your bit.”

  “So have they. Oh, Dody, I’m such a miserable, cowardly creature.”

  “Now stop that, you are just working yourself up into a state. The others may have been arrested before, but you are the only one of the group who has endured force-feeding. How could anyone expect you to go through that again—Christabel Pankhurst certainly doesn’t. She needs you working for the cause outside jail, not inside. And I certainly couldn’t bear the thought of you enduring that again.”

  “And I will feel each suffocating shove of the tube with them, I know I will.” Florence began to sob, great gasping sounds that seemed to shake her from the inside out. Dody took her sister in her arms and stroked her rich dark hair until the sobbing ceased and she fell into a fitful sleep.

  Dody heard the telephone bell as she was on her way downstairs and reached it before Annie. The voice was familiar, but so full of fuss and bluster that Dody missed the caller’s name.

  “A woman’s body, Doctor, found swinging from a roof beam; can’t say if it’s suspicious or not. I’d like you to have a look at it before we take it to the morgue.”

  “Is that you, Superintendent Shepherd?”

  “Indeed. I need you now…most inconvenient, the police surgeon and Pike both away with influenza.”

  “Where shall I meet you, sir?” The line crackled, either with interference or Shepherd’s impatience, Dody could not tell which.

  “I’ve dispatched a motor wagon to fetch you.”

  The new housing reforms had yet to reach this East End neighbourhood, Dody observed as she gazed through the window of the motor wagon. The street was dirty and bleak and full of carts and barrows; the police motor wagon was the only motorcar on the road. She sensed that the Royal London Hospital was close by but failed to catch a glimpse of its distinct iron railings owing to the sweep of tenements on each side of the road. She sank back into the squeaking upholstery. She viewed the Royal London with the same yearning a pauper might have outside an inviting upmarket restaurant. Famous for its services to the East End poor, the hospital still barred its doors to female medical students and doctors.

  As they drew up, scattering a group of listless children, a young policeman opened the motor wagon door for her and introduced himself as Constable Blunt.“This way, Doctor,” he said, indicating a doorway behind him. He seemed anxious to get off the street, no doubt because the area was notorious. Nevertheless, Dody remained where she was, looking about her. Blunt cleared his throat. “The lady was found in this one.” He pointed again to the open door.

  “In a moment,” Dody told him. “I need to get a feeling of the environs first.” Even after death, she thought to herself, a place like this would surely cling to the skin like soot.

  Blunt plunged his hands into his coat pockets and stamped his feet. Dody gazed at the old-style tenement block before her. Other than the numbers on the pitted door, nothing could distinguish this set of flats from its neighbours on either side. The rank odour suggested a midden close by, one that took more than just household waste. Victorian tenements such as these lacked the internal conveniences of the new flats that were being constructed elsewhere in London.

  Wooden poles for washing jutted out over the street from balconies on the upper storeys. It was hard to imagine the sun’s weak rays ever reaching this dingy part of the city, where shirts and trousers hung stiff and twisted, as if in a perpetual state of rigor.

  Blunt glanced warily up and down the street. Children chased a hoop down the footpath, while others squatted in doorways and stared vacantly at their more energetic companions. Women passed by carrying pails and jugs to collect water from a standpipe in a nearby alley. The water was only switched on intermittently and they had to take advantage of it while they could, storing it in their rooms for later. Dody had discovered this when she treated the mother of a small child who had drowned in a tub of water stored in their flat. The mother had been admitted to hospital suffering from hysteria, and there was little Dody could do other than offer her sedation.

  The constable broke into Dody’s thoughts. “Please, Doctor, we needs to be upstairs and off the street. If the villains don’t get us, the superintendent will.” He picked up her medical bag, giving her no choice but to follow. “Watch your step, the body’s upstairs, top floor.” She stepped over a pile of rotting vegetable matter, passed through the doorway, and was immediately confronted with a long narrow stairway. Although it was cold, the gloom and fug of the apartment block felt stifling, the skylight at the top of the stairs letting in only a feeble light.

  They came to a landing fronted with multiple doors exuding an unpleasant mixture of the odours of urine and boiled cabbage. Sounds of a bitter domestic argument reached them from behind a door on the next landing, but the constable marched on, seemingly oblivious to the cursing and crashing.

  The last landing was perhaps a little cleaner than those below it. One door was ajar and from it wafted the scent of lavender water.

  “In ’ere, Doctor.” The constable knocked and pushed the door fully open, whereupon Dody was forced to renew her acquaintance with the cigar-chomping, loose-jowled Superintendent Shepherd.

  She tried to take in the scene in the room, but found her view obstructed by his bulk. She suspected this was his way of asserting control; only when he was well and truly ready would he permit her to examine the body. Shepherd was telling her about life in the tenements, speaking to her as if she had only just left school. Dody found herself wishing she were dealing with Pike. While he could be formal and stiff, he would not address her with such condescension.

  “Oh, please,” she said, losing her patience at last, “tell me what you must and then let me examine the body.”

  Shep
herd took a step back and rubbed his strawberry nose. “Yes, very well.” He cleared his throat. “A female colleague of the deceased raised the alarm first thing this morning.” The pomposity of his vocabulary clashed with the rhythms of his London accent. “It was the custom of this lady and the deceased to accompany one another to their place of employment every morning. When the deceased failed to meet her outside, the lady climbed the stairs to the deceased’s room, fearing her friend had taken ill. Upon reaching the landing, she discovered the door unlocked and the deceased woman hanged.”

  “The name of the dead woman, please, Superintendent.”

  “Miss Agatha Treylen. A shipping clerk at St. Katharine docks.”

  Dody kept her face expressionless. She was not going to admit that this was another of her sister’s colleagues—the poor, drab Miss Treylen, whom she had met only once at that WSPU meeting when she’d first returned from Edinburgh. “We’ve not found a note yet.” Shepherd nodded towards Constable Blunt, riffling his way through the drawers of a handsome Chippendale tallboy. An inlaid writing desk near the window looked also to have been recently ransacked, its drawers hanging open. These two fine pieces looked incongruous among the other furnishings: a rag mat, a simple washstand, and a cheap plywood wardrobe. The ashes in the grate had long since died, though somehow the lavender seemed to soften the edge of the bone-aching chill and the scent of death. What circumstances, Dody wondered, could have reduced a woman like Miss Treylen to a place like this?

  Shepherd finally stepped aside. “It looks like suicide, but I need to rule out murder. Hope you can oblige, Doctor.”

  The body had been cut down, and lay stretched out on a narrow iron-framed bed. Next to the bed was an overturned chair, and above this, a cord, possibly from a dressing gown, dangled from a ceiling beam. The cord had been cut through, leaving the noose embedded in the soft flesh of the woman’s throat.

  Suicide seemed to be the most likely explanation; regardless, Dody pushed away the pen and paper Shepherd thrust under her nose. “I am not ready to sign the death certificate yet, Superintendent. I must cover all possibilities first.”