The Anatomy Of Ghosts

11

Philip Whichcote stood in the doorway and gnawed his forefinger. He did not like looking at the bed but he could not stop himself staring at it. It was an ugly, old-fashioned thing, too big for the room; Sylvia’s mother, who had been inordinately proud of it, had given it to them as a wedding present. The bare mattress rested on the wooden skeleton of the frame. The four carved posts at the corners supported a canopy that had always reminded him of the top of a hearse.

Here Sylvia had lain, night after night. Here he had lain with her. Her warm body had pressed down on that mattress, and he had pressed his body against hers. Night after night.

The still, silent room oppressed him for more reasons than he cared to count, but the bed was the worst part of it. He would like to have been able to order them to break it up, take it downstairs to the kitchen garden and burn it, along with the mattress. Instead he would have to sell it for what he could get.

Whichcote went next door to Sylvia’s sitting room. He walked rapidly to the nearest window and pulled up the blind. Midday sunshine streamed into the room. Motes of dust danced in the air. He tugged the dust sheets from the furniture. The bureau bookcase was a handsome piece, which had come from his great-uncle. It should be worth something. He pulled the volumes at random from the shelves. Her books should fetch a few guineas at least as well. He’d call in someone from Merrill’s or Lunn’s and see what they would offer.

He opened the bureau and poked his fingers into its recesses and compartments, hoping he had overlooked something of value the last time he looked. There were rusty nibs, paper, dried-up ink, sealing wax and string. Sylvia had left surprisingly little trace of herself. It was as though she had barely existed. She had spent half her life writing to other women, to her mother in the country, to Elinor Carbury at Jerusalem. But she had not kept the letters she received. She had not kept a diary, either. There was nothing left of her.

Dead. Dead. Dead.

He closed the bureau flap. Behind him, there was a squeak as Augustus cleared his throat. The footboy aimed to produce the discreet cough of a well-trained servant advising his master of his presence. But nature decreed otherwise.

‘What is it now?’

‘If you please, your honour, Mr Mulgrave is below.’

‘Send him to me in the study.’

Whichcote locked the door leading to Sylvia’s apartments and went downstairs. Almost at once, Augustus announced Mulgrave. The gyp came slowly into the room, his body leaning to the left as it always did because his left leg was shorter than the right.

‘Well?’ Whichcote demanded.

Mulgrave shrugged. ‘Not much change, sir. Mr Oldershaw is quiet enough, they say. They keep him dosed up so he’s sleeping most of the time. He’s eating like a horse. But there’s no life in him, any more than that there sofa.’

‘Do his attendants believe their master will cure him?’

‘They say the doctor’s mended a lot of people.’ Mulgrave smiled. ‘Made a deal of money out of it at any rate. But he don’t seem to have got very far with Mr Oldershaw. He shouts at him, like at the others – says do this, do that, do the other thing, kiss my arse – but mostly Mr Oldershaw just sits there. Or he starts yelling and crying fit to burst himself.’

‘Mind your tongue. Is that all?’

‘Still having these violent fits, sir, if that’s what you’re asking. Not very often, but he’s a big lad, Mr Frank, and you don’t want to get in his way when the fit is upon him.’

‘When do you next visit?’

‘Tuesday, sir, unless I hear contrariwise beforehand. Usual thing – shave him and dress his hair, brush his clothes, see to his linen. One thing, though – I hear Mr Holdsworth’s been to Barnwell too.’

‘Her ladyship’s man?’

‘Yes.’ Mulgrave frowned. ‘Dark horse, that one.’

‘I should like to hear more about him. Come and see me after you have visited Barnwell again – or before if you have information, especially about Holdsworth.’

‘As your honour pleases.’

Whichcote turned away and stared out of the grimy window. ‘You may go.’

Mulgrave coughed. ‘Begging your pardon, sir, but there’s the little matter of my bill.’

‘Not now.’

‘It’s mounting up, sir.’

‘I gave you something the other day,’ Whichcote snapped.

‘A couple of guineas on account in late March, sir.’ Mulgrave took out a pocketbook and opened it. ‘March twenty-ninth, sir, to be precise. That was when the account was thirteen pounds, eight shillings and fourpence. Bit more than that now, I’m afraid, not far off twenty pounds.’

‘Damn it, you shall have it. But not now, man.’

Mulgrave held his ground. ‘Begging your pardon, sir, but these last few months, I can’t help noticing you’re not as flush as you were. You’ve sent the footmen away, haven’t you? There’s only that boy to wait on you, and the women.’

‘My domestic arrangements are nothing to do with you, and I don’t choose to discuss them. Leave me.’

‘And then there’s also your note of hand, sir. When there was the trouble with the livery stable.’

Whichcote held back his temper. ‘Your bill isn’t due yet. Anyway, the money is as safe as the Bank of England. This is merely a question of a temporary shortage of ready money in the house.’

‘Oh yes, sir, I don’t doubt it. Why, I dare say you could make a completely fresh start if you mortgaged this place, or even sold it, for it must -’

‘Damn your eyes, Mulgrave.’

‘Listen, sir, I don’t want to be disobliging, and you and me, sir, we’ve known each other for a long time. But a man must live. I’ve got my dependants, same as you.’ Mulgrave raised his eyebrows very high. ‘I could apply to her ladyship, I suppose.’

‘What ladyship?’ Whichcote said in a voice hardly louder than a whisper, knowing the answer before he asked the question.

‘Why, Lady Anne, of course, sir. Seeing as I’ve done so much for Mr Oldershaw since he was admitted at Jerusalem, and now especially at Dr Jermyn’s. I ain’t sent in my bill yet. Anyhow, her ladyship might find it a comfort just to talk to me about how he does.’ He patted his waistcoat. ‘I feel for her, sir. I’m a parent myself.’

‘There’s no need to trouble her,’ Whichcote said. ‘As for the bill, if you wish, I shall look into the matter directly and see if we cannot manage something further on account.’

‘In full, if you please, sir. With the note of hand, it comes to a little under eighty pounds.’ Mulgrave opened his pocketbook once again. ‘I have the exact figure here, sir.’

‘Something on account, I said,’ Whichcote repeated.

It was as though the ground itself were giving way beneath him. One winter’s day, when he was an undergraduate, he had been shooting in the Fens and the earth beneath him had done just that: what had seemed solid became liquid mud, drawing him down and down and down. If a party of Fenmen had not been within earshot, he would have drowned. They had pulled out his shivering body in its sodden, stained clothes. They had stood around him and laughed.

‘Yes, sir,’ Mulgrave said. ‘In full. You could raise something on the house, I’m sure. Do it easy.’

‘Get out,’ Whichcote said. ‘Just go. Now.’

Mulgrave moved unhurriedly to the door. Before opening it, he stopped and glanced around the room. ‘I’m sure old Jeevons would oblige in a trice, sir. You know him? Corner of Slaughterhouse Lane. Very reasonable, all things considered. There’s always a way, your honour, always a way.’

They walked side by side up the broad, shallow stairs. A clock ticked in the cool darkness at the back of the hall. The air smelled of beeswax, lemon juice and vinegar. The house radiated normality so powerfully and so perfectly that it made normality itself seem sinister.

On the landing, Jermyn paused. ‘You may not get much sense out of the poor fellow,’ he murmured. ‘As his physician, I cannot sufficiently stress the importance of his treatment continuing. His treatment here, that is – it is imperative not to uproot him.’

A private asylum was a commercial enterprise. Holdsworth doubted that Jermyn’s motives in setting up the establishment were solely or even primarily scientific, let alone philanthropic. He wondered what Lady Anne was paying the man for her son’s board, lodging and treatment, and for all the sundries that no doubt accumulated when a young gentleman of Mr Oldershaw’s standing was residing here. Five guineas a week? Six? If Jermyn had half a dozen patients like this, he must be making a handsome competence. If he had a dozen, say, his income would outstrip that of most landed gentlemen.

On the first floor, the doors leading off the landing were closed. Jermyn entered the nearest on the right without knocking. Holdsworth followed him into a large bedchamber. There were two windows, which overlooked the pleasure grounds at the back of the house. The air smelled sweet.

A broad, muscular man rose to his feet from a chair by the door. Jermyn raised his eyebrows, a silent question. The man nodded. They both looked at a youth sitting at a card table in the corner farthest from the door. He was concentrating on something in front of him. He did not look up.

Jermyn advanced towards his patient. ‘Well, Frank? And how do you do today?’

The young man did not answer. Holdsworth could not yet see his face. He was dressed plainly but well in black. Like many young men he wore his own hair.

Jermyn beckoned Holdsworth to come forward and turned back to his patient. ‘Ah, good, Frank, very good indeed. I like to see you engaged in a useful activity.’

As he moved across the room, Holdsworth noticed a sturdy wooden armchair standing against the wall near the fireplace. There were broad leather straps attached to the arms, the legs and the back. The straps had the supple, flexible appearance that leather acquires with use.

On a woman, Frank Oldershaw’s face would have been called beautiful. He was looking downwards, frowning slightly, like an angel brooding over the imperfections of humanity. On the table before him were several dozen small wooden cubes. Each face of each cube had a little picture on it. Six of them were lined up on the table, with the visible faces matching those of their neighbours so a broader picture was beginning to emerge. The cubes looked unexpectedly familiar, and suddenly Holdsworth recognized them for what they were. They formed an instructive puzzle for use in nurseries. The pieces could be assembled to make six different pictures. The markings on the little engravings ensured that each piece must match its neighbour. One was a genealogical table showing the kings and queens of England back to King Arthur. Another illustrated episodes from the Old Testament, with particular emphasis placed on the prophets, arrayed in their proper order. Frank Oldershaw was working on a table of useful knowledge, rationally displayed. Holdsworth had stocked the puzzle in the Leadenhall shop for a few months but it had not sold well.

‘Frank, you must interrupt your labours for a moment. There is a visitor to see you.’

Very slowly, Frank placed the cube in his hand on the table and looked up, first at Jermyn, then at Holdsworth.

‘Pray rise, sir,’ Jermyn said. ‘It is what we do in polite society when we are introduced to somebody.’

Slowly, Frank rose to his feet. He was a large youth, nearly as tall as Holdsworth himself though less broad; his movements still had an adolescent gawkiness, as if he had not quite learned to live with the unaccustomed length and weight of his limbs. Despite the beauty of his face, there was nothing effeminate about his appearance. He stood in front of them, shoulders rounded, head lowered. Holdsworth bowed. Frank responded with a twitch of his head.

‘Good,’ Jermyn said. ‘This is very agreeable. We are getting on famously, are we not?’

He paused but no one spoke.

‘Her ladyship has sent Mr Holdsworth down to see you,’ Jermyn went on. ‘Who knows, if you continue as you do for a few more weeks, he may even be able to take you back to London.’

Frank Oldershaw came to life like a sprung trap in a covert. He whirled round, arms outstretched, and swept the wooden pieces of the puzzle from the table. Jermyn stepped back, his face expressionless. Equally abruptly, Frank reversed the direction of his movement. He sent the little table flying into the corner.

The episode was over almost as soon as it had begun. The attendant rushed across the room and grasped Frank in such a powerful hold that he could not move his arms. The young man heaved and strained and stamped. But he could not break the grip.

Jermyn rang a bell in the wall beside the fireplace. The door opened and two more men appeared. Between them they forced Frank into the armchair and strapped him in. All this time no one said a thing. It was as if such episodes were so familiar that there was nothing left to say about them.

Holdsworth picked up the table and set it upright. As he did so, he trod on one of the cubes. He bent down and picked that up too. He put it down on the table. Animal husbandry was uppermost. He turned it over and got the sacrifice of Isaac instead. He looked up suddenly. Frank was staring intently at him.

‘That was very wrong,’ Jermyn said sternly, bringing his face down to the level of Frank’s. ‘You must not allow these fits of temper to master you.’

Frank’s mouth gaped wide. He stuck out his tongue and waggled it from side to side. ‘Quack,’ he said. ‘Quack.’

‘You must apologize,’ Jermyn went on. ‘To me, and of course to Mr Holdsworth, who, as your mother’s emissary, deserves your particular attention. And to poor Norcross, who was obliged to restrain you again.’

Frank bowed his head, shutting them all out.

Jermyn seized his patient by the hair and yanked his head back. Frank stared up into the doctor’s face. ‘Look at me, Frank,’ Jermyn said firmly. ‘Look at me and tell me who is master here.’

Frank screwed his eyes shut, retreating into a private darkness.

Jermyn nodded to Norcross, who came forward, stood behind the chair, and prised open Frank’s eyelids with his thumbs. He pulled back the head so Frank was looking directly into Jermyn’s face, hardly six inches above his own.

‘Look at me,’ Jermyn said. ‘And tell me who is the master here.’

Frank’s eyeballs twitched and rolled as though he were having a fit. He spat at Jermyn. The doctor stood back and carefully hit his patient twice, left palm to right cheek, right palm to left cheek. He took out a handkerchief and wiped spittle from his face and the sleeve of his coat.

‘You are here for your own good,’ Jermyn said in a deep, resonant voice, speaking slowly and rhythmically. ‘It is for your own good that you must obey me in all things. Who is the master here?’

Frank’s tongue appeared briefly between his lips as though he were moistening them. He made a gargling sound deep in his throat.

‘Who is the master here?’ Jermyn repeated, and as he spoke he glanced up at the attendant, who responded by jerking Frank’s head further backward and digging in his thumbs more deeply to the eye sockets.

‘You are,’ Frank burst out, his voice little more than a hoarse whisper.

‘Say it like this,’ Jermyn commanded. ‘ “You are the master here, sir.” ’

‘You – you are – the master here.’

‘Sir!’ roared Jermyn.

‘Sir,’ Frank muttered.

Jermyn stepped back from his patient and Norcross released his hold. The doctor turned smiling to Holdsworth.

‘There you see it, sir,’ he said cheerfully. ‘The modern system of moral management in action. Sooner or later it answers in every case. But you must show them who is master. Everything follows from that.’

Frank’s head fell to his chest. He closed his eyes. The lashes gleamed with moisture.

‘I wish to talk to Mr Oldershaw,’ Holdsworth said.

‘By all means.’ Jermyn waved towards his silent patient. ‘However, I do not think his replies will necessarily be much to the point.’

‘I should prefer to talk to him alone, sir. I have private matters to discuss.’

Jermyn smiled courteously. ‘I do not doubt it, sir. But I cannot permit it.’

Norcross picked up a leather gag from the mantelpiece and looked at Jermyn for instructions.

The doctor shook his head. ‘Later. It is better our visitor should understand what we have to deal with.’

Frank drew a long, sobbing breath. He threw back his head and howled like a wolf.

When the noise had abated, Jermyn turned to Holdsworth. ‘Now, sir,’ he said briskly. ‘Now do you understand?’