Satan himself must lord over these lost souls. I didn’t know what could be worse than Hell, or this place, but wished a thousand terrible deaths on the blackguards responsible for such cruelty. These were people and they deserved to be treated as such.
Grabbing a threadbare blanket from the floor, I shook it out, allowing dust motes to swirl in the pale light streaming in from the bars on the door. The cell was in the supposed heart of this place, yet there was a chill here that hadn’t been present in the humid corridor. I approached my uncle slowly, not wanting to startle him, but desperately curious to learn what he was repeatedly whispering.
The closer I got, the thicker the odor clung to molecules in the air. It smelled as though he hadn’t bathed in the last two weeks and was using the floor to relieve himself. I fought a bout of rising nausea. His blond mustache was long and unkempt, meeting new facial hair growth in haggard tangles. There was something strange about his eyes, apart from their unfocused, mad glaze. He looked terrified.
After draping the blanket around his shoulders, I knelt down, inspecting him closer. That’s when I noticed the upturned bowl of slop and strange consistency of it. My blood turned icy as the Thames in winter, freezing the rivers and tributaries of my veins in sickening waves. I’d kill whoever did this. I would slay the miserable beast so violently, I’d make our Whitechapel murderer seem like a harmless kitten playing with a ball of intestinal string once I was through with them.
“He’s been drugged.” I glared at Blackburn as if he had a personal hand in the matter. Which, since he’d arrested him, it could be argued he had.
He slowly crossed the room and crouched beside me, avoiding my accusing stare. It wasn’t uncommon for the so-called insane to be given tonics to calm their minds, but my uncle was neither insane nor in need of such medication.
“God only knows what this powder is capable of,” I said. “Can’t you at least protect him while he’s in here? What good are you, or do you simply excel at being terrible?”
Blackburn flushed. “In a place like this, intoxicants are often the only way of keeping the peace…” His voice trailed off as I glared at him. “It’s inexcusable, Miss Wadsworth. I assure you, it wasn’t done with malice. Most everyone here is dosed with… experimental serums.”
“Wonderful. I feel so much better.” I tugged a ribbon from my hair, then tore a length of fabric from the bottom of my skirts and scooped some of the goo into my makeshift cloth bundle before tying it. I’d bring it back to Uncle’s laboratory and test it for poisons or lethal toxins. I didn’t trust anyone with telling me the truth. It might be a harmless tonic given to “most everyone” or it might be something worse.
Anyone who could administer something like this to a healthy man was too foul and tainted to be trustworthy. Blackburn fell into that same category.
Sitting back on my heels, I peered into my uncle’s face. “Uncle Jonathan, it’s me, Audrey Rose. Can you hear me?”
Uncle was awake but might as well have been sleeping with his eyes open. He didn’t see me or anyone else in the room, only whatever images were playing in his own mind. I waved my hand in front of his face but he didn’t so much as blink.
His lips moved, and I could just make out what he’d been repeating since we first stepped into his cell. He was saying his full name, Jonathan Nathaniel Wadsworth, as if it were the answer to all the mysteries of the universe.
Nothing useful then.
I gently shook him, ignoring the wave of disappointment crashing around me.
“Please, Uncle. Please look at me. Say something. Anything.”
I paused, waiting for some sign he’d heard me, but he only chanted his name and giggled, rocking back and forth so hard it was aggressive.
My eyes pleaded with him to look at me, to respond, but nothing broke the trance he was in. Tears of frustration welled up. How dare they do this to my uncle. My brave, brilliant uncle. I clutched his shoulders, shaking him harder, not caring how abysmal I must look to Blackburn. I was a terrible creature. I was selfish and scared and didn’t care who knew it.
I needed my uncle. I needed him to help me exonerate him, so we could stop a madman from a murder spree that surely wasn’t over yet.
“Wake up! You must fight your way out of this.” A sob broke in my throat and I shook him until my own teeth rattled. I couldn’t lose him, too. Not after losing Mother to death, and Father to both laudanum and grief. I needed someone to stay. “I cannot do this without you! Please.”
Blackburn reached over, gently pulling my hands away. “Come. I’ll fetch a doctor to watch after him. There isn’t anything more we can do for him tonight. Once the drug is out of his system, he’ll be able to speak with us.”
“Oh?” I asked, wiping my face with the back of my hand. “How can we be sure this doctor of yours isn’t the one who administered this… cruelty to begin with?”
“I apologize, Miss Wadsworth. I’m fairly positive it was just a routine procedure,” he said. “Know this—I’ll make sure everyone is aware there’ll be a steep penalty if your uncle is dosed again.”
His tone and the expression darkening his features were menacing enough to make me believe him. Satisfied as much as I could be, I allowed Blackburn to guide me from the cell, but not before I kissed the top of Uncle’s head good-bye. My tears had already dried when I whispered, “By my blood, I will make this right or die trying.”
Once we were back in the carriage, Blackburn gave the driver my address in Belgrave Square. I’d had enough of men telling me where I was going, and rapped my knuckles on the side of the carriage, startling them both. I didn’t care what Nathaniel wanted, what Aunt Amelia would say, or what Blackburn would think of me.
“Actually, you can drop me at Piccadilly Street,” I said. “There’s someone I need to speak with urgently.”
London Necropolis Railway, c. 19th century
EIGHTEEN
NECROPOLIS RAILWAY
THOMAS CRESSWELL’S FLAT,
PICCADILLY STREET
25 SEPTEMBER 1888
I stood half a block away, hiding, as Thomas opened the door to his flat then peered around, looking as sharply put together as if it were nine in the morning instead of nearly ten at night.
I wondered if he ever looked unkempt or frazzled. Perhaps his hair was permanently plastered to the side of his head for less hassle. My brother ought to take a lesson.
I watched silently, gathering courage to walk over to him, but some innate force whispered for me to remain hidden. I half expected him to come marching over, but he didn’t notice me standing half in the shadows several yards away.
I’d lied and told Blackburn that Thomas lived two blocks down and had been slowly making my way toward the correct address.
I wasn’t sure what I was doing here so late at night and was collecting my thoughts. Silly fears had bubbled up. What if the girls at tea were wrong and he did live with his family? They’d be scandalized by my unchaperoned presence at this hour.
It’s not as though he’d offered me his address. I’d found it in one of Uncle’s ledgers and was contemplating simply going home. Now I was hesitating because he was acting… suspiciously.
I held my breath, certain Thomas had somehow spotted me or deduced my arrival, but his attention never touched on my location. He flipped the collar of his overcoat up, then strode down the gaslit street, his footsteps purposely quiet.
“Where are you off to?” I whispered.
Fog hovered in steamy puffs, obscuring everything from the ground up. All too quickly I lost sight of him. Cool fingers of fear slid down my spine, coaxing gooseflesh to rise. Though it was a fashionable neighborhood during the daytime, I didn’t want to be stuck alone when everyone shuttered up for the evening.
Gripping my skirts, I scurried after Thomas, carefully sticking to shadows between the lamps.