“It’s only one flight, boy. Keep up!”
So he did. Jasper stepped closely behind Norris’s black, polished shoes as they swept into a chemistry laboratory on the second floor. Jasper had seen it dozens of times while working, but on every visit it changed. More and more equipment crowded the tables. The supply closet had gone from being haphazardly strewn with labeled brown bottles to being organized within an inch of its life.
In the center of the room, under milky ceiling lamps, a table was crowded with gas burners, flasks, and glass-stoppered bottles. The scent of biting preservative was far stronger in here. Jasper wrinkled his nose. As soon as he saw Norris observing him, he smoothed his face into an expression of benign calm.
An oddly shaped package wrapped in butcher paper lay on a table by the tall windows, red-and-white-striped twine hanging over the edge. Jasper peered beneath the paper covering and saw several pounds of fresh cow liver oozing burgundy blood.
“Hungry?”
He tried not to jump back. What was it with these fellows and sneaking up on you? He turned to see another man at the doorway, staring at him with pale, calculating eyes. The beginnings of a double chin and peaked eyebrows added to an expression that was anything but friendly. Wearing a lab coat with frayed holes in the sleeves, the man motioned to Norris.
“Who’s this? You stealing more staff from the Brooklyn coroner?” The man had a powerful Brooklyn accent that would make a sugar lump go bitter.
“No. Alexander, this is Mr. Jones. Surely you recognize him.”
“You’re the janitor.” He was still staring. Jasper felt like he’d rather be back in the morgue, where the bodies weren’t quite so rude.
“Perhaps. Perhaps not. Jasper Jones, this is Alexander Gettler. My chief forensic chemist.”
“How do you do?” Jasper asked.
“I’d be better if my horses won at the tracks more often.” He walked past Jasper to organize half a dozen bottles, making notes on a ledger.
“Alexander, Jasper believes that a young woman in the morgue was murdered.”
“Does he now?”
“Indeed. With cyanide.”
“Oh yeah?” Gettler turned around. “What makes you an expert in cyanide?” He had picked up a rather large knife the way a person might hold a book or a pen. Casually, as if it were the most normal thing in the world.
“I know what a cyanide death looks like,” Jasper said, feeling more confident—the sight of the knife hadn’t rattled him at all.
“What, are you a medical intern too?” Gettler twirled the knife, but Jasper didn’t back away.
“No sir. But I’m applying to the school here. Next year.”
“So you’re not even a medical student?”
“No sir. But I will be.” He said the words with confidence. There would be no question of his studying here. He knew it.
“So that head”—Gettler pointed the knife at Jasper’s forehead—“is still empty.” Seeming already bored, he pushed up his sleeves and unwrapped the chunk of glistening liver. It quivered nauseatingly, as if entertained by the conversation. A deep fissure bisected the mass into two lobes. “What do you know about methyl alcohol poisoning?”
It was such an ordinary chemical, so terribly undramatic. Jasper’s uncle certainly liked methyl alcohol. He was making bottles of it in the kitchen, after all. If Gettler was already preparing to detect poisonings, he knew what was coming with the upcoming laws. Smart fellow, he thought.
“I know a little. It’s cheap booze, but poisonous,” Jasper said. He pointed to the liver. “What’s this for?”
“I’m mixing liver samples with methyl alcohol so I can determine how best to test for it in human tissue samples.”
“Oh.” Jasper crossed his arms. “So . . . you don’t know much about methyl alcohol either.”
Dr. Norris laughed heartily. Gettler turned, looking like he’d just swallowed a bad lemon. He pursed his lips.
“Well, the young squirt’s got a tongue on him, eh? All right then. Tell me what you know about cyanide.”
He spoke of cyanide as if it were a person, a formidable enemy that needed thorough and respectful discussion. Norris simply leaned against the doorjamb, watching the exchange. Which meant the burden was on Jasper. If he wanted to be part of this department, part of unraveling the mystery of Florence’s death, part of something beyond last night’s engagement party and his own failed past, then everything was up to him. He could mention his parents’ death as the reason why he knew of cyanide. But no. He wouldn’t ride on sympathy to boost him up. Pity would not create his successes. He lifted his chin to speak.
“A Prussian blue test could reveal a poisoning. That would be easy enough. All we’d need was a sample.”
“From where?” Gettler had turned back to the jiggling hunk on the butcher paper, making a long slice in the liver. His blade hit no connective tissue, sliding through the organ as if it were warm butter.
“The stomach,” Jasper guessed. He tried to sound more confident than he was. He heard Dr. Norris chuckling behind him but dared not turn around.
“And how would we extract it?” Gettler sank his blade into the liver again, but this time his slice was crooked. He was paying more attention to the conversation than the cutting.
“Cyanide salts would dissolve in water. I’d do an aqueous extraction after macerating a sample.”
“Then what?”
“Then I’d distill it to separate out the particulates.” Jasper waited for another challenge, but when it didn’t come, he pressed further. “Friedrich Otto’s textbook on the matter is very clear, though I think he is a bit too wordy.”
At this, the two doctors gaped. Dr. Gettler rested the bloody knife on the counter and stared him straight in the eyes.
“And why do you care to know how this particular person died?”
“I knew her, sir.”
“Doesn’t matter. Let the office take care of that. We can’t make things personal here.”
“It’s not just that,” Jasper said, feeling like he was on the cusp of losing first place in a race. “Everyone thinks it was an accident. If that’s not true, then there is a murderer out there who’s getting away with it. Someone clever enough to know it would look like an accident.”
“And you think you’re cleverer than this killer?”
“Yes sir.”
“You care about this woman.”
“No, I don’t.” Gettler’s eyes snapped onto him, and Jasper realized how callous he sounded. But it was true. Florence’s smug stares and acid words were the only things about her that had ever touched him.
“It doesn’t matter what I think of her. Isn’t the truth worth fighting for?” The two men exchanged glances with each other. In the silence that followed, Jasper stepped up to Dr. Gettler and held out his hand. “And, truth or not, you need someone to slice up that liver for you, so you can do more important things. Don’t you?”