The Ballroom (34 page)

Charles brought his hands away from Mulligan’s body. ‘How long have you been standing there?’

‘Long enough.’

‘Answer me.
How long?
’

‘The superintendent sent me. He told me it was urgent.’

Charles adjusted his jacket. His cheeks were scalding now. He pulled the sheet back up to Mulligan’s chin. ‘The patient is ready. Stay here. Watch over him. Remember the chloroform. I will be back shortly.’

He held his head high as he left the room, but once outside the floor tilted beneath him as though he was on the heaving deck of a ship. He put his hands against the corridor wall to steady himself. Dear God. What had the man seen? How much had he heard? And what had he himself uttered, standing there, his hands on Mulligan’s body? He could not remember. In truth, in that strange, honeyed light, he had no idea what he had said.

Anyone seeing that would think the worst.

Danger. There was sudden danger everywhere.

At Soames’s office, he was brought up short at what greeted him.

He had expected the superintendent alone, a brief meeting to clarify the facts of the case, but Miss Church’s father was there, seated behind the desk with his head buried in his hands. Soames stood behind him, a little distance away, the air hazy with tobacco smoke and an uneasy quiet.

‘Gentlemen.’ Charles nodded to them from the door.

Soames spoke first. ‘Dr Fuller. As you can see, Mr Church has asked to be present for this interview.’

Charles turned and shut the door behind him.
Interview?
‘Yes, sir. Of course.’

He threw a furtive glance at the clock on the wall – quarter past eight. He stepped a small way into the room and planted his feet wide.

Soames eyed him for a long moment, then, ‘As his daughter’s chief medical consultant, the one to whom her care was entrusted, Mr Church, as you might imagine, has several questions to ask of you. I will leave him to do so, and then you and I will speak alone.’

Charles nodded. He clasped his hands behind his back.

Mr Church’s shoulders were slumped, and his hands were stretched out on the desk, palms upturned, as though Charles might take whatever heavy thing weighed him down. ‘How?’ That low, sonorous voice was cracked. ‘How did you allow this … to occur?’

‘Superintendent. Mr Church.’ Charles spread his legs a little wider. The thing was to take charge, not to be sorry, never to be sorry. A sorry man was a weak man. He cleared his throat. Beneath his jacket his shirt was tacky with sweat. ‘I have been as shocked as anybody by this morning’s news. But when a young woman is as determined and as cunning as your daughter was—’

‘
Cunning?
’ The father’s face was twisted.

‘Indeed. I am sorry to say I was informed this morning by the nurse on duty that she kept a blade on her person, for just such a purpose as this.’

‘But …’ Mr Church stared up wildly. ‘Where did she get this
blade
? Why was she not searched? How, in God’s name, was she allowed to do such a terrible, terrible thing?’ The man’s voice rose until it broke like a woman’s and he was overcome, and the room filled with the sound of his sobs.

Charles stared. Other than on the wards, he had never seen a man weep like this. But Mr Church appeared to have no self-consciousness in his grief. Soames stepped forward, and Charles waited for the hand to come down on the other man’s shoulder –
There, there, old chap, crying won’t bring her back –
but the superintendent only hovered in the middle of the carpet, his face pale, his expression almost as stricken as that of Mr Church.

Charles threw a glance to the clock. Five minutes had passed since he had arrived in the room. How much longer would Mulligan stay under for? And Goffin.
Damn
Goffin. He didn’t trust him, didn’t trust him now to do his job.

Mr Church’s sobs had become a little less vocal now. He was shaking, as though the force of his grief had been swallowed and taken within.

‘Fuller?’ The superintendent spoke sharply. ‘Do you have nothing to say to this man?’

‘Yes,’ Charles cleared his throat, ‘I do. With all due respect, sir, when someone is so bent upon their course, I fail to see how blame is appropriate or where indeed it resides.’

A muffled groan of pain came from the father.

Soames shook his head. ‘No, Fuller. I am afraid that this is simply not good enough. The young woman was
entrusted
to our care. That she now lies dead in the mortuary I take to be our collective responsibility. That you show no sign of thinking the same I take to be a dereliction of duty. I will have no choice but to conclude that you no longer wish to work in a place where the care of other human beings should be your first priority and therefore say—’

‘
No!
’ Charles shook his head. ‘You cannot do that. Not now. Not today.’

‘I
cannot
do it?’

‘You cannot.’ He was shaking. ‘I will not countenance it. I am in the midst of an operation. You know full well of what I speak. Everything is ready. Everything is prepared.’

The superintendent’s face creased into a frown; he turned to Mr Church. ‘Please, leave us, sir.’

The father rose slowly.

‘
Wait.
’ Charles put his hand out. The older man, bewildered, looked from one to the other. ‘Mr Church, this girl, this daughter that you mourn for. What was she? Tell me. You think you knew her? Believe me, sir, had you heard and seen the filth that came from her in her latter days you would not be so quick to mourn. She was—’

‘Dr Fuller.’ Soames’s voice was low. ‘I warn you—’

Hang comportment.
Hang
politeness.

‘Corrupted. She was utterly corrupted. Do you not see?’ He could not stop the shaking. He did not care. ‘Hereditary
taint
, Mr Church. Indeed, sir, one could even say it was your own fault for choosing to breed with a woman incapable of being a mother to her children—’

‘Dr Fuller—’

‘
No.
’ He turned to the superintendent. ‘Are you so con
gen
itally stupid, Dr Soames, that you would choose to punish me for something that was inevitable? And in doing so deny this institution the opportunity to forge ahead? To
birth the future
?’

Turning from him, the superintendent picked up a bell and rang it sharply.

Charles reared his head as though he had been hit.

‘Good
grief.
’ A bark of a laugh came from him. ‘What is the meaning of this? Do you mean to have me carried off?’

‘It would appear that you may have to be forcibly removed from this room, Dr Fuller, yes.’

‘My God.’ Charles leant over the desk, incandescent now. ‘Tell me, Soames, how will the future remember you?’

‘I have enough to concern myself with, Dr Fuller, with the present matters at hand. Let the future remember me how it will.’

‘Well, I’ll tell you, shall I? As a weak man. A weak and a stupid man.’

‘Dr Fuller. Let me tell you that you are doing yourself and your prospects no good at all.’

‘My
prospects
? I assure you, Dr Soames, that my prospects are of the very best. I assure
you
that Home Secretary Churchill will hear of this.’

‘Let him.’

The door opened, and two attendants appeared. Soames turned to them. ‘Gentlemen, please take Dr Fuller away. I wish to see him escorted from this office immediately.’

The two attendants began to cross the room towards him. Charles put his hands up.

‘Enough.
Enough.
There is no need for restraint. I will go gladly. I am not a patient, after all.’

B
URNING
. H
IS FACE
was burning. He put his hands to it and groaned.

A terrible sickening sweetness clung to him.

He curled on to his side and vomited, and when he had done, he lay, catching his breath, the upper half of his torso suspended over empty space, eyes and nose and throat on fire. As he came back to himself, he saw where he was – saw the space beneath him, the clean, spare floor – and in a swift, panicked movement pulled himself back up on the bed.

It was not a bed, though, but some sort of table. He was no longer in the ward.

He struggled to sit, limbs leaden, and in sitting saw that he was naked, his groin exposed. He had been shaved. Someone had shaved him. He stared down, stunned, unable to comprehend what he saw.

A sound came from beside him, and he turned to see the attendant was standing there – the young, tall one, and he remembered then being taken from the ward. Being told to sit on a chair, and then a cloth over his face, struggling to breathe. The wide eyes of this man as he pressed the rag to his mouth.

John lurched for him, but his legs did not obey, and he stumbled and fell from the table, limbs twisted beneath him.

‘It wasn’t me.’ The man held his hands out before him. ‘I swear … please … it wasn’t me.’

‘Who then?’ John struggled to his feet, gripping the sheet around him.

The man shook his head.

‘
Who?
’

‘Dr Fuller.’

He could see more clearly now, could see his clothes folded in a neat pile on a chair. The table beside him set out with gleaming instruments. With tiny, shining knives. ‘What the
fuck is this
?’

The man moved crab-wise towards the door. ‘It wasn’t me. Please … I promise it wasn’t me. They made me. I don’t know anything about it.’ He opened the door and slid around it. John heard the sound of a key in the lock.

He roared and threw his shoulder up against it, but it did nothing but hurt him. He made to the chair that held his clothes, pulling on his shirt and trousers, buttoning them with thick fingers, stuffing his feet into his boots.

He was aware of a thick dread. In his body. In the sickly-sweet air. The shaved skin of his groin. He stood, pacing the length of the room. The door was locked. There was no sound in the corridor outside. The man was gone, but he would come back. Hold him down again. More of them this time perhaps. So many that he couldn’t keep them off. They would hold that terrible rag to his face. And then Fuller would come and then – what?

He lifted his head.

He saw the window.

Open wide. No bars. Half disbelieving, he crossed the floor towards it.

The cool air of the day outside touched his skin; he sucked its cleanliness into his lungs. He saw a cobbled yard and then more stone buildings opposite. To his left, open country. Fields. The moor.

And everything shrank to this – an open window, the world outside. Beyond.

If he ran now, how would she find him?

But if he stayed, there may be no man left to be found.

For a long moment he remained there, unable to move. Until a sound came from the corridor behind, and he hauled himself up, scraping his shoulders as he pulled himself up and out, rolling on to the grass.

He could see the clock tower behind him, and knew he had been right – he was at the back of the buildings, close to the path that led to the wood and the farms, and the moor.

And so he ran.

He ran like he hadn’t run for years, his hands pumping at his sides, making for the stand of trees, the thickness in his head and his legs lifting as he moved.

And it was so long. It was so long since he had run like this.

D
ISGRACE
. T
HAT WAS
what his father had called it.

There was a poem, wasn’t there? Shakespeare; they had had to learn it at school:

Charles watched the lowlands of Yorkshire give way to the Midlands, the brown blur of autumn fields through the window of the train. He supposed, in a way, he had been outcast. But there were no tears. He couldn’t imagine ever crying again. It was as though his blood had been changed. To mercury, or some other such substance. His fluids become the fluids of the superior man.

He had stayed two weeks in his parents’ house. He had not ventured into Leeds.

That morning, as he left, it had been sunny, a bite to the air, the last of the leaves a deep, satisfying gold. He had taken a small trunk with only his most necessary books and a few clothes. He left his violin and his music in his childhood bedroom and knew he would never see them again.

He was going to London. He was going to a place that the future loved. He had money saved. No fortune, but enough to see him through for a good while yet.

The future was still coming; every turn of the wheels of the train affirmed it. Inexorable. Whatever had occurred, the future was always still coming. And whatever had occurred, Charles knew, this future was clean, unsullied and ready to be carved.

All one ever needed was a sharp enough knife.

H
E PULLED THE
last fistful of potatoes from the soil and brushed the dirt from their skin before throwing them in the crate at his feet. Then he lifted the heavy box on to his shoulder, steadying himself a moment before making back towards the cottage. Even now, after all these months, he could still feel the sway of the ship in him, the low pull of water beneath his feet.

The sun was bright, and he could see little at first as he made his way indoors, walking slowly through the kitchen, where he stacked the box in the dark pantry, taking four small tubers from the top and putting them on the deal table. He would eat them later, when he returned. At the sink he washed the dirt from his hands.

Through the window he could see the path that led to the lane and then to the small town three miles or so beyond. He had not known what he was looking for when he came last summer, only trusted he would know it when he saw it. And he had: the house was low and simple, but there was something welcoming in the slant of the roof. The thatch was good and would not need replacing for a long while yet. It was recently whitewashed, had been taken care of. The barn wanted work, but nothing that was beyond him. And there was the position: close enough to the town, close to the sea. A hundred miles south of where he had grown up. An acre of good, fertile land.