The Ugly Sister (25 page)

‘Thank you.'

Mr Wallis put some papers back in his briefcase and took out some others. ‘ There is one other important item I have to bring to your attention …'

I looked up at him but did not speak. He glanced away, no doubt not wishing to seem to look at my drooping eyelid.

‘Fifteen years ago, just after he came here and just after I met him and became his legal adviser, an uncle of his in Bristol died suddenly. He too was unmarried, and he left a substantial legacy to the Canon. This has remained untouched so now it has obviously become a part of the estate bequeathed to you.'

‘What d'you mean, untouched? Do you mean my uncle …'

‘Would not utilize it in any way. I argued that if he was personally adamant some charity would be only too pleased to make use of it, but he did not seem to want to do anything with it, not even good!'

I sat on a chair. ‘I still don't
understand
, Mr Wallis. Could you please tell me exactly what this is about?'

Mr Wallis twitched and put the documents on the table as if they had suddenly become hot.

‘Mr Gregory Roberts – he would have no truck with the new family spelling of his name – Mr Gregory Roberts was a shipping merchant in Bristol and it was generally acknowledged that he traded in slaves. I can understand that your uncle with his principles should abhor such a trade, but I ask myself – and indeed asked him – whether money itself can be tainted? Whether such money however ill-earned could not be turned to good offices to purge itself of its evil origins? I have always believed that, but he would never discuss it at any length. I think he felt contaminated by the connection.'

‘Does this mean that the legacy …'

‘Will come to you, yes. Unless you wish to disown it. Though I trust you will not.' I did not speak so he went on: ‘I have always found it difficult to believe that the Canon, even with such frail financial resources as he had, should have considered it necessary to live so frugally. His stipend was not negligible. But if he did so find it necessary, then it speaks eloquently of his Christian principles that he should never have dipped into this legacy which was always to hand. As a man who liked good living it must have irked him to live less than well, but I suppose he found moral strength in resisting the temptation.'

‘He never said anything to me.'

‘No, he would not. After all, it is a surprise to you, is it not, that your uncle should have made you his sole legatee.'

‘The greatest surprise. I have no call on him. There was a time when he …'

He waited at my hesitation but I found I did not want to tell him of the proposal of marriage.

‘We became very close,' I said. ‘ He said he talked to me more freely than he had done to anyone else. But even so, he never mentioned this. I am overcome.'

He turned and fumbled for more papers from his briefcase.

‘I have here computations which you may like to look at at your leisure, Miss Spry. In this envelope I have put an assessment of the few investments and possessions that the Canon has bequeathed to you. In this other envelope is an account of the monies that will come to you – if you will accept them – from the legacy of the late Mr Gregory Roberts. Aside from the Canon's various railway investments, except at a give-away price, I should estimate that his estate, short of what furniture you wish to sell from this house, would amount to upwards of £1,000.'

The pony had disappeared from view. But I would not have been altogether surprised if it had turned into a camel.

‘The other money is almost all in the form of bonds. These of their nature pay only minimal interest, so the legacy has not grown substantially in the fourteen years it was in your uncle's keeping. The advantage, of course, of this is that the bonds can be realized at any time and to any degree you may think fit. It will be a week or two before the will is proved, but before then you will no doubt have decided what you will do.'

‘And – this is a larger sum?'

‘Oh, yes. Oh, dear yes. My latest information suggests that the figure will be a little less than £53,000.'

P
ROFESSOR
D
IEFFENBACH
said: ‘My English, very poor, Fraulein Spry, therefore and so forth the translator necessary.'

‘Yes, I understand.'

‘And Herr Doktor Hamilton is to speak so between us.'

‘Yes, sir,' said Hamilton. ‘I was born and brought up in Hanover.'

‘Ach, so.' The Professor put a pair of tiny spectacles on his nose. They were dwarfed by his square face as he reread the letter in front of him. Then he looked over his spectacles at me and smiled. The forbidding expression creased into more benevolent lines. ‘Ach, so.'

I was in a room in the Charité Hospital in Berlin. It was an untidy room with shelves and files along one wall carrying headings like
Chirurgie
and
Rhinoplastik
and
Prosthesis
. In a corner was a wheelchair with some of the spokes broken; and in another corner Sally Fetch pulled nervously at the fingers of her gloves.

I have seen one painting of Joseph Friedrich Dieffenbach which made him look a very big man. But he was not tall: the breadth of his shoulders gave the impression of size. When I went to see him he was black-bearded, fortyish I suppose though he looked older, and was then surgical director and head surgeon of the Charité Hospital near Charlottenburg.

David Hamilton was thirty and had only just qualified at the Royal College of Surgeons in Edinburgh. I had been put in touch with him in London, and he had agreed to accompany me for a maximum of six weeks.

Dieffenbach spoke and Dr Hamilton said to me: ‘The Herr Professor is reading, as you can see, Dr Latham's letter and he wishes to know if you know what Dr Latham has said.'

‘I expect I know. But I would like to hear it again.'

Dr Edwin Latham had said to me: ‘My advice to you, Miss Spry, is to let it alone. I find it difficult to imagine how these injuries were suffered at birth, since you say you have reason to believe instruments were not used to facilitate parturition; but if the midwife was drunk she may have used undue force with her hands. You are, in fact, perhaps fortunate that you are no worse. The palsy has only affected the eye and not involved the mouth as usually happens. The scar is disagreeable, but to open it and then re-suture it would only have a very long-term benefit, and perhaps not even that. It is not possible to improve the neck stain, and I would advise you to follow the fashions of the day with high collars and the like.'

‘Thank you, Dr Latham,' I had said. ‘So I suppose I must take your advice and return to Cornwall.'

‘That would be for the best.' He sighed. ‘I'm sorry … Mind you, there are a few techniques at present being practised on the Continent, but they are in the experimental stage and you might well end up with a greater disfigurement rather than less.'

‘Where on the Continent?'

‘Well, largely in Germany. There is a man called Fricke. And there's Von Graefe. And another called Dieffenbach. All have published papers. All are surgeons of great distinction. In France of course there is Baron de Dupuytren, who is at least the equal of any experimental surgeon living today, but his researches have not been so directly concerned with surgery to the face and neck.'

‘If I want to see one of these doctors, which one would you recommend me to approach?'

Dr Latham had sighed again. ‘ If you insist …'

‘I should prefer not to say insist, doctor. Per-sist perhaps. At least I'd like to go one step further, just – just to find out a little more. I can afford it.'

‘Hmm. If they would see you. One would have to be quite certain that you were not fobbed off onto some deputy or assistant surgeon. These are all enormously busy men.'

‘But they treat patients?'

‘Of course. The only one I have had some exchange of correspondence with is Dr Dieffenbach – and that was five years ago, before he became a professor. No doubt he will remember me because I wrote when I was in India, with some remarkable details about the replacement of a nose …'

‘Can I ask you to write to him?'

‘If you say so. I will do that tonight.'

Professor Dieffenbach had finished reading the letter and David Hamilton had finished translating. There was a pause.

‘So,' said the German. ‘If you please. This place, please …'

I sat in a chair by the window. The bearded man, in his black heavy suit, stiff collar and black tie, came and bent over me. He smelt strongly of serge and starch and carbolic soap. His fingers loomed large but rested on my cheek and forehead very lightly. He grunted. ‘Ah, so.'

He pulled gently at the corners of the eye and said something to Dr Hamilton which the latter did not translate. Then he pressed the scar. Finally plump smooth fingers lightly brushed along the stain on my neck. Again he said something which Hamilton replied to but again did not translate.

‘What did he say?'

‘He asked if that was the extent of your injuries, and I said yes. That was correct, I imagine?'

‘Yes.'

Professor Dieffenbach brought a magnifying glass and peered again at the eye. Then he went back to his desk and began to make some notes.

‘He says you may go back to your other chair.'

I went back. The surgeon fixed me with stern eyes, in which in spite of their fierceness I detected a gleam of warmth and goodwill. Then he began to speak to Dr Hamilton.

After he had paused for breath Hamilton took a moment to gather his English and then: ‘The Herr Professor says yes he can help you. He agrees with Dr Latham about the stain on your neck, but says that in the matter of the prime disfigurement, that to the ectropion of the eyelid, he can operate with some prospect of success. He proposes …'

Professor Dieffenbach began again.

‘
Ja, Meinherr Professor. Ja
… He proposes to cut a flap of skin from the upper eyelid and bring it down to reconstruct the lower lid. It is difficult to translate medical terms, Miss Spry, as I'm sure you'll understand, but I believe he called it a pedicled flap. This should correct the prolapse of the lower lid, he says, and will allow the lid to function normally. I do not know, Miss Spry, whether this operation has been done before, but he seems quite confident of the outcome.'

Surgeons often were. ‘Will you ask him?'

Dr Hamilton asked him. The Herr Professor nodded vigorously and spoke at length.

‘He assures me that a similar operation has been done before, twice last year and twice the year before, always with a degree of success though naturally each case is different in some respects.'

The German spoke again.

‘He says he can improve the scar and will do so at the same time. He proposes to come to your hotel at noon on Tuesday next. He says you should engage a nurse for a day or two.'

Although I had come all this way, persisting until I reached Berlin, with an attendant doctor and an attendant maid, although I had been driven on by a bitter determination to see this quest through to the end, now that the outcome was suddenly thrust upon me,
at such short notice
, I hesitated. The Professor had taken it for granted that by coming for his advice I had come for his treatment. Well, hadn't I?

‘Will you ask the Herr Doktor if this operation is likely to harm my sight?'

‘The Herr Doktor says very unlikely.'

I looked at Fetch, who had given up pulling at her gloves and was staring fixedly at me. I had found her in the spring of the year working in a laundry. Since then she had been my devoted maid and friend. But she did not like being in Germany and she did not at all like what was being proposed now.

I said to David Hamilton: ‘Does he know how long the operation will take?'

‘He says preparations half an hour, surgery half an hour, convalescence three weeks, inspection monthly for three months.'

I thought, cutting skin from my upper eyelid? Was there skin to spare there? Skinned alive, did not some martyrs suffer that? I was no martyr. Go home. I was healthy enough. Count blessings. Wasn't this vanity? Pride? Arrogance?

And if I left and went home after getting so far? What was that? Cowardice? Timidity? Fear of pain? Did I have the money but not the stomach for this?

I looked at Herr Professor Doktor Joseph Frederik Dieffenbach and he looked at me. Even though only a few seconds had passed since the last words were spoken, everyone was waiting. Waiting for me.

I said: ‘ Tuesday at midday, Professor?'

‘
Ja. Dienstag. Mittag.
'

‘Very well,' I said.

I
HAD
taken a suite at the Hotel den Linden, which comprised a bedroom and a small sitting room. Dr Hamilton and Sally Fetch had bedrooms further down the corridor. On the Tuesday morning a special chair was delivered, taken up to my bedroom and set down facing the window. There was an adjustable headrest and straps dangling from the chair that I did not like the look of. Dr Hamilton had received instructions to have hot water available, two empty china bowls, four clean towels and an assortment of gauze swabs.

At ten minutes to twelve Professor Dieffenbach in frock coat and silk hat drove up in an open landau. With him were three other men all equally dressed in sober black. One was his assistant, Dr Scherz, and the other two were students brought to watch the professor at work. The thought crossed my mind that I had not seen so many black-clad men since the Canon's funeral. Unfortunately I was not in the mood to see this as an amusing reflection.

The Professor bent over my hand and led me to the chair, while his assistant poured something into a glass and invited me to drink it.

‘What is this?' I asked.

Dr Hamilton said: ‘Cognac, laced with laudanum.'