A Different Girl
“WHOMEVER MCDERMOTT THOUGHT he was—whether Charles Dickens was a nom de plume, a dédoublement, flesh and blood, or Jolly King Eddie—is immaterial, Doctor,” Battle said. “My interests lie in tracking him down. For that, I require his daughter to be lucid. At this point, I see little value in your methods. The way you and that thug of an attendant manhandled that girl …”
“Don’t tell me my business,” Kramer said as he went to work on another lemon slice. God, the smell was driving Doyle mad. He swallowed back a flood of saliva; his stomach seemed to have grown claws that dug at his belly. He didn’t know what he wanted more, the phial in Kramer’s vest or that bit of fruit. Christ, he’d settle for the rind at this point.
“She was agitated,” Kramer said, around lemon. “You may not approve of my tactics, Inspector, but if you want information, if you desire her lunatic of a father before he kills some other innocent in the misbegotten fantasy that he can somehow magically restore his family … well.” Plucking up a napkin, Kramer set about wiping his fingers. “This is the way. The answers are locked in that girl’s brain, and I will have them.”
“As you had the father?” Battle observed.
“Yes, thank you, Inspector.” Every word was hard-edged as a cut diamond. “Would you like me to admit defeat? Very well: I failed. There.” Kramer tossed his napkin aside. “Satisfied?”
“It is not a question of satisfaction, Doctor, or blame. This is not a competition. This is about catching a madman.”
“But you hold me responsible, isn’t that right?”
“McDermott was in your custody.” Battle’s shoulders moved in a slight shrug. “If he’d escaped my station, I’m sure there’d be a hue and cry.”
“So you do blame me. Brilliant. We’ve descended to name-calling and finger-pointing.” Sitting forward again, Kramer selected a lumpy scone studded with what might be raisins but looked suspiciously, to Doyle, like dried rat turds. “I’d complained to the Lunacy Commission for quite some time about the criminal wings’ gas mains. They cleared me of any culpability in the explosions. Besides”—Kramer snapped his scone in two, the sound crisp as the break of a small bone—“you ought to be delighted. All those criminal lunatics immolated at a go.”
“I’m glad to see your irony intact. I might share your sentiments if the same explosions hadn’t both set McDermott free and destroyed his notebooks and writings, so we’ve no clue as to his whereabouts. You say you read that last novel?”
“The Dickens Mirror? Yes, but it was in pieces, not a proper story at all. More fragments and notes.” When Kramer slipped scone into his mouth, Doyle caught a fleeting glimpse of wet muscle. “Why?”
“I wondered if there might be something you recall, a detail or mention of a place that might point us in the right direction.”
“Other than it being set in London and predominantly within these walls? It revolved around the man’s usual preoccupations: labyrinthine tunnels, structures that transmogrified, doppelgängers, splits in the personality, false selves, and, of course, his wife and daughter. I was struck by how he wove the Peculiar and our current predicament into his mythology. Saw it as energy that might be manipulated. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if he’s not holed up somewhere close by its edge, or even worked out a way to wander in and out without becoming lost.”
“All conjectural and meaningless if the girl can’t remember where she was. Your mesmerism’s failed, and I don’t see how clouding her mind with your tonics helps.”
“Which is why I am the doctor and you are the inspector. Get a medical degree, we can talk. Otherwise, lodge your complaints with the Lunacy Commission … but oh yesss … they’ve gone the way of Parliament and our good King Eddie, haven’t they, stealing off into the night?” Kramer dusted crumbs from his fingers. “You say we should work together? So answer me this: why have I not been allowed to examine the bodies?”
“The bodies.” Battle gave Kramer a look as if the doctor had just spouted gibberish. “You’re not a police surgeon. You’ve not even a surgeon. You’re a doctor. An alienist.” (Doyle thought the inspector might as well have said quack.) “You’ve no standing,” Battle said.
“Balls. Who do you think performs necropsies here or inspects the dead before we sack them for the rats?” How Kramer managed a noise like a wet fart with a mouth like that was a mystery to Doyle. “I know my way around a body.”
“Don’t try to sell me a dog, Kramer. Why are you so keen on them?”
“It’s not obvious? Battle, for God’s sake, a thorough study of the corpses might provide a clue as to McDermott’s whereabouts.”
“They’re not within your purview, and that’s final.”
“Oh, don’t piss on me, Battle, and call it rain. This is about territory. You don’t want me to examine them, do you?”
“Perhaps not. Frankly … I suspect you’ve other motives.”
“Have I? And what might they be?”
“I don’t know. But I’m certain to find out.” Battle got to his feet. A very tall and broad man, he seemed to inhabit the office, which settled around his shoulders like a cape. “The bodies are not your concern. Now, if you’ve nothing useful to add, I’ll leave you to work on Doyle here. In the interim, I wish to interview some of the staff who’ve attended the girl. If you’d make them available, I’ll speak to them on the ward.” Battle tossed a look at Doyle. “How long? For you to tend to my man?”
“Not very,” Kramer said, regarding Doyle with eyes that were hard as stones. “I dare say your constable’s as eager to be free of this place as you.”
Got that right. Doyle forced himself not to squirm.
“What about the girl?” Battle asked. “When can I speak with her?”
“Hard to say. I’ll send word when she’s stable. But, Inspector,” Kramer said, “let’s not get our hopes up, shall we? It’s not as if she’s going to wake a different girl.”