Shaking, Edgar slips past the butler and begins to make his way downstairs, seized by an overpowering need to flee, to run from the nightmare that seems to be alive in his life again. He is anxious not to encounter Annabel, to leave the house before she has the chance to question him again and see his even more unsettled appearance.
“It is likely nothing about which to concern yourself,” he hears Beasley say behind him. “Just an old woman, not a threat to anyone, a wandering street person. But I shall ensure that all the doors are locked in the future.”
Edgar finds his own quick breakfast of toast and tea in the kitchen at the back, but Beasley intercepts him again as he attempts to slip out the front door. The butler is bearing a card on a gleaming silver tray. It is on the personal stationery of someone whose name he does not recognize, and it requests Edgar’s appearance at the London Hospital, where he had worked alongside the monster Dr. Godwin until a few weeks ago. It is as if someone is magically giving him a reason to be somewhere else, to elude Annabel. His presence is required there in exactly an hour and a half, a perfect length of time to walk through the city to the East End, to calm himself, surrounded by reality, not the dreams swirling in his mind. He tells Beasley to send messages to his friends in Kentish Town and Brixton, asking them to meet him at the hospital in the afternoon—he wants to be sure that they are all right, especially Tiger.
He makes his way through the loud London day as if he were inside a bubble, still anxious about what happened in the night. He tries with his very being to take things in, to concentrate on the real world around him—the sights, the sounds, the smells. He cannot, however, seem to think of anything but the hag. She keeps going round and round in his head. He looks over his shoulder, into the shop windows, down the alleys that he passes.
Eventually, it occurs to him that speaking to someone would be the best way to get out of his bubble and get away from his fears, and even though the matron at the hospital’s front desk is as formidable as usual, she is most definitely real. He walks right up to her.
“Master Brim,” she snaps, “you are to proceed all the way to the top floor to the chairman’s office, where your presence is expected.” She looks angry about it.
He wonders why in the world he would be wanted up there where the wealthy and influential people who run the hospital often meet with the powerful man who makes the final decisions. Edgar knows it only as a mysterious place located behind double wooden doors at the end of the upper floor’s main hall, an inner sanctum.
The hospital’s ceiling fans are little relief against the heat. His shirt soaked through with sweat, Edgar climbs staircase after staircase, gets to the top nearly out of breath, and sees his destination way down the hall. As he approaches, he observes that the doors are wide open and a crowd of doctors and other hospital employees have gathered inside its ample space. Three or four well-dressed gentlemen are settling themselves at a long gleaming table under a huge stained-glass window with an image of Christ looking down upon them. No one seems to notice Edgar as he slips into a chair at one end.
One of the well-dressed gentlemen, a tall, broad-shouldered fellow wearing a monocle, a long black coat, checked waistcoat and gray trousers, rises to his feet. Edgar is surprised to see that his handsome face is tanned, unlike the pasty white visages of his colleagues. “I will be brief,” he begins. “As chairman of your hospital board, I have gathered you here today to inform you that we are moving forward on the assumption that our esteemed colleague, the brilliant Dr. Godwin, has met the same regrettable fate as his friend and collaborator, Dr. Vincent Brim. Though the latter’s remains were found in the fire that ravaged the Midland Grand Hotel, there was no sign of the former, but his simultaneous disappearance has led the police to conclude that he met his maker in the same inferno. It is a sensible conclusion. Though none of us knew of Godwin’s laboratory on the top floor of the hotel, neither were any of us surprised to learn that his dedication to his science, one might even say his art, kept him at his research even when away from this hospital, and also that his dear friend, Brim, would be with him. Medicine has its dangers even to those who are not patients. The fire, it seems, originated in the lab. Some sort of combustion occurred while these two valiant men were at work…with the tragic result that they are no longer with us. May God bless them.”
There is a murmur of similar blessings from the men at the table. Edgar remains silent, his mind cast back to those terrifying moments in that laboratory. He sees himself and his friends captured and tied to tables so the monster Godwin could experiment upon them, make a hybrid human being out of them, just as Godwin himself had once been made by the brilliant mind and expert hands of another. Edgar thinks of his uncle setting fire to everything, his incineration, and their narrow escape.
“We shall encourage applications for the chief operating surgeon’s role here and shall hire another doctor to take the admirable Vincent Brim’s place. We shall continue to pursue experimental surgery at the London Hospital and thus will remain at the forefront of advances in our great science. I know it is difficult to go on under these circumstances, but we are meant to be leaders of men, conveyors of succor and aid to the ill, and as such, we shall lift up our chins and proceed. Thank you, gentlemen.”
There is an instant of silence and then the grinding of wooden chairs pushing back from the table on the polished wooden floor and a general exodus, which Edgar joins. The chairman, however, calls out amidst the noise.
“Master Brim!”
Edgar turns and regards the man and gestures to himself with a finger.
“Yes, you, Brim, come forward.”
The other board members are departing while deep in conversation. In moments, Edgar and the distinguished gentleman wearing the monocle are the only people left in the room.
“I am sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Edgar turns to go, but the chairman seems interested in detaining him.
“My name is Andrew Lawrence, perhaps you have heard of me?”
Edgar recognizes his name from the message that Beasley had given him this morning. He turns back to Lawrence.
“No, sir…not before today.”
Lawrence laughs. “Not a financial man, are you, Brim? I like that.” He has a deep voice that in formal speech is elegant and has a slight Irish lilt, but now, in private conversation, betrays a much broader accent. He seems an ordinary man, yet extraordinary at the same time. Edgar imagines him as a father, reading a story to his son in his slightly foreign, down-to-earth baritone and making it sound wonderful. Lawrence takes the monocle from his eye, leans down and speaks softly into Edgar’s ear. “They say I am the richest living thing in London, but the Rothschilds and Queen Victoria might beg to differ. They also say that such success is a remarkable thing for a man of my race.”
“I…I am pleased to meet you, sir.”
Lawrence straightens up and pops the monocle back into his eye socket. “And I to make your acquaintance, as well. Do not be swayed by my money or position, my boy, or anyone else’s. Most rich folks inherited their wealth and power and deserved none of it. They are fortunate, nothing more. I am pleased to say that I earned my filthy lucre through a combination of brains and effort, but that does not make me anyone special. Take me as I am. Judge me for how I treat you, nothing less. I asked you to come because I was told that one of the gentlemen who died was your uncle and the other was your mentor.”
“I…I wouldn’t say mentor, sir, if I may.”
“Of course you may, you may say anything you like.”
“He was my superior.”
“It sounds as though Godwin was superior to most of us, at least in mental capacity, and his disappearance is a great loss. We were well aware that he was working upon momentous scientific experiments that could have been of lasting benefit to humanity.”
“Yes, sir,” says Edgar quietly.
“You do not sound convinced.”
“Yes, sir, absolutely, sir,” he says a little louder.
Lawrence chuckles. “I like you, Brim—a man of his own mind. I thought it right that someone at the hospital, and in a sense I AM this hospital—chairman of the board, chief investor, you know, and the like—should at least say hello to you and offer our condolences.”
“That is very kind of you, sir.”
There is no response from Lawrence. He is staring over Edgar’s shoulder as if he has seen a miracle. The monocle pops out of his eye. Edgar turns and sees Annabel standing in the doorway. She is wearing another black dress, this one remarkably form-fitting for a widow’s gown; her blonde hair somehow showing to extraordinary advantage under a bonnet with the word Love stitched into it, and her ankles on display again above gray high-heeled boots with white laces.
“Mother!”
“This is your mother?”
Annabel marches forward. There is not a drop of perspiration on her face in this terrible heat, but her temper is heated. “Edgar, I am not pleased with you, no no no! You slipped out of the house this morning without saying a word to your mother. You were to tell me more about your adventures this past week, and then I had to suffer the dreadful news that there was an intruder in our home last night. Another one!”
“An intruder?” says Lawrence.
“SHUSH!” snaps Annabel.
Lawrence glows.
“Mother, you shouldn’t…do you know who this is?”
“I do not care if he is the Queen of Sheba. I want answers from you, Edgar Brim, answers. Well, young man, what do you have to say for yourself?”
“Mother, may I introduce you to the chairman of the board of the London Hospital, Mr. Andrew Lawrence. This, sir, is Mrs. Annabel Thorne.”
“Sir Andrew Lawrence, actually, though I would never insist.”
Annabel has stopped in her tracks, still staring at Edgar, her back to the chairman of everything at the London Hospital. “Do you mean to tell me that the man I just shushed is Sir Andrew Lawrence?”
“I believe so.”
“Well then…I should close my mouth.”
“Not at all,” says Lawrence, “not to worry.”
“Oh,” exclaims Annabel, turning toward him, “I shan’t worry. That is not my way. I move forward, always forward. A smile is always the best remedy.” She gives him a dazzling one. “I am never a worrywart, like this one.” She motions toward Edgar. “Now, let us start again.” She extends a hand. “I am most pleased to make your acquaintance, Sir Andrew Lawrence.”
He takes her gloved hand and kisses it. “Andrew will be sufficient.”
Annabel pauses for a moment, not removing her hand from the grip of the tall, handsome billionaire with the tanned face and black hair only slightly touched with gray, and a miracle occurs: her face turns red. She pulls her hand back.
“I am a busy woman and I must be going. I am sure you gentlemen have things to discuss, not that I could not discuss them with you. The day shall come, very soon, when not only will this hospital be peopled by female doctors but a woman shall have your place, sir!”
“I have no doubt,” says Lawrence, “and I hope to live to see it.”
“You do?”
“I do indeed. Especially if that woman were someone such as yourself.”
Annabel looks flustered.
“Well then…good day to both of you. Edgar, we shall have that talk as soon as you get home.”
“Your son, madam,” adds Lawrence, “seems like a fine young man”.
Annabel pauses. “That is very kind of you to say.” She regards Lawrence, who has briefly put his hand on Edgar’s shoulder. “Especially since you just met him. Perhaps you have plans for him? I believe he has the ability to go places.”
“I see evidence of that already. One cannot have too many fine young men in one’s employ.”
Annabel regards the chairman again and narrows her eyes a little as if contemplating something. Then she turns and strides from the room, her heels clacking forcefully on the wood floor.
“Good day, Mrs. Thorne,” says Lawrence after her, “and my condolences for your loss.”
She stops and, without turning completely around, says, “One must go on,” and moves off down the hallway.
Edgar turns back to Lawrence to see that he is still gazing at Annabel’s retreating back, and smiling.
Edgar spends the day cleaning up his uncle’s and his “mentor’s” rooms, which have not been attended to for more than a week. Lawrence has told him that he will be assigned as an apprentice to a doctor soon, to help ready him for his medical studies in Edinburgh the following year. Edgar wants to tell Lawrence that he has no interest in being a doctor, and that it is only Annabel’s future financial needs that make that profession his only choice. It is books that intrigue him, stories, plays, and works of art, but he keeps quiet.
Just being in his uncle’s room and Godwin’s laboratory gives him strange sensations. It is as though their ghosts and the ghosts of what happened to them, and what might have happened to him and his friends, linger in the air. The copies of the sensation novels Frankenstein and The Island of Doctor Moreau are still on Vincent Brim’s desk, their presence more poignant now that Edgar knows that his uncle, far from being the villain he had thought him to be, had been studying those texts because he feared what Godwin was planning. Uncle Vincent had given his life for Edgar in that fire.
The laboratory in the basement is more problematic for Edgar to enter. He can barely bring himself to open the door. The operating table with the light above it is there, where Godwin had mutilated animals—Edgar shivers at the memory of what the surgeon forced him to do to a quivering little rabbit. They had also taken apart dead human bodies here, put limbs into formaldehyde jars and kept others on ice, ready for transportation to Godwin’s secret lab at the hotel. At the time, Edgar had known nothing of their destination or their fate. He sweeps and cleans up the room like an automaton, trying to resist any emotions, but wondering, again, what in God’s name could be worse than a Frankenstein creature.