Chapter 5

The cracked plaster on the bedroom ceiling extends like a spiderweb. The last time Walt was in this room, he was helping Abraham Stowe move an armoire, a gift to Lena for their anniversary. At one point, Abe’s foot became stuck between the armoire and the doorjamb. To get loose, he had to take off his boot, sending Walt and Lena into fits of laughter.

He sits up on the bed and returns to sorting through the Stowes’ possessions. Inside the armoire he finds clothing, jewelry, a Bible belonging to Lena’s mother, and an old anatomy book inscribed to her by Abraham. To my darling doctor. Yours forever in science and love, Abraham. Lena’s clothing will be distributed among the students according to their need, and the rest will be used for patients. Abraham’s clothing will be donated to one of the immigrant shelters. Walt makes two piles of clothing, a third pile for non-clothing items, and a fourth for Lena’s family.

Miss Blackwell knocks on the door. “May I come in?”

“Please.”

She sits down on the dressing chair in front of the mirror. On her lap is the brown leather-bound ledger for the college’s finances. “Mr. Whitman.”

“Call me Walt.”

“Walt, then. No one would blame you if we have to close the school. I know Lena asked you to live here, to help me run the college, but you can return to the newspaper full-time, and I’ll forge ahead with my plans to get into a proper medical school. The students will return to their families, start again somewhere else.”

He shakes his head. “We have to keep the college open.”

“We have money for a few months, at the most,” she says. “One of the problems is only half the students pay any tuition. I spoke with Miss Zacky about this, and she confirmed my suspicions: Abraham accepted students who could not pay, telling them to repay the tuition once they began earning money as doctors.”

Whitman knows this too. “Abraham was terrible with money,” he says. “No sense at all.” This causes him to laugh, and it’s nice to remember his friend this way.

Elizabeth smiles. “Apparently.” Her British accent muted now. “You know, they thought of you like a son.”

“The feeling was mutual.” He felt comfortable around the Stowes as he never had in his own home. “Where will you go, Miss Blackwell?”

“Pardon?”

“If we have to close the college,” Walt says. “Where will you go?”

She thinks for a moment. “It wouldn’t be the first time I had to leave New York.”

“May I ask why?”

She looks at the wall before answering. “My father’s New York sugar refinery burned down in 1836, and we relocated to Ohio, where he might rebuild his business using sugar beets instead of sugar cane.” She looks at Walt. “You see, we learned that sugar cane relies on the slave trade, and my father was an abolitionist.” She begins to cry, but catches herself. “He died three weeks later.”

Walt says, “That must have been difficult.”

“My sisters and I moved to Ohio to start the Cincinnati English and French Academy for Young Ladies. We were forced to close by those who feared our ideology was too revolutionary. That’s what women are up against, Mr. Whitman. Even when no other alternative exists, we are expected to mind our places.”

“I left Manhattan in 1836 too.”

“Oh?”

“I moved to the city from Brooklyn to work as a compositor, and I fell in love. New York City was an exciting, dangerous place.” He pauses. “I had never seen such. One night at the Bowery Theatre, an English actor appeared on stage, and a riot broke out that left the building badly damaged.”

“Because he was British?”

“We’re Americans, Miss Blackwell.” Walt smiles. “We have long memories.”

“Why did you leave the city?”

“Same reason you did. Work was scant after the 1836 printing district fire. I moved home to Hempstead, where I began teaching at a country school in East Norwich. I’ve been back and forth a few times.”

“You were a teacher?”

“A poor one for sure.”

“Nonsense.”

“You’ll have to take my word, Miss Blackwell. I do not have the temperament,” Whitman says. “So would you try again with the school for young ladies?”

Miss Blackwell sighs. “That’s the kicker, isn’t it? I decided to be a doctor after I watched Jane, my close friend, die a painful death. I realized that her doctor, a man, didn’t understand Jane’s body, and after she passed, it came to me like a revelation from God. Women need women doctors.”

Walt nods in agreement.

“Then I saw the advertisement in the newspaper for the Women’s Medical College of Manhattan, and when I saw Abraham Stowe’s name attached to it, I knew it was another sign from God. You see, one of my acquaintances in Ohio was Harriet Beecher, and she was married to Abraham’s cousin, Calvin Ellis Stowe.” She looks lost in herself now. “For all that Abraham and Lena sacrificed—we have to keep the college going.”

She hands the ledger to him.

“And we do have another problem to contend with,” Miss Blackwell says. “Turn to the last page.”

There he finds the name James Warren and a series of check marks. The name rings familiar, but he can’t place it. “Who is it?”

“I don’t know,” Elizabeth says. “Probably a sack-’em-up. Dr. Stowe kept that part of the college private.”

Walt nods. “He detested working with the resurrectionists.”

“That’s why he was so grateful for your help with the Bone Bill.”

Abraham had asked Walt to help him draft a new version of the Bone Bill, legislation that would provide a legal way for medical colleges to acquire cadavers. Up until now, medical students and their instructors had to rely on the illegal trade of cadavers. The Bone Bill, short for An Appeal to the People of the State of New York to Legalize the Dissection of the Dead, had failed to pass several times, due in large part to the real belief that a dissected body cannot be resurrected.

Abraham approached Walt for help a few weeks after they met, having rightly guessed that Walt had reported on the increase in grave robberies. That reporting taught him that the resurrection men, once a motley group of ruffians, had become more organized and efficient than ever before, their network stretching beyond the city to Brooklyn and Long Island, even up into Connecticut and over to Pennsylvania.

Walt says, “And you think Abraham’s murder has something to do with the body snatchers?”

“Abraham became an enemy the moment he publicly supported the Bone Bill,” she says. “It would end a very lucrative business.”

“I’ll let you know what I find out about this James Warren,” Walt says.

Miss Blackwell surveys the room, her gaze lingering at Lena’s belongings piled on the bed. “I really thought she’d come home.” Her voice cracks.

He takes her hand. “So did I.”

Walt Whitman sits next to Azariah Smith while he sleeps. He feels a kinship with the boy who has been forced by circumstances to grow up too fast. Walt himself left home at twelve to work and was expected to send home what he earned to his father, a drunkard and a spendthrift.

Azariah opens his eyes. “Ah, Mr. Whitman.”

“So how is the treatment here?”

“Well.” Azariah takes his time. “I have three beautiful women who tend to me. I’m warm and fed. Drugged with good laudanum. How lucky am I?” He pushes himself upward until the pain becomes too much.

Walt pushes gently on Azariah’s shoulder. “You are lucky indeed, Mr. Smith. But your job now is to rest.”

The boy relaxes into the bed.

“I wondered if you might help me,” Walt says.

“Me, help you?” The boy smiles. “Sure.”

“The name James Warren,” Whitman says. “Does it mean anything to you?”

He’s frowning now. “We all know Warren.”

“A body snatcher?”

The boy considers the question. “I spend my time avoiding people like Warren,” Azariah says. “If you’re smart, you will too.”

Walt places his hand on the boy’s forehead. He’s got a fever now. “Shall I tell those three beautiful women that you need a bath?”

The boy smiles again. “Tell ’em I need three.”

Walt cracks a grin. “Posthaste.”

“And, mister,” Azariah says. “Be careful. Them resurrectionists ain’t nothing to fool with.”

“Rest up, and I’ll check on you again.”

Azariah nods, then closes his eyes.

Walt returns to the Stowes’ old bedroom, where he writes a note to Henry. Meet me at the Pewter Mug in two hours, and in the meantime, find out what you can about James Warren. Then, while he waits for the courier to arrive, he stares out the back window across the street and watches the sun as it slips behind the grog house roof.