I was left alone in the room with the bound man. My chest heaved to get more air, and only after the several minutes it took to regain my breath did I hear his. Thoughts of the horrific acts I was about to perpetrate on this young man who could have been my brother unleashed a panic in me, and I rushed out of the stone cottage. My host was nowhere to be seen. I had told him the truth. I had seen Emanuel Hoffman peel the skin and muscles back with a sure hand until the bone was revealed, fasten clamps around the arteries, steady himself by placing his knee on the injured man’s shoulder, and after a couple of pulls of the saw have the damaged limb on the ground, whereupon the wound could be dressed. Far from everyone survived this intervention, and others pined during their convalescence. Rot found its way in between the stitches and caused the stump to blacken and smell, and death followed in the throes of fever thereafter. Hoffman had never let me perform this operation myself. We were both satisfied with me simply handing him the tools that he could not reach himself. How would I manage this?
I took the road past the shed where the monstrous Magnus was chained. The wall was so decrepit and dry that the logs had shrunk from one another and left gaps. I cupped my hands and stared into the darkness. Soon I could see him. He slowly rose to his feet when some animal sense alerted him that he was being watched. It seemed to me that he looked straight at me and met my gaze with hungry eyes. He was breathing through an open jaw, and before long saliva started to drip from between his yellow fangs. I saw myself on the ground with him over me; my feet between his chops, bite by bite up along my shins, crunching through my kneecaps like chestnuts. I started to cry again, dear sister, when I realized that it was not courage I needed to dismember another human being, just the cowardice of saving my own life at any price. It came to me all too quickly.
By the fountain, I remembered the pamphlet that Hagström had given me. I hurried up to my room, turned the knapsack inside out, and started to read as quickly as I could. Here was help in the form of instruction and pictures of many procedures, including amputation and the tools necessary. Maybe the professor’s thoughtfulness would once again become my salvation. But the tongue? Nowhere was such a thing described. It seemed I would be left to my own devices. The biggest challenge seemed to me the staunching of the blood flow. To bleed someone was beneficial in order to keep a person’s fluids at a healthy balance, but only up to a point.
Since Hagström’s text could not avail me, I chose to follow what Hoffman had taught me. He called it miasma, those invisible gases that rise from impurities deep underground and grope their way into the lungs of the healthy and the wounds of the injured. He was always dispatching me to find the things that helped the most, and so now I went to look for a pantry. There was nothing to be found that smelled like vinegar, but beyond the empty shelves there was a door and behind that were some stairs leading down into a cellar. I found a small number of torch sticks to light my way underground and when I raised the flame above my head, I saw rows upon rows of dusty bottles. This was a wine cellar, and although it was vinegar I had asked for, I had many times set out bowls of wine to sour into vinegar in closed rooms for Hoffman. I gathered as many bottles as I could carry.
I found spruces in the forest as well as juniper. I did not have to go far. The spruce fir I spread on the floor around the bound man and the juniper branches I lit until they smoldered and gave off a thick white smoke. I waited until the smoke filled the room before I stamped out the glowing embers.
In the chest under the table I found all of the tools that I knew from Hoffman, even if these were cleaner and did not look as if they had ever been put to use. Here were the tongs, the saw, the knives. I tested their edges against my left thumbnail and found them sharp.
I now intended to take out his tongue, dear sister. I undid the strap that kept the stick wedged between his teeth, lifted out the wet ball of cloth that had been pressed in behind it, and loosened the binding that had been tied around his eyes. I made a small fire in the hearth and placed an iron poker in it so that it was licked by the flames. It slowly took on a glowing red hue, fading to white as the heat increased. I carved a wedge that I pressed in between his teeth to keep his jaws open. Then I tilted his head to the side so that the blood would not run down his throat. When I lifted the knife, my hands were shaking so much that I despaired. I poked my fingers into his mouth, warm and wet, and felt around, but found it impossible to form a secure grip on the tongue. Again and again, the slippery point slipped from between my thumb and forefinger. I thought back to the feeling of trying to grip the lizard in its glass container. I gave up, put the knife down, and walked out of the room. I took one of the wine bottles, a Tokay, smashed the neck in the absence of a better way to remove the cork, and drank it down until my throat burned and my white linen shirt was stained.
The sun was on its way down. It wasn’t evening yet but close. I sat with my arms drawn around my knees, rocking back and forth. Only then did I hear him behind me, only a few slurred words through the considerable state of intoxication he had been forced into. He was speaking in his sleep, mumbling: “We are indebted to . . .”
I would hardly be able to manage the task I had been assigned with my patient unconscious. If he were awake, I would have no chance. I flew up from my seat, invigorated by the wine. The glowing poker filled the room with its smell, distinct even through the heavy scent of juniper. In a mood of hopelessness, I turned over the medical chest and started to root through the various instruments. In my foolishness, I actually managed to help myself. I soon saw the tools I should have been using. Here were both pliers and scissors. I grabbed them and held the tongue fast, only to realize that the root of the tongue was still beyond the reach of the scissors. I ran back to the tools, picked up a small hammer and a chisel with a flat end. What I was now preparing to do was something I had seen Hoffman perform on some of his unfortunate patients, even though my stomach had turned at the sight. I turned the man’s head so that the jawbone was positioned closely against the table, placed the tip of the chisel on the teeth along the jaw, and struck with the hammer until I heard the roots give way. I moved the chisel and struck again and again. Finally only the lacerated gums and craters filled with pale shards remained where his teeth had just been. Now the scissors had room to maneuver. I cut his tongue as close to the root as I could manage. When I reached for the poker, I wasn’t thinking straight and grabbed it with my bare hand and, for the first time since Karlskrona, smelled the stench of singed flesh. I swore, wrapped my sleeve around the end, and placed the glowing white end of the heated metal into the stream of blood issuing from the bound man’s mouth.
It was only then that he screamed, my sister. And that wasn’t the worst of it. The worst was when he opened his eyes and looked straight at me.
That look will follow me to my grave.