Art has aforetime been the plaything of kings. We shall recommission it to the service of the common man. He shall it uplift and educate.
From Revolution
Autopsy – the word glowered at me from the decoded message. North Leicester Intelligence Gatherer reports Target A signed up Mrs Raike three weeks ago. Target A was surely Julia. Will send message indicating disapproval. We had received the message – Antonia’s severed finger – and passed it on to its intended recipient. Your description woman target B too vague. That had to be me. I took comfort that the description had been insubstantial. Determine identity. Highest priority. It would be disastrous if they did discover my identity. But again, comfort could be taken from the fact that they had not done so yet. May require intervention as before. Intervention could mean anything. But a young intelligence gatherer had gone missing. Mrs Raike might assume he had run off with the advance payment, but I feared worse. Usual bonus. It had happened before. That supported my theory about the missing intelligence gatherer. Half payment on collection. The man was a hired hand. Half on autopsy. The skin on the back of my neck tightened as I re-read the transcription.
Then the final word on the first message: Fox.
The recipient must have known the identity of the sender. Perhaps the name was some deeper code. Even so, it felt like cold vanity to include it. To make free with any badge of identity in such a conspiratorial message is to believe yourself beyond harm.
From Derby to Nottingham is a journey of just fifteen miles. There was no time for better precaution so I travelled by coach with no disguise but the wig and a small beauty spot. I found a respectable boarding house just south of Castle Rock and secured a twin room on the ground floor with the story that my aunt would be joining me in a couple of days and that her arthritis made climbing stairs quite impossible.
I heaved the sash window up and open, then leant out to survey the small back garden. Cucumbers grew under glass in a line of cold frames against the side wall. A brick path ran between a potting shed and a greenhouse. The thought came unbidden that there would be places for Tinker to hide should he find me again. Irritated with myself for the sentiment, I shoved my case under the bed and set about my tasks.
My first call was to the postal office. I scanned the notice board behind the counter and was relieved to find no picture of myself. Emboldened, I asked the clerk for the city directories. He pointed me to a stack of volumes further down the counter, the biggest of which was devoted to medical businesses.
Every town was famous for something. With North Leicester it was trade and smuggling. With Derby it was ice and heavy industry. But with Nottingham it was medicine. Any doctor who hoped to rise through the ranks of his profession would surely study there. A year spent in one of its hospitals was as good as a certificate on the consulting room wall.
I leafed through the heavy volume to the list of principal medical establishments. The Women’s Hospital on Peel Street, the Borough of Nottingham Lunatic Asylum and the Forest House Children’s Hospital could all be discounted. None of them had operating theatres. The City Hospital did carry out surgical procedures. But it was to the General Hospital that bodies were transported for autopsy. The list of surgeons who worked there took up nine pages.
Having thanked the clerk for his help I purchased, for one penny, a sheet of notepaper and an envelope. Then, making sure that no one overlooked me, I wrote:
Dear Mr Farthing,
You told me once that I should contact you in the event that I needed anything. I am doing so with this letter, which is my request to meet you at noon today in the art gallery in Nottingham Castle. You will understand why I cannot come to your office in person.
When he visited me in the prison camp, John Farthing had told me that he could be contacted via premises situated on High Pavement. The street was easy to find, though I could not at first locate the building. Looking for something of grand scale, I walked clear past it. But on retracing my steps, noticed the brass name plaque next to the door. It seemed too ordinary a property to be occupied by an agency of world-encircling power.
I offered a boy tuppence to put the letter in Farthing’s hand, but he was too afraid to approach an agent. Tenpence restored his courage and he scampered into the building. I climbed a short flight of steps on the opposite side of the road to the grounds of a library that must once have been a church. From this vantage point, I could look down on the street, whilst pretending to study old gravestones.
I did not have long to wait. John Farthing emerged at a great rush, followed closely by the boy. I slipped into the library before either had a chance to look up and see me.
Nottingham Castle is built on top of a rocky crag in the centre of the city. Little more than a gatehouse remains from the original fortifications. Instead of a drawbridge and portcullis there stands a ticket window and turnstile. I paid my money and entered. Immediately before me were manicured lawns and borders of roses. Paths led to a large building of pale stone at the top. It was towards this I climbed. Instead of entering, I chose a bench overlooking the gatehouse and sat to wait.
I was still unsure of Farthing’s reaction to my escape. He had seen my preparation – the folding of my stocking to thicken the ankle. I felt myself blushing as I remembered. He had stared at my reflection in the dark glass of the window and seen what a man should not see. I believed it was shame that stopped him reporting me. Or perhaps it was simply beyond the narrow focus of his loyalty. Though Patent Law transcends all borders within the Gas-Lit Empire, it is of limited scope.
Even if he had planned to make a report, one of the prisoners in the hut had got there first. The image of Tulip swam in my mind, the woman who saw me leave. She’d told me that she was a bad person. I had not believed her.
Now, at last, one question from that episode would be resolved. If Farthing came accompanied by the constabulary, I would know the nature of his loyalty. I had already planned my escape route.
The town clock struck twelve with no sign of him. Feeling a pang of disappointment, I decided that ten more minutes could do no harm. But it was not until the fading of the half hour chime that he at last came hurrying through the gatehouse turnstile. Even at a distance he was unmistakable. Some men seem to lurch or tumble as they run. John Farthing had balance.
I kept watching the turnstile. The next person through was a nurse leading two toddlers. There were no constables.
He did not notice me. I counted to ten before getting up and following him inside the building. I took my time climbing the stairs to the art gallery on the first floor. He took off his hat as I stepped towards him and I saw that he was perspiring.
He ran a hand back through his hair. “I thought I’d missed you.”
“And I thought you might be fetching the constables.”
A look of pain crossed his face and I immediately regretted my words. He turned, as if to examine the paintings on the wall – a triptych of Ned Ludd smashing the stocking frames.
“Forgive me,” I said. “You came as I asked.”
“I couldn’t have not come, Elizabeth.”
“Thank you.”
“I was surprised by your letter. Getting away was... difficult. Discreetly, I mean.” He faced me again. “Why did you call me here?”
We found a pair of back to back benches and sat one on each, heads close together but facing in opposite directions. To an observer it would have seemed we studied the paintings on different walls. In a low voice I related my adventure – in edited form. I did not give away the real identity of Mrs Raike. Nor her relationship to the kidnapped Antonia. And I was especially careful to steer away from any hint of my method of disguise. That was one card I was glad to keep up my sleeve – one power I still had to use against John Farthing if the need came.
When I told him about the perfectly severed finger and the evidence that pointed to Nottingham, he stood and began pacing. I followed him. When I caught up he said:
“I don’t approve.”
“Of severed fingers?”
“Of your investigation.”
“I should have conducted it some other way?”
“I have a duty to protect,” he said. “And this is too dangerous.”
“Think of poor Antonia. Kidnapped by bodysnatchers. Is she owed no duty?”
His mouth opened and closed again, caught between speaking and silence.
A party of teenage girls with satchels entered the gallery, shepherded by two women who might have been governesses.
“Your brother should be doing this,” Farthing muttered. “Not you.”
Then he strode away, as if he had merely been passing the place where I stood. On the other side of the room, the governesses gave instructions and the girls began getting out pencils and sketch pads. I caught up with Farthing in the next gallery along.
“Even if your deductions are correct,” he said, “what can you possibly achieve?”
“I can follow clues.”
“You intend to visit every hospital? Question every physician?”
“Remember the name from the message? Fox. There are only two medical men with that surname. A dentist and a chiropodist. Not promising. But there’s also a Dr Foxley. Erasmus Foxley. He does public autopsies. What odds would you have put on that?”
Farthing checked and wound his pocket watch. I walked away and stood in front of a huge canvas depicting the battle of Stanhope. Heroic lead miners doing battle with the soldiers of the Prince Bishop. Other visitors were ambling through the gallery. Farthing did not join me until they had moved on.
“Your reasoning could be wrong,” he said. “Have you thought of that? Elizabeth Barnabus could have made a mistake?”
“You think me proud?”
“I think you clothe yourself in virtue and call me corrupt whenever I disagree!”
“Then you fault my reasoning?”
“I cannot. That’s what I’m afraid of. You’re walking into terrible danger.”
“Then help me!”
“You know the risk I’ve taken merely coming here?”
“And why have I asked you? Why am I forced to do these things? Because an agent of the Patent Office took a bribe and–”
“Say the word and I’ll raise your complaint. There could yet be an investigation. If an agent is guilty as you claim…”
“The Patent Office investigating its own? I’d win my case, do you suppose? We both know that’s not going to happen.”
“Then what can I do?”
“You have files on important people. Check to see if anything’s written about Erasmus Foxley. That’s all I ask. Without information, I’m fighting blind. If there was something, even a suspicion, you could ask questions. Officially, I mean. As an agent.”
“There won’t be anything,” he said.
“But you will look?”
“I don’t know why I’m agreeing. But yes. I’ll look.”
“How soon can we meet?”
“A week?”
“Too long.”
“Searching the files, I put myself in danger! I’ll need four days, at least.”
He began telling me of a tea shop on Bridlesmith Gate where we could meet. I gazed at the canvas on the wall in front of us.
“Elizabeth, did you take in what I said?”
In truth I’d drifted, distracted by the unfamiliar thought that an agent of the International Patent Office could be in danger from his own organisation.
“I was saying that he’s a doctor. That leaves slim chance of finding anything in the records.”
I gestured to the painting. “Look at those miners. You know the story. What chance did they have against trained soldiers? But all other choice was gone. So they took up arms.”
“You’re not fighting a war, Elizabeth.”
After a moment in which we both stared at the picture, I asked: “Why didn’t you report me?”
“I’m sorry?”
“At the prison camp. You knew I was planning to escape.”
“I... I didn’t mean to look at you. But–”
“A woman prisoner raised the alarm. You refrained.”
“She was driven to it. Don’t think too badly of her.”
I tried to drive the image of Tulip from my mind. I had thought her my friend.
“Neither you nor I have children,” said Farthing. “We can’t know the desperation that woman felt. I was there when she raised the alarm. I can tell you she wept.”
“Children?”
“Her son and daughter. They were together on the end of the same chain that held you. She informed in the hope it would win their release. It did not.”