The small wooden bird felt warm from the sun. Now that I was up close, I could see how beautifully it was carved. The smooth head, cocked to the side as if listening for predators, invited stroking. The detail on the feathered back and wings was so fine, it must have been carved by a master craftsman. If a wood magician made the bird and the other creatures on display, it would only take a moving spell to give them the appearance of life.
I balanced the bird on my palm. “The man we know as Bill Foster made this, didn’t he?”
Mrs. O’Brien snatched it up and returned it to the side table, carefully positioning it just so amongst the other animals. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Her lodger, Mr. Tovey, sat silently, studying his fingernails. He wouldn’t want to speak out of turn and risk offending his landlady.
“Bill Foster carved a beautiful box when he was on the battlefield,” I said. “We saw it, and it was lovely.”
Her head snapped up. “Where? Where did you see it?” Her hunger for information about her lover overrode her caution. She was desperate for knowledge of him, even if it confirmed her worst fears.
“It was given to Mr. and Mrs. Reid by the War Office, along with Bill’s other belongings. They were told they were their son’s things, but of course they weren’t. No one knew the man who enlisted as Robin Reid was in fact Bill Foster. Not even Robin’s parents. The carved box meant nothing to them, it was just a box. But it would have been a treasured keepsake for Bill’s loved one because they would have known he’d made it with his own hands while he waited in the trenches.”
Mrs. O’Brien withdrew a handkerchief from her sleeve and dabbed at the corner of her eye. Then suddenly, as if she could no longer hold it in, she began to sob.
I put my arm around her and steered her to a chair. I held her as she cried the tears she’d not dared to shed while she waited for Bill to come home. She’d never received official word of his death, so she’d lived in hope, like so many war widows whose husbands were listed as missing. Without proof, she could tell herself he was recovering in a hospital somewhere, unable to write to her, but the carved box sent to the Reid family was the proof that he’d died in battle.
Her reaction was also the proof Gabe and I needed that she not only knew Bill Foster, but also knew he’d enlisted under a different name.
When her tears subsided, she finally admitted that Bill Foster had been her lodger when he moved to London in 1893. “We fell in love. I’d been a widow only a year, but I knew immediately that Bill was special. He was the kindest man you’d ever hope to meet. A true gentle giant. That’s why he signed up as a stretcher-bearer. He didn’t want to fight. He didn’t want to kill anyone. He just wanted to help the injured boys; help them get home. He wasn’t a young man when he enlisted, but he was strong and with his experience as an orderly, he felt it was his duty. That’s the sort of man he was. Loyal, capable, kindhearted.” She pressed the handkerchief to her eyes again as fresh tears welled.
“Do you know why he moved to London?” I asked. Gabe seemed to be leaving the questioning to me. Perhaps he thought a woman’s touch was required now.
Mrs. O’Brien drew in a deep, shuddery breath. “He wanted a change.”
“From his life in Liverpool? What happened there? What prompted his move?”
“I told you. He wanted a change.”
I glanced at Gabe, hoping he’d weigh in, but he remained silent.
“Was he in trouble with the Liverpool police?” I pressed.
“He wouldn’t hurt a fly, my Bill. People would be afraid of him because of his size, but once they got to know him, they saw how sweet he could be. He was a gentle man and I won’t hear another word said against him.”
She was getting angry, so I decided to change tactic. “Why did you never marry? Was it because Bill Foster wasn’t his real name, so legally you couldn’t?”
She teased the damp handkerchief between her fingers, but her lips were set in a firm line.
“Was he running away? Is that why he had to change his name?”
“It’s time you left. I have to do the shopping.”
Gabe hitched his trouser legs and crouched before her. “He’s gone, Mrs. O’Brien. Telling the truth now can’t hurt him.”
She sniffed and jutted her chin at the door. “Mr. Tovey, if you wouldn’t mind seeing these people out.”
Mr. Tovey kept Gabe and Alex in his sights as he skirted around us, keeping his distance. He hurriedly opened the front door and then slammed it closed behind us.
“Why won’t she talk?” Alex asked as he trotted down the front steps. “She can’t get Foster into trouble now.”
“Perhaps she still has hope that he’s alive,” I said.
“Or she’s worried about tarnishing his memory,” Gabe added. “If he’s wanted for a crime in Liverpool, the police may retroactively attribute guilt to him. If it made the newspapers, it might upset family he left behind.”
Alex retrieved the crank handle from the motorcar. “Did you notice she kept making the same point, over and over, that he was gentle and kind? It makes me more confident than ever that he’s wanted for a crime, and a violent one at that.”
“If that’s true, then the Liverpool police should be able to help us.”
“We just have to wait,” I said.
I expected Gabe to sigh in frustration and start tapping his thumb impatiently on the steering wheel, but when Alex slipped into the passenger seat after cranking the engine, Gabe had a determined look about him. Instead of heading south to take me back to the library, he drove west, in the direction of Rosebank Gardens.
“I want to return to the hospital,” he said. “According to Bernard Reid, Robin’s stint there changed him. Dr. McGowan may not remember Robin, but he would remember the treatments meted out to the artless patients.”
“He won’t admit anything that will harm his reputation or that of the hospital,” Alex said. “But I agree. It’s worth trying. We haven’t got any other leads.”
“Have you two forgotten what happened the last time we were there?” I asked. “We won’t be allowed through the front gate, let alone be able to speak to Dr. McGowan.”
Gabe flashed a grin. “Leave that to me.”
The guard at the gate posed no problem once Gabe passed him a few pound notes. Patients on the lawn stared blankly into the distance, not even heeding our presence. There was none of the distress of last time, no shouting or wailing. The nurses and orderlies, however, took more interest but didn’t approach. Only one man did—Stanley Greville. He smoked a cigarette with an orderly near one of the rose beds. When he spotted us, Stanley spoke to the orderly then crossed the lawn to greet us.
“What are you doing here?” Gabe asked, extending his hand.
Stanley shook it and nodded at Alex and me. “Visiting a friend I met when I was a patient. What are you doing here? I heard a rumor you’re no longer welcome.” He looked back at his friend, still standing by the roses, watching us.
“We’re not very popular with management,” Gabe conceded with a crooked smile. “But we need to speak to McGowan again. It remains to be seen whether he’ll talk to us, however. Are you coming in?”
Stanley’s gaze flicked to the entrance and away again. “I’d rather not.” The fingers that placed the cigarette between his lips trembled. “I should go.”
“Can I ask you something about your time here?”
“Such as?”
“I want to know more about the treatments and cures they used.” Gabe cast subtle looks at Alex then me, and we both moved away, but not before we heard Stanley apologize then refuse.
Gabe joined us and we entered the hospital.
The nurse on duty at the front desk hadn’t been warned about us and smiled warmly. She asked an orderly who was passing by to take us up to Dr. McGowan’s office. We waited a few minutes until he was ready to see us, then marched inside and closed the door before he had a chance to call for the orderly to return and escort us off the premises.
“We just have a few more questions,” Gabe told him. “If you don’t answer, you’ll look guilty.”
Dr. McGowan stood and buttoned up his white coat. “I have nothing to hide, but I take offence to being railroaded. I’m also still furious that you broke in here the other night. We have vulnerable men in our care, Glass. Their mental state is delicate. Your presence in the middle of the night could have caused a major setback.”
“We weren’t going near the wards. If anything, the commotion you caused when you threw us out was more detrimental to the patients than us quietly looking through the records. Just like it will be if you throw us out now, in front of all the patients currently enjoying the sunshine outside. If I were you, I wouldn’t want to draw attention and upset anyone.”
Dr. McGowan’s nostrils flared. “State your piece then leave. I’m busy.” To drive home the point, he picked up a clipboard and tucked it under his arm.
“You told us that you remember the orderly named Bill Foster.”
“And?”
“That wasn’t his real name.”
Dr. McGowan blinked. “That’s news to me, but what does it matter now if he lied when he applied for work?”
“He was running away, hiding from someone. He changed his name to Bill Foster, then changed it again to Robin Reid when he enlisted. He chose Robin’s name because Bill Foster wasn’t real, and he needed a name that was. He needed the name to be associated with a real address and a real date of birth, all of which he knew from Robin Reid’s hospital admission records.”
“I didn’t employ him, Mr. Glass. I wasn’t involved in administration back then and the people who were are no longer here. So, what is your point?”
“My point is, Bill Foster knew Robin’s name was available when he enlisted in 1914. As in, Robin was dead. Considering the Reids and the police all assumed he was simply missing, the question is, how did Bill Foster know otherwise?”
“I don’t know and I don’t care. Is that all?”
“Bernard Reid informed us that his son was sent here to be cured of his artlessness. This hospital claimed it could turn the artless children of magician parents into magicians.”
“That’s absurd. No doctor can create a magician.”
“Everyone knows that now, but in the nineties, magic was still very much an unknown art. It’s feasible that doctors thought they could cure the artless if magic was in their bloodline.”
Dr. McGowan’s jaw worked but he otherwise didn’t move. He stared back at Gabe, defiant.
“Patients were subjected to treatments that left them worse off than when they were admitted. The treatments didn’t work. All it did was destroy their spirit. When they left here, they were mere shadows of their former selves. They’ve been likened to the shell-shocked patients you have in your care now, in fact.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“The so-called cures must have been horrific, perhaps even dangerous. Do you still employ those cures in the treatments of your current patients?”
Alex and I both stared at Gabe.
Dr. McGowan emerged from behind the desk and charged past Gabe, only to be blocked by Alex. “Move aside.”
Alex settled his feet apart and crossed his arms.
Dr. McGowan turned back to Gabe, his chest rising and falling with his seething breaths. “You want to hear the truth, Glass? The truth is that parents did admit their children back then, and adults admitted themselves, too. They wanted to become magicians. They were desperate to draw the magic out. The medical profession thought it lay dormant with those artless whose parents were magicians. We know now that magic doesn’t work that way, but everyone was still learning back then. We doctors don’t always get it right. We’re not miracle workers. We’re just trying to help. There was nothing wrong with what we did.”
“There is if patients were harmed and you didn’t stop.”
“We used treatments that were common practice at the time in other mental institutions.”
“And now?”
Dr. McGowan stiffened. “As you can see, we no longer treat the artless children of magicians. We only treat returned soldiers. Soldiers who were fine before the war and have come back damaged. Their problems are different.”
“Do you still use those treatments?” Gabe pressed.
“We use the same methods as other institutions, Mr. Glass. Now, tell your man to move. I have work to do.”
“Will you look up Robin Reid’s records for us?”
Dr. McGowan’s only answer was to glare at Alex. Alex stepped aside and Dr. McGowan marched out. “Do I need to summon the orderlies and have you thrown out in front of everyone?”
We made it easy for him and left. We walked along the corridor behind a nurse hurrying away. I recognized her as the same one who’d been there the night we were caught in the records room. Had she been listening at the office door?
Outside, the orderly who Stanley had been talking to was no longer on the lawn. The patients who were still there sat on chairs, staring into the distance. They did not play checkers with the nurses and didn’t read or chat to one another. They didn’t cry out at the sound of the engine. In fact, they didn’t look around at all. Perhaps these men were in a worse way than the patients we’d seen the other day.
Alex had another theory. “Do you think they’ve been given something to keep them calm?”
Neither Gabe nor I had an answer, but both theories were troubling.
The young man loitering at the entrance to Crooked Lane stopped inspecting his fingernails and straightened upon our arrival. “Are you Gabriel Glass?”
Alex spoke up before Gabe could answer. “Who’s asking?”
“Leonard Flagg from The Weekly Mail.” He removed a notebook and pencil from his jacket pocket. “Mr. Glass, what do you have to say about—?”
Alex grabbed his lapels and forced him out of the way.
“Oi!” The journalist batted Alex’s arm until he let go. “I could have you arrested for assault!”
“Likewise.”
“But I didn’t assault anyone.”
“Who would be believed? Me, a former police officer with a decorated military career or you, a gutter-dwelling weasel?”
“I’ll have you know that I served, too.”
Alex indicated that I should enter Crooked Lane ahead of him,
Gabe didn’t follow us. He addressed Flagg. “Why are you here?”
Leonard Flagg adjusted his tie, but instead of fixing it, he made it worse. “Everyone knows the Glass Library belongs to your family and I thought I’d find you here.”
Gabe merely sighed at the common mistake instead of correcting it. “And why do you want to speak to me?”
Leonard Flagg eyed Gabe carefully, as if he suspected he was being led into a trap. “I want to know what your response is to the latest reports that you can extend the magic of other magicians.”
“The journalist who wrote the story you’re referring to was given false information.”
“By whom?”
“It doesn’t matter. The point is, I’m artless.” The lie came out smoothly, perhaps because he’d has so much practice. “I have no magical ability whatsoever. Don’t you think I would have taken advantage if I could?” Gabe laughed softly. “I assure you, I’d like the benefits these magician manufacturers are offering me in exchange for extending their magic, but unfortunately I can’t do it. I know this is a good story, which is why the journalist printed it without checking his facts, but it’s simply not true.” He stepped through to Crooked Lane and together we walked to the library.
Leonard Flagg dogged our steps. “Are you saying someone deliberately fed false information to the press?”
Alex suddenly stopped and turned on the journalist. “It’s time you left.” He settled his feet apart and nodded at the lane’s exit. “Understood?”
Leonard Flagg swallowed heavily. “Another time, perhaps.”
Movement at the end of the lane caught Alex’s attention. “You have a visitor, Gabe.”
Stanley Greville remained at a distance, one arm crossed over his stomach as if he had an ache. It was a common stance of his, however, and I knew it didn’t mean he felt unwell. He stepped forward, only to step back again when the journalist looked his way.
“Your friend looks sick,” Flagg said.
“Didn’t I just tell you to leave?” Alex snapped.
Flagg returned the notebook and pencil to his jacket pocket and pulled out a business card. “If you ever want to give me a quote, you can find me here.”
“He already gave you a quote.”
The journalist handed the card to Gabe. “If you want the rumors to end, you should give your version of the story. I’ll print the truth.”
“I’m artless. You can print that.” Gabe signaled to Stanley that he should join us in the library.
Stanley walked toward us, his head bowed.
Inside the library, Alex peered through the window and watched Leonard Flagg walk away. “That bloody Hobson woman. She started this fresh wave of interest with her ridiculous theory.”
“It’s not entirely ridiculous given my mother was once rumored to be able to extend the magic of others.” Gabe nodded a greeting to Professor Nash as he came down the stairs.
“I thought I heard voices,” the professor said. “Mr. Greville, what a pleasant surprise. Can I get you some tea? I was just about to make a pot.”
Stanley politely refused and the professor returned upstairs. Gabe invited Stanley through to the reading nook, but he insisted he couldn’t stay.
“I wanted to speak to you about the hospital, Gabe.”
“Is this regarding your visit to Rosebank Gardens this morning?”
Stanley brushed his cheek with trembling fingers and nodded. “Mind if I smoke?”
“I’m sorry,” I said, “but this is a smoke-free library. Professor Nash believes it might damage the texts, some of which are old and very delicate.”
He put away the tin of cigarettes he’d retrieved from his jacket pocket. “I wanted to explain why I was at Rosebank.”
“You told us you were calling on an old friend,” Alex said. “Is that not true?”
Stanley’s fingers fluttered over his cheek again as if brushing off a crumb. “I had another reason for going. I wasn’t sure I wanted to mention it at first, but I think you should know. It might help your investigation.” Another flick of fingers over his cheek. The nervous habit was worse than usual. “When I was a patient there, I saw some…things. Things that the doctors did to the other patients in an attempt to cure them. They didn’t subject me to these cures,” he added quickly. “They reserved them for the men suffering the worst cases of shell shock, the ones who couldn’t get out of bed or speak a single coherent word. Those are the men they subjected to their so-called cures.”
“What precisely did you see?” Gabe asked.
“Ice-cold baths in the middle of winter.” He folded his arms over himself and shivered. “Electric shock therapies where they’d wire the men up to a machine and blast electricity through their bodies.”
“The therapies didn’t work?” Gabe asked.
Stanley passed a hand over his face. “It only made the patients worse. But that didn’t stop the doctors. They kept trying and trying, every day subjecting those poor souls to another horrific treatment. You know I was studying medicine, Gabe. I was taught that an experiment should be abandoned if there’s no evidence of success. From what I could see, not a single former soldier was cured after one session, let alone multiple sessions.”
“Did any die?”
“Not that I am aware.” He removed the tin of cigarettes from his pocket but didn’t open it. “McGowan should be stopped. You should look into his background and see if he’s a proper medical professional.”
“You think he’s a fraud?”
Stanley shrugged one shoulder. “It’s worth checking. The General Medical Council will know.” He shuffled toward the door, opening the cigarette case as he went. “That’s all. I should go.”
Alex held the door open for him. “I don’t understand why you needed to visit the hospital before telling us this.”
Gabe narrowed his gaze at his friend, but didn’t tell him not to pry.
Stanley glanced at Gabe before addressing Alex. “The orderly you saw me speaking to was one of the ones who encouraged me to leave the hospital a few months ago. He didn’t think my condition was as bad as the other patients there, and he suggested I would cope better on the outside than in a hospital where the men were severely damaged. He’s a friend, of sorts, and I trust him. I wanted his thoughts about McGowan before I spoke to you. I worried I might be causing trouble by telling you all this. He assured me I wasn’t imagining it, said he also dislikes McGowan’s therapies and believes they do nothing to cure the patients. It was he who suggested McGowan doesn’t know what he’s doing.” He glanced at Gabe again. “Should I not have spoken to him?”
“It’s all right,” Gabe assured him. “You did the right thing.”
Stanley removed a cigarette from the tin and placed it between his lips.
Alex lit it for him and opened the door wider, then closed it after Stanley left. He pocketed his matchbox. “I know what you’re going to say, Gabe, but I had to ask. There seemed no reason for him to call at the hospital before coming here.”
“That’s true, but it’s Stanley. What would his ulterior motive be?”
Alex held his hands up in surrender. “It was simply my police instincts wanting a reason for everything people do.”
“So, what do you think about his claims?” I asked. “Should Dr. McGowan be trusted?”
“Definitely not,” Alex said. “He shouldn’t be in charge of men like Greville. His so-called therapies could set them back, not make them better. They need peace and quiet, not shocks.”
Gabe agreed, but had misgivings. “McGowan insists he’s doing nothing wrong, that his therapies are the same that are used by other medical institutions to treat shell-shocked patients.”
“So he says. We don’t know what other hospitals do. We can’t take his word for it, particularly in light of Stanley’s suspicions.”
“All right,” Gabe said. “We’ll look into McGowan further.”
Gabe and Alex left to call at the office of the General Medical Council and search through their register of doctors. I offered to join them, but was glad when they declined my assistance. I felt guilty for not working.
I found Professor Nash seated in the library’s smallest reading nook, located on the mezzanine level on the first floor. It wasn’t until I drew closer that I noticed he was napping in the armchair. I tried sneaking away, but a floorboard betrayed me and he woke up.
He shifted in the chair, causing the notebook he’d been reading to slide off his lap. I picked it up and glanced at the page it had opened to before returning it to him.
“Your travel journal?” I asked.
“One of them.” He traced his finger over the letters G.N. stamped in gold on the brown leather cover. The gold had dulled over the years, but the cover had fared worse. The corners were frayed and there was a large stain on the back. Inside, the pages looked as though they’d been dried off after getting wet. “I kept one journal for every journey we undertook. This is the first.” He smiled wistfully as he removed his spectacles. “It was also my first time leaving England.”
“How thrilling. You must have been excited.”
“More anxious than excited, but it did turn out to be thrilling, even though we only went as far as Scotland.”
“Would I be allowed to read it?”
The voice of Daisy calling out from down below stopped him from answering. “Yoo-hoo! Is anyone here?”
I leaned over the mezzanine rail and waved at her. “Hello! Would you like me to come down or will you come up?”
“That depends on whether tea is on offer.”
I told the professor to remain seated while I made some tea. When I returned, I found Daisy and the professor in the larger reading nook, seated side by side on the sofa. She was looking close to tears and he was attempting to comfort her by patting her shoulder. He was relieved to see me.
I set down the tray. “You were as cheery as a summer’s day when I left. What happened?”
Daisy showed me the professor’s journal. “I read a few pages of this while we waited.”
“And something in it made you sad?”
“Yes!”
I glanced at Professor Nash, a little dumbstruck that his travel journal had started out so miserably. “What is it?”
“He writes so well! My story is dull by comparison.”
“There, there,” he said, patting her. “You’ll get better if you continue to practice.”
She sighed heavily, her spine curving as she slumped. “I suppose.”
We plied her with tea and cake then encouraged her to keep going with her story. She stayed at the library instead of going home, preferring to help me, although her version of being helpful was to rearrange the books on the shelves into a color-coded system. I would need to spend another hour putting them back in the correct order.
As we were about to close the library for the day, Cyclops arrived. He touched the brim of his cap in greeting and apologized for arriving when we appeared to be finishing for the day.
“I was just on my way home, but thought I’d come past on the chance Alex and Gabe were here. I have some information for them.”
“They’ve been gone all afternoon,” I told him. “Do you want to wait and see if they return?”
Cyclops shook his head. “I’ll telephone them later.”
“I can make cocktails,” Professor Nash piped up.
Cyclops chuckled. “Not tonight. Speaking of cocktails, you should all come to dinner soon. I’ll check with Catherine and get back to you with a date.”
“All of us?” the professor asked.
“All of you.”
“Even me?” Daisy asked.
“Especially you, Daisy.”
She looked taken aback.
Cyclops was about to leave when Gabe and Alex arrived. They brought dark clouds with them and dark news, too.
“McGowan is a legitimate doctor,” Alex began. “He’s been at Rosebank Gardens hospital for thirty years, just as he claimed. Back in the nineties, the General Medical Council received complaints about the therapies used at Rosebank. Some patients left there worse off than when they went in.”
“That aligns with what we know about Robin Reid,” I said.
“Records show that McGowan wasn’t in charge of the hospital then. He was simply one of several doctors employed there. According to statements on his file, the therapies were considered dangerous. They went further than the standards of the time. For instance, the water in the ice baths was colder than recommended, or the electric shock treatment went for too long. After receiving the complaints, the GMC ordered Rosebank Gardens to cease the treatments. According to the GMC’s records, the hospital complied and there were no more complaints.”
“So Stanley’s orderly friend was mistaken,” I said. “As a young doctor, McGowan was simply following orders.”
Gabe removed a piece of paper from his inside jacket pocket with fingers stained black with ink. “Not entirely. We spoke to a clerk who’d been at the GMC for years. He told us about an investigation conducted by Scotland Yard.”
Daisy gasped. “What was the hospital accused of doing?”
“Not the hospital. Just McGowan.” Gabe showed us the piece of paper with two names written on it. “He was accused of causing the deaths of these patients in 1894.”
The same year Robin Reid disappeared.