“Next, I shall clear away this bowel, which so thoroughly obstructs our view of the organs beneath. While any knacker who’s butchered a cow or horse is well acquainted with the voluminous mass of intestine, new students attending their first dissection are frequently astonished when they encounter it for the first time. First I shall resect the small intestine, slicing it free at the level of the pyloric junction, where the stomach ends…”
He leaned in with his knife, and his hand came up holding one severed end of the bowel. He let it slither over the side of the table, and Edward caught it with his bare hand before it could splatter onto the floor. In disgust, he quickly dropped it into the bucket.
“Now I shall free it at the other end, where the small bowel becomes large bowel, at the ileocecal junction.”
Again he reached in with his knife. He straightened, holding up the other severed end.
“To illustrate the marvels of the human digestive system, I should like my assistant to grasp that end of the small bowel and walk up the aisle, as far as he can go.”
Edward hesitated, staring down in disgust at the bucket. Grimacing, he reached into the mass of entrails and came up holding the severed end.
“Go on, Mr. Kingston. Toward the back of the hall.” Edward started up the center aisle, pulling his end of the bowel. Norris caught a foul whiff of offal and saw the student across the aisle clap his hand over his nose to mask the stench. And still Edward kept walking, dragging a coil of intestine behind him like a stinking rope until it finally lifted from the floor and stretched taut, dripping onto the floor.
“Behold the length,” said Dr. Sewall. “We are looking at perhaps twenty feet of bowel. Twenty feet, gentlemen! And this is only the small intestine. I have left the large bowel in situ. Contained within the belly of every single one of you is this most marvelous of organs. Think of it as you sit there, digesting your breakfasts. No matter your station in life, rich or poor, old or young, within the cavity of your belly you are like every other man.”
Or woman, thought Norris, his gaze not on the organ but on the gutted subject lying on the table. Even one so beautiful can be dissected down to a bucket of offal. Where was the soul in all this? Where was the woman who once inhabited that body?
“Mr. Kingston, you may come back to the stage, and the bowel can go back into the bucket. Next, we shall see what the heart and lungs look like, nestled within the chest.” Dr. Sewall reached for an ugly-looking instrument and clamped its jaws around a rib. The sound of snapping bone echoed through the hall. He looked up at the audience. “You cannot get a good view of the thorax unless you look straight into the cavity. I believe it might be best if the first-year students rise from their seats and move closer for the rest of the dissection. Come, gather around the table.”
Norris rose to his feet. He was closest to the aisle, so he was one of the first to reach the table. He stared down, not at the open thorax, but at the face of the woman whose innermost secrets were now being revealed to a room full of strangers. She was so lovely, he thought. Aurnia Tate had been in the full bloom of womanhood.
“If you’ll gather ’round,” said Dr. Sewall, “I should first like to point out an interesting finding in her pelvis. Based on the size of the uterus, which I can easily palpate right here, I would conclude that this subject has quite recently given birth. Despite the relative freshness of this corpse, you will note the particularly foul odor of the abdominal cavity, and the obvious inflammation of the peritoneum. Taking all these findings into account, I’m willing to offer a conjecture as to the likely cause of her death.”
There was a loud thud in the aisle. One of the students said, alarmed: “Is he breathing? Check if he’s breathing!”
Dr. Sewall called out: “What is the problem?”
“It’s Dr. Grenville’s nephew, sir!” said Wendell. “Charles has fainted!”
In the front row, Professor Grenville rose to his feet, looking stunned at the news. Quickly he made his way up the aisle toward Charles, pushing through the students crowded in the aisle.
“He’s all right, sir,” Wendell announced. “Charles is coming around now.”
On stage, Dr. Sewall sighed. “A weak stomach is not a recommendation for someone who wishes to study medicine.”
Grenville knelt at his nephew’s side and patted Charles on the face. “Come come, boy. You’ve just gone a bit light-headed. It hasn’t been an easy morning.”
Groaning, Charles sat up and clutched his head. “I feel sick.”
“I’ll take him outside, sir,” said Wendell. “He could probably use the fresh air.”
“Thank you, Mr. Holmes,” said Grenville. As he stood up, he himself looked none too steady.
We are all unnerved, even the most seasoned among us.
With Wendell’s help, Charles rose shakily to his feet and was helped up the aisle. Norris heard one of the students snicker, “It would have to be Charlie, of course. Leave it to him to faint!”
But it could have happened to any one of us, thought Norris, looking around the auditorium at the ashen faces. What normal human being could watch this morning’s butchery and not be appalled?
And it was not yet over.
On stage, Dr. Sewall once again picked up his knife and coolly eyed his audience. “Gentlemen. Shall we continue?”
Eleven
The present
JULIA DROVE NORTH, fleeing the heat of the Boston summer, and joined the weekend stream of cars headed north into Maine. By the time she reached the New Hampshire border, the temperature outside had fallen ten degrees. Half an hour later, as she crossed into Maine, the air was starting to feel chilly. Soon her views of forest and rocky coastline vanished behind a bank of fog, and from there northward the world turned gray, the road curving through a ghostly landscape of veiled trees and barely glimpsed farmhouses.
When she finally arrived at the beach town of Lincolnville that afternoon, the fog was so dense she could barely make out the massive outline of the Islesboro ferry docked at the pier. Henry Page had warned her that there’d be limited space aboard for vehicles, so she left her car parked in the terminal lot, grabbed her overnight bag, and walked onto the vessel.
If there was any view to be seen out the ferry window that day, she caught no glimpse of it during the crossing to Islesboro.
She walked off the boat into a disorientingly gray world. Henry Page’s house was just a mile’s walk from the island’s terminal—“A nice stroll on a summer’s day,” he’d said. But in thick fog, a mile can seem like forever. She stayed well to the side of the road to avoid being hit by passing cars, and clambered off into the weeds whenever she heard an approaching vehicle. So this is summertime in Maine, she thought, shivering in her shorts and sandals. Though she could hear birds chirping, she couldn’t see them. All she could see was the pavement beneath her feet and the weeds at the side of the road.
A mailbox suddenly appeared in front of her. It was thoroughly rusted, affixed to a crooked post. Staring closely, she could just make out the faded word on the side: STONEHURST.
Henry Page’s house.
The one-lane dirt driveway climbed steadily through dense woods, where bushes and low branches reached out like claws to scrape at any passing vehicle. The farther she climbed, the more uneasy she felt about being stranded on this lonely road, on this fog-choked island. The house appeared so suddenly that she halted, startled, as if she’d just encountered a beast looming in the mist. It was made of stone and old wood that, over the years, had turned silvery in the salt air. Though she could not see the ocean, she knew it was nearby because she could hear waves slapping against rocks and seagulls crying as they wheeled overhead.
She climbed the worn granite steps to the porch and knocked. Mr. Page had told her he would be home, but no one came to the door. She was cold, she’d brought no coat, and she had nowhere to go except back to the ferry terminal. In frustration, she left her bag on the porch and walked around to the back of the house. Since
Henry wasn’t home, she might as well take a look at his view—if there was one to see today.
She followed a stone path to a back garden, overgrown with shrubs and scraggly grass. Though the grounds were clearly in need of a gardener’s attention, she could tell this once must have been a showplace, judging by the elaborate stonework. She saw mossy steps leading downward into the mist, and low stone walls enclosing a series of terraced flower beds. Enticed by the sound of waves, she headed down the steps, past clumps of thyme and catmint. The sea had to be close now, and she expected at any second to catch a glimpse of the beach.
She stepped down, and her heel met empty air.
With a gasp, she scrabbled backward and her rear end landed hard on the stairs. For a moment she sat staring down through shifting curtains of fog to the rocks a good twenty feet below. Only now did she notice the eroded soil on either side of her, and the exposed roots of a tree that was barely clinging to the crumbling cliffside. Gazing down at the sea, she thought: I’d survive the drop, but it wouldn’t take long to drown in that frigid water.
On unsteady legs she climbed back toward the house, fearful the whole way that the cliff would suddenly collapse, dragging her down with it. She was almost to the top when she saw the man waiting for her.
He stood with stooped shoulders, his gnarled hand gripping a cane. Henry Page had sounded old over the telephone, and this man looked ancient, his hair as white as the mist, his eyes squinting through wire-rimmed spectacles.
“The steps are unsafe,” he said. “Every year, another one drops off the cliff. It’s unstable soil.”
“So I found out,” she said, panting from her quick climb up the stairs.
“I’m Henry Page. You’re Miss Hamill, I presume.”
“I hope it’s okay that I took a look around. Since you weren’t home.”
“I’ve been home the whole time.”
“No one answered the door.”
“You think I can just sprint down the stairs? I’m eighty-nine years old. Next time, try a little patience.” He turned and crossed the stone terrace toward a set of French doors. “Come in. I already have a nice sauvignon blanc chilling. Although this cool weather might call for a red, not a white.”
She followed him into the house. As she stepped through the French doors, she thought, This place looks as ancient as he is. It smelled of dust and old carpets.
And books. In that room facing the sea, thousands of old books were crammed in floor-to-ceiling shelves. An enormous stone fireplace took up one wall. Though the room was huge, with the fog pressing in against the sea windows, the space felt dark and claustrophobic. It did not help that there were a dozen boxes stacked up in the center of the room beside a massive oak dining table.
“These are a few of Hilda’s boxes,” he said.
“A few?”
“There are two dozen more down in the cellar, and I haven’t touched those yet. Maybe you could carry them upstairs for me, since I can’t quite manage with this cane. I’d ask my grandnephew to do it, but he’s always so busy.”
And I’m not?
He thumped over to the dining table, where the contents of one of the boxes were spread out across the battered tabletop. “As you can see, Hilda was a pack rat. Never threw away anything. When you live as long as she did, it means you end up with a lot of stuff. But this stuff, it turns out, is quite interesting. It’s completely disorganized. The moving company I hired just threw things willy-nilly into boxes. These old newspapers here have dates anywhere from 1840 to 1910. No order to them whatsoever. I’ll bet there are even older ones somewhere, but we’ll have to open all the boxes to find them. It could take us weeks to go through them all.”
Staring down at a January 10, 1840, issue of the Boston Daily Advertiser, Julia suddenly registered the fact he’d used the word us. She looked up. “I’m sorry, Mr. Page, but I wasn’t planning to stay very long. Could you just show me what you’ve found concerning my house?”
“Oh, yes. Hilda’s house.” To her surprise, he walked away from her, his cane thudding across the wood floor. “Built in 1880,” he yelled back as he headed into another room. “For an ancestor of mine named Margaret Tate Page.”
Julia followed Henry into a kitchen that looked as if it had not been updated since the 1950s. The cabinets were streaked with grime, and the stove was splattered with old grease and what looked like dried spaghetti sauce. He rummaged around in the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of white wine.
“The house was passed down through succeeding generations. Pack rats all of us, just like Hilda,” he said, twisting a corkscrew into the bottle. “Which is why we’re left with this treasure trove of documents. The house stayed in our family all these years.” The cork popped out of the bottle and he looked at her. “Until you.”
“The bones in my garden were probably buried before 1880,” she said. “That’s what the university anthropologist told me. The grave is older than the house.”
“Could be, could be.” He pulled down two wineglasses from the cabinet.
“What you’ve found in these boxes isn’t going to tell us anything about the bones.” And I’m wasting my time here.
“How can you say that? You haven’t even looked at the papers yet.” He filled the glasses and held one out to her.
“Isn’t it a little early in the day to be drinking?” she asked.
“Early?” He snorted. “I’m eighty-nine years old and I have four hundred bottles of excellent wine in my cellar, all of which I intend to finish. I’m more worried that it’s too late to start drinking. So please, join me. A bottle always tastes better when it’s shared.”
She took the glass.
“Now what were we talking about?” he asked.
“The woman’s grave is older than the house.”
“Oh.” He picked up his own glass and shuffled back into the library. “It very well could be.”
“So I don’t see how what’s in these boxes could tell me her identity.”
He rifled through the papers on the dining table and plucked out one of them, which he set in front of her. “Here, Ms. Hamill. Here is the clue.”
She looked down at the handwritten letter, dated March 20, 1888.
Dearest Margaret,
I thank you for your kind condolences, so sincerely offered, for the loss of my darling Amelia. This has been a most difficult winter for me, as every month seems to bring the passing of yet another old friend to illness and age. Now it is with deepest gloom that I must consider the rapidly evaporating years left to me.
I realize that this is perhaps my last chance to broach a difficult subject which I should have raised long ago. I have been reluctant to speak of this, as I know that your aunt felt it wisest to keep this from you…”
Julia looked up. “This was written in 1888. That’s well after the bones were buried.”
“Keep reading,” he said. And she did, until the final paragraph.
For now, I enclose the news clipping, which I earlier mentioned. If you have no desire to learn more, please tell me, and I will never again mention this. But if indeed the subject of your parents holds any interest for you, then at my next opportunity, I will once again pick up my pen. And you will learn the story, the true story, of your aunt and the West End Reaper.
With fondest regards,
O.W.H.
“Do you realize who O.W.H. is?” asked Henry. His eyes, magnified by the lenses of his spectacles, gleamed with excitement.
“You told me over the phone it was Oliver Wendell Holmes.”
“And you do know who he was?”
“He was a judge, wasn’t he? A Supreme Court justice.”
Henry gave a sigh of exasperation. “No, that’s Oliver Wendell Holmes Junior, the son! This letter is from Wendell Senior. You must have heard of him.”
Julia frowned. “He was a writer, wasn’t he?”
“That’s all you know about him?”
“I’m sorry. I’m not exactly a hi
story teacher.”
“You’re a teacher? Of what?”
“The third grade.”
“Even a third-grade teacher should know that Oliver Wendell Holmes Senior was more than just a literary figure. Yes, he was a poet and a novelist and a biographer. He was also a lecturer, a philosopher, and one of the most influential voices in Boston. And he was one more thing. In the scheme of his contributions to mankind, it was the most important thing of all.”
“What was that?”
“He was a physician. One of the finest of his age.”
She looked at the letter with more interest. “So this is historically significant.”
“And the Margaret whom he addresses in the letter—that’s my great-great-grandmother, Dr. Margaret Tate Page, born in 1830. She was one of the first women physicians in Boston. That’s her house you now own. In 1880, when her house was built, she would have been fifty years old.”
“Who is this aunt he speaks of in the letter?”
“I have no idea. I know nothing at all about her.”
“Are there other letters from Holmes?”
“I’m hoping we’ll find them here.” He glanced at the dozen boxes stacked beside the dining table. “I’ve only searched these six so far. Nothing’s organized, nothing’s in order. But here is the history of your house, Ms. Hamill. This is what’s left of the people who lived there.”
“He said that he enclosed a clipping. Did you find it?”
Henry reached for a scrap of newspaper. “I believe this is what he referred to.”
The clipping was so brown with age that she had trouble reading the tiny print in the gray light of the window. Only when Henry turned on a lamp was she able to make out the words.
It was dated November 28, 1830.