“Well said,” Trebor murmured. “But we’re neglecting your education.” He smiled at his companion. “If you intend to administer treatment to these people you’ll have to learn their language. I suggest a few lessons in vocabulary.”
“But I speak English,” Mark said.
“Do you?” Trebor’s tone was quizzical. “Then suppose you try your hand at identifying the occupations of some of the patrons as I point them out to you.” He jabbed a finger in the direction of a sooty-faced man wearing smudged coveralls and high boots who stood at the end of the bar. “What does he do for a living?”
“I’d say he’s a chimney sweep.” Mark grinned. “And a drunken one, at that.”
“A flue-faker.” Trebor smiled. “As for his condition, he’d generally be referred to as a lushington. Note the heavy side-whiskers? They’re called Newgate knockers hereabouts.”
He pointed to a dark-skinned man in a pea jacket and stocking cap, clinging to the bartop for dear life. “What about this fellow?”
“That’s easy — a merchant seaman. And Asiatic, from the looks of him. You call them Lascars, I believe.”
“Full marks.” Trebor’s eyes narrowed. “But notice his friend. While pretending to hold him up, his free hand is groping into his companion’s jacket.”
“A pickpocket!”
“Better known as a mutcher. A drunken-roller.” Trebor swiveled in his seat. “How about that chap in the far corner, with the portable grindstone beside his chair?”
“A knife grinder, obviously.”
“Chiv sharpener is the preferred description. The lady he’s buying drinks for is a trooper — a polite euphemism for prostitute. But he can afford the treat. Chiv sharpening is a lucrative profession, what with all the sailors, leather cutters, market porters and slaughterhouse men using knives in their work. Some of them could teach us a bit about surgery and dissection. I fancy.”
A fat waiter in a soiled apron waddled up to their table. “Your pleasure, gents? Another round o’ gatter?”
“Why not?” Trebor nodded at him. “In for a penny, in for a pound.” As the waiter moved away the older man reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of coins. “Which reminds me,” he said. “While we’re at it, I’d best give you a lesson in arithmetic.”
He spread the loose change on the tabletop before him, indicating each coin in turn with a thrust of his forefinger. “This ha’penny piece is called a flatch. And here’s a yennap — a penny, pronounced backward. The tuppence is a deuce. A sixpence is a sprat, the shilling is a deaner, the half-crown’s an alderman—”
“What cheer, luv?”
Trebor glanced up quickly at the interruption. A plump double-chinned woman wearing a frayed jacket and brown skirt lurched unsteadily beside him, her bleary eyes blinking at the row of coins. At a table directly behind her, two bearded soldiers stared sullenly as another woman rose to join her intoxicated companion. She moved up to Mark, a tall imposing presence in her huge plumed hat and pearl-buttoned dress, then offered him a gold-toothed simulacrum of a smile and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Are you goodnatured, dearie?” she said.
Trebor scowled and shook his head. “Clear off,” he muttered.
The pearl-festooned woman drew herself up with a look of injured innocence. “No need to jump down me throat! ’Ere we are, wantin’ to be sociable-like—”
Trebor’s scowl and voice deepened. “Mind what I said. Clear off, both of you!”
The tall woman turned to her matronly companion without replying. “Come along, Martha. To hell with these bloody buggers — let’s go back to the sodgers.”
As the two started away, Trebor relaxed, nodding at Mark. “Good riddance.”
Mark shifted uneasily in his chair. “Weren’t you a bit short with them?”
“One needs firmness. It’s the only thing they can understand.” The older doctor pushed the coins together as he spoke. “Thousands of them about, drunken and raddled with disease, spreading infection every time they spread their legs.”
Mark nodded. “Still, they’ve got to live.”
“Do they?” Trebor glanced over at the table occupied by the two whores and the pair of bearded ruffians in uniform. One soldier was pinching the tall woman’s breasts while the other’s hand crept up beneath the brown skirt of her drunken companion. “Disgusting,” he said. “Animals prowling our streets. Thank heaven they’re leaving.”
Mark followed Trebor’s gaze as the soldiers rose, yanking the women to their feet. The pudgy one stumbled and her escort cursed, cuffing her cheek with a meaty fist. Then they staggered off.
“Where are they going?” Mark asked.
“Does it matter?” Trebor shrugged. “Tarts like that will raise their skirts anywhere — in alleys, courtyards, or up against a wall. There’s nothing too low for their tastes, no act too perverted for them to perform. And all for want of a sixpence to pay for a night’s kip in a public lodging house.”
Mark stared at him. “You mean to say we could have prevented this if we’d only given them a few pennies?”
“I dare say.” Trebor nodded indifferently, then looked up as Mark pushed his chair back and started to rise. “Where are you off to? Our drinks are coming—”
The younger man didn’t reply. His eyes were fixed firmly on the two couples as they weaved to the swinging door and reeled out into the street.
“Hold on,” Trebor said. “Don’t be a fool—”
But Mark was already striding to the doorway and now he too moved past it and disappeared in the night beyond.
For a moment Trebor remained seated, his jaw tightening as anger overcame him. “Filthy sluts,” he murmured. Scooping up the coins from the tabletop, he thrust them into his pocket.
Then he rose, lifting his brown surgical bag from underneath the table, and hurried toward the door.
~ THREE ~
It was still dark when John Reeves stumbled down the steps of his lodgings in the George Yard buildings early on the following morning.
Early? Five o’bloody clock it was, and him off to the bleeding market without so much as a wash or a cuppa tea.
The stale reek of fried fish filled the hallway and through the thin walls he could hear the sound of snoring from the tiny rooms on either side; their occupants were sleeping off the after-effects of Bank Holiday celebrations.
No sleep for Johnny Reeves, worse luck. No sleep, nor even a taste of kipper — though the notion fair put him off this morning, seeing what lay in his gut from last night.
Just putting one foot before the other was a bit of a rum go, let alone dodging through the dark like this. Johnny started down the stone staircase and almost went arse-over-teakettle as he slipped on a spot of wet at the first-floor landing.
What the flaming hell was this? Most likely some drunken sod who couldn’t wait to get rid of his gatter, using the stairs for a muzzpot. What a stink!
But not the smell of piss. And now, as he blinked down in the dim dawn light, not the look of it either.
His eyes widened as he stared at the dark design staining the stone.
Then he saw what lay huddled against the wall beyond — the body of a woman, with blood oozing in rivulets of red from under her upraised brown skirt.
~ FOUR ~
Egypt, 2300 B.C. In addition to the usual tortures — scourging and mutilation — and execution by strangling, impaling, or burning — the ultimate punishment was to be embalmed alive coated with corrosive natron, which slowly ate through the flesh.
Shortly past noon on the following Thursday, Eva Sloane emerged from the new Whitechapel Underground Station into the hazy sunlight of the street.