An Improper Death (Dr. Alexandra Gladstone Mysteries Book 2) (3 page)

Alexandra was silent. The constable’s explanation had tied everything nicely into a neat, if unlikely, bundle. It was not at all satisfying to her. Finally she spoke. “I should like to perform an autopsy, Constable.”

This time it was the constable who stopped walking and stared at Alexandra. “An autopsy?” He spoke the word as if he had never heard of it. “Absolutely not, Dr. Gladstone. There will be no autopsy in this case.”

Chapter Two

“Said there was to be no autopsy, did he?” Nancy questioned Alexandra as she helped her spread a fresh linen over the examination table. The one she had removed was soaked with a compound tincture of camphor, which Alexandra had used to bathe the neck of the miller’s twelve-year-old daughter. She was suffering from an inflammation of the larynx and had lost her voice. Her father had brought her in early, before Alexandra left the house for her morning rounds.

“Yes, and he seemed rather adamant.” Alexandra smoothed the linen with her hands. “And I believe the reason he had the body taken to the undertaker’s home was to make certain I had no access to it.”

“Odd indeed.” Nancy gave the cloth one final swipe and placed her hands on her hips. “And he has the events leading to the admiral’s death all sorted out, does he? Says the admiral was drunk. So drunk, in fact he mistakenly put on his wife’s drawers and went for a swim in the cold sea?” She laughed. “A man would have to be pretty drunk for that, I would say.”

Alexandra glanced at Nancy. “Indeed.”

“Or it could be wearing a woman’s drawers is nothing unusual to the constable. Perhaps he has a pair just like them himself.” Nancy giggled and turned away, pretending to be busy straightening a row of medicine bottles.

Alexandra scowled. “Nancy! For heaven’s sake, such a bawdy statement is unbecoming to…” She sputtered and turned away, unable to get the image of the skinny former schoolmaster in lacy drawers out of her mind. She had to give in, finally, to laughter that brought tears to her eyes.

Nancy laughed as well, and the raucous sound the two of them made brought Zack hurrying in from the parlor to see what was going on. He gave one sharp bark, a reprimand, perhaps, that he had not been let in on the fun.

The bark served to sober Alexandra, who wiped her eyes and managed to speak without choking. “Nancy, this is no laughing matter. A man is dead. His wife and son are grieving. And it all seems rather mysterious to me.”

“Of course,” Nancy said, “you are right. And you don’t believe, any more than I do, that Constable Snow has everything resolved. The question is how did he come up with such a story?”

Alexandra was trying to concentrate on stocking her medical bag with supplies she might need on her rounds. “First,” she said, “consider that Admiral
Orkwright was an upstanding and much-admired man and, I should think, a friend of the constable’s. Obviously the admiral’s drunkenness came as no surprise to the constable, although it seemed to embarrass Mrs. Orkwright to admit it. It is possible he’s trying to protect Mrs. Orkwright from further embarrassment and to protect his friend’s good name from any kind of scandal.”

“And you think…” Nancy prodded.

Alexandra sighed and shook her head. “I don’t know what to think. And my guess is, in truth, neither does the constable.” She handed Nancy an empty vial to wash and be refilled.

“If that’s true, then why does he object to an autopsy?” Nancy inspected the vial as if she half expected to find the answer inside.

Alexandra snapped the bag shut. “My father and I have influenced you beyond our culture, Nancy. Not everyone accepts autopsy so easily. Most people see it as a defilement of the body. Again, the constable is protecting the admiral’s family from ridicule and scandal.”

“But you expect to learn something, perhaps, that will clear the matter,” Nancy said.

“I don’t know what to expect. It is simply that I find it curious that the admiral would have been out bathing in the sea when a storm was due, even if he was drunk. Particularly since he was known not to be fond of recreational bathing. Yet, I did notice there were scrape marks on the body, perhaps from the rocks, and, as I said, his mouth was full of seaweed.”

Nancy’s eyes widened. “Are you saying he was dead before he went into the sea? That someone killed him first?”

Alexandra shook her head. “I’m saying I don’t know. I’m saying it’s a possibility. And I’m saying there’s no way to know without an autopsy, if then.”

“And the drawers…” There was no hint of laughter in Nancy’s expression.

“Yes,” Alexandra said, “the drawers remain a question.”

Nancy shook her head, trying to remain serious. “Very strange,” she said, then turned away quickly and left the room. Alexandra heard her giggling, the sound muffled by her hand over her mouth, as she hurried away to the kitchen.

Alexandra picked up her medical bag and took her cloak from the hook in the front hall, calling over her shoulder to Nancy that she was leaving for her rounds. There was no response from Nancy, but Zack bounded to her side. He always acted as if the morning rounds to visit homebound patients were as much his responsibility as Alexandra’s.

The two stable boys Nancy had recently hired had Lucy, her mare, saddled and waiting for her. Rob, the older of the two, stood ready to help her into the sidesaddle while Artie, the younger, held Lucy’s reigns.

“Is it true about the admiral?” Rob asked as she walked to his side.

“You’ve already heard?” She gathered her skirt and stepped onto the mounting stool. She wasn’t surprised, really. Artie and Rob, whom she had rescued from a band of young thieves several months ago, still had an uncanny way of knowing everything of a darker nature that went on in Newton-Upon-Sea.

“Heard ’e was dead, if that’s what ye mean,” Rob said.

Artie, who could not have been more than nine years old, nodded his head. “
Drownded, ’e was.” He glanced at Rob.

“Bit odd for
a old sea dog, what?” Rob took the reins from Artie and handed them to Alexandra, who was now mounted on Lucy’s back. Her knee was securely hooked over the horn and her skirts discreetly covering every inch of leg.

Alexandra looked down at both of the boys. “And what else have you heard?”

They both sputtered with laughter, and Artie spoke first. “Wearin’ ’is wife’s knickers, was ’e?”

“Knickers? Where did you learn that word?” Alexandra did her best to keep her voice stern.

Artie gave her a frightened look, obviously afraid he’d spoken inappropriately. “I—well, I just…”

“Never mind.
Just be sure you don’t repeat gossip.” She gave Lucy a nudge and turned her toward the gate. Obviously the constable’s attempt at containing the gossip hadn’t worked. She had to admit she wasn’t surprised that the word had spread. Tom and Nell Stillwell’s butcher shop carried more news than the
Times
, without the added burden of accuracy. What continued to puzzle her, however, was how the boys could have possibly heard it so early when, to the best of her knowledge, until a few hours ago, they’d been sleeping peacefully in their living quarters above the stables and had no contact with anyone other than herself.

She could not let their mysterious lines of communication concern her now, however. She had patients to see. Mary Prodder, an aging seamstress, forced to live with her cantankerous daughter-in-law, had fallen and broken a hip the day before. The Blackstone baby had croup, and Hannibal Talbot, an oyster man, was enduring a great amount of pain from bladder stones.

The Prodder household had already heard the news of the admiral’s death when Alexandra arrived. Mary’s daughter-in-law, Edith, had gone early to the Stillwell’s shop to purchase a shank of beef to boil.

Edith, almost giddy with excitement over the delicious news, leaned toward Alexandra and whispered. “Nell’s the one what found ’
im. Near naked ’e was, with all ’is private’s showin’. And Nell seen ’em all. The full cluster!” She straightened and spoke in a louder voice. “’Twas only a pair of a ladies’ drawers ’e was wearin’. Some men is pure perverted, I say.”

Alexandra adjusted the splint in which she had placed the elder Mrs. Prodder and didn’t respond. She’d fallen late at night, taking a shortcut home after staying late with one of her customers. Constable Snow had found her and brought her home, then sent for Alexandra. It had caused the elderly woman a great deal of pain when Alexandra set the bone in her hip. She’d then applied a long splint. It extended from under her arm to her foot, and her legs were tied together in the hope of keeping the injured leg from shortening too much. Alexandra knew from experience that the bones would not be likely to unite properly, and her leg on the injured side would, in spite of her efforts, be shorter than the other. Broken bones that healed poorly were the curse of elderly women, and it seemed to worsen after the menses had ceased. The exact cause, however, remained a mystery.

“Is Mrs. Orkwright faring well enough? I’m concerned for her. She was always kind to me. Not like some people what treats their dressmakers like dogs.” Mary seemed particularly agitated and her face was pale and beaded with sweat, obviously from the pain in her hip. Current medical knowledge demanded that she be confined to her bed for two months. Of late, Alexandra had begun to wonder if it might not benefit the patient to shorten the time in bed, but she dared not harm her patient by experimenting.

“Mrs.
Orkwright is in shock, of course, but I have reason to believe she will adjust. For now, though, I’m most concerned about your own pain.” Alexandra suspected pain was something Mary Prodder knew too much of. An examination after her recent accident had revealed suspicious scars on her back and legs, most like left by a rod long ago when she was a child. Mary, however, had insisted they were the result of a fall from a horse.

“My own pain is nothing,” Mary said, “and I
knows ye’ll heal me.”

“Pain?”
Edith said. “She knows not what pain is until she’s had to lift all the laundry I have to do, what with an extra person in the house. And the heavy cooking pots I must use with an extra mouth to feed. ’Tis my back what knows pain!”

Again Alexandra did her best to ignore the daughter-in-law. “Make sure you turn Mary several times a day, Edith, lest she develop bedsores.”

Edith stiffened. “I does the best I can, but she’s a demanding woman, she is, and there’s no time for it all. I cannot take the responsibility for everything.”

“Nor am I asking you to,” Alexandra said. “I ask only for a little kindness and mercy for Mary. She is suffering greatly.”

Edith took on a defensive look. “Kindness and mercy? I should be so fortunate as to get half the kindness and mercy I shows her. Just ask my husband. Fin will tell you I’m kind to his mother, ’e will.”

Alexandra closed her medical bag and stood to take her leave. “Please see that the constant pressure on her backside is relieved by turning her frequently.” She handed her a vial of laudanum. “If the pain is too great, see that she gets two drops of this no more than twice a day. If she requires more send for me.”

Edith took the bottle absently. “’Ave ye seen the admiral for yerself?”

“No,” she said, hoping to end the conversation with that small lie. Edith, however, was so enthralled she refused to hear.

“Was he swimming half naked, as Nell said? What was he doing out in such dreadful weather, I’d like to know. And his wife, what did she have to say for herself, being married to a perverted man what dresses in women’s drawers? Nell said you and the constable seen her and talked to her. All high-hatty, she is, livin’ up there on top ’o the world and lookin’ down on everybody. I guess this will show ’er she’s no better than the rest of us.”

Mary spoke up in a trembling voice from her bed.
“Poor woman. That’s all I can say.”

Edith glanced at her mother-in-law and scowled. “Doesn’t know what she’s saying half the time. Such a burden, she is! You can see that, can’t you?”

Once more Alexandra ignored her complaints and pointed to the vial. “Remember, two drops no more than twice a day.”

With that last instruction, she left the house. Zack, who was waiting outdoors in the sun, got up and followed her, watching over her carefully while she mounted Lucy, boosting herself up from a stump in front of the house.

She made her way to the Blackstone cottage a short distance from the village in the countryside. The cottage would have, under normal circumstances, been her last stop, since it was outside of town, but Edith’s gossip and attitude toward Mary had so distressed her, she felt she needed the ride to clear her mind.

Once there, she found little Saul, the Blackstone baby, was much improved. His stepmother, Helen, took as good care of him as she did her own infant, who was only a few weeks older. Helen had been hired as a wet nurse when Saul’s mother and twin brother died at his birth. The arrangement as wet nurse had eventually resulted in a permanent position as Seth Blackstone’s wife and mother to little Saul and two-year-old Phillip, something patently beneficial to each of them.

Feeling refreshed after the ride and after seeing the family thriving, she rode back to the village to look in on Hannibal Talbot. She found him in a restless, laudanum-induced sleep. His face was flushed and his body hot to the touch, suggesting that an infection of the bladder had set in. His wife was beside herself with worry.

When Hannibal first became ill, Alexandra had examined his urine under a microscope and diagnosed
cystine deposits in the bladder. She had prescribed a preparation of iron, iodine, iodide of iron, and nitro-muriatic acid, along with podophyllin for the liver along with copious amounts of water. When he didn’t respond to the medicine, she had recommended surgical removal of the stones, but he had, so far, steadfastly refused the operation, claiming a female could not possibly know a man’s body well enough to accomplish such a procedure. He preferred, it appeared, to live in pain and beg for laudanum for occasional relief.