Chapter 126: Stop [2]
“No, we waited until now!”
“You’re saying chopping off people’s arms and legs is entertainment?”
“It was your hospital that took the money!”
“What?!”
As soon as I walked out with Robert Liston, the people who had been lingering around with awkward expressions started protesting. The people inside were satisfied. They had seen something worth their money. But those outside? Not so much. Some had come on their rare day off. If this had been an actual performance, I might have felt guilty.
But now, I had a rough idea of how the lower classes of London lived.
Still… watching surgery like it’s the Colosseum…
Honestly, it felt like a replacement for gladiator fights. Of course, it was better than that, at least no one died…
No, wait. People definitely die. A lot of people die…
Luckily, Liston’s outcomes were slightly better.
“Professor. No, Brother! You don’t need to flaunt your experience anymore. Please… just wash that reeking knife. Please?”
It had worked, my desperate plea. Honestly, did Liston really want to carry around a knife still crusted with someone else’s dried blood? It was just an outdated superstition that it gave him prestige. But after hearing my reasoning, he agreed. His reputation already stretched beyond London, across England, and even into France. He did not need a dirty knife to prove anything.
Meanwhile, other surgeons still amputated with filthy blades, as if their goal was to kill the patient rather than help them.
“What did you just say, man?”
“Oh, nothing, nothing.”
I had muttered out of frustration. These people thought even executions were a good show. Honestly, it was not surprising. Anyone else would have been flattened by such criticism, but Liston, even with a blood-dripping knife in hand, remained unbothered.
“Let’s take a look.”
“Sure. Come back for the next surgery. I’ll make it worth your while.”
“Yes, yes. It would be an honor.”
Surprisingly, we left with a warm send-off.
“Harry… Harry the Butcher.”
“…Excuse me?”
As soon as we got outside, Liston wiped his knife with a towel, tucked it into its case, and casually dropped that disturbing nickname.
Wasn’t he a doctor? Why did they call him the Butcher?
“It’s a name he earned because so many people died. Fortunately, our professor was safety-first. He always tried to reduce danger while treating even brutal conditions like Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia.”
“Ah… right.”
I nodded, but in truth, I was barely following. Was this a textbook case or a horror story?
“That guy did whatever he could to make the procedure more effective. You’ve dissected before, so you know the prostate is in front of the rectum, right?”
“Yes…”
But the more I listened, the more anxious I became. Was this another lunatic, just like before?
“Inspired by that, he tried removing the prostate through the front.”
“…What?”
That could not be right. I asked again, hoping I had misheard.
“He slit from the front, cut from the side… opened up the abdomen, despite it being taboo. And then the intestines would burst, with feces floating everywhere… It’s no wonder he got kicked out of the hospital.”
“Ah…”
How could someone like that ever become a professor? Of course he was kicked out. And yet, this man had the audacity to open a practice near London and continue “treating” patients. Naturally, many of them died.
Even in the nineteenth century, that must have seemed heretical. No antisepsis, no proper sterilization. Cutting open the abdomen under those conditions? Insane. Did they even know what an enema was? Did they understand that feces were dirty? The streets were practically rivers of human waste.
Fecal contamination… Christ.
Even in the twenty-first century, we worried about perforated bowels during emergency surgeries. When that happened, we cleaned obsessively with disinfectant. And still, the prognosis worsened. But back here? Survival would have been a miracle.
“Still… the professor kept in touch with him. He’s the only one doing that type of surgery, and technically, he was once his student. I guess he was just… lonely.”
“Lonely?”
“Yeah. You know Amputation is the most common major surgery, right?”
“Yeah…”
I did not like it, but it was true. Surgery back then basically meant cutting things off. Other procedures, like lithotomy or hemorrhoid treatment, were fringe at best. Most surgeons were limited to removing limbs and praying it worked.
“I never thought I’d be shaking hands with a lunatic like that. Anyway, let’s go. Got to go chop some testicles, huh?”
“Y-yeah… Let’s go.”
After that lovely introduction to Harry the Butcher, we got into the carriage.
This was Liston’s personal coach, and as you would expect from someone rich and bored, it was upgraded frequently.
“Whoa, this…?”
“Ha! Nice, right? From the Qing Dynasty.”
“Aha.”
There was a time when Chinese goods were prized. That time… was ending soon.
The Opium War… How long until that?
Ten years? I thought briefly about the Qing Dynasty’s future, and then about Joseon’s. Not exactly bright, either. But that was a worry for another day. For now, I had to focus on the present.
It would have been great to gain fame and earn a title, but that was still far off. At least I had already become a professor. Plus, Queen Victoria, still a princess, seemed to view me favorably.
“What are you thinking so hard about?”
“Oh, nothing. I was just wondering what we’d do if… you know… they were already gone.”
“Hah! A valid concern. The crazier they are, the more diligent they tend to be.”
Are you really someone who has been holding a scalpel since dawn? The thought almost escaped my lips, but I swallowed it and offered a polite reply instead.
“Yes. I wish all doctors were like you.”
“Ha ha! No, they should be like you. You know I respect you from the bottom of my heart, right?”
“I still have a long way to go.”
“Ha ha ha! And humble, too! This is why I recommended you to the director.”
Liston looked forward again. At some point, we had left the crowded streets and entered a quieter road. The hospital itself had been built just outside London, which made sense. The rich did not go to hospitals anyway. Doctors came to them.
Hospitals were not places of healing. They were cemeteries with roofs. With the occasional corpse rotting in the dissection room, no wonder people feared them.
“There it is. The Butcher’s Clinic.”
We arrived at a building that looked far too hateful to be called a hospital. Even though the area was quiet, the city around it had grown large enough that this was still part of London. There were not many people walking around. The place was in worse shape than I had imagined.
“Is that it?”
In the middle of the row stood a building labeled Harry’s Infirmary. Honestly, it looked more like a bar than a clinic. But what could you expect? Just outside London, wandering shamans offered miracle cures. Even a self-proclaimed doctor operating in London proper attracted patients simply by proximity.
“There’s a crowd forming. That fraud.”
“Um… don’t kill him.”
“Who said anything about killing?”
“Then why did you pull your knife?”
“Habit.”
Liston reflexively drew his knife at the sight of the crowd, then quickly tucked it back. I did not even ask why he was carrying it like that. It was just who he was.
“We’re here, Professor.”
The coach stopped in front of the building. It was the kind of carriage that never appeared in neighborhoods like this, which naturally drew attention. Some people stared like they wanted to rob us. But the coachman looked unbothered. He was probably packing heat.
“Whoa.”
“Let’s have a look…”
“Looks like a gang boss just got out…”
As soon as Liston stepped down, more than half the gawkers turned away.
Yep. Thought so.
As long as I stuck close to this man, I would not have to worry about random thugs. His presence alone was its own deterrent.
“It must be exhausting standing next to you.”
“Hah… Qing Dynasty gang leader…”
Just being beside him gave me an intimidation buff. I glanced around. Sure enough, everyone looked away when we made eye contact.
Bang.
Liston strode straight through the crowd and banged on the clinic door.
“Oi! Come out!”
He looked like a loan shark demanding repayment. I wondered if anyone would actually answer…
Crash.
A window shattered nearby.
“What?”
“Whoa!”
“Why are they jumping out?!”
“They probably thought a patient’s family was here for revenge.”
“Ah.”
What a mess.
Well, horsemanship was a requirement in medical school for a reason, right?
The patient died, and the doctor fled on horseback… What a world.