Prevention Is Key, After All (Part 2)
Screeech.
Regardless of my personal reservations, the carriage soon arrived at the factory. It was one of several locations the Hospital Director had tracked down and pointed out while Liston and I were busy raising holy hell in the operating theater. After all, wasn't this the very man who had secured Liston a speaking slot before Parliament? With just a brief inquiry, he had already sniffed out four of these foul establishments. This particular factory was the closest of the lot.
"What's your business?"
The moment we pushed open the battered wooden door without bothering to knock, a burly brute standing nearby—built like a heavy cavalryman—stepped forward to demand an explanation. One might wonder why a factory, rather than a disreputable tavern, would employ such muscle, but in this day and age, bouncers were an absolute necessity for industrial enterprise. Why? Because the workers ran away.
Truth be told, looking at the place, I would have wanted to run away too. Choking white vapor filled the suffocatingly cramped quarters. Would these wretches be given proper rest breaks or decent meals? They would be fortunate to receive their meager wages at all. Seeing this, the rise of Marxism in the nineteenth century felt less like an ideological movement and more like an inevitability.
"We came by carriage."
In any case, answering a direct question was the proper conduct of a civilized gentleman. Both Liston and I took immense pride in considering ourselves civilized men, so we provided a perfectly truthful reply. The bouncer, however, did not seem particularly satisfied with our answer and glared at us with squinted eyes.
"The hell kind of—"
"What? Where's the owner?"
Liston, having shown what he considered admirable courtesy, clearly took offense at the man's insolent tone. In one fluid motion, he clamped a massive hand around the fellow's throat and hoisted him clean into the air.
I cannot say how many people have experienced being lifted by the windpipe, but when it happens, the vocal cords are crushed flat, rendering speech utterly impossible. When a man cannot draw breath, words are hardly forthcoming.
"Guh-ack!"
"I gave you an answer, yet you refuse to give me one?"
It was not as if Liston was unaware of the anatomy. Nor was it because he possessed a profound medical knowledge of the cervical structures; rather, it was empirical knowledge garnered through extensive personal experience.
"Ah—wha—"
"The boss! Go get the boss, now!"
As the man dangling from his grip fell silent, the rest of the workers scrambled into frantic motion. Liston smiled warmly at the sight. This man knew better than anyone that a violent spectacle was always the swiftest path to results.
Me? I was busy acting in a manner befitting my own reputation. I propped one foot onto the chair the bouncer had just vacated, leaning forward in what I judged to be the most thuggish posture in my repertoire.
"Pyeong."
"Yes?"
"Stop fooling around and stand beside me. You only look intimidating when you're next to me."
"Ah, right. Understood."
While I adjusted my stance, a commotion arose from the back, and a hulking man came storming out, huffing and puffing with rage. He had certainly started at a furious sprint, but by the time he approached, his pace had slowed to a cautious walk. Eventually, he halted at an awkward, hesitant distance.
"What... who on earth are you people?"
To be fair, the sight of Liston and me together was rather jarring. Anyone looking at Liston would mistake him for a cutthroat gang leader. And standing right beside him was an East Asian fellow, who naturally looked like his foreign henchman. The bouncer from earlier had clearly been an idiot for failing to read the room.
Thud.
Liston dumped the now completely subdued guard onto the floorboards like a sack of turnips and turned his gaze upon the proprietor. Though the man looked more suited to racketeering than running a legitimate business, surprisingly, most industrialists of this era were cut from this very cloth. After all, this was a society where fortunes were amassed by threatening and browbeating laborers, withholding wages as much as possible, and wringing out the maximum number of working hours. That ruthlessness was what passed for competitive edge and managerial competence.
"I-if it's money you're after..."
Men who operated on the fringes of the law inevitably crossed paths with real criminal syndicates. The owner naturally assumed Liston was some high-ranking underworld boss, and one of his lackeys hurriedly produced a thick bundle of banknotes.
"Hmm."
It was an amount substantial enough to make Liston's eyes gleam. Frankly, even my own resolve wavered for a split second. There were four such factories; if we collected from every one of them...
"We didn't come for money. First of all—you lot! Yes, you over there! Everyone out!"
"W-wait! By what right are you doing this!"
Snapping back to his senses, Liston began herding the workers outside—men and women who, even at this very moment, were inhaling toxic white phosphorus fumes with their bare faces exposed. Seeing his workforce dispersed, the factory owner finally discarded his fear and grabbed Liston's arm. To him, this was a threat to his livelihood. In truth, the man probably didn't even believe he was doing anything wrong.
"Two match girls who worked here stopped showing up a while ago, didn't they?"
"Ah, yes, yes. Ah... did those two owe you money? I'll bring them to you! No, I'll pay their debt myself—"
"You insolent cur! I'm not a gangster, I'm a doctor!"
"That can't be..."
"I am Liston! Liston!"
"A-ah! Th-the Sword Master...!"
Tired of talking in circles, Liston barked out his true identity, and the owner instantly dropped to his knees. Under normal circumstances, a physician should never be more terrifying than a violent mobster. But when that physician was Robert Liston, all conventional logic ceased to apply. The owner's eyes drifted down to the gleaming bone saw and knife scabbard strapped to Liston's hip, and he pressed his forehead toward the dirt.
"Wh-what business brings you here, sir...?"
Cold sweat dripped onto the floor along with his trembling gaze. Every droplet that struck the filthy, unwashed floorboards kicked up a puff of dust.
"Have you seen the faces of those two girls recently? You have, haven't you?"
"I-I wouldn't know."
"Is that so? Then I suppose I'll have to show you. Pyeong."
"Right here."
I drew out two medical sketches and handed them to Liston. Holding the drawings in one hand, Liston used the other to seize a fistful of hair at the back of the kneeling owner's head, violently wrenching his face upward.
"Aaargh!"
"Do you see this?"
"Y-yes, yes!"
"This is what became of them. This is entirely your doing. Do you understand?"
"What? I-I didn't do anything..."
"You bastard! Did we not issue a warning forbidding the production of white phosphorus matches? Official notices should have arrived at your door!"
"Ah... those. I did see them, but does that make any sense? Simply breathing a bit of vapor..."
Even with visual evidence shoved in his face, reason failed to penetrate his thick skull. But that was hardly surprising. Anyone who accumulated wealth as a factory master in this era had long since traded away their conscience. The other workers, however, were a different matter entirely. Sure enough, several among them were already displaying early symptoms of the affliction.
"Wait... is that why my teeth have been...?"
"Dear God, no..."
"You evil monster!"
Murmurs of outrage erupted from the match girls who had been herded outside. Even so, none of them dared rush forward to strike the owner. The law had always belonged to the wealthy. And as if to prove that grim reality, the police were already arriving on the scene.
Seeing the constables, the owner's pallid face brightened with relief.
"Un-unhand me! How dare you torment an innocent man in broad daylight!"
Emboldened, he shouted defiance at Liston, a smug grin of triumph beginning to curl upon his lips. But rather than letting go, Liston tightened his grip and ripped out a massive tuft of hair from the back of the man's scalp.
"Aaagh!"
"This is for my patient."
"Aaaaargh!"
"And this is for Pyeong's patient."
Not content with that, he reached around and tore out another generous clump from the man's bangs. Subjected to agonizing physical pain and the sudden horror of premature balding, the owner completely lost his wits. Consequently, the one who greeted the arriving constables was not the factory owner who had summoned them, but Liston himself.
"Er..."
Needless to say, no one was arrested on the spot.
"Ah, yes. How is the Chief Inspector these days?"
"H-he is well, Doctor Liston."
"Good. What brings you here?"
"We received a report of a disturbance taking place..."
"Ah, this fellow has been causing quite a racket for some time now. Screaming at the top of his lungs, you see."
Liston pointed casually at the owner. Technically, the man was screaming. Screams of agony, to be precise, but screaming nonetheless.
"Well... this is his place of business, sir. Obstructing business is..."
"Ah, but this 'business' is the crime."
"Pardon?"
"Look here."
"Ugh! What in heaven's name is this?"
Liston thrust the sketches into the hands of the constable, who looked utterly at a loss.
"These were workers from this very factory. This is what happened to them."
"Did... did he beat them?"
"No. It was the fumes."
"The fumes...?"
The constable, who had been on the verge of siding against the owner, developed a blank, uncomprehending expression the moment the word 'fumes' was uttered. This was an era where the concept of industrial negligence and occupational disease did not even exist. It was not that the policeman was particularly ignorant; this was simply the prevailing spirit of the age. If someone suffered injury or illness while earning a living, society merely shrugged and accepted it as unfortunate collateral damage.
"I believe I gave fair warning," Liston said sternly. "Inhaling the vapors produced while dipping white phosphorus matches leads to this dreadful necrosis."
"Ah, yes, I believe I recall hearing something of the sort."
"Then why was this left unaddressed?"
"Well... the general consensus was to wait and see if any real problems arose first, I suppose."
Good grief. For a moment, I thought Liston was going to strike the policeman. But Liston seemed to realize the man was simply echoing his superiors, and he displayed an astonishing degree of restraint.
"A common enough approach. But as you can see, the problem has arrived."
"This... does not seem like a matter that falls under my authority to resolve."
"Indeed, I am well aware. So, tell me, should work continue in this place?"
"That hardly seems advisable, but..."
"But?"
"Do you think the laborers will stand for it?"
"A fair point."
The laborers, not the owner? Wondering if I had misheard, I looked around at the crowd, only to realize the constable was entirely correct. Those who had been shouting in anger just moments before were now looking on with deep unease. These people lived hand to mouth; a single day without work meant starvation. Desperation was an unforgiving master.
Even in the twenty-first century, human lives were routinely sacrificed at the altar of economic expedience. To expect anything better from nineteenth-century London was sheer folly.
"Shall we shake this bastard down until they can find other employment?" Liston proposed casually.
"Pardon?"
"I shall negotiate an agreement with him. Peacefully."
"Uh..."
The constable's eyes darted frantically. Liston's ferocious visage, his hulking hands, and the lethal blades at his waist—nothing about the man suggested anything remotely lawful. But... in reality, Liston was an extraordinarily distinguished citizen of London and a physician of royal renown. Had he not just performed heroic deeds saving lives in France? The French aristocracy itself had showered him with gratitude, so the higher-ups in London held him in the highest possible regard.
"Well... as far as I am concerned, I saw nothing."
The constable cast one final glance at the scattered clumps of hair on the floor and the agonized face of the owner staring at them, before turning on his heel and making a dignified, hurried retreat. The law, which was meant to protect the vulnerable, chose to look the other way.
"W-wait! The money I've paid you all this time—!"
"Which means you can now give that money to your workers instead," Liston interrupted cheerfully.
The owner wailed, but to no avail. Now that the constabulary had turned a blind eye, nothing in London could stop Robert Liston, the undisputed master of surgical amputation.
"Good. A very sensible decision."
The owner was a quick study. At first, in a fit of rage, he had spouted nonsense and earned himself a few more heavy blows, but that was more than enough to knock sense into his skull. The fear of being literally dismantled was a powerful motivator.
"If you hadn't complied, I was going to have him lay a curse upon you."
Liston accepted the bundle of cash and gestured toward me with his chin. The factory owner shuddered in sheer, superstitious terror. Leaving the quivering wretch behind, we distributed the money among the laborers and set off for the next establishment—or rather, the next sweatshop.
What unfolded there was virtually identical. Bouncers were knocked unconscious, factory owners lost handfuls of hair, and money was thoroughly extracted.
"A productive outing," I remarked.
"Indeed. We shouldn't see any more trouble from these places."
"The weather is quite pleasant as well."
"Ha-ha! It is autumn, after all."
It was autumn.