Poison, Pure Poison [3]
“What a truly wicked idea…”
“Admit it, though. You were tempted, weren’t you?”
“To be frank, yes.”
“Same here.”
The two of them stood muttering to each other while eyeing me as if I were some incarnate evil. If they intended to whisper behind my back, they might have at least had the decency to step a few paces away. Muttering right next to my ear made every syllable crystal clear. In fact, aside from the minor detail that they were facing one another, they might as well have addressed the words directly to my face.
“Good heavens, that gown… For a physician to propose dressing a human being in it, knowing full well it would kill them…”
“Well, not to speak ill out of turn, but he once made a man drink water straight from the River Thames.”
“Good lord.”
“Hold on, Liston. That was—”
“Yet thanks to that, we were able to properly uncover the true nature of miasma. It is no mere toxic vapor, but a tangible, physical—”
“Is that not precisely what toxic vapor is?”
“Mmm.”
I tried to intervene, but it proved entirely futile. Now the entire crime of forcing someone to drink Thames water had been pinned squarely on my head.
I could not tell whether it was a blessing or a curse, but after that initial gasp of astonishment, the police inspector showed no inclination whatsoever to treat my suggestion as a crime. In this era, slap the label of ‘scientific research’ onto almost anything, and people readily looked the other way. So what would become of the arsenic dress?
“At any rate, conducting an execution in such a manner…”
“Aye. How many rascals are bound for the gallows this week?”
“Three this week alone.”
Three… That was rather few.
I wondered if public safety had improved, or if London’s police detectives had suddenly honed their investigative prowess.
No, that hardly seems likely…
Investigative techniques did exist, technically speaking. But nearly every case wound up cold and unsolved. In twenty-first-century South Korea, new unsolved murders were practically nonexistent. Here, apprehending a culprit was nothing short of a miracle. Why, just the other day, they had thrown an outright street festival after catching a single murderer.
In any case, after an awkward beat, the mood began shifting favorably in my direction.
“Three. Three of them,” Liston muttered, rubbing his nose before nodding resolutely. Then, as if channeling King Solomon himself, he delivered a crisp verdict. “Let us lock one in a cell plastered with arsenic wallpaper. A remarkably cramped one.”
“Ah… indeed. And the next?”
“Dress the second in the arsenic gown. And the third… well, what do you think? Shall we subject him to both?”
“Both? But these arsenic wares must cost a fortune. To waste them on prisoners… hmm.”
“Take these and put them to use! I told you, they were sponsored,” Liston urged. “If used for a noble cause, the original owners would surely rejoice.”
“As expected of the renowned physician laboring day and night for our dear London. My thanks. I shall go see to the preparations at once. Now then… care to observe?”
Observe what, exactly? There was no need to hesitate. This was an age where any horror became permissible the moment one uttered the words ‘experiment’ or ‘study.’
“Naturally. A true physician through and through,” the inspector beamed. “I shall summon you the moment everything is arranged. As for the execution… well, I shall speak with the commissioner and see that it is carried out before the day ends.”
“Splendid! A true police officer through and through!”
Between a true physician and a model policeman, how could either refuse the opportunity to let men already doomed to die make one final contribution to mankind? Still, I could not help but wonder whether pulling forward an execution date scheduled for another day was entirely proper.
“Ah, but what were they condemned for?” Liston asked, a sudden prick of conscience troubling him.
While condemned men of this era might all seem deserving of the rope, that was not always the case. Although political dissidents and colonial independence fighters were usually executed on local soil, exceptions did make their way to London.
“Ah… rapists and murderers, the lot of them.”
“My mind is entirely at ease, then.”
“Aye. The victims’ families will all be present to watch. Ah.”
“What is it?”
“Sir James must also be in attendance, so we may need to coordinate the hour. Regardless, I shall send word the moment it is settled. Depending on how matters unfold, the families might even prefer it this way. There have long been grumblings that hanging is far too humane. It is over far too quickly, you see.”
“Ah, indeed. That may well be. Send word at once.”
“Understood.”
Everything concluded amicably. Lower-ranking constables hauled off the arsenic gown and the rolls of wallpaper. Liston watched them go before heading off to saw off limbs.
And me? I slept. Even with my intravenous strike team at my side, I had been awake practically all night.
Strictly speaking, this is a university hospital… Is it truly acceptable to doze off during working hours?
Lying on a cot in the laboratory, I pondered the thought for a moment before closing my eyes, finding the whole premise utterly meaningless. A university hospital? This butcher shop?
“Aaaargh!”
Even without straining my ears, agonized shrieks drifted through the walls. General anesthesia had arrived, but that was just it—it was general anesthesia. Was it safe? Far from it. Even I preferred to avoid it unless there was no other choice. A local anesthetic had to be found. If only we had something like lidocaine…
With that, one could perform almost any major operation.
In the twenty-first century, general anesthesia was the default unless contraindicated, as it proved far easier on both the patient and the surgical team. Yet in an era where people lived longer with chronic debilities, patients battered by advanced cancer often could not endure even modern general anesthesia, necessitating local nerve blocks instead. Just how extensive a surgery could be carried out under local?
What was it again… Ah, right. I had once mobilized a pectoralis major myocutaneous flap to seal a chest defect under local anesthesia.
“Mmm.”
Lost in such memories, evening fell before I knew it. No one dared disturb a professor sleeping soundly after an all-nighter. By contrast, students were relentlessly exploited whether they had slept or not, and whether they had paid tuition or not. Colin was living proof. Wait, had that lad not just suffered from arsenic poisoning?
“What on earth are you doing?”
“Ah, Professor Liston ordered me to hold the patient’s arm, sir.”
“Did he nick you?”
“I was on edge, so I managed to pull away in time. Besides… I took a tonic.”
“A tonic? What sort of…”
“Well, you see—”
“No, never mind.”
An ominous dread washed over me, especially because it was Colin. In appearance, he was the picture-perfect aristocratic white gentleman primed for Victorian prejudice, but in practice… he was a savage. Had today been quiet, I might have probed, but we had our hands full. My head would burst if I complicated things further.
“Tell me later. Are you coming along as well?”
“Of course, sir.”
“And your body?”
“I am quite well. I am sturdy, sir.”
I already knew that. Still, whatever ‘tonic’ he had downed could hardly be wholesome. If it did not sap his vitality further, he would be fortunate. In any case, I boarded the carriage alongside Colin and Liston, who was freshly drenched in blood from severing limbs.
“Ugh, foul. Joseph, hand that over.”
“Yes, sir!”
Liston grimaced through a mask of crimson splatter. He looked terrifying—truly horrific. Pedestrians across the street recoiled so violently that several nearly tripped over their own heels.
“Ugh… it stings.”
“Is a little pain not preferable to death, Professor?”
“Aye, we cannot afford to catch cholera.”
Grimacing even more fiercely, Liston wiped his face, neck, forearms, and hands with a snow-white cloth soaked in carbolic acid. The pungent, choking stench of bleach soon saturated the carriage interior. With only slight exaggeration, it was enough to make a man gag, yet Joseph flared his nostrils and inhaled deeply.
“Ah, the scent of life.”
This was precisely why ordinary folk took one look at him, branded him a madman, and crossed the street. Still, it hardly mattered. Joseph was built like a fortress, and everyone knew he fell under Liston’s wing. Anyone would rather endure raw, scrubbed hands than deal with the fallout of crossing that giant.
“Haa, excellent.”
Had Liston not personally championed carbolic acid? At first, it had shared equal footing with the iodine I had introduced, but carbolic acid had now seized absolute supremacy. Even to my mind, iodine had its drawbacks. Not only did it sting like holy hell when applied to an open wound, but it dyed the skin a vivid yellow. Those who despised me had even raised a hue and cry, claiming that the ‘yellow man’ was plotting to dye white folk yellow.
I had been so exasperated that I considered claiming it was an import from France, but Liston had talked me out of it.
—If you say that, even I cannot shield you. A Qing gang member operating under French directives… You would be lynched on the spot.
He had a point, so I had held my tongue.
“Ugh, what in heaven’s name is that stench?”
At any rate, despite its atrocious odor, carbolic acid retained its crown as the undisputed king of antiseptics.
“It is the scent of life. You had best grow accustomed to it if you wish to live.”
We bypassed the constables standing guard outside and stepped inside. The classical police station was magnificent to behold, though its splendor was only half the story. In the basement lay a subterranean hollow that made hell look inviting.
“This way.”
Today promised to be even worse. Beneath the faint glow of the gas lamps lining the descending stairway, the faces of the constables looked like actual ghosts. Truly, like walking corpses.
“Are these men alright?”
“Ah… they complained of dizziness after working down here. I had intended to ask the good doctors to examine them while you were here.”
“Dizzy? They have no color in their faces… none at all.”
“Bleeegh!”
“He’s vomiting!”
“My apologies. A disgraceful showing from London’s finest.”
“That is hardly the point!”
It was poisoning! The basement was cramped and pitch-black, but worse still, it had zero ventilation. Even if ventilated, London’s smog would rush in, but that was still far better than breathing arsenic dust.
“Oral rehydration solution!”
“Number One!”
“Number Two!”
“Number Three! Deploying!”
At my barked command, Alfred, Joseph, and Alfred—the three brothers—sprang into action. Finding suitable vessels, boiling the water, and preparing the sterile saline took barely ten minutes. Sheer madness. With these lads by my side, setting up intravenous lines on thirty men would be child’s play. Better yet, since the constables were still conscious, dissolving salt into boiled water and feeding it to them was far simpler.
“A remarkable sight,” the inspector remarked, smiling with satisfaction as color crept back into his subordinates’ pale cheeks.
Liston clapped a broad hand onto the inspector’s shoulder.
“Will the spectacle below not be far more remarkable?”
“Haha. Indeed. Never in the history of mankind has an execution been so lush with green.”
“A rather luxurious execution, would you not say?”
“Quite so. The gown was rather small, so we had to slit the back open a bit. Will that be alright?”
“It was sponsored, so it matters not.”
I was about to point out that sponsored articles were meant to be returned, but swallowed the words. Truth be told, I had no intention of handing it back either. What good would come of returning it? It would only kill more people.
“They should recover now. Do not step foot in the basement again. Understood?”
“Yes, Doctor. Phew…”
Having saved the constables, I made my way downward. Of course, there was no room for complacency. Arsenic possessed no scent.
“If any of you feel the slightest abnormality, speak up at once.”
“Yes, sir.”
With our mutual safety measures firmly established, we settled into the chairs arranged for us. Before our eyes stood three small iron cells. Two of them were plastered thickly with vivid, gaudy green wallpaper.
They were the chambers soon to be occupied by the condemned.