Lake in the Clouds (52 page)

“It will take ten stitches or more to close it,” Hannah said sometime later. She was bent over Dr. Savard’s hand, working by the light of hastily lit candles. “It could have been much worse. You’re lucky.”

“Oh, very fortunate indeed,” he replied. There was a swipe of blood on his cheek and dribbles of it all down his shirtfront, as well as a line of sweat on his brow, but his expression was as mocking and detached as ever. “Be so kind as to pass me the bottle in that bottom drawer, I will need some distraction from your needlework.”

Without looking up from his hand, Hannah said, “When the last of the splinters are out.”

“Of course,” said Dr. Savard. “I wouldn’t dream of inconveniencing you.”

Hannah dropped another glass shard onto the examination table. “My stepmother says that white men use sarcasm to hide something they would like to say but may not.”

He grunted. “As you well know, I am not inclined to withhold my opinion on anything. Speaking of hiding things, what exactly were you doing in the records office?” After a while he said, “You resort to silence, and I resort to sarcasm. To each the weapon of his own choosing, Miss Bonner.”

Hannah brought two candles closer to improve her view of the injury. The doctor had interrupted his fall on the wet floor with his hand, which landed on a piece of the broken jar. The cut ran in an angle across his palm from the base of his little finger to the juncture of the thumb and wrist. It was deepest in the pad of muscle below the thumb, and in fact if the angle were only slightly different he might have done himself more serious injury by cutting into the artery.

With the tips of her fingers she pressed along the edge of the cut to be sure that there were no more glass shards. Dr. Savard looked away and said nothing at all.

“No more splinters,” she announced.

“Then if I might remind you—”

Hannah avoided his gaze as she opened the drawer and retrieved the bottle he had asked for, the candlelight sparking hints of red in the deep brown of the brandy. It was half full, and it made a little clinking sound when she put it down before him.

“I should think you’ve already had enough.” She wondered at herself, that she should make such a comment to him when she knew how it would be received.

But he was more curious than offended. “And how do you know how much brandy I’ve had to drink, Miss Bonner?”

Hannah was preparing the suture needle, but she looked up to meet his gaze. “The more formal your speech, the more you’ve been drinking. When you are completely sober your language would make any lady faint.”

He blinked in surprise. “You’ve made a study of my habits, I see.”

Hannah said, “I’m ready to start. If you are going to drink, then you had best go ahead with it now.”

“You would prefer I take laudanum?” he asked, reaching for the bottle with his uninjured right hand. “Or should I take nothing at all and sneer at the pain, as your Mohawk warriors are trained to do?”

She glanced up at him and saw the challenge in the dark eyes. He was embarrassed and ill at ease and in pain, but Hannah was not inclined to humor him by entering into the argument he wanted. She said, “You must please yourself, Dr. Savard. As you always do.”

He snorted softly, the corner of his mouth twitching.

Hannah began to stitch. From the corner of her eye she saw how his right hand tightened on the unopened bottle.

“You needn’t take such small stitches,” he said finally. “I don’t mind the scar.”

“It will heal faster this way,” Hannah replied calmly. “Unless that was an order?”

He exhaled loudly, as if she were a stubborn student and he a poorly used teacher.

Hannah worked as quickly as she could, and after a minute she was so focused on the work that she forgot the man attached to the hand. The flinching of his fingers at every movement of the needle meant only that there was no nerve damage; the sounds he made now and then were irrelevant.

When she had placed the last stitch she stopped to consider her work. Even Dr. Todd might be satisfied with her, for once. She went to her own bag and came back with a corked bottle.

Dr. Savard cleared his throat. “And what do you intend to do with that?”

She met his gaze. “I intend to wash your wound out with it. What did you think?”

His gaze skittered away and then back again, and to Hannah’s great surprise, he flushed a mottled red. “You’re always pulling some root or leaf or some strange Musselman cure out of that bag of yours.”

For once she let herself smile. “I’m sorry to disappoint you but it’s nothing so exotic or effective as Dragon’s Blood. If I had any, I would use it.”

He straightened. “I’m a man of science, Miss Bonner. I studied in Edinburgh, which is widely regarded as the best school of medicine in the world. Your magical remedies are of no interest to me. Now what is in that bottle?”

She didn’t try to hide her smile as she took out the cork and held it under his nose. “Nothing very shocking, just a distillation of winterbloom and slippery elm to keep the wound from getting inflamed.”

Dr. Savard frowned at her, his nose twitching. “That will sting like the very devil. I’m not sure it’s worth it.”

Hannah considered the neat line of stitches in his palm, and she thought of the Hakim. How would he convince a reluctant patient, one who happened to call himself a doctor? Appeal to his better nature, he would say. On the other hand Curiosity would laugh aloud at such childishness and shame him into it; neither approach seemed the right one for Dr. Savard.

She said, “Well then, let’s experiment.”

His combative expression gave way to distrust. “With my hand?”

“Listen, please. You say that you are a man of science. Let me wash half the wound, from here to here.” She traced a line from the middle of his palm to the base of his palm, and his fingers twitched.

“If both halves of the wound heal at the same pace and in the same way, I will concede that you are right and there was no need to bother. And of course as a man of science, you will concede the opposite, if it turns out that it does help in the healing process.”

He scowled at her. “You are very clever, Miss Bonner. There is no way for me to refuse your suggestion without appearing small-minded and stubborn.”

She drew her brows together and said nothing.

“Very clever indeed,” he fumed. “I will enter into this little experiment of yours. On one very small condition.”

Hannah saw, too late, that she had underestimated him and put herself in a corner. She could walk away, of course, but then she looked at his palm again. She had seen wounds like this go bad very quickly.

“You want to know why I was in the records office.”

“Of course.”

“I will meet your condition, if you will promise me not to tell anyone else about this. Anyone at all. No matter what you think of the merits of my … undertaking. Or of my reasoning.”

Dr. Savard did not often grin, and it made Hannah uncomfortable to see him do it now. “You’ve piqued my interest,” he said. “Very well, go ahead with your experiment. I agree to your terms.”

Hannah kept her own expression neutral as she took his hand and tipped the bottle over his lower palm. He jerked hard at the first touch of the liquid and let out a hiss between his teeth.

After a long moment he said, “Now that you’ve had your fun—”

Hannah took Manny’s note from her work-apron pocket and handed it to him. While he read, she put away the bottle in her workbag and tidied the examination table, trying not to look at his expression as he turned the paper over and read the other side.

When he raised his head she said, “I’m trying to find some record of what happened to the child. As a favor to her father.”

“Who is—”

“A friend of mine.”

There was nothing to read from his face, neither surprise nor censure nor approval. His eyes were very dark and Hannah found she could not hold his gaze.

Dr. Savard was silent while she wrapped his injured hand in a piece of linen and tied the bandage neatly. When she looked up he was staring at her with a look that bordered on anger.

“Does this have anything to do with the way you disappear for an hour now and then in the late afternoon, in the direction of the kitchens?”

Hannah blinked at him. “I must go now. They will be waiting for me on Whitehall Street.”

He said, “I’ll see you home,” and held up his newly bandaged hand to stop her protest. “I have no intention of letting you walk the length of Manhattan unaccompanied, Miss Bonner. Save yourself the argument.”

“If you would simply have the desk clerk call a hackney carriage for me—”

“Doesn’t it strike you as odd that I was carrying a specimen jar here at this hour of the evening?”

Hannah pulled up in surprise. “I hadn’t thought about it. I suppose it is odd.”

“A mob broke into the autopsy room at the hospital this evening to claim the cadaver.”

“But I thought the body had been found on the docks?”

Dr. Savard lifted a shoulder. “It seems that the men who delivered her to the dissection room stretched the truth a bit to get their pay.”

“Grave robbers.”

“These gentlemen prefer the term ‘resurrectionists.’ The lady’s husband took issue, of course, and the mob got ugly, to say the least. They decided that while they were there they would destroy everything they could get their hands on.”

“Was anyone hurt?”

He lifted a shoulder. “Some bumps and bruises. William Ehrlich got himself a black eye, but the worst of it is we’ll have to take autopsies somewhere else for a good while. I hoped to save at least one laboratory specimen, but you see I was not very successful.”

“So you rescued the—” She paused, thinking of the mess on the hallway floor, glass and blood and chunks of something unidentifiable. “What was it?”

“A cirrhotic liver,” said Dr. Savard. One corner of his mouth turned up. “It was the closest thing to me, in more ways than one.” He cleared his throat and looked at his palm critically. “So you must understand that given the mood on the streets, I cannot let you leave here unaccompanied.”

After a long moment Hannah said, “It will be just a moment while I change out of my apron.”

As it turned out the only carriages they saw were already engaged. After a few minutes in which the doctor paced up and down the Broad Way waving his arms unproductively, he
fetched a whale-oil lantern from the Almshouse and they began the walk to Whitehall Street by unspoken agreement.

Hannah carried her own bag, as Dr. Savard had one hand that he could not use and needed the other for the lantern on its short pole. It creaked agreeably with each step, sending an oval of light swinging back and forth between them. The shapes of the buildings and trees were easily made out against the night sky. Coffeehouses and shops were silent, but the tavern doorways were lit by darkly smoking torches or lamps. Now and then they passed a private watchman who patrolled the street with a lantern of his own. There was no sign of ruffians, but Hannah did not point that out, mostly because she didn’t want to add to the noise.

Coaches and cabs pulled by iron-shod horses moved briskly along cobbled streets; laughter and voices raised in argument drifted from everywhere and nowhere; dogs barked; shop signs creaked with every gust of wind.

“I don’t know how people stand the constant racket of the city.” She said this out loud, to her own surprise and to the doctor’s.

“Really?” He raised his head to listen. And then: “I don’t suppose the world is silent at night even on your mountain, is it?”

“No,” said Hannah. “There is sound enough. But not this constant buzzing.”

He made a noncommittal sound. “You would become accustomed to it with time.”

“No,” said Hannah. “I would not.” To change the subject she said, “You must be in some considerable pain.”

Dr. Savard made a sound deep in his throat.

“Was that a denial?”

He sent her an irritated look. “Of course I am in pain. But it will pass. Most things do.”

“Willow-bark tea would be some relief.”

“Watch your step here.”

They skirted a pile of refuse that had been cast out into the road, the light catching the eyes of a rat that had settled itself in a nest of rags.

As they passed the darkened doorway of a milliner’s shop two figures moved deeper into the shadows, followed by a hoarse giggling.

“Oooh, look, Susie. Dr. Savard come out this evening for a stroll. How very good to see you, Doctor.”

“Miss Susan, Miss Mariah. Good evening to you both.” He raised his voice without slowing. To Hannah he said, “Ladies of the night, as Dr. Simon refers to them so shyly. Prostitutes, in other words.” His tone was matter-of-fact and unapologetic.

Hannah looked over her shoulder, but could make out nothing of the women.

“Dr. Savard’s out walking with a lady, Mariah. He’s got no time for us.” There was a hiccup of laughter.

“I recognize that voice,” said Hannah, slowing. “I treated her just yesterday for—” She paused.

“Blennorhagic discharge?”

“Yes.”

“Many of them have it, it’s why they come to us.”

“But they are contagious.”

“Yes.”

“And …”

“Professionally active, yes. The phrase you’re looking for, Miss Bonner, is
caveat emptor
.”

“No,” Hannah said, irritated finally by his tone. “I wasn’t thinking about the buyer at all. I was thinking how painful it must be for her.”

He shrugged so that the lantern swayed. “Hunger is a harsh mistress.”

Hannah said, “You are very cold on this subject, Doctor.”

In the light of the lantern his expression was sober. “I prefer the term
detached.
It is a necessity when practicing medicine among the poor. I’m afraid that’s a lesson you haven’t learned yet.”

“It is one I hope I never learn.”

“You are very young.”

“And you are stating the obvious. What does my youth have to do with it?”

He looked away into the dark, as if he might find the right answer there. “I was like you, once. I found that optimism is a liability in the practice of medicine, especially here.”