The Specimen (39 page)
Authors: Martha Lea
Carrick House. October 5, 1866.
Susan had known that it had been awful of her not to have told her mistress about the murder at Hyde Park. She had tried to look for a sign, a solution. She had gone to the
Reverend for advice, but it had been Mrs Brewin who had said that it wasn’t really Susan’s responsibility to make sure her mistress read every square inch of the daily paper, and that
if it had been put on the pile in the scullery, well, that was it done with. Mrs Brewin also pointed out that there were other ways the widow would find out, sooner or later. So, Susan had made
peace with her troubled conscience and cut and strung the lavatory paper as usual.
Susan had followed the trial meticulously while her mistress had stayed in London. Running the house and taking care of the boys wore Susan right out, and she’d had to enlist the help of
Mrs Brewin, who had been very quick indeed to down pots and pans at the vicarage. In turn, the Reverend had realised at some point that unless he wanted to live off old beef dripping, runny jam,
pickled beets and no bread to put it on, he had better walk the three-mile round trip to Carrick House every day and eat his meals there. He couldn’t say it was a disagreeable arrangement,
and he found that the rigorous, out-of-doors exercise helped him to think clearly and was more conducive to the composition of sermons than the pacing of carpet his study afforded.
He liked the little boys, who said amusing and mainly incomprehensible things, and who did not seem at all perturbed by the extended absence of their mother. He also noticed that there was a
keener brightness to his surroundings at Carrick House. His preparations for his sermons, whilst rather different in tone and timbre to those he’d made for years at the vicarage were rather
pleasing to his sensibilities. The surfaces of the furniture gleamed at him and seemed to cast God’s light about the room in a rather fairylike manner. The windows seemed not to have been
glazed at all until his head bumped up against the glass when he tried to peer at the view up the main drive further than the panes would permit. Over the first week or so, the Reverend gradually
began to realise that the house was simply very clean. Mrs Brewin, firmly ensconced, took it upon herself to engage through an acquaintance in town an illiterate but excellent cook whose skills in
preserving were exemplary.
The Reverend had followed the trial. Everyone he knew had been following the trial. He had tried to keep Mrs Pemberton’s identity to himself, but the impossibility of that became clear as
the trial had progressed. After all, Mr Scales had not taken a whole
harem
of lady watercolourists to Brazil.
Today, they were all waiting for the paper to arrive, each avoiding the other’s eye. The Reverend peered again from the window at the view of the drive and stifled a release of digestive
gas behind a clenched fist.
Waking to a dry mouth, bodies pressed against Euphemia as the shroud of an uncomforting sleep slipped away. The empty carriage she had chosen at the beginning of her journey
had since quickly filled. The train gave out its final shudder of stopping at a station and the dent in her forehead from taking a sleep against the window frame began to make itself felt. The
usual stink of such confinement—stale tobacco, boiled egg, old sweat, camphor, lavender, naphthalene, rotten tooth, fart, wet wool—made her sit up straighter and look about without
looking at faces, to see who had travelled with her, who had witnessed her sleep. The embarrassment of the dream she’d been taken from was still fresh in her mind, and it was possible that
she had been calling out in her sleep. Euphemia turned her face to the window. There was a wasp, late for its winter nest or tardy in its dying. It butted against the window, and the screams from
the guard’s whistle masked out its tiny noise.
Before boarding the train, Euphemia had bought herself a newspaper from one of the stands. There were many things, many activities, according to some, which a female of certain rank should not
do, should not indulge in, should not permit herself to enjoy. Buying a newspaper was one of them but Euphemia had given up caring what other people would think of her. She had been there to see
her sister vilified all through those sweltering days and stuffy hours of the trial. Euphemia had been incapable of restraining her curiosity.
Euphemia had not opened the paper. She knew what the report would say, so she kept the paper folded away in her travelling bag as she reached in for her flask. There were hours yet of this
journey to endure, and Euphemia took a very tiny sip, just enough to wet the sour taste on her tongue. Then, she brought out the tin of sweets she had paid for along with the newspaper; she put one
of the sugared violets into her mouth and stared again out of the window at the rushing by of the land and let her mind empty, of everything, just for a few moments.
THE TIMES
, Friday, October 5, 1866.
MURDER TRIAL AT THE OLD BAILEY.
T
HE PRISONER has held herself well erect in the courtroom each day of the proceedings, and today was no time for the
prisoner to deviate from her usual attitude. Her dress was quite impeccably attended and sombre. A thick veil half obscuring her face, the prisoner kept up a surreptitious knotting or sliding of
her fingers against each other, slotting them together in a constant bid to make sure that her gloves were without wrinkles. When each person spoke, she attended to what that person had to say
with silent acuity; to the reaction of others in the room, the prisoner seemed alert to every nuance of tone. She has betrayed no emotion during the last session of the proceedings. There has
been nothing in her manner which could have been interpreted as that of a guilty party or otherwise. Her attitude has not, apart from the constant adjustment to her gloves, demonstrated that all
of this bother has been centred around herself or that her life has been in the balance. Mr Probart for the Prosecution examined witnesses, during which time the Defence made several objections;
some were upheld, others were not. However, by the end of the Defence cross-examination it was clear to all assembled in court that Mr Probart’s witnesses served only to strengthen the case
for the Defence. From the gallery a veritable hum of consternation and excitement could be discerned after the summing up by the Judge, Mr Justice Linden. The Jury retired and deliberated for
more than forty-five minutes before they returned the verdict: the prisoner was found Not Guilty, the Jury concluding that the death of Mr Edward Scales was accidental. At which declaration, a
roar of appreciation emitted from the gallery and rose to the roof, after which a general hubbub of whistles, cheers and cries of “Bless you, Mrs Pemberton’ were audible amidst the
noise. Mrs Pemberton was helped away from the courtroom by her husband and others.
Carrick House. November 1, 1866.
The Book of Phobias
by
C.R. Jeffreye
“The exercise of combining two emotions, so as to bring out a third different from either, is not intrinsically arduous. Everything depends on the facility of
assuming the elementary feelings.”
Bain, 1855.
(i) And so we come to the most singularly intriguing case which has been a subject of my exploratory studies of the mind and its peculiarities under inspection. We shall call
the specimen, [censored], or
X
, hereafter.
X
first came to my notice some years ago. The spouse had called to my attention, in my capacity as a Gentleman of Medicine, the distress caused to both parties on the occasion of
the pinnacle feat of the nuptial requirements. This would not in itself cause undue concern under normal circumstances. My advice to the unhappy spouse of
X
was that Time would Unravel
the Mysteries, and that All Would Be As Expected. The dysfunction, dissatisfaction and, moreover, disappointment over the lack of potential progeny continued, however, for several months, and
the spouse sought my counsel once more. On this occasion, I was privy to further details, thus:
X
was unable to consummate his marriage due to an aversion to the follicular
protuberances of his wife’s [cut].
I delicately suggested the obstacle of consternation might be solved by a simple act of removal. This, she informed me, after many floods of tears and blushes, had been attempted without
success. The renewal of such follicular emergence, before the next attempt by
X
, was in all senses, quite apart from being wholly distasteful in practical terms, more disastrous than
the original state of affairs.
My suggestion then, was to allow a certain amount of time between our meeting and the next attempt, to allow for Nature’s Replenishment of that which had been depilated. I suggested
that I might have an interview with
X
, to which, after Gentle Persuasion, the Lady agreed.
(ii) In earnest conversation with
X
, his inhibitions loosened medicinally, he unfolded his version of the sorry affair.
X
began by relating to me the fact of his ignorance of the way nature has endowed the anatomy of the female.
X
stated that the sight of his naked wife on his wedding night
was an absolute shock, his having come to expect a perfectly smooth creature, as portrayed in any tasteful work of art. After jovial reproach, I asked him to expand upon his reaction to this
“discovery” of his. Utter revulsion, was his reply. He did not, could not, desire his wife in any measure from the neck down; that he regarded her as a grotesque freak of
Nature.
I earnestly implored him to take the not uncommon measure of approach from afar. That completion of desire, could be attained, I assured him, by stealth. If the marble-like surface was what
he desired, and nought else, a route from a different angle entirely, might ease his desire to a more satisfactory conclusion, i.e., that he must [deleted] at all. That he must approach her in
this manner every night for a month, and, rather than try to force the issue, remain apart from her and regard the beauty as though a work of art were before him.
X
went away much lighter in attitude and I fully expected to hear no more about it.
(iii) Two months later I was again in earnest confidence with
X
. The solution had, to a degree, been successful in that he had managed, after a number of weeks, to
stand to and not lie asleep in his wife’s presence. However, at the merest touch of passion, all was lost, and unrecoverable.
X
was utterly despondent and, alas, allowing this
most private part of his life to overshadow everything in his path. In short, he was a most frustrated mess. At this point, I was quite at a loss as to how to proceed, if indeed it was possible
to proceed.
Then, a moment of inspiration struck. I brought into the room a small fur, concealed behind my back. I asked
X
to close his eyes and to put out his hand. I laid the fur into his
hand. He seemed puzzled, but not at all vexed by the article. So, I surmised to
X
, that it was not a case of pelts
per se
. No, he concurred; in any case, he said, this sable
was like silk. His wife’s [removed] resembled his beard: wiry and manly and unladylike. I assured him that the [erased] he so desired could be found within, if only he could overcome his
aversion to the fact that all women, not only his wife, were so endowed. That he must make himself familiar with his wife at all costs, as his health demanded it. The next suggestion I made was
that in [section expurgated]. In this, I assured him, he might be so satisfied that he may climb to the next ridge of the mountain and thus from here admire the vista.
(iv) Unhappily,
X
was to confide some while later that the weather was not at all suitable or conducive to mountain scrambles. I then suggested to
X
that he
should familiarise himself with the true meaning of Freak of Nature. He accompanied me on an excursion to witness the various exhibits at Saville House where I had heard one particular hirsute
lady performed.
X
became obsessed with this personage and would not leave the subject alone. I perceived an unhealthy attitude in his attention to the female, and advised
X
that his energy
must be spent on the sole prize of [excised] his wife in her [eliminated].
After some deep consideration I altered my opinion; this phenomenon, I had come to realise, was hysteria induced by suggestion, which could, therefore, following Babinski’s principle,
be cured by persuasion. I divined that if
X
should so encounter a woman, covered in hair from top to toe, then the revulsion would be so complete that the cure would be instantaneous
and a happy marriage might flower. Now here, one might be forgiven for supposing that my inclinations on this matter were correct. Not so.
X
, upon meeting this hirsute female, did lose all feelings of revulsion when faced with this peculiar Nondescript. However,
X
did not go home at once and make up for time
lost, so to speak.
X
became [withdrawn] fascinated with the Nondescript, and commenced an affair with same, and in so doing lost all interest, desire and what little passion he had so
far achieved for his wife. It was some months before this fact became known to me, and, by that time, the obsession was intensely and irrevocably carved into his fevered brain.