Imogen Robertson - Circle of Shadows

Crowther had returned to his room from the Alchemist’s cave in a thoughtful state of mind. He had developed a habit of writing out his thoughts as they occurred to him when considering complexity, and he turned to his pen now. The time it took to form the words on a page slowed his thinking just enough to stop his mind skittering off into speculation. One word at a time, one sentence, to form a thought and follow it. This was how he built his arguments. The visit to Kupfel had not humbled him as such, since he saw Kupfel in some ways as a relic of a previous age, but his simple question, if Crowther had in the many human bodies he had dissected ever found a soul, was a serious one. It had hovered around the edges of Crowther’s study from the first time he took a knife in his hand and began to use it as a tool of investigation. He normally tried to ignore it.

The workings of a living being were both miraculous and coarse: the speed and accuracy with which humans saw, moved, reacted compared with the weight of flesh slippery and dead. What was it that created life in matter? Kupfel was right in his suggestion that Crowther’s studies had given him no answer to that. The difference between the living human and the corpse seemed initially so small, unless great violence had been done. It was no different than his pocket-watch wound and ticking, and his watch stopped. The cogs and wheels were all still present, and ready, it appeared, to function as they always had. Yet there was no key to turn, no way to make the heart move again once it had ceased. Did life come into being as a result of motion? As the sense of wind on his face came to him when he rode on a still day, did thought — life — form through some effect of the movement of blood? Was that life? Was the soul a smoke generated by a body moving in the world; rubbing up against it? If that were true then must animals, having blood and brains, also have souls? Did Mr Al-Said’s creations, which had so impressed Harriet, having movement, have life?

He looked down; he had ceased to write. The quill remained between his fingertips, waiting for him. There were mysteries enough in the pattern of muscles that controlled the movement of his hand over the page to employ his mind. Let alchemists, philosophers and mechanics experiment with the rest. He sensed he was being watched and turned to see Mrs Westerman in the doorway, smiling at him.

‘You haven’t moved in some time, Crowther. I feared you had wound down.’

‘Good evening, Mrs Westerman. How is Clode?’

‘Confused, and he has been very afraid, I think, that he might have had some hand in the killing of Miss Martesen under the influence of that drug. Graves did something to convince him it could not be so, and got him to eat. Then they spent two hours attempting to discover who might have tried to kill him. I have never seen Graves so covered in ink.’

He smiled. ‘Did they reach any conclusion?’

‘There was nothing obvious, of course. No business dealings he thought crooked, nor did he call unexpectedly on any gentleman to find a knife in his hand.’

She came into the room and took a seat in one of the armchairs by the fire. He watched her move, easy and unselfconscious where he felt so often stiff, unsure. ‘Rachel and Graves will go out to the castle again tomorrow.’

‘And you, madam?’

‘I have not decided yet; they certainly need no assistance to spill ink. Crowther, is it very wrong of me to occasionally find our friends who are in the first flush of youth a little exhausting?’

He picked up the pages and began to read what he had written. ‘You are almost twenty years younger than I am, Mrs Westerman. For the sake of our friendship, perhaps I should leave that question unanswered.’

He glanced at her sideways; she laughed softly, then began to pull at one of her red curls. ‘I have just had an interesting visit from Colonel Padfield,’ she said.

‘Indeed? Did he supply you with any further suspects?’

‘That would have been good of him, but no. He asked me if he and his wife might have our blessing to employ Michaels in some quest of their own.’

‘Michaels? How did you answer him?’

‘That Michaels was his own master and might do as he wished, naturally. It seems the Colonel learned that Michaels is fluent in the local tongue, and Rachel has spoken highly of him.’

‘But he gave you no clue as to the mission?’

‘None. But I rather suspect it is to do with his wife. Something mysterious in her past. But I must save my imagination for our own concerns.’

Crowther sat back in his chair and lowered his chin. ‘Curious.’

‘Indeed. Michaels has agreed to call on Mrs Padfield in town tomorrow. But for now come and have supper with us, Crowther, and tell us what you have learned.’

Pegel did not find help. He clambered up to his rooms slowly and in pain and instead of the blessing of warm water he had to rely on the curative powers of the remains of a bottle of red and clean clothes. The ankle was sprained, not broken. If Florian came tomorrow would he have the sense to connect the man running over the rooftops with his injured friend? Best take that one head on. He removed his notebook from his filthy coat and hid it behind a piece of loose skirting board. Not the best of hiding-places but all he could do at the moment. He managed to light the fire then lay in front of it like an old gun dog, his arm a pillow and the rough woollen blanket Florian had slept under the night before, his only covering.

4 May 1784

Doubt can drift through corridors like a woman’s scent. It passes in a touch from one being to another; a question asked, or even the idea that a question has been asked, can circulate without facts to carry it or definitive news to push it from place to place, but nevertheless it leaps from one to another like an infection. The day Harriet, Crowther and Graves arrived in Maulberg, everyone knew that young Mr Clode had murdered Lady Martesen and attempted to kill himself in remorse. Shocking, of course. But done, enclosed, over, tied up and tidied away. This morning, without being able to say quite why, everyone was less sure. The question opened up like a wound, and at once the next followed. If he was not guilty, then who was? Many tried to dismiss the question, to ignore it, but it troubled the corners of their minds. Gentlemen paused in the middle of their correspondence to stare out of the window; they found they were not listening to their stewards. Ladies ceased to hear their maids as their hair was dressed, and gave their orders in a manner distracted and unsure. Servants raised their eyebrows at each other as they passed in the corridors, shook their heads in the courtyards and the question spread, knocking at the doors with the milk-seller, carried out of the dress shops and perfumiers, coming home from the market with the fish and potatoes till it landed finally on the lap of a middle-aged woman sitting in the kitchen of a neat little house on Bergman Strasse.

Mrs Gruber was alone and expected no company that day. Her mistress had left Ulrichsberg after the funeral for her sister’s house in Hamburg with her little son and the best plate. Her only duties in the past fortnight had been to catalogue the contents of the house and see it protected from dust and sunlight until the final decisions could be made. The will had been read and confirmed her master as a man reasonable and fair in death as in life. His family were content and the servants had all been left with a little something to keep out the cold. Mrs Gruber thought she might go and live with her son, perhaps invest the money she had been left, and that she had saved, in the business he was beginning to grow. He and his wife had offered her a home in the past, and told her they would be glad of her help with the book-keeping. There was a good chance of growing old peacefully and secure there. Well. There it was. She would not be sorry to leave Ulrichsberg. But now the question had crept in through the keyhole and she wondered how to answer it. There was, after all, no help coming to her master now, but then again … He had been generous. He had been kind. He had put business her son’s way, and even if he could be short-tempered at times when the gout was eating him up, a little careless in the friends he made and brought to the house sometimes, he deserved something .