Frank Tallis - Deadly Communion

‘We have, sir. He said he was going to dine at Cafe Landtmann but would be back at the Institute by eight o’ clock. He also said that he wasn’t feeling very well and might need an assistant. He requested Miss Lydgate.’

Rheinhardt raised his eyebrows and addressed Liebermann: ‘Do you think Miss Lydgate would be willing to join us at this late hour?’

‘Such is her nature,’ said Liebermann, sighing, ‘I suspect that nothing in the world would please her more.’

The morgue was particularly cold at night. Liebermann and Rheinhardt had kept their coats on, but Professor Mathias seemed comfortable in his shirtsleeves. The electric light suspended above the autopsy table shone down on the mortuary sheets, making them glow vividly. This artificial landscape of luminous hills and hollows was disturbed by a central peak, the summit of which was, by contrast, unnaturally sharp.

Liebermann was sitting on a stool, contemplating the mysterious contents of a jar filled with formalin. The preserved organ, which looked vaguely like a sea horse, was magnified by the curvature of the glass. It was pink with yellow pleats down one side, creating the illusion of a spine which curled to form a hooked tail. The young doctor thought it might be an unusually proportioned vermiform appendix.

Rheinhardt was pacing around the autopsy table and Professor Mathias, muttering softly to himself, was engrossed by the organisational possibilities of his trolley.

A knock roused the men from their respective states of self-absorption.

‘Enter!’ cried Professor Mathias.

The door opened and Amelia’s voice floated out of the darkness.

‘Good evening, gentlemen.’

She emerged from the shadows, her pale face and hands preceding the rest of her body like a ghost at a seance.

‘Ah, Miss Lydgate,’ said Rheinhardt, ‘I would offer to take your coat, but the temperature in here is so low I would suggest you continue to take advantage of its benefit.’

Liebermann stood and inclined his head. As she approached, her hair drew the hard brilliance of the light and transmuted it into a ruddy haze. She glanced down at the mortuary sheets and a vertical crease appeared on her brow.

‘So, he has struck again.’

‘He has indeed,’ said Rheinhardt, coming forward. ‘This unfortunate lady,’ he swept his hand over the covered body with its conspicuous peak, ‘is his third victim.’ Amelia stared at the salient irregularity that destroyed the gentle geography of the sheets. ‘The hilt of a knife,’ Rheinhardt explained. The inspector was about to say more but was cut short by Professor Mathias, who was tutting loudly.

‘Miss Lydgate?’ The professor looked up and beckoned. ‘Would you be so kind as to arrange my instruments?’ His voice sounded nasal and he took a handkerchief from his pocket. ‘I have a head cold,’ he added, as if this constituted sufficient explanation for his inability to complete his preparations.

‘With pleasure,’ Amelia replied.

Liebermann caught Rheinhardt’s eye and their shared amazement brought them perilously close to laughter. Such an invitation was unprecedented.

Professor Mathias blew his nose and observed the Englishwoman’s deft movements. When she was finished, she stepped back from the trolley and Mathias inspected her handiwork. His palpable relief was evident in the softening of his features.

‘Very good,’ he said, as if nothing remarkable had transpired.

He turned to face the autopsy table and folded the upper sheet back, revealing the corpse’s face. He placed a finger on the dead woman’s cheek and traced one of the lines that curved out from her nostrils and arced around her lips.

‘Only distant death can heal the presence of such suffering; where the portals shall open, there shall I be healed again …’

Then he removed the sheets, exposing the dead woman completely.

‘What is her name?’

‘Selma Wirth,’ Rheinhardt replied.

‘And where was she discovered?’

‘Neubau. In her apartment — lying on the parlour floor.’

‘Was she found lying on her back?’

‘Yes.’

Mathias picked up a large pair of scissors and cut vertically from the hem of the dress to the cinched waist.

‘No undergarments?’

‘Her drawers had been removed — voluntarily, so it would seem. We found them in the parlour beside her.’

Mathias examined the material that was bunched up directly underneath the woman’s genitals. He pressed out the creases with the palm of his hand.

‘I cannot see any traces. And there are no indications to suggest forced ingress.’ Then he leaned forward, prised the woman’s labia apart with his fingers and inhaled. The subsequent noise he produced was stertorous. The old man looked round at his companions. ‘My nose is congested: I can’t smell a thing.’ His words were as much an appeal for assistance as a statement of fact.

While Rheinhardt and Liebermann were exchanging looks of alarm, Amelia took Professor Mathias’s place between Selma Wirth’s legs and breathed in deeply. She did so with the serious determination of a convalescent eager to experience the invigorating tang of a coastal breeze.

‘I cannot detect anything …’ she paused before adding ‘distinctive.’ Then, addressing Professor Mathias, she said: ‘Be that as it may, the question of her violation could be resolved — definitively — with the aid of a microscope.’ Mathias gestured towards a hefty optical device that stood next to the jar containing the mysterious organ. The tube was made of brass and it stood on three heavy iron legs. Amelia raised an inquisitive eyebrow and asked: ‘Do you have any hematoxylin, Herr professor?’

Mathias shuffled over to a cupboard and returned with a flask of blue-purple liquid and a tray of glass slides and cover slips. He placed them by the microscope.

‘I am happy for you to prepare the slide, Miss Lydgate,’ said Mathias. ‘Please proceed.’

The Englishwoman stood at the end of the autopsy table, folded her coat sleeve back, and insinuated her right forefinger into the dead woman’s vagina. Her first metacarpal began to move from side to side, suggesting that the hidden digit was rotating. This image of Amelia Lydgate — so prim and controlled — exploring the internal anatomy of another woman (albeit a dead woman) aroused shameful feelings in Liebermann which he tried to suppress. He lowered his eyes and garnered some consolation from the sound of Rheinhardt nervously coughing into his hand and shifting his weight from one foot to the other. Curiously, Amelia showed no sign of embarrassment or discomfort, only the focused resolve of an individual utterly engaged in an important task.

Amelia withdrew her finger and turned it beneath the electric light. The cast of her face altered slightly — suggesting satisfaction — as the semi-transparent film covering her white skin glistened. Taking a glass slide from the tray, she rolled her finger over its surface, leaving a grey mucoid smear. She then dipped the slide into the hematoxylin, shook off the excess liquid and fixed the slide on the stage of the microscope. Finally, she wiped her finger on a grubby towel that was hanging from a hook under the bench and sat down on the stool.

With practised ease she altered the angle of the mirror, changed the objectives, and made coarse and fine adjustments.

‘She was most definitely violated,’ said Amelia.

The Englishwoman moved aside and let Professor Mathias look into the eyepiece.

‘Come over here and see for yourself, inspector,’ said the professor.

When Rheinhardt peered into the microscope he saw a luminous blue world populated by a swarm of bullet-headed creatures with long tails.