Michael Crichton - The Great Train Robbery

The second method for avoiding premature burial was technological; the Victorians contrived an elaborate series of warning and signaling devices to enable a dead person to make known his resuscitation. A. wealthy individual might be buried with a length of iron pipe connecting his casket to the ground above, and a trusted family servant would be required to remain at the cemetery, day and night, for a month or more, on the chance that the deceased would suddenly awake and begin to call for help. Persons buried above-ground, in family vaults, were often placed in patented, spring-loaded caskets, with a complex maze of wires attached to arms and legs, so that the slightest movement of the body would throw open the coffin lid. Many considered this method preferable to any other, for it was believed that individuals often returned from a state of suspended animation in a mute or partially paralyzed condition.

The fact that these spring-loaded coffins popped open months or even years later (undoubtedly the result of some external vibration or deterioration in the spring mechanism) only heightened the widespread uncertainty about how long a person might lie dead before coming back to life, even for a moment.

Most signaling devices were costly, and available only to the wealthy classes. Poor people adopted the simpler tactic of burying relatives with some implement-- a crowbar, or a shovel-- on the vague assumption that if they revived, they could dig themselves out of their predicament.

There was clearly a market for an inexpensive alarm system, and in 1852 George Bateson applied for, and received, a patent for the Bateson Life Revival Device, described as "a most economical, ingenious, and trustworthy mechanism, superior to any other method, and promoting peace of mind amongst the bereaved at all stations of life. Constructed of the finest materials throughout." And there is an additional comment: "A device of proven efficacy, in countless instances in this country and abroad."

"Bateson's belfry," as it was ordinarily known, was a plain iron bell mounted on the lid of the casket, over the deceased's head, and connected by a cord or wire through the coffin to the dead person's hand, "such that the least tremor shall directly sound the alarum." Bateson's belfries attained instant popularity, and within a few years a substantial proportion of coffins were fitted with these bells. During this period, three thousand people died daily in London alone, and Bateson's business was brisk; he was soon a wealthy man and respected as well: in 1859, Victoria, awarded him an O.B.E. for his efforts.

As a kind of odd footnote to the story, Bateson himself lived in mortal terror of being buried alive, and caused his workshop to fabricate increasingly complex alarm systems for installation on his own coffin after he died. By 1867, his preoccupation left him quite insane, and he rewrote his will, directing his family to cremate him at his death. However, suspecting that his instructions would not be followed, in the spring of 1868 he doused himself with linseed oil in his workshop, set himself aflame, and died by self-immolation.

On the morning of May 22nd, McPherson had more important things to worry about than the weeping servant girl and the coffin with its belfry, for he knew that today the gold shipment from Huddleston amp; Bradford would be loaded upon the railway van at any moment.

Through the open door of the van, he saw the guard, Burgess. McPherson waved, and Burgess responded with a nervous, rather reserved greeting. McPherson knew that his uncle, the dispatcher, had yesterday given Burgess a good deal of sharp talk; Burgess was no doubt worried to keep his job, especially as the other guard had been dismissed. McPherson asssumed that this accounted for Burgess's tension.

Or perhaps it was the sobbing woman. It would not be the first time a stout man had been put off his mark by a female's piteous cries. McPherson turned to the young girl and proffered his handkerchief.

"There, now, Missy," he said. "There, now…" He sniffed the air. Standing close to the coffin, he noticed that the odor seeping out of the ventholes was certainly rank. But he was not so overcome by the smell that he failed to observe the girl was attractive, even in her grief. "There, now," he said again.

"Oh, please, sir," the girl cried, taking his handkerchief and sniffling into it. "Oh, please, can you help me? The man is a heartless beast, he is."

"What man is that?" McPherson demanded, in a burst of outrage.

"Oh, please, sir, that guard upon the line. He will not let me set my dear brother here upon the train, for he says I must await another guard. Oh, I am most wretched," she finished, and dissolved into tears once more.

"Why, the unfeeling rogue, he would not let your brother be put aboard?"

Through sobs and sniffles, the girl said something about rules.

"Rules?" he said. "A pox on rules, I say." He noticed her heaving bosom, and her pretty, narrow waist.

"Please, sir, he is most firm about the other guard--"

"Missy," he said, "I am the other guard, standing here before you, and I'll see your dear brother on the train with no delay, and never you mind that blackguard."

"Oh, sir, I am in your debt," she said, managing a smile through her tears.

McPherson was overwhelmed: he was a young man, and it was springtime, and the girl was pretty, and soon to be in his debt. At the same instant, he felt the greatest compassion and tenderness for her distress. Altogether, he was set spinning with the emotions of the moment.

"Just you wait," he promised, and turned to chastise Burgess for his heartless and overzealous adherence to the rules. But before he could make known his opinion, he saw the first of the gray-uniformed, armed guards of Huddleston amp; Bradford, bringing the bullion consignment down the platform toward them.

The loading was carried out with sharp precision. First, two guards carne down the platform, entered the van, and made a quick search of the interior. Then eight more guards arrived, in neat formation around two flatcarts, each pushed by a gang of grunting, sweating porters-- and each piled high with rectangular, sealed strongboxes.

At the van, a ramp was swung down, and the porters joined together to push first one, and then the other, of the laden flatcarts up into the van, to the waiting safes.

Next an official of the bank, a well-rigged gent with an air of authority, appeared with two keys in his hand. Soon after, McPherson's uncle, the dispatcher, arrived with a second pair of keys. His uncle and the bank's man inserted their keys in the safes and opened them.

The bullion strongboxes were loaded into the safes, and the doors were shut with a massive metal clang that echoed in the interior of the luggage van. The keys were twisted in the locks; the safes were secured.

The man from the bank took his keys and departed. McPherson's uncle pocketed his keys and came over to his nephew.

"Mind your work this morning," he said. "Open every parcel large enough to hold a knave, and no exception." He sniffed the air. "What's that ungodly stink?"

McPherson nodded over his shoulder to the girl and the coffin, a short distance away. It was a pitiful sight but his uncle frowned with no trace of compassion. "Scheduled for the morning train, is it?"

"Yes, Uncle."

"See that you open it,". the dispatcher said, and turned away.

"But, Uncle--" McPherson began, thinking he would lose his newly gained favor with the girl by insisting on such a thing.

The dispatcher stopped. "No stomach for it? Dear God, you're a delicate one." He scanned the youth's agonized face, misinterpreting his discomfiture. "All right, then. I'm near enough to death that it holds no terrors for me. Ill see to it myself." And the dispatcher strode off toward the weeping girl and her coffin. McPherson trailed reluctantly behind.