Discussions. Oh my, how very thoughtful and caring for a young woman.
“May we know where the young lady’s body has been taken?” Brodie then asked, a perfectly natural question and important to our inquiry. However, it had the expected reaction.
“Good heavens, man!” Sir William responded. “What reason…?”
I exchanged a look with Brodie and returned to the conversation.
“There may very well be some clue that could be useful to our investigation. I am certain that you would not want something overlooked, Sir William. And I assure you that all consideration and care will be taken.”
He looked very much like a balloon that had suddenly deflated. He looked over at his brother who nodded.
“Yes, of course, I see your point. Are we quite through?”
Brodie thanked him for his time and Sir William excused himself to see to his wife.
His brother provided the name of the family physician who had been called in when the young woman’s body was found. Her body had been taken to the physician’s private office out of consideration of the family.
I frowned.
In our past inquiry cases and encounters with victims, the class distinction was not lost on me. The poor were taken to a police holding facility and from there most often to a pauper’s grave, while those of the upper classes were treated distinctly different with the family notified and private arrangements then made.
I thought of my own choice for sucharrangements, a flaming Viking send-off much as my aunt had stipulated. No muss, no fuss, ashes and all that.
“Some additional garments will be necessary,” I commented thinking of what we had discovered on Amelia Mainwaring’s clothing.
“There may be something in the clothing she was wearing at the time, that might provide a clue,” Brodie explained. “If ye will be so good as to acquire additional items. Miss Forsythe will provide them to the physician.”
“Yes, I understand. Let me speak with my brother. I’m certain that something can be arranged. The family will of course wish to have the necessary funeral garments provided for the laying in period.”
Oh, of course, I thought, without saying so. By all means, lay Catherine Abbington-Thorpe out where everyone can parade by, hang black bunting around the mirrors and the front gates. The Vikings had it quite right I thought, but didn’t say that aloud either.
Stephen Thorpe excused himself to return quite promptly with Lady Thorpe’s personal maid and a wrapped bundle.
“Lady Anne personally selected the garments,” the maid announced with reddened eyes, and handed the bundle to me.
“Miss Catherine was such a bright, lively young lady,” she said through what was obviously a new round of tears.
We had the physician’s name and the location of his private office. Stephen Thorpe had sent along a letter of permission for us to view Catherine Thorpe’s body.
I thought the weather quite appropriate as our coach left the Abbington-Thorpe manor in Kensington— ominous with the threat of more rain and an icy cold that had set in. Perfect for viewing dead bodies.
“Did you ever get accustomed to it— the sight of a dead body?” I asked from the gloomy shadows inside the coach.
“Does it become just part of the routine when making inquiries? Facts and details entered into a report? A name, description, all of it then filed away?”
I couldn’t see Brodie for the shadows, only the outline of his shoulders and the silhouette of that mane of dark hair. But I could feel that dark gaze.
“Her death was not the first body I ever saw,” he eventually replied. I knew who he spoke of— his mother.
“When ye must go about on the streets in places like Edinburgh and London, ye see things; a body in an alley, a lad not much older than meself lyin’ in a gutter, starved to death. And things since. It is easy to look away or simply tell yerself that its part of the job.”
He paused. “But when it is someone ye care about, ye canna look away. Ye remember that they meant somethin’ to ye, or someone else. Whether it’s a poor lad lyin’ in the gutter for want of a piece of bread or someone with a title, they need for ye to see them and remember.”
Perhaps that was the reason for a family to lay out a loved one, so that others would remember.
However, I was still in favor of the Viking ritual. The thought of my bones lying in a casket for the next few hundred years, possibly vandalized by grave robbers as was quite common, was not an appealing thought. Who would remember me two hundred years from now?
“What about a murderer?” I asked.
