The Undertaker's Cabinet Read online

  Bobby looked to the leaden sky and watched the doves as they fluttered, floated and darted on the breeze.

  "At Jacobs The Undertaker we believe in making your loved ones as free as birds. Mutes, bring the leaflets."

  Bobby got to his feet again and watched Jacobs and his merry men hand out leaflets to the crowd. He realised all he'd done was raise a far larger audience than would have ordinarily watched and in doing so given him the platform to peddle his wares.

  He felt Esther's hand on his shoulder but he didn't have the strength to shake it off. He turned and walked away. Back toward his house.

  "Come and see us, we're in the old church. I have something for everybody." He heard Jacobs voice behind him and it made him sick.

  "Where are you going?" Esther asked.

  "Home," he replied.

  "I'll drive you."

  Bobby didn't answer, he just kept walking; away from the square, from Moreton and sons and from Jacobs. He didn't know if Esther was beside him or behind him, he kept his eyes focused on the trees at the end of the lane and beyond them was the bluff. In the time it took to get there he would've decided whether or not to throw himself headfirst off the edge and onto the rocks below. It might hurt, but it would only be for a split second, and then it would be over. Besides it couldn't be any worse than how he felt right now. "Why were you born when the snow was falling? You should have come to the cuckoo's calling..."

  "Come on get in please."

  Esther's car matched his pace perfectly which was no mean feat considering how slowly he was walking. He'd been aware of her for a while but hadn't spoken yet. He was still considering whether to turn off the track at home or continue down the road and straight over the bluff. Had Tom really gone? He dismissed the question instantly and put it in the 'too hard to cope with’ box.' He needed to concentrate on matters more easily resolved. Questions like what he'd do to Jacobs if he managed to get his hands on him. There were other questions too. If he didn't bash his head in on the rocks at the foot of the bluff, just how much Jameson's would he need to consume before he forgot who he was.

  It was a trivial matter compared to pondering how best to murder Jacobs. He'd not given much thought to how best to dispatch someone and was surprised that the options seemed infinite.

  "Get in or I'll drive over your foot and you won't be able to walk at all."

  He turned and looked at her. Why was she following him? A scruffy looking drunk who was way past his best. A man who had been fast-tracked to a chaotic end by too many deaths and too much whiskey.

  "I saw him you know? Stretched out on that table like all the others but he was still alive. I should've saved him. That's what big brothers are supposed to do." He stopped walking and looked at Esther. "I'm going to kill him and use his body to demolish Crabbe's statue. Then I'm going to drink every bottle of whiskey and smoke every cigarette I can find until my body burns itself up from the inside."

  "Just let me take you home first. Okay?"

  He stepped around the car and slipped into the passenger seat. "I'm serious. You won't stop me."

  She dropped the jet brooch into his lap. "I know you are. Let's find Tom first though eh?"

  He sat in the old leather wing-back. It was the same one his dad sat in every night, and looked at the ridiculous photographs on the walls. Relatives, forebears, ancestors, whoever they were, they all looked the same. Relics of a time long past. A time when Moreton and Sons could be relied upon.

  "Here's your tea." Esther pushed a mug toward him. He wished it was something stronger but he had time. The good stuff would come later and it wouldn't stop flowing for quite some time.

  "Thanks." He took it from her and watched her sit down on the two seater. That was a laugh. There hadn't been two people in the room since... Since Lucy had been buried. "Why are you here?" he asked.

  "Why? Because you look like you need a friend right now," she replied quickly.

  "But why are you here?" He watched her expression change slightly.

  "Because I've never forgotten you."

  "What?" He was confused. "What are you talking about?"

  "You probably won't remember this but I came in to discuss the arrangements for my granddad. It was a long time ago."

  "I remember." Bobby said flatly and looked away.

  "You do?"

  He simply nodded.

  "Well I was grieving. I'd lost one of the most special people in my world, and I know you deal with hundreds of people like me, but that day and the day we buried him I felt he was the most important man on earth to you too."

  Bobby raised his cup and mocked a 'cheers' gesture. "That sounds like me." He knew he sounded like a moron and regretted his trite words. He turned to face her again. "He was. They all were; each and every one of them. I'm happy you felt like that and I'm happy you remember me for the person I was then; for the undertaker I was back then."

  "No. That's not why I remembered you."

  "Then why?"

  "Because when I looked into your eyes. When I put my hand on yours I saw my grief in your eyes. I saw every grieving widow, every grieving son, daughter, father and mother you've ever met, sobbing the in dark recess of your soul. And when I left, I thought, that man has taken their pain and their tears and swallowed them down yet he's never allowed to grieve. One day the tears will come and I hope someone will be there to offer him their handkerchief."

  He bit his lip. He'd been drunk in front of her. He'd met her with egg and bacon grease down his shirt, but he wouldn't cry in front of her even though he felt like it. "I grieve everyday. I just don't show it." He smiled. "Not unless I'm drunk anyway." His little joke garnered no response and he knew it was time for sincerity. "Thank you."

  "Drink your tea. You might like it."

  Bobby held the cup to his lips and smiled. The rising steam carried a hint of something spicy. It was something warming and altogether better suited to his spirits - whiskey "Thank you again."

  "So tell me. How exactly are you going to kill Jacobs?"

  Bobby licked his lips. "I've had a few ideas." He took another drink and felt the warmth spread throughout his chest. He sighed contentedly. "But let's find Tom first. I've got an idea where I'd like to start."

  "Not today though eh? You didn't sleep at all last night and that can do strange things to someone's mind."

  "I have to. I have to sort it all out as soon as possible. Tom needs..." What exactly did Tom need? Tom was dead.

  Esther stood up and walked toward him. "Listen Bobby, we'll find him I promise but you're not making good choices at the moment."

  He looked up at her. "How so?"

  "Jacobs engineered that whole show. He dropped the brooch because he knew how you'd react; everyone would do the same thing but you have to rein that instinct back a touch. I'm sorry to say it but you gave him exactly what he wanted. You gave him your reputation and he stamped it into the road."

  Bobby nodded. He knew she was right but right now all he wanted to do was cleave Jacobs' head into two parts with a machete. "He's got that cabinet too. That hideous box of tricks had gone when I went back for Tom." He put his head in his hands. "He's got everything. I should've just sold it lock stock and barrel when he came calling then none of this would've happened." He felt her touch on his knee and was ashamed at the thrill it sent shooting up his thigh.

  "Don't you dare blame yourself. This isn't your fault."

  Her hand moved off his leg and he felt a mixture of relief and disappointment. "I'm not blaming myself, I'm just questioning my decision-making skills." He looked at her again. "My dad told taught me how to embalm someone. He taught me how to keep a ledger and how to make people feel like you did when we buried your granddad but he never taught me how to deal with death. He never told me how hard that little bitch of detail is. Can you believe that?"

  "Perhaps he didn't know either."

  He turned away. "Maybe." He paused and thought for a moment. "Look, I'm going to stay here for a whi
le and think things through. You don't have to stay, I'm not going to do anything silly. I'm sure you need to get back to work."

  Esther shrugged and sat back on the two-seater. "I've closed early today so I'm here to stay. Unless you'd like me to leave?"

  "No." Bobby replied instantly. Even though Tom hadn't lived at home for several years Bobby felt his absence more keenly than ever and he didn't want to be alone in the house. Not today; not with all those memories floating about and with no way of dealing with them. "Stay for a while longer. For as long as you want that is."

  "Of course." She stood again. "More tea?"

  "Only if you make it like the last one." He handed his cup to her and she took it away.

  He was going to kill Jacobs, that much he knew. But, as his dad had told him, preparing someone to be buried can be a lengthy and painstaking process. Why should preparing someone for their death be any different. He expected the demise of Richard Jacobs to be lengthy and painstaking. Particularly pain-staking.

  *

  The afternoon passed in a peaceful and mellow haze of tea and later, whiskey. Yet it was not the frantic guzzling of a man on a mission, which he usually was. It was the sweet inebriation of an afternoon in the sun even though they were indoors with a vista of leaden skies beyond the walls.

  "So, you know all about me and my doom laden past. What about you? Where's hubby?"

  "I expect he's trying to be eighteen again; propped up in some bar trying his luck with a girl half his age. He'll be all black hair dye, beer paunch and too tight jeans. Isn't that what a mid-life crisis looks like?"

  Bobby shrugged. "You paint a picture that's for sure."

  "You haven't seen him the way I have. No hard feelings though. He's gone on his way and I'm going on mine. That's just the way life goes isn't it?"

  "I suppose so. It doesn't make it easier being philosophical though does it?"

  "I don't know. Crappy things happen for a reason. It just takes a while before you see why."

  "And sometimes, there's no reason at all." He rubbed his eyes; they had been stinging for a while. He felt exhausted but showing it would send Esther back to town.

  "I'll get you one last drink then I'm going home and you're going to bed." She took his tumbler to the kitchen.

  Outside the last of the afternoon light was fading. Soon it would be dark and he intended to pass out long before the owl started screeching in the orchard.

  Esther pressed the glass into his outstretched hand. "Stay." He blurted the word out even though he hadn't even considered it until that moment. "Stay?" He repeated it as if he was asking himself if he had in fact said it the first time .

  For a while Esther just looked down at him and didn't speak; neither of them did.

  Bobby was the first to break the silence. "Sorry. I'm not sure why I said that. It came from nowhere. I didn't mean..."

  "I'll stay," she interrupted him, "until you fall asleep, okay?"

  "Thank you. I'll need more than this to get there though."

  Esther winced. "I've seen the bottles stacked up in the kitchen, Bobby and I'm not encouraging your obvious tendencies but if you want anymore you'll have to get it yourself."

  *

  He didn't mind standing in the field again. Especially not at this time of day. Darkness bloomed from all around and coddled him in a silky blanket. The air was fresh and alive with the sweet scent of nature's decay. He exhaled loudly and inhaled a great lungful of the cold air. Soon the frost would come and dig its tiny, spiky fingers into the earth. You could almost hear the ground scream in agony as life was ripped from it.

  It wasn't all good though. A nagging twitch had buried itself at the nape of his neck. Why was that nosey girl there? What on earth could she want with a miserable failure like Moreton? Women troubled him, they always had. They didn't think like men and that made them unpredictable, especially with a knife at their throat in a darkened alley. Nevertheless they had a purpose in life and that was to bear children; there could never be enough children Still, if she persisted in engaging in this questionable and doomed relationship, whatever it was, she would have to be taken care of too; the Jacobs way.

  The house was to be admired. Whoever commissioned it knew what a house should look like. It was not at all the boxy rubbish built nowadays and it had more in common with a church than a home. Perhaps when this was over and the house was at auction, which it inevitably would be because Robert Moreton was the last of this ridiculous family, he would take it as his own; for a while at least.

  He looked further down the road, toward the coast. He abhorred motor-cars and their throbbing, spluttering engines but he'd had no choice but to bring the Daimler tonight. He needed to bring a gift to Mr Moreton and the horses were apt to make too much noise, especially if an errant fox happened across them. No, the Daimler was the best of a bad lot. The driver was uncouth too but a bully-boy can have his uses, if you pay him enough. He'd shown his worth earlier in the street when Moreton had tried to attack him. It all panned out so beautifully. He couldn't have delivered Moreton's lines any better himself.

  He held his right arm up to the car and the lights flicked on and then off again. "Not yet. Not yet," he whispered. "I've got one last treat for our friend Mr Moreton. One last treat for the man who took my name."

  Bobby listened for the sound of the door closing and Esther posting the key through the letter box. She'd been as good as her word. As soon as his eyelids closed and his head slumped forward she gently shook him and told him firmly it was time for bed. He hadn't argued because she was right. He felt more exhausted than he had ever done in his life. Physically and mentally he was done in.

  He switched the lamp off and shifted onto his stomach with his arm stretched under the pillow. He wouldn't fight it anymore; he couldn't. With any luck tomorrow would make today a terrible nightmare and confine it to a drunken daydream. That's what he hoped anyway. That's exactly what he hoped for and if it wasn't, then by this time tomorrow Jacobs would find himself buried in a deep dark hole. He closed his eyes and fell asleep instantly.

  Across the road, what at first looked like a scarecrow, raised his arm. A large black car cruised silently toward him. The driver lowered his window, shivering against the cool autumn air and pulled to a stop beside the dark figure of his boss.

  "It is time my friend. Time for a family re-union."

  Chapter 12

  June 1855

  Moreton The Undertaker,

  Regent Street,

  London.

  Just over a year had passed since he had arrived back at Moreton's with Roe's still warm body riding in the carriage behind him. It was just over a year but it felt like a lifetime. Benjamin filled the bowl with cold water and sank his hands into it. The relief was heavenly but brief. Seldom did his hands not burn and ache from the chemicals Mr Moreton filled his jars and vessels with. Those strange smelling agents that he mixed and poured into the great copper chamber before sending them coursing through yet another body.

  He did not care to recall the numbers that Tidd had sent on their way but Bethlem's numbers grew fewer each week, of that he was sure. He dried his hands on the towel and winced. The flesh was cracked and sore, and in places there was no feeling where the nerves had been tortured and driven far below the surface.

  Still Moreton continued with his endeavour. Still he clung to Alice and what she once was. What she once was.

  "Benjamin! You must come at once. There has been a breakthrough!" Mr Moreton's voice shouted excitedly from the embalming room. How many times had he made that declaration this last year? This last month? This last week?

  "I am coming, Mr Moreton." He trudged wearily toward his master.

  "Come closer! Look at her skin. Is it not glistening with life?"

  Benjamin looked to Mr Moreton. His face was lined with the creases of stolen hope and bitter desperation. His thinning hair fell in dirty, lank strands down the back of his neck and gathered in a greasy clump on his filthy coll
ar. He was not the man he had once been.

  Nor was Alice what she had once been. Benjamin pulled his ever-present handkerchief over his mouth. The stench of death was not what worried him now. No, it was the stench of untended decay which filled the atmosphere with a fetid cloud. He looked down at what was left of Alice. Mr Moreton had dressed her in fresh clothes everyday for the first few months. That was until her skin sloughed from her bones like mutton cooked in the kitchen at The Albion Tavern's supper rooms. Then he could do it no longer.

  Mr Moreton clapped him on the back. "See! She looks as she did on our wedding day."