for Day to acclimate before pushing through the inner doors and leading the way into the sanctuary.
Directly ahead was an aisle that ran down the center of the sanctuary to a raised altar. There were three steps down from the foyer to the sanctuary, and Campbell pointed them out to Day, cautioning him against tripping. To Day’s right, pews filled half the room, row upon row of them, far more seating than the small village needed. But the pews were stacked too closely together for anyone to sit, almost on top of one another. Day realized that the pews had been removed from the left side of the room and piled between the remaining pews on the right. The empty half of the sanctuary had then been filled with makeshift beds. Dozens of people lay in cots or on blankets on the floor. Most were unconscious, sweating and moaning in their sleep. Some lay awake but delirious, calling out to absent loved ones or crying for help. Older children from the village, those who weren’t already ill, moved between the rows, pressing wet cloths to the foreheads of their friends and relatives, spooning room-temperature broth into their mouths, and whisking away chamber pots, filled to the brim with vomit and worse. The enormous room was thick with the mingled odors of human bodies and excrement and incense.
“What’s happening here?” Day said.
“This began before you arrived. People fell ill and didn’t recover.”
“Here in the church?”
“Dr Denby was unable to visit everyone in their homes. There were too many. The vicar was kind enough to offer up the space, and some of the men helped move the pews.”
“And now Denby’s sick, too.”
“It does seem that way.”
Brothwood chose that moment to approach them. He had been out of sight, somewhere among the sea of bodies. He had a small rug rolled up under his arm. Behind him, a pretty woman stared at Day with something like panic in her eyes. She was not young, and her face was lined with sorrow and pain, but her beauty was unmistakable, even in that place. She looked at Campbell, then away, and put a hand up as if to shield herself from their gaze. She dropped the damp rag she was holding and then walked quickly away, toward the altar. Day tried to watch where she went, but the vicar distracted him. Brothwood smiled a greeting at Day, but there was sadness and guilt in his manner. He touched Dr Denby on the arm, then led Calvin Campbell to a section of floor that was not yet occupied by the sick and unrolled the rug he was carrying. Campbell laid the doctor down on it and stepped back.
“Mr Brothwood,” Day said, “why didn’t you mention this to me last night?”
“What bearing does it have on your mission here?”
“The missing family might be in a house somewhere here, sick and in need of help. Not out in the woods or down in the tunnels. Our thinking may have run in entirely the wrong directions.”
“I told you,” Campbell said. “I’ve looked in every house in this village.”
“And Dr Denby and I have been inside nearly all of them ourselves,” Brothwood said. “Virtually no house is untouched by this plague.” He shook his head at the ground and made a small motion for Day to follow him. Campbell nodded and then walked away from them in the direction of the altar, the direction the woman had gone.
Brothwood took Day by the elbow and turned him the other way, toward the foyer, but Day pulled away and pointed at the altar. Campbell was already gone. “What’s back there?” Day said.
“Beyond the pulpit?”
“Yes.”
“My rooms. Mine and Mrs Brothwood’s, of course.”
“Why would Mr Campbell go to your rooms?”
“Did he?”
“And who was that woman helping you when we came in?”
“Woman?”
“There was someone helping you minister to the sick. A woman. Where did she go?”
“I’m not sure who you’re talking about. Many of the village women have volunteered to help, taking shifts here.”
“Who is helping today? Right now?”
“I’m not absolutely sure. There’s no requirement, you know; nobody organizing things. This all came on so quickly.”
“How long ago?”
“Three or four days, perhaps. It’s spread so fast. We weren’t prepared. But, Inspector, this has nothing to do with your search for the boy. You mustn’t let this, all of this illness, distract you from your duty.”
“Everyone seems to be concerned with my duty. If you’re all so worried about the missing family, why haven’t you gone out searching yourselves?”
Brothwood wordlessly gestured at the room full of stinking, writhing bodies, their cries echoing off the high beams of the vaulted ceiling. The implication was clear enough: There weren’t enough people left standing to conduct a search.
“Where is Mrs Brothwood?” Day said. “I’d like to speak to her, if I may.”
The vicar turned and walked away, and Day followed him. Brothwood led him to the far end of the room, where an old woman lay on a straw-filled mattress against the stone wall. Her hair was long and white and tangled with dry sweat. She lay slowly writhing, her gnarled hands clenched in agony, her mouth half-open in a rictus of pain. It took Day a long moment to recognize the vicar’s wife.
“It set in last evening,” Brothwood said. “Soon after we returned from the inn.”
“God,” Day said. “What’s happening here?”
“The Devil, I fear.”
“I don’t-”
“Someone did something dreadful to those people. To the boy, Oliver Price. Rawhead has come to live here, been welcomed by these evil deeds. That’s why we need you. You and your friend Hammersmith. You’re untouched by this. You can make it right.”
“You don’t need policemen, you need doctors.”
Brothwood sucked in a deep breath and pointed in the direction of Denby’s limp body, somewhere on the floor behind them. “Our doctor. And not even a cot left for him.”
Day watched a dust mote dance through a beam of dim blue light. “How fortunate, then, that I’ve brought the best doctor in England for you.” He motioned to a boy who was perhaps ten or twelve years old. The boy wrung a damp cloth out in a shallow bowl of water and laid it on an older boy’s forehead, then stood and approached the inspector. “Go to the inn, boy,” Day said. “Find Dr Kingsley and a man named Henry and bring them here immediately.”
“Sir, my brother. .”
“If there’s any hope for your brother, you’ll find it at the inn. Now, go.”
The boy nodded and, with one quick look back at his unconscious older brother, hurried away, through the foyer and out of sight.
36
This presents a problem,” Kingsley said. He held the shriveled eyeball up to the light and turned to Henry. “It’s a real eyeball, of that I have no doubt. But I have no way of knowing whether it’s a human eye or not.”
“It should be in someone’s head if it is,” Henry said.
“Yes, that’s where I prefer to keep my own eyes.”
“Me, too.”
Kingsley turned away before Henry could see him smile. The gentle giant had brought a touch of innocence and unaffected humor to the laboratory, something Kingsley hadn’t known he needed or wanted there. It was much appreciated.
“So,” he said, “the eyeball may not be particularly useful as evidence. But the bloodstained dress is another matter entirely.”
