“Of course,” I said. “The men who killed for corpses.” I cleared my throat. “That’s a bit to the point, but…”
“Right,” Rena said. “Back in the early 1800s they killed and sold the corpses of their victims tae Dr. Robert Knox, who used them for dissection in his anatomy classes at the University of Edinburgh. Anyway, Dr. Eban tells the story, and his rendition is filled with enough drama for a vampire story. He finishes off the lecture by saying that Burke and Hare probably saved more people than they murdered, considering what their contributions did tae assist medical students. He has a point, but it was still murder, and the way he tells the story … he’s plain creepy. It’s a tone he sets for himself early, and it’s something he sticks with. That, along with his always-tough attitude, makes him the most talked about, and probably most feared, professor at the medical school.”
Mallory added, “Either it’s just the way he is, or the impression he wants tae give. And he conducts his classes in a theater that’s set up the exact same way Dr. Knox’s was, on purpose. There’s a plaque about Dr. Knox on the wall outside the door and everything.”
“In his office, he’s a totally different man, when no one else is looking,” Sophie said.
We looked at her as she leaned against the sink. I thought she might say more, but it seemed like she lost her train of thought.
“I could use a cup of coffee,” she said a moment later.
“I think that’s the best idea of the night,” Rena said. “Come on, I saw a table in the back. It’s small, but we’ll see if we can grab it.”
“I’ll go order the coffee,” Mallory said.
The musicians told the crowd they were taking a break just as we exited the restroom. I followed behind the other three and kept on the lookout for someone creepy as we weaved our way thought the mostly student crowd in the small pub.
I’d met a few students over the past couple of months. Rena and Sophie shared a flat close to the university. Most of the building’s residents were medical school students, but not all. It was immediately obvious who the undergrads were. Other than the fact that they looked the youngest, they also usually seemed to be having the most fun.
As we made our way through the crowd I spotted a familiar woman leaning against the bar next to another woman I didn’t recognize. The one I recognized lived on the bottom floor of Sophie and Rena’s building, and had opened the building’s front door for me a few times. She could spot visitors approaching though her window and seemed to feel compelled to let people in.
Though I’d never met Mallory before tonight, she lived in Rena and Sophie’s building too, in a flat all her own. She’d already mentioned that she spent most of her time holed up there, studying, and studying some more. In the brief time I’d known her I’d already noticed that she had a quiet calm about her that Sophie and Rena didn’t possess. Maybe Mallory just worked harder to hide her stress.
I waved at the woman from the first floor, someone I’d pegged as an undgrad. I thought she was looking my direction, but she didn’t wave back. I followed her line of vision and spotted who she must have been watching instead. A handsome man, probably about sixty, stood not far from the edge of the small dance floor. He wore dark pants and a dark peacoat over his tall, thin frame. His short dark hair was slicked back from his high forehead, and though I thought his nose should be hooked to match the rest of him, it wasn’t. It was straight and almost regal. He was lazily holding a tumbler half full of liquid.
He didn’t see me looking, and neither he nor the young woman noticed that I saw what happened next. Both the man by the dance floor and the woman sent a quick, furtive glance toward a third person, a man who seemed to be in a hurried exit out of the pub. The only features I caught of the third person were a head full of bushy gray hair and the back of a tall body that moved in defiance of the gray hair; strong and sure.
It could have been my imagination or the happenstance of my timing regarding their expressions, but in those brief beats of time, I thought both the man by the dance floor and the woman were concerned about the leaving man, or at least concerned about something. But the moment was over quickly, and I immediately doubted what I thought I’d seen.
As we approached the table Rena had spied, three men were also about to sit there. They sent us smiles of surrender and let us have the chairs.
After we sat, Mallory approached with a tray of four cups of coffee. “Freshly brewed,” she said as she placed the cups in front of us one at a time and then leaned the tray against the wall. She angled herself into the tight space that held the last of the four chairs.
“Did you see him?” Sophie asked Rena.
“Yeah, just standing there being creepy,” Rena said.
“The tall man in the dark clothes next to the dance floor?” I asked.
“That’s him. That’s Dr. Eban,” Rena said.
“Did you guys see the gray-haired man leaving?” I said.
They all looked toward the door and said they hadn’t.
“He must have left,” I said, not sure why those brief seconds had made such an impression on me.
Mallory twisted around in her chair so she could see the man by the stage. “That’s Dr. Eban, though. He’ll probably just stand there all night and ooze horror, just tae set us all off balance. Take away our fun.” Her words were
