‘Dr Raven, I believe there is no pus emerging not because it has accumulated elsewhere, but because there is no inflammation. I don’t know whether it is down to luck or judgment, but I would aver that Sarah looks set fair to make a full recovery.’

Raven looked back and forth from Sarah’s relieved expression to the wound, barely daring to believe the professor must be right.

‘I used chlorinated water to ensure everything was scrupulously clean and I remembered what you had said about Lizars, how he had successfully carried out several ovariotomies.’

‘Then presumably you also remembered that he incurred the lifelong disdain of his surgical peers.’

‘There was something altogether more valuable at stake than mere reputation.’

Simpson nodded sagely. ‘Yours was a courageous and skilful course of action,’ he said, ‘but one I would nonetheless advise we remain discreet about.’

‘I understand,’ said Raven.

Simpson turned his attention back to Sarah.

‘And how are you feeling now? All this excitement is hardly conducive to recovery.’

‘Better than I was,’ she replied. ‘And better than Mary believed, evidently. She seemed to think that I was dying.’

‘I am pleased to say that she was wrong,’ Simpson replied.

Sarah shook her head and endeavoured to sit up. Raven moved to intervene, but she warded him off.

‘You miss my meaning, Doctor. I must elaborate. She climbed into bed with me. She wanted to hold me as I died. A nurse at the Infirmary gave me a similar account, though Mary was interrupted that night too, else her victim would not have lived to tell the tale.’

‘She held you to comfort you?’ Simpson asked doubtfully.

‘Not to comfort me, but to gratify herself. She seemed … excited, in a particular way.’

Simpson’s mouth fell open. There was no question but that he understood the way Sarah meant.

‘I think that death pleasures her,’ Sarah went on. ‘As though death itself were her lover.’

Raven could not recall ever seeing Simpson truly shocked before, but there was a look of appalled bewilderment upon his face. He was scarcely less horrified himself.

‘It is a manner of perversity the like of which I cannot comprehend,’ Raven said.

‘Nor I,’ Sarah agreed, ‘but I am certain that is what she was doing.’

Simpson shook his head gravely.

‘We cannot comprehend it because we are not equipped to do so. She must be delivered into the hands of someone who is.’

‘And by that,’ said Raven, ‘I trust you do not mean McLevy.’

SEVENTY-EIGHT

aven hammered at the door a second time, his thumps reverberating all the way across Castle Street and back again.

‘I hope your treatment of that door is not a precursor to your intended treatment of Mr Quinton’s face,’ said Simpson. ‘For if I fear you cannot contain yourself, I will be forced to send you back around the corner to Queen Street.’