Jack (1)

Chapter One:1

Night Surgeon 2

James Grayson3

August 2nd, 18884

5

The profession of a surgeon is not one to be taken lightly. Though my colleagues and I are less than favorable in society and they consider us as low class as brick-layers, the shoulders of a surgeon are weighted. Our science, unlike that of brick-layers, involves the knowledge of internal anatomy. The complexity of a human being in our hands. So unappreciated is our mastery that we are often stripped of the title Dr. and forced to the sir, or Esquire. Yet, to whom do they come when the leg is broken, or the wound infected?6

The walls of my examining room are a pale brown, the years showing. The instruments of my trade sit in their appropriate places, gleaming with the evening wash. “Dr. Grayson…” I know the voice well enough, thick and low. The door opens with a slow creek and in comes the brutish Mr. Collins. Mr. Collins is a man of physical labor, with the arms of a tree trunk and the build of a bull. His favor for spirits follows him in a thick scent and in the sour smell to his breath. To my surprise and perhaps everyone’s, he walks straight and sober…in pain. A thick cut is clean across his forearm, blood running. Ordinarily, this would be quite simple. A heated needle, thread and a careful hand would have easily had this fellow out. But, Mr. Collins is of a different nature and medical stance entirely. For a year now, the man has suffered quite frequently from an aliment of deep bruising and the simplest wound refusing to close. Awake this man has kept me, night after night, when I could be with my sweetheart. Because of him, my desk is messy with the journals and medical advice from my mentors and comrades. I find that my head feels swollen and quick burst of pain throb by my ears. Never in my life have I felt so incompetent.7

As quickly as I have thought it, I take it back, remembering my other inadequacies. Nothing, not even a man of cursed blood and failing health is comparable to the sight of my beloved, crooked with pain and holding tightly to her torso…as if trying to hold something in. I have heard many excuse for a lack of fertility and more so for the inability of a woman to nurture a child. That the woman is a cursed, has sinned greatly, even that she has bedded with the Devil, himself! Yet, Sophie…my Sophie, is not capable of such. She is such a slight thing, with fingers like wisps of thread and a face of porcelain. She wishes nothing more than to nurture our child in her womb, to carry him and feel him move within her. She follows my prescriptions for a healthy pregnancy as if they are scripture and kisses me with delight when she has gotten closer than ever before. 8

I wonder if I should warn her, tell her to grip her enthusiasm, yet I find myself unable to break the smile of my angel, unable to take from her the only true joy a woman can have. Besides my own history, besides my own hardened ways, I find myself smiling at the feeling of my hand against the firm curve of her belly, as if it holds all my hopes. Perhaps that is because it did. And, as I have so many times before I awaken to those red sheets, wondering if I should wake her, wondering if I might leave to the morning where she’ll discover it herself. A terrible aching settles inside of me, knowing that whether I awake her or the Sun does...We will be childless still. I touch her and it is not until I feel my eyes burn do I realize that I am sobbing. She does not say a word; she knows this routine well enough. I feel her slump against me, her arms tangle around me like vines of support. Though I am not the one who has just bleed out a child, though I am not the one with an empty womb, something inside of me has broken free and I feel as a shell; empty.9

The sheets are sent off with the maid and I see in her smile, that she knows our pain. The small weight of her head is against my neck, the warmth of her breath reminding me of her presences. “I thought this time would be different…” The voice is hallow and cracked, so barren it takes me a moment to realize it is I who utter the phrase. “He was going along so steadily, my rose. I could already imagine him in my arms, my love, my life.” It is I who has broken into sobs and is muttering away like a disheveled lunatic. It is I who seek solace in the strength of her embrace. It is I who was quick to smile and first to cry out to God, to ask him why he has forsaken me so. When clean linens are brought and pulled over our bed, we lay and pretend nothing has occurred. Yet, when my hand hangs loosely over the small of her waist, draped across her belly, I feel those hallows again and feel irreparable.10

When my mind returns, Mr. Collins has recovered and another surgeon has aided him. He is escorted out of the building, likely to find himself in another brawl and a return visit to my examining table. With spare time in hand, I busy myself with my account, calculating as best as I can. Though, women are hardly taught beyond the keys of a piano, my Sophie is quite good at finances and I’m afraid numerals are a lost cause to me. To think, a man that can perform surgery but is lost at the finer elements of mathematics. Yet, tonight I know what I will do. I know I will take a carriage down to White Chapel and perform a God Forsaken deed. I do this not because I’m some man wishing for damnation, I do it because I love my wife and as the man, I must be able to sustain us, regardless of the means.11

The thin line between greater London and the home of prostitutes is drawn with the dirty cobblestone. Here, in the back alley of some brothel, I reach between her and carve out the sin. I think of Sophie, how lovingly, how tenderly she cradled her unborn child, how she would have fainted at the thought of abortion. Those giving away to happily the only thing that had meaning to her. I try hard to hide my anger, my resentment. I find myself think that if this were my child, how I would care for it, not wish for it to be discarded along with the street trash. The operation is done and all the while I have praying to God from him to bless us, that we could cradle our angel like he was china. 12

It is far past my working hours when I return home.13

I find Sophie sitting at the table, with all our finest china set out for an occasion. A chocolate cake sits as the center piece. It is not until I reach the silence of my room do I realize the occasion is my 32nd birthday. 14