covered with a white cloth on the examination table in the middle of the room. Aprons, both clean and bloody, were hanging nearby. They could not move in this new subject until the old one was disposed of.
I shuddered at this sight and my closeness to this fresher corpse. I breathed quicker to try to calm myself, but that let in a horrific stench I hadn't noticed before. My grip loosened.
I slipped down fast-and down more-nearly an entire floor down. Scrambling my legs into the side of the shaft, I attempted to regain my balance so I would not drop four stories to a certain demise in the eternal blackness below.
"What was that?" I heard Bonjour say. "That noise? It's from inside the wall. The hoisting shaft."
I steadied my grip and made myself as still as the corpse now several feet above me.
"Perhaps our little gift to you has woken up, Dr. Moran." The Baron laughed in a way perhaps no man had ever done in the immediate vicinity of two dead bodies. The Baron leaned through the opening and peered down into the shaft. I was now in the dark center of the passage and, miraculously, was blocked from the Baron's view by the bag with the corpse. He returned his head to the room.
"Never mind," said Moran, "we secure the windows and doors with ropes in this building, and the place still seems to make more noise than any of the patients ever did."
I then saw Bonjour trade places with the Baron at the shaft opening, and I became more anxious. She leaned fearlessly inside the horrible compartment.
"Take care, miss!" Moran said.
Bonjour now launched herself fully into the shaft, and for a moment I was certain she would land on top of me. Instead she caught the rope with one hand and then between her knees to steady herself. Moran must have been protesting above, since I could hear the Baron trying to placate him. I clung to my position for my life and prayed for a miracle. I could almost feel Bonjour's eyes pierce the darkness directly onto my uncovered head.
She lowered herself inch by inch toward me, raising my side of the rope so that I was involuntarily moving nearer to her.
Eyes closed tight, ignoring the drops of cold perspiration, I waited for my discovery. A terrible inhuman shriek broke my concentration-at a breath, an army of voracious black rats rushed up the walls of the shaft. They ran en masse toward Bonjour, as though involuntarily attracted by her. Several propelled themselves onto my shoulders and back, their wiry claws attaching to my coat and daring me not to scream.
"Only rats," Bonjour murmured after a moment, then kicked some of the creatures off the walls, sending them dropping down. The Baron extended a hand and helped her back into the lecture room.
"For goodness' sake," I gasped in gratitude to the beasts. I brushed off two that had remained perched on my back.
Since I could still hear most of the conversation, I decided to pull myself back up only a few inches and stay at that safer position.
"If you will go on with the details, Doctor," said the Baron. "You told Poe you would bring his friends to him."
Moran paused in hesitation. "Perhaps I should consult with Mr. Poe's family and friends before speaking with you further. There were some cousins of his, when we were treating him-if I remember right, a Mr. Neilson Poe and a friend, a lawyer, Mr. Z. Collins Lee..."
The Baron sighed loudly.
"Let us see what is on the doctor's table," Bonjour said playfully. I could hear her rustling the white blanket on the naked cadaver.
"See here!" Moran gasped with obvious embarrassment. "What are you doing?"
"I have seen men before," Bonjour replied happily.
"Do not shock the young doctor, my dear!" the Baron cried.
"Perhaps we should take this deceased gentleman home for our study," Bonjour said, rolling the table away. Dr. Moran protested vigorously. Bonjour continued: "Come now, Doctor. No halves-finder keeper. Besides, I wonder, Baron, if the family of that young woman we have hoisted up in that shaft would be interested to know her body's missing from the grave and could be found here, waiting to be diced to pieces by the dandyish doctor."
"Most interested, I'd think, sweetheart!" said the Baron.
"What? But we do this to learn to save lives! You brought that other body here yourselves!"
"On your request, Doctor," said Bonjour, "and you have accepted it in exchange for the information