Harry: Chapter One

An Injured Patient

by Liederlady

Notes

April 7, 1878

I was finishing the final weeks of my residency prior to reporting to Netley for my Army training. I had taken my last round of clinical training at Radcliffe Infirmary, in Oxford, near the university.

I had hoped to begin practice once I had completed medical school, but financially, that was impossible. So it was the Army for me. A few years’ service, additional experience and perhaps my Army pension would finance a meagerly appointed practice.

Doctor Brett, the chief of surgery at the hospital, had become my mentor. He was a warm, good-natured fellow and an excellent surgeon. I had learned much in my months working under him.

“So Watson,” he said one evening as we shared a late supper in the infirmary’s kitchen, “the Army will be gaining a promising surgeon. Many fortunate young lads will return home from India because of your dedicated care and expertise.”

I blushed at the premature compliment. I had worked hard in my studies and clinical training. In an emergency, I was as controlled as any doctor, but was still unaccustomed to the graver responsibilities of a medical man. I was apprehensive about how I would perform under battlefield conditions.

Frankly, I fell apart when I lost patients. Brett told me it was the mark of a good physician … one who cared deeply enough to win the greater portion of medical battles. I was not so certain.

“My dear Brett, you are too free with your praise,” I said.

“Nonsense, you’re a fine physician, John. I only wish we could afford an additional assistant to surgery. I’d never let you go,” Brett said, smiling.

I shook my head at his kind flattery. It would be difficult to leave Oxford. I had grown to enjoy the bustle of the college town. There was diversion, but the intimate atmosphere was a stark contrast to the hectic pace of London life.

I was about to tell Brett I would miss him as well when a nurse approached us with news of an emergency case ... a young man apparently requiring surgery.

Brett and I abandoned the remains of our dinner, hurrying toward the emergency ward.

We were met by a local man from the official force, Constable Macauley Edwards, a thirtyish bear of a man with ruddy hair, dark, nearly black eyes and a Cockney accent thicker than treacle. I had encountered Edwards on other cases. He and I had pulled a few pints together over the past few months. The constable could be a good sort, if overly cynical about his work. Unmarried, he had been a law officer for better than 10 years, having worked himself up from street patrol.

As Doctor Brett and I approached, Edwards was impatiently slapping his ever-present notebook against his thigh. I noticed a hefty bobby in sergeant’s stripes standing at attention just inside the door of the ward. His uniform was soiled—uncharacteristic in the extreme for the local force.

“Only a rent boy, Doctors. And from the look of him, one who displeased a customer,” Edwards drawled, hooking a thumb over his shoulder.

Brett and I hurried to the curtained examination area. As I pulled back the curtain, I gasped.

There on the examining table lay a nude, slim young man—filthy, shivering, in shock—curled in the foetal position. To judge his age would have been difficult as his face had been battered by harsh blows. From his stature, he appeared to be in his late teens … perhaps six or so years my junior.

His right eye was swollen shut and his left brow bore a sizeable cut that was oozing blood into the eye. His lips were broken and bloody as well. It appeared as though his nose had been fractured or badly contused. It, too, was bleeding.

Indeed, the boy’s entire body was a mass of bruises, gashes and abrasions under the filth—fecal matter, mud, god-knew-what-else—that caked him. His condition explained the sergeant's soiled uniform.

By far, the worst wounds appeared on the boy's lower body. Although his right hand was attempting to cover it, blood clearly trickled from the young man’s injured rectum.

Brett and I exchanged glances.

“See what I mean?” Edwards said, gesturing at the boy’s bleeding rump and again chuckling.

I stifled the urge to cuff the man. I had never seen this side of him.

“Constable, please allow some privacy. We must examine our patient,” I said tightly, reaching protectively for the curtain with an angrily shaking hand.

“I’ve been trying to question him, but he won’t give anything up. Probably afraid I’ll run him in for the Offences Act,” Edwards said, stepping around me and shaking his notebook at the boy.

“You may question him once he is strong enough, Edwards, not before,” I said, rounding on the man. His head jerked alert; he looked at me with surprise.

Doctor Brett laid a restraining hand on my arm.

”Constable, drop down in the morning. The young man will possibly be up to answering your questions by then. It was good of you to bring him in,” Brett said cheerily—and equally dismissively.

“Alright, alright,” Edwards said strolling around the examining table, appraising the bruised body from various angles as though the boy was a horse on the auction block.

“Found him on the bawdy side of town. His clothes, what’s left of them anyway, were bundled in a heap in the alley, like him. No papers of any kind. No billfold. No money. Just a tossed rent boy—trash the likes you've never known of, Doctor Watson,” Edwards said, his eyes narrowing at me.

The constable gestured toward the rags that had apparently once been the young man’s garments. Then Edwards thumped his notebook possessively on the boy’s right hip, causing him to flinch from the contact. I started forward, but Doctor Brett grabbed my coat sleeve.

“I’ll be back bright and early for him, gentlemen,” Edwards said. He gestured to the sergeant and they whisked out of the ward.

“Insensitive lout,” I muttered as I jerked the curtain closed then turned to Brett.

“He has been at his job too long, Watson,” Brett said sighing, then turned to our patient, “and has seen too much of humanity’s uglier side.”

“As has this young man, Doctor,” I said, sucking in breath through my mouth to avoid the stench rising from the sullied boy.

Brett began digitally examining the young man’s rectum. At his touch, the boy began to struggle and rant in a hoarse voice.

“NO, NO, DO NOT…DAMN YOU…NO…I WILL NOT…PLEASE, NO, NO…GOD! NO!...DAMN! NO!”

“Easy, easy, son, you’re safe, you’re at Radcliffe Infirmary … at hospital. We are physicians. We’re only trying to help you,” Brett said soothingly.

But the boy continued to flail at Brett’s hands. The older doctor glanced up at me and I understood his unspoken request.

I grasped the young man’s wrists and pinned them to the table, using only enough force to immobilize him. Despite the severity of his beating, the strength with which he struggled against me was surprising. Restraint appeared to enrage him.

“There, there, it is all right, my boy. We’ll help you. Yes, that’s all right. Don’t struggle so,” I said gently in an effort to calm him. My thumbs found his pulse points and I rubbed firmly over and over them, a gentling gesture I remembered from my boyhood. My mother had often soothed me that way when I was afraid or upset

But the young man was in no condition to be soothed. He was in shock and apparently still under the impression that he remained with those who had abused him.

His flailing right arm escaped my grip and he landed an undercut to my jaw. I saw it coming and pulled back enough to somewhat parry it. The force that caught me smarted; the full blow would have dropped me to the floor. The slim, beaten boy’s power was astounding.

I saw no alternative but to lean my upper body over the boy and catch his legs in a wrestling hold to restrain all of his movements while Brett examined his violated rectum. My chest pinned his upper torso and I again caught and immobilized his arms with my free arm. His open left eye was bloodshot, but I could still see the rage roiling there. He spat at me and tried to bite at my restraining arm as I leaned over him, but I pressed my elbow against his cheek, effectively pinning his head to the table. Hoarse curses spewed from him between exhausted pants, his wild strength rapidly fading.

Once Brett nodded to me, I rolled the boy onto his back. He still struggled against my iron hold, but his movements were weaker. Between my restraining arms, Brett palpated the young man’s abdomen and chest for internal injuries then listened to his lungs and heart. When he finished, I eased my grasp on the boy. I felt him tense to rise, but held him down by his shoulders. He instantly curled again to the foetal position, drawing his long legs protectively to his rear, trembling with mixed rage and fear.

“No apparent internal haemorrhages, obvious contusions and abrasions. I believe his impaired breathing is due to bruised or fractured ribs, although nothing I could palpate. The most immediate concern is the internal rectal wall lacerations and anal abrasions and tearing—the boy has undoubtedly been brutally violated,” Brett said quietly, his voice lowering even more on the final words. He caught my eye and gestured to specific marks on the boy’s upper buttocks, back and flanks.

I had never seen anything like them … clustered rows of deep, closely grouped scratches. I looked up at Doctor Brett, puzzled. He moved around the table and leaned down to my ear.

“Canine claw marks,” he whispered then gazed in sympathy down at the boy.

“What? He was mauled by a dog?” I asked in confusion. Doctor Brett shook his head grimly. It was the look on his face that finally broke through my obtuseness.

I gasped.

“Surely not!” I exclaimed. I could not conceive of such an atrocity.

But the older physician nodded. He seemed certain.

I looked down at the boy I was restraining. A shimmer arose in his visible eye. He had apparently heard Doctor Brett or guessed at his comment.

“Good Lord,” I said, suddenly believing Brett could be right.

The boy’s open eye darted away from my incredulous gaze. I attempted to mask my horror and leaned close to him

“You are safe now. I swear no one else will hurt you. Please let us help you, please,” I whispered to him.

A solitary, half-stifled sob broke from the boy. His resistance diminished. He did not relax, but I immediately understood he would no longer struggle.

I released his shoulders, squeezing one reassuringly. I straightened from him and he lay quiet. Doctor Brett gestured toward me to consult outside the examining area.

I raised the sheet that hung down over the examining table and covered the young man with it. Then I touched his arm. Despite my reassuring intentions, he flinched.

“We will be back in a moment. You just rest,” I said and followed Brett, careful to close the curtain, concealing the boy.

“Good work calming him,” Brett said.

“Do you honestly think he was--” I glanced back at the curtain, still not wanting to concede such brutality was possible.

“Unfortunately, I have seen such symptoms before,” Brett said, pressing his right hand to his temple; he looked suddenly weary. “It apparently is a common spectacle at some of the worst brothels.”

My fists clenched involuntarily at the notion of someone paying to see so vile an act perpetrated on another human being.

“The boy’s rectal tearing is a problem. It requires immediate repair, but he is still in shock. I am concerned about sedating him,” Brett continued.

“He has been through so much already. The pain--”

“I know,” Brett said, nodding, “perhaps we can manage with minimal sedation. Laudanum?”

I sighed. Laudanum would not take full effect quickly enough, but it was better than nothing and safer in this case than chloroform. I nodded reluctantly.

“I’ll have the nurse bathe him and administer the enemas before we begin,” Doctor Brett said and began to turn away.

“No,” I said suddenly. Brett looked back at me inquisitively. “I shall see to it. He will be calmer … the nurse…”

Brett smiled gently at me.

“As I said, Watson, caring deeply--” Brett said.

I returned to the examining area, and briefly explained to the young man that he required treatment. He swore in protest, but seemed too exhausted to physically resist. I lifted him easily and carried him to an adjoining water closet.

I first placed him on the commode. His open eye went round as I told him of the enema.

“Like hell,” he spat.

“I assure you it is necessary. You will require several over the next few days to ease--”

“I tell you, I will not submit to--”

“I understand your reluctance, but you are in serious danger of infection. Do you understand the idea of germs? There is also the risk you will strain the su--”

“Damn you,” he cried, “just get on with it.”

Notes

Netley for my Army training: A reference to canonical information; Watson actually mentions this in STUD (“A Study in Scarlet”). This storyline of Watson’s residency at Radcliffe’s Infirmary near Oxford University is non-canonical. There has been rampant speculation among Sherlockians over the years regarding the locale of Holmes’s alma mater: Oxford or Cambridge. This flashback chapter evidences this author’s choice … at least until further plotlines alter the decision!

Doctor Brett: Although originally included as an insufficient, but heartfelt, homage Doctor Brett appears in later chapters.

rent boy: a male prostitute

Offences Act: The Offences Against the Person Act of 1861, a British vice law; the context here involves the Act’s provisions regarding “buggery” (homosexual anal sex). This law was used to prosecute Oscar Wilde for his homosexual affair with Lord Alfred “Bosie” Douglas in 1895. Wilde served a two-year prison term and his career as an author and playwright, as well as his health, were ruined. The 1861 Offences Act repealed prior provisions for convicted “inverts” (homosexuals), which often included execution by hanging. The Act’s provisions covering homosexuality were not overturned until 1967.

Chapter Two: Fresh Wounds