The Frankenstein Chronicles (2015–…): Season 1, Episode 5 - The Frankenstein Murders - full transcript
- Frankenstein?
- It contains references to galvanism, sir.
- Do you know much about it?
- Not my subject, I'm afraid.
- What brings you here, Mr. Marlott?
- A crime I'm investigating.
A little girl lost,
in a rose pink dress.
I know that picture.
He's out to catch someone
and you're his bait.
- For a tup?
- They don't plan to tup you, Flora.
They plan to kill you.
- How's Flora?
- She breathes.
Nothing else.
A family of murderers that
call themselves the Bishops.
They killed to sell to
the surgery school, sir.
We now have a potential
scandal on our hands
which threatens to do exactly
what that monstrous object you found
was designed to bring about.
God help us when the
newspapers get hold of this!
"Why, on the eve of the Anatomy Act,
"has the disclosure of this
monstrous artefact been suppressed
"denying Londoners the knowledge of
a diabolical surgeon in their midst
"acting in apparent imitation of
Mary Shelley's infamous mad man,
"Victor Frankenstein?"
Oh! You're sure? I won't
think any the less of you.
I feel as if I'm standing
at the edge of the world.
- The household's asleep.
- William.
To the unflinching eye of
the intellectual soul.
You're the poet, Shelley.
Give us some words.
We're about to take a step that will alter
the course of natural philosophy forever.
What words could possibly suffice?
James.
Is she to stay?
She's as committed as any man.
The honour is yours.
To examine the causes of life,
we must first have recourse to death.
You scavengers!
- Ingrates.
- Bastards!
If it wasn't for us, they'd
be wallowing in scrofula!
Mind your tongue, Garnet. And smile!
When you learn?
At times like this, appearances
aren't merely important,
they're everything.
Get the nurses and orderlies
to man the gates.
I won't have my hospital overrun.
You're on ward round this morning.
I've urgent business to attend to.
Whatever you say... cousin.
You? Here?
How dare you? I told you I
never wanted to see you again.
Out.
Not before you tell me why you
went back to Hogg's laboratory.
- Pirkis.
- I'll reveal what you did.
- What we did.
- I have less to lose.
Sir?
Yes, thank you, Pirkis. Two
glasses and my finest port.
Mrs. Shelley and I are going to
toast the future of medicine.
Yes, straight away.
You ask me why I went back.
Ask yourself why you've never left.
Mocking my achievements
in your wretched novel!
Dragging my past endlessly
into the limelight.
You've seen this no doubt?
12 years it took to disassociate
myself from you. Now this.
On the eve of the Anatomy Act,
my greatest triumph.
The Anatomy Act?
A free supply of corpses
to do with as you wish?
It is you.
Literary wretch!
Your wine, sir?
I'm drinking alone, apparently.
Thank you, sister.
There's another patient in here, sir.
Flora.
- Get out.
- Sir.
Mr. Marlott?
Sir Robert instructs me to
tell you he is occupied.
What about this?
- The Frankenstein murders.
- It's history, Mr. Marlott.
Like yourself. Pack your bags
and get back to Wapping.
Mr. Marlott! Sir Robert has known
about this all along, hasn't he?
I'm not at liberty to say.
Mr. Marlott, the time
for coyness is passed.
Who would place power into the
surgeon's hands after this?
Don't berate him, Bentley.
- None of this is his doing.
- No. You are right, my dear.
He only answers to his master's voice.
Well, then, a gift from me to him.
An emergency vote to declare
the Anatomy Act dead.
What better way to
celebrate our engagement?
I apologise for Sir Bentley's rudeness.
He doesn't know you as I do.
Come to my house in one hour.
Thank you for coming.
What is it you wish
to talk to me about?
When we met earlier, Sir Bentley
mentioned our engagement.
- Congratulations, my lady.
- Please, Mr. Marlott.
He is... money to us and
I am status to him.
Nothing more.
You would pledge yourself
in a loveless marriage?
For my brother's work. Yes.
What I've concealed from
him is my intention
to disappoint him should
the Act fail to pass
and my brother allowed
to continue his work.
Something I now have reason to hope,
thanks to the scandals
implicating the surgeons.
But I know Sir Robert well.
He will stop at nothing
to get his own way.
Therefore, I have asked you here to...
..beg you to help me.
Do not let him succeed.
You should know, Sir Robert wants
nothing more to do with me.
I've been removed from the case.
Then all hope is truly lost.
I have a confession of
my own to make, my lady.
That thing you read about.
The Frankenstein murders were
the reason Sir Robert hired me.
My investigations led me to suspect
all who oppose the Anatomy Act,
your brother included. My brother?
Responsible for that?
Please, listen to me.
If Sir Robert's wrong, then
the mad man who made it
could very well have been a surgeon.
Sir William Chester? Someone
without regard to human suffering.
I swear to you, whoever
it is, I'll find him.
Should he be the highest in
the land, I'll find him.
Then I was right!
You ARE a man of God.
If it's your position
that concerns you...
No. It's not that.
Forgive me. Forgive me.
All things might be possible.
In time.
But time is not with us and
my adversaries are powerful.
Then I will wait.
And pray for your success in
bringing them to justice.
Who are you?
- Joseph Nightingale, sir. Bow Street.
- What do you want?
The patient is a witness. I'm to
sit with her until she wakes.
Out of the question. I won't have
you jeopardising her welfare.
- Will she recover?
- Out! At once! Go!
You have no authority here. This
patient is under my care now.
My little girl lost has been found.
It's about Flora, sir. I was...
Close the door, please.
I need a word in private.
I need you to withdraw a
pistol for me in your name.
Why? I'm not employed here any more.
My investigation is beginning
to step on a few powerful toes.
So what now? The investigation goes on.
In private.
With me? If you'll agree.
I'll get that pistol.
This newspaper article, Mr. Marlott.
This is where your missing
girls have gone to, is it not?
Why did you not tell me? I couldn't.
If I'd known more I
might have said more.
Now we have both been defamed.
Then get a lawyer.
I've other business to attend to.
I know who you're looking for, Mr.
Marlott.
I'm listening.
I was 17 and... in
love with my husband.
And with science, too.
That much you know.
We were visited in Oxford
by Percy's friend.
James Hogg.
And he... He introduced
us to his mentor,
William Chester, and his...
..pursuit.
Again.
'Wretches, we four!'
We thought we could conquer death,
but we found that death
had conquered us.
'William banished us to our rooms,
but sleep didn't come easily.
'At dawn, we were roused by Mrs.
Hogg's screams.
'A scalpel had been
placed in James's hand.
'His wrists cut...
'..expertly.
'A verdict of suicide was infinitely
better than one of murder.
'For all of us.'
A young mind driven to
distraction by dark science.
Why didn't you tell me this before?
How could I be sure?
Either someone was tracing our steps
or William Chester himself
had returned to his...
great obsession.
Creating life from death.
Like your Victor Frankenstein.
He truly thought such
a thing was possible.
Still does, if my surmise is correct.
Today, I confronted him
and he attacked me.
Where was this? The hospital.
I called on him at Greenwich,
but there was no answer.
Greenwich?
Their old family home, where
we first knew one another.
Years ago.
Do you admit purchasing bodies
from this woman? I admit nothing.
Liar! He knows me well.
Let's try again.
We buy things from many people.
I can't know them all.
Your masters will let you
hang to protect themselves.
Even if I did buy from them,
it don't make me responsible
for how they come by them.
That's for the law to decide. Ugh.
I'll ask you again.
Did you or did you not buy corpses
from that woman? It's possible!
Adults? Children?
Adults, maybe. Kids
is rare, I told you.
How come your masters had so many?
What makes you think they did?
Sir William said eight children
made up that composite,
all dead within a
fortnight of each other.
Well, you...?
You think that he created that thing?
If he did, it makes you an accessory.
So save yourself.
Tell me everything you know.
I've done so already.
I don't know what more I can say.
Try this another way.
Does he ever require you to deliver
bodies to Greenwich? Why Greenwich?
Because that poor creature floated to
Bugsby's marshes from near Greenwich,
the family home of Sir William Chester.
Sir William lives in Hampstead.
Garnet has the house in
Greenwich, his cousin.
What do you think you're doing?
Taking her far away from you.
- Where she'll be safe.
- On whose authority?
The law's. And God's.
I am her doctor, damn you.
You will leave her be.
Orderlies! Shall I tell them
you drugged her and raped her?
Go ahead. No-one will believe you.
The picture of the little girl lost.
It was yours, wasn't it?
You gave it to her to
tempt her from Billy.
There's no law against giving a
girl a present. You've no proof.
There's proof that you knew Billy.
What other business did you do?
How many children did you purchase?
This is outrageous!
Many, I'd wager. Some for
pleasure, some for dissection.
Stop him.
It was him.
He's the one who tricked me.
It means nothing.
There's no law against what I did to her.
Do you hear me?
- Stop him.
- Get out of my way. Move!
It's all right. It's all right now.
You're a dead man, do you hear me?
Damn you!
You ned to get strong.
I don't deserve to.
Why would you say that?
I killed my child.
I led Alice to her death.
I deserve to die.
All life is precious, Flora.
Yours, too.
If you've been brought back,
well, there's a reason for it.
You've been given another chance.
Take it.
Stay here and guard her -
with your life, if need be.
Where are you going?
It's past midnight.
Garnet knows I'm on to him. I
need proof of his guilt - fast.
What proof is there? Billy
did business with Garnet.
The next link in the chain.
I need Billy's confession.
It's my only chance. Then God help you.
I know Garnet bartered
with you for Flora.
What other business
did you do with him?
Did you sell Alice to him?
Who does this code of
silence serve, Billy?
Only your masters, who'll gladly
watch you hang to save themselves.
If you help me convict them, it'll
go well for you with the court.
You may find your sentence
commuted to transportation.
Billy don't peach, not for no-one.
Death holds no terrors for me.
You know Garnet cheated
you of Flora's virginity?
That's right, Billy.
She's not a virgin.
After you bilked him on the price,
he drugged her, took her for free.
Laughing at you.
You lie!
It's the truth. She was with
child and had it aborted.
The girl you were saving went
to that bastard for nothing.
Now you're lying to save his skin.
How does that make you feel?
Transportation, you say?
"I, Billy Oates, this day
of the 1st April 1827,
"do hereby confess that I provided
numerous unwanted children
"from the streets of Smithfield
"to Garnet Chester of St Bartholomew's
to do with as he wished
"with no concern for their
safety or anything else,
"except my own profit."
Sign it, Billy.
- What's going on?
- Dawn raid, sir.
Where? No idea.
Special order of the Home Secretary.
- He's in there now.
- Beale?
His man.
I am assured that Warburton
will be there when you arrive.
Why are you still here? To get this.
A written confession describing
the supply of children
from the streets of Smithfield's to
the surgeons at St Bartholomew's.
You were removed from
this case yesterday.
And today I have this.
I suggest you take a copy
to Sir Robert immediately.
Unless you want me to take this
to our friend at the Chronicle.
You have your instructions.
- You've been very busy, Mr. Marlott.
- My initial surmise was right, sir.
That corpse child I found was not an act
of political sabotage, as you assumed,
but the work of a mad man.
Garnet Chester.
And those murderers you
found in the East End?
The Bishops are murderers, sir, but
not the ones we're looking for.
They deny killing children
and I believe them.
This is the man who
provided them, Billy Oates.
He sold them to Garnet Chester,
who stitched them together.
I'd like your permission
to arrest him, sir.
Thank you, Mr. Marlott, you
have done quite enough.
I'll take care of this.
Personally.
- What about Sir William?
- This doesn't touch him.
His hospital, his cousin.
No man is his brother's
keeper or his cousin's.
I imagine he'll be every bit
as shocked by this as I am.
Go and rest now. You've earned it.
And when you wake, we'll
talk about YOUR future.
Stay where you are!
Get your hands off me, you brute!
I'm sorry, ladies. Change of venue.
Richard! Richard! Do something!
Please don't tell my wife.
Get up the bloody stairs.
Get up. Go on!
This has all been a
terrible misunderstanding.
I believe you're acquainted
with this young man, Bentley.
What scandalous business is this?
Scandal is the last thing
any of us want, Bentley.
Please.
What's this? It's a calendar.
How can you tell?
12 pictures, 12 months.
And it can tell you the seasons. Look.
Green leaves, red leaves.
Leaves falling and leaves gone.
Simple.
Agh! Sir.
You'd best come quick, sir.
Sir William found him
like this this morning.
Suicide.
As clear an admission of
guilt as any confession.
'A scalpel had been
placed in James's hand,
'his wrists cut... expertly.'
- Thank you for coming so quickly.
- Of course.
We don't have long.
- Suicide.
- That's what I need YOU to determine.
What do you think?
It was murder.
If he'd died from blood loss, there
would have been less of it, much less.
I think he was killed another way.
The wrists were cut afterwards to
make it look like suicide. But why?
Garnet murdered, disguised as suicide.
Makes him look like the guilty one.
Just what is it you think
they've been up to?
You read that story in the paper,
the body stitched together
from different corpses.
Galvanism?
Well, it will play into
our hands all the same.
Jemima tells me we're
on the eve of victory.
An emergency vote on the
Anatomy Act tomorrow.
That means my work can go on. You
still have to answer for Flora.
It's a criminal act to rob an
unborn child of life, my lord.
At the very least, your
practice will be closed,
you yourself subject to prosecution.
Is that what you want?
I want to know how you justify it.
I believe her existence
would have been blighted
by the birth of that child, as did she.
She would have died
homeless and starving.
A vagrant or a prostitute, along
with her unloved offspring.
You call that life?
I call it suffering.
Does Lady Harvey know?
There is much about my
work that I keep from her.
Though she would do everything
to support you in it.
That is true.
Her heart is filled with love for me.
This, however, will surely break it.
I would not be held
responsible for that.
You'll forbear from telling her?
For the while.
If your God exists, I believe
he will cherish you for it.
'Your treatment didn't work.
Too late in this case.
'And in mine?
'Maybe not, though you might want
to act quickly, Mr. Marlott.'
Honourable members! Honourable members!
Let us bring this emergency
meeting to order!
The motion before us
is that this House would
forbear the passing of any Act
which would license the
surgeons with greater power.
Pray silence for the honourable member,
Sir Henry Warburton, proposing.
Hear hear!
Mr. Speaker.
Honourable members.
After much consideration...
..and in the light of
recent developments...
..I regret to inform the House...
..I am withdrawing this motion.
Order!
Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, the events
of the last week
have shocked us all.
Firstly, the discovery of
a gang of bodysnatchers
rumoured to have been engaged in
the business of procuring corpses
by acts of murder.
Secondly, the emergence in the
press of a story of dubious origin
implicating the surgeons in a
grotesque act of defilement
lifted straight from the
pages of popular fiction.
And, most recently, the suicide of Mr.
Garnet Chester,
surgeon of St Bartholomew's, in what
appears to be a gesture of despair
after being uncovered as
the source and culprit
of one or more of these
terrible crimes.
Never has the need for reform in the realm
of public medicine been more pressing.
Hear, hear!
I therefore commend Sir Bentley's
historical rejection of partisan interests
in the name of the common good.
Hear, hear!
I would also like to commend
the fearless work and daring
of Mr. John Marlott of Bow Street.
Mr. John Marlott of Bow Street,
whom I will be recommending
as advisor to my special committee
on the formation of the
new Metropolitan Police.
Hear, hear.
In light of these tragic events,
it is our conviction that no
further delay should be brooked
in the passage of the Anatomy Act.
Let us, once and for all,
banish this trade in bodies!
Let reason and regulation
banish fear and scandal from
our streets and hospitals.
To which end, I propose an
immediate vote on the Anatomy Act
as an alternative motion
for this House today.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The motion before the house is the
immediate passage of the Anatomy Act.
John Marlott for Lord and Lady Harvey.
My lord and lady are not in residence.
Come along, my dear...
Your office.
Sir Robert would like your
proposal at the end of the week.
'This city, Mr. Marlott,
dragged kicking and screaming,
'like a raucous infant,
towards a better future.
'Do well by me and you'll
be assured a part in it.'
♪ ..sat him
round with dismal stories
♪ Do but themselves confound
His strength the more is
♪ No lion can him fright
♪ No foe shall stay his might
♪ He who with a giant fight
shall be a pilgrim. ♪
Sir...
I would like it if Flora...
Flora and I... would like it
if she would move in with me.
As your maid?
No, sir.
We wish to be married.
We're both of us without family, and...
we feel that we belong together.
We'd very much like your blessing, sir.
Well, you have it!
Thank you, sir.
But properly, with church
and marriage bans.
Until then, she stays here. You agree?
Thank you, sir.
I'd like to buy us all a drink!
You two go. I can't.
It's a big occasion, sir.
We'd appreciate it.
I have work to do. Tonight?
Come on now, sir. You can
put your work off for once.
I can't. In fact, I have to leave now.
Where to at this time, sir? Greenwich.
Why Greenwich? Garnet Chester's house.
I missed something last time.
But the case is closed. He was guilty.
What are you looking for?
Alice.
Proof she was there.
What makes you think you
missed it last time?
Either that creature was made
there or it was kept there.
It found its way to the river by
accident through a sluice or sewer.
A cellar, perhaps? Probably.
I'm coming with you.
No sluice. No sewer.
Nothing.
Perhaps you were wrong, it came
into the water from somewhere else.
I measured the tides. It
came from here, Greenwich.
I'm sure of it. Then
someone disposed of it.
Why risk it being discovered?
I don't believe they did.
Sir, look at the distance
from here to the river.
Do you really think it fell out
of a cart and rolled down there?
By accident! It did get
there by accident.
But not that way. I don't follow, sir.
It moved, Nightingale.
Sir William and Garnet were working
together to resurrect the dead.
And they succeeded.
It crawled there.
I know who can help me prove it.
Dover stage? Yes, sir.
You're leaving London?
I asked you a question, Mrs. Shelley.
Leaving England, not
that it's your affair.
You have unfinished business here.
Go inside.
Do as I say, please. I've
told you everything I know.
Sir William Chester walks
free, a murderer twice over.
Twice?
His cousin, Garnet, killed and made
to look like suicide, just like Hogg.
What do you expect me to do?
Tell the world what you told me.
Sir William Chester has
returned to galvanism.
He thinks he can conquer death.
He'll sacrifice anyone.
His madness is no longer my concern.
You have a duty to say what you know.
Let the dead bury the dead.
What if they won't stay buried?
What do you mean?
Where you once failed, he now succeeds.
The dead live, Mrs. Shelley.
- I don't believe you.
- You must.
This nightmare is your creation.
It's not mine any more. It's yours.
Giddy-up!
- It contains references to galvanism, sir.
- Do you know much about it?
- Not my subject, I'm afraid.
- What brings you here, Mr. Marlott?
- A crime I'm investigating.
A little girl lost,
in a rose pink dress.
I know that picture.
He's out to catch someone
and you're his bait.
- For a tup?
- They don't plan to tup you, Flora.
They plan to kill you.
- How's Flora?
- She breathes.
Nothing else.
A family of murderers that
call themselves the Bishops.
They killed to sell to
the surgery school, sir.
We now have a potential
scandal on our hands
which threatens to do exactly
what that monstrous object you found
was designed to bring about.
God help us when the
newspapers get hold of this!
"Why, on the eve of the Anatomy Act,
"has the disclosure of this
monstrous artefact been suppressed
"denying Londoners the knowledge of
a diabolical surgeon in their midst
"acting in apparent imitation of
Mary Shelley's infamous mad man,
"Victor Frankenstein?"
Oh! You're sure? I won't
think any the less of you.
I feel as if I'm standing
at the edge of the world.
- The household's asleep.
- William.
To the unflinching eye of
the intellectual soul.
You're the poet, Shelley.
Give us some words.
We're about to take a step that will alter
the course of natural philosophy forever.
What words could possibly suffice?
James.
Is she to stay?
She's as committed as any man.
The honour is yours.
To examine the causes of life,
we must first have recourse to death.
You scavengers!
- Ingrates.
- Bastards!
If it wasn't for us, they'd
be wallowing in scrofula!
Mind your tongue, Garnet. And smile!
When you learn?
At times like this, appearances
aren't merely important,
they're everything.
Get the nurses and orderlies
to man the gates.
I won't have my hospital overrun.
You're on ward round this morning.
I've urgent business to attend to.
Whatever you say... cousin.
You? Here?
How dare you? I told you I
never wanted to see you again.
Out.
Not before you tell me why you
went back to Hogg's laboratory.
- Pirkis.
- I'll reveal what you did.
- What we did.
- I have less to lose.
Sir?
Yes, thank you, Pirkis. Two
glasses and my finest port.
Mrs. Shelley and I are going to
toast the future of medicine.
Yes, straight away.
You ask me why I went back.
Ask yourself why you've never left.
Mocking my achievements
in your wretched novel!
Dragging my past endlessly
into the limelight.
You've seen this no doubt?
12 years it took to disassociate
myself from you. Now this.
On the eve of the Anatomy Act,
my greatest triumph.
The Anatomy Act?
A free supply of corpses
to do with as you wish?
It is you.
Literary wretch!
Your wine, sir?
I'm drinking alone, apparently.
Thank you, sister.
There's another patient in here, sir.
Flora.
- Get out.
- Sir.
Mr. Marlott?
Sir Robert instructs me to
tell you he is occupied.
What about this?
- The Frankenstein murders.
- It's history, Mr. Marlott.
Like yourself. Pack your bags
and get back to Wapping.
Mr. Marlott! Sir Robert has known
about this all along, hasn't he?
I'm not at liberty to say.
Mr. Marlott, the time
for coyness is passed.
Who would place power into the
surgeon's hands after this?
Don't berate him, Bentley.
- None of this is his doing.
- No. You are right, my dear.
He only answers to his master's voice.
Well, then, a gift from me to him.
An emergency vote to declare
the Anatomy Act dead.
What better way to
celebrate our engagement?
I apologise for Sir Bentley's rudeness.
He doesn't know you as I do.
Come to my house in one hour.
Thank you for coming.
What is it you wish
to talk to me about?
When we met earlier, Sir Bentley
mentioned our engagement.
- Congratulations, my lady.
- Please, Mr. Marlott.
He is... money to us and
I am status to him.
Nothing more.
You would pledge yourself
in a loveless marriage?
For my brother's work. Yes.
What I've concealed from
him is my intention
to disappoint him should
the Act fail to pass
and my brother allowed
to continue his work.
Something I now have reason to hope,
thanks to the scandals
implicating the surgeons.
But I know Sir Robert well.
He will stop at nothing
to get his own way.
Therefore, I have asked you here to...
..beg you to help me.
Do not let him succeed.
You should know, Sir Robert wants
nothing more to do with me.
I've been removed from the case.
Then all hope is truly lost.
I have a confession of
my own to make, my lady.
That thing you read about.
The Frankenstein murders were
the reason Sir Robert hired me.
My investigations led me to suspect
all who oppose the Anatomy Act,
your brother included. My brother?
Responsible for that?
Please, listen to me.
If Sir Robert's wrong, then
the mad man who made it
could very well have been a surgeon.
Sir William Chester? Someone
without regard to human suffering.
I swear to you, whoever
it is, I'll find him.
Should he be the highest in
the land, I'll find him.
Then I was right!
You ARE a man of God.
If it's your position
that concerns you...
No. It's not that.
Forgive me. Forgive me.
All things might be possible.
In time.
But time is not with us and
my adversaries are powerful.
Then I will wait.
And pray for your success in
bringing them to justice.
Who are you?
- Joseph Nightingale, sir. Bow Street.
- What do you want?
The patient is a witness. I'm to
sit with her until she wakes.
Out of the question. I won't have
you jeopardising her welfare.
- Will she recover?
- Out! At once! Go!
You have no authority here. This
patient is under my care now.
My little girl lost has been found.
It's about Flora, sir. I was...
Close the door, please.
I need a word in private.
I need you to withdraw a
pistol for me in your name.
Why? I'm not employed here any more.
My investigation is beginning
to step on a few powerful toes.
So what now? The investigation goes on.
In private.
With me? If you'll agree.
I'll get that pistol.
This newspaper article, Mr. Marlott.
This is where your missing
girls have gone to, is it not?
Why did you not tell me? I couldn't.
If I'd known more I
might have said more.
Now we have both been defamed.
Then get a lawyer.
I've other business to attend to.
I know who you're looking for, Mr.
Marlott.
I'm listening.
I was 17 and... in
love with my husband.
And with science, too.
That much you know.
We were visited in Oxford
by Percy's friend.
James Hogg.
And he... He introduced
us to his mentor,
William Chester, and his...
..pursuit.
Again.
'Wretches, we four!'
We thought we could conquer death,
but we found that death
had conquered us.
'William banished us to our rooms,
but sleep didn't come easily.
'At dawn, we were roused by Mrs.
Hogg's screams.
'A scalpel had been
placed in James's hand.
'His wrists cut...
'..expertly.
'A verdict of suicide was infinitely
better than one of murder.
'For all of us.'
A young mind driven to
distraction by dark science.
Why didn't you tell me this before?
How could I be sure?
Either someone was tracing our steps
or William Chester himself
had returned to his...
great obsession.
Creating life from death.
Like your Victor Frankenstein.
He truly thought such
a thing was possible.
Still does, if my surmise is correct.
Today, I confronted him
and he attacked me.
Where was this? The hospital.
I called on him at Greenwich,
but there was no answer.
Greenwich?
Their old family home, where
we first knew one another.
Years ago.
Do you admit purchasing bodies
from this woman? I admit nothing.
Liar! He knows me well.
Let's try again.
We buy things from many people.
I can't know them all.
Your masters will let you
hang to protect themselves.
Even if I did buy from them,
it don't make me responsible
for how they come by them.
That's for the law to decide. Ugh.
I'll ask you again.
Did you or did you not buy corpses
from that woman? It's possible!
Adults? Children?
Adults, maybe. Kids
is rare, I told you.
How come your masters had so many?
What makes you think they did?
Sir William said eight children
made up that composite,
all dead within a
fortnight of each other.
Well, you...?
You think that he created that thing?
If he did, it makes you an accessory.
So save yourself.
Tell me everything you know.
I've done so already.
I don't know what more I can say.
Try this another way.
Does he ever require you to deliver
bodies to Greenwich? Why Greenwich?
Because that poor creature floated to
Bugsby's marshes from near Greenwich,
the family home of Sir William Chester.
Sir William lives in Hampstead.
Garnet has the house in
Greenwich, his cousin.
What do you think you're doing?
Taking her far away from you.
- Where she'll be safe.
- On whose authority?
The law's. And God's.
I am her doctor, damn you.
You will leave her be.
Orderlies! Shall I tell them
you drugged her and raped her?
Go ahead. No-one will believe you.
The picture of the little girl lost.
It was yours, wasn't it?
You gave it to her to
tempt her from Billy.
There's no law against giving a
girl a present. You've no proof.
There's proof that you knew Billy.
What other business did you do?
How many children did you purchase?
This is outrageous!
Many, I'd wager. Some for
pleasure, some for dissection.
Stop him.
It was him.
He's the one who tricked me.
It means nothing.
There's no law against what I did to her.
Do you hear me?
- Stop him.
- Get out of my way. Move!
It's all right. It's all right now.
You're a dead man, do you hear me?
Damn you!
You ned to get strong.
I don't deserve to.
Why would you say that?
I killed my child.
I led Alice to her death.
I deserve to die.
All life is precious, Flora.
Yours, too.
If you've been brought back,
well, there's a reason for it.
You've been given another chance.
Take it.
Stay here and guard her -
with your life, if need be.
Where are you going?
It's past midnight.
Garnet knows I'm on to him. I
need proof of his guilt - fast.
What proof is there? Billy
did business with Garnet.
The next link in the chain.
I need Billy's confession.
It's my only chance. Then God help you.
I know Garnet bartered
with you for Flora.
What other business
did you do with him?
Did you sell Alice to him?
Who does this code of
silence serve, Billy?
Only your masters, who'll gladly
watch you hang to save themselves.
If you help me convict them, it'll
go well for you with the court.
You may find your sentence
commuted to transportation.
Billy don't peach, not for no-one.
Death holds no terrors for me.
You know Garnet cheated
you of Flora's virginity?
That's right, Billy.
She's not a virgin.
After you bilked him on the price,
he drugged her, took her for free.
Laughing at you.
You lie!
It's the truth. She was with
child and had it aborted.
The girl you were saving went
to that bastard for nothing.
Now you're lying to save his skin.
How does that make you feel?
Transportation, you say?
"I, Billy Oates, this day
of the 1st April 1827,
"do hereby confess that I provided
numerous unwanted children
"from the streets of Smithfield
"to Garnet Chester of St Bartholomew's
to do with as he wished
"with no concern for their
safety or anything else,
"except my own profit."
Sign it, Billy.
- What's going on?
- Dawn raid, sir.
Where? No idea.
Special order of the Home Secretary.
- He's in there now.
- Beale?
His man.
I am assured that Warburton
will be there when you arrive.
Why are you still here? To get this.
A written confession describing
the supply of children
from the streets of Smithfield's to
the surgeons at St Bartholomew's.
You were removed from
this case yesterday.
And today I have this.
I suggest you take a copy
to Sir Robert immediately.
Unless you want me to take this
to our friend at the Chronicle.
You have your instructions.
- You've been very busy, Mr. Marlott.
- My initial surmise was right, sir.
That corpse child I found was not an act
of political sabotage, as you assumed,
but the work of a mad man.
Garnet Chester.
And those murderers you
found in the East End?
The Bishops are murderers, sir, but
not the ones we're looking for.
They deny killing children
and I believe them.
This is the man who
provided them, Billy Oates.
He sold them to Garnet Chester,
who stitched them together.
I'd like your permission
to arrest him, sir.
Thank you, Mr. Marlott, you
have done quite enough.
I'll take care of this.
Personally.
- What about Sir William?
- This doesn't touch him.
His hospital, his cousin.
No man is his brother's
keeper or his cousin's.
I imagine he'll be every bit
as shocked by this as I am.
Go and rest now. You've earned it.
And when you wake, we'll
talk about YOUR future.
Stay where you are!
Get your hands off me, you brute!
I'm sorry, ladies. Change of venue.
Richard! Richard! Do something!
Please don't tell my wife.
Get up the bloody stairs.
Get up. Go on!
This has all been a
terrible misunderstanding.
I believe you're acquainted
with this young man, Bentley.
What scandalous business is this?
Scandal is the last thing
any of us want, Bentley.
Please.
What's this? It's a calendar.
How can you tell?
12 pictures, 12 months.
And it can tell you the seasons. Look.
Green leaves, red leaves.
Leaves falling and leaves gone.
Simple.
Agh! Sir.
You'd best come quick, sir.
Sir William found him
like this this morning.
Suicide.
As clear an admission of
guilt as any confession.
'A scalpel had been
placed in James's hand,
'his wrists cut... expertly.'
- Thank you for coming so quickly.
- Of course.
We don't have long.
- Suicide.
- That's what I need YOU to determine.
What do you think?
It was murder.
If he'd died from blood loss, there
would have been less of it, much less.
I think he was killed another way.
The wrists were cut afterwards to
make it look like suicide. But why?
Garnet murdered, disguised as suicide.
Makes him look like the guilty one.
Just what is it you think
they've been up to?
You read that story in the paper,
the body stitched together
from different corpses.
Galvanism?
Well, it will play into
our hands all the same.
Jemima tells me we're
on the eve of victory.
An emergency vote on the
Anatomy Act tomorrow.
That means my work can go on. You
still have to answer for Flora.
It's a criminal act to rob an
unborn child of life, my lord.
At the very least, your
practice will be closed,
you yourself subject to prosecution.
Is that what you want?
I want to know how you justify it.
I believe her existence
would have been blighted
by the birth of that child, as did she.
She would have died
homeless and starving.
A vagrant or a prostitute, along
with her unloved offspring.
You call that life?
I call it suffering.
Does Lady Harvey know?
There is much about my
work that I keep from her.
Though she would do everything
to support you in it.
That is true.
Her heart is filled with love for me.
This, however, will surely break it.
I would not be held
responsible for that.
You'll forbear from telling her?
For the while.
If your God exists, I believe
he will cherish you for it.
'Your treatment didn't work.
Too late in this case.
'And in mine?
'Maybe not, though you might want
to act quickly, Mr. Marlott.'
Honourable members! Honourable members!
Let us bring this emergency
meeting to order!
The motion before us
is that this House would
forbear the passing of any Act
which would license the
surgeons with greater power.
Pray silence for the honourable member,
Sir Henry Warburton, proposing.
Hear hear!
Mr. Speaker.
Honourable members.
After much consideration...
..and in the light of
recent developments...
..I regret to inform the House...
..I am withdrawing this motion.
Order!
Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, the events
of the last week
have shocked us all.
Firstly, the discovery of
a gang of bodysnatchers
rumoured to have been engaged in
the business of procuring corpses
by acts of murder.
Secondly, the emergence in the
press of a story of dubious origin
implicating the surgeons in a
grotesque act of defilement
lifted straight from the
pages of popular fiction.
And, most recently, the suicide of Mr.
Garnet Chester,
surgeon of St Bartholomew's, in what
appears to be a gesture of despair
after being uncovered as
the source and culprit
of one or more of these
terrible crimes.
Never has the need for reform in the realm
of public medicine been more pressing.
Hear, hear!
I therefore commend Sir Bentley's
historical rejection of partisan interests
in the name of the common good.
Hear, hear!
I would also like to commend
the fearless work and daring
of Mr. John Marlott of Bow Street.
Mr. John Marlott of Bow Street,
whom I will be recommending
as advisor to my special committee
on the formation of the
new Metropolitan Police.
Hear, hear.
In light of these tragic events,
it is our conviction that no
further delay should be brooked
in the passage of the Anatomy Act.
Let us, once and for all,
banish this trade in bodies!
Let reason and regulation
banish fear and scandal from
our streets and hospitals.
To which end, I propose an
immediate vote on the Anatomy Act
as an alternative motion
for this House today.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The motion before the house is the
immediate passage of the Anatomy Act.
John Marlott for Lord and Lady Harvey.
My lord and lady are not in residence.
Come along, my dear...
Your office.
Sir Robert would like your
proposal at the end of the week.
'This city, Mr. Marlott,
dragged kicking and screaming,
'like a raucous infant,
towards a better future.
'Do well by me and you'll
be assured a part in it.'
♪ ..sat him
round with dismal stories
♪ Do but themselves confound
His strength the more is
♪ No lion can him fright
♪ No foe shall stay his might
♪ He who with a giant fight
shall be a pilgrim. ♪
Sir...
I would like it if Flora...
Flora and I... would like it
if she would move in with me.
As your maid?
No, sir.
We wish to be married.
We're both of us without family, and...
we feel that we belong together.
We'd very much like your blessing, sir.
Well, you have it!
Thank you, sir.
But properly, with church
and marriage bans.
Until then, she stays here. You agree?
Thank you, sir.
I'd like to buy us all a drink!
You two go. I can't.
It's a big occasion, sir.
We'd appreciate it.
I have work to do. Tonight?
Come on now, sir. You can
put your work off for once.
I can't. In fact, I have to leave now.
Where to at this time, sir? Greenwich.
Why Greenwich? Garnet Chester's house.
I missed something last time.
But the case is closed. He was guilty.
What are you looking for?
Alice.
Proof she was there.
What makes you think you
missed it last time?
Either that creature was made
there or it was kept there.
It found its way to the river by
accident through a sluice or sewer.
A cellar, perhaps? Probably.
I'm coming with you.
No sluice. No sewer.
Nothing.
Perhaps you were wrong, it came
into the water from somewhere else.
I measured the tides. It
came from here, Greenwich.
I'm sure of it. Then
someone disposed of it.
Why risk it being discovered?
I don't believe they did.
Sir, look at the distance
from here to the river.
Do you really think it fell out
of a cart and rolled down there?
By accident! It did get
there by accident.
But not that way. I don't follow, sir.
It moved, Nightingale.
Sir William and Garnet were working
together to resurrect the dead.
And they succeeded.
It crawled there.
I know who can help me prove it.
Dover stage? Yes, sir.
You're leaving London?
I asked you a question, Mrs. Shelley.
Leaving England, not
that it's your affair.
You have unfinished business here.
Go inside.
Do as I say, please. I've
told you everything I know.
Sir William Chester walks
free, a murderer twice over.
Twice?
His cousin, Garnet, killed and made
to look like suicide, just like Hogg.
What do you expect me to do?
Tell the world what you told me.
Sir William Chester has
returned to galvanism.
He thinks he can conquer death.
He'll sacrifice anyone.
His madness is no longer my concern.
You have a duty to say what you know.
Let the dead bury the dead.
What if they won't stay buried?
What do you mean?
Where you once failed, he now succeeds.
The dead live, Mrs. Shelley.
- I don't believe you.
- You must.
This nightmare is your creation.
It's not mine any more. It's yours.
Giddy-up!