Resurrection Men

By Steven Harper

Two men become friends in a graveyard in this moving novel of love, loss, and redemption.

Arthur Tor steals the dead for a living. As a resurrection man, he creeps around graveyards with his shovel, hoping to dig up corpses so he can sell them to the local medical college and pay his tuition there. He also holds a strange position in underground society. If someone is dying a slow, painful death, the family members come to Arthur and beg him to end their loved one's pain. Arthur can never refuse, and he helps the dying painlessly cross the threshold in a process he calls the Black Rounds. Unfortunately, a local judge has gotten wind of Arthur's activities and has sworn to send him to prison—or the hangman's noose.

Jesse Fair has fled his corrupt family in Baltimore and landed in Ypsilanti, Michigan, where he becomes the town gravedigger and undertaker, and he works hard to help grieving families through their pain with warmth and compassion. Some families make odd requests for their dearly departed, and Jesse discovers that the undertaker must often deal with the absurd side of death. But his venomous family is still searching for him. Relentlessly. And once they find him, Jesse will have to make a terrible choice.

When Jesse catches Arthur in the act of robbing a grave, the two of them form a strange friendship and even stranger partnership that digs deep into social taboos—and into their own souls.

In his first book since the critically acclaimed novel The Importance of Being Kevin, Steven Harper spins a heartfelt, uplifting story of suspense, life, and love against the backdrop of a Michigan town at the edge of the frontier.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Steven Harper
• Release date: Oct 1, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005083908

Steven Harper

Steven Harper Piziks was born with a last name no one can reliably spell or pronounce, so he usually writes under the name Steven Harper. He grew up on a farm in Michigan but has also lived in Wisconsin and Germany and spent extensive time in Ukraine.So far, he’s written more than two dozen novels and over fifty short stories and essays. In 2022, his short story "Eight Mile and the City" in When Worlds Collide by Zombies Need Brains was nominated for the Washington Science Fiction Association Small Press Award for Short Fiction. When not writing, he plays the folk harp, lifts weights, and spends more time on-line than is probably good for him. He teaches high school English in southeast Michigan, where he lives with his husband. His students think he’s hysterical, which isn’t the same as thinking he’s funny.

Book preview

1

Aresurrection man watched the funeral, and his expression was hungry. He stood behind the huddle of funeral-goers clustered around the grave and didn't speak with anyone, which was how Jesse spotted him. A dead giveaway, so to say. Jesse stared at him from the corner of one dark eye. The resurrection man wasn't yet twenty. Brown as a dead tree. Straight brown hair under a frayed brown cap, long nose, sharp jaw, long brown coat mended twice, worn brown shoes that were nonetheless carefully polished. Someone who was used to hiding who he was.

The resurrection man met Jesse's eye for a flick. He had good eyes, that one—clear and blue and strong—and Jesse touched his cap in salute. Jesse had a gravedigger's build, wiry and a little short, able to throw an eight-pound shovelful of dirt six feet toward heaven, and he could hold his own in a fight against two men half again his height. The resurrection man was taller, whipcord, and Jesse bet he wore gloves to keep his hands clean when he robbed night-time graves. No one who saw him by day would know what he did at night.

When their eyes met, blue on brown, it created something interesting and indefinable, like that boundary moment when water touches a burning coal, or warm ocean air brushes a chilly shore. The resurrection man looked away. Jesse clicked his tongue in mischief—and the chance to make some money.

The coffin rested on a pair of beams set across the grave Jesse had dug only that morning. Jesse always put a scattering of sawdust and a few pine branches in the bottom of his graves so the coffin wouldn't rest on dirt. It made no difference to the deceased, mind you, but it made the family feel better. Two solemn boys pulled the beams away, and the pallbearers lowered the coffin with ropes braced around their necks like pulleys while the preacher said his final bit. While all this was going on, the resurrection man slipped away, confirming Jesse's suspicions that the man was a grave robber who knew the best time to leave was when the family was occupied.

As the family drifted off, Jesse barely overheard a man and a woman in conversation. The woman murmured, He won't get up and come after us, do you? He's stubborn enough to try.

Jesus, I hope not, the man muttered back. That copper-plated sumbitch was bad enough when he was alive. I can't think what he'd be like, lurching around, dead.

Death brought out the truth among the living. Jesse looked in the direction the resurrection man had taken and gave himself a private nod. It was going to be an interesting evening.

Jesse finished filling the grave of Mr. Elmer Pitt (b. 1803, d. 1889), then went home to the little shack he occupied at the edge of Highland Cemetery, made himself a pot of strong coffee on his bachelor stove, dropped a slug of Irish in it, and waited until sunset. When the early autumn night slid in cozy among the gravestones, Jesse put his shovel back over his shoulder and strolled toward the grave of Elmer Pitt. There was time to enjoy the walk and think about how to spend the money he would shake out of the resurrection man. It had been a while since he'd passed a good night's drinking and fighting at a pool hall. Or maybe he'd buy a new pair of boots.

The trek was easy. Didn't matter that it was dark. Jesse had dug plenty of graves in Highland Cemetery and knew the place like the end of his shovel. He even had a map of the place tacked to the wall of his shack, with every grave picked out in careful precision. People thought that graveyards laid out the dead in neat, cornfield rows, but Highland's graves made a swirling mosaic that twisted around the hills and trees, creating stars and flowers and teardrops that only God and Jesse's map could see. Jesse had taken over as the main gravedigger in Ypsilanti from Mr. Suggs two years ago. Mr. Suggs himself currently rested in a grave well back from the road that Jesse himself had dug with extra care. Jesse didn't run the cemetery—that job belonged to the great and gloomy Frederick Huff, who issued daily orders from the caretaker's house and only emerged to complain at Billy Cake and the other fellows who worked the cemetery. But it was Jesse who dug the graves.

Highland Cemetery had opened twenty-some years ago, a bit before Jesse was born, and it had stolen away all the business from Prospect Cemetery. Didn't seem to matter that Prospect was half a mile closer to downtown Ypsilanti, with its growing Normal School and expanding railroad system. Prospect still failed to prosper.

Problem was, Prospect had both proven too small, so the city had bought a big chunk of loamy hillside outside Ypsilanti and named it Highland Cemetery. The local Catholic community had been scandalized at the idea of sharing eternity with Protestants and even Lutherans, so they had bought a bit of land right across the road for their own dead, keeping Mr. Suggs, and now Jesse, busy digging graves for both. Meanwhile, the townsfolk stopped using Prospect Cemetery entirely, and no one seemed interested in paying Jesse Fair or Billy Cake to even trim its trees, so these days the verge ran wild. The inhabitants didn't complain.

It was a serpent night, with the chill breeze hissing in the leaves. Jesse wound through the stones until he came to the new grave of Elmer Pitt. The thin glow of a little lantern on the ground illuminated the markers from the bottom up, and the familiar quiet sound of a wooden shovel biting earth came to Jesse's ears. Resurrection men always used wooden shovels. They made less noise. Jesse crept closer.

The resurrection man had already made good headway and was knee-deep in the ground at the head of the grave. Two canvas drop cloths lay beside him, one to catch the dirt and the other to receive Elmer Pitt. Jesse noted the well-worn leather gloves covering the resurrection man's hands. The man also had a crowbar and a length of rope.

So you're from the University Medical School, Jesse said in the dark.

To his credit, the resurrection man didn't drop his shovel or even shout. Instead, he turned and focused sky eyes on Jesse. Mud stained his trousers.

You knew I'd be here, he said simply.

Haven't seen your kind in a while, Jesse said. They passed that law a few years back that says paupers and prisoners go to the anatomy lab, which means the dead poor and the poor dead get a free train ride to your dissecting table. Last I knew, there was no end of dead paupers, so what brings you down here to my cemetery?

We still run short of bodies now and again. The resurrection man went back to work. He was digging at the head, which was why he'd attended the service—he needed to know which way Mr. Pitt was pointed. I saw the funeral notice in the paper and came on down.

What's your name, friend?

The resurrection man stopped his shovel again and sighed. Are you going to call the constable, sir, or just empty my pockets?

Jesse had been about to name a figure, one that would give him a delightful evening's entertainment and leave him with a fine morning's hangover, but something stopped his tongue. Something in the other man's posture, his face, his eyes. Jesse cocked his head, and a coyote grin crept across his face.

Depends. Jesse stuck out a hand for the resurrection man to shake. I'm Jesse Fair.

Uh ... Arthur. Arthur Tor.

The coyote grin widened. Does it bother you to dig up bodies for that fancy medical school over in Ann Arbor, Mr. Tor?

It does. Arthur's shovel bit the ground again. I had to kill a dog to dissect during my first term, and I don't mind telling you, my hands were shaking for an hour afterward. Still, I did it. Now I'm doing this.

Jesse cocked his head. Why?

We have to learn anatomy somehow. Arthur's voice was weary, the sound of someone who had explained this a hundred times. We cut up the body of one person who died, and hundred other people get to live. And I have rent to pay. Why do you care, if you intend to turn me in?

Just wanted to see what you would say. Jesse stepped into the head of the grave with Arthur, close enough to smell cemetery sweat. Move over, Mr. Tor, and I'll show you how a gravedigger digs.

2

Arthur Tor was used to ignoring and hiding. He ignored growing up without the mother who had died birthing him. He hid when his father fell into a bottle. He hid during the burial of his brother, Gerald, who died of dysentery, and of his sister, Sally, who took an infected tooth and spent her last days with her face filled with pus and skin green as rotten grass and her quiet voice begging for the pain to stop. Eventually, it had.

Sally's death had been the hardest. Arthur had stood at her bedside when he was twelve and she was nine and the breath was stopped in her little body. His hands still shook at memories he couldn't quite push aside. Arthur was invisible to the memory, but the memory didn't stay entirely invisible to him.

Those deaths, however, had allowed Arthur to finish high school. With only a single son to support, his laborer father was able to keep food on the table without Arthur dropping out to take a job. Still, Pop battled his demons with a whisky bottle in one hand and a shot glass in the other, and thank heaven he just sank into his chair instead of going at Arthur the way Mr. Pickering did with his wife across the hall. Arthur knew every sip brought Pop closer to his own end, and the knowledge ached like frostbite, so Arthur hid from it behind books, behind studying, behind a burning desire to see an end to pain, and an end to painful death. His grades and a tuition scholarship from the Detroit Boys Club got him into the big, proud University of Michigan Medical School, and he was finally able to leave behind the crumbling tenements, the muddy manure streets, and suppers of fried oatmeal. Two years of study, and he'd be a doctor. Well, two years plus the odd term he'd have to take off to work. The scholarship paid tuition, but not bed, board, and books. But so what if it took him three years, or even four? He'd be a doctor, able to destroy suffering, conquer death, let Sally go. That mattered. Time didn't.

So he had nearly pissed into the grave at his feet when the devil's own voice burst out of the dark. If Arthur got arrested a third time, it meant his expulsion and the end of his dream of becoming a doctor. Only a long life of hiding kept the terror from his face. He saw himself standing before the Board of Regents, his head hanging heavy, his dream dead on the floor. But a moment later, Jesse Fair, the gravedigger with the earth-brown eyes, jumped into the hole beside him and set to work.

Arthur's mouth dropped open. He wasn't quite sure what he was looking at. Once he understood that Jesse intended to help, his bones went feathery with relief and he sagged on his shovel a little. The world steadied, and his dream came rushing back to him, a gift from this plain-dressed man and his corded forearms. Arthur took a moment to watch Jesse dig, the muscles bunching and pulling beneath his blue workman's shirt.

At last, Arthur said, Um ... I guess I should—

Don't thank me! Jesse levered up a healthy clod of earth. You owe me, Arthur Tor, and I'll collect. Eventually.

Oh. Damn it. Well, Pop always said nothing came free, and why would it be any different in a graveyard? You'll want half my fee.

Jesse tossed a graveyard smile at him. Maybe. Or maybe I won't charge money. I like having people in my debt, Mr. Tor.

Arthur didn't know what that meant. It should have made him uneasy, but Jesse's tone was light as spun sugar, and Arthur was too relieved to be afraid. Instead, he picked up his shovel again.

It was a strange experience, digging up dead body with a living man, and when the hole grew too deep for two, they took turns, another new experience for Arthur. Two men took no time at all to get to the head of Elmer Pitt's coffin and break it open with the crowbar. Arthur looped the length of rope under Mr. Pitt's arms, and Jesse yanked. A moment later, Arthur was rolling Mr. Pitt and his funerary finery into canvas while Jesse filled the grave back in. Jesse took a paper packet from his pocket and scattered seeds over the twice-done dirt.

Wolfsbane and snapdragons for the copper-plated Mr. Pitt, Jesse said. Out of every death comes a little life.

Arthur couldn't think what to say to that, so he stayed quiet. Jesse nipped from a pocket flask and offered it to Arthur, who shook his head. Jesse shook a few drops over the grave instead. Mr. Pitt's last drink, he said. Or, if he was a teetotaler, his first. Either way, now is the perfect time for it.

With that, Arthur lifted Mr. Pitt onto his back while Jesse caught up the lantern and lighted their way down to the dirt road that threaded between the two graveyards. Arthur had hidden the Medical School's mule cart in a clump of trees down by the creek.

What happened to Doc Naegele? Jesse asked. This is usually his business.

You know Doc? Arthur said in surprise.

I know all the resurrection men hereabouts. Doc's one of the best. Precision shovel work. Can't even tell the grave's been disturbed, unless you're me.

He's getting on in his years. The Medical School tried to make him retire, and everyone raised a fuss, so they let him stay on. Arthur pushed Mr. Pitts into the back of the cart. He still cleans the anatomy lab and rings the bell to start classes, but he no longer digs. Doc knows more about human anatomy than the head of the Medical School. Set a knife point to a man's skin, and Doc will say exactly what you will stab beneath.

That's Doc, Jesse agreed, and climbed onto the driver's seat behind the mule.

What are you doing? Arthur said.

It's eight miles to the Medical School on a dark road. You'll get there at sunrise, and then only if you're lucky.

So?

Jesse grinned at him in the graveyard night. There's a place just up the street from the Medical School where you can buy me breakfast, Mr. Tor. Your debt, you know.

Arthur took the reins. If you intend to blackmail me, you had best call me Arthur.

Neither man spoke much on the bumpy, rutted road to Ann Arbor with a corpse in the wagon. Arthur felt strange—glad and uncomfortable both. It was nice to sit with someone who was both quiet and not dead. At least, not dead yet. The road ran alongside a set of train tracks that went all the way to Detroit. Once, a train tussled past them, grumbling and chewing its iron nails. Arthur watched it with enjoyment. Trains were fascinating dragons ridden by knighted engineers heading off to explore new cities, new people, new places. They made connections, brought people together, and pulled them apart. A train had taken Arthur from the slums of Detroit to a new life in Ann Arbor. Trains created destiny, even in the dark and lonely night.

What is it? Jesse asked, raising his voice above the noise.

The train, Arthur said. I've loved them since I was a boy. But a train passing at night is the loneliest sound in the world.

Good thing we aren't alone, then. Jesse glanced back at Mr. Pitt. Even he has us right now. The living need the dead. And vice-versa.

The train pulled into the distance. Arthur gave Jesse an odd look. How so?

The living feed on the dead, Jesse said. Part of nature. Everything we eat, drink, and breathe used to be part of something else. The dead give themselves up so we can exist.

Why do the dead need us, then?

To remember them and to use them, so they don't be wasted. The cart passed through the only intersection of a town called Carpenter's Corner, a speck that didn't even rate a stop on the Detroit-Chicago rail run. Jesse pointed left. Down that road a bit? Used to be a cemetery there. Carpenter brothers owned it. They sold the land to a farmer only after he promised to relocate the graves.

You're going to tell me he didn't.

Jesse slapped Arthur's shoulder. You're not the one to look shocked. Farmer tried moving a body, but he discovered right quick it takes a lot of effort to dig up even one grave, 'specially when it turned out the coffin had rotted and he had to pick bones out of the dirt. So for the rest, he dumped the gravestones in the river and fuck the devil. That left him with some nice, clear land to farm above with decaying coffins below. You've probably eaten his produce, grown from the dead.

That doesn't bother you?

Isn't it worse to let all those bodies rot in a forgotten graveyard no one ever visits? The dead need the living. They provide fertile farmland for a whole lot of people. He glanced back at Elmer Pitts. And the chance for men to become doctors. Live goes on, and we go with it.

As Jesse had predicted, they were still in the farmlands just outside Ann Arbor when the eastern sky behind them woke with light. Arthur tried to hustle the mule, but the animal plodded steady as a stone. A little sweat broke out across Arthur's forehead at the thought of getting caught.

Resurrecting bodies wasn't a major crime. Exactly. Quite. Oh, the general population found it horrific, and Arthur understood why. He knew he wouldn't enjoy someone poking around his sister's grave. But after steady exposure to the University of Michigan Medical School, the police—and the state government—had come to the reluctant conclusion that the world needed doctors, and young doctors needed to open up at least one body to have a look around. And so both entities pretended outrage about resurrection in public and turned a blind eye to it in private. Unless the city coffers fell low or a local official came down with religious fever, or you accidentally dug up someone important. In those cases, resurrection men faced the heavy end of a gavel.

Really, the main problem came from the screamers, those folk what stumbled across a resurrection man at work and screeched loud enough to wake the corpses they were afraid to see. They brought police, and with the sky growing lighter, it became more and more likely someone would shout about the corpse-shaped bundle in the back of Arthur's wagon. He swiped at his forehead with a red handkerchief that had seen many washings.

Nervous? Jesse asked.

We're at least two miles from the University, Arthur said. I should've hidden the body until I could make other transportation arrangements. Or put something into the cart to disguise Mr. Pitt.

They were at the edge of town now, with farmland behind and houses in front. Roosters crowed, and already wagons and hand trucks were moving along the streets. A few headed their way. Arthur's stomach tightened, and he cast about for a solution.

Jesse clicked his tongue. You need to think with a little more creativity He hopped off the wagon, and Arthur hurriedly checked the mule.

What are you doing? Arthur hissed.

Helping. Jesse hauled Elmer Pitt onto the wagon seat between Arthur and himself, straightened Mr. Pitt's burial suit, and dropped his own cap onto Mr. Pitt's head. Mr. Pitt's high collar hid his dropped jaw, and the cap hid his bloodless pallor. Jesse snaked an arm up the back of Mr. Pitt's jacket and grabbed the back of his neck just in time for an approaching milk wagon to haul itself into view. Arthur clucked to the mule with a tongue made of wood.

Morning, Jesse called to the milk driver.

Morning, the milk driver called back absently.

Jesse nodded Mr. Pitt's head. Morning, Jesse said without moving his lips and in a different voice. The milk driver passed without a second look while Arthur coughed into his handkerchief.

Problem, my friend? Jesse said over Mr. Pitt's head.

Not a one, my friend, Arthur replied. Not a one.

They reached town as the last of the stars closed up for the day. A light traffic of rumbling carts delivered the last of today's supply of beer, bread, milk, and newspapers up and down tree-lined streets. Workmen trudged sleepy-eyed toward the day's labor. Arthur felt naked, driving through town with a corpse next to him, but no one gave them a second glance.

They trundled down to the sprawl of Greek-style buildings that made up the University of Michigan and headed to the back of the white, four-story Medical School. Next to it, the bare walls of the new Anatomical Laboratory rose from a muddy yard and piles of bricks. Everyone hoped the new laboratory would be completed next year, but money was a problem. The same Anatomy Act that allowed the Medical School to dissect human cadavers from poorhouses and prisons also allowed the University to build a new anatomy lab next to the Medical School building. Unfortunately, the Act hadn't gone so far as to provide actual money, forcing the University to shoulder the burden alone, meaning the new lab remained in a constant state of near-completion. This meant dissection classes were still held on the fourth floor of the Medical School, and it was toward the latter building Arthur hauled the unreluctant Mr. Pitt. Fortunately, today was Saturday, so classes didn't start until ten o’clock and no one was about.

I'll wait here, Jesse said at the rear service entrance. You still owe me breakfast.

Arthur rewrapped Mr. Pitt in canvas without comment and carried him up four flights of stairs to the dissecting lab. The lab, a long, echoing room that smelled of formaldehyde, had a high, peaked skylight two stories up that let in the bright light needed for pulling out livers and examining veins. At the moment, eight cadavers lay on tables with sheets over them that turned them into sleeping ghosts. Doc Naegele, a portly man with a leonine white beard and sideburns, was setting out trays of sharp scalpels and gleaming saws.

I have a new one, Arthur said.

Doc turned. Good morning to you, too, Mr. Tor. Put it on that table there and unwrap it so we can have a look.

Arthur obeyed. Doc adjusted his spectacles and peered down at Mr. Pitts. Excellent condition. No damage. Rigor has worn off, and putrefaction has not begun. Excellent work, Mr. Tor. No one saw you come in, I trust?

A sharp knock came at the lab door.

3

Doc shot a glance at Arthur, who spread his hands. Neither man was expecting anyone. Doc limped over to open the door a crack while Arthur waited tensely near Mr. Pitt's table. The table, which hung from the ceiling on wires, quivered lightly.

Morning, Doc, said an affable but stern voice through the partially-open door.

Can I help you, Constable Turner? Doc said, a little too loudly.

We had some reports by telegraph of lantern light and digging in Highland Cemetery last night, Turner said. The Pitt family went down for a look just before dawn, and they seem to think the grave of Mr. Elmer Pitt was disturbed.

Dear me. When was he interred? Doc asked.

Yesterday.

So the grave is fresh, then. How would they know it was disturbed?

One of them saw a stranger hanging about the funeral, and they're suspicious. Your log book downstairs says you have eight cadavers in your lab. You wouldn't mind if I checked for an extra, would you? Just to put the Pitts at ease.

A little pang went through Arthur's stomach. It wouldn't do for a constable to find Mr. Pitt, not in the slightest. The lab had a single exit, however, and right now Doc and the unseen constable were standing in it. Only three places in the lab could hide a body—a wardrobe for coats, a glass-fronted cupboard for chemicals, and the space under a pair of tables. None would keep an extra cadaver hidden if anyone looked in or under them. Arthur removed a framed painting of Hippocrates that looked over Mr. Pitt. Behind it, set into the wall, was a metal crank.

Do you have a warrant? Doc asked.

I do, said Turner to a crackle of paper. You know Judge Winter doesn't like what you're doing down here.

Judge Winter. Arthur's fingers chilled at the mention of that name. The finding of an illegal cadaver in the dissection room was a minor offense—unless Judge Winter was involved. He could see the man, corpulent, with his thin lips and his fringe of iron hair. Arthur had experienced two run-ins with Winter, and both had gone badly south.

The first time, Arthur had just arrived in Ann Arbor and had taken a job as a waiter in a cheap hotel. A customer had flung a handful of coins on the bar as payment for a beer, gulped his glass down, and rose to leave, but the careful-counting Arthur had discovered him a penny short. Arthur quietly brought the matter up to the man, who explosively accused Arthur of cheating him. He took a swipe at Arthur with the beer mug. Arthur ducked, and the mug shattered against a wall. The rest of the clientele gleefully bounded into the fray, and the police had to break it up. Arthur and his accuser landed in front of Judge Winter, who took one look at Arthur's shabby coat and shoes and sentenced him to five days in the clink, while the better-dressed drinker sauntered out with a gleeful grin. Arthur missed the first days of classes at the Medical School, and the Board of Regents had intended to revoke his scholarship. Arthur had been wondering where on earth he would go, when Doc Naegele and Dr. James Herdman, a member of the Board, had interceded.

Young men get into fights, Doc had said during the hearing, which took place in an empty classroom. It's nothing we haven't seen before, and something we'll surely see again. The Boys Club of Detroit put their faith in Mr. Tor, and we should, too. Keeping him will help many more young men in the long run.

I agree. Dr. Herdman had stroked his distinguished white beard. He had all but founded the Medical College and had barely said five words to lowly freshman Arthur, so his intercession puzzled Arthur greatly, though he would hardly turn it aside. We shouldn't allow a single unfortunate event to derail Mr. Tor's entire career.

With Dr. Herdman and Doc both behind Arthur, the Board had agreed to let Arthur remain. After the hearing, Doc took the relieved Arthur's arm and led him toward the professors' offices on the second floor of the anatomy building. Dr. Herdman came with them.

What's going on? Arthur asked. Why did—?

Shush. Doc glanced down the hallway, though it was empty, and unlocked a pebbled glass on the door. Privacy first.

Inside an office crowded with books and odd, greenish jars of formaldehyde, Dr. James Herdman sat behind a battered desk while Doc judicially closed the door behind them. Arthur's apprehension returned.

What is this about, sir? he asked.

I won't waste time mincing words, Mr. Tor. Dr. Herdman leaned forward. It's you and that judge. You need to stay out of his way.

"I did nothing to get in his way," Arthur protested.

Please have a seat. Dr. Herdman gestured kindly to a hard chair, and Arthur took it while Doc stayed at the door. There's more going on here than you know.

And that is, sir?

"Winter wants this school to fail. Specifically, he wants you to fail. Dr. Herdman drummed his fingers on the desk. The situation is ... delicate, Mr. Tor. I think it's best simply to say that Judge Winter doesn't have this school's best interest at heart, and although Mr. Naegele and I are watching your back, you need to stay away from Judge Winter."

Arthur felt he should press for details, but Dr. Herdman and Doc Naegle had walked the edge of a cliff for him, and he felt uneasy about asking for more. I'll do my best to stay out of his way, he said instead.

Doc said, And with that in mind, we need to find some other work for you. Waiting tables in a beer hall will only increase your risk of being arrested again.

What did you have in mind? Dr. Herdman said over steepled fingers.

The poorhouse and prison sometimes come up short on the dead, and the Anatomy Lab still needs the occasional cadaver. Mr. Tor needs a paycheck to supplement his scholarship. Two problems with one solution. He thrust a hand at Arthur. What do you say?

Arthur blinked at him. You want me to rob graves in a town with a sitting judge who hates grave robbers?

Dr. Herdman winced. "Could we use the term resurrection man? I worked hard to change those laws, and grave robber was a constant stumbling block."

The lab work must be done, judge or no judge, Doc replied affably, and I'm getting old for grave—er, resurrectionism.

Well ...

It'll pay your way through medical school, Dr. Herdman said. A night or two a month will take care of your bills and give you some spending money. And Ypsilanti is just up the road. Its graveyards are outside Winter's jurisdiction.

Arthur hesitated another moment, then took Doc's proffered hand and then Dr. Herdman's. Done.

And stay away from Harold Winter, Dr. Herdman added.

But the devil grins in hell. Months later, on the break after his first term, Arthur had found himself at the entrance of tiny pool hall on the south side of Ann Arbor. Originally, he had only wanted a few moments outside in chilly winter air to clear his stuffy head, but the fluttery piano music ran a light hand over his face and stroked his hair, while the crack of the billiards and the laughter of the men called to him, gnawed at him. Arthur kept himself apart from the other medical students, and he rarely spoke to anyone. Most days, it made a mere hunger. Today, it made a famine.

A pool hall was a racy place, with gambling and drinking and smoking ready to seize a man's soul and drop it into the fanged, fiery mouth of old Nick himself. Or so the Michigan Temperance League pamphlets liked to say. Thanks to them and to Dad's bottle, Arthur had never entered a pool hall before. Tonight, though ... tonight, the company of other men called to him, woke a hunger in him that he'd been pushing down into his shoes for too long. The hunger was climbing back up, making him want more than he had. Arthur went in, and his heart beat a little quick.

The men who gathered around the piano, bar, and billiard tables, took no obvious notice of him. Arthur saw several sideways looks, and he put that down to being a stranger in the pool hall. The smell of sharp, blue tobacco smoke washed over him. The room had just enough space for a bar, an upright piano, two pool tables, a card table, and a crowd of men, several of whom were engaged in deep conversation over tall glasses. Their hats were lined up on hooks at the door, and the air was stuffy. Arthur got a beer and sipped it uncomfortably in the corner while the other men smoked over snooker or cards. How odd it was to watch them laugh and joke and drink, when in a hundred years, or even fifty, every one of them would be dead. This one would fall victim to a cancer of the stomach. That one would take a scratch at work and develop blood poisoning. The one over there would crank along until the paper-thin tissues of his heart burst. Arthur watched the men, each a talking skeleton encased in dying flesh, held together by sinew and blood vessels. In the end, medical science would prove unable to help any of them or to stop their journey to the graveyard.

Hello, friend. A blond man with a brown beard leaned against the wall next to him. Haven't seen you here before.

It's my first time, Arthur admitted. I've little experience with pool halls.

This is a friendly place, the man said. We don't go in for foolery. Least, not the kind that'll get you a bloody nose. My name's Richard.

Arthur T—

Just first names here, Arthur, Richard interrupted with a raised hand. That's all we need.

This struck Arthur as a little strange, but he nodded. It was nice just to talk to someone, and he was glad the other man had come to him. They had a conversation about nothing much until the door burst in and five constables waving wooden truncheons rushed into the pool hall. In short order, every man in the pool hall was rounded up and hauled down to the jailhouse. Arthur spent a miserable night crammed into a cell with a group of equally miserable men, and in the morning, the bailiff hauled him to the bench in a crowded courtroom. Of course, the judge was Harold Winter. He peered down at Arthur, and recognition touched his face.

Arthur Tor. Don't I know that name, son? he said with false kindness.

We are not acquainted, sir, Arthur quavered.

I didn't ask if we ran in social circles. I asked if you've been in my courtroom before.

He's a student at the Medical School, said a helpful clerk. Now charged with public drunkenness and disorderly conduct.

Medical College. Yes. A small silence fell over the courtroom, and Winter tapped a stack of papers into a neat pile. Arthur swallowed. Finally, the judge said, "Can't seem to stay away from the liquor, can