ADW Part 3

In the course of the next several months I became increasingly involved in Prof. Glauben’s research efforts. I don’t think I became as obsessed as he with the goal of the experiments, but rather I developed an affection for the process. I viewed each individual experiment as an end unto itself, and reveled in the results for their own sake.

I must admit that I also was flattered by Prof. Glauben’s increasing reliance on my assistance, and I developed a not insignificant reputation within the university as a valuable research assistant. There occurred a commensurate decline in my baccalaureate studies (which putatively focused on politics), and by the end of my third year I formally reframed my course of study to physiology. The other faculty seemed skeptical of my association with Prof. Glauben, but they couldn’t fault my work.

Academics, however, held only minor interest to me. It was the research experiments that captured my imagination. I was engrossed in the laboratory most evenings, often working until midnight. Our labors steadily progressed, and by the winter of 18– we felt confident that our work was ready for the supreme test: Thus far we had kept alive sample tissues and small animals, but we were now ready to apply our method to a human being. Unfortunately, the experiment was a miserable failure, for, upon drinking the potion, our volunteer (an old retired bookkeeper) coughed, blinked rapidly, and fell face-first upon our credenza, dead, completely destroying two-thirds of our tea service.

Yet we would not be discouraged. It is true, of course, that Prof. Glauben was arrested and sentenced to five years in prison for the unintentional manslaughter of the bookkeeper, but he insisted that I continue the experiments during his absence. For this purpose I set up a small laboratory in my apartments and secured for myself Prof. Glauben’s books and papers. Indeed, I had everything I needed except one vital component: a supply of cadavers.

For human bodies had become the primary vehicle of our experiments, indicating through their rate of decomposition the viability of the electrical life force that we managed to elicit. Thus cadavers served, in effect, as our litmus paper. Due to his esteemed position, Prof. Glauben had been able to secure an adequate supply of this litmus paper from the city morgue. But I, lacking suitable credentials, enjoyed no such access. In order to continue the experiments during the professor’s incarceration, therefore, I was forced to resort to grave robbing.

No doubt you find the idea of grave robbing to be revolting and immoral. Admittedly it’s not a topic for discussion among polite society. But I was able to justify my unpleasant work to myself, and perhaps I can alleviate some of your disgust as well. I reasoned thus: First, graverobbing is not actually robbery, for no one is being robbed. The former inhabitant of the body–the soul–has shed its earthly shell and has ascended to a place where a body is superfluous at best and downright burdensome at worst. The only ones being deprived of the body are the worms of the grave, and few of us have any particular concern for their diets.

Not only were the bodies I was disinterring unclaimed, but they were serving no good purpose. I, however, was putting them to productive use; surely positive utility is preferable to mindless waste.

Whether or not you now accept my justification, I was, at the time, convinced, and I proceeded with my work. Had I only foreseen where those accursed labors would lead!

PART 4 WILL APPEAR ON MONDAY