by Alex Grecian
In the room, oblivious to the boy on the roof, eight men sat around a scarred table and talked business. A ninth man, a large fellow wearing white gloves and tails, circulated a box of cigars, and each of the other men took a smoke. The man with the gloves punctured the tips of their cigars and made another circuit of the table, lighting them. The businessmen sent tendrils of smoke upward toward Ambrose, but their gazes did not follow the smoke. They talked together about the day’s business, about personnel and shelf space and displays. The man with the gloves took the box of cigars away and set it on a side table that already held four other boxes of cigars and cigarettes and pipe tobacco. There were larger boxes and crates stacked all round the room, marked with symbols that Ambrose could barely make out: alcohol, guns, ammunition, lamp oil, all the most valuable or dangerous goods that the store had to offer, kept on the top floor where they couldn’t be easily pilfered.
If he could only find a way into that room, he could take away big handfuls of tobacco, boxes of it, all of it new, none of it found on the street and dried out and reused. It would cost Ambrose nothing, and it would be a boon to his employer.
Reasonable Tobacco, indeed.
He watched as the men smoked and talked for the better part of an hour, and his mind turned over ways to lower himself into the room and get back out. It seemed impossible. Perhaps it would be better to follow the women through the back of the store one night and hide until the place was empty. But he didn’t think he could do that. The alley was too narrow for him to go unnoticed. Perhaps he could pay the women to look the other way or leave the door unlocked.
His musings were interrupted when one of the men pushed back his chair, stubbed out his cigar, and stretched. The others followed suit and, in small groups of two or three, the men left the room and closed the door behind them. Ambrose hurried across the roof and watched the fog moving slowly along the street below. In due course, he heard the men exit the building and go their separate ways, creating eddies in the mist and hollering “good night” back and forth.
Ambrose went back to the skylight and looked down into the darkened room, empty but for those crates of volatile merchandise. He felt along the outside of the wooden casing for a lock or a catch and, when he didn’t find one, tried pulling upward on it. He heard something creak and felt the frame give. There was the sound of splintering wood and the big pane of glass cracked, a fine silvery thread zigzagging away from Ambrose toward the far edge of the roof. At that moment, below him, the door opened and the man with the white gloves entered the room. Ambrose froze, still clutching the skylight’s frame, afraid to let go for fear it would make further noise or, worse, come apart and crash inward. The man with the gloves held the door open for the two washerwomen, who entered behind him. One of them held a rag and a bucket; the other carried a mop. Ambrose could hear their voices as the three people talked, but they were too far away and the cracked glass muffled the sound. Below, the man closed the door and turned a lock. Neither of the women looked up as he removed his gloves, folded them, and put them in his pocket. From another pocket he took a folding razor and opened it. As Ambrose watched, the man stepped up behind one of the women, grabbed a handful of her hair, and snapped her head back. In a flash, he had pulled the razor across her throat, releasing a spray of blood that glistened black in the wan light. Ambrose gasped. The other woman started to turn around, but the man let go of the first woman and stepped over her body as she dropped to the floor. He moved gracefully, like a dancer, and grabbed the second woman’s arm before she had a chance to move. Ambrose forgot himself and pounded on the skylight. The silvery crack in the glass widened, but didn’t separate. The man below him slashed the razor downward, in one practiced move, opening up the second woman from her throat to her pelvis, and her insides splashed out at his feet.
Then the man looked up and saw Ambrose. He was still holding the arm of the second woman, who had gone limp and lifeless. In his other hand he held the razor. His right shirtsleeve was drenched in dark blood. Ambrose held very still. He can’t see me, he thought. It’s dark and the glass will obscure my shape against the sky, he thought.
But the man smiled at Ambrose and saluted him with the dripping razor, and Ambrose could no longer hold himself still. He reeled backward, pushing away from the skylight, and almost fell off the roof. He ran trembling to the access ladder and made his way down to the alley floor so quickly that his feet only touched every third or fourth rung. He ran as fast as he could to the mouth of the alley and didn’t stop, but pelted breathlessly down the street.
Behind him, he imagined he could hear the door open and quiet footfalls as the man stepped gracefully out into the grey mist.
Surely, Ambrose thought, surely he didn’t get a look at me. Surely he could never find me again. But somehow he knew that the man had seen him and would find him, no matter how fast or how far Ambrose ran.
• • •
THE DRAPER’S SHOP was closed for the night, the doors locked, the shutters bolted over the display windows that faced the park. Day woke up from a dream about a whispering shadow and leapt out of bed. Someone was pounding on the door. He lit a candle and threw a dressing gown (made especially for him by Esther Paxton) over his nightshirt before taking the back steps to the ground floor. The pounding continued, growing louder as he moved closer. Through the small window in the back door he saw a boy’s face against the pitch black of the trees, an ivory cameo on black velvet. He put down his walking stick and unlocked the door, pulled it open, and Ambrose stumbled in.
Day led him to the parlor and left him there to catch his breath. He padded back upstairs and used his hot plate to heat two cups of gunpowder tea, which he brought back down the stairs. Ambrose had already got a cozy fire going and took one of the cups from Day.
“What, no ale?”
“Sorry,” Day said.
“It’ll do,” Ambrose said.
“Are you quite all right?”
“I’m good, yeah,” Ambrose said.
“It looked like you were being chased.”
“Just in a hurry. Ran over here. I don’t sleep so good anyway and thought I’d take a chance you were about.”
“I was sleeping.”
“Sorry then.”
“But nobody’s trying to harm you?”
“I dunno if he even saw me. No, that’s not true. He saw me, all right.”
“Who? Who saw you?”
Ambrose stared at the fire and sipped his tea. He opened his mouth as if about to talk, then shuddered and took another sip. Day let him be, and after a few minutes the boy straightened his shoulders and spoke quietly, watching the flames. “He kilt them two women. The man with the gloves did it after them others was gone for the night.”
“You saw this happen?”
Ambrose nodded.
“A man wearing gloves. But he didn’t see you? Are you sure?”
Ambrose shook his head. “No. ’M not sure.”
“Did he chase you?”
“No, guv, he looked right at me, he did. Like he was lookin’ right into me and knew everything about me.”
“This man. Describe him for me.”
“Can’t. He was in shadows the whole time. Like he stayed in the shadows without even tryin’. Like they followed him round, like they was his dog and stayed at his heel.”
“Dark, wavy hair?”
“Yes.”
“Tall?”
“Couldn’t tell. I was lookin’ down on him.”
“How did he kill the women?”
“Wiff a razor, like. Calm and collected as he could be, like he was guttin’ a fish is all. They didn’t hardly stand a chance. They was dead before they even knowed it was happenin’. He didn’t have no reason for it; they was just doin’ they jobs.”
Day set his tea down on the table between them. He sat back and frowned at the boy. He thoug
ht he knew who Ambrose was talking about, who the man with the gloves must be. “Where is he? I mean, where did you see him?”
“At the new store. I think he works there.”
“Plumm’s?”
“That’s the one. Ever been in there?”
Day swallowed another mouthful of his green tea. “No.”
“Neither me,” Ambrose said. “But it’s got a window in the roof. A big one, round and beautiful.”
“And you’ve been spying on the goings-on there?”
“Not spying, no. Not me. But I like to sleep up high when I can. Keeps the tearaways offa me. So I was up there on top of the place, like, and just so happened to look down in, and there’s gennulmens of leisure, don’t you know? And they got a smoking room in there.”
“An office on the top floor?”
“Right.”
“Is he there now?”
“I dunno. Maybe. He mighta chased me.”
Day stood and went to the door. He pulled the curtain aside on the tiny window and looked out into the night. There was nothing to see. Only the dark shapes of trees and bushes. He drew the lock across, then went around the ground floor and checked the shutters on all the windows.
“You’ll stay here,” he said. “I can’t very well turn you out at this time of night. You can sleep here on the sofa.”
“That’s kind of you, guv.”
“But you must be gone by the time Mrs Paxton arrives in the morning. I don’t think she’d care to find a . . . Well, I don’t think she would appreciate my taking the liberty of lending out her sofa. I’ll fetch you a blanket from upstairs.” Day started toward the staircase, then stopped and turned back. “And, Ambrose . . .”
“Yes, guv?”
“Don’t steal anything.”
“What, like a ribbon or somethin’? What would I do that for?”
“Just don’t.”
Ambrose grinned. “Don’t worry none, Mr Tobacco. Your lady’s ribbons is safe from me.”
11
Mr and Mrs Parker had a table at the back of the coffeehouse, where the lights were dim. It was early, and foot traffic was minimal. The high judge entered and removed his coat and hat, handing them over to the gentleman at the door before passing under a low arch and scanning the room. His business brought him to London on a regular basis, but he never seemed to have time to enjoy all that Mayfair had to offer. He thought he might stroll down to Piccadilly after tea to buy souvenirs for his family. He spotted the Parkers at their table, recognizable from the description they had sent him, and gave Mr Parker a discreet nod. Parker waved him over and an abrupt feeling of dread washed over him, dispelling pleasant thoughts of long walks and frivolous purchases.
The couple stood as he approached, and the judge saw that the woman was wearing trousers. He shook his head, but decided to say nothing to her about it. Perhaps it was the custom in whatever place they called home. If they wished to travel inconspicuously about the city, though, she would need to update her wardrobe sooner rather than later.
Before he had even taken a chair, the high judge began talking. “I shouldn’t be seen with you,” he said. “You know I can’t. This place is quite out in the open, isn’t it?” He glanced around him at the nearly empty room, its tables laid out with latticework napkins and bone china.
“The hour is unusual, and you English are good in the area of staying out of each other’s business,” Mrs Parker said. Her grammar was stilted and her accent was unplaceable. The high judge flicked his gaze to Mr Parker, but the man didn’t seem the least put out that his wife had spoken for them both. There was something unsettling in the woman’s expression. Her eyes were flat and dull and regarded him the way he thought he might regard an insect or a bit of soot on his collar.
He smiled at her, but when she didn’t smile back, he gave up and turned his attention to the man instead. “Be that as it may,” the high judge said, “a less public place might have been better.”
“No,” Mr Parker said. His voice was low and soft, and the judge leaned forward to hear him. The accent made it difficult to pick out his words. “A less public place makes people wonder.”
“I don’t know about—” the judge said. But Mr Parker cut him off.
“This is where we are now,” Parker said. And that seemed to end the matter. The judge would talk there, or nowhere. His prospective employees would simply return to their home country, where he knew their services were in great demand. He wondered where they had originally come from and whether they felt any native sympathies for anything.
“I understand.” The judge sighed. A woman wearing an immaculate apron approached. “I don’t care for coffee,” the judge said. “Do you also serve tea?”
They did, and he ordered Imperial with strawberry cakes and brown bread for the table. He shot a glance at the Parkers, and Mrs Parker nodded back. She was satisfied with his choices. When the woman had left, the judge leaned forward and whispered. “I have news.”
“Don’t whisper,” Mr Parker said. “It draws attention. Pretend you are speaking of something mundane . . . What? Anything English is mundane enough, I suppose.”
The judge sat back, mildly offended. The insult was hardly merited. He took a moment, wondered if he shouldn’t stand and leave and forget the entire affair. But he had set this in motion, had wired a coded message to these vulgar people, and they had traveled all this way. And what did it matter if they were vulgar? Of course they were. One had only to look at what they did for a living. They killed people, without compunction or shame, and with no thought for the justice behind any of it. They were hired to do a job, they were nothing more than tools, and tools did not have manners. He pulled down on the bottom of his waistcoat, straightening it, and cleared his throat.
“No need for that sort of thing,” he said. He felt he was displaying admirable restraint.
Mr Parker nodded. “Apologies,” he said. “We are tired from the traveling and are not looking forward to our, how do you say it here? Our accommodations tonight.”
Mrs Parker smiled, and the high judge felt something cold and wet run up the length of his spine.
“I could arrange . . .” he began, but Mr Parker held up a hand to stop him.
“No,” Mr Parker said. “Thank you, but we make our own way. You do not need to know where we are staying. No one needs to know that.”
“I see. Trust no one, is that it?”
“I think I would say it more as ‘be careful whom you trust.’”
“Just so.” The judge was warming to the whole thing. He was sitting across the table from hired assassins and he controlled them. At least for the moment. “I have urgent news. It may change everything.”
“Tell us.”
“Walter Day is alive,” he said. He didn’t whisper, but he kept his voice low. “I saw him in the street.”
The Parkers exchanged a glance. Mrs Parker shrugged, and Mr Parker spoke. “We don’t know who that is.”
“He’s a detective with Scotland Yard.”
“And you wish us to make him go away?”
The judge took a second to realize what the killer meant. He shook his head. “No. It’s only that Walter Day complicates the matter.”
“In what way?”
“It’s . . . Well, it’s a bit much to explain.”
“Then don’t.”
“No, I . . . No, it’s just that Day is tied up with everything else, and it’s hard to see why.”
“He’s alive, we visit him,” Mrs Parker said. “Then he is no longer alive. Very simple. Although to deal with a policeman in this way will be costing more money than we agreed upon.”
“No, not Walter,” the judge said. “And he’s not . . .” He could hear a note of panic creeping into his voice, but was relieved to see the woman with the apron approaching with a big silver tray. He hadn’t
prepared well enough for the meeting. He was used to working with people who shared his same point of view. He was used to being a leader, being listened to and obeyed, but here he was being forced into a subservient position. He sat back and let the woman set out the tea and cakes and bread, along with butter and cream and lemon, small chocolate biscuits that he hadn’t asked for but must be a specialty of the house, jam and honey. She smiled at them and walked away. Neither of the Parkers made a move toward their cups or the food, so the judge helped himself before speaking again. “Walter Day is no longer a policeman, and he is not, not precisely at this moment, the objective.”
“What is the objective?” Mrs Parker poured some tea and then swirled in a dollop of cream. The judge was gratified to see that she knew what to do with a cup of tea. Perhaps that same expertise extended to killing people.
“The objective . . .” And here the judge could not help himself. He leaned forward and whispered. “The objective is Jack the Ripper.” He leaned back and sipped his tea. It was very hot. He waited for a reaction from the Parkers, but was disappointed. They concentrated on their own cups and did not appear to take any special notice of what he had said. He took a bite of chocolate biscuit and raised his eyebrows. “Jack the Ripper,” he said again.
Mr and Mrs Parker exchanged a look. Mrs Parker picked up a bit of bread and smeared it with jam. She took a delicate bite. Mr Parker watched her, then turned to the judge. “The Ripper is already dead. Or gone. One or the other.”
“He is neither dead nor gone. He’s alive and he’s still causing mischief. It’s only that the sort of mischief he causes has changed of late.”
“So you know where this person is, then, this Jack person?”
“No,” the judge said. He had felt a bit of fire banking in his belly, and now it sparked out and died.
“Of course not. The biggest mystery ever in your city, maybe in your entire country, and you expect us to solve it for you now? Like this?” He snapped his fingers and two elderly men several tables away looked over at them.