The Ripper's Shadow

by Laura Joh Rowland

  14

  At eleven o’clock on Tuesday night, we reconvene in my studio. Hugh says, “I just spoke with my friend at the press. John Pizer, also known as Leather Apron, was arrested.”

  “Arrested?” My heart leaps. I pause while checking the equipment needed for our venture. Mick is pointedly ignoring Hugh, pretending to study the photographs on the walls. “When?”

  “Yesterday morning. He was already in custody while the mob was calling for his blood last night. But he was released.” Hugh explains, “The police did an identity parade, and the women who’d sworn statements against Leather Apron couldn’t pick him out. And he has an alibi for Annie Chapman’s murder. He was in bed with his landlady. The police have no evidence to connect him to Polly’s and Martha’s murders. They had to let him go.”

  So much for my hope that the crime would be solved, my models safe, and myself spared the dreaded visit to the police station and the equally dreaded expedition we are about to undertake. “Well, if we’re correct in thinking that one of the customers Mick and I saw at the bookshop is the killer, then it’s certainly not Leather Apron.”

  “Yes, Leather Apron couldn’t have been at the bookshop because he was in prison at the time,” Hugh says.

  “Can we go now?” Mick asks impatiently.

  The fog is heavy tonight. As we walk together up Montague Street, I’m glad of its concealing veil, but the sensation that I’ve lost an insulating layer of skin persists. The fog’s damp tendrils invade my pores and chill me even though the weather isn’t cold. Every day I feel more vulnerable, as if my blood is running closer to the surface, its scent easier for predators to detect. Mick, beside me, carries my tripod; I lug my flash lamp and stand and a bag containing supplies. Hugh trails us with my large camera in its case.

  “Why does he have to come?” Mick asks.

  “Because I need a man along for this.”

  “I’m a man,” Mick says, his voice filled with hurt because I’ve impugned his masculinity. He stalks ahead of me.

  I slow down to walk with Hugh.

  “He’s never going to accept me,” Hugh says ruefully.

  I’m sad to think of how many people would shun Hugh if they knew his secret. “Give him time,” I say without much hope that Mick will change his attitude. “By the way, what did you tell Catherine about how we know each other?”

  “I told her that we met when you were taking photographs in St. Dominic’s Church, and you walked in on me kissing a nun. When I ran into you and Catherine, I snubbed her because I was so disconcerted to see you again that I wanted to get away fast, but then we kept bumping into each other and decided to be friends.”

  “Well,” I say, impressed by his twist on the truth.

  “Catherine believed it. But there’s a problem: she likes me.”

  “I noticed.” Here is another unfortunate situation, which I am ill equipped to handle.

  “Could you discourage her? I don’t want to hurt her feelings.”

  The onus is mine because although Catherine was acquainted with Hugh before I met him, I brought them into closer proximity. “I’ll try.”

  “Thank you.” Hugh changes the subject. “Are you sure this idea of yours will work?”

  “I can’t vouch for it based on personal experience, but I read an article in the British Journal of Photography. It said an American physician named Sandford has had great success with the technique.”

  “I wish Sandford were here now. Better him than me. I’m not looking forward to this.”

  “Neither am I.” We pass through the murky glow of a gas lamp, and I glance nervously at Hugh’s handsome, tense face. As much as I like Hugh, he’s an unknown quantity, unpredictable. I peer through the fog, but I can’t see Mick. Has he changed his mind about coming with us? At past midnight, no one else is about; fear of the Ripper has emptied the streets. Lights shine from few windows in the dark tenements. When we arrive at a green-painted gate, Mick is waiting there. I’m relieved, but I rather wish he’d decamped for the sake of his own safety.

  “It’s barred,” he says.

  Hugh sets down my camera, laces his fingers together, and lowers his hands. Mick hesitates, leery of any contact with Hugh, then reluctantly steps into Hugh’s hands. Hugh boosts Mick over the gate. In a moment, I hear the bar clank. The gate opens, and Mick beckons. Hugh and I lug my equipment into a yard that fronts a low shed—the mortuary, attached to the dingy brick Whitechapel Workhouse. Mick quietly closes and bars the gate. Hand in his pocket, he tiptoes to the shed. I hear his picklocks jingle as Hugh and I follow with the equipment. My heart hammers because we’re about to break and enter and tamper with evidence.

  A figure stands up near the door. Mick skids to a halt. I gasp as I stop; Hugh bumps into me. The fog is so thick that we didn’t see the man seated in a chair, guarding the mortuary. He says, “Hey! Who are you?”

  Despair entwines with fright in my gut. Our plan is thwarted, I may be seeing Inspector Reid again sooner than I expected, and Hugh and Mick will be in trouble with the police, too. I whisper, “That’s Robert Mann, the mortuary keeper who testified at Polly’s inquest.”

  “Let me handle this,” Hugh says. He smiles gaily and calls, “Good evening, Mr. Mann.” He introduces the three of us with false names spoken so quickly that I can’t discern them. Neither can Mr. Mann, whose grizzled face wrinkles in confusion.

  “What are you doing here?” Mr. Mann asks.

  “We’ve come for a look at Annie Chapman’s body,” Hugh says.

  “Forget it.” Mr. Mann blocks the door. “No one’s allowed in the mortuary.”

  After the fiasco at the inquest, the police are being more careful with their evidence, including the corpse. I should have expected it.

  “Come, my good fellow. We won’t disturb anything,” Hugh says. “Swear to God.”

  “Get out, or I’ll call the police.”

  Mick and I start toward the gate, but Hugh motions us to stay.

  “How about a little wager?” Hugh asks.

  Mr. Mann’s bleary eyes shine. Hugh’s intuition is remarkable; he has correctly pegged Mr. Mann as a gambler. “What kind of wager?”

  “I bet I can tell you where you got your shoes,” Hugh says. “If I’m right, you let us see Annie. If I’m wrong, I pay you a quid.”

  Mr. Mann grins, thinking Hugh a sucker. “You’re on.”

  “You got your shoes on the ground outside the mortuary,” Hugh says.

  Indignation erases the grin from Mr. Mann’s face. “You tricked me!”

  Surprised, I burst into laughter. Mick does, too, then scowls; he doesn’t want to show Hugh any approval.

  “I told you where you got your shoes,” Hugh says. “Pay up.”

  “I ain’t letting you in.” Mr. Mann folds his arms.

  “How about a consolation prize?” Hugh says. “I’ll give you a crown.”

  “Sod off!”

  “A florin. The prize is shrinking,” Hugh taunts.

  Mr. Mann says crossly, “Oh, all right.” Hugh hands over the coin. Mr. Mann unlocks the shed.

  “Well done,” I murmur, impressed by Hugh’s cleverness.

  Hugh grins proudly. Mick sulks.

  Mr. Mann flings the door wide. The smell of old, decayed meat pours out. My stomach clenches. Hugh says, “Ugh.” Mr. Mann strolls into the shed and lights the gas lamps. Their flames reflect in the glass fronts of cabinets that line the walls. Mick bounds after him. Hugh and I carry in my equipment. The small, cold room contains a table that holds a figure covered with a soiled sheet. When Mr. Mann whips the sheet off Annie’s body, I try not to look at anything except her face. It’s gray like dirty wax, bruised on the right temple, cheeks, and left jaw. Her curly dark hair looks gray, too, as if death has leached out the brown color. Her thick tongue protrudes from her puffy, bluish lips. I remember John Richardson mimicking her expression. My gaze moves, against my will, down her body. Her throat is cut, the gash jagged and deep. Her stomach is an o
pen red cavity from which the innards have been scooped. The smell rising from it is fetid with rotten blood and excrement.

  Hugh moans, his face green. He drops my equipment on the stone floor, doubles over, and retches.

  “Not in here!” Mr. Mann shoves Hugh out of the mortuary.

  As I hear Hugh vomiting outside, bile engorges my own throat, but folks who live in Whitechapel are more used to the sight and smells of death. I feel bad to have brought him here. Accustomed to working alone, I didn’t think to ask if he had a strong stomach.

  “I coulda told you he’d lose it,” Mick says with contempt. He opens cabinets and drawers, fingering beakers, knives, and saws, hunting for something to steal, but his face is as green as Hugh’s. I can tell that he wants to leave as desperately as I do, and I feel even worse for exposing a child to such a sight, but this is an opportunity we mustn’t waste.

  “Mick, I need your help,” I say.

  We position the tripod by Annie and mount the camera. Mick sets up the light stand while I load the negative plate. The activity calms my stomach, distracts me from the odors, and restores the healthy color to Mick’s cheeks. Peering through the viewfinder at Annie’s waxen face, I needn’t see her mutilated body, but I see, to my dismay, that her eyes are closed.

  “Her eyes are closed,” Mick says.

  We look at each other; neither of us wants to touch Annie. I steel myself, reach out with my fingertip, and push her eyelids up. They feel like the skin on a dead, cold, plucked chicken. Her eyes are cloudy, gelatinous.

  Mick peers at them. “Miss Sarah, you said that the last thing Annie saw was her killer’s face and that there should be a picture of him in her eyes. But I don’t see nothing.”

  “Neither do I, but the camera can record images that are invisible to us. When Dr. Sandford developed a photograph of a murder victim, the eyes showed an image of a man wearing a light-colored coat. And there was another case in France, where a killer was convicted based on similar photographic evidence.”

  I open the camera’s shutter. The flash powder explodes, lighting up Annie’s gruesome cadaver. Sulfurous smoke overlays the reek of death.

  Mr. Mann returns. “Hurry up! Anybody finds you here, I’ll be in trouble.”

  On impulse, I change the negative plate, move the camera farther away from Annie, frame her entire body in the viewfinder, and take another photograph. Then Mick and I repack my equipment and haul it out of the mortuary, through the gate. The night air is blessedly fresh. We inhale great, relieved gulps. Hugh sits against the wall, groaning. Mick mutters, “Sissy!”

  I can’t rebuke him, not after he stood by me through the ordeal. I won’t blame him and Hugh if they both decide they have better things to do than hunt the Ripper with me.

  “I haven’t been so ill since I drank a whole bottle of wine when I was twelve,” Hugh says. “Did you get a photograph of the killer?”

  “I hope so.”

  Footsteps approach. We turn to see a police constable. The lantern he carries shines through the fog. My heart lurches as he sees us and the open gate to the mortuary. “What’s going on here?” he demands.

  “Run!” Mick cries.

  I lumber away with my tripod and heavy camera. Hugh moans, staggering to his feet. The constable is already upon us. Mick throws himself at the constable and shouts, “Go, Miss Sarah!” A wrestling match ensues—small boy against big, strong man. “I’ll hold him off!”

  Hugh grabs the constable, pulls him away from Mick, and rams him against the wall. The constable’s head bangs, Hugh releases him, and he crumples to the ground.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Hugh says, panting.

  “Where did you learn to fight so well?” I ask as we run through the streets; I’m remembering how he rescued Mr. and Mrs. Lipsky.

  “At Eton.” Glancing at my surprised face, Hugh grins. “The old school may look civilized from the outside, but inside, it’s war.”

  Back at my studio, after we catch our breath, I say, “Who wants to watch me develop the negatives?”

  Mick and Hugh exchange the sort of glance that I imagine passes between soldiers who’ve gone into battle together and one has saved the other’s life. All offenses are put aside if not completely forgotten or forgiven. They both follow me into the darkroom. Now that they’re both apparently sticking with me, I realize how much I would miss them if they quit. I’m not the same person who once survived on a steady diet of solitude.

  At three o’clock in the morning, we examine the two dripping prints that hang from clothes pegs on the string stretched above the worktop. The closeup image of Annie’s face gazes back at us. Her eyes are blank.

  Mick curses. Hugh says, “Dr. Sandford’s technique was a bust,” then tells Mick, “I’ll get a cab and give you a ride home.”

  “No thanks,” Mick says hastily. “I’ll walk.” He’s not afraid to be with Hugh; he doesn’t want us to know where he lives.

  I’m studying the other photograph of Annie, frowning in surprise because the camera captured something I didn’t notice at the mortuary.

  “What?” Mick asks.

  “Look.” I point to Annie’s left hand, lying on the table. Where once she had worn three lucky brass rings she bought from a black man, now three white indentations circle her finger below her thick, abraded knuckles. “Annie’s rings are missing.”

  15

  The day after our trip to the morgue, neither Mick nor Hugh makes an appearance at my studio. Restless because there seems nothing I can do to further our investigation, I go out to market. I see, posted in a shop window, a handbill that reads,

  Important Notice

  To the Tradesmen, Ratepayers, and Inhabitants of Whitechapel and District:

  Finding that the Murderer in our midst is still at large, we the undersigned have formed ourselves into a Committee, and we intend on gathering information that will bring the Murderer to justice. The Mile End Vigilance Committee will meet every evening at nine o’clock at the Crown Tavern, 74 Mile End Road, and will be pleased to welcome and receive assistance from the residents of the District.

  I’m intrigued to see that my friends and I aren’t the only citizens who have banded together to apprehend the Ripper. Might collaborating with the Mile End Vigilance Committee further our mutual interest? I feel guilty about keeping the boudoir pictures and the customers a secret, and how terrible if the Ripper killed Mary Jane, Liz, Kate, or Catherine! Maybe, if I were to tell the committee, they would help me and not report me to the police.

  At eight thirty that night, the omnibus conveys me east along Mile End Road. I get off at the Waste—an open area occupied by a market. Despite the heavy fog and the threat of the Ripper, the stalls that sell old clothes, hot baked potatoes, crockery, jellied eels, and other goods are doing a lively business. Under the flaring gas lamps, a crowd applauds a half-naked black man swallowing swords. The Crown Tavern is packed with customers, ripe with the smell of beer and the damp sawdust on the floor. This is a respectable crowd; the women look to be wives with their husbands. The meeting room upstairs is full, all the fifty or so chairs taken. I stand by the wall with dozens of other folks. I’m the only unaccompanied woman.

  At the front of the room, four men sit at a table. One bangs a gavel and says, “Order, order!” The room quiets. “I hereby call this meeting to order. My name is George Lusk. I am the president of the Mile End Vigilance Committee.” He’s about fifty years old, with muttonchop whiskers. “For those of you who don’t already know me, I’m a builder and contractor, a member of the Metropolitan Board of Works, and a vestryman of the Mile End Old Town Parish.” He introduces the three other men—the vice president, the treasurer, and the secretary.

  They have the same affluent, self-important air as George Lusk. My spirits fall because I can’t tell these men about the boudoir photographs. They would have neither respect nor sympathy for the likes of me. I decide to stay anyway, in case I can learn something.

  “The first it
em on the agenda is raising money for a reward to encourage people to report information that might lead to the arrest of the murderer,” George Lusk says.

  Kate Eddowes asked me about a reward. If the committee offers one, maybe she’ll tell them what she’s hiding from me.

  “Raise money for a reward?” says a man in the front row. “Is that all we’re going to do?”

  Another man says, “We should get out there and hunt for the Ripper!”

  Amid the clamor of agreement, people call out scathing remarks about the police’s incompetence. George Lusk bangs his gavel. “We’re not here to criticize the police. The mission of the committee is to work with them.”

  I look around to see if any police are present, and there is PC Barrett in his uniform, standing by the door. A thrill of alarm, not entirely unpleasant, shoots through me. Barrett sees me, frowns, then smiles. He’s thinking I can’t run away as I did at the cemetery. The only exit is the one by which he’s stationed. I’m trapped.

  Amid jeers and hoots, a woman says, “Work with the police? What are they doing besides strutting around and scratching their heads?” The whole audience turns to Barrett.

  Put on the spot, he rises to the police force’s defense. “This morning, we arrested a new suspect.”

  George Lusk looks annoyed that the meeting has veered from his agenda, but I’m eager to learn whether the police’s suspect is either of the male customers we photographed at the bookshop. I’m also glad of an opportunity to look at Barrett without attracting attention.

  The audience quiets to listen as Barrett says, “His name is Jacob Isenschmid.”

  It’s not the Duke of Exford.

  “He’s a butcher,” Barrett says.

  My hopes dwindle. The other customer didn’t look like a butcher. The news provokes disdainful remarks from the audience.

  “Leather Apron is a butcher, and you decided he’s not the Ripper and let him go!”

  “Are you going to haul in every butcher in London?”

  Barrett raises his voice over the jeering. “Witnesses saw a foreigner with Annie Chapman shortly before she was murdered. Jacob Isenschmid is Swiss. He has a violent temper, and he roams about at night carrying knives. He had two on him when he was arrested. Since he’s been in custody, he’s threatened to stab his wife and children to death, throw acid on his neighbors, and blow up the queen with dynamite. He was sent to Grove Hall Lunatic Asylum.”