Iron and Blood

by Gail Z. Martin

  “Think so. Might have been a young man, but he was fine-boned if that’s the case. The coroner will figure it out,” Finian replied.

  They stood in the carriage lot behind the Highland Club in Evergreen Hamlet, upriver from the previous murder scene. The club, a ‘gentleman’s establishment’, did its best to detract from any respectability Evergreen Hamlet attempted to earn. Forty years ago, the old tavern had been a stop on the Underground Railroad. Rumor had it that a secret trap door beneath the bar led into a cavern where runaway slaves gathered, and an old tunnel up to the hillside beyond. Nowadays, if the cave and tunnels were still used, Fletcher suspected it was to hide philandering husbands from their angry wives.

  “You think it was someone at the bar?” Finian mused.

  Drostan grimaced as he thought. “Those sots come to see women without their hosiery and ogle a bit of leg. Hard to imagine them doing more than throwing a punch or two.”

  Finian nodded. “My thoughts, too.”

  “Looks more to me like the unfortunate we found down by the river,” Drostan added, “and all the other ones, all the way down the Mon to Vestaburg.”

  “Dammit, Finian! That’s twelve dead so far, all savaged almost beyond recognition, and the only things they’ve got in common were that they were out along one of the rivers late at night.” Drostan shook his head. “It’s got to mean something. Why have all the bodies been found between here and the Vestaburg docks? If these were just the usual knifings, I’d figure the killer was traveling on barges up and down the rivers. But there’s nothing ‘usual’ about these murders.” He sighed. “I don’t know what to think.”

  “I agree, but the brass at the station aren’t having any of it,” Finian said. “They don’t want to hear about Ripper-killers or patterns. Want to treat each one by itself, just some poor nobody got cut up for a wallet or purse, and sweep it under the rug quick as possible.”

  “They’re scared,” Drostan said. He had seen the signs before, back in Scotland. Then, police too frightened to accept a supernatural threat turned to a more believable possibility: a corrupt investigator.

  “Yeah.” Finian did not have to point out that he was the only cop assigned to the corpse. Here, behind a seedy drinking club, no one downtown cared who the killer or the victim was so long as they stayed away from the swells in the better neighborhoods.

  “I talked to Carmody,” Drostan said. He was trying not to look too hard at the body. Whoever he—or she—was, no one deserved that. The murderer would kill again, and whether or not the victims mattered to the higher-ups, it bothered him. He knew he wouldn’t leave well enough alone.

  “Get anything?” Finian was nearly done jotting notes in a report no one would read.

  “He’s gone round the bend, that’s for sure,” Drostan admitted. “At the end, he started talking about mad miners and Vesta Nine.”

  Finian froze. “You’re sure he said Vesta Nine?”

  “Sure as I breathe,” Drostan replied.

  “Now that’s odd,” Finian said. “We’ve had some trouble out that way. Not my beat, you know, but I hear things.”

  “Like what?”

  Finian snapped his notebook closed and put it back in his jacket. “Like more miners than usual been dying.” He made a dismissive gesture. “Oh, they’re saying it’s bad air—blackdamp and all—but the truth is the mine superintendents don’t know, and don’t care so long as it doesn’t shut down work.”

  “I hear Vesta Nine is the deepest mine around—maybe in the whole country,” Drostan ventured.

  “Wouldn’t know. What are you getting at?”

  “Maybe nothing. But it isn’t natural, men being down so far underground. We haven’t explored much, down there. How do we know there aren’t things there no one’s seen before, things that shouldn’t get loose?”

  Finian raised an eyebrow. “You keep talking like that, I’m going to sleep with a lamp burning. Next, you’ll be telling ghost stories.”

  “You ever heard of gessyan?”

  Finian snorted. “Is that some fancy word for a spook? I’m willing to believe we’ve got a Ripper killer loose, maybe even Tumblety back for a second try. But ghosts and goblins? That’s stretching it too far.” He peered at Drostan skeptically. “Did Carmody actually mention ghosts?”

  “Uh-huh. Well, gessyan specifically. And when I did some asking around after the last killing, people started talking about the Night Hag, Nocnitsa,” Drostan said.

  Finian shrugged. “Easier I guess to believe in boogey-men than to think one of your neighbors might have done the killing.”

  Drostan was quiet for a moment. “What if there’s something to it?” he said finally. “Not boogey-men, but something that’s gotten loose that shouldn’t be out, something that kills like a beast.”

  “Mighty smart animal to only pick poor folks the brass won’t bother with.”

  “No smarter than a lion sizing up a herd of antelope and picking out the sick and the old. It’s pretty certain that the victims were alone when they were killed, or we’d have more than one corpse. Wealthy people don’t usually wander the city alone, not in deserted areas like the riverside.”

  “We’re not on the riverside now,” Finian pointed out.

  “No, but there’s not a lot of traffic out this way, and not much light, either.” Drostan nodded toward the ravine that ran behind the club. “Got a ditch back there that goes on a ways. High grass. Good hiding place. And we’re not that far from the riverside. I bet half the alley cats in Allegheny have been this way and back.”

  “Maybe,” Finian agreed grudgingly. “And I have to say, I’d rather be tracking one killer instead of several. But no one is going to believe either theory—a new Ripper or some kind of monster.”

  “I’ll keep digging. You done?”

  “Almost. I’ll have to put the body in the back of the paddy wagon,” Finian said, disgust clear on his face. “Damn. I hope it doesn’t come apart like the last one.”

  Drostan helped Finian roll the corpse onto a piece of oilcloth and heave the remains into the back of the wagon.

  “I hate driving around with a dead body,” Finian admitted. “Not that I’m scared. It’s just… unnatural.”

  Drostan chuckled. “I don’t envy you. How ’bout this? You give me a ride back to Ohio Street, and then you’ve got company for half the trip.”

  “Sounds good.”

  Drostan carefully climbed up beside Finian on the driver’s seat. “Hey, before I forget—you hear anything about someone named Karl Jasinski?”

  Finian looked over at him. “You get around, don’t you? What’s the interest in Jasinski?”

  “Carmody mentioned him.”

  Finian’s eyes grew skeptical. “How’s that? Carmody’s been out at Nutter Hill since before this whole mess began.”

  Drostan shrugged. “If I had an answer, I wouldn’t be out here in the middle of the night hauling dead bodies around.”

  Finian drove a few blocks in silence. “Folks say Jasinski’s a witch. Warlock. Whatever you want to call it. The Witch of Pulawski Way. That’s over on Polish Hill.”

  “Is he? A witch, I mean.”

  Finian snorted. “You’re scaring me, Drostan. First ghosts and Jack the Ripper, now witches. Watch who you talk to, or you’ll end up on Nutter Hill, too.”

  I’m well aware of that. “I meant, what do the people on Pulawski Way think of him?”

  Finian looked away. “There’s what they tell me when I’m in uniform, and what they say when I’m at the tavern with some of my friends. I talked a buddy of mine, Stan Rutkoski, into taking me over there one night. Did a little asking around. Folks were scared of Jasinski. Not because he was a tough guy; because they thought he could put the evil eye on them.”

  “Interesting.”

  Finian shook his head. “You know how it is, Fletcher. People bring the old ways over with them. Superstition. Ignorance.”

  “So you don’t believe in the Dearg-Dur?”
>
  Finian crossed himself. “All right, all right. Maybe there’s something to some of the old stories.”

  “You were telling me about Jasinski.”

  “I heard that people ask him to set curses or lift them. He has a pretty good track record: folks seem to think he has the Power.”

  “Anyone seen him lately?”

  Finian scowled. “No. He’s missing—or at least he’s not where people think he ought to be. Maybe someone he cursed caught up to him. Or maybe he’s a charlatan and he figured he’d get out of town while the getting was good.”

  They had turned toward town, and the stretch of road was desolate. All of the houses were dark, since it was long past the hour where decent people were awake. Even the taverns were closed. The gas street lights gave a dim, orange glow, but on a moonless night, they only served to chase back the darkest shadows.

  Ghosts wandered along the sides of the road. This was an old trail, long used. Before the modern road went in, the way had been a plank road, and before that, a footpath used by traders, settlers and native scouts. Death was no stranger here. Highwaymen and robbers had frequented the road throughout its history. Accidents and illness had claimed other lives. Drostan was certain that if everyone could see the spirits that lingered throughout the city’s streets they would shut themselves up in their homes and not come out.

  Most of the time, the ghosts regarded Drostan with curiosity, if they acknowledged him at all. As the police carriage clattered down the road, several of the ghosts met his gaze and slowly shook their heads. One by one, the ghosts winked out, before the carriage could reach them.

  Drostan felt a chill run down his spine. Overhead, the gas lights wavered. The night air grew unseasonably cold, and gooseflesh rose on his arms.

  “We need to get out of here. Now,” Drostan warned.

  Finian looked at him as if he had lost his mind. “There’s no one about. What’s the hurry?”

  “We’re in danger. I feel it,” Drostan said, and chanced a look over his shoulder. The shadows seemed to press in on them, darker than the night had a right to be. And then Drostan realized something.

  The shadows blotted out any glimpse of what lay behind them.

  “Something’s coming!” Drostan hissed.

  “I don’t hear any hoofbeats,” Finian countered. “And I don’t think too many ruffians are willing to run down a police wagon.”

  Drostan looked behind them again. A curtain of darkness was rolling toward them like a wave, swiftly gaining on the carriage.

  “For God’s sake, Finian, look!”

  As the policeman turned, the color drained from his face, and his eyes went wide.

  “Sweet Mother Mary. What is that?”

  “Nothing good. Get us out of here!”

  Finian flicked the reins, and the horses surged ahead, as if they had been chafing for permission to run for their lives.

  “It’s gaining on us!” Drostan said, holding on as they skidded around a bend. The wagon was built for rugged use, but not for comfort. Drostan felt as if his teeth would shatter as his jaws snapped shut when they jolted over bumps in the road. He marveled that Finian kept his seat.

  The ghosts had all disappeared. All that remained was the pursuing darkness. The wagon sped down the road, the gas lights winking out as the wagon reached them. The shadows were darker than night and hungry as the grave.

  “What in the name of Heaven is chasing us?” Finian shouted.

  “Nothing that has anything to do with Heaven,” Drostan replied. “Those things you said were boogey-men and fairy tales? They’re gaining on us.”

  The horses were flecked with sweat. Finian shouted to the team for speed, and though their hooves pounded down the empty street, the shadows seemed to swallow all sound.

  “What happens if it catches us?” Finian asked.

  “I don’t want to know.”

  “How do we lose a shadow?” Finian’s face was pale with fear. He was a good man and an honest cop, a veteran of the streets. None of that prepared him for the silent terror behind them.

  “Watch out!” Drostan shouted.

  The road took a sharp left turn beneath a railroad trestle. Finian reined the horses in hard, and the carriage tottered up onto two wheels, threatening to roll over. Finian jerked the reins again, and the panicked horses bolted. The carriage swayed crazily, and the traces snapped, sending the wagon with Finian and Drostan off the road and into a hedgerow.

  We’re dead men, Drostan thought, climbing out of the brambles, steeling himself for whatever horror the shadows brought with them. Finian scrambled to his feet, and the two men stood shoulder to shoulder, resolved to await death head on. Finian drew his service revolver, but his hand wavered as he saw nowhere to shoot.

  Drostan blinked, and a man appeared in the middle of the road, standing between them and the writhing shadows. He had dark brown hair and a neatly trimmed beard, and he wore the black cassock of an orthodox priest, with a crimson sash and a black rope belt.

  “Get out of there!” Drostan shouted. “Run!”

  The stranger did not turn. Shadows rushed toward him.

  “Are you crazy? Run!”

  Instead, the stranger lifted a golden box—a reliquary, Drostan guessed—and began to chant. The chanting grew louder, and the priest lifted the box high before bringing it down to chest level.

  Drostan looked wildly about, but there was nowhere to hide. The horses had fled, and the ruined police wagon lay smashed in a ditch. He and Finian were bloodied and bruised, in no condition to run, even if there had been anywhere to run to. The shadows would be on them in seconds. They, and the black-robed stranger, were going to die.

  “I banish you, in the name of all that is holy!” the stranger cried out, repeating the command in the language he had used before. The reliquary flared with light, and a piercing beam burned from its center, striking the heart of the boiling darkness.

  Drostan braced himself, but the shadows abruptly stopped. The brilliant white light bored a hole in the darkness, tearing it open. Drostan glimpsed stars through the gap. He watched, speechless, as the light burned away at the shadows, like fire consuming paper, until the last of the unnatural night became a black mist and disappeared.

  When Drostan looked back to thank the priest, the man was gone.

  Finian crossed himself, then he reached beneath his shirt for a saint’s medallion, kissed it, and closed his eyes in prayer. Drostan stared at the empty road and willed himself to stop shaking.

  “What the hell was that?” Finian asked when he had gathered his wits.

  “I have no idea,” Drostan said.

  “Those shadows—were they gessyan?”

  Drostan shook his head. “Maybe. I don’t know. I’ve heard tell of them, but have never come across an accurate description.”

  “Where did that priest come from—and how’d he get away so fast?”

  Drostan spread his hands wide. “You’re asking good questions, but I don’t know. Never saw him before.”

  Finian looked at the ruined wagon. “Damn. If that corpse wasn’t already in pieces, it can’t be in good shape now. And the Captain will have my ass over this.” He sighed. “No one is going to believe me.”

  Drostan took pity on the cop. He laid a hand on Finian’s shoulder. “No, they won’t. And if you try to explain what happened, they’ll hang you out to dry.”

  “What’s my choice?”

  “Tell them a story they’ll believe.”

  Finian glared at him. “You want me to lie?”

  “You want to keep your job?”

  Finian gave a snort. “Like I have a chance of that, after what happened to the wagon and horses.” He smacked his forehead and grimaced. “Sweet Brigid and Mary! The horses! If they’ve gone lame or we can’t find them, they’ll take them out of my pay; I’ll be in debtors’ prison for sure.”

  “I’ll help you find the horses,” Drostan said, cursing himself for making the night longer than it a
lready had been. “But what will you tell your Captain? What would he believe?”

  Finian was a smart guy, Drostan knew. He had come up the hard way, and this probably wasn’t the first time he had shaded the truth. His conscience likely kept him from doing it too often. But Drostan could see Finian’s mind working, thinking through the choices.

  “We were heading back from the Highland Club, and got chased by a pack of wild dogs,” Finian said. “Spooked the horses. I kept control as long as I could, but the horses didn’t make the turn. The dogs came after us again, and I fired my revolver. They scattered.”

  Drostan nodded. “All right. That’s good. Better fire your gun.”

  “What? Oh, yeah.” Finian drew his pistol, aimed at the ground a ways off, and fired.

  “I’d appreciate it if you kept me out of it, but if you need corroboration, I’ll back you,” Drostan said.

  Finian gave a crooked grin. “Somehow, admitting I was with you doesn’t seem likely to keep me out of trouble.”

  Drostan chuckled tiredly. “Let’s go. We’ve got horses to find.”

  HOURS LATER, DROSTAN headed back to the rooming house. Finian got lucky: the horses somehow made it back to the station house safely, and were waiting for them. Drostan had helped Finian check the horses over. Nothing worse than some bruises and a few superficial cuts—easily fixed with a little salve and a couple of apples to appease the skittish geldings.

  Drostan felt the evening’s work in every muscle, bone and sinew. “I’m getting too old for this kind of thing,” he muttered to himself. He was jumpy as hell, flinching at every noise. In the distance, he heard hoots and shouts, and guessed that the pack of boys he had befriended, his informants, were having a late night, playing dice and drinking stolen ale. The sidewalks were deserted. Drostan walked quickly, forcing himself to be alert, unwilling to end the night the victim of a petty thief.

  We got lucky. Tonight could have gone wrong in a hundred different ways.

  A man in an overcoat came out of a side street and strode toward Drostan. The brim of his hat shadowed his face and he kept his gaze averted. Long habit made Drostan pay attention. The man was built solidly, dressed in the dark clothing of a manservant: curious attire for this part of town.