Mind of a Killer

by Simon Beaufort

  Lonsdale went upstairs to wash away the stench of the Thames. He threw his clothes in the linen basket, on top of the last ones he had ruined. Perhaps Louisa Galton had been right to complain about the difficulty of finding good help, he thought, and if he ever dined with her again, he could match her stories of lazy servants.

  He sat on the edge of the bathtub as a thought struck him. Galton! Had part of the solution to the murders been staring him in the face all along? The scientist had spoken at length about fingerprinting, and only hours before, Peters had commented on Baycroft’s blood being smeared on the sewer wall. Could Galton glean anything from it? Were there prints that could lead to Baycroft’s killer?

  As he considered, Lonsdale realized that Galton might have answers to other aspects of the case as well – he certainly knew about the human brain. He not only had sophisticated theories about its development, but had conducted studies. To Lonsdale, the cerebrum seemed an odd organ to take, but perhaps Galton could explain why someone might want one.

  Then again, Baycroft had been insane. For all Lonsdale knew, the man might have believed that by taking cerebra he would be able to absorb intelligence. Maybe he was even eating them. Still, Galton might be able to help him understand even that. Lonsdale decided that he would put everything else aside and try to see the scientist.

  After a hurried bath and dressing in clean clothes, he penned a quick note to Stead and Morley, outlining what had happened and telling them he was going to see Galton. He gave it to Jack’s valet with the order it be taken straight to The PMG. He then left the house at a run, waved down a hansom, and promised the driver double if he took him to Rutland Gate as fast as he could. Determined to have the money, the man whipped his horse into a gallop, and there followed a frantic journey full of jolts, angry yells from other road users, and urgently clattering hooves. They arrived, Lonsdale shoved money at the man, hoping he would spend some of it on extra oats for his lathered horse, and hammered on Galton’s door.

  The great man was shuffling papers into a series of boxes when his guest was shown into his study. Lonsdale reached out to shake his hand, but his host’s limp appendage returned little pressure, and the reporter quickly withdrew his own.

  ‘I’m just filing my notes for Human Faculty,’ said Galton grandly. ‘Material of this importance can’t be treated with too great a care.’

  ‘I quite agree,’ said Lonsdale. ‘But I wanted—’

  ‘Louisa is away,’ interrupted Galton. ‘She will be sorry to have missed you. She told me your conversation was a delight.’

  As Lonsdale could not recall her having listened to a single word, he could only suppose that she preferred the kind of discussion where she was the only participant.

  ‘I need your help, sir,’ he said urgently. ‘Lives depend on it.’

  Galton looked pleased. ‘Then sit down. We’ll have tea while I save the day. And not just out of one of those asinine thimbles of Louisa’s. We’ll have man-sized receptacles.’

  In the next hour and a half, while drinking tea served in what appeared to be plant pots, Galton gave the reporter a penetrating assessment of the structure and functioning of the human brain.

  ‘I can think of no one who has conducted more research into cerebral functions than I have,’ Galton declared. ‘And I certainly can’t see any benefit in collecting them. But you say this man Baycroft was mad. Perhaps that is your answer – he was possessed of the lunatic belief that owning the part of the brain that controls sensory processing allowed him to absorb its power. Similar beliefs have been shown to exist among some of the cannibals along the Congo River.’

  Lonsdale felt that information led him nowhere, and he was further disappointed to learn that, unless Baycroft’s murderer had placed his fingertips on the sewer wall, there was unlikely to be evidence that could be interpreted by the scientist. Moreover, even if he had, if the prints were smudged – and the entire area had been one large smear – they would be useless. Lonsdale sighed. He was faced with more dead ends.

  ‘You are hungry,’ declared Galton. ‘We shall dine.’

  Lonsdale was not hungry at all, and itched to leave, to visit the Regent’s Club and ask after Jack, but he still had questions for Galton, as the very faintest glimmer of a solution was beginning to grow at the back of his mind. He realized he needed to stay, as he could not be sure of a welcome if he declined the invitation and tried to resume the conversation later.

  ‘You’ll observe that no grace was said prior to this meal, unlike the last time you were here,’ said Galton between mouthfuls of radish soup. ‘Louisa insists on prayers before meals, but I avoid them. Unless I am analyzing them.’

  ‘You analyze prayers?’ asked Lonsdale warily.

  ‘To determine whether they are answered. The scriptures, of course, express the view that blessings, both of long life and a spiritual nature, should be requested in prayer. I have compiled a table of the mean age of death for males of various occupations. It shows that the clergy and missionaries, who should be good at prayer, have lifespans less than that of doctors, who do not have time for them. Meanwhile, lawyers, who are a godless horde, live the longest of all. Ergo, prayers are futile.’ He beamed proudly.

  Lonsdale could see a lot wrong with that thesis.

  ‘But doesn’t your assessment ignore the fact that some pray for others, not just petition the Almighty for a longer life?’

  Galton’s eyes fixed on Lonsdale. ‘If such prayers had any influence, don’t you think that insurance companies would make allowance for them? But they ask no questions about their customers’ religious habits, nor do they take into account the risk to ships and buildings owned by pious individuals. Members of the civilized world must give up this childish belief in the efficacy of prayer, and be guided by an understanding of demographics and statistics.’

  The last sentence grabbed Lonsdale’s attention. ‘Demographics and statistics,’ he echoed. ‘Are they the same?’

  ‘Of course not. Demographics is a new field of science and refers to studies of the life conditions of people as shown by the statistics of their births, deaths and diseases.’

  ‘There is an Imperial Statistical Institute,’ said Lonsdale, recalling what the boaters had seen on the paper in Donovan’s pocket.

  ‘It closed last year,’ replied Galton. ‘But there is an Imperial Demographic Institute. It’s fairly new, and is located at the end of Kensington Gardens, on Brunswick Gardens.’

  Lonsdale’s mind was in a whirl. Jack’s diary had read ‘Imp Dem Inst’. It had to be the same place. Moreover, Donovan’s appointment had been the day before he died, so the chances were that he had gone to the Demographic Institute, and the boaters, unfamiliar with the term, had misremembered. His stomach churned. Was Jack in danger? He wanted to dash to the place immediately, but forced himself to wait. First, he had to find out as much as he could.

  ‘What is its remit?’ he demanded.

  Galton looked up in surprise at the urgency in his voice.

  ‘I haven’t had extensive dealings with the place, as I consider its director an egotistical dogmatist, but I imagine data are being compiled that will become relevant to my studies on eugenics—’

  ‘Eugenics?’ interrupted Lonsdale curtly, wishing the man would speak plain English.

  ‘A term I’ve coined in Human Faculty. If I tell you what it means, it will spoil the surprise when it’s published.’

  ‘Please,’ begged Lonsdale. ‘Believe me, I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t a matter of life and death.’

  ‘Life and death,’ mused Galton. ‘Very well, then. Eugenics is the science that deals with improving the human race. Its aim is to further the ends of evolution more rapidly than if events were left to their own course. First, we identify the characters we want to propagate, then we see about promoting them and eliminating useless rivals.’

  ‘But sir,’ cut in Lonsdale, ‘how can you reconcile a desire to expedite evolution by directing it to a predetermined e
nd? It contradicts the notion of natural selection.’

  ‘Eugenics won’t control natural selection, but will assist it. Helping the weak and preventing suffering is all very well, but eugenics will improve the life of our entire community. We must, for example, breed out feeble constitutions and immoral instincts, and breed in those that are vigorous and noble. Eugenics cooperates with natural selection by ensuring that humanity is represented by the fittest individuals. What Nature does blindly, slowly and ruthlessly, we may continue providently, quickly and kindly.’

  ‘From what I’ve observed,’ remarked Lonsdale dryly, ‘humanity is already doing an admirable job of continuing itself.’

  ‘That’s not the purpose of eugenics,’ responded Galton. ‘Quite the reverse, in fact. Improving a race depends on increasing the best stock. That is far more important than repressing the worst. Eugenics encourages the best characteristics to be passed on to future generations.’

  ‘But how will you dissuade your “lesser stock” from reproducing?’ demanded Lonsdale, not realizing he was sounding exasperated. Eugenics was as mad a theory as anything Baycroft had believed, and here he was listening to Galton go on about it while he should be finding out what had happened to Jack. ‘Besides, other than the occasional extraordinary men, aren’t people rather similar?’

  ‘Such a lack of understanding!’ spat Galton, annoyed in turn. ‘Those who believe in natural equality are deluding themselves. I’ve no patience with the hypothesis that all babies are born alike – they aren’t. Furthermore, the British man is superior to any others. It’s a fact.’

  Lonsdale was shocked by the imperial arrogance. ‘I hardly think—’ he began.

  ‘So we must control breeding,’ interrupted Galton, ‘or the intelligent, thoughtful and prudent members of society will be outnumbered by the ignorant and non-thinking, and therefore bring utter ruin upon our country. It may seem monstrous that the weak should be crowded out by the strong, but it’s still more monstrous that the strong should be crowded out by the incompetent and unfit.’

  ‘And this is what the Imperial Demographic Institute is exploring?’ asked Lonsdale. ‘How to manipulate some ideal devised by an elite few? Eugenics?’

  Galton looked at him as if he were an unruly school child. ‘Consider the gain to our nation if the practice of eugenics were applied. Our race would be less foolish, less frivolous, and politically more provident. We should be better fitted to fulfil our vast imperial opportunities. And able men would thrive.’

  Lonsdale had had enough, and also felt an urgent need to find Jack. ‘I am sorry, sir, but I simply must go to an appointment at The PMG,’ he lied, standing abruptly. ‘But thank you for sharing your fascinating theories, and I shall look forward to reading Human Faculty when it’s published.’ Mind whirling, he left Galton.

  As Lonsdale walked out of Galton’s front door, he decided to go straight to the Regent’s Club to ask about Jack. He hurried up Rutland Gate towards Kensington Road.

  Questions and answers poured into his mind in equal measure with every step. The relevance of eugenics to the murders had been apparent the moment Galton explained it. Could it be that a group of scientists was conducting investigations not unlike Galton’s, but going a step further and looking at their subjects’ cerebra? What if Baycroft’s ‘them’ was not a delusion? What if someone really had ordered him to steal cerebra – someone who had already collected other data from his subjects, and who had paid them for their time, so they were able to make house repairs or buy whisky?

  What if that same someone hoped to match his results to the part of the brain where the answers originated? Baycroft had confided that he had been ordered not to poison his victims lest he pollute the organs. Is that why Baycroft had been shot? Because he had not managed his ‘takings’ properly?

  But certainly legitimate scientists would never condone such an unethical study, and the results could hardly be published. Any such information would be worthless, for who could ever admit how he had come by it? And yet, did the results need to be published? Could they not be given to those able to act on them? There were genuine fears that the rising numbers of poor would rebel against the wealthier classes. Wilson from the zoo had talked about it, for example. But whereas Galton proposed a fairly sedate rate of change, Wilson had wanted something done fast. Would other, like-minded, people try to put such a plan into practice now?

  Or were strain and tiredness causing his imagination to run riot? No one would seriously consider implementing such a scheme. Yet someone was killing people for their cerebra. He decided to go to the Imperial Demographic Institute to see what he could discover the moment he had assured himself that Jack was safe and well.

  ‘Lonsdale! Lonsdale, here!’ A voice cut through his thoughts as he turned onto Kensington Road, and he looked around wildly. It was Hulda, sitting in a carriage and motioning to him. He found himself wondering if Peters had been true to his word and had had her watched over for the night. ‘I’ve been waiting for you here, because I didn’t want Galton to see me sitting outside his home,’ she said. ‘Get in.’

  ‘I must go to the Regent’s Club to try to find Jack,’ he replied.

  ‘Morley sent me to collect you,’ she said. ‘You’ve been summoned to his office – Superintendent Ramsey was sending Inspector Peters over to speak to you. I have some other news as well.’

  ‘After I find Jack. I need—’

  ‘No, now,’ she interrupted. ‘Besides, The PMG is not that far from the Regent’s Club, and it will be quicker for you to get in now, even with the stop there, than to walk the whole way.

  Knowing she was right, Lonsdale acceded to her demand, and the hansom shot off. As it raced along Knightsbridge Road, he began to tell her what he had learned from Galton and how it helped explain the pattern of events. But after several minutes, she suddenly interrupted him again.

  ‘A gentleman was killed around one or two o’clock this morning,’ she blurted, ‘and his cerebrum taken.’

  ‘But Baycroft was dead by then.’

  ‘Nevertheless,’ said Hulda, ‘it has happened again.’ Lonsdale felt his stomach churn, but didn’t have time to speak before Hulda added: ‘We’re there. Now come upstairs.’

  The first floor was in its usual controlled chaos. Morley’s door was closed, a murmur of voices emanating from within. Stead was distributing fresh orange peel into various containers – which he insisted counteracted the smell of the printing presses – while simultaneously dictating an article for the final edition. Lonsdale slipped into the reporters’ office behind Hulda but, before he could close the door, Morley emerged from his office, looking grave. ‘Do you have a moment, Lonsdale?’

  Lonsdale followed him inside, with Hulda at his heels. Peters was there, looking grey from lack of sleep. Morley gestured for Lonsdale and Hulda to sit, but Lonsdale refused. He had a very bad feeling about the look on Peters’ face.

  ‘There’s been another murder,’ said Peters. ‘It happened while you were at the station giving your statement. The victim was a barrister, judging from the papers with the body. We don’t yet know his name, but you told me last night that your brother was missing. Have you seen him this morning?’

  ‘No,’ whispered Lonsdale. He felt sick. ‘He didn’t come home last night.’

  ‘We found this with the body.’ Peters held out a dirty rag that Lonsdale saw with horror was Emelia’s spoiled antimacassar. He did not need to tell Peters he recognized it: the answer was clear on his shocked face.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Peters gently. ‘That was all the killer left, other than some miscellaneous court papers.’

  ‘The Imperial Demographic Institute,’ said Lonsdale numbly. He gazed at the antimacassar but could not bring himself to touch it. ‘Jack wrote it in his appointment book. He went to discuss it with someone at the Regent’s Club at six o’clock yesterday evening.’

  ‘The Regent’s Club?’ asked Peters. ‘That’s a strange place for a gentleman of yo
ur brother’s standing to go. But what is this Institute? Where is it?’

  Lonsdale tried to force his stunned brain to work. What had Galton said? ‘Brunswick Street. No – Brunswick Gardens.’

  ‘Right,’ said Peters. ‘Now go home, Lonsdale. Can I have your assurance that you won’t go to this Institute or the Regent’s Club? We can’t risk losing our culprit because you storm into these places and start demanding information.’

  Lonsdale nodded, barely hearing. Peters patted his shoulder, then was gone, leaving Lonsdale with the antimacassar.

  The journey to Cleveland Square was a blur. Lonsdale was dimly aware of Hulda sitting next to him, but he heard nothing of what she said. He looked at the familiar streets in a daze, feeling as though he were in the grip of some terrible dream.

  Once home, the butler took Hulda’s umbrella and cloak, then reached out to remove Lonsdale’s hat, seeing he was not going to do it. Dully, Lonsdale aimed for the morning room.

  ‘There you are,’ said Jack, looking up from the remains of a meal. ‘I do hope you two haven’t been doing dangerous things again.’

  ‘God’s blood!’ breathed Hulda, gazing at him. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I live here,’ said Jack curtly. ‘Where else would I be?’

  Lonsdale lurched over and enveloped Jack in a hug, bewilderment, relief and shock vying for attention in his mind. He wanted to yell at his brother for giving him such a fright. Instead, he pulled the antimacassar from his pocket and held it out to him.

  ‘Where in God’s name did you get that?’ demanded Jack. ‘I thought it was lost.’

  ‘It was found with …’ began Lonsdale, but could not bring himself to say it had been retrieved from a corpse.

  ‘If you have any sense, you’ll keep your dirty fingers away from Emelia’s lacework from now on,’ advised Jack. ‘She’s not as stupid as you think – she knows you had something to do with it.’