by Paul Cornell
‘Look at how much silver gets spilled on that wall,’ said Sefton. ‘A bigger deposit than any we’ve seen.’
‘Spilling fuel,’ said Sefton, ‘like something’s going wrong.’
Rudlin had indeed gone to help and had been attacked as per witness statement. This was the first time Quill and his team had seen the Ripper at work. They watched the shining shape of a razor sweeping through the air, cutting and cutting. There was an unhinged rage to it, but also a terrible precision. There was a sudden hauling of the razor that made the victim scream silently on the footage like a slaughtered animal. Then the Ripper was bounding off and the young man had collapsed into a pile of his own bloody insides.
The woman had stayed put for a moment after the Ripper had dropped her, unharmed, then she’d hauled herself to her feet and run for the door. She also had got through the door staff, who were reacting to the violence now happening inside their establishment, and was gone into the night.
‘I want a word with her,’ said Quill. ‘She’s experienced that thing close up, and it let her off. And she saw fit to run, immediately, through more trouble.’
‘The bloke who was with her too,’ said Costain. ‘Would you walk out into what was going on outside that bar?’
‘I would need,’ said Ross, biting her bottom lip, deep in thought, ‘a reason.’
* * *
The team circulated the description of the woman and her companion among the witnesses. A few people had seen them, but nobody knew who they were. They weren’t going to be able to get the main inquiry to put pictures of them onto the news, Ross realized. All Forrest would see on this CCTV footage was the sort of headache-inducing visual lie that she and her colleagues had experienced during the Losley operation before they’d got the Sight. To see even as much as he had – a young woman being thrown against the wall by something invisible – their witness must be somewhere on the lower end of the Sighted spectrum. Most of those working the main inquiry would interpret the same scene as her being thrown to the floor, or something like that.
Ross wished she could feel comfortable around Costain. His expression when he glanced in her direction, that shared secret, made her wince inwardly. She wished they could have had that kiss without having the prospect of the auction hanging over them. That look on his face, if she could ever think of any expression of his as genuine, said he wasn’t feeling comfortable either, that maybe he was as vulnerable as she was. Yeah, maybe.
They found the woman’s original companion, the balding guy, on CCTV camera footage from outside as he left the bar, skirting the edges of the clash between protestors, and then they managed to follow him, camera to camera, to Old Street, where he’d caught a taxi heading towards town. Ross noted down the registration number. Checking earlier CCTV footage from the bar, the man had paid only with cash, damn it, and not a card they could check for at the bar. They’d at least have a record of where he’d got out of the taxi. The woman’s path from the bar was caught on a couple of cameras, but then she’d vanished into the backstreets. Ross knew from previous experience that the CCTV footage wouldn’t be good enough for the facial recognition software used by the Photographic Intelligence team to be any use, but she sent images of both patrons to them anyway.
So now Ross was looking for links between this victim and the others. Rudlin had been pretty ordinary, not important like Staunce and Spatley: redbrick university, Lancaster; reasonably well-off family; nobody close to him worked in police or government. It was possible that the idea here was just to create terror in a particular group of people, but then why not kill loads of them? The presence of the protestors outside was interesting. The faces that had been identified in the crowd outside the bar didn’t match any who’d been present at the Spatley murder, but that sample, among all the masks involved, was pretty small. It was perhaps indicative that the protestors just happened to show up in this neighbourhood and mount their first ever protest outside a bar on the night when the Ripper attacked someone inside it. That was a very attractive connection to make, now with three data points in a row, but it could still just be coincidence, given the prevalence of the Toff movement across London. Perhaps the Ripper was somehow the ‘spirit of the protests’ or being summoned by someone in the Toff crowds, or feeding on their anger or something like that.
Tired coppers from the main investigation had told her they’d found no sign of a pre-organized picket of the bar on Toff websites. But with an organization this diffuse – if it could be called an organization at all – there was usually little warning of anything. It was as if they were dealing with a flash mob as a culture. A bunch of tweets had gone out, giving the impression that something was already happening outside this particular bar, and other people had shown up to join in. The main investigation had asked Twitter to provide details of those accounts under the Data Protection Act, and Forrest’s office had promised to share that with her.
‘If our lot ever get something on Crimewatch,’ said Quill, after she’d told him, ‘they’ll need a special effects budget.’
In the back of Ross’ mind, as she worked the case, she was also working her other problem. She looked to Costain every now and then, and gradually she realized that there was something she could do to change things, perhaps to make things better. It would involve no risk on her part. It would be very hard on him.
That was all right.
She waited until he was on his own, staring into the fine detail of the silver splash on the wall. ‘About last night…’
‘What about it?’ He was careful now, guarded. She could tell that he thought she was going to say it had been a mistake, that it was all over. He was worried either about losing the connection they’d made or about missing his chance to get hold of the Bridge of Spikes. Would she ever be able to look at him and make an accurate assessment of what he was thinking?
‘I had a good time.’
She felt horribly pleased to see his sudden smile. ‘Oh. Great.’
‘So, we should talk about how we’re going to go forward with all this. I mean, if we’re going to go to the auction together, how we could maybe find, you know, some trust.’
He was nodding quickly. ‘Absolutely.’
‘So, I was thinking, second date?’
‘Right. Right, yes.’
She didn’t like the amount of power she had over him either because of her bloody allure or because he was giving it to her in order to flatter and deceive her. ‘Do you mind combining business and pleasure? There’s someone I want you to meet. My place at 2 p.m. tomorrow.’ She walked off and looked over her shoulder: yeah, now he was the one watching her go.
* * *
Sefton lay awake in bed, listening to Joe snoring beside him. He couldn’t help but keep seeing the blows the Ripper had struck. The news tonight had been about escalation, about far right groups starting to march in areas affected by the riots, starting to shout down Toff protestors. From what he knew about the Thirties, he didn’t like the feeling of where this was all going. If people started to feel the establishment was failing them, that the police were failing them, they looked for order in terrible places.
He kept thinking about Barry Keel, about human remains. The two deaths overlapped each other in his head, to the point where he felt vaguely guilty, insanely, for Rudlin’s death too.
He had to do something more than he was doing, he decided. He had to find some way to heal both himself and everything around him. He had to see if the centre was going to hold, to ask a greater power for answers.
* * *
At home, Quill stayed up late that night, looking at the documents of the case, wondering if there was any single thing more he could do. They’d gone out to the Spatley home that afternoon, after they’d got all they could from the new crime scene, and had found, even with their Sighted eyes, nothing the main op hadn’t.
Forrest was starting to realize that Quill’s team were bringing nothing extra to the operation. There seemed to be no c
onnections between Rudlin and the other two victims. They still had very little in the way of access to an occult underworld that seemed to know nothing about this case. Nothing, nothing, nothing … and time was running out both for his team and for the next bloody unlucky man who the Ripper decided to randomly slaughter. Just as he’d finally decided to go to bed, his mobile rang. He saw it was Sefton, and answered.
‘Jimmy,’ said the voice on the other end of the line, ‘I’ve decided.
We’re not getting anywhere. So it’s time for me to do something I’ve been putting off. Something a bit scary.’
‘You know,’ said Quill, ‘Ross called five minutes ago, and she said almost exactly the same thing.’
NINE
It was Sunday morning. Sefton stood at the familiar bus stop in Kensington. Nobody else waited there. The streets were quiet, still calm, despite that now omnipresent smell of smoke. You could actually hear the birdsong. The occasional jogger or dog walker passed him.
He heard the bus approaching. He looked down the road and concentrated … and yes, now he knew what he was looking for, there it was: the number 7 bus, to Russell Square, as indicated by the display on the front. This wasn’t a modern bus. It was a very old one. As Sefton knew from terrifying experience, you needed the Sight to see it, let alone board it.
He put his hand out. He tensed up as the bus slowed down. He could see nothing behind its dark windows. It stopped, and he got onto the rear platform. Brutus had said that each time he had to find a new, more dangerous way of coming to see him, but surely if he made it again through what had been an overwhelming passage, at least he’d get a hearing. He braced himself to encounter what was in this darkness, taking a step forwards as the bus accelerated away from the stop at—
He turned. This was different. They were travelling incredibly fast.
A force that he could not have argued with thrust every inch of his body at once towards the door.
He had time to yell and—
The bus vanished. He hit the road. There had been a moment in his head of knowing he was going to. That moment was the worst thing of all.
He bounced. He rolled. He missed the wheels of a car that swung suddenly out of his way. His body hit the kerb and he yelled.
He lay there, taking big, slow breaths. He was okay, but only because something had made sure he was okay. It wouldn’t do so next time. That had been a warning.
Brutus had meant what he said. He’d been stupid enough to try it anyway. It would need something new. It would need something worse.
* * *
The middle-aged Asian woman who answered the door of what had been Ross’ family home in Bermondsey was the same one as the first time Ross had come here. That had been months ago, during the Losley case. The woman seemed to recognize her, but then looked suspiciously at Costain beside her.
‘I’m afraid we need another look upstairs,’ she said. ‘Police business. Nothing you need to worry about, but we’d really appreciate it. My colleague is a detective sergeant.’
Costain showed her his warrant card.
As she had last time, the lady took the offered documents inside and called the station to check they were who they said they were. She and Costain waited, looking at each other. She’d refused to tell him where they were going, in a teasing way, as if it was going to be something pleasant. By now he must surely have realized why they were here, that this was going to be much more business than pleasure. He was already looking tense and awkward.
The woman opened the front door once more, let them in and told Ross she knew the way by now.
This was only the second time Ross had been back to the house where she’d grown up. The look and smell of it filled her senses, reminding her of her childhood and how it had been taken from her. At least these days it didn’t set off her allergies. She led Costain to the top floor without a word. There was the door where she’d looked through the crack to see Dad hanging there, seemingly having hung himself, but actually, as she’d spent so long proving, having been murdered by his own brother. She opened the door and this time walked straight in.
‘So this is the place?’ It was only a few streets away from where Costain had worked for Dad’s murderer, Rob Toshack. He still looked awkward. It was good that she’d taken him out of his comfort zone. Now he surely knew what he was in for, yet he was still here. He must really want whatever he wanted.
‘Yeah.’ She stepped into the middle of the room, under the ceiling rose, and looked up. ‘Dad?’
There was a moment when nothing happened. Ross feared, and kind of hoped, guiltily, that perhaps this time he wouldn’t be here. But that would result in even more fear, wouldn’t it? Because then she’d never know what had happened to him.
Then colours that weren’t like any she’d ever seen started to unfurl in strange waves from the ceiling, and with them came the stench, the smell that came pouring down on them, the air feeling heavy with it, settling onto her shoulders, getting into her hair.
The ceiling opened and he burst downwards on the end of his noose with a cry, his eyes finding hers as he fell, his legs flailing, his hands trying and failing to hold on to the rope around his neck. For reasons he had never explained, he could only appear in the room where he’d died, so she could only ever see him again here. That beloved face. So terrible to see it in pain. So wonderful to see it animated with something that could be called life. Terrible and wonderful were still, for Ross, mixed up together in this room.
‘Girl,’ he said, his voice cracking on the rope, staring at her. ‘It’s been so long. Why didn’t you come sooner?’ She hadn’t expected that. She felt absurdly guilty to have someone else here to hear that. But now Alf was looking across at Costain, startled. ‘What’s he doing here?’
‘He’s—’
‘You’re telling me that you and him—?’
Costain could only stare. He’d taken a couple of steps backwards, Ross realized. He was now almost flat against the wall. He’d put a hand up to cover his nose and mouth. His expression was terrified.
Ross quickly turned back to her father. ‘We’re not here about that.’
‘I know you work with him, I keep an eye on you. But you know he was one of Rob’s men—’
‘Yeah. He was undercover—’
‘But he really was one of Rob’s men. Rob was like a dad to him. You haven’t seen him – I have, girl.’
‘I’ve heard the tapes—’
‘You haven’t heard everything.’ Her father had actually started to cry. ‘Don’t trust him, girl.’
‘She doesn’t!’ That had come from Costain, a shout from behind his hand.
She didn’t know how to deal with all this. This wasn’t what she’d come here for. ‘Dad, I came here to ask about the case we’re on—’
‘The Ripper. I know, I watch you. You don’t come to see me, but I see you.’
‘Do you know anything about what it is?’
‘I can see any bit of London I want to. You can see everything from up here. They like us to see what we’re missing. But I don’t have no bloody way of watching out for something when I don’t know what I’m looking for, do I? I follow you. I follow you too, boy! But I don’t see every time someone’s murdered.’
‘So—’
‘But don’t you go thinking I’m useless and leave me alone here! It’s all up here! What’s that they say, “Hell is other people”? The things I can’t tell you! Don’t you know, boy? You’ve had a glimpse of it.’
Costain closed his eyes and appeared to be controlling his breathing, didn’t seem able to reply.
‘What do you mean, Dad?’
‘I’m saying I’ve seen Jack the Ripper. But up here. And when all this started to be something you were looking into, I checked out all the echoes of him down there and all. And this ain’t nothing to do with him. This is something new.’ Alf looked over his shoulder suddenly, and the tone of his voice changed into a high growl of pleading. ‘They let you have
a bit of hope. This is me getting my hope. They let me see you. But then there’s more pain, and you can’t stand it in the end – your brain just switches off and then you wake up in here again, ready to have it all crushed out of you again…’ He was crying again, actually wailing. She was too, she realized, a low noise in her throat to match his.
‘I’m working on it, Dad. I’m trying to get you out.’
‘Hope again. You’re part of it!’ His face contorted as if he regretted saying that more than anything. ‘No, I didn’t mean that! Come and see me soon. Please!’ Then he looked over his shoulder again, and started to scream abuse at something that was coming. He had been found out, she understood. ‘Let me stay with her! Please! It’s the only joy I—!’
Something hugely powerful heaved him back into the ceiling, all in one sudden and terrible movement. With a slam and the stench bursting again into the room, the ceiling closed.
‘Dad!’ Ross shouted helplessly after him. ‘Dad!’ She stopped herself. He wasn’t coming back. Not this time. Now she knew that every time she came here she was contributing to his torture. That was why they, whoever they were, had let him talk to her. But now he’d been caught, she doubted he’d be allowed to give her any help that went against their cause. She allowed herself to shoulder the burden of having hurt him. She would not cry. Not here. She had tried to save him when he was first hanging here in this room, and she would save him again. She was doing something towards that goal. She would not let anything stop her.