by N. M. Bell
“Right, bitch, that one.” Joe spit on the ground and raised the half empty jar of gin to his lips.
“Aye, most of ‘em are given the chance,” Jake agreed. He experienced a morbid fascination with the woman. Just the faint sound of her brogue woke memories of his mam that were better left buried. Father maintained she was a witch who ensorcelled him, an evil treacherous being. Jake needed to remember that and not be taken in by the gentle smile and soft words he remembered her by.
“Gone off hooring, so she has, the bitch. I’se tol’ ‘er and tol’ ‘er it t’aint safe with that maniac running about.” Joe waved the bottle over his head to add emphasis to his words. “Says iffen I aren’t able to keep grub on t’ table and a roof over the head she’s no t’other choice. Ball breaking bitch, so she is.”
“Go after ‘er and drag ‘er back the hair,” Jake advised.
Joe slugged back another dose of rot gut and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “Ain’t worth me trouble. That one’ll be back a’fore the night’s over. I’ll have her then, so I will. Hooring bitch.” He staggered back into the room and slammed the door rattling the loose window panes.
A grim satisfaction settled in Jake’s gut as he entered his own digs. Father was right again, as always. That one, Mary it was, was no better than she should be. No matter she looked like an angel and be named after the Blessed Virgin herself, evil lurked in her heart. Like black rot in an apple, it hid and festered until it was cut out.
Throwing off his damp coat he slung it over the rickety chair by the table. He pulled the trophy out of the front pocket of his trousers. A hank of his latest victim’s hair and the cheap brassy ring he had wrenched from her little finger. It had a distinctive shallow engraving on it and he was sure Aggie would not fail to recognise it. He frowned. Would the woman realise the peril he saved her from? It wouldn’t do for her know he had a hand in the girl’s disappearance, mind, much as he would like to show his hand and take the credit. He needed to send a strong message though, creatures like that had no place anywhere near the premises. The butcher’s daughter was a smart woman. Surely she would understand the underlying message behind the present he planned to leave on her doorstep. He placed the tokens he saved for Aggie on the table by the lamp. He could not resist the temptation of allowing her to know he had protected her from the presence of the whore. She could not be permitted to employ such dross, he could not allow her to be tainted by their company. She must remain pure and perfect. He wished she could accept the token of his esteem and appreciate it for what it was and acknowledge him as the Lord’s champion and protector of virtuous women. But it was too soon for that. Far too soon, and there was Horst to deal with yet.
* * *
An abortive attempt to rest left Jake irritable and restless. He fumbled in the gloom and touched the lamp wick with a match. Light shimmered on the hank of hair lying beside the lamp, the glint of the ring barely visible where it lay buried in the tangled strands. Jake sighed, it was no rest he would be having until the message was delivered. Father’s voice whispered in his ear prodding him into action.
The ever present fog hung in a malignant green curtain, illuminated in the feeble light of the gas lamps. The Lord God Himself must have driven him out into the streets again Jake realised. No more than a few steps past the opening onto Dorset a wretched creature clutched at his coat sleeve. The vacant look in her eyes and slack face marked her as yet another whore addicted to the drink. His flesh crawled, but he steeled himself to carry out the Lord’s work. Taking her arm he walked with her down the street, allowing her to believe he was actually interested in what she offered for a few coppers.
The woman shivered, her arm quivered under his grasp. Turning abruptly he drew her into a narrow pass through, no more than two feet wide. The cobbles were slick underfoot and she stumbled. He paused for a brief moment to ensure no one was about. Swift as a snake striking Jake thrust her against the wall, his hand tight on her throat.
“Oh, dear God, have mercy! Don’t … I can’t…”
“Don’t ye dare to take the Lord’s name in vain,” Jake hissed the words through clenched teeth. He adjusted the grip on her neck, thumbs pushing into the flesh to stop the words. The woman seemed paralysed by fear, her hands made no move to loosen the fingers constricting her breathe. Pale blue eyes bulged and trapped blood darkened her face as he inexorably tightened his grip. The trachea collapsed under the pressure and her body convulsed with its effort to draw breath into the lungs. It lasted only a moment before the flesh went limp in his grasp.
Jake lowered the body to the ground, released the knife from its concealment and drew it precisely across the bruised skin. Steam rose from the released blood, the evil drawn from the body and taken into the body of the fog. He contemplated clipping the earlobes for the police but decided against it. This one wasn’t worthy of him. He performed his duty as Father decreed he should. Harsh laughter reached him, muffled by the fog. He cast a longing look at the splayed body, wanting desperately to split it open and remove the organs of sin lurking within. But there was a more pressing task at the moment. He stepped over the body and slipped further into the narrow alley, emerging two blocks over to continue on his way.
In spite of the chill night air a fine sheen of sweat gathered on his face, he wiped it away with his handkerchief. The drunken whore was like all the other trash in this hell hole of humanity that thronged the crowded alleys, ready to spread her legs and lure good men into her trap. No matter, the situation was properly dealt with. The worthless trash wouldn’t tempt the weak any longer. Really, he had done the whore a favour, cleansed her in the font of her own blood and sent her to be judged by Saint Peter. More than she deserved, really.
It had been quick, more’s the pity.
* * *
He stopped by the door of the butcher shop, now closed up tightly for the night, and deposited a small paper wrapped parcel against the wall by the step. In a swift movement he rose and strode purposefully down the narrow street. A surge of excitement coiled in his belly and gathered in his groin. A giddy joyousness filled him at the thought of the daughter of the house finding the package in the morning and recognising the ring and severed hair of her erstwhile shop girl.
He returned to the Ten Bells and nursed a glass of gin until the barkeep called time. Joe Barnet’s woman sat at a table in a dim corner of the room with a man. Every once in a while he caught a snatch of her lilting Irish voice, even roughened by the drink it stirred emotions that brought a frown to his face. Mam was never harsh with him. How could he have been so wrong about her, have never detected the evil beneath the surface? Of its own volition his gaze returned to the table in the corner where the woman’s hair seemed to glow in the smoky air. Disgusted with himself he left the establishment before the crush of humanity spewed out onto the filthy cobbles to mingle with the other excrement. He could catch a kip for a few hours before he had to be at the shop. Tomorrow should be a very entertaining day.
Chapter Nine
Rest did not come easy to Jake. Adrenaline from the night’s successful work still flowed through him and restlessness drove him from the narrow cot. The faint light of the small lamp flickered on the fine edge of Father’s special knife. The blade bequeathed to Jake to remind him of the promise he made to Father and the Lord. This was the instrument that freed his father from the clutches of the Irish witch. A small spasm of guilt twisted through him. How had he never known Mam was a witch? She always showered him with love and tried to keep him from the terror of Father when he was overcome by the Lord’s wrath. Witch she must have been though, even now, years later, her spells still held him bound and unable to see her wickedness. He turned the knife over and over in his hand lost in the fascination of the play of light on the blade. Presently, the tolling of the church bells told him it was time to be getting on to work.
Jake shoved back from the table, and sloshed cold water on his face from the cracked basin by the window. He jammed the cap over his dishevelled ha
ir and tucked the knife into the knife safe. Night still hovered over the narrow alleys and closes but the streets were not deserted by any means. Some, like himself, were making their way to poor paying jobs and others were just reeling their way home. He stepped over the legs of a bloke sprawled in a doorway and carried on his way.
What will Aggie make of the present I left her? It shouldn’t take her long to figure it out. The thought brought a smile to his thin lips. The woman should be right happy to have the problem taken care of, so she should. Of course, he could never tell her it was him who did the deed. He hesitated for a moment. Or could he? Wouldn’t she be appreciative of his actions on her behalf? God-fearing woman that she was, even if she was a Pape. Like Mam. His inner eye lingered on the glint of the gold cross that hung in the valley of her breasts. He had glimpsed it once when she bent over to retrieve a ball of butcher’s twine. His penis twitched against his pants at the memory and he tamped down the image as a scowl twisted his features. He shouldered his way past a man who turned to protest. The man took one look into Jake’s face and hastily scurried out of the way. Jake strode on, berating himself for allowing his baser instincts to get the better of him. Women’s black magic Father called it.
The front of the shop was still dark when he made his way into the alley, boots slipping on the dank detritus underfoot. He unsnibbed the gate into the yard and entered the backside of the butcher’s. After setting a match to the lamp wick he set about readying for the day’s work. He listened with half an ear for sounds of movement overhead or in the front of the shop. It wouldn’t do to miss the moment when Aggie discovered his offering. Presently the sound of male voices rumbled as Heinz addressed Horst by the butcher block. It was another while before Jake recognised the woman’s step on the stairs. Laying down the skinning knife in his hand he slunk forward into the shadows behind where Horst struggled to learn the basics of carving a carcass.
Delicious thrills of excitement and expectation surged through him, tightening his groin and curling his toes in the hobnailed boots.
“Barmherzigen Mutter Gottes,” Aggie’s voice rose to a shriek.
“Daughter,” old man Fleischer roared, “don’t blaspheme Blessed Mary’s name.”
The woman stood framed in the doorway, her face white and twisted in a grotesque rictus of emotion. Her fingers clenched the blood stained package and her mouth worked, but no more words came from her.
“What is it, liebchen?” Horst moved toward her.
Aggie stumbled to the counter and let the package fall to the surface. A trembling hand sketched the sign of the cross before she covered her quivering lips. Huge tears gleamed in the lamp light before they spilled down her cheeks. Horst stopped in his tracks as the bloody hank of hair and the cheap ring fell from the wrappings. Her father pushed the younger man aside to reach his daughter.
“What is this? Where did it come from?” The words bumped against each other as Heinz gathered her into his embrace. Even though his roughened hands stroked her back, his horrified gaze never left the items on the counter. Aggie shivered and sobbed in his arms.
Horst shook his head as if to clear his vision and strode to the counter. He patted his fiancée on the back in an attempt to offer comfort. Jake stayed where he was for the moment, interested to see how the scenario would play out.
“Where did you find this?” Horst demanded. “Some gobshites out for a bit of jolly, were they? Whist now, liebchen, whist.”
Jake’s stomach curled and tightened as the man turned Aggie out of her father’s arm and into his. She was beautiful, even with horror contorting her face. Blotches of red marred the pale skin and boogers of snot hung off the end of her nose. It took all his will not to leap from his concealment and give the cove a good dust up.
“Amy, Amy … where’s Amy?” Aggie shook her head wildly. “She never came back last even—” A burst of fresh sobs threatened to drop her to her knees. She clung to Horst her gaze never leaving the items on the counter. “That’s her ring, so it is. And her hair. Mutter of Gotte, what has happened to her? Who would be so cruel as to leave that…?” She pointed at the gore in front of her. “She’d dead and the babe with her….” Her voice rose to a crescendo as grief gripped her.
“Do you think it was that idiot of a father who done this?” Heinz moved toward the door, anger flushing his features. “Or that gobshite what put her up the spout in the first place….”
“Wait, Heinz. Don’t go off half cocked. Why would the man leave something like that here? If he knew where she was biding he’d have hauled the fraulien out of here by the hair before this,” Horst cautioned.
Heinz turned back to his distraught daughter and shook his great bearded head. “Are you sure the ring is Amelia’s?”
Aggie nodded wordlessly, her sobs quieting to hiccups. Jake moved out of the shadows and approached the trio by the counter.
“Is sommat the matter, boss?” He addressed auld man Fleischer. “I heare’d the caterwauling all the way out in the yard. What in the name of Lord is that?” He pointed a trembling hand at the blood stained hair and ring. A nice touch that, the horror in his voice and the trembling of the hand, he thought. I should be an actor fellah, so I should.
“Aggie found it at the shop front just now. Swears it’s Amelia’s, the new shop girl we hired. Who would do such a thing to such a sweet child?” Heinz told him. “She must be kilt or she’d ‘ave come back last night.”
“Ye shouldn’t ‘ave sent her out for the drink,” Aggie sobbed anew.
“Well now, could be she’s just found some bloke while she was about and will turn up later,” Jake said.
Aggie wailed louder and shook her head violently. “She’s kilt, she is. There’s the proof.” The distraught woman pointed at the items again. “It was that fiend, it must ’av been ‘im. The one wi’ the knife what’s been killin’ all them women.”
Heinz exchanged a look with Horst over his daughter’s blonde head that Jake failed to interpret. “Stay with ‘er, aye,” he said. “I’ll go see iffen I can roust out a copper and show ‘im this stuff.”
Horst nodded and continued to stroke Aggie’s head. Her sobs gradually lessened and she wiped her nose with a hanky she pulled from a skirt pocket.
“Some’un should go tell Alfie,” she said through her sniffles. “Even if he is a gobshite, he deserves to know what’s happened to his daughter.”
“I’ll take care of it,” Jake volunteered. This was just too good to pass up. How perfect that he would be the one to tell the cove his flighty bit of skirt was delivered to her maker. Excitement thrilled through him, curling in his belly and stroking his bollocks to life. The blood-stiffened canvas apron he wore effectively hid the tent in his trousers. The rough cloth stimulated the tender flesh as his cock head rose and Jake was hard put to keep the spasm of pleasure from showing in his face. For a moment his sight darkened with a vision of the glorious blood of her release from sin cascading over his righteous hands.
“Jake, are you going then, man?” Aggie’s voice dispelled the sight from his mind.
“What’s wrong wit you, slaughter man?” Horst’s expression was puzzled and suspicious. Almost, Jake thought, as if the bashtoon could read his thoughts.
“Aye, I’m off then,” Jake said. He turned on his heel and made his way to the back of the shop. His cap hung on the familiar peg and he snatched it as he passed. The head of his cock sent painfully exquisite sensations through his groin where it rubbed on his pants as he moved. He left the canvas apron in place to conceal his state of excitement. Aye, and what better way to tell the man his wean is gone than covered in blood? Schooling his features into a suitably sombre expression he strode off to find Amy’s da’.
* * *
Alf’s face turned white and then red in turn. Jake thought for a moment the man might collapse in the street. The bloke who was with him when Jake hailed Alf from the public house swayed on his feet at the news.
“Are ye sure it’s her? Have ye
seen the body?” Desperation coloured Alf’s words as if the man sought for reason to believe his Amy wasn’t the victim.
Jake shook his head. “Aggie is fair certain the ring is hers and the hair is the right colour.” He took quiet pleasure in defeating the man’s slim attempt at hopefulness.
The big man beside Alf took a few steps away, his expression of shock turning to one of sly cunning.
“Don’t seem like a good time to mention it, Alfie. But, iffen the girl is gone, then ye still owe me fifty quid.” He fixed the grief stricken man with a dark look.
“I never do,” Alf exclaimed. “You took yer pleasure with her enough times to cover my bets, just like we agreed.”
“Your one didn’t like the games I wanted to play. Ye recall the fuss she raised, do you not? All over a bit of rough tickle and slap that did the bitch no lasting harm. Ye were gonna fix it with her the night she disappeared. Get ‘er to see reason and play nice with me.” The man’s eyes glittered in the dim light and he licked his thin lower lip.
“I tried, so I did,” Alf protested. “There weren’t no way Amy would agree to let ye ram her up the bung hole, let along having other blokes there to cheer you on, like.”
“Pity, that,” the big man said. “The poor bit of tail she did be persuaded to allow me weren’t in no way worth enough to pay yer debt. I’ll be around t’morrer to collect.” The man strode off into the jumbled crowd that were starting to clog the streets now that the sun was nearly up.
Alf stared after him for a long moment before he turned back to Jake. “Did Heinz summon the Peelers? Useless coppers should mind their business and stop that Ripper fellah,” He spat on the cobbles.
“Aye, I expect it will be all over the rags by the next edition,” Jake replied. “Fleischer was off to alert the p’lice when I left to find you.” He turned on his heel and started back toward the shop. It irked him to leave Aggie alone with the German bashtoon. Who knew what ideas might be going in his head? Now he had delivered the news to Alf the curls of excitement streaking through his belly lessened. His cockhead withdrawing back into the foreskin as he softened.