City of Darkness

by Kim Wright

  “Evening,” the man said.

  “Frightful weather, is it not?” she asked, a particularly inane remark for London where the weather was always frightful, but one had to begin somewhere. The man made no reply and only stared at her with narrowed eyes.

  “Are you out for dinner?” Mary continued, a bit uneasily now, for it had crossed her mind he might be a copper trying to draw a working girl into his lair. She would have to choose her words carefully. “I’m on my way for a bite myself, you see, and I…”

  “I dine alone.”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” she said, stammering, for she had evidently misjudged the situation badly. She backed up, nearly stumbling as her foot left the curb and offering the gentleman a tremulous smile in parting. He did not look at her and as she started off into the mist she found herself, to her own surprise, running. For a moment she felt disoriented as if she had not walked these streets a thousand times in the last five years.

  “Fair Mary, where ye goin’?” lisped a familiar voice from the curb and she stopped, gasping against the constraints of her corset and looking into the face of Georgy McDale, a regular customer at the local bars and - for the time being, at least - somewhat of a friend.

  “The strangest man,” she gasped, unable to go on.

  “Aye, girl are ye mad? Roamin’ the streets with the Ripper around? It’s no time to be findin’ new customers, I can tell ye that. ‘Tis a time to be seein’ old friends who ye know,” he smiled at her, holding out one arm and displaying brown, uneven teeth.

  Mary raised her chin. “I’m hungry. I want some stew.”

  “Aye, well enough.”

  “And don’t think my price has gone down, just because these are hard times.”

  Georgy laughed, “I wouldn’ be takin’ advantage of ye, Mary. There’s a tavern here across the way.” Mary nodded, taking the extended arm and wondering if Georgy was right. The gentleman on the corner had done nothing, not really, but he had frightened her nonetheless. Perhaps fear were a palpable thing in the air, floating above London and mingled with the fog, and they would all breathe it in eventually, even the young and the clever and the strong. Perhaps it was truly better to stick with old friends, even if they did have bad teeth. Even if it did mean coming down a bit on her price.

  6:10 PM

  “Whoever can that be?” Geraldine murmured, heading for the front door since both Gage and Emma were involved in a raucous game of charades. She pulled hard on the oaken door, which tended to stick a bit, and swung it open to reveal the thin, elegant frame of John Harrowman, swathed from head to foot in his black broadcloth cape.

  “Darling,” Geraldine exclaimed. “Do come in. We’ve having a sort of impromptu party and Leanna will be so delighted to see you.”

  “I’m forgiven for canceling our theatre plans, then?” John asked, his voice attractively husky from the night air.

  “Yes, of course. The girl isn’t that petty,” Geraldine said, showing him toward the parlor.

  “I have it, I have it,” Leanna was saying. “It’s ‘Bird in a Gilded Cage.’”

  “At last,” Emma said, sinking to the couch. “I thought none of you would ever guess and I would be forced to attempt to act out the word ‘gilded.’ Why, hello doctor,” she added, looking at the door with surprise.

  “Hello, Emma, Leanna, Welles, Gage,” John said, advancing into the room and shirking his cape.

  “Do you know my nephew, Tom?” Geraldine asked.

  “Thomas Bainbridge. Your reputation precedes you.”

  “As does yours,” Tom said, extending a hand. “I take it you’re John Harrowman.” Leanna glanced at her brother nervously, hoping no teasing was forthcoming, but Tom stopped there. “At the risk of stating the obvious, we’re playing a game or two, hoping to take poor Trevor’s mind off his troubles.”

  “And his promotion as well,” John said, turning to Trevor. “I was, of course, reading the evening edition of the papers intently, as was all of London, and was gratified to learn you’ve been named chief coordinator. Congratulations.”

  “Thank you,” Trevor said stiffly. “But I’m afraid Tom’s right. My promotion has led to my troubles and I’ve run here to Geraldine’s home for comfort. I’ll be leaving in a second, though. It’s the evening shift for me from now on.”

  “Of course, crimes of the night,” John said, and his eyes fell on Leanna for the first time. He raised his brows questioningly.

  “Care to play charades, with us, Doctor John?” Emma asked. “And we have a custard about to come out of the oven.”

  “I would be a fool to leave such stimulating company,” John answered. “Yes, by all means let’s play and speak of nothing important.”

  “Come, John, be on our team,” Leanna said quickly “and help even things up. Aunt Geraldine has the concentration of an infant and so far the men are trouncing the ladies most thoroughly.”

  “Well we can’t have that, now, can we?” John said.

  6:50 PM

  Forty minutes later, warmed by the custard and the steady flow of conversation, Trevor found himself seated across from John Harrowman at the chess board, while Tom lay stretched across an armchair smoking. The ladies had ventured off and the room was silent save for the occasional crackle of the fire and Tom’s enthusiastic inhalations on the pipe, a ritual he performed with such gusto that Trevor suspected he was a beginner at smoking.

  Trevor glanced at his pocket watch. He had told Davy he would meet him at seven-thirty to begin rounds and it was nearly seven. He should have left some time ago, not let himself be drawn into a game of chess, and in fact he was not even sure if the game was going well or not. John was an enigma; he made his moves quickly and with little apparent forethought, while Trevor was in the habit of lengthy consideration. Trevor had taken the first three pieces, a setback John bore with such cheerful equanimity that Trevor suspected these minimal early losses were part of some overall strategy. Or perhaps he didn’t care about the outcome of the game at all, a thought which gave Trevor pause. He had always viewed chess as a type of mental war and was incapable of playing a casual game.

  “Mind if I ask you something?” he inquired. He had waited until the women were out of earshot.

  “Feel free to ask anything,” John said.

  “Have you heard of a woman named Maud Mitford?”

  John raised his chin, all the complacency out of his face. “How the devil would you know Mad Maudy?”

  “One of the women we interviewed mentioned her. I take it she’s an East End midwife?”

  “Midwife?” John said with a sharp exhalation. “It’s stretching matters a bit to refer to Maud Milford as a midwife. She performs abortions.”

  “Oh,” Trevor said. He was shocked but he tried not to show it. John made a careless move, exposing his bishop, and Tom put down his pipe and sat up a little straighter.

  “Mind you, my objections aren’t moralistic,” John said. “The vast majority of those babies are better off never being born, although perhaps I shouldn’t express such a belief to a man of the law. My complaint with Maud is that she is untrained, stubbornly ignorant, and refuses to observe even the most rudimentary rules of sanitation. Half of the desperate women who come to her don’t live to see another day, killed either by her scalpel or by the nearly inevitable infections which follow. Of course, women who are determined to have an abortion know the risks, but they haven’t much place else to go. Certainly no reputable midwife or doctor would attempt one.”

  Trevor took John’s bishop.

  “And it isn’t just the working women of Whitechapel,” John went on distractedly. “I’ve always suspected Maud’s knife was behind the death of a young debutante last year, a girl from the very best of families, who found herself in need of Maud’s rather unique specialty. By the time she arrived at a proper hospital the gangrene was too advanced to treat.” John shook his head, trying to clear the memory. “A spectacularly horrible way for a sixteen year old girl to die
.”

  Tom stood up, frowning, then went to pour himself another brandy.

  “Seems like the sort of mistake that would put her out of business for good,” Trevor said with surprise, for he couldn’t recall the case making its way to Scotland Yard. “The girl’s family took no interest in who might have done this to their daughter?”

  “Not likely to pursue the story too far, were they?” John said, and his mouth twisted in disgust. “The socially accepted story is that the girl died of consumption and Mad Maudy goes free to turn her scalpel on her next victim… My God,” John said, looking up from the board as comprehension finally dawned. “Are you suggesting she’s a suspect in this Ripper business?”

  Trevor shrugged. “She was seen in the vicinity of two of the killings. From what I gather, she is large-framed enough to pass as a man with the right clothing a bit of a fake facial hair added.”

  “She wouldn’t have to add much,” John said. “She has half a mustache as it is.”

  “Yes, I get the impression she’s rather masculine.”

  “Hardly begins to describe it. I’ve always felt she hated her own sex, that there was a deliberate cruelty behind her carelessness. I’ve offered her some of my instruments, some training…if she’s going to ply her trade she should at least have that much. But each time I’ve been rebuffed. Evidently the high mortality rate of her practice does not distress her.” John looked down and made another bad move.

  “Hates her own sex?” Tom repeated, entranced. “Do you mean she hates them for being feminine, for having obviously attracted a man, which she could not? Or do you rather mean she’s a puritan of sorts who hates them for being pregnant and uses her tools to punish them for their sins?”

  “More of the latter,” John said, impassively watching Trevor take another of his pawns. “It sounds ridiculous to say she’s an abortionist who hates women who have abortions, but -”

  “No, not ridiculous at all,” Trevor cut in. “When you remember the sort of psychology we’re dealing with. I must make it a point to call on this Maud.”

  “Have a drink first,” John advised. “But there’s another thing, something which makes me doubt she’s your Ripper. You’ve stressed how skillfully the dissections were done and I doubt poor Maud could take out an ovary cleanly if you offered her diamonds. And the Ripper writes rather elaborate messages while I’d imagine Maud’s literacy is limited at best.” He casually moved a knight and Trevor stared down at the board, thinking of the letter which had come to the Yard, with its poetic meter and neat penmanship.

  “Both good points, but I’ll visit her nonetheless. Witnesses say she seems to always be near the trouble. It’s a shame you’re going back to school so soon, Tom. I know Gage means well but he’s elderly and, let’s be frank , a bit odd. I’d feel better if there were a young man in the house with Geraldine and the girls.”

  “You don’t honestly feel upper class women are in danger?” Tom asked. “I mean, here in Mayfair…”

  “No, no, you’re right, such a thing is unlikely,” Trevor said, moving his rook. “Paranoia is a natural outgrowth of my job. You’re confronted with the very worst society has to offer and you see it hour after hour, day after day. After a while, the whole world begins to look dangerous to you. Everyone’s suspect.”

  “I’ve had the same problem with medical school,” Tom said cheerfully. “I’ve developed the symptoms of half of the conditions described in my textbooks already. Rashes and tremors and headaches, the lot. Did that ever happen to you, John?”

  “Hypochondria and paranoia are diseases of the educated mind,” John said, taking Trevor’s rook. “At least that’s what I tell myself for comfort, since I’m rather prone to both. It takes a certain level of imagination to concoct dangers where none exist. Or perhaps Trevor’s right and this is all just the natural outcome of the professions we’ve chosen. When you work with the diseased and the criminal all day, they become your reality. You begin to look for those same traits in yourself.”

  “I think I want to be a doctor…” Tom said slowly, looking up at the ceiling, “but there are days when I wonder if I’m more like grandfather, destined for the laboratory. The thing is, I’m not sure I could bear losing a patient. Even if someone were old and sick, perhaps I would torment myself, always thinking there must have been something else I could have done. I suppose you get used to death, though, do you not?”

  “Don’t turn death into the enemy, Tom,” John said, looking at the chess board. “If you do, you will lose every game you play.”

  “But as a doctor, surely you –“

  “As a doctor I can do no more than forestall the inevitable conclusion of a rigged contest. Death is the end we all march toward…. rich and poor, old and young, the healthy and the infirm. All I can do is keep it at bay for a year or a decade, more if the patient is lucky. But death isn’t such a bad thing.”

  Tom frowned at the ceiling. “I should think it’s the worst thing.”

  “Ah…but if we were immortal, how cruel would we be?” John asked, as Trevor confidently advanced his queen. “Fear of death, and what comes after, is all that keeps most men from even deeper depths of depravity than those we currently navigate. If we all lived forever, we would have no fear of God. Perhaps no need of God at all. Immortal men would become their own gods, and I suspect that, given such power, we would be neither just nor merciful. Do you agree, Trevor?”

  “A month ago I might not have,” Trevor said. “But given the events of late I too am beginning to wonder if there’s such a thing as innate human decency. And next month at this time I may be more cynical yet again.”

  “I take it you aren’t predicting a rapid conclusion to the investigation,” Tom said, turning to look directly at Trevor.

  “Well we’ve got it narrowed down to a butcher, an abortionist, the Duke of Clarence, doctors, sailors, the Poles, the Turks, the Greeks, the Jews, Mad Maudy, and a man of medium height who’s wearing a hat. So, no, I think it’s safe to say I don’t predict a rapid conclusion to the investigation.” Trevor slumped back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. “You’ll have to forgive my tone. I’m exhausted and it’s all just beginning. I shouldn’t have come here today, I should have gone home to rest. But I can’t seem to sleep.”

  It was true. Trevor had been up before six that morning to brief the bobbies beginning their rounds, and then there was a whole new gaggle of suspects in the cells to interview. Well, to call them suspects was stretching the point. Everyone on the force, no matter what their ranking, was so determined to find the Ripper that the jails were full of vagrants, drunkards, prostitutes and their customers, and men whose only offense was the imprecise crime of “looking suspicious.” He and Davy had gone through them one by one, filling more sheets of papers with their endless notes, and then broken off about three. Trevor had urged the boy to go home for a few hours rest before they took up again at nightfall. But he had found himself unable to take that same advice himself.

  “I could give you something to help you sleep,” John said quietly, staring at the board.

  At that moment the door opened and Emma entered, carrying three brandies on a tray. The men fell silent as they each took a glass from Emma and thanked her.

  “Will you be back next weekend, Tom?” John asked casually. Trevor had taken his other bishop.

  “I wasn’t planning on it,” Tom said. “I’m dreadfully behind at school, all these problems with the settling of my grandfather’s estate.” He caught himself just in time, remembering how Leanna had pleaded with him to let neither Trevor nor John know of her inheritance. “I have two missed papers to present, but if you think I should -”

  “No, nonsense. Your priority is your studies,” Trevor said sharply, with a glance at Emma.

  But her personal safety was the last worry on Emma’s mind. The thought of Tom leaving tomorrow felt like a knife to the heart. This was no sort of life for her, she thought, hanging on from visit to visit for the pleasure of
just watching him, feeding him, perhaps exchanging a few friendly words with him. And with each departure the ache grew stronger until the weekdays were becoming nearly unbearable.

  Stop it, she thought to herself. He comes and he goes and if you haven’t figured that out by now, you are a proper dunce. All this moaning is more like the thoughts of a wronged romantic heroine. More like Leanna. Aloud she said, a bit saucily, “May the ladies venture back into this smoke-filled den? You’ve banished us for nearly an hour.”

  “Banished you?” Tom protested. “I could have sworn you had banished us. Yes indeed, the ladies must all come back in, I’m bored to death of this masculine conversation.”

  “We’ve been in the doldrums without you,” John laughed. “Checkmate,” he added, glancing at Trevor as he pushed himself back from the table.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  October 4

  3:20 AM

  After their largely uneventful rounds had been completed, Trevor and Davy had stopped off at the Pony Pub, the place Micha Barasik had claimed to be the night of the double murders. Trevor’s choice of a place to drink was not accidental. Barasik’s alibi had been confirmed earlier in the day, so the giant had been released, but something about the situation still niggled at Trevor’s mind. He had offered to buy Davy a beer but the young officer had, quite sensibly, opted instead to go home for a few hours sleep.

  “Not likely much will happen on a Tuesday anyway, Sir,” he’d said. “The Ripper strikes on weekends, doesn’t he, Sir? If we rule Martha Tabram out, the other four were on a Friday or Saturday. Maybe a working man, turns in early through the week but cats around on the weekend.”

  “Quite right, Davy,” Trevor had said, ashamed he hadn’t thought of that himself. “Get some rest and I’ll see you at the Yard tomorrow.”

  The boy had a profound gift for the obvious, Trevor reflected, idly wondering if the barmaid sliding him his pint was the same girl who had provided an alibi for Micha. That bit about the murders occurring on weekends was so basic that everyone else on the case had somehow managed to miss it. For the hundredth time in the last two days Trevor blessed he series of coincidences that had brought Davy Mabrey to his attention.