by Kim Newman
‘There have been vampire traitors before.’
‘But not, I think, like our Sergeant. I am only beginning to make out the extent of his activities. He is the tool of greater forces. Perhaps greater forces than a simple policeman and a soldier can hope to best.’
They emerged from the alley and stood by the Sergeant’s building. Without discussion, they understood that they would now break in and search the murderer’s rooms.
While Mackenzie looked both ways, Kostaki splintered the door-lock with a firm grip. In the Old Jago, this would not be unusual or suspicious behaviour. A sailor, pockets pulled out and empty, zigzagged past, eyes rolling from gin or opium.
They slipped into the lodging house, and climbed three flights of narrow, precipitous stairs. Eyes looked at them through holes in doors, but no one intervened. They came to the room where the light had been. Kostaki broke another lock – somewhat stouter than he would have expected in this pit – and they were inside.
Mackenzie lit a stub of candle. The room was tidy, almost military in its precision. There was a cot, sheet tighter than a wrestler’s stomach muscles. On a desk, writing materials were laid out square as if for an inspection.
‘I have cause to believe our fox not only the destroyer of Ezzelin von Klatka,’ Mackenzie declared, ‘but also the would-be assassin who put a bullet into John Jago.’
‘That makes little sense.’
‘To a soldier, maybe not. But to a copper, it’s the oldest game in town. You stir up both sides, set them at each other like dogs. Then sit back and watch the fireworks.’
Mackenzie was going through papers on the desk. There was a fresh bottle of red ink and a neat pot of pens beside the blotter.
‘Are we dealing with an anarchist faction?’
‘Quite the opposite, I should think. Sergeants do not make good anarchists. They have no imagination. Sergeants always serve. You can carve an Empire with Sergeants behind you.’
‘He is following orders, then.’
‘Of course. This whole business has the whiff of the ancien régime, don’t you think?’
Kostaki had an intuition. ‘You admire this man? Or at least, admire his cause?’
‘These nights, that would be a very unwise opinion to harbour.’
‘Nevertheless...’
Mackenzie smiled. ‘It would be hypocritical of me to mourn for von Klatka, or even to express sympathy for John Jago.’
‘What if it had not been von Klatka, what if it had been...’
‘You? Then, things might have seemed different. But only seemed. The Sergeant would make no distinction between you and your comrade. That is where I part company from his masters’ thinking.’
Kostaki thought for a moment. ‘I may lose my leg,’ he said.
‘I am sorry for that.’
‘What do you intend to do about the Sergeant? Will you let him continue to serve his unknown cause?’
‘I told you I was a copper before I was warm. When I have a case Warren can’t ignore, I’ll lay it before him.’
‘Thank you, Scotsman.’
‘For what?’
‘For your trust.’
There were a great many pages of loose paper, covered with a cypher or shorthand that resembled hieroglyphic script.
‘Hello,’ Mackenzie said, ‘what have we here?’ He held up a pencilled draft of a letter. It was in plain English. ‘Lestrade will be sick with envy,’ Mackenzie said. ‘And Fred Abberline. Kostaki, look...’
Kostaki glanced at the paper. ‘Dear Boss,’ it began, and it was signed ‘Yours truly, Jack the Ripper.’
44
ON THE WATERFRONT
The body had washed up on Cuckold’s Point, at the curve of Limehouse Reach. It had taken three men to drag it out of the sucking mud and deposit it on the nearest wharf. Before Geneviève and Morrison arrived, someone took the trouble to lay the corpse out into a semblance of dignity, untangling the limbs and arranging the water- and dirt-clogged clothes. A length of sailcloth was draped over the dead man to protect the sensibilities of dock-workers and waterfront idlers who happened by.
He had already been identified by an inscription in his watch and, surprisingly, a cheque made out to his name. Nevertheless, they were formally to confirm the corpse’s identity. As the constable lifted the sailcloth, several on-lookers made exaggerated sounds of disgust. Morrison flinched and turned away. Druitt’s face had been eaten by the fish, exposing empty eye-sockets and a devil’s-grin of bare teeth, but she knew him by his hairline and chin.
‘It’s him,’ she said.
The constable dropped the cloth and thanked them. Morrison seconded her statement. A wagon was ready to receive the body.
‘I think he had family in Bournemouth,’ Morrison told the policeman. The constable took a dutiful note.
The Colonel had kept his word. Druitt’s pockets were stuffed with stones; no suicide note had been manufactured, but the inference was inescapable. Another unpunished murderer was at liberty: the police would mount no campaign against him, there would be no special investigators from the Diogenes Club. What was so extraordinary about the Ripper? Within fifty yards of the river, there would be a dozen as cruel, as profligate. The Whitechapel Murderer was presumably a madman; Moran and his kind had not even that excuse. Their murders were simply stock-in-trade.
With Druitt hoisted on to the wagon, the show was over. The idlers drifted off to the next spectacle and the policeman returned to his duties. She was left with Morrison, at the edge of the wharf. They walked towards Rotherhithe Street, a row of rope-merchants, public houses, sailors’ lodgings, shipping offices and bawdy houses. This was the Arabian Nights quarter of London, a bazaar in the thin fog. A hundred different languages mingled. It was a heavily Chinese district and the rustle of silks still touched her with dread.
At once, a veiled figure was in her way. A vampire in black pyjamas. She bowed an apology and her veil parted. Geneviève recognised the Chinese girl from the Old Jago, who had spoken for the Lord of Strange Deaths.
‘There will be reparation for this wrong;’ she said, ‘you have the word of my master.’
Then, the girl was gone.
‘What was that about?’ Morrison asked.
Geneviève shrugged. The girl had spoken in Mandarin. If Charles was to be credited, she could guarantee that Colonel Moran would not avoid the consequences of his actions. But if punished, it would not be for brutal murder but for unnecessary brutal murder.
The girl had disappeared into the crowds.
Geneviève did not intend to return immediately to the Hall. She wanted to seek out Charles, not so much for himself but to enquire after the condition of his unfortunate fiancée. Penelope Churchward, whom she had met once and hardly warmed to, was the latest of her concerns. With multitudes shovelled into the furnace, how many could she save? Not Druitt, certainly. Not Lily Mylett. Not Cathy Eddowes.
Morrison was talking to her, confiding in her. Having heard nothing, she begged his pardon.
‘It’s Dr Seward,’ he repeated himself. ‘I’m worried that he’s making a fool of himself with this Lucy of his.’
‘Lucy?’
‘That’s what she calls herself.’ Morrison was one of the rare individuals who had met Jack Seward’s mysterious lady-love, and he had not been impressed. ‘Personally, I think we’ve seen her before. Under another name and in shabbier clothes.’
‘Jack has always ridden himself too hard. Perhaps this amour is the cure for his habitual exhaustion.’
Morrison shook his head. He was finding it hard to express his exact thoughts.
‘Surely, you can have no social objection to this girl? I had thought those concerns well behind us,’ said Geneviève.
Morrison looked sheepish. Himself of modest birth, his work should have given him an understanding of the situations of even the meanest and most degraded.
‘There’s something wrong with Dr Seward,’ he insisted. ‘He is calm and even-tempered on the sur
face, more so than of late. But underneath he is losing his grasp. He forgets our names sometimes. He misremembers which year it is. I believe he is retreating to some Arcadian time, before the coming of the Prince Consort.’
Geneviève pondered the notion. Recently, she found Jack hard to read. He had never been as open to her as others – as Charles, for instance, or even Arthur Morrison – but in the past few weeks he had given away almost nothing, as if his mind were behind lead shutters as stout as the cabinet in which he locked his precious wax cylinders.
They stopped walking and she took Morrison’s hand. At the touch of his skin, tiny memories burst. She still had Charles’s blood in her; with it came fly-blown specks of faraway lands. She kept seeing a face in pain, which she assumed to be his late wife.
‘Arthur,’ she said, ‘madness is epidemic with us. It is everywhere, like evil. There is little we can do to ease the condition, so we must learn to live with it, to make it serve us. Love is always a species of insanity. If Jack can find some purpose in this spinning world, what harm can it do?’
‘Her name isn’t Lucy. I think it’s something Irish... Mary Jean, Mary Jane?’
‘Hardly proof of direst perfidy.’
‘She is a vampire.’ Morrison stopped, realising what he had said. Embarrassed, he tried to smooth over his prejudice. ‘I mean... you know...’
‘I appreciate that you are concerned,’ she told him, ‘and to an extent I share your misgivings. But I don’t see what we can honourably do.’
Morrison was plainly torn inside. ‘Still,’ he said, ‘something is wrong with Dr Seward. Something should be done. Something.’
45
DRINK, PRETTY CREATURE, DRINK
Her touch had changed him. For two days, Beauregard had been troubled by dreams. Dreams in which Geneviève, sometimes herself and sometimes a needle-fanged cat, lapped at his blood. It had always been in his stars. The way things were, he would sooner or later have been tapped by a vampire. He was luckier than most, to have given blood freely rather than be drained by force. He had certainly been more fortunate than Penelope.
‘Charles,’ Florence Stoker said, ‘I’ve been running on for close to an hour, and I declare you’ve not heard a single word. It’s plain from your face that your thoughts are in the sickroom. With Penelope.’
Oddly guilty, he let Florence continue in her belief. After all, he should be thinking of his fiancée. They were in the drawing room, awkwardly superfluous. Florence consumed cup after tiny cup of tea. Mrs Churchward occasionally darted in with a noncommittal report and Mrs Yeovil, the housekeeper, would regularly appear with more tea. But, absorbed in his own thoughts, he paid them no mind. Geneviève had taken blood from him, but given something of herself in return. She ran and turned about like quicksilver in his mind.
Penelope was attended by Dr Ravna, the specialist in nervous disorders. A vampire, he had a reputation in the field of diseases of the un-dead. Dr Ravna was with the invalid now, attempting some treatment.
Beauregard had been in his daze for two nights and had neglected his duties in Whitechapel. Penelope’s infirmity provided an excuse but an excuse was all it was. He could not stop thinking of Geneviève. He was afraid he wanted her to drink from him again. Not the simple thirst-slaking of an opened wrist but the full embrace of the Dark Kiss. Geneviève was an extraordinary woman by the standards of any age. Together, they could live through the centuries. It was a temptation.
‘I suppose the wedding will have to be cancelled,’ Florence said. ‘A great pity.’
There had been no possibility of a formal discussion, but Beauregard assumed his engagement to Penelope was now at an end. It would be best if lawyers could be kept out of it. There was no real fault on either part, he hoped, but neither he nor Penelope was the person they had been when they entered into their understanding. With all the other troubles, the last thing he needed was a suit for breach of promise. It was hardly likely, but Mrs Churchward was old-fashioned and might consider that her daughter had been insulted.
Geneviève’s lips had been cool, her touch gentle, her tongue roughly pleasant as a cat’s. The draining of his blood, so slow and so tender, had been an exquisite sensation, instantly addictive. He wondered what she was doing just now.
‘I cannot understand what Lord Godalming was thinking of,’ Florence continued. ‘He has acted most peculiarly.’
‘How unlike Art.’
A screech sounded through the ceiling, barely human, followed by a whimper. Florence cringed and Beauregard’s heart contracted. Penelope was in pain.
The Jack the Ripper business was dragging on without fruit. The faith expressed in his abilities as an investigative agent by the Diogenes Club and the Limehouse Ring might well be misplaced. He had, after all, accomplished little.
A personal note of apology had arrived from the Professor, informing him that Colonel Moran had been severely reprimanded for his interference. Also there had been a peculiar missive in green ink on thin parchment, informing him that Mr Yam, whom he took to be the Chinese elder, would no longer be inconveniencing Mlle Dieudonné. Apparently, a commission had been undertaken, but the Lord of Strange Deaths no longer felt obliged to carry it out. Beauregard made a connection with a news item buried in the pages of The Times. A singular invasion, a burglary-in-reverse, had occurred at the home of Dr Jekyll. Apparently, an unknown person effected an entry into his laboratory and scattered fifty gold sovereigns over the ashes of the elder vampire that the scientist had been examining.
‘Sometimes I wish I had never heard of vampires,’ Florence said. ‘I told Bram as much.’
Beauregard mumbled some assent. The doorbell rang and he heard Mrs Yeovil scuttling past the room to admit the caller.
‘Another well-wisher, I should think.’
Yesterday, Kate Reed, Penelope’s new-born journalist friend, had come by and loitered in embarrassed impotence for half an hour, mumbling sympathetically, then found an excuse to dash off somewhere. She had hardly set Penelope a good example.
The front door was pulled open, and a familiar voice explained: ‘I don’t have a card, I’m sorry.’
Geneviève. He was on his feet and in the hallway before he could think, Florence trailing after him. She stood on the doorstep.
‘Charles,’ she said. ‘I assumed I would find you here.’
She stepped past Mrs Yeovil and slipped off her green cloak. The housekeeper hung it up.
‘Charles,’ Florence prompted. ‘You are being remiss.’
He apologised and made an introduction. Geneviève, on her best behaviour, touched Florence’s hand and made a passable curtsey. Mrs Churchward was in the hallway now, come down to investigate the new arrival. Beauregard made a further introduction.
‘I understand you are in need of a doctor familiar with infirmities of the un-dead,’ Geneviève explained to Penelope’s mother. ‘I have not a little experience.’
‘Dr Ravna of Harley Street is with us, Miss Dieudonné. I should think his services sufficient.’
‘Ravna?’ Her face betrayed her opinion.
‘Geneviève?’ he asked.
‘There’s no polite way of saying it, Charles. Ravna is a crank and a buffoon. He’s been a vampire six months, and already he’s declared himself the Calmet of the age. You’d be better off with Jekyll or Moreau, and I wouldn’t trust them to lance a boil.’
‘Dr Ravna comes most highly recommended,’ Mrs Churchward insisted. ‘He is welcome in all the best houses.’
Geneviève waved that aside. ‘Society has been known to make mistakes.’
‘I hardly think...’
‘Mrs Churchward, you must let me see your daughter.’
She fixed her eyes on Penelope’s mother. Beauregard felt the persuasive force of her glance. The wound on his wrist tickled. He was sure everyone noticed how often he fidgeted with his cuff.
‘Very well,’ Mrs Churchward said.
‘Think of it as a second opinion,’ Geneviève said
.
Leaving Florence and Mrs Yeovil behind, Geneviève and Beauregard followed Mrs Churchward upstairs. When Mrs Churchward opened the sick-room door, a dreadful odour seeped out. It was the smell of things dead and forgotten. The room was heavily-curtained, a single fishtail gaslight casting a pale half-circle on the bed.
Dr Ravna, sleeves rolled up, was bending over the patient, taking a set of tongs to a wriggling black thing fastened to her chest. The bedclothes were rolled back, and Penelope’s chemise was open. A half-dozen black streaks were fixed to her breast and belly.
‘Leeches,’ Geneviève exclaimed.
Beauregard swallowed his nausea.
‘You damned fool!’ Geneviève pushed the specialist aside and laid her hand on Penelope’s brow. The patient’s skin was yellowish and shiny. She was red around the eyes and angry marks dotted her exposed body.
‘The impure blood must be drawn out,’ Dr Ravna explained. ‘She has drunk from a poison well.’
Geneviève pulled off her gloves. She plucked a leech from Penelope’s chest and dropped it into a basin. Working methodically and without distaste, she detached all the sluglike things. Bloodspots welled where their mouths had been. Dr Ravna began to protest, but Geneviève stared him silent. When the job was done, she rolled up the bedspread, and tucked it around Penelope’s neck.
‘Fools like you have much to answer for,’ she told Dr Ravna.
‘My credentials are of the finest, young lady.’
‘I’m not young,’ she said.
Penelope was conscious but apparently unable to speak. Her eyes darted and her hand took Geneviève’s. Even ignoring the obvious symptoms of her illness, Penelope was different. Her face had changed subtly, her hairline shifted. She looked like Pamela.
‘I just hope your leeches haven’t destroyed her mind utterly,’ Geneviève told Dr Ravna. ‘She was already sick and you’ve dangerously weakened her.’
‘Is there anything that can be done?’ Mrs Churchward asked.