“Oh, but I did,” Collin pronounced in a deep, mocking tone. “Your policeman needs to demand satisfaction. What shall it be?” Collin turned frosty eyes on Major Brown. “Pistols at dawn? Fisticuffs at noon? Swords at sunset?” A grudging laugh. “Pick your poison, Major. I’ve a point of honor to settle with you that has nothing to do with my sister.”
Lady Beatrix’s hands flew to her mouth. “Collin! Stop this at once. You’ve gone mad! As crazy as that lunatic who’s slashing innocent women!” She began to tremble so uncontrollably, the lace at her throat and cuffs quivered as if from a strong breeze.
Major Brown, Katie could see, was having trouble remaining calm. His face was contorted and so drained of color that the gash across his cheek stood out like an angry red boil against the dead white of his skin.
Katie had an unfathomable urge to laugh. Not because the scene unfolding was funny, but because Major Brown, with his face twisted up and the veins popping out from his temples, reminded her of the Incredible Hulk when he’s about to morph into an angry beast.
But Major Brown didn’t morph into anything. He just stood there, a furious expression on his face, his fists clenched and white-knuckled at his sides.
It was Reverend Pinker who stepped into the fray.
“Collin! Cease and desist this instant!” Pinker demanded in a low, nervous tone. “Apologize to your future brother-in-law at once, or—”
“Or . . . ?” Collin’s tone was bored, but his face held hard contempt.
“Or my name isn’t Horton Philbert Pinker the third!” Pinker roared, pulling out his Bible and waving it above his head as if to summon God down from heaven. “English common law forbids the practice of dueling! If either one of you is killed, the other will stand trial for murder.”
“Juries never convict,” Collin said with a gloating sneer. “Juries of one’s peers, that is. The nobility are rawther fond of dueling, don’t you know?”
Pinker thumped the Bible to his chest like a shield. “And you know perfectly well that Major Brown cannot participate in a duel. As an officer in service to his queen, he would be court-martialed for appearing in a duel. No. No. This is all wrong. Whatever offense has been taken, you shall have to address it in a manner befitting a peer of the realm and the future Duke of Tywford, not as some low-life, guttersnipe ruffian.” Pinker tugged out a large handkerchief and mopped his profusely sweating brow. “You,” he said, turning to Toby, “and I shall escort Master Collin forthwith to his grandfather’s study. Sir Godfrey will talk sense into him, by heaven!”
“Very well, escort me,” Collin said placidly.
“Yes. Go!” Lady Beatrix sobbed, her tear-smudged gaze swiveling from Major Brown’s implacable face to her brother’s mocking one.
•
The Duke, smoking a cigar in his study with his feet propped on his desk, was gazing out the window when Toby, Katie, and Collin entered, followed by Reverend Pinker, who proceeded to give the Duke a full account of Collin’s transgressions.
“Let that dirty dog be run through with a sword, for all I care!” the Duke thundered. “Let a bullet pierce Major Brown’s heart and be done with it!”
“B-but, my lord!” cried Reverend Pinker, thumping his knuckles on his Bible. “Perhaps you don’t understand the full extent of Collin’s grievous actions—”
“You bloody fool!” the Duke roared. “Leave us! I’ve no use for nincompoop padres!”
Pinker’s neck rose out of his cleric’s collar like an indignant turkey. “But, your grace—”
“Out!”
Moments after Reverend Pinker left, red-faced and bristling, the Duke tugged his cigar from his mouth and clamped his eyes on Toby.
“Lad,” he growled, squinting down the length of the cigar as if sighting Toby through a telescope. “Burn me! You got it all wrong, son. We got it all wrong. Should have seen this coming.” The Duke’s facial muscles were uncharacteristically twitching.
“Sir?” Toby lifted an eyebrow.
Behind him, Collin scrambled across the floor and plunked himself into the armchair by the fire. With a sound like a snuffling warthog, Collin swung his muddy boots onto the leather footstool. “Bloody fool of a padre!” he chortled. “Have to remember to call him ‘Pinker Padre’ next time I see him. Touché, guv’nor!”
Without actually rolling his eyes, the Duke glanced at the stuffed vulture on the mantel, then back to Toby.
“Last night, son, you and I put our thinking caps on. I surmised that it was Collin whom Major Brown would go after for those murders. You thought it was Pinker. You were wrong m’boy, by a long shot.”
Toby froze and glanced at Collin slouched in the fireside chair. Was it possible? Brown was going to implicate Collin? Toby felt the hair on his neck rise up like that of a dog scenting trouble.
“Go ahead,” Collin said, cracking his knuckles one by one. “Take a guess who Major Brown is going to try to send to the gallows?” Collin stopped popping his knuckles and plucked up a half-smoked cigar where it lay balanced atop a stack of ledgers, and clamped it between his teeth.
Toby remembered Major Brown’s look of triumph last night at Dark Annie’s house. And the hatred in his eyes when he spoke to Collin.
“He’s going to try to pin this on Collin, sir? I would have bet my bottom dollar against it.” There was bitterness in Toby’s voice.
“Why’s that, son?”
Toby explained about the code of honor amongst Cockneys. “You never rat out a family member—which Collin will be if Major Brown marries Lady Beatrix. He’s duty bound to protect the members of his family. Even if Collin were Jack the Ripper—”
“Who?” the Duke demanded.
“Bloke killing those innocent girls,” Collin chimed in.
“I read the papers, boy. I thought they were calling that devil ‘The Slasher Fiend’ or some such?”
“Katherine says that after the third murder he’ll be nicknamed Jack the Ripper.”
“Does she now?” The Duke puffed on his cigar.
“Conjecture on my part . . . sir.” Katie shot Collin a warning glance. “I, er . . . heard . . . someone on the street mention that name.”
“Has a catchy ring to it, Jack the Ripper. But bah! Enough. What were you hinting at, Toby?”
“Not hinting, sir. Stating a fact. Major Brown is obliged to honor his familial duties—to defend, shield, protect, even break the law if need be, for Collin. It’s precisely why Scotland Yard has such trouble recruiting Cockney officers. They’ll forsake all else—their sworn allegiance, their oaths of office, everything, to protect a family member.”
“Rubbish. Major Brown doesn’t have a chivalrous bone in his body, if that’s what you’re implying. He doesn’t give a rat’s farthing about Cockney moralities or Cockney conventions. He’s got his own tinpot rules and wants us all to dance attendance. Don’t you see? The only thing standing between my granddaughter, Lady Beatrix, and the fifth largest fortune in England, is Collin. With the heir of Twyford out of the picture, and me dead and buried, Beatrix inherits everything! The estate lands in Devon, the castle in Dartmoor, all the grazing land on the moors, the Twyford jewels, an annual income worth a king’s ransom. Everything except the ducal title. And burn me if Major Brown doesn’t find some litigious loophole to pilfer that!”
Toby’s throat felt dry. “He won’t get away with this, sir. I won’t let him.”
“Oh, he won’t get away with it . . . any of it . . . not while there’s an ounce of breath left in my body.”
That was the exact expression Collin had used right before he slashed Major Brown across the cheekbone with the crop. Toby glanced from the Duke to Collin, and it hit him that the Duke had sent Collin into the dining room to challenge Major Brown. But why? The Duke was from a different era, a generation that chose dueling to settle differences. But even so . . .
“Major Brown is nothing if not tenacious.” The Duke glowered. “The insolent, arrogant dog says he can prove Collin murdered those
women. Says he found a blood-soaked handkerchief with Collin’s initials on the last chit’s body. Probably swiped it from Collin’s room and tricked it out with pig’s blood. But by thunder when the time comes”—the Duke’s voice was choked with a vengeful eagerness—“I shall crush Major Brown like a spider under the heel of my boot. Just watch me.”
“Major Brown’s lying!” Toby stormed. “I was there. I was at number twenty-nine Hanbury Street. I saw the body, sir. There was no handkerchief, bloody or otherwise, with Collin’s initials on it.”
Leaning back in his chair, the Duke grabbed his silver-headed cane and began tapping it lengthwise on top of the desk.
“It gets worse, lad. Major Brown claims that Collin was absent during a portion of the play Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Says Collin could easily have slipped out, strangled the first girl, and hightailed it back to the theater.”
Katie gasped. “No, that’s not possible. I was sitting next to Collin. He left his seat for a short while, it’s true. But so did Reverend Pinker and Oscar Wilde. Toby, too, for that matter. I didn’t see Toby for the longest time. If Major Brown thinks he can implicate Collin on the strength of whether or not he was sitting with me at the theater, Major Brown has another think coming. I’ll vouch for Collin. What’s more, Major Brown arrived halfway though the second act, giving him ample time to have killed that poor girl.”
“I’m afraid, lass,” explained the Duke, tap-tapping the cane rhythmically on the desk, “it’s more complicated than just vouching for Collin. You see, Major Brown believes he can pin this on Collin as easy as pluggin’ a tail on a donkey at a birthday party. But he’s not going to. I’ve seen to it. Brown is now going after a far easier kettle of fish to fry. Burn me for a fool! I’m getting soft. The old thinkin’ apparatus up here”—he pointed a finger to his gnarled temple— “isn’t what it used to be. Major Brown is going after the one person I didn’t anticipate.”
“Who?” Toby and Katie asked in unison.
The Duke opened his mouth, and then hesitated. When he finally spoke, it was in a flat, quarrelsome voice from deep down in his throat.
“Burn me! It’s you, m’boy!” The Duke jabbed the cane in Toby’s direction. “It’s you, lad! He’s got his sights set on you. He can personally place you at the scene of Mrs. Chapman’s murder at twenty-nine Hanbury, and he says he has two witnesses who will swear you entered the back window leading into the room in which Georgie Cross was murdered. There’s a pillow in his possession, with teeth marks, which he found in your room above the stables. Says he’ll swear in a court of law that that pillow was in Georgie Cross’s room when he left the lad alive.”
The room went silent.
Toby watched the smoky sunlight dance across the Persian carpet.
The Duke sighed. “Major Brown paid me a visit this morning. Laid it all at my feet. You’re under house arrest, m’boy. I bought you a little time is all. Won’t be long before they march you off to Newgate Prison. Best I could do under the circumstances was negotiate for house arrest.”
House arrest.
The mention of those two words sent a chill down Toby’s spine. Major Brown was not in the room, but his menacing presence was. The Duke could save only one of them, Toby knew. And he had chosen his grandson. But Major Brown would have his pound of flesh. Toby’s flesh. Swinging from the gallows.
Collin sprang to his feet. “It’s up to you and me, Katie!” he cried, waving his cigar in the air like a bandleader with a baton. “It’s up to the two of us to stop Major Brown, who just happens to be Jack the Ripper . . . and clear Toby’s name.”
With a thunderous thwack! the Duke crashed his cane down on the desk top. The sound of splintering wood reverberated across the room. The Duke’s eyes were brilliantly alive. They roved around and around the room from Toby, to Katie, to Collin. “By thunder, we’re not licked yet!” But his voice cracked just as the wood had a moment before with a sort of groaning, splintering defeat.
Chapter Forty-three
Murder and Mayhem say the loud bells of Bedlam
“Looks as if it’s up to you and me, Katie, old girl,” Collin said. “It’s up to us to stop Jack the Ripper and clear Toby’s name. I know you thought I was crazy when I challenged Major Brown to a duel. Don’t deny it. I saw it in your eyes. But I won’t let Scotland Yard take Toby away. Not Toby. He’s my best friend and my cousin, er . . . illegitimate cousin to be sure, but cousin nonetheless. Major Brown won’t get away with this, not while there’s an ounce of breath left in my body.”
“What nonsense are you spouting off?” the Duke demanded, scowling at Collin. “You’re not going anywhere, m’boy. I can save Toby’s hide. Just like I saved yours. But you have to make a small, legal adjustment to your lifestyle.”
“Legal adjustment? Are you saying I should hand over my legal rights to my bastard cousin . . . ? Because if you are, well . . . that’s a jolly good idea! We’ll claim Toby is my legal cousin. We’ll fake a birth certificate. Shouldn’t be hard to do. Jolly good plan. I’m older than Toby by six months. This way you’ll have an heir and a spare, as they say. Fancy that! Give me the documents and I’ll sign on the dotted line! Good show, guv’nor. Major-bloody-Brown can’t go after two ducal heirs!”
“I wasn’t thinking of anything so . . . convoluted,” chuckled the Duke. “You’ll have to sign, all right. But a document of a different sort. A marriage document.”
“Bloody hell!” Collin yelped. “I’m only seventeen!”
“You’ll be eighteen in December. I was married to your grandmother at nineteen. You shall marry Prudence Farthington, the Earl of Dorchester’s daughter. This is not a request or a polite how-d’you-do. It’s an order.”
“But why on earth—?”
“Like you said,” the Duke roared with laughter. “I need an heir . . . and a spare.”
“Bloody hell! And how does this benefit Toby?”
When the Duke didn’t answer, Collin turned to Katie and whispered, “Looks like you’re on your own with Jack the Ripper, old girl.”
Hurrying out of the Duke’s study, the three teenagers fled through the conservatory and down the hall into the large lofty library where Toby carefully locked the double doors behind them. When he turned and edged past Katie, their elbows touched, and they both flinched.
Watching Katie stride to the long windows at the far end of the library, Toby was all too aware of her physical presence. And when Katie fingered the velvet curtains and stared out at the garden beyond with its lush, green grass and thick line of willow trees, Toby could think of only one thing—in a very short time he would never see her again.
Now that he was under house arrest and soon to be locked up in Newgate Prison, Toby realized how difficult it would be to lose Katie. Just being in the same room with her made him ache in a way he would never have dreamed possible only a few short weeks ago. What were the odds he would fall in love with a girl from a different century who could travel through time? Or that Major Brown would come after him like a bulldog after a rat for the murder of Georgie Cross? He was doomed, past hope. Major Brown would never back down. And Katie, Toby felt sure, was as far from reciprocating his feelings as the moon was from the sun.
Toby tore his eyes from the girl.
Next to the fireplace, flanked by stone gargoyles, Collin had plunked himself down on an overstuffed sofa and was staring up at the top section of the library with its iron balcony circling above. A tea service had been set on a book table next to the sofa, with a plate of biscuits and a silver bowl brimming with butterscotch toffees. There was a strong scent of wood smoke from the lone log crackling in the fire grate.
Collin reached for a butterscotch toffee, took careful aim, and chucked it into the fire where it sizzled and smoked and sent off a burnt-caramel odor.
Katie continued staring out the window. There was a chill in the vaulted library despite the blaze of sunlight outside in the garden and the fire in the grate. On the trees in the distance, Katie could see fl
uttering leaves tipped in yellow and gold, hinting at the autumn to come. A sparrow swooped past the upper window. Everything outside looked bright and cheerful and full of promise, unlike inside where gloom had descended as palpable as the chill in the air.
Behind her, Collin tossed another butterscotch candy into the flames, followed instantly by a tiny pop! as the sugary glob bubbled and blistered and sent off a pungent toffee smell.
With a sigh, Katie swiveled back to the others, avoiding Toby’s eyes. But his face, she saw instantly, was grim and strained as he paced the room. Collin, too, appeared morose as he continued hurling butterscotch torpedoes into the protesting flames.
“Bloody hell,” Collin finally muttered, pitching a handful of the hard candy all at once into the fire where it crackled loudly, then burst into a staccato of small cork-popping sounds.
Poor Collin, Katie thought. The Duke had made it clear that Collin had no choice but to become engaged to Prudence Farthington. And if the family history in Grandma Cleaves’s Bible is correct, Collin will marry Prudence, have a child, and accidently drown in a peat bog all within the next year. There were dark circles below Collin’s reddish-blond lashes, making the whites of his eyes, usually so luminous and clear, appear yellow and dull. I can’t tell Collin that he has only a year to live! That’s a terrible thing to know . . . like having an anvil hanging over your head that’s attached to a ticking bomb. And if we stop Jack the Ripper, that means we can change history. And if we change history, that means Collin’s death isn’t inevitable . . .
“It’s freezing in here,” Collin shouted in a peevish whine. “Ring for Stebbins to add more logs to the fire!” He clamped his eyes on Toby. And although Collin didn’t actually snap his fingers, the effect was the same, as if to say, “Do as I say and hop to it!”
Toby shook his head. “No. We need to talk without interruption. We need to formulate a plan. I’ve been thinking . . .”
Ripped, a Jack the Ripper Time-Travel Thriller Page 32