The Sixth Victim

by Tessa Harris

  Gilbert can’t back off now. His manhood’s at stake.

  “Right,” he says. He downs his ale in one, then wipes his mouth with his sleeve. “You’re on!” he cries, and we watch as he marches over to the Yankees and challenges one of them to a contest.

  “He’s done it!” Flo is clapping her hands. “Let’s go and watch,” she says to Danny. Like a sulky mongrel, he obeys. He’s betting on Gilbert making a fool of himself, but I wouldn’t be so sure.

  “Come on, Con!” Flo’s tugging at my arm, but I’m not budging.

  “I’d rather sit tight,” I tell her, lifting my drink up in a sort of toast.

  “Suit yourself.” She shrugs, downing the rest of her port and lemon. She hooks an arm around Danny and drags him over to the table where Gilbert is poised to start his arm wrestle. I’m left on my own. I just hope no Jolly Jack Tar fancies his chances with me. I glance over to the lounge bar yet again. The crowd has thinned and it’s then that I catch sight of her a second time. She’s wearing her usual dark blue jacket and matching hat, and, yes, there’s her green umbrella dangling from her arm.

  “Miss Tindall!” I call out, but she doesn’t hear me over the racket. Chin up, she just carries on, not minding the men pressing around her. She’s heading for the door. “Miss Tindall!” I have to reach her. I stand up from the table, but suddenly feel light-headed. The booze has made me a little giddy and I steady myself against my chair. “Miss Tindall!” I call again. My eyes follow the crown of her hat as it bobs along among the crush.

  Over in the corner, there’s quite a crowd. The Yanks are cheering on their man, but Gilbert’s got his supporters, too. There’s jeering and whistling and it’s doing my head in. I need to get out of this place. I need to follow Miss Tindall. I elbow my way toward the door just as it opens. For a moment, I lose sight of her; then my eyes latch onto her hat again as it glides into the night. A moment later, I, too, am over the threshold and outside. The cold air hits me hard and stings my face. For a moment, I’m stunned and my eyes find it hard to make sense of the dark. I blink and in that second I’ve lost her.

  “Miss Tindall!” I hear myself mew pathetically.

  A couple passing by give me an odd look, then tut to each other, like I’m some slut. My head switches from left to right. The gas lamp on the corner is glaring, but I still can’t see far ahead of me. I don’t know which way to turn, until suddenly I see a brougham clopping up Fournier Street and there’s a figure silhouetted in its lights.

  “Miss Tindall! Wait! Please!” My arms fly up and I dash out into the road. The sound of neighing horses fills my ears and I turn just in time to see a cart swerve to the left to avoid me.

  “What the bloody hell!?” The driver is shouting at me, cursing at me. I think I shall cry as he shakes his fists at me. My mouth trembles, and my guts roil, but I scuttle away toward the pavement on the other side of the street.

  “Little idiot. Could’ve got yourself killed!” an old crone scolds, then shuffles on.

  I look about me, then back at the lights of the Ten Bells. They’re getting dimmer now. Pinpricks in the blackness. I turn again and there she is. It’s her. I know it is. She’s about to go down Wilkes Street.

  “Miss Tindall.”

  She stops for a second. Has she heard me? My heart misses a beat. She’ll turn. I know she will. I’m holding my breath. But, no, she walks on and I hear myself bleat as she disappears into the blackness once more. I quicken my pace in pursuit, but I keep my head down. There are two men leaning against a doorway in Hanbury Street. Hanbury Street. My mind flashes to an image of poor Annie Chapman, found with her guts hanging out just a few yards away.

  I swerve to avoid a pool of vomit and pass a dark alleyway. A man’s earthy grunts stab the cold air. They make me shiver. I won’t think on what he’s doing.

  I’m at the junction with Brick Lane. People, thank God. There’s a small crowd outside the Frying Pan. For a moment, I feel a little safer; then I hear someone shout and a punch is thrown. A scuffle breaks out between two men—sailors, I think—and it soon turns into a brawl. I look down the street and strain my eyes toward the brewery. The smell of hops fights with rotting cabbage. She’s there! I break out into a trot.

  “Miss Tindall!”

  She’s no more than ten yards away.

  “Miss Tindall!” I call again, following her round the corner.

  She stops and turns. I stop, too, my heart barreling in my chest. Then it’s like someone takes a sledgehammer to me. It’s not her. It’s an old woman, dressed in shabby garb. Her blue hat’s all battered and the brolly, I see now, is a walking stick.

  “What you want?” she yells, angrily shaking her stick at me. Her face is all bloated by booze.

  I drop back. “Nothing,” I say pitifully. “I thought you was . . .” My voice trails away to a whisper. I’m feeling like a fool and the woman carries on her way into Quaker Street.

  EMILY

  I think her time is growing closer. I could tell from the outset that she was different. Her quick speech and willingness to engage stood her apart from the other bedraggled waifs. She was pleasing to the eye, but not so attractive to the opposite sex as to be a distraction. I did, however, find her large eyes quite captivating and her general mien intelligent and alert. She was older, of course, but at eighteen she was yet young enough to mold. I could still fashion her into a thing of refinement, sculpt her manners and her outlook. Yet, my task would have been futile, had she not been a most willing participant in her own transformation. She lapped up her education like a cat does cream. She devoured the books that I gave her to read, then sought out more—often less suitable ones—of her own volition. Her elocution, at least when speaking to me, was much improved. Her deportment, too, progressed as if she grew an extra inch in my presence. But there was more, a change perceptible only to me—a connection, a synthesis, a synergy, if you like. Between us, there was an undoubted chemistry. Whenever she read to me, or showed me her letters, or, latterly, when we began to discuss politics to a small degree, she would look at me as if to seek my approval in a way that I found both exciting and inspiring. There was an electric charge between us; the spark and fizz in her expression and manner, which had initially attracted me toward her, became quite magnetic. I had not managed to mold her, not entirely, but I had knocked off the hard edges, smoothed out those telltale irritations that make more genteel persons cringe and wince. And now I see that her physical metamorphosis appears to have created a vacuum. She is a glass awaiting a good vintage, a clasp open for a pearl. She is a vacant space ready to be filled, a room ready to be occupied. I think I am pushing at an open door.

  CONSTANCE

  Suddenly I find myself quite alone and it’s started to drizzle. The wind whips the rain right into my face, making my eyes sting. There’s no one about. A dog barks in the distance, but that is all the sound I hear—that and my own footsteps, echoing down the deserted street against the pitter-patter of rain. An eerie darkness is pressing around me.

  I should turn back. A cat leaps up onto a window ledge at my side and damn near gives me a heart attack. Yes, I should turn back. I’m about to pivot on my heels when I hear my own footsteps joined by another’s. They’re heavier. A man’s. I’m too afraid to glance over my shoulder, terrified of what I might see. Could it be him? The cat leaps down again and crosses my path. It’s black. That’s bad luck, ain’t it? I can still hear them footsteps. Someone’s close at hand. I walk in the center of the roadway. I tell myself it’s safer here. His arms can’t reach out of the shadows to grab me. I’ll have more of a chance. If I scream, will anyone hear me? Will anyone come? There are houses all around me, but does anyone know I’m here?

  “Miss Tindall,” I mutter under my breath. “Miss Tindall, where are you?” My words catch in my throat and I start to cry. I feel the hot tears scald my cold cheeks. “I need you, Miss Tindall.”

  The footsteps again! They’re growing closer. Louder. I can hear him breathing. F
eel his breath wreathe my neck. Please, God. No!

  From somewhere up ahead, there’s a great rumbling sound that rises into a thunderous roar and I realize I’ve come to the railway viaduct. The air fills with steam and I press my hands over my ears as a train screeches overhead. All I can think of in that moment is that no one will hear me scream if he strikes me now! I shut my eyes tight, waiting for the steel to rip into my throat. Waiting for him. But he does not come. He does not come. Instead, when I open my eyes, there’s a bright light. It’s so bright that it fills all my vision and then I see her. It’s Miss Tindall. This time, it’s really her. She’s standing there clear as day and she’s smiling at me.

  “Miss Tindall!” I cry. I can’t believe my eyes. “Miss Tindall!” I rush forward, but it’s like my feet are glued to the cobbles. I can’t touch her, but she’s reaching out to me. Then she speaks. She opens her lips and she says to me: “Constance, know that I will always be with you.”

  And suddenly I’m not afraid anymore. All the fretting and the fear fall away from me, like someone’s lifted a load off my shoulders and I feel as content and peaceful as a suckled babe. It’s like I’m wrapped in a warm blanket, in the arms of someone who’ll take care of me. And that’s when I know. I know that from now on, everything will be all right and that he cannot harm me. From now on, I know I have nothing to fear.

  EMILY

  And so it is done. The terror has gone and in its place oblivion. She is lying on the cobbles now, in a swoon. The rain is driving down hard and it is a piteous sight to see her, crumpled like a pile of rags, in the gutter. She will not be alone for long. Help is on its way. A police constable is not ten yards yonder. Soon he will round the corner and come across her. He will stop in his tracks and, for a moment, may even dread that he has come across Jack the Ripper’s next victim. With trepidation, he will edge forward and, with his boot, will gently prod her limp body. He will be praying that she will moan, that she is simply gin-sodden, and not slashed and gutted by this madman who is terrorizing the streets. He will hold his breath until he realizes that she is alive and has simply fainted. Relieved, he will call for help and all will be well.

  How do I know? I know because something happened underneath the railway arch tonight; in a flash, in a moment, something remarkable. Something supernatural. Constance Piper is now me, and I am her. We are one, but not the same. We are a whole, yet divisible. The change will not happen instantly. It will take a little while, but, from now on, she will know I am near. You see, I am present, but I am not. I am to be found underfoot in the cobbles of Whitechapel, on the panes of grimy glass, in the fabric of people’s clothes, on wood and on brick, even floating on the air you breathe. There are traces of me all around—of what was, what is and what will come—but only the chosen few can sense them. And Constance Piper is one of them.

  I will be her guide. I am the lamp in her darkness. I will lead and she will follow. I shall show and she shall tell. She shall be the one to bear witness to the truth, and she shall shine a light into the deepest, darkest corners to uncover man’s direst misdeeds. This is why I returned. This is now my new mission.

  CONSTANCE

  “Con! Con! Can you hear me?” Is that Flo’s voice I hear? It’s all muffled, like she’s talking through a blanket. “Con!” I feel a hand on my arm. I open my eyes and there are blurred shapes all around me. “Oh, thank God!” I hear someone say.

  It’s Flo. She’s beside me in this . . . Where am I? It’s cold and it stinks. I lift my head, but she presses me down gently. “Lie still. You’ve had a nasty accident.” She shakes her head and looks worried. “What was you thinkin’?”

  “Miss Piper.” A man’s voice. Gruff and stern. I turn my head and suddenly there’s a terrible pain shooting up my jaw.

  “I . . . I . . .” I feel the spittle run out of my mouth and down my cheek.

  “Don’t talk, Con,” says Flo, patting my arm. She turns to the man beside her. He’s top to toe in dark blue. I suddenly realize he’s a copper.

  “What the . . . ?” Despite the pain, I raise my head; then, too weak to hold it up, I let it fall back down onto the hard wooden platform that I’m lying on.

  The constable ignores Flo and leans right over me. “Miss Piper, I found you in the street. I could smell alcohol on your breath.”

  “Leave it out, will ya!” scolds Flo. “Can’t you see she’s hurt?”

  I put my hand up to my cheek and feel a crust over my skin. I am grazed.

  “I’ll call the surgeon,” says the policeman.

  But Flo won’t have it. “You’ll do no such thing,” she tells him. “She’s coming home with me right now and we’ll take good care of her there.” She’s like a mother hen when she gets riled, is our Flo.

  I see the copper’s eyebrows lift. He’s not used to being bossed by a girl. All the same, he nods. “Very well. If you think . . .”

  “I do.” Flo cuts in like a boxer with a mean left hook, and she slides her arm under my shoulder and helps me up.

  The room swims a bit before I can make sense of where I am; then the penny drops. The brick walls, the iron grille. I’m in a cell—a cell at the police station—and I don’t like it. I try and heave myself up from the bed. “Get me out of here!” I bleat.

  “ ’Course, Con. You come on ’ome with your big sis.” She takes hold of my arm and pulls me upright. There’s a lamp dangling from the ceiling and for a moment I’m blinded by its glare. Then I remember. I remember what happened before.

  “Miss Tindall,” I mumble. It hurts to move my jaw.

  “What she say?” asks the copper.

  Flo flashes me an angry look. “Nuffink,” she snaps. “She didn’t say nuffink.” And she takes me by the arm and marches me out of the cell.

  “I saw her, I tell ya,” I protest, suddenly feeling a little stronger.

  Flo looks round, like she doesn’t want me to be heard. She pulls me toward the counter, where the old duty sergeant has the discharge book ready for her to sign. Quickly she makes her mark on the paper. As she bends over, I see the door behind is ajar. Inside I can make out at least four rossers, but there must be more. They’re all listening to a man who’s talking. He looks important and he’s waving a piece of paper about like it’s a flag.

  “So there you have it, lads. Saucy Jackie’s latest. He says there’ll be more. It’s our job to make sure there aren’t.”

  It’s the night shift—for all the good they’ll do. He’s too clever for them by half, but at least now they’re taking him seriously.

  “Be careful now,” says the sergeant as Flo hands him back his pen. “It’s not safe for you ladies out there this time of night.”

  Flo snorts. “And don’t we know it,” she replies. “Best get your boys on the streets, eh?” she tells him, jerking her head toward the room where the men are gathered. Then she puts her arm through mine and we’re out into the night once more. I’m not sure how I’ll manage to stagger back home, but somehow the streets of Whitechapel don’t hold as much dread as they did before. Now it’s as if there’s someone looking out for me, watching over me. It suddenly feels very different.

  CHAPTER 22

  Sunday, October 21, 1888

  CONSTANCE

  Next thing I know, I’m waking up in my own bed and it’s light. The sun comes streaming through the holes in the curtains and hurts my eyes. I screw them up and moan. The church bells don’t help, neither, making such a racket. Then I realize it’s a Sunday.

  “It’s all right, love.” It’s Ma. She’s sitting on the bed. “You ’ad us that worried,” she says. But she’s not scolding me. Her words are soft and round, like a big hug.

  Just then, Flo comes in, carrying a jug. There’s a rag over her arm. “I’ll say she did,” she mumbles, pouring out a cup of small beer before setting the jug on the bedside table. “Here,” she says, thrusting the cup in front of my face. It’s plain she’s not as forgiving as Ma.

  I manage to heave myself up on m
y elbows and take the cup. My face still hurts and so does my head. It feels like a football that’s been kicked from one end of Brick Lane to the other. Slowly I part my lips to sip the beer. It feels cool on my dry throat, even though it hurts to open my mouth.

  “You came a real cropper, my gal,” says Ma, shaking her head. “Catching your face on the curb like that.” This time, there’s a note of disapproval in her voice.

  “I hope it learns ya,” chimes in Flo, wetting the cloth. She reaches over and dabs my cheek. I wince. My hand flies up to the right side of my face and I push her away.

  “But I saw her,” I protest.

  “Who?” asks Ma. She turns to Flo. “What’s she on about?”

  Flo and I swap looks. I can tell she thinks I’m off my rocker. “You know you can’t hold ya drink, Connie,” she tells me with a shake of the head.

  I open my mouth again to gripe, but the pain reminds me to keep my own counsel. I slump back on the bolster. It’s no use. I know what I’ve got to do and I’ll just have to do it alone.

  So I wait. I wait until Flo slips off to see Danny, and Ma goes off to church. They thought they’d left me sleeping. But I’ve more important things to do. I ease myself out of bed and pad over to the chest. My head still feels like someone’s driven a coach and horses through it, but I open the lid and take out my old pinny. The card is still there in the pocket. I force myself to focus. Brown’s Hotel, Albemarle Street, Mayfair. I know there is no time to lose.

  EMILY

  Before we rejoin Constance, I must take you back again to the day of my dismissal. I recall little of how I returned to my lodgings that day. I must have been too shocked and dazed to be able to record my journey back to Richard Street. Yet, return I must have, because some while later, I remember my landlady, Mrs. Appleton, banging on my door, asking me if I was unwell. Apparently, I had not emerged from my room for almost thirty-six hours and she was growing concerned about my welfare. I dared not tell her the truth. Kind as she was, it would test even her limits of generosity to give shelter to an out-of-work teacher with no prospects and no other means of supporting herself. I feigned illness, which, as it turned out, was actually prophetic.