Fearless (Scarlet Suffragette, Book 1): A Victorian Historical Romantic Suspense Series

by Nicola Claire

Seven

  Let’s Try To Keep It That Way

  Anna

  Sounds came at me as if from some distance. The raised voices of Inspector Kelly and Sergeant Blackmore. The clang of metal on wood on one of the wharves. The rattle of an anchor chain. The shrill cry of a sea bird. The clap of distant thunder.

  “It rains south of here,” Kelly remarked. “Quickly now, Miss Cassidy. Is the murderer likely to still be nearby?”

  The sole reason for him allowing me ingress.

  I didn’t waste time contemplating the rationale for my being granted access to this crime scene. I approached the fallen form with as much haste as my father’s training would allow. The alley was little more than a shoulder width wide. No crates were stacked here, but the grime of an ill-used back passage smeared itself upon every surface at hand.

  The head of the victim was farther away than their shoes. Their clothing dark and dirt stained. At first glance, I was sure this was a dock worker, or perhaps a homeless person having met the nefarious side of the opium market firsthand. But as I crouched down by the boots of the victim, it became swiftly obvious that the body was female.

  That didn’t necessarily rule out the opium den. Of all people, I was acutely aware of this fact. But a dock worker the woman was not. A lightskirt perhaps?

  I pulled my soiled glove off and wrapped a hand around her ankle. Warmth still seeped through the thin material of her stocking, but not much. The chill of the dead had invaded.

  I tested the body’s temperature higher up the leg, having to lean out at an awkward angle over the victim to gain access. I could reach only her knee, just above it. The temperature was barely warmer there. I needed to feel the chest.

  Blood seeped between my bare fingers. Not pulsing with a heartbeat; the mere pressure of my grip had been enough. That and the fact that her thigh had been sliced deeply.

  “We will need to move her,” I said, standing back up and pulling a cloth, to wipe my hand, from my pocket. “But it is possible she has been dead less than half an hour.”

  “He is close at hand, then,” Kelly surmised. “Can you ascertain cause of death?”

  Blackmore appeared with a lantern. I hadn’t even realised he’d disappeared; Kelly the only man at my back while I’d performed my preliminary assessment.

  I took the offered lamp and held it aloft. My head tilted to the side, nose wrinkled, eyes straining, searching for something I couldn’t see nor understand. The victim’s body was covered in slashes, and tears rent her clothing apart. My first thought was a frenzied attack, not unlike Margaret’s. Both Kelly and Blackmore remained silent, witnessing the same similarities as myself.

  How many stab wounds on this one? And which was the killing blow?

  I moved closer still, my feet between the woman’s. Ordinarily I’d take greater care not to stand in any of the evidence, but something disturbing had caught my eye.

  A gaping wound in the stomach.

  I stilled, sucking in air through my mouth as the smell I had registered earlier, and not been able to place, made sense.

  “She has been eviscerated,” I announced, my words hollow. I lifted the lantern higher, angling the light towards the narrowed walls. “But there is no sign of blood on the buildings.” I glanced down, shifting to move her dress skirt slightly, shining illumination on the dirt covered floor. “None on the ground.”

  “What killed her?” Kelly pressed, ignoring my findings and seeking the possibility of a weapon.

  I stepped backwards, more unsettled than I’d like to have admitted. My heart beating too swiftly, my palms indeed full of sweat.

  “Without shifting her, it is difficult to ascertain,” I explained. “But she has been sliced with a blade, repeatedly. And disembowelled.”

  Blackmore whistled, taking his hat off his head and holding it in both hands at his front. He said a small prayer, and then repositioned the bowler. Kelly only stared at the woman. As if his attention alone was enough to discover her secrets. Her hair covered her face, so identification was impossible until we removed her from the alley. I did not want to think what her face would reveal.

  Had she seen her attacker, as Margaret undoubtedly had?

  “This does not go any further,” Kelly suddenly declared. “Do you hear me, Sergeant?”

  “Yes, sir,” came Blackmore’s immediate reply.

  “We keep this from the papers,” Kelly went on. “We deal with only the most certain of men.” He turned to look at the sergeant. “Who do you trust in the constabulary?”

  “Mackey, sir. Without a doubt.”

  “Bring him in on this, but no others. Her body we’ll have shifted to Anna’s.”

  My breath stilled at the ramifications. At the consequences of Inspector Kelly’s words. Why would he consider cutting Dr Drummond? Why was he keeping this from the Police Force?

  “Half an hour, you say?” Kelly queried, his eyes now on me and not the victim.

  “Not much more, if at all. The lower extremities still retain some warmth. I’ll know more once she’s back at my surgery.” I wanted to ask, to press for more.

  Why now? Why this?

  Why me?

  It wasn’t anything I’d said or done; our argument earlier was indication that nothing had changed.

  I looked back down at the body, realising belatedly that this was an escalation in crime from that of Margaret’s. Murder is murder. But there are degrees by which it can occur. This was a departure, a path not many take.

  The Ripper is here.

  I let a slow breath of air out, and searched the scene for something more. Sergeant Blackmore was on his way to organise a constable for assistance, no doubt a cart, as well, to take the body to Franklin Street. But the lack of blood concerned me. And the agitation in Inspector Kelly’s frame distracted even more.

  “What is it?” I said, moving more of the woman’s clothing.

  “I do not wish to leave you here, unprotected.”

  He wanted to chase the killer. Search the dockyard, flush him out.

  “He’s long gone, Inspector,” I offered, following the line of something in the woman’s pocket with my fingers. It was difficult to gain purchase from the precarious angle I was forced to maintain.

  “Half an hour is not long. He could work nearby,” the inspector argued.

  “You believe that?” I queried, wrapping the tips of my fingers around the prize.

  I reached out with my free hand to steady myself, finding the inspector’s palm wrapping around it and holding tight. I glanced back at him, noting he leaned on his good leg, favouring his bad. But still stretched beyond comfortable to ensure I remained upright. I didn’t pass comment; he would not have invited such. Concentrating on my actions, I pulled the piece of paper free and then promptly fell backwards when the inspector tugged on my hand too forcefully. My body tumbled into his legs, causing him to offer a muted grunt in reply.

  I scrambled to my feet, dusting myself down, and pretending I didn’t see him shift carefully. Favouring again that blasted leg. What had happened tonight to warrant such a recurrence of agony?

  “The body was moved here,” I offered, wanting to get his mind off his ailments and onto the task at hand.

  “How do you know?” he asked, bringing himself to full height again; having recovered most admirably. Or simply an expert at masking his pain.

  “Not enough blood for the type of injuries sustained,” I explained, unfolding the paper in my hand while I nodded to the dirt, but not blood, stained walls. “None has pooled beneath her skirts, either, indicating she was already deceased when he brought her here.”

  “He killed her elsewhere. But where?” the inspector wondered aloud.

  I would have offered an answer, but I now had the folded piece of paper flat. I immediately crouched down to get close to the lantern, my hands shaking, my eyes darting from the advert in my grip to the slain body in the dirt.

  “What is it, Anna?”

  I recognised the arti
cle. I’d paid for several to be printed just last month. This may well have been one I had handed out.

  “Anna?” Kelly pressed, leaning down and slowly reaching for the paper.

  My gloved hand had come up to my mouth, my lips trembling. I leaned my upper body against the wall, heedless of the filth, and just concentrated on breathing. On not vomiting. On not breaking down and screaming.

  “A Suffragette,” Kelly said softly, having seen the words, the call to arms for my sisters, the plea and the promise. The battle royal. “She’s a Suffragette.”

  I did not know, but why else would she carry that poster? Why else would she keep it on her person, if not for the address and times of meetings that it held?

  “Are you to attend this meeting? The one scheduled for this afternoon?” Kelly questioned.

  I nodded my head, my eyes for the dark shape of her body. For the hidden promise of her identity in the form of dishevelled hair.

  Who did this to you?

  And please, God, don’t let it be because of that. Not that. Not our fight for what is right. Anything but that.

  “Anna?” Kelly offered carefully, moving closer, just as horses’ hooves and carriage wheels could be heard. He looked back over his shoulder, a frown dominating his expression, and then tapped his cane once on the ground. “Stay here,” he ordered, and strode from the passage.

  I sat there for a moment longer, breathing, praying, feeling too many things, and then I lifted the lantern up and crawled over the body. Brushing her hair back carefully, I shone the light on her face. Recoiling with horror once I saw what had been done. Slashes marred the once cream colour of her cheeks. Her mouth hadn’t escaped the savagery. Sliced as if in punishment for words misspoken. I lifted the upper lip, gazing inside. No tongue. Cut out. The murderer did not like whatever this poor soul had uttered.

  Or shouted.

  The protest rally came back in a flash of blinding colours in my mind. Our voices raised in unison. Our chants that could be heard, I was sure, for miles. Had he disagreed? This man who likened himself to the Ripper. Who modelled his exploits on an evil killer’s deeds.

  Had he silenced her for her beliefs? For mine?

  Her eyelids were closed. Not a mark to be seen. The Ripper had been known to slice crosses on his victim’s eyelids; a decoration he had left on at least Catherine Eddowes, if I recalled. But the concentration of marks on this woman’s face was centred on her mouth and tongue alone.

  Not what she saw, but what she was wont to speak.

  I pulled back, forcing myself to do what my training had until now helped waylay. I looked at her. Not her injuries. Not the parts of the whole, but the whole being.

  Mary Bennett. A Suffragette indeed. Although a reluctant one. Her being involved in the movement was not at my behest, thankfully. But at Ethel Poynton’s. Our self appointed leader.

  How well would Ethel take this?

  How well would any of them? How many would we lose tonight? How far would this set us back?

  It was with a grave sense of guilt that I began to crawl back off Mary’s body, trying my best, but not succeeding, to not disturb the setting. She would have been rumpled further once she was moved. But everything I was doing was going against my training. Against my father’s rules for handling a crime scene.

  I’d almost succeeded in extricating myself by the time I had company.

  “What the devil is she doing, Kelly?” a raised, unimpressed voice shouted from behind me. It sounded harsher in the confines of the small alleyway. Louder and much more opinionated.

  I paused in my movements, half off Mary Bennett and half on. My gloves were now covered in blood, and I had a good portion of it over my dress as well. I hadn’t even thought to remove my coat at all. I dreaded to think how my boots fared.

  “At a guess,” Inspector Kelly’s voice announced, I couldn’t determine his state of mind from the even tone, “examining the victim, sir.”

  Sir. His superior. Superintendent Chalmers.

  I began to move again and instantly a large hand wrapped around my upper arm and hauled me the rest of the way to my feet. I glanced down, suppressing a groan at the sight of my clothing, and then straightened my cloak, making a futile attempt to cover the damage.

  My eyes came up and met the disgruntled grey gaze of Chalmers’. His long, white whiskers twitching with unbridled rage.

  “Have a care, Miss Cassidy,” he remonstrated. “What would your father say?”

  He was right, of course. My father would not be impressed. But I had faced men like Chalmers before. Fear was not an option.

  I turned to Inspector Kelly and said, “Her tongue has been removed. It’s not on her person or around the body. Her mouth was slashed,” I added. “Purposefully, and with great care.”

  “What’s she saying?” Chalmers blustered.

  My eyes inadvertently darted to the superintendent’s. His voice was deliberately hard.

  He was a bully. But a bully in charge of the Auckland Police Force.

  “Do we have an identity?” Kelly asked, drawing my attention away from the snorting bull and back to him.

  Again, I’d hazard a deliberate move. But this one I welcomed.

  “Mary Bennett.”

  Kelly nodded his head; a show of understanding and of his thanks. Identity would have been established upon removal from the scene, but having a name always seemed to make a difference.

  “Mary Bennett, you say?” the superintendent murmured. “My Elizabeth knows her well.”

  Auckland, for all its metropolitan guises, was still a small city.

  “And you want to keep this quiet?” Chalmers queried, turning on Kelly, and dismissing me in one last disapproving glance.

  “The nature of the injuries and the timing, so close to the last murder, will cause a riot,” Kelly offered.

  “I don’t know, Kelly,” Chalmers replied, looking back at Mary’s body. “If it gets out that we’ve kept this from the papers, it could all blow up in our faces. It is an election year, you know?”

  “I am aware, sir. But panic is the last thing we need. The last thing the mayor’s office needs.”

  Chalmers looked up at Kelly sharply. The disapproving gaze I’d received now directed at the inspector.

  “Either way,” the superintendent eventually argued, “this could come back to haunt us in a manner you haven’t ever seen.”

  “You’d be surprised what I have seen,” Inspector Kelly offered neutrally.

  I wondered just what the inspector was referring to, but the superintendent’s next words made the puzzle slip completely from my mind.

  “Be it what it would, get Drummond in on this straight away.”

  I let out a small breath of air, the only indication of my disappointment. I looked up at Kelly, his eyes already on me. A wealth of apologies in that one heavy gaze. This hadn’t been his intention. This hadn’t been what he’d meant when he’d told Sergeant Blackmore to keep the crime from the papers.

  How had the superintendent heard of the murder so quickly? When Kelly and Blackmore hadn’t even mentioned his name? Perhaps they inherently trusted him. Perhaps they had no choice in the matter; he was their superior officer, so immediately informed of the crime.

  It didn’t matter. It was irrelevant. I was being locked out of the case.

  “Keep me abreast of your progress, Kelly,” Chalmers demanded, beginning to walk away. “I want firsthand knowledge of how this develops for my Elizabeth,” he said over his shoulder. “And make sure, man, that Miss Cassidy is kept out of the way.”

  My hands fisted at my sides.

  “We’re a professional operation, after all,” the superintendent added gruffly. “Let’s try to keep it that way.”

  Eight

  In Every Way But Reality

  Inspector Kelly

  Anna’s mouth fell open and then, in the next heartbeat, she was striding towards the superintendent. A fiery glow to her eyes. Her body the fluid and graceful
charge of a wildcat; it seemed to mesmerise, to slow down time to this single moment. I stepped in front of her, receiving a second shock in as many hours.

  Soft breasts pressed up against me, as a whoosh of heated air left her mouth. I stared at her lips for too long, then stepped back and straightened my jacket.

  “Anna,” I started.

  “Don’t you Anna me!” she growled in return. “How dare he?”

  “He has every right,” I explained. “Drummond is the official chief surgeon.”

  “And yet, you did not want him to know about this crime.”

  “He has a tendency to gossip,” I offered. “Word will get out now.” Just how long we could get ahead of the papers remained to be seen.

  Anna let out a slow breath of air, as though releasing her anger and disappointment in that one expulsion. She bit her lower lip and turned back to look at the alley. Of all her miraculous talents, her ability to acclimate to any situation was the most impressive. Anger did not rule her as it so often did myself these days.

  “What else can you tell me?” I enquired, desperate to appease.

  If it were my choice, she would be chief surgeon. But it was not my choice. And Drummond was too connected by far to be toppled by anyone else’s hand but the superintendent’s.

  “He did not perform the murder here,” she said slowly, eyes scanning the alleyway and the two walls either side. “Then why the blood at the entrance?”

  I paced back to the opening and looked at the spot Anna had soiled her glove at. The blood was smeared, from Anna at a guess. But it would be difficult to determine now if that was indeed the case.

  “An invitation to enter,” I deduced. “He wanted us to find the body.”

  “He knew you were in Mechanics Bay this morning.”

  I nodded, looking around the street we were on. Noting the closed warehouses, some abandoned, some in operation but loading bays were down the side, out of sight. Some merely vessels for storage, little activity going on within.

  “He brought her here,” I announced, “while it was still dark enough to go unnoticed in such a disused part of the dockyard. Making his escape possible. But he also knew we were in the vicinity.”