“You were in that carriage?” he thundered, pocketing the glass. “It was dismantled. The driver is in hospital. Jesus Christ, they found severed fingers inside.”
I shrugged with a great deal more nonchalance than I felt. “I was able to escape the worst of it.” With a wince, I remembered I hadn’t the opportunity to properly thank Aramis Night Horse for his protection. He’d used his body as a shield for mine, and not an easily camouflaged one, at that. In any proper, pale British crowd, Night Horse was something of a conspicuous target.
I’d expressed my gratitude to the Hammer—to Jorah—over dinner. And while we were drinking ancient wine and enjoying succulent lamb, Night Horse had been the saber point of a militia charge.
I swallowed an absurd bubble of worry for the assassin.
“Christ.” Croft repeated, his lip pursed into a caustic curl of disbelief. “You have nine bloody lives.”
I began to wonder if Croft’s outward displays of ire didn’t stem from a more profound and primitive emotion. His skin stretched white over his knuckles as his hands curled into fists. A vein pulsed just below his hairline.
In my experience, anger followed quickly on the heels of something more vulnerable. Hurt, perhaps. Or fear.
I’d not want to meet whatever made a man like Grayson Croft afraid.
“Did they ever discover what caused all the madness this afternoon?” I prodded. I wanted to talk about—to think about—anything other than Thaddeus Comstock, Jack the Ripper, or the letters addressed to me that I’d left in police evidence.
Croft shook his head, staring out the windows with a blatant misanthropic cynicism that might have matched mine. “Madness is contagious. It spreads like a disease. Like wildfire. All it takes is tinder. And the entire world is just a pile of kindling waiting to catch on a spark.”
“Is that what happened today?”
He dipped his grizzled chin in a sharp nod. “A mob turns reasonable men into animals, and no one knows why. They’re just swept up in the firestorm. But I’d bet my life that the spark was provided by the Hammer. I’m going to retrace his every step today. I’m going to find where the match was struck and burn him with it.”
It occurred to me that I should be alarmed by this, given the Hammer’s steps intersected with mine for several hours today. Still, my inner alarm seemed to be broken at the moment. Like someone had cut the clapper from its middle so the bell swung wildly but made no sound.
“The Hammer,” I echoed. “Aberline mentioned at the station that he had a hand in squelching the riots, not starting them. Do you disagree?”
“No, the Syndicate was there to scatter the rats. But I wouldn’t put it past the Hammer to have organized the riot just so he could be seen resolving it. It’s a masterful show of force within a city he intends to control.”
I didn’t like the part of me that felt defensive of Jorah.
I didn’t like the part of the Hammer that made me as suspicious of him as Croft. Did I believe him capable of such deviousness as to incite a dangerous riot only to further his own ambition?
Absolutely.
“He’s the key to all of this,” Croft hissed. “I can feel it in my bones.”
“Is that what you’re basing your suspicion of him on? Sensations in your appendages?” I raised a dubious eyebrow at him. He’d have to do better than that to convince me.
Not that I didn’t have my own reservations.
“As a detective, you learn to trust the reactions your guts and bones have.” He pinned me with that hard, emerald glare of his.
I remembered what Dr. Phillips had said regarding this. That intuition was just the brain processing information more quickly than one’s consciousness could comprehend. Or something along those lines.
What did Croft’s bones know about the Hammer that his brain did not?
What did Croft’s bones tell him about me?
I’d seen too many guts—too many bones—to trust them as reliable communicators.
“Those letters you received lead me to believe that my theory would convince even the Ripper.”
I gaped at him. “What could you possibly mean?”
“Clearly, he believes the answer to who killed Frank Sawyer and Katherine Riley lies in what connects them.”
My brows pinched together. “And you think that connection is the Hammer?”
He leaned forward, his arm draping over his knee. “I don’t think it. I know it.”
My heart stopped for a full second before sputtering to life again. “Frank Sawyer owed the Hammer money. But how is the Hammer connected to Katherine Riley?”
“How is that any of your concern?” Croft volleyed back.
“Because,” I wanted to say but didn’t. The Hammer claimed never to have met Katherine Riley.
Had he lied? Again?
I gazed back at Croft, dodging the waves of palpable tension and menace rolling off him like thunderclouds down a mountain.
I wasn’t sure why I reached for him, I just did. My hand landed on his forearm and stayed there. “I think you’re right, Inspector Croft. This is all somehow connected. Frank Sawyer, Katherine Riley, Thaddeus Comstock, Jack the Ripper, the Hammer…and me. If you can tell me anything—anything—that doesn’t suggest that I’m the middle link to this gruesome chain of murders, I’d—” I broke off, unsure what promises to make. What gestures of quid pro quo I was willing to offer. Especially after our most recent conversation. “Well, I’d be grateful,” I finished lamely.
He stared at my hand for a long time, the sinew and fibers of his forearm twitching and flexing beneath his jacket. After a moment, he relaxed, much of his tension releasing on a never-ending sigh. “Did you know I have a sister?”
I fought a growing sense of aggravation. What did that have to do with anything? “I know hardly a thing about you,” I hedged, hoping he’d make a relevant point.
“We were whelped in Northumberland. Street rats, mostly. Our mother died in a factory fire, and our father took off several years before that.” He revealed this all whilst glaring down at my knuckles, a smooth, pale contrast to his.
“I’m sorry to hear it,” I murmured. And I was. Truly.
He lifted one giant shoulder. “We were better for his loss, but not hers. We came to London in search of a cousin we’d heard word of, but what we found were the likes of the Hammer. I, being the youngest, fell in with a gang right away, and Amelia, she…she did about the only thing an uneducated girl can do in the East End for money.”
His sister had been a prostitute. I understood immediately why she hadn’t searched for factory work.
“Amelia had a baby several years ago,” Croft continued. “A little boy. She placed him with Katherine Riley, as many girls in the business do. Including the Hammer’s.” He looked up at me then.
I had to be careful to temper my reaction. “How do you know the Hammer sent his girls to Katherine Riley in particular? There must be many such women who provide services like hers.”
“Easy.” He smirked. “I asked a few of them, and they told me. For a price. Always for a bloody price.”
“It surprises me that any employee of the Hammer’s would dare incriminate him, even for quid,” I said.
“He’s made no real secret of it. The Hammer tells his girls if they end up with a git they don’t want, to take it to Katherine Riley. Said he’d pay extra money to place the child with the best family possible.”
“It sounds like they had a profitable working relationship. Why would he want her dead?”
“That’s what I intend to find out.” Croft sat back, dislodging my hand from his arm. It grazed his thigh before I snatched it back. It didn’t seem that he noticed, so I tried not to either.
“Whoever killed Katherine Riley stole my only chance of finding my nephew. Ms. Riley was trying to help me get in touch with the family who has him. But because of the illegal nature of her business, she’s shite at keeping records. I think we were close, though, and now my siste
r is devastated.”
“Where is your sister?”
“She lives with me. I take care of her…because of what she did to take care of me for so long.”
I absurdly wondered if Amelia Croft’s eyes were as green as her brother’s. Then I realized this must have been Croft’s reason for joining the Metropolitan Police. Not only because he could carve out a better living than down in the tube tunnels swinging a pickaxe or a hammer. Not only because he was the right height and build, but also because theirs was now a respectable life.
Come to think of it, an enterprising man could climb quite high on the social and political ladders within Scotland Yard. It was one of the only ways a man without noble blood could gain a voice in the system.
One of the only honest ways, rather.
“I hope you find your nephew,” I told him earnestly. “I know what it’s like to be without family.”
That seemed to spark an idea behind his eyes. “What did the Ripper mean about your father?” True to his blunt disposition, Croft took aim at the most painful and mystifying words contained in either of the Ripper’s epistles.
“I couldn’t begin to imagine,” I answered honestly.
“Were there any brutal murders of prostitutes back in Dublin or Limerick?”
“Not that I can remember.”
“Perhaps your father investigated something. Or perhaps he…”
I stared at him with hard, bleary eyes, daring him to finish that thought. “I don’t know. My father was a good man,” I said from between clenched teeth. “He was both an altruist and an activist. One of those made him beloved and respected by all who knew him, the other got my entire family killed. He was not, however, a murderer.”
It was impossible to read Croft’s reaction to what I’d said, but his voice was low and soft when he asked, “How did they die?”
“Never you mind how,” I spat. “It has nothing to do with this.” I was not ripping open that wound. Not tonight. And not for him.
“Fiona, eventually, you’re going to have to—”
“Oh, look, we’ve made it home.” I sprang for the carriage door and half-stepped, half-stumbled down to the walk. “Goodnight, Inspector.”
What I wanted to say was, “Go to Hell, Inspector.”
I might have fallen and humiliated myself had dear Oscar not unintentionally caught me.
“Here’s trouble.” He laughed as he caught my hand, wrapped his other arm around me, and swung me around in a perfect waltz. “We must stop meeting like this.”
“Oscar.” I squirmed in his grasp, acutely aware that Croft had emerged from the carriage and was glaring at us with tight-jawed disapproval. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“You’re a fleet-footed Irish woman, Fiona, dance like one!” He kept perfect rhythm despite my protestations, I’d give him that.
“You’re drunk,” I accused, finally managing to twirl out of his grasp, astonished that his breath, alone, hadn’t inebriated me.
“You’re sober,” he slurred with equal dismay. He reached out to stabilize himself on the closest, sturdiest object he could find.
Which happened to be Grayson Croft.
“Well, hello.” Oscar’s warm smile intensified from coquettish to brilliant. “Who is this brute in a suit?”
“Inspector, this is my neighbor, Oscar Wilde. Oscar, meet Inspector Grayson Croft. Now, please let him go.”
Croft offered neither pleasantry nor presage. He stared at me, silently ordering me to make this interloper disappear so we could finish our discussion.
“Who died?” Oscar pressed a hand to the chest of his dinner jacket and glanced to me for verification. “Not Aunt Nola.”
“Not Aunt Nola,” I verified. But a great many others…
Relieved, he adjusted his white bowtie with equally pristine gloves. “Then why so grim, the both of you?” He glanced between us, still yet to release Croft’s shoulder. “I’d beg your pardon for interrupting a lover’s spat but…” He leaned in close to stage-whisper into Croft’s ear. “We both know our dear Fiona hath taken no lovers.”
“Oscar!” I gasped, relieved to note our walkway was deserted at this hour.
“But I do,” he purred, closer, I think, to Grayson’s neck than any other man had ever been allowed to venture. “Take lovers, that is.”
As if that point needed any clarification.
Croft’s expression warned that Oscar’s life was in mortal danger.
Hastily, I clutched at my friend’s elbow and dragged him away from the querulous inspector. “Let’s have some tea in the garden,” I suggested. “I can’t send you up to your wife like this.”
“She and the boys are visiting relations in Dublin,” he informed me with a plaintive sigh. “I’m all alone in the world.”
“We’ll talk about it inside.” I shoved all six feet and three inches of him up my front steps.
“Will the inspector be joining us?” The third word came out inshpecter.
“No.” My gaze clashed with Croft’s. “He was just leaving. He has a murder scene to return to.”
“How ghastly.” Oscar shuddered. “Tell me everything.”
“Good night, Inspector,” I said firmly.
I detected a hint of reluctance in the lines of Croft’s body beneath his long coat.
“This isn’t over,” he rumbled.
“I know.” It never was.
“Good night, then.” He hesitated before swinging back into the carriage. “Lock your doors. And your windows.” He settled in and shut the coach door decisively before opening the window and commanding, “And your grates.”
“I always do.” Unlocking my door, I shoved Oscar inside and did, indeed, lock the portal behind us.
Oscar made a derisive sound. “Grayson. What an apropos moniker. He’s like a giant, fierce storm cloud.”
“Tell me about it,” I grumbled.
“I don’t know whether to be frightened or fascinated by him.”
I didn’t, either.
“You should be frightened,” I admonished. “It’s reckless to all but proposition an officer of the law. He could have arrested you.”
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained!” Oscar sing-songed through the foyer and down the hall toward the back kitchen, where he’d find the garden door. “I need a smoke.”
I followed him, retrieving bits of his expensive attire as he abandoned them along the way. His cufflinks, his tie, his hat, his jacket. “I don’t think Benjamin Franklin was referring to homosexuality when making such a declaration.”
He paused to roll his eyes at me before letting himself out to the garden. “You think that degenerate didn’t sodomize a few beautiful boys in his hedonistic romp through life?”
I wrinkled my nose. I’d never really considered the private antics of great men. And why should I? Though now that the opportunity had presented itself, I’d imagine their tastes were often vast and varied.
I deposited Oscar’s things on a table and joined him on the back stoop. I smoothed my skirts beneath me before settling on the steps, shoulder to shoulder with him. His legs were almost comically long next to mine, even though his feet rested a whole two stairs lower.
“He’d have not arrested me in front of you,” Oscar said with more sobriety than I’d accredited him. “He wants you too much.”
“Don’t be so sure,” I snorted. “He’s that intense with everyone.”
“It’s a wonder he doesn’t explode,” the playwright murmured.
“He probably does, sometimes.” Though I’d not like to bear witness to it and pitied anyone who did. I breathed in the threatening scent of autumn frost and expelled all the horrors of the day on a world-weary sigh.
Nudging me with his arm, Oscar asked, “Are you all right, darling?”
“I’m so tired,” I whispered so he could not hear the tears tightening my throat.
“Of what, my dear?”
“Of blood. Of fear. Of all the terrible things people
do to each other, and all the reasons and excuses they use to do them.”
“Sweet girl. You are right to be tired. And afraid.” He kissed my temple. “It takes a great deal of courage to see the world in all its tainted glory and to love it.”
“Are you still running away to Paris?” I asked.
“I wouldn’t call it running away…”
“I would.” I put my head on his shoulder. “Take me with you?” I was only half-joking.
“What are you running from?” he asked fondly.
“Jack the Ripper.”
He grasped my hand with the force of his shock. “Tell me he’s not after you.”
“No, but he did kill someone tonight. We’re sure of it, this time.”
“How devastating.”
“Not really.” I was more upset that he’d killed Comstock for me, than I was by the journalist’s actual death.
What did that say about me?
“Fiona!” Well, Oscar certainly disapproved.
“He killed a man this time,” I explained. “A bad man.”
“It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious. You are both, if you were wondering.” He took a sage drag 24of his cigarette.
“What about the Ripper?” I gasped. Surely, he was considered evil to everyone.
“The Ripper is tedious, obviously, because he is predictable. Above that, what is charming about murdering whores? Nothing. You’re ridding the world of a lovely laborer, who provides a much-needed service to society. S’like—s’like why would one kill servants or wait staff for simply being who they are? Who, then, would bring you sustenance?”
I usually forgave Oscar for saying such silly things, especially when he smelled of absinthe. “Sex is hardly sustenance,” I pointed out.
“Is it not? Is it not the sustenance of humanity, itself? Is it not necessary for the hunger of the soul? The very mortar which holds the bricks of love together?”
“I wouldn’t know.” I rested my glum chin in my hand.
“That, my dear, is why you are tedious. Once your flower is well and truly plucked, you’ll have a better understanding of things. You should see to that as soon as possible. You’re not getting any younger, you know.”
The Business of Blood Page 23