by Sam Gafford
“Why did you wait so long to bring it to us? Good God, man, he killed two women while you were sitting on your hands!”
Martin looked very put out and indignant. “As you know, Inspector, we are not obliged to share anything with you. That we do so is out of our desire to see justice done. As soon as I made the connexion, I brought it straight here. The note’s right, though, isn’t it? He tried to cut this one’s ears off.”
Abberline ground his teeth and glared at the note. I thought he might tear it apart in anger, but for a different reason this time.
“You know damn well he did. Mr. Martin. I have to ask you not to publish or distribute this letter in any way. It may be vital to the future of our investigation.”
The senior editor thrust his chin upward. “You misunderstand me, Inspector. This is simply a courtesy call. We released the letter nearly an hour ago. By nightfall, it will be in every paper and every home in London, probably the world, will be reading it.”
With that, Martin turned and went to leave, but before he left the room he had one more thing to say. “Oh, you may keep that, Inspector, I’ve had it photographed already and have many copies.”
I’d never seen such anger on Abberline’s face before. If he could have, I believe he would have throttled that newsman to within an inch of his life. Instead, he stomped over to where I was sitting and thrust the letter in my face.
“Look at it, Besame. Is this Machen’s handwriting?”
Glaring, I could find no resemblance between that and Arthur’s writing at all. “No, not a bit.”
He looked at the letter again. “And it’s not the handwriting that was on the wall at Goulston Street either. Damnation! What I wouldn’t give for one simple, straightforward clue! An eyewitness! Someone with a grudge! Anything but this maniacal nonsense!”
The men were standing around, stunned.
“Dew!” Abberline shouted. “Take this. I want it photographed and copies made of it and the envelope, and then I want you to track down any possible clue you can find from it. What kind of paper? Ink? Where was it mailed? You understand me?”
Dew stood stock still and didn’t move.
“What’s your problem? Struck deaf of a sudden? Didn’t you hear me?”
The younger man stared at Abberline with a look of plain horror on his face. “Do you think it’s true, sir? Is this from the Ripper?”
Abberline sputtered as if he were about to have an epileptic fit. “What did you just call him? What did you say?”
“Well, the ‘Ripper,’ sir. That’s what he called himself in the letter there. And, thinking about it, doesn’t it fit? I mean, the way he killed those women, he ‘ripped’ them . . .”
“That’s enough of that! I swear by all that is holy, Dew, that if I hear you or anyone else refer to this killer by that disgusting name, I’ll have your guts for garters. Is that clear to everyone?”
The men nodded and looked away. Slowly they drifted back to their duties. “Get a move on, Dew,” Abberline said. “And as for you,” he looked at me, “finish writing your statement yourself. I’d like to see how your handwriting compares to this note as well.”
He walked away, but I could hear him muttering to himself, “Damn bastard. Can’t let that name stick.”
But it did stick. Within hours, the streets were full of talk about ‘Jack the Ripper.’ The horror had given himself a name.
Chapter 65
Unreal City,
Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,
A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
I had not thought death had undone so many.
—T. S. Eliot
After I had written out and signed my statement, Abberline looked it over carefully. I had taken special care not to elaborate or embellish any of the facts but state them plainly. It was obvious, however, that he was paying more attention to my handwriting itself.
“Well, your handwriting doesn’t match this letter either. Have you ever been to America, Albert?”
I noticed he was now addressing me far more informally than earlier.
“No,” I answered. “I’ve never been out of the country at all. Why do you ask?”
He waved his hand dismissively. “Just a hunch. The writer of this note addresses it as ‘Dear Boss,’ which is a term I’ve only heard Americans use.”
“Unless someone knows that and is trying to confuse you,” I offered.
At that moment, Sergeant Godley finally arrived with Arthur Machen in tow. Although complaining at first, Arthur’s demeanour changed as soon as he saw me.
“Albert! There you are! I’ve been looking for you. Have you heard the news? Two in one night!”
His enthusiasm was unintentionally suspicious, as indicated by Abberline’s frown.
“Right, come along with me, Mr. Machen. I’ve got some questions for you.”
“‘Mr. Machen’? What’s up with that, Fred?”
“I’m working right now, Mr. Machen, and it’s Inspector Abberline, if you please.”
With that, they brought Arthur back to the same room I had occupied only a few hours before. I felt as if I had been forgotten. The men bustled about me in a frenzy of activity, and I half felt that I could have just walked out without anyone stopping me. From the room in back I could hear raised voices, but I could not tell what was being said. Eventually, Godley came back and motioned for me to follow him.
I had been dreading this. Now I would have to face Arthur and accuse him of horrible acts. There was a great part of me that didn’t want to do this, that hoped I had been mistaken or confused. But I knew what I had seen, even if it made no sense.
When Godley opened the door, I could hear Abberline shouting.
“I’ve got a signed statement from a witness placing you right at the scene! I could arrest you right now based on nothing more than that.”
Arthur was outraged but implacable. “I don’t know what your witness saw, but I was nowhere near those places last night. You’ve known me for years, Fred, and you think that I could have anything to do with this? It’s preposterous! I’ve been trying to find the killer!”
At the sight of me, Abberline turned and pointed. “Here’s my witness, Mr. Machen. Your friend, Albert Besame, has sworn out a statement that he saw you at not one but both of the murder scenes last night! And this is a man who knows you! How do you account for that?”
Arthur was dumbstruck. He could not form any words, and I felt a wave of shame wash over me.
“Albert?” he finally said. “You were there?”
“He saw you in Berner Street,” Abberline went on. “Then he saw you fleeing Mitre Square. Two places and two dead women. Now, I ask you again, Mr. Machen, where were you?”
Sergeant Godley chimed in. “He wasn’t home last night, Inspector. His wife said he was gone all night until this morning.”
“Right,” Abberline said. “If you can’t give a good account of yourself, then I’m arresting you for the murder of two women, possibly even four!”
Arthur looked crushed. I could not bring myself to speak.
“I was in seclusion with a friend from last night until early this morning. We . . . we were trying to receive some divine guidance about these deaths and other matters.”
“What?” Godley said. “You were with a priest?”
Arthur shook his head. “No, not exactly. I was with a spiritualist friend of mine, A. E. Waite. We have often worked together to solve unusual mysteries. It was my hope that we would be successful this time as well.”
“And were you?” asked Abberline.
Arthur drew a deep breath. “No, Inspector, we were not. For all our efforts, we received no revelations or assistance. We began last night at nine, and neither of us left that room until almost seven this morning. Satisfied?”
“And why didn’t you want to share this information?”
“Because Mr. Waite values his privacy and because I could not believe that I was a suspect. I still cannot.”
&nbs
p; “Right,” Abberline rose from his chair. “Well, we’ll bring this ‘Waite’ in and see if he corroborates your story. Until then, stay put. Both of you.”
Abberline and Godley left the room, and I was left alone with Arthur.
“What’s this all about, Albert?” Arthur said incredulously. “Why would you say those things? You know they’re not true.”
By this point I’d no idea what was true anymore.
I sat down in the chair opposite him and tried to explain.
“Arthur, I was there. I came upon that first woman in Berner Street, and when I accosted the man assaulting her, I saw that it was you. Don’t try to deny it. I saw you! And then, when I was running around trying to find you, you ran right into me as you fled out of Mitre Square. There is no mistake. I saw you!”
“I’m telling you, Albert. I was never there. I was with Waite all night into this morning. Whoever you saw, it wasn’t me. I swear it. These murders are unnatural—they are not being committed by any man. They are sacrifices and—”
A look of comprehension came over him.
“Albert, listen to me: do you remember that night at the play? When we saw Mary Kelly? Who was she with?”
I slowly began to comprehend.
“She was with a man who looked exactly like you. So that’s who I saw?”
A smile spread across Arthur’s face. “Don’t you see? I’ve been saying that this is all connected to Mary Kelly and that she’s using this thing as her instrument.”
Now he had lost me again. “What thing?”
“Think, Albert! I told you about what Mary and I used to do in the woods when we were children. I told you about the thing we made, remember? It was a dhole—and as a dhole grows in strength, it takes the form of a person. Eventually it takes the place of that person. It’s like the old stories of the creatures that would steal a child from a crib at night and replace it with one of their own. The dhole eventually, if made correctly, becomes that person—so much so that not even a doctor or a lover could tell the difference.”
“Arthur, I don’t know. It’s just too fantastic to believe.”
“Fool!” Arthur cried. “How can I get through to you? How much more do you have to be shown before you believe? Damn your closed Cornwall mind.”
“Yes!” I shouted back. “My mind is Cornwall because I believe in what I can see and touch, not in these fairy tales! Do you know what we believe in in Cornwall? Fish! Fish and the sea. Those are our constants; they are our world. So forgive me if I’m not educated enough to believe in supernatural creatures and women who are the spawn of hell. Isn’t there enough horror in this world already? Must we invent even more?”
Arthur collapsed into his chair. “I am at a loss. I don’t know what will convince you. Was there nothing about this creature you found that was unnatural? Do you touch him?”
A memory of flesh that was disgustingly soft and formless came back to me. “Yes. When I pushed him against a wall, he felt as if he were made of some sort of dough.”
Invigorated, Arthur pressed on. “You must have tasked him and broken his concentration. Did his looks, my face, ever change?”
I nodded. “There was an instant where it went blank, with no features whatsoever. I thought I had imagined it.”
“No, you broke his concentration. He couldn’t hold his form. That’s who you saw in the street this morning, not me. Don’t you see? This proves what I’ve been saying all along. Mary Kelly is behind this, and she’s using this dhole to do her work and throw suspicion on me.”
“What do you mean?”
Arthur was getting very excited. “I’ve just realised it now! Ever since this whole horrible affair began, people whom I’d never met before had been acting as if they’d known me. Remember that first night in the pub? Someone thought he recognised me, and even Mary thought I was the dhole! Then, when we tracked her down to that room in Miller’s Court, the girl who answered the door thought she had seen me but realised she was wrong. All this time, she’s been parading him around, acting as if he were I!”
“But why? For what purpose?”
Arthur made a sound of derision. “For the very same reason we’re here right now, Albert: so that, eventually, someone would accuse me of being the killer.”
“The ‘Ripper,’ you mean. He’s given himself a name.”
“What’s that you say?”
I told Arthur about the arrival of the man from the Central News Agency and the note that they had believed was from the killer. I was surprised how easily I recollected the words.
“‘Jack the Ripper’!” Arthur exclaimed. “Now there’s a name—although I suspect this has nothing to do with Mary or the dhole.”
“How can you say that? Abberline is convinced that it was written by the killer!”
Arthur shook his head. “No, no, this has all the earmarks of being some concoction by a muckraking journalist. I wouldn’t be surprised if that swine Best had a hand in this. He’d sell his own mother to get a headline. Still, I have to hand it to him (if he did make this one up), that’s a definite hook right there. It’ll sell a lot of papers, and that’s all that lot cares about anyway.”
“Then we should tell Abberline about it right away!” I stood up and made for the door when Arthur stopped me.
“Let him chase it. If it is a fiction, he’ll find out soon enough. But one thing you haven’t told me why you were out in Whitechapel at that hour.”
I sat down and filled him in on my fruitless chase of Ann and my discovery that the house where I had been kidnapped was not only empty but a former bordello that had once served as the home of Mary Kelly. For once, I had information that even Arthur didn’t have.
“And Sickert said that Martha Tabram knew Mary Kelly?”
“Knew her and was some sort of apprentice, apparently.”
His face became grave, and he spoke very adamantly.
“That is very bad, Albert, because, if what I suspect is true, Mary has made Ann her new pupil. She may be beyond redemption even now.”
Abberline came into the room with a rather sombre-looking gentleman in tow. He looked to be roughly thirty years old, with autumn-brown hair and a moustache. He was thin but not exceedingly so, and he carried himself with the manner of one who has spent his life in the pursuit of learning.
“Right,” Abberline said, “Mr. Waite, can you verify for me which one of these gentlemen was at your house last night?”
“Certainly,” Waite answered and put his hand on Arthur’s shoulder. “This is Arthur Machen. He was with me in private mediation all night.”
Abberline nodded. “And your servant will testify that he locked you in your study and, when he opened it this morning, you were both still there? Neither of you left at all? Not even for a minute?”
Waite was quite determined. “That is correct. My study has no windows or any other doors. We could not have left that room until it was unlocked. Under my strict instructions, my servant was not to open the door until six this morning. Now, if you don’t mind, Inspector, I’m sure that Arthur has more important matters to attend to.”
“Mr. Besame”—Abberline had reverted to using my formal name—“do you still maintain that Arthur Machen was the man you saw on Berner Street this morning and then fleeing Mitre Court?”
Faced with Waite’s testimony and my increasing self-doubt, I could not be sure about anything. “I—I’m not sure.”
“Right, that’s what I thought. Fine. Machen, you’re free to go, but I might have some questions for you later.”
Arthur got up and headed to the door, as did I. Abberline put up his hand and held me back.
“Not so fast, Mr. Besame, I’m not done with you yet.”
Arthur and Waite were hustled out the door and I was left alone with Abberline.
“Now, then, we’re going to talk about why you’ve wasted a lot of my time this morning, Mr. Besame, and why you were at those two crime scenes. I warn you, however, my patience has be
en worn thin.”
*
It was a long conversation.
In the end, Abberline was still not completely convinced that I had nothing to do with the murders. However, he also had no evidence that I was connected with them. So, after several hours, I was finally allowed to leave. I was advised very strongly to make sure that I was ‘available’ for any questioning later on.
Arthur and Waite were nowhere around, and I assumed that they had left as soon as they were able. Whatever they had been up to the night before, they probably didn’t want to talk about too extensively. My head was pounding and I felt as if I hadn’t slept in weeks. I wanted nothing more than to go back home and fall into a peaceful oblivion before deciding what to do.
The bright sunlight outside was blinding, but it told me that it was already several hours after noontime. I hadn’t eaten anything for as long as I could remember, so I bought a lukewarm meat-pie from a street cart and forced myself to eat it while I rode home in a cab.
Thoughts raced through my head. My body might be exhausted, but my mind was alive with questions and speculations. After all my doubts, had Arthur been right all along? Was there a supernatural explanation behind all this? Could it be that the killer was more than just some deranged madman? Despite all I had seen myself and my own doubts, could I really allow myself to embrace this insanity?
By the time the cab rolled up to my home, I knew only that I had no idea what was going on. As much as I wished to cling to the hope that the city was only being stalked by one lone mad killer, every day produced more and more doubts. All I wanted at that moment was the balm of sleep and quiet dreams.
I would get neither.
*
When I opened the front door, it looked as if a hurricane had been raging through the house. Furniture was overturned. Papers and books thrown about and cabinets opened and dashed upon the floor. Mrs. Hutchins’ prized china had been ripped out of the hutch and smashed into bits. I was suddenly terrified and ran from room to room. Up on the second floor, I found Mrs. Hutchins lying in the hallway, and my heart fell for fear that she had been killed.
Thankfully she had only been knocked unconscious, and I could see a big welt forming on the side of her head. She moaned softly, but when I checked her pulse I found it strong and regular.