Death at Whitechapel (12 page)

Charles had been speaking in a calm, dispassionate voice, but Kate knew him well enough to know that his self-composure masked a deep agitation. He cleared his throat, not quite looking at her. “When we arrived in Dorset Sheet—”

“In the East End?”

“Yes. It's a hellhole. A narrow street lined with squalid lodging houses, surely the most wretched part of the whole wretched East End. Duval Street, they call it now, because of the notoriety. Millers Court, where the woman was killed, was a yard lined with houses, just off Dorset. When we arrived, we saw a crowd of police packed into the courtyard, with spectators flocking in the street outside, amid a great deal of noise and utter confusion. An officer told me that a man had gone to Number 13 that morning to collect the rent. The door was locked, but he had looked through a broken window to see a woman lying on a bloody bed. The police were summoned. Eventually, after a good bit of confusion-Warren had resigned as police commissioner the day before, and nobody was minding the shop—they went through the window, and then broke down the door. The detective inspector in charge, Frederick Abberline, asked me to come in and make a photographic record of the scene.” He grimaced. “It was as bad as anything I'd ever seen on the battlefield, Kate. Worse, in some ways. Throat cut right across, the head nearly severed from the body. Face slashed beyond recognition, abdomen ripped open, breast and arm sliced off, entrails—” He bit off the word. “It is not something you should know about, my dear.”

“It must have been a ghastly sight,” Kate whispered, her eyes on Charles's face. She was thinking how hard it was to imagine the brutal reality of murder; how often in her books she trivialized death, even violent death; how little she really knew of the terrors that flocked like black bats from the darkest cellars of the human heart. The sight that Charles described was one that privileged women should never have seen, should indeed be forbidden to look upon or think about. But it had been a woman who had been butchered in that bloody room. And even though the Ripper had disappeared a decade ago, women like Mary Kelly—an Irishwoman, like herself—still died by violence in the East End, while ladies of Society did not have to see their corpses, or know why they were killed, or try to find any meaning in it. Suddenly it seemed grossly unjust that these women had died and that other women were forbidden to ask why.

Charles's chin had sunk to his chest and his reply seemed muffled, as if he were speaking to himself. “Yes, ghastly. Unspeakably so. Artillery fire can do horrific things to a human body. But in war, the purpose is to kill the enemy, and mutilation is an unintended side effect. In Mary Kelly's case, it seemed to me almost the reverse—that death was a necessary side effect, but the real intent was mutilation. Not random mutilation either, but planned, premeditated, purposeful. Almost as if—” He stopped, frowning. “Odd thing, that. And I had not thought about it until last night.” He fell silent.

Kate, captured by the flow of his thought, could not let him stop. “Almost as if what?”

He straightened, seemingly surprised that she was still there. “You don't want to know, Kate. This isn't a fit subject for you to ponder.”

“But I do want to know!” Kate exclaimed passionately. “Those women, those victims—they've been all but forgotten. Who remembers Mary Kelly? The only name people remember is Jack the Ripper.”

He looked up, studying her face. As if satisfied by something he saw there, he nodded. “Well, then. It's been generally assumed that these crimes were carried out by a lunatic who killed for the mad pleasure of killing. But suppose that the killer was as sane as you and I, and that he acted with purpose. Suppose, for instance, that he—or they—wanted to set an example, or make some sort of statement.”

Kate stared at him. “They?”

“Exactly,” Charles said. “Madmen are incapable of working together toward a single purpose. If we discard the insanity theory, it is just as likely that the Ripper killings were carried out by a group of men. More likely, perhaps, given the rapidity and dispatch with which the killer worked.”

Kate shuddered. A madman—a man with no reason—did not need a motive, and hence was less culpable, or so it seemed to her. What motive on earth could compel a sane and reasonable man—much less a group of men—to butcher five women?

Charles's jaw worked for a moment. Finally, he said, “At the moment, we seem to have two tasks before us. The first, and perhaps the easier, is to learn who sent the typed note to Jennie. When we do this, we may also have found the man who killed Tom Finch, and Jennie will be cleared.” He fell silent again.

“And the second?” Kate prompted, although she thought she knew what his response would be.

Charles roused himself. “The second will be considerably more difficult. In order to clear the Churchill name, it may be necessary to identify the Ripper.”

“Is that possible, at this late date?” Kate asked.

“I don't know,” Charles said honestly. He picked up the photograph once again and held it so that Kate could see it. “There is something odd about this photograph, Kate. Look at the shadows behind the woman.” He handed her the magnifying glass. “And then here, at the highlights on Randolph's face.”

Kate studied the photo with the magnifying glass. “Yes, I see. There are some very subtle differences in the lighting. It seems to be coming from different directions.”

“Exactly. The shadows and highlights are inconsistent with the general lighting of the scene as a whole. I cannot know for certain without examining the negative, but I suspect that the print is a forgery. It looks to me as if it has been created from a montage of two or more carefully positioned negatives.” He eyed the photo appreciatively. “A very clever effort, actually. It would fool almost anyone. Especially a wife who already has her doubts.”

“Doubts?” Kate pulled in her breath. “But Jennie can't possibly suspect her husband of—”

“She might,” Charles said grimly. “In the years before he died, Randolph was increasingly unbalanced.”

“Mentally?”

“Yes. The truth is that he was suffering from syphilis.”

“Oh, no!” Kate exclaimed. “Oh, poor Jennie!”

“Yes,” Charles replied, “poor Jennie indeed. The best that could be said about Randolph's public behavior, even when he was in the Exchequer, was that he was often inexplicably eccentric. Jennie might well have seen private behavior that was much worse. She might have looked at the photograph and recalled times when Randolph seemed capable of such brutal murders.”

“Then you must show her that it is a forgery, Charles,” Kate said earnestly. “She will know that he was innocent, and her mind will be at rest.”

“But that is not necessarily the case, Kate.” Charles's voice was bleak. “In and of itself, this forged photograph is only a forged photograph. It does not provide proof of innocence. And what if the blackmailer either believed or knew that Randolph was guilty? What if he intended the photo to be investigated, assuming that a serious inquiry would eventually prove Randolph's guilt, in some way he could not?”

“I see,” Kate said thoughtfully. “Of course, Randolph is dead and can no longer be held to account. But if the Ripper killings were committed by a group of men—” She stopped. “In that case, Charles, an investigation might endanger
them.
They might be exposed.”

“Precisely,” Charles said. “In fact, it is possible that they discovered the blackmailer and decided to silence him.”

Kate shook her head wonderingly. “If all this is true, how will we ever get to the bottom of it?”

Charles put his hand over hers. “I understand your concern, Kate, and you know that I have supported your participation in other investigations. But this is not a matter in which you—or any woman—should be involved. I am going to London to visit Finch's lodgings, with the hope of locating the negative from which this photograph was printed. Then I'm on to Bournemouth to have a talk with Inspector Abberline, who is retired from Scotland Yard.” He smiled gently. “And you, my very dear, are going to stay here at Bishop's Keep and entertain our guest.”

Kate was tempted to an angry response. The five murdered women had certainly been “involved,” as Charles so delicately put it! And by what right did he believe that he could restrain her activities? Did he feel that because he was her husband, he could tell her what to do? Really—these British gentlemen, thinking that they could control their wives!

But she said none of this. She bowed her head and gave him a sidelong look. “Yes, my lord,” she said meekly. “Is there anything you wish done in your absence, my lord?”

Charles did not look up. “Please tell Jennie what we have talked about and what I plan to do. That might give her some respite.” He spoke absently, for he had once more picked up the magnifying glass and returned to his examination of the photograph.

 

H
earing the rustle of skirts, Jennie looked up from the desk in the morning room where she was writing a letter of instructions to Manfred Raeburn regarding Maggie's subscription list. Kate had come into the room, wearing a thoughtful frown.

Jennie stood. “I'm sorry I ran out so impetuously,” she said ruefully. “It really was awfully rude of me, when both of you are trying to help. I'm sure you must think I am overdramatizing myself—and heaven only knows what Charles thinks. He probably sees me as a spoiled child.”

“Please don't fret,” Kate said. “You certainly are not to blame for feeling upset by all that has happened in the last few days, and before. It is quite dreadful.'

Kate crossed to the tall window that looked out over the park. Her rich, handsome mane of titian hair was pulled back severely, giving her face, with its high cheekbones and firm jaw, an almost sculptured look. She stood erect, her shoulders held rigidly, her face pale. There was tension in every line of her figure, and Jennie thought at once that she and Charles must have quarreled. The thought was accompanied by a swift sadness, and a kind of guilt. They must have quarreled about her.

“You seem upset as well, Kate,” she said contritely. “You have been of so much help to me—how may I help you?”

“I think,” Kate said, “that we must be of help to one another.” She turned, and Jennie saw that her hazel-green eyes held a new look, compounded of anger and firm determination, as if she would flash out. But when she spoke, her voice was quiet and controlled. “Charles says that he thinks the photograph may be a very clever forgery—an image made by placing separate images side by side. A montage, he called it.”

Jennie was at once flooded by a relief so profound that it made her knees weak. “So it's a fraud!” She sank down in the chair beside the writing desk. “There is nothing to the blackmail!” Bitterly, her mouth twisting, she thought of the money she had poured into the scoundrel's pockets. He had
fleeced
her, damn it! How could she have been so weak and foolish? She should have called his hand immediately, instead of giving in to her own worst fears.

“It appears to be a forgery,” Kate said. She went to the teapot on the sideboard and poured each of them a cup of tea. “Charles said that he could not know for certain without examining the negative. And as for there being nothing to the blackmail—that, too, is still in question, I'm afraid. The photograph may be faked and still point in the direction of a truth that you might prefer not to explore.” She offered one of the cups, and Jennie saw a deep compassion in her look. “You'll think my probing impertinent, Jennie, as indeed it is. If you choose not to answer, or tell me to mind my own business, I will certainly understand.”

Still in question?
Jennie was not sure she wanted to know what that might mean. “Please do ask,” she said. She sipped the hot tea and set the cup down on the desk. “If I can't answer, I shall at least tell you why.”

“Very well.” Kate sat in a nearby chair. She spoke in a steady tone, without hesitation. “When you saw the photograph for the first time, how did you feel? What did you think? Were you certain, beyond a doubt, of Lord Randolph's innocence?”

Jennie felt as if she had been slapped, and her breath caught in her throat with a quick gasp. Kate's questions went straight to the deepest heart of the fear she had carried for a full decade, a fear she scarcely admitted to herself and never, ever to another soul—not to Winston or Jack, nor her beloved sisters, nor the dowager duchess. How could she now admit it to Kate Sheridan, whom she had known for only a few months? But unless she nerved herself to speak about her terrible apprehension, it might always lurk in the depths of the shadow like the Ripper himself, waiting to disembowel her with his savage knife. She took a deep inward breath and steadied herself. If she did not speak now, she would never speak.

“How did I feel? I was terrified. The photograph was evidence that Randolph had been with that woman. And no, I could not be certain in my soul that he was not the killer.”

“Dear Jennie,” Kate said softly.

Jennie closed her eyes, inexorably drawn back to a time she had prayed never to revisit. “Those were terrible days, Kate. Randolph was quite ... ill. He was suffering from—” Her eyes came open again. She stopped, unable to bring herself to say the word.