Fearless (Scarlet Suffragette, Book 1): A Victorian Historical Romantic Suspense Series (25 page)

I let a slow breath of air out and took one last longing glance around the place.

Sometimes the battle seemed so daunting. Too long and dark and unfair.

If you believe in it, then you fight for it
, my father had always said.

“Very well, Chief Constable,” I announced, forcing strength into my voice which was not there. “I’m sure we’ll meet again some day.”

“Not here, miss. If you’ve got a lick of your father’s sense to you.”

I smiled. “I am my father’s daughter, after all.”

Davies offered a huff of breath in reply, making his whiskers fly for a moment. And then I picked my magazine up, careful not to crush the edges as I placed it inside my reticule - the article was all the evidence I had, all the evidence we needed, if they’d only take the time to read it - and then turned to leave.

Across the room, the door to Inspector Kelly’s office was open, the man himself watching on with dark eyes, thin lips and creased brow. He didn’t acknowledge me, so I forced my gaze off his stern features - features, which although hard, were at once so familiar and so very welcoming to me - and walked with head high and shoulders back out of the room. Out of the building. Out of that world.

Winter was on its way, I noticed, as I made the footpath outside. The brush of its chilled fingers crossed my cheek making me realise it throbbed slightly from where Mr Entrican had inadvertently struck. I lifted a gloved hand to press carefully against the bruise there, noting the pain was sharper than I’d at first imagined.

Mr Entrican had a strength to him even when not exerting himself overmuch.

I tugged the cuffs of my sleeves down over my gloves and pulled my cloak around me more firmly, and then set off in the direction of Albert Park. My mind a tumult of discordant thoughts; old memories washed with recent horrific images, amalgamating in a volatile cocktail of desperately unwanted emotions

But I am a Cassidy, and as such I forced my feet to take me past where Helen had been found. The fountain had been scrubbed clean of all evidence of wrongdoing. The cast iron shapes of the cherubs and their dolphins appearing much darker in contrast to the pristine waters that flowed from their horns. Or perhaps it was the knowledge of what they had witnessed.

I paused mid-stride.

Helen. Helen had died here. Alone with a killer who’d plied her with drugs. What had she thought as he wielded the knife above her? Had she been capable of conscious thought at all?

My fists tightened on the drawstring of my reticule as impotent anger surged through me, making my body tremble from head to foot. I could only pray she was not of sound mind in the end, for the things he had done were too horrific to bear thought. But think on them I must.

What had she seen? A Militia Guard, with fervour in his eyes at the notion of murder?

Or a devious chameleon, capable of ruse with precision, and intimately acquainted with opium based substances?

And not just opium, was it? But something not even the scientific community had yet fully and broadly acknowledged.

“Your man is familiar with the dark dens, in particular the one located down in the dockyard area,” I said to the inspector who had stood silently at my back as I’d faced Helen’s demise again.

He stepped forward, his body facing my side, his eyes alighting on the bruise that was surely colouring my cheek by now.

I spoke before he could make another move or utter a single sound. I couldn’t be dissuaded yet, not here in front of the memory of sweet Helen’s death.

“His knowledge is not simply perfunctory either,” I added, noting the way the inspector clenched his hands out of the corner of my eye. “He has a deeper understanding of science, one aspect that has only recently been discovered.”

“And what would that be, Anna?” Kelly asked in a low but infinitely soft voice.

I turned to look at him, unable to resist the draw. His hand reached up and cupped my cheek, above the bruise. His gloved thumb offered a gentle stroke and then was gone.

I closed my eyes, then undid my reticule, pulling the magazine from its depths and finding the article.

“Lazăr Edeleanu,” he read. “I don’t understand.”

I leaned forward and pointed to the line I wanted him to read.

“It’s in its early stages, but Mr Edeleanu has discovered a way to synthesise a central nervous system chemical which is said to offer unprecedented stimulant effects.”

“Stimulant?” he queried, uncertain eyes lifting to my face.

“Combined with the chronic use of
lachryma papaveris,
or opium as we know it, it is said that
phenylisopropylamine
can have a maddening effect. One that induces an unusual amount of strength for the person partaking of it.”

“Madness and strength,” Kelly repeated.

“Your murderer is also well learned in human anatomy,” I added. “His skill allowing him to excise with precision.”

Kelly lowered the magazine and looked me in the eye.

“What are you telling me, Anna?”

I held myself upright and met his searching gaze.

“The Militia Guard is none of these things. You know it, Inspector. He lacks the intelligence, the education and I am sure the right combination of toxicology.”

“Not something we can check,” he pointed out.

“A search of his home should uncover the truth of it,” I shot back.

Kelly sighed, staring at the fountain as though it affronted him. Perhaps it did. His memory would be as solid as mine.

“It is not the Militia Guard,” he consented, making a rush of relieved air leave me.

Perhaps there
was
a way for us to work together.

“He is unmarked,” he offered.

“Unmarked?” I asked, confused.

“Margaret Thorley. Or had you forgotten? She managed to fight back. Drummond found skin and blood beneath her nails.”

I
had
forgotten; I too had witnessed the evidence of a fight on her person. Had in fact been the first to suggest it.

The smart hurt. Drummond again.

“Anna,” Kelly said softly. I didn’t trust the tone. “We are on this. You need not concern yourself any longer. Look after Wilhelmina, she needs you.” In other words the station, the police,
he
, did not. “I appreciate this information, but from the date of the article it is only a recent discovery. Think you not it a far stretch for the Antipodes?”

“Not at all,” I shot back. “I am a colonialist, am I not? I reside on the far side of the globe, an Antipodean as you call us. If I am aware of this drug, then perhaps there is another.”

“Perhaps,” he conceded.

Silence as we both recovered from the exchange. But a resolution or agreement had not yet been reached, so I forced myself onward.

“There is more,” I said, reaching into my reticule again and pulling free a copy of the latest letter from the murderer. I’d taken the time to write the words down before I left the house, lest I forget them. Perhaps it hadn’t been a wasted move; I’d overlooked Margaret’s fingernails, hadn’t I?

Too close to the victim, my father would have said.

I distanced myself now.

“This is the letter,” Kelly remarked, sweeping narrowed eyes over the missive. “In your hand,” he added, either recognising my penmanship or making an educated guess.

“
‘Never fear, for I shall guide you,’
” I recited from memory.

“No,” Kelly announced, balling the letter up in his fist. “Absolutely not!”

I smiled. Not for his words, although the vehement tone did please me. But because Inspector Kelly, for all his insistence that we should not work together, knew me so very well.

“I offer myself as bait, Inspector,” I said, and received a dark scowl in reply.

Twenty-Two

Spare Me Your Winsome Talents, Miss Cassidy

Anna

“Are you mad?” the inspector demanded. His question was punctuated perfectly with the clap of distant thunder. “There is no way on God’s earth that I’d allow you to endanger yourself.”

“You are not in a position to make that call,” I pointed out reasonably.

“I’m a police officer,” he offered. “The detective in charge of this case. I can have you banned.”

“Too late,” I whispered and watched his face fall as comprehension dawned.

“Anna,” he said softly, as the first patter of rain started to fall.

I adjusted my hat and blinked up at him. I was not going to let him bully me on this. More women were sure to be killed. The next could very well be Mina.

“He has a taste for it, this murderer,” I announced. “He is not ready to stop. Indeed, he has only just begun.”

“That is not argument enough to warrant your involvement.”

“He has connected with me,” I went on, ignoring his counter attack. “His letters are delivered to my home.”

“Even more reason to keep you out of this.”

“It is my opinion he seeks. My approval. Yet he also sees me as a pupil.”

“I refuse to listen to this!” Kelly snapped, turning away and starting to walk. His cane tapped down angrily, splashing in puddles that had started to form from the persistent rain.

“You know I’m right,” I said, running to catch up with his long strides. The heavens opened up as if in answer, drenching us from head to toe in five seconds flat.

I hugged my reticule to me, in order to protect the article within, but there was nothing to be done for my hat or silks. Of all the days to leave my parasol at home!

“I know nothing of the sort,” Kelly growled back.

“I want to do this,” I offered.

“Desire does not make it right,” he said with such heaviness that for a moment I thought he might be speaking of something else.

“Wilhelmina will be targeted next,” I tried desperately.

“You cannot know that, and I have a constable on your house, keeping guard. Where you should be, I might add.” He turned to look at me upon delivering those last words and came to a sudden stop. “You’re drenched.”

“S..so are you,” I managed in reply, teeth chattering.

“Bloody hell,” he muttered, removing his long coat and throwing it over my shoulders. He kept a hand on my upper arm and looked up, no doubt searching for a tree to take cover under. But we’d walked some distance away from the fountain without knowing it, farther away from the trees that lined the main paths.

Closer to the old barracks themselves.

“Damnation,” he muttered, grasping my hand in his and pulling me toward the cluster of buildings.

I was so busy looking down at his large hand wrapped around my smaller one that I managed to trip on the uneven ground. Kelly reached around and caught me, swearing again in a most impressive manner, and then I was up and in his arms, his cane hanging ineffectually off one wrist, as he practically ran with me towards the door to one of the barracks.

It wasn’t until he’d unlocked the door, placed me down on my sodden feet, and removed himself to light a candle, that I realised he’d barely limped at all. I stood dripping puddles of rainwater onto the wooden floor as I watched him light more candles, the illumination outside darkening as the thunder clouds closed in even more. He stopped beside a set fireplace and crouched down to light it. Heat seeped into the cold space, tendrils of warmth reaching out and beckoning me closer.

I took a step and felt more water sluice off me, so stopped where I was for fear of dripping all over the room.

It was only then that I looked up to determine what this building was used for and found myself walking again without conscious thought. My feet took me to a large board, covered in notes and newspaper articles, photos and post-mortem reports.

Names jumped out at me. Mary Ann Nichols. Annie Chapman. Elizabeth Stride. Catherine Eddowes. Mary Jane Kelly. More and more were crossed out with big Xs in red ink. Annie Millwood. Mina Smith. Ada Wilson. Martha Tabram.

The Whitechapel Murderer
one newspaper article declared.
Leather Apron
another shouted in bold print.
Ghastly Murder In the East End
a third pronounced.

My eyes skipped to the closest post-mortem report.
Five teeth missing and slight laceration to the tongue
for Mary Ann “Polly” Nichols. A bruise marred the right side of her face, the surgeon had written. My hand lifted to my own cheek, feeling the tenderness left by Entrican. I shook myself and moved closer to the board, searching, searching, searching for what I was unsure. But determined to find it.

The body was terribly mutilated
, one line read.
The throat was dissevered deeply
, the same report went on to say. The blade six to eight inches long and sharp and narrow.

There was indication of anatomical knowledge, it said of Annie Chapman. Again the neck had been cut. For Catherine Eddowes he’d drawn the intestines out and placed them carefully over her right shoulder. Like an ornament on a Christmas tree. Her ear had been cut. Her face mutilated, eyelids sliced. She’d bled out from a carotid artery puncture.