Lestrade and the Ripper Page 22

  ‘Not so hasty, Lestrade,’ Holmes stopped him. ‘There have been times when you and I may not have seen eye to eye, but I’ve always acknowledged that you and what’s his name, Gregson, are the best of a bad bunch.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Holmes.’ Lestrade tugged his bowler in mock deference.

  ‘Lestrade . . .’

  The Inspector turned to him. ‘We’re not jealous of you at Scotland Yard. No, sir, we are totally bored by you, and if you come down tomorrow there’s not a man, from the oldest inspector to the youngest constable, who wouldn’t be glad to shake you by the throat.’

  ‘Sir! Sir!’ George came at the gallop across the white-coated lawns. ‘A telegram.’

  Lestrade risked exposure by ripping open the envelope. His face fell, but it gave Holmes time to read over his shoulder.

  ‘Ah, the Ripper has been busy again,’ he said. ‘You’ll be going south. Mind if I tag along?’

  Lestrade turned to him again. ‘Regrettably, it’s a free country, Mr Holmes. But if you get under my feet again I’ll wipe you all over the mat.’

  George, Derry and Toms had their instructions to stay where they were, to watch, to wait. Watson received similar orders. Nails fumed at the sudden disappearance of Mr Sherrinford on urgent family business, but he fumed to himself, smashing Gwendoline’s mother’s best china with his deadly cane. He couldn’t remember when a member of his staff had defied him last, but he thought it was 1868, when one of them voted for Gladstone. He hadn’t stayed long after that.

  ‘You have to hand it to Nails, Lestrade,’ Holmes breathed on the frosted window in their first-class carriage.

  ‘Must I?’ Lestrade’s comment was sourer than usual. Holmes had insisted on the first-class compartment which had bitten deep into the Inspector’s pocket; it was cold and another victim of the Whitechapel murderer lay awaiting inspection, as though on a rack at Smithfield.

  ‘The way he’s kept that school going. “Business as usual”, I suppose. Odd, though, that no parents have complained after . . . how many murders is it?’

  ‘Cases of diphtheria,’ Lestrade corrected him.

  ‘Oh, come now, Lestrade,’ Holmes rummaged for the meerschaum. ‘What sort of idiot do you take me for?’

  ‘What sort of idiot would you like to be taken for?’

  The train jolted into life, hissing and clanking as it gathered speed.

  ‘Shame about the bloodhounds, however,’ Holmes smiled, peering at the discomfited Lestrade through the pipe smoke.

  ‘You knew about that?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Holmes. ‘Watson and I were there at the time. Of course, I had hoped for more from the chalked slogan on the wall.’

  ‘You knew about that too?’ Lestrade was even more incredulous.

  ‘Naturally.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ Lestrade remembered. ‘The Professor of London University – not to mention the Sandhurst lecturer.’

  ‘Not to mention, ducks,’ Holmes fluttered his eyelashes and flicked out his tongue, ‘Mog Cheeks.’

  ‘The tall, male-looking prostitute.’ Lestrade clicked his fingers in recognition.

  ‘The same,’ Holmes beamed. ‘Not one of my most convincing disguises. Those damned stays were murder. And as for the beds in Fashion Street . . . Frankly, Lestrade, I don’t see how our great British unfortunates make a living. I made precisely three and twopence in seven weeks.’

  Lestrade pressed himself rather harder into his seat. ‘I could of course arrest you for that.’

  ‘It was all done in the best possible taste, Lestrade. Besides, it was all in the cause.’

  ‘The cause?’

  ‘Of justice, Lestrade. Can there be any higher cause?’

  ‘So what did you make of the chalk scribblings?’ Lestrade was prepared to try any port in a storm.

  ‘Elementary, my dear Lestrade.’ Holmes blew smoke rings to the panelled ceiling. ‘Freemasons.’

  ‘What?’ Lestrade edged forward a little.

  ‘The Juwes,’ Holmes said.

  ‘The Jews are all Freemasons?’

  ‘No, no, the spelling, man. J-U-W-E-S. Jubelum, Jubela, Jubelo, the three masons convicted in antiquity for the murder of their Grand Master.’

  ‘I don’t see the connection.’

  ‘Of course you don’t, Lestrade,’ Holmes smiled. ‘You’re a policeman. According to Masonic ritual, the offending masons had to be killed in a certain way.’

  ‘What way?’

  ‘They had to be strangled first. Read the coroners’ reports again on Mary Ann Nicholls, also known as Polly, Annie Chapman, Liz Stride and Kate Eddowes.’

  ‘Which you’ve seen, of course?’

  ‘Of course. Then, they, the Juwes, were laid on the ground and their throats were cut. Does any of this sound familiar?’

  ‘Horribly,’ confessed Lestrade.

  ‘Between the feet of Annie Chapman, some coins, am I right?’

  Lestrade nodded.

  ‘In a neat line, carefully placed, not scattered by a maniac in a hurry.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘Another Masonic symbol. Finally, the ghastly mutilations. Disembowelling, Lestrade, entrails carefully draped over the shoulder – all Masonic.’

  Lestrade stared at his man. He was still staring at Peterborough when a man got on, struggling with canvasses, brushes and palettes.

  ‘Assuming all this is correct,’ Lestrade and Holmes both ignored the newcomer, ‘do you have anyone in mind?’

  ‘Ah,’ Holmes clamped his pipe between his teeth, ‘I really don’t know why I’m sharing all this with you, Lestrade, but I suppose you need all the help you can get. Reflect for a moment – who is the most senior man on your force?’

  ‘Er . . . Charles Warren, I suppose, but he’s going.’

  ‘Because of public pressure, yes. And quite right, too. The man’s an idiot. But he is also a mason.’

  ‘A mason?’

  ‘To be precise, Past Grand Sojourner of the Supreme Grand Chapter. One of the most powerful masons in the world.’

  ‘Are you saying,’ Lestrade closed to him, ‘that Sir Charles Warren, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, is Jack the Ripper? You’ll be accusing Rodney next.’

  ‘Ah, no,’ Holmes chuckled. ‘Besides, he’s gone already.’

  ‘Gone? But I was with him only days ago.’

  ‘And days ago he resigned.’

  ‘How can you possibly know that?’ Lestrade hated to be impressed in this man’s presence, but events had got the better of him.

  ‘I have my irregulars.’ Holmes tapped the side of his hawk-like nose.

  There was really no answer to that.

  ‘Excuse me?’ A voice in the corner broke the moment.

  ‘Yes?’ Holmes and Lestrade chorused.

  ‘Aren’t you the Great Detective?’

  ‘Yes,’ they chorused again.

  ‘No, not you,’ the interloper ignored Lestrade. ‘It is Sherlock Holmes, isn’t it?’

  ‘Excuse me, Lestrade,’ Holmes preened, ‘this happens to me all the time. It is, Mr . . .?’

  ‘Paget.’ The man fumbled in his Ulster for his card. ‘Sidney Paget, the artist.’

  ‘The artist?’ Holmes enquired.

  ‘I wonder . . . oh, this is joy indeed. I wonder if I may impose on you and Dr Watson here to make a few sketches . . .’

  ‘I am not . . .’ Lestrade began.

  ‘Worthy?’ Paget interrupted. ‘Oh, Doctor, do not, I beg you, undersell yourself.’

  ‘Go on,’ Holmes gave his royal assent, ‘but anything you may hear, Mr Paget, which passes between us, is not to be divulged to a living soul. Do you understand?’

  ‘Of course, Mr Holmes, of course.’

  But it was not with living souls that either of them was concerned.

  The train rattled into Liverpool Street a little after lunch. Paget finished his sketches and promised to send copies to Holmes at Baker Street, Watson at his practice and one to the Strand Magazine fo
r whom he occasionally etched.

  ‘You’d better send one to Inspector Lestrade at Scotland Yard,’ Holmes called to the artist, struggling with his impedimenta through the station smoke. ‘Modesty forbids me to admit it, but I am, for my sins, one of his heroes.’

  Lestrade’s comment was drowned by a sudden burst of steam from the locomotive.

  ‘Where away, Lestrade? I caught the drift of your telegram, but not its gist. Whitechapel, obviously, but where precisely?’

  Lestrade suddenly ducked under a barrier and flattened himself against a wall, beckoning Holmes to him. The Great Detective hurried over, eyes swivelling left and right, wondering what was afoot and whether it was game.

  ‘Here, Mr Holmes!’ Lestrade suddenly lashed out, clamping his man with his handcuffs to the brass bar that ran near the pistons. Too late, the Great Detective lurched forward, succeeding only in scattering the contents of his Gladstone the length of the platform.

  ‘Damn you, Lestrade.’ Holmes rattled the metalwork in his fury.

  The Inspector beamed, tipped his hat and scuttled off through the gawping crowds. On his way, he hailed an employee of the railway company. ‘There’s a madman who’s chained himself to your engine,’ he told him.

  ‘’As ’e now?’ the employee croaked. ‘Well, ’e’d better shift ’isself. It’ll be movin’ off in ten minutes,’ and he hurried to the scene, rolling up his sleeves ominously.

  Further on his way, Lestrade found a constable of the City Force. ‘A madman has chained himself to an engine,’ he pointed to the smoke, ‘and an employee of the railway company is about to do him violence, I fear.’

  ‘Is ’he now?’ The constable adjusted his helmet and whipped out his trusty truncheon. ‘We’ll see about that,’ and he rushed off to enjoy the fray.

  ‘Mind ’ow you go,’ chuckled Lestrade and hailed a passing hansom.

  ‘Morning, Dew.’ Lestrade turned into the cesspit that was Miller’s Court to find the constable shivering, pale-faced, in a corner.

  ‘I think to be accurate, sir, it’s afternoon,’ he said.

  ‘So it is. Had your lunch?’

  Dew shook his head.

  ‘Breakfast?’

  ‘That’s it behind me, sir.’

  Lestrade glanced at the mess on the cobbles. ‘You don’t remember eating any of it, I suppose?’ he said. He turned to face the man. ‘You were first on the scene?’

  ‘In a manner of speaking, sir.’

  ‘All right, Dew. Got any loose change?’

  The constable fumbled in his pocket. ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Get yourself a drink. You need one.’

  ‘But . . . I’m on duty, sir.’

  ‘I won’t tell Mr Wensley if you don’t,’ Lestrade said.

  ‘It’s not Mr Wensley who worries me, sir. It’s Mrs Dew.’

  ‘That’s an order, Dew,’ Lestrade said.

  ‘Very good, sir.’ The constable saluted gratefully and left.

  Lestrade turned to the door of the aptly numbered thirteen. He tapped it with his foot but it stayed put. He saw the window pane smashed to his right and, angling himself gingerly to avoid the glass slivers, eased himself in. It was a slaughterhouse. The walls and floor were daubed with blood, dark and dry now. What was left of a woman lay on the bed, her head turned grotesquely as though to see who had entered her window with so little ceremony. Lestrade suddenly understood why Dew and his breakfast had parted company and why he had not partaken of lunch. The Inspector had seen the Sights before – the threshing machine in the Hard case and the garrotte in the garret – but this reached out and snatched his stomach like the prunes at Rhadegund. There was no nose – it and both breasts lay on the rickety table beside the bed. Entrails were draped around the picture rails left and right. And a line from the Bible came into his mind, he didn’t know why: “For we have a little sister; and she hath no breasts”, he said quietly. Honeybun would have been proud of him.

  ‘Sholto?’ The sound of his name made him jump.

  ‘Fred?’ He peered through the rags and the filthy panes.

  ‘I’ve got a photographer here. The Chief Inspector’s on his way.’

  ‘Is he?’ Lestrade slid the bolts on the door. ‘Then we’d better make this quick.’

  ‘God’ Wensley stepped back from that terrible room. ‘Do I look as awful as you?’ he asked.

  ‘You always did.’ He stopped the police photographer. ‘Had your lunch, Lichfield?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ the sergeant answered. ‘Why do you ask?’

  Lestrade patted his shoulder. ‘You won’t have it long. Don’t touch anything, there’s a good fellow.’

  He led Wensley to the rather less putrid corner of Miller’s Court and together they strolled along Dorset Street, through the crowd kept back by the constabulary. ‘What do you know about this one, Fred?’

  ‘Name’s Mary Kelly, also spelt Marie. She was twenty-four. A doxy. Lived until recently with a Joseph Barnett.’

  ‘Fancy-man?’

  ‘Looked plain enough when I saw him.’

  ‘When was that?’

  ‘This morning. About an hour after Kelly had been found.’

  ‘Who found her? Not Dew?’

  ‘No, he was the first policeman on the scene. The bloke who found her was the landlord, or, to be precise, his assistant, one Thomas Bowyer.’

  ‘She owed rent?’ Lestrade asked.

  ‘Don’t they all? Which reminds me . . .’ He fumbled in his wallet. Lestrade swore he saw moths fly out.

  ‘Do we know how much?’

  ‘Thirty-five bob, I think. Does it matter?’ Wensley asked.

  ‘God knows,’ Lestrade shrugged. ‘I’ve clutched at more straws in this case than a gleaner at harvest time,’ he confessed.

  ‘Sir! Sir!’

  ‘Yes?’ Both Inspectors replied instinctively and turned to find Constable Dew hurrying along the road towards them with a man’s ear between his thumb and forefinger. The rest of the man was muttering and grumbling about police brutality.

  ‘Well, well, Constable,’ said Wensley. ‘What have we here?’

  ‘George Hutchinson, sir. I met him in the Stoat and Salamander. He knows something.’

  ‘Indeed?’ Lestrade signalled Dew to bring the man into a nearby alleyway.

  ‘’Ere, I’m not goin’ in there wiv no coppers,’ but Dew’s boot in his kidneys changed his mind.

  ‘Now, Mr . . . Hutchinson.’ Lestrade leaned back gratefully against a wall and lit a cigar. ‘What is it you know?’

  The labourer decided to try bravado. ‘I know ’ow many ounces in a pound,’ he said.

  Lestrade blew smoke into the man’s face and smiled at Wensley. ‘Ah, a comedian,’ he said and leaned forward. ‘I’m tired, Mr Hutchinson. And my colleague here is tired. And my other colleague has had no lunch. And he didn’t have much breakfast. So let’s stop wasting time, shall we?’ The smile vanished. ‘Or I’ll kick your head around this court like a cabbage.’

  Hutchinson swallowed hard and straightened his hat. ‘Well of course, since you ask so nicely,’ and he took a deep breath. ‘I ’ave known Mary Kelly for free years. I met ’er in Frawl Street at about two o’clock vis mornin’. She said, “’Utchinson, ’ave you got sixpence?” An’ I said “Yes, fanks”,’ and he began to laugh.

  ‘We’ll do the jokes,’ Lestrade and Wensley chorused.

  ‘“Will you lend it me?” she says and I says, “I can’t, I spent all me money goin’ down to Romford . . .”’

  ‘Where?’ Lestrade stopped him.

  ‘Romford,’ Hutchinson repeated with what little dignity it merited.

  ‘What did Mary Kelly do?’ Wensley asked.

  ‘She said she ’ad to get the money some’ow and off she went.’

  ‘Is that it?’ Lestrade was impressed by neither Hutchinson nor Dew.

  ‘No. She walked on towards Flower and Dean an’ met this bloke. I ’eard ’er say to ’im, “All right”, an’ ’e said, “You’ll
be all right for what I’ve told you”, an’ they larfed an’ that.’

  ‘And that?’ Wensley was beginning to lose the thread.

  ‘And then?’ Lestrade put him on the right track.

  ‘They come back past me. An’ I saw ’im.’

  ‘This was two in the morning,’ Lestrade reminded him. ‘How clearly did you see him?’

  ‘Very clear,’ Hutchinson maintained. ‘’E was standin’ under the Queen’s ’Ead.’

  Lestrade looked to Wensley for explanation.

  ‘It’s got a light,’ he said.

  ‘All right,’ said Lestrade. ‘What did this man look like, the one you saw with Kelly?’

  ‘’E was about my age . . .’

  ‘How old is that?’

  ‘Er . . .’ Hutchinson began to work out on his fingers, ‘. . . firty-free,’ he managed at last.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘’E was abaht five and a ’alf foot tall. Yiddish, I’d say. Small ’tache, long coat, dark, pale vest an’ a gold chain. ’Is boots was buttoned wiv gaiters an’ ’e ’ad a ’orseshoe tiepin.’

  ‘Inside leg measurement?’ Dew chipped in.

  Lestrade and Wensley looked at him. ‘Constables,’ Lestrade tutted; ‘they’ll be showing signs of intelligence next. Is that it, Mr Hutchinson?’

  ‘No, indeed.’ Hutchinson was strutting his hour on the stage with relish now, enjoying the crimelight. ‘Vey went in ’ere, along Dorset Street an’ I ’eard Mary say to ’im, “All right, my dear. Come along, you’ll be comfortable”, an’ they kissed an’ went into Miller’s Court.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘I went ’ome. Well, it was obvious ’e was a live one an’ I guess Mary ’ad ’er money.’

  ‘That’s not all she had,’ murmured Lestrade.

  ‘What? Oh yeah,’ Hutchinson sniggered. ‘Good ’un on ’er back is our Polly.’

  ‘Polly?’ Lestrade asked.

  ‘Yeah. Polly, Mary. She answers to bofe.’

  ‘She doesn’t answer to either now,’ Lestrade told him.

  ‘Watchya mean?’

  ‘She’s dead, Mr Hutchinson.’

  The labourer literally staggered against the wall. ‘The Ripper,’ he whispered, ‘it’s the Ripper, ain’t it?’

  ‘Dew,’ Lestrade turned to the constable, ‘take Mr Hutchinson to Leman Street and get his statement, will you? Fred, can I possibly drag you to the Yard?’