Slade stared. “That’s what you discovered in his house in Whitechapel?”
“Yes,” I said. “Niall Kavanagh is the Whitechapel Ripper. The murder victims were subjects in his experiments.”
“Good Lord.” Slade was awed by the truth about Kavanagh and the fact that I’d discovered it. “Kavanagh wasn’t inventing a gun; his work involved determining the cause of diseases. He thought it was a substance that could be taken from a sick person, grown in a laboratory, and passed to other people.”
Slade leafed through the journal, frowning at the illegible, ink-blotted script. “Kavanagh must have been drunk when he wrote this. Look, there’s wine spilled on these pages. ‘Dutch scientists have studied samples of water, soil, and vegetable and animal material under the microscope. They have observed tiny animalcules moving therein. I have repeated the experiments and seen the animalcules myself.’” We beheld drawings of spherical, ovoid, and wormlike creatures. “‘I have a theory that it is some species of these animalcules that are the cause of all contagious diseases.’”
“My friend Dr. Forbes mentioned Kavanagh’s theory,” I recalled. “He said it was met with ridicule and contributed to Kavanagh being expelled from the Royal Society.”
“Kavanagh deserved it,” Slade said. “His theory goes against hundreds of years of learning, the judgment of the best minds in the world, and all common sense. If Kavanagh believes it, he isn’t just a fraud; he’s mad!”
“Madman or not, he’s still dangerous. He’s a murderer even if he can’t help Russia win a war against England.” I was jarred by a sudden idea. “Perhaps we’ve misinterpreted Niall Kavanagh’s work. Perhaps he really has invented a weapon.”
“What are you talking about?”
My idea sprang full-fledged into my mind while I spoke. “We assumed the weapon was a gun. But what if it’s some completely new kind of device for killing?” Slade looked puzzled, and I rushed on: “No matter that his theory is ridiculous, Niall Kavanagh demonstrated that he could cultivate a substance that causes disease and use it to make people sick. Maybe he discovered how to do those things on a larger scale, how to affect more than one person at a time.”
“One couldn’t apply his animalcules to enough people to make a difference in the outcome of a war. Besides, the disease he gave those women isn’t fatal.”
“Other diseases are,” I said, convinced by my own logic. “Fevers, cholera, typhoid, consumption-they kill thousands of people. And what if Kavanagh invented another way to spread the agents that cause those diseases?”
“That’s preposterous. You’ve been writing fiction for so long that you’ve started to believe-” Sudden, dismayed recollection and enlightenment stopped Slade. “The fans. The bicycle with the bellows. That’s what they’re for-to spread diseases through the air. Damnation. You’re right.” Horror filled Slade’s eyes. “If Niall Kavanagh has perfected a weapon of that sort, it could start a plague!”
It hardly bore imagining. “What should we do?”
“ We aren’t going to do anything. You’re going home. I-” Slade paused.
“What?”
He put his finger to his lips. Now I heard the sound of footsteps approaching the house, and the gate creaking. Slade blew out the lamp. We hastened to the window and saw, far below us, three men coming up the front walk.
“Who in the devil?” Slade muttered.
They carried lanterns, but we couldn’t see their faces. They mounted the stairs and disappeared under the roof of the porch. A moment later there came a loud knocking.
“Kavanagh!” one of the men called. “If you’re in there, open up!”
“It’s Lord Eastbourne,” I whispered. “I recognize his voice.”
“Lord Eastbourne!” Slade’s profile, illuminated by the moonlight, showed surprise. “What is he doing here?”
Now was the time to fill Slade in on the remainder of what I’d learned in Whitechapel. I told him about the letter written by Lord Eastbourne. “He furnished the laboratory. Dr. Kavanagh is working for him.”
“My, my, you’re just full of surprises.” Slade regarded me with amusement.
“But I still don’t understand why, if Kavanagh is working for the British government, Lord Palmerston didn’t know about him and the invention.”
“Lord Eastbourne is an ambitious man,” Slade said. “He must have learned about the invention and gone behind Palmerston’s back to hire Kavanagh.”
“But why?” I heard shuffling and muttered conversation from Lord Eastbourne and his men on the porch.
“Maybe he didn’t know whether the weapon would work, and he wanted to wait until Kavanagh came up with a successful model, and then reveal it to Lord Palmerston and the Queen. That would have done wonders for his career.” Slade thought a moment. “He may even be planning to encourage a war between Britain and Russia. That would give him a chance to demonstrate Kavanagh’s weapon, and a victory for Britain would make him a hero.”
“Now I understand why he left me in Newgate Prison. He didn’t want me to tell anyone about Dr. Kavanagh and the invention and have it come out that he’d hired Kavanagh without official sanction.”
“Now I understand what became of the letter I wrote to Palmerston,” Slade said grimly. “Lord Eastbourne must have intercepted it. When he read it, he had a choice: show it to Palmerston, warn him about Wilhelm Stieber, and come to my defense; or protect his secret.”
Outside, Lord Eastbourne called, “Kavanagh!” and pounded on the door. I heard a key rattling in the lock, and the door opening.
“They’re coming in!” I whispered.
Footsteps clattered in the entryway. Lord Eastbourne said, “Search the house.” I heard him and his companions mounting the stairs.
“We can’t let him find us,” Slade whispered.
He urged me under Niall Kavanagh’s bed and slid in after me. We lay facedown, side by side, while the footsteps marched through the house. Despite my terror, I was intensely attuned to Slade-his breathing, his scent, the warmth of his body. I felt an almost overpowering impulse to touch his hand. He lay still and rigid. Light spread across the floor of the tower as one of the men entered. Slade and I held our breath. The man muttered, “Filthy pig,” then left. His footsteps hurried down the stairs, and he called, “Kavanagh’s not here. The house is empty.”
Slade and I exhaled.
“Then we’ll proceed,” Lord Eastbourne said.
His voice came from the direction of the kitchen. I heard him moving around, and splashing noises; then he and his men exited the house. Slade scrambled out from under the bed. I followed. As we peered out the window, we heard rustling noises in the bushes alongside the house, then more splashes. Through the window drifted a sharp, pungent, oily odor.
“I smell kerosene,” I whispered.
Slade turned to face the door and sniffed. “I smell gas. Lord Eastbourne must have opened the taps.”
We looked at each other in sudden, appalled realization. A loud whump came from outside the house; then a roaring, crackling noise. An orange glow of flames lit the night. Slade grabbed my hand. We ran for the stairs, only to find them blocked by flames that coiled along the floor like a dragon and leaped up the walls where Lord Eastbourne and his men had poured kerosene. Slade said, “We’ll have to climb out a window.”
“Why would Lord Eastbourne want to burn down the house?” I asked as we sped from room to room. Flames licked at all the windows; the outside of the building was on fire.
“To destroy the evidence of Niall Kavanagh’s work and anything that could tie it to him,” Slade said.
“Maybe he knows Kavanagh killed those women in Whitechapel. If his relationship with Kavanagh became public, what a scandal there would be!”