Gasping, Mark peered over the ledge. Over and down, down to the courtyard and the fence-rail encircling the walk below.
Skewered upon the iron spikes, something dangled. It wasn’t a stranger any more, and it wasn’t Eva. The form was as limp as a rag doll, and the face leering up at him bore a doll’s garish grin. One spike had pierced the neck, and a second impaled the skull to emerge through the left eye. From the empty socket a single teardrop oozed.
The tear was red.
And so were the flames leaping through the room behind him.
~ FORTY-FIVE ~
“More tea?” Mrs. Abberline said.
“No, thank you.” Mark settled back in the wing chair, favoring his left shoulder. Beneath the bandage the wound still throbbed, but it was healing nicely now. If only memories would heal as easily—
Inspector Abberline caught his wife’s eye. “Would you excuse us? We’ve things to discuss.”
“Of course.” Setting the teapot on the table near the fireplace, she left the room and closed the door behind her.
“Now,” said Abberline. “From the beginning.”
Mark spoke softly, reciting his encounter, reliving it as he stared into the fire. The flames were rising, just as they rose last night when he fought his way through the blazing room, then stumbled down the smoke-choked stairway to safety in the street below.
By the time help arrived it had been too late. The house was like a tinderbox, the firemen said. They puzzled over how the conflagration had started, but Mark didn’t explain. Taking advantage of the confusion, he melted back into the gathering crowd and left the scene, grateful for shadows that concealed telltale bloodstains soaking through the slashed shoulder of his coat. Luck was with him; he moved unobserved along side streets to reach the safety of his room. There he cleaned and dressed the wound, then sank into slumber.
It was late morning when he awoke, and almost midafternoon before he nerved himself to seek out Abberline here at his home.
Now the inspector listened silently. Mark searched his face for a reaction, but it was merely a motionless mask looming before him in the firelight.
At last he spoke. “You know you committed a criminal offense by leaving. I could take you in charge. Why didn’t you stay and explain what happened?”
“Because you’re the only one I can trust,” Mark murmured. “If I told them and they didn’t believe me—”
“They wouldn’t.” Abberline paused. “But I do.”
“Then you think I was right about the murders?”
The inspector nodded slowly. “In the light of evidence, it appears to be so. The two of them must have worked together. One imagines Pedachenko approached the women, leading them to a secluded spot where Eva was already hiding in wait. Undoubtedly she came at them from behind, twisting the scarves or handkerchiefs around their necks as a stranglehold while Pedachenko used his weapon.”
Mark closed his eyes, trying to shut out images that came unbidden. Eva, clutching a helpless victim in a death-grip while her lover drove his blade deep into the throbbing throat—
“No wonder they got away so easily,” Abberline was saying. “As a couple they’d be unnoticed. Scattering false clues around some of the bodies to puzzle the police was a cunning move. And those letters, the handwriting on the wall — the master-touch to confuse us all.”
“But who could dream of such a thing?” Mark opened his eyes as he replied. “Outside of us there’s nobody who would even suspect.”
“Only one,” Abberline said. “I think Gull knows.”
“Sir William?”
The inspector nodded. “Remember what Lees told us about the man he followed? Gull swore it was Prince Eddy’s coachman, but we know he lied. I believe Pedachenko went to Sir William’s house on the afternoon of the ninth, before Kelly was killed.”
“For what reason?”
“Blackmail.” Abberline leaned forward. “I’ve nothing to go on except circumstantial evidence. Still it makes sense, if you follow my reasoning.
“We’re aware that Eddy paid secret visits to the East End. Gull admitted as much and told us how the Prince managed to elude him. But what if someone else happened to see him there?”
“Pedachenko?”
“Exactly.” The inspector lowered his voice. “I think Eddy’s excursions had a purpose. As a future ruler, he’d be expected to marry and provide an heir to the throne. But this would be impossible unless he felt assured of conquering his homosexual cravings. Obviously the only way to find out was to put himself to the test. He couldn’t risk proving his manhood with a lady of the court, but it would be no problem if he went to Whitechapel incognito and found a whore.”
Mark shook his head. “I can understand he wouldn’t take the chance of being recognized in an upper-class brothel. But I can’t see him approaching one of those ugly street-women in the slums.”
“Mary Jane Kelly wasn’t ugly.” Abberline pivoted to face Mark. “Suppose Pedachenko happened upon Eddy in Kelly’s company one evening and recognized him?
“It’s common knowledge that Gull is Eddy’s personal physician. As such, Pedachenko sought him out, told him what he knew, and demanded a price for his silence.”
“Are you saying that Sir William Gull conspired with Pedachenko to commit murder?”
“Certainly not! I’d hazard he merely listened and then paid whatever sum Pedachenko was asking. He probably expected him to divide the money with Kelly in return for keeping her mouth shut.
“But I don’t believe Gull knew anything about Pedachenko’s real intentions. I think the news of Kelly’s murder came as a total surprise. And our visit was an even greater shock. All he could do was divert suspicion with that lie about the coachman’s visit — not to shield himself, but to protect Eddy and the Crown.”
“Perhaps you’re right,” Mark said. “But how can we be sure? It’s only a guess.”
Abberline grimaced. “In my line of work we prefer to call it deduction. Under the circumstances that’s all we have to go on.” He rose, pacing before the fireplace. “At least it gives us a partial picture of the way Kelly was killed, and the reason.”
“Partial?”
Abberline grimaced again. “We’ll never really be certain of how Pedachenko got hold of the key to Kelly’s room. He may have come there as a customer after seeing her with Eddy, and stole the key then. That would explain why she went with him so willingly the night of the murder, because he wasn’t a stranger.
“Kelly didn’t know Pedachenko had taken the key. She didn’t know he’d given it to Eva, and that she was already inside the room, waiting. She didn’t know what the two of them had in store for her. Just as we can’t know the details of the bloodbath that followed.”
Bloodbath. Mark closed his eyes again but the vision burned behind them; the vision of Eva and her lover, two shadowy forms crouching in darkness over the butchered body on the bed.
Bloodbath and blood-lust. Forbes Winslow was right after all. But who would have suspected that the quiet country girl could be capable of such savagery? Perhaps she herself was unaware until Pedachenko awakened the impulse within. The secret impulse linking pleasure with pain… In a way, she too was a Ripper victim.
He forced himself into awareness as Abberline continued. “But we do know what happened when it was over,” the inspector said. “The clothing you found in the closet tells us as much. Eva must have burned her own bloodstained clothes in the grate and donned the cheap outfit she’d brought with her for that purpose. It was Eva, disguised as Kelly, whom those witnesses saw when she left the next morning. Pedachenko, of course, was long gone.