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Authors: Carole Nelson Douglas
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far-fetched tales constructed around the acts of Jack the Ripper, I could…well, I could afford a finer blend of shag.”
I coughed a bit at inhaling the foul stew that passed for air among these twisted byways. “What do you need of me?”
“You have no acquaintanceship of Whitechapel?”
“I am a married man, Holmes!”
“It was not always thus, Watson.”
“No, but even then I should never find my way to Whitechapel. The disease potential alone would dissuade any man of sensibility.”
“We are not looking for a man of sensibility.” Holmes paused beneath one of the too-few gaslights to study the street. “We are hunting a man who revels in the opposite. That does not mean he cannot sleep on silken sheets elsewhere.”
“And the Ripper letters?”
“Are they indeed from the monster? Possibly. But why then the Americanisms and the mock Cockney phonetics?” He gazed around the ill-lit scene, people lurching beyond the honest circle of gaslight like supernumeraries in some contemporary vision of urban hell. “I understand the opium addict, Watson. The drug brings phantoms, illusions. It makes pain seem like pleasure, for a while. I do not understand the men who come here looking for that particular delusion as any kind of surcease, or illusion of pleasure.”
I followed his gaze to a staggering woman across the way.
She was a creature of the ignored and much-abused homeless classes: thick of frame with poor nutriance, thick of mind thanks to too many tankards, about as feminine as that quality is experienced in a drawing room as an andiron. To a physician, a walking cesspool of disease and decay. No wonder they were known as “unfortunates.”
“Why bother slaying such a sad creature?” he went on. “Yet men willingly consort with such. Can you explain it?”
“The men are drunk as well.”
“I am devoutly grateful that the occasional fine port does not bring me to such a condition.”
I nodded to some tattered-looking men linking arms with lamp-poles along the lane. “Most of these men are brute laborers. Their work is low and vile and distasteful, and so are their scant and guilty pleasures, but I tell you, Holmes, the same game is played in more attractive guise in the West End nightly.”
“Ah. So I understand. Or know for a fact. It is the same game you say, Watson. Then a man from a pristine playing surface might wish to…try his skill in a more…dangerous neighborhood.”
“True, Holmes. The confirmed hedonist seeks sensation at its rawest. A demented aristocrat may wish to wallow in the city’s worst sinkhole.”
“There. That innocuously run-down building is an opium den of my…knowledge. I guarantee that all within are dead to the world, Watson. The life that goes on in these streets is another matter. When death strikes here it is usually not worth noting. Where does the Ripper begin and end? I begin to think he is eternal. Not a man, but a…mania.”
“How can you find and accuse a mania, Holmes?”
“I don’t know. I suspect it hasn’t been done before.” He paused under another lamp to light his pipe, nodding at the bobby who strolled past.
“You’ve been here before,” I accused.
“Frequently. In many guises, including my own.”
“Your own personage is not a disguise, Holmes.”
“Is it not? One night I stood perhaps ten feet from the Ripper.”
“You saw him?”
“I glimpsed his shadow. And chased another shadow, believing it more likely.” He inhaled so deeply on the clay pipe the bowl glowed as cherry-red as fresh-spilt blood. “I went the wrong way. I pursued a witness, not a perpetrator. I left the Ripper behind to do his bloody work.”
“You, Holmes?”
“I, Watson. The man I observed was berating a woman. He knocked her down but from my recent observations of the environs, knocking down women is more the commonplace than the exception. I took it for the usual street scene. By the time I returned, she was warm but no more. It was all
I coughed a bit at inhaling the foul stew that passed for air among these twisted byways. “What do you need of me?”
“You have no acquaintanceship of Whitechapel?”
“I am a married man, Holmes!”
“It was not always thus, Watson.”
“No, but even then I should never find my way to Whitechapel. The disease potential alone would dissuade any man of sensibility.”
“We are not looking for a man of sensibility.” Holmes paused beneath one of the too-few gaslights to study the street. “We are hunting a man who revels in the opposite. That does not mean he cannot sleep on silken sheets elsewhere.”
“And the Ripper letters?”
“Are they indeed from the monster? Possibly. But why then the Americanisms and the mock Cockney phonetics?” He gazed around the ill-lit scene, people lurching beyond the honest circle of gaslight like supernumeraries in some contemporary vision of urban hell. “I understand the opium addict, Watson. The drug brings phantoms, illusions. It makes pain seem like pleasure, for a while. I do not understand the men who come here looking for that particular delusion as any kind of surcease, or illusion of pleasure.”
I followed his gaze to a staggering woman across the way.
She was a creature of the ignored and much-abused homeless classes: thick of frame with poor nutriance, thick of mind thanks to too many tankards, about as feminine as that quality is experienced in a drawing room as an andiron. To a physician, a walking cesspool of disease and decay. No wonder they were known as “unfortunates.”
“Why bother slaying such a sad creature?” he went on. “Yet men willingly consort with such. Can you explain it?”
“The men are drunk as well.”
“I am devoutly grateful that the occasional fine port does not bring me to such a condition.”
I nodded to some tattered-looking men linking arms with lamp-poles along the lane. “Most of these men are brute laborers. Their work is low and vile and distasteful, and so are their scant and guilty pleasures, but I tell you, Holmes, the same game is played in more attractive guise in the West End nightly.”
“Ah. So I understand. Or know for a fact. It is the same game you say, Watson. Then a man from a pristine playing surface might wish to…try his skill in a more…dangerous neighborhood.”
“True, Holmes. The confirmed hedonist seeks sensation at its rawest. A demented aristocrat may wish to wallow in the city’s worst sinkhole.”
“There. That innocuously run-down building is an opium den of my…knowledge. I guarantee that all within are dead to the world, Watson. The life that goes on in these streets is another matter. When death strikes here it is usually not worth noting. Where does the Ripper begin and end? I begin to think he is eternal. Not a man, but a…mania.”
“How can you find and accuse a mania, Holmes?”
“I don’t know. I suspect it hasn’t been done before.” He paused under another lamp to light his pipe, nodding at the bobby who strolled past.
“You’ve been here before,” I accused.
“Frequently. In many guises, including my own.”
“Your own personage is not a disguise, Holmes.”
“Is it not? One night I stood perhaps ten feet from the Ripper.”
“You saw him?”
“I glimpsed his shadow. And chased another shadow, believing it more likely.” He inhaled so deeply on the clay pipe the bowl glowed as cherry-red as fresh-spilt blood. “I went the wrong way. I pursued a witness, not a perpetrator. I left the Ripper behind to do his bloody work.”
“You, Holmes?”
“I, Watson. The man I observed was berating a woman. He knocked her down but from my recent observations of the environs, knocking down women is more the commonplace than the exception. I took it for the usual street scene. By the time I returned, she was warm but no more. It was all
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