by Kat Ross
I composed a quick response saying I would come at nine with my associate, Mr. John Weston, who had played an indispensable role in the Hyde investigation and had extensive knowledge of the occult.
And so it was that on the morning of December 25th, 1888, John and I stood on the corner of Pearl and Fulton Streets. A light snow had fallen overnight. It made the cobblestones slippery for walking, but I always liked how clean the city looked clad in fresh snow—for the first hour at least, before all the carriage wheels churned it into a brown, mushy mess.
As it was Christmas Day, the streets were empty.
“I told you he was the Ripper,” John said again. He’d been insufferable ever since I’d shown him the letter. “The subject you mentioned has been located. What else could it mean?”
“I’ve no idea,” I said. “But you’re jumping to conclusions. As usual.”
He smiled magnanimously. “Why don’t we just agree that we were both right? You figured out that it was Brady, and I figured out that Dr. Clarence was a homicidal killer.”
“No.”
“Yes, I think so. Didn’t Edward say that medium you went to…what was his name?”
“Mr. Dawbarn,” I said stonily.
“Mr. Dawbarn! Didn’t he say something unclean had touched Straker’s cameo? Well, guess who else you handed it to at the flat? Oh right, that was Brady.”
I scooped up a handful of snow and threw it at him.
John ducked away, laughing. “You just can’t stand the fact that I figured out something you didn’t.”
“I think you might benefit from a few weeks at that sanatorium Straker stayed at,” I said.
John rubbed his hands together, breath puffing white in the crisp air.
“Where is number 253 anyway?” he said, looking around.
In front of us sat the Pearl Street power station. Edison had purchased adjoining buildings at 255 and 257 for his great experiment. They were four-story brick structures with three tall smokestacks. I was surprised at how quiet the engines and whirring dynamos inside were.
We walked down the block to a decrepit looking tenement just next door.
“This must be it,” John said dubiously.
There was no plaque, nothing to signify that we were in the right place, except for the crooked number on the front door.
I knocked. We heard the slow shuffle of feet, the click of numerous locks tumbling open, and an ancient man in a butler’s uniform poked his head out.
“Um, Merry Christmas,” John said. “Sorry to trouble you. We have an appointment—”
“This way, sir,” the man intoned. “Mr. Kaylock is expecting you.”
We stepped inside. John and I exchanged a startled look. The building’s drab exterior gave no hint of the lavish furnishings and fine art that decorated the inside. A fire roared in an enormous hearth, and the space seemed much larger than the structure should be able to accommodate, like its dimensions had expanded somehow.
“Please follow me,” the butler croaked.
We went up two flights of stairs and down a long hallway, to the fourth door on the left. John and I followed him into a panelled study, our boots sinking into overlapping Persian carpets.
“Shall I bring coffee, sir?”
This was directed at a tall, gaunt man sitting behind a mahogany desk.
“No, just leave us, Joseph,” he said brusquely.
“Very good, sir.”
Joseph retreated, breath wheezing with each ponderous step.
We sized each other up.
Mr. Harland Kaylock looked much as I remembered him from that day I’d shadowed him around. He had a sharp beak of a nose and thin lips that he held drawn into a straight line. His attire was dark and formal. The only undisciplined thing about him was his hair, which he wore in a wavy tangle that swept back from his pale forehead.
Mr. Kaylock gestured to a pair of wing chairs in front of the desk with long, fluttery fingers.
“Please sit,” he said.
We did. A clock ticked. It was very loud. I started to feel a bit like the jittery narrator of Poe’s Tell-Tale Heart.
My eyes wandered to a pair of tall glass cabinets flanking the windows, and the array of strange objects displayed inside. A milky eye floated in goo, of average size but sporting three golden irises. On the shelf above it perched a shrunken head, the tiny horns serrated like shark’s teeth…
“Well then, Merry Christmas!” John ventured, flashing his dimples.
Mr. Kaylock eyed him in distaste. “I don’t celebrate holidays. They’re an excuse to be lazy. Now. I presume you are Mr. Weston and you—” he looked at me with keen eyes—”are Miss Harrison Fearing Pell.”
I nodded. Don’t mess this up, Harry, I thought. He’s an odd one all right, but you didn’t really expect different. Just play along.
“I’m sure you’re familiar with the London S.P.R., so you know that their primary focus is psychical phenomena,” Mr. Kaylock said. “Spiritualism, ghosts, that sort of thing. The American branch…well, our interests are more wide-ranging, one might say. But before we go any further, I’ll have to ask you to sign some documents. This is an extremely sensitive matter and I can’t have you running off and blabbing about it. Is that acceptable?”
“I wasn’t planning to blab about it,” I said, trying to keep my temper in check. “But I suppose it’s fine.”
Mr. Kaylock slid a thick sheaf of papers towards us. I took them and started scanning the tiny print.
…both during and after contact with the Organization, Agent will not disclose or deliver to anyone, whether employed by the Organization or not, except as authorized by the Organization, or use in any way other than in the Organization’s business, any information or material… There is a risk of danger, bodily harm, injury, emotional distress, or death... there is the potential for risks and dangers that may not be obvious or reasonably foreseeable at this time...I do not have any medical ailments, physical limitations, or mental afflictions that will affect my ability to...Organization undertakes no direct legal or financial responsibility for my personal safety or well being when I am participating in… I assume the risks, including, but not limited to, those outlined in Section 3 of this agreement… In the event that any one or more of the provisions of this agreement shall be held to be invalid, illegal, unenforceable or in conflict with the law according to the jurisdiction of the state of New York, the remaining portions will not be invalidated, and shall remain in full force and effect…
Mr. Kaylock gave us a thin smile and slid a fountain pen across the desk.
“Perfectly standard,” he said.
“And if we don’t sign it?” John asked.
“Then I wish you a pleasant morning,” Mr. Kaylock said.
I let out a sigh and signed it. John shot me his Oh, Harry, what are you getting us into now? look, but he took the pen and scrawled his name next to mine at the bottom.
“Excellent!” Mr. Kaylock said, snatching up the papers and shoving them into a drawer, which he locked.
“Don’t we get a copy?” I asked.
“Of course,” he said smoothly. “I’ll send it over with my messenger boy.” He steepled his long fingers. “Now, we get to the heart of the matter. Perhaps you’ve heard of the Egypt Exploration Society?”
“Vaguely.” In fact, I hadn’t a clue, but wasn’t about to admit it to my new employer.
“It’s been around for about six years now,” he said. “Bunch of archaeologists based in London. In any event, they were recently involved in a joint expedition with the American Museum of Natural History. A dig in Alexandria. It turned up several quite valuable items that were acquired by the museum.”
“Like what?” John asked politely, stifling a yawn with the back of his hand.
“I’m sorry, am I boring you, Mr. Weston?”
“Not at all.” John sat up a little straighter.
“Please go on,” I said.
“The find included items believed to
belong to Claudius Ptolemy.”
“The mathematician?”
“Precisely. An armillary sphere as described in the Syntaxis, for example.”
“That must be quite a coup for the museum,” I said.
“Indeed. The expedition returned almost five months ago, but it took time to properly catalogue the new acquisitions. Therefore, the gala to celebrate the opening of the special collection only took place two nights ago.”
We nodded, waiting for him to explain why the S.P.R. was interested.
“Dr. Julius Sabilline led the expedition to Alexandria. Educated at Harvard and Oxford, degrees in art history, linguistics and archaeology, et cetera. One of the museum’s brightest lights.”
“Was this light…snuffed out?” I guessed from his funereal tone.
Mr. Kaylock gave me an appraising look. Then he unlocked his desk and removed two sheets of paper, sliding them across to us. “A copy of the police report. It was just after midnight and the party had wound down. Only a few guests remained. Dr. Sabelline excused himself and went to his office to fetch something.”
I took the pages and scanned them, then gave them to John. “Stabbed in the neck?”
“Yes, but with a murder weapon no one has seen before.”
“In New York?” John raised an eyebrow.
“Apparently so.” I thought I detected a glint of humor in Mr. Kaylock’s dark eyes but his face remained stern as a schoolmaster. “That is not the most inexplicable thing about the death, however. The door was locked from the inside.”
“Windows?”
“There are none.” Mr. Kaylock tapped his fingers on the desk. “And here’s the best part. Dr. Sabelline staggered across the room, bleeding profusely. He collapsed near a bookcase. There are footprints approaching and entering the pool of blood, but not leaving it.”
“That’s odd,” John ventured.
“It’s more than odd,” Mr. Kaylock said.
“Suicide has been ruled out?” I asked.
“Definitively.”
“What do you think?”
“That we have rather a mystery on our hands.” He gazed at me blandly. Whatever private theories he held, Mr. Kaylock had no intention of sharing them, at least not yet. “Our involvement has been requested. Informally, but at the highest levels. Rumors are already circulating that the objects taken from Alexandria are cursed.”
John snickered.
It had to be another killer, didn’t it? I thought glumly. Couldn’t be a nice haunting, or vampires, or even a good old-fashioned sewer beast.
And then I realized that Kaylock hadn’t mentioned Myrtle’s name. Not once. I decided that I liked him, even if his manner was off-putting.
“Is something the matter, Mr. Weston?”
“No, I’m fine, it’s just that Harry here—”
“Would be delighted to take the case,” I said, smiling.
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Read on for an excerpt…
Chapter One
* * *
Saturday, December 15, 1888
Rain drummed on the roof of the carriage as it raced up Wickham Hill Road. Just ahead, the Greymoor Lunatic Asylum crouched at the end of a long, treeless drive, its peaked slate roof silhouetted against the sky. The black brougham drew to a halt before the wrought-iron front gate. Following a brief exchange with the occupants, two officers from the Essex constabulary waved it through, immediately ducking back into the shelter of a police wagon.
The asylum made a grim impression even in daylight. Now, in the darkest hour of the night, with water coursing down the brick façade and thunder rattling the turrets, Greymoor looked like something torn from the pages of a penny dreadful, hulking and shadowed despite the lamps burning in every barred window.
“I told them to watch him,” Lady Vivienne Cumberland muttered, yanking her gloves on. “To keep him isolated from the staff and other patients. Clearly, they didn’t listen. The fools.”
The carriage jolted forward down the rutted drive. It had been a little over a month since her first and last interview with Dr. William Clarence. Afterwards, Lady Cumberland had taken a hard look at those bars and strongly suggested to the asylum superintendent that he move Dr. Clarence to a room with no window at all.
Her companion, Alec Lawrence, gripped the cane resting across his knees. He had been present at the interview, had looked into Dr. Clarence’s eyes, a blue so pale they reminded him of a Siberian dog. The memory unsettled him still, and he wasn’t a man who was easily shaken.
“We don’t know what happened yet,” he pointed out. “Superintendent Barrett can hardly be faulted considering we withheld certain information. I rather doubt he would have believed us anyway.”
Vivienne scowled out the window at the rain-blurred grounds. “You may be right, but it was only a matter of time. I’ve known that since the day Clarence was brought here. The S.P.R. made a bad mistake entrusting him to Greymoor.”
“We still don’t know for sure—”
“Yes, we do. The killings stopped, didn’t they?”
“That could be for any number of reasons,” he said stubbornly.
“Including that the creature who committed them is behind bars. Or was, at least.”
Alec Lawrence buttoned his woolen greatcoat. This was not a new debate. “Perhaps. But there’s not a scrap of hard evidence against him. Nothing but a single reference in a report by some American girl and Clarence’s own odd demeanor. Had there been more, he would have been locked up tight in Newgate Prison.”
Vivienne turned her obsidian gaze on him. With her unlined skin and full lips, she might have been thirty, or a decade in either direction. Only Alec and a handful of others knew better.
“That American girl is Arthur Conan Doyle’s goddaughter and she seemed quite clever to me. It wouldn’t have mattered anyway,” she added quietly. “Walls don’t hold Dr. Clarence’s sort for long.”
“Look,” he said, softening. “For what it’s worth, I think we did the right thing taking him off the streets. I just....” He trailed off, unsure how he meant to finish the thought.
“You don’t trust my judgment anymore. Since Harper Dods.”
“That’s not even remotely true. I simply think we need to keep open minds on the matter. The signs aren’t there, Vivienne. I’m the first to admit Dr. Clarence is an odd duck, perhaps worse. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t human.”
Vivienne arched a perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “And yet here we are, summoned by Sidgwick in the middle of the night. I wonder if he’s regretting his decision?”
The note from Henry Sidgwick, president of the Society for Psychical Research, had arrived in the form of a small, bedraggled messenger boy pounding on Lady Vivienne’s front door in St. James an hour before. It was both vague and ominous, citing an “unfortunate incident” involving Dr. Clarence and urging all due haste to the asylum.
“I suppose we’ll find out in a minute,” Alec said, turning his collar up. He swiped a hand through chestnut hair and jammed a top hat on his head. “Off to the races.”
A gust of rain shook the carriage as it slowed at the front entrance. A six-story tower capped by a Roman clock and white spire anchored two wings extending on either side. Unlike most asylums, which had separate annexes for men and women, Greymoor’s residents were all male. The north wing housed those poor souls suffering from garden-variety disorders like dementia and melancholia. The other was reserved for the so-called “incurables,” a euphemism for the criminally insane. Violent, unpredictable men deemed unfit for prison.
Despite his doubts, Alec Lawrence would have happily had the lot of them over for tea rather than spend five minutes in the company of Dr. William Clarence. In his heart, he wondered if Vivienne’s instincts were correct. But he wanted her to be wrong because the alternative was far worse.
The jouncing of t
he wooden carriage wheels ceased. A pocket of silence descended, broken only by the steady hiss of the rain on the roof. He watched Lady Cumberland compose herself, smoothing a stray curl into place. The pearl grey gloves seemed to glow against her dark skin. They had been together for many, many years, and frequently disagreed, but he’d never grown tired of looking at her.
Vivienne unclenched her jaw and took a long breath through her nose.
“Shall we, Mr. Lawrence?”
He nodded once, girding himself for what waited inside. The young coachman, Henry, jumped down and opened the carriage door, offering his hand to Vivienne. Freezing rain swept sideways across the heath, soaking them both despite Henry’s best efforts to subdue a wildly flapping umbrella. Alec ducked his head against the downpour and used his cane to clamber down. The winter damp always worsened his knee, but he limped swiftly up the stone steps to the welcome shelter of the portico. A tall woman, Vivienne’s stride matched his own. Henry snapped the reins and the carriage moved toward the rear stables. Somewhere off in the darkness, Alec heard the mournful baying of a hound.
Moments later they stood dripping on the carpet of Greymoor’s small entrance hall. The sour aroma of mutton and boiled cabbage emanated from a distant kitchen. Through the door of an adjacent parlor, Alec glimpsed a fire crackling in the hearth, but the air in the hall was still uncomfortably cold.
A knot of police stood at the end of the corridor. They turned at the newcomers’ arrival. Alec recognized the shrewd gaze of Detective Inspector Richard Blackwood. He acted as the liaison between Scotland Yard’s Dominion Branch and the S.P.R., of which Alec and Vivienne were members. They’d worked together on several previous cases of a delicate nature, and Alec liked D.I. Blackwood. He was discreet and open-minded, embracing modern methods of investigation while at the same time accepting there were things in the world the general public would be better off staying in the dark about.
“Lady Cumberland,” he exclaimed, rushing forward in his usual energetic manner. Blackwood was small and wiry, with prematurely thinning black hair parted on the side and a faint Yorkshire accent. The buttons of his navy uniform had been done up crooked, as if he’d put it on in a hurry. “Mr. Lawrence. I’ve been waiting for you.”
