by Amy Cross
Copyright 2017 Amy Cross
All Rights Reserved
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, events, entities and places are either products of the author's imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual people, businesses, entities or events is entirely coincidental.
Kindle edition
First published: October 2017
His mind finally in tatters, Doctor Charles Grazier wanders the streets of London. He knows he must soon return to the house and deal with the creature in his basement, but he decides to first pay a visit to Scotland Yard. Soon, however, his sanity unravels even further, and finally he comes face to face with his monstrous creation, leading to an encounter that will have ramifications for many years to come.
Meanwhile, in the present day, Maddie finds herself trapped in a desperate fight for survival. With even her best friend turning against her, she needs to find a way out of the house, but all the exits are blocked. When she finally tries to escape, she learns the shocking truth about the house, but will she live long enough to tell anyone?
Doctor Charles Grazier is the sixth book in a new eight-part horror serial, titled The House of Jack the Ripper. This book ends on a cliffhanger, and the story continues in the serial's next book.
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Doctor Charles Grazier
(The House of Jack the Ripper book 6)
Prologue
“Doctor Culpepper can be rather trying sometimes, can he not?”
Turning to Catherine, I find that she has returned to my side. She moves so gracefully through the crowd of party-goers, one can sometimes be surprised by her return. Even now, as the pianist continues to play nearby and as great works of art stand arranged for inspection along the length of the south wall, I cannot stare at anything or anybody other than my wife. She is perfect.
“The man can talk for England,” she continues, rolling her eyes, “although I suppose there's no harm in that. Still, I feel dreadfully sorry for his poor wife Delilah. The young woman is scarcely able to get a word in. To live with a man like that, she must have the patience of an absolute saint.”
“Then it is good that she seems to have so few words in the first place,” I point out.
Catherine nudges my arm.
“Do I lie?” I continue with a faint smile. “The creature seems utterly devoid of merit. Why, I do not recall ever hearing her say anything useful in a conversation.”
“Do not be so mean, Charles,” Catherine says, although a smile is already crossing her lips. She is polite and diplomatic – far more so than I – and she will not admit that she agrees with my every word. “I'm sure Delilah is delightful.” She pauses for a moment. “In her own way. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to find some more of these canapes before they're all taken. They're the one saving grace of this dreadful party. We shall be going home before nine, shall we not?”
“Nine?” I reply. “I was hoping to be gone by eight.”
“We cannot be rude, Charles.”
“I don't see why not.”
“Mingle a little,” she adds with a sigh. “It might actually do you some good.”
As Catherine goes to fetch more canapes, I gravitate toward the far end of the room, where several of my distinguished colleagues are gathered, along with a few of the not-so-distinguished doctors from the local hospitals. Truly, I find these gatherings rather tiring, and one of the few bright sides of my impending retirement is the fact that I shall never again have to endure long, painful days with Doctors Culpepper, Markham, Shaw and all the rest. Well, not unless I bump into them at the club, anyway. Perhaps I should think about finding a new club.
“Having a good evening, are you?” Markham asks languidly. “We don't often see you at these shindigs, Charles. I must say, I was rather surprised when I saw you and your dear lady wife coming in.”
“One must go out occasionally,” I say with a forced smile.
“The wife dragged you here, did she?” he adds.
“Of course not!” I spit back at him. “I am the man of the house!”
“Steady on,” he replies, raising both eyebrows as if he's a little surprised by my tone. “I was just making a joke.”
“And is that what passes for humor around here?” I ask.
“I see that your impending retirement has done little to soften your edges,” Markham mutters needlessly. “Will you taking up any hobbies once you have all that spare time, or is Catherine going to be honored with your presence all day?”
“Charles and Catherine seem to prefer one another's company most of the time,” Culpepper suggests. “I suppose that is to be admired.” He leans closer to me. “If I had to spend too much time with Delilah, I think I would go absolutely spare. She's the perfect wife, don't get me wrong, but she is not skilled at the art of conversation.” He sighs. “Then again, she has good qualities as well. I suppose I should be grateful.”
As he says those words, I spot Delilah Culpepper standing near the door, and it is apparent that she is all alone. Abandoned by her husband for the evening, she has been unable to engage anybody else, and now she is simply standing meekly with an untouched glass of wine in her hand and a plate of uneaten cake. The sight is actually rather pitiful, and becomes doubly so when she attempts to speak to two women who pass by. The women ignore her, of course, and Delilah is left to go back to her silent introspection.
“Would that any of us had your perfect life,” Culpepper continues, patting me on the shoulder. “Happy. Successful. Respected by all your peers. Why, I am sure that in such circumstances, anybody could be a fine man.”
“And what is that supposed to mean?” I ask.
“Just that a man can be himself when he isn't tested.” He pauses. “If one is tested, however, then that is when one discovers one's true mettle. If a man can remain strong and moral during difficult times, then I think we can surely say that he has a proper core.”
“Whatever are you on about?” I reply, unable to hide the fact that I am irritated by his poor attempts at philosophy.
“I suppose I'm rambling,” he admits. “You don't know how lucky you are. That's all, really.”
“Charles?” a voice says suddenly, and I turn to find that Doctor Saward is approaching with some degree of urgency in his tone. “Your wife would like to see you in the drawing room,” he explains. “She asked you to hurry.”
I am about to tell him that I shall be along presently, when I hear the sound of Catherine coughing nearby. Immediately filled with a sense of concern, I make my excuses and hurry across the room. I tell myself that I should not overreact, and that most likely Catherine is simply feeling tired, but then – as soon as I reach the doorway and see her bent against the table – I realize that something must be very wrong. Catherine is not a woman who allows herself to succumb to illness, nor has she ever shown even a hint of bad posture. At this moment, however, she looks posit
ively wretched.
“Catherine?” I say cautiously, heading over to her. “I was told that you wanted to see me. Is something the matter?”
“Charles,” she stammers, turning to me with blood around her lips, “what -”
Suddenly she bursts into a coughing fit. Bending over, she inadvertently sprays blood from her mouth, dappling the fine white tablecloth.
“What is wrong with me?” she gasps, sounding as if she is struggling for air. “Charles, tell me what's wrong!”
Chapter One
Doctor Charles Grazier
Thursday October 4th, 1888
I slip my fingers deeper into her womb, searching through the bloody mess for the child.
***
Catherine was always so, so much better at this.
Standing alone in the hallway, I peer at my reflection in the mirror and try once more to arrange my bow-tie properly. In truth, I have been struggling at this task for several minutes now, and I have tied and untied and then re-tied the damnable thing so much that I am ready to cast it aside. My hands tremble and my patience is worn thin. Yet I persist, because I want to look my best today, but also because I know how much Catherine liked me to be smart.
“You must get dressed for the street,” she told me once. “If you look good, you will feel good.”
“I'm not sure,” I remember telling her, “that it works quite like that.”
“Trust me.” She smiled. “I am not letting my husband leave the house with anything other than an immaculately presented bow-tie.”
I never learned to tie the thing properly myself, so she used to set it for me every morning, standing right in front of me in this exact spot, right up until she was too weak to even get out of bed. Even then, for a few mornings she insisted that I sat next to her while she tried to make me look acceptable. When that proved too much for her, I knew that she was feeling truly sick.
“There,” I mutter finally, supposing that I have managed at least an approximation of how I should look. Lowering my hands, I see that although the bow-tie has some creases, it is at least passable. Why, I have seen men with wives who look worse when they arrive at the club. “That will do until Catherine is able to -”
Before I can finish, I hear a loud banging sound coming from down in the basement. The sound lasts for only a few frantic seconds, but I hold my breath for the duration, filled with a sense of overwhelming dread. The banging goes on and on and on, as if some foul force means to shake the house apart. Even when silence abruptly returns, I cannot escape the feeling that something quite dreadful must have occurred down there, and I can tell without checking that my pulse is racing. Indeed, I am also sweating rather profusely.
At least silence has returned, affording me another spate of calm between two storms.
“Not long now,” I whisper, staring at my reflection. “Give it time to work, and soon Catherine will be back. Then everything will be alright. She will tie your...”
My voice trails off.
Am I crying?
I take a moment to dab my scratched eyes with a moist cloth. In truth, the pain and discomfort have become part of the background hum of my existence over the past few days, and I am at least comforted by the knowledge that I shall not be forced to witness that hideous perversion of Catherine on the beach. I cannot trust my mind, so my eyes must remain open. I shall attend to the problem of my lidless eyes, just as soon as Catherine is back, and for now the discomfort is my cross to bear. As I set my tinted spectacles in place, I see from my reflection that I actually look rather dapper.
With that, I make my way to the front door and prepare to step out into the world. Reaching down, I take hold of the bolt. It is a little stiff, and I have to wiggle it several times.
Chapter Two
Maddie
Today
“Almost got it!” I call out, as I struggle once again to slide the bolt across. “Hang on...”
Suddenly it gives way, and I immediately pull the back door open. As soon as I do so, I see a look of genuine wonder on Matt's face as he stares into the house. Framed against the overgrown garden, he almost looks as if he's nervous about crossing the threshold and actually coming inside. As I wait for him to step forward, I actually start to wonder whether he might turn around and walk away.
“It's okay,” I tell him. “It's just a house, right?”
I wait.
No reply.
“Right?” I ask again, although this time I can hear the tension in my own voice.
He stares into the gloomy hallway for a moment, almost as if he's in a trance, and I can't help thinking that his reaction seems similar to Jerry's yesterday. And then, just as I'm starting to wonder whether he'll start talking about weird sensations and screams that nobody else can hear, he takes a step forward and makes his way over to the center of the hallway. As he does so, the bare floorboards creak beneath his feet. They always creak, of course, but somehow they seem louder right now.
“I know what you're thinking,” I continue, as I bump the door shut and walk over to join him. “We shouldn't even be here. It's private property, we're trespassing, and I know you're right. I told you I'll explain that later, but for now -”
“Wait,” he says, holding up a hand as if he wants to listen more closely to the silence.
“What is it?” I ask.
Again, I wait.
Again, he says nothing.
“What?” I ask again, lowering my voice a little.
He still doesn't reply, so we stand and listen for a moment. And then, just as I'm about to tell him that I don't hear anything, I realize there is a very faint noise drifting up from the basement, getting a little louder and little clearer. It's not a scream, or some kind of ghost rattling its chains, but for a few seconds I struggle to realize what I'm hearing. Finally, however, the sound seems to become a little clearer, and I slowly turn to Matt as I understand the embarrassing truth.
“That's Alex and Nick,” I explain, already starting to blush as sex sounds continue to rise up through the house. “I'm really sorry about them. I didn't know they'd be doing that, they're my... friends...”
***
“Show me what you've got here,” Matt says as I step around the desk in the study and pick up one of the notebooks. “I'm due on duty in two hours, so I'm afraid I don't have much time.”
“I'm sorry I called you,” I reply, still blushing slightly even though we've shut the door to screen out the noises coming from the basement. “I wouldn't have, if I didn't think it was important. I mean, when you gave me your number, I really didn't mean to ever use it. Then after I called you that one time, I thought I wouldn't need to again, but -”
“Maddie.”
“And I wasn't going to,” I continue, speaking so fast now that I'm almost tripping over my words, “but things have gone a bit weird and I just -”
“Maddie.”
“What?”
“Just calm down a little, and take your time. I'm glad you called. Now what is it that's got you all worked up like this?”
I tuck a loose strand of matted hair behind my ear as I look down at the notebook I've just opened, and as Matt comes around to join me. My thoughts are racing, but I know that I need to settle down a little so I take a moment to figure out how I can even begin to explain all of this. I guess the best option is just to be direct.
“You said you'd researched the original Jack the Ripper,” I say finally. “Well, I guess it's a huge long-shot, and it'd be an even huger coincidence, but some of the things we've found in this house seem like they might be connected. To Jack the Ripper, I mean.” Hesitating, I realize that these words sound ridiculous, but I guess I need to explain. “Look at these diagrams,” I add, pointing at some of the sketches. “They were drawn by a guy named Doctor Charles Grazier, who lived in this house right around the time Jack the Ripper was active.”
“I've never heard that name before,” he mutters. “These sketches are... kind of freaky.”
“Definitely.” He sounds as if I've caught his attention.
“Some of them look like he was planning experiments,” I point out, “or at least operations.”
I wait for Matt to reply, but he simply reaches down and turns to the next page.
“Some of them are kinda gross,” I continue. “I don't really know much about the state of medicine back in the 1880's, but it looks like he was getting up to some pretty extreme stuff.”
Again I wait, but Matt simply turns to another page.
“These are very detailed and interesting drawings,” he says finally, “but I'm sure there might be good reasons why someone would be working on them. It doesn't mean that he was actually the killer.”
“Okay, but look at this,” I add, leafing through the pages until I find the picture of the woman with the torn-open belly. “Look at the name.”
“Maddie...”
“Look at the name!”
“It looks like...” He pauses, clearly struggling to read the handwriting. “Delilah? Delilah Culpepper?”
“The woman from the alley.”
I wait for him to tell me I'm crazy, that I'm finding patterns that don't exist, but instead he turns the notebook a little so that he can better try to decipher the comments. He seems genuinely fascinated, and I can feel a slowly, growing sense of anticipation in the pit of my belly as I start to realize that maybe we've stumbled onto something after all. A moment later he turns to the next page, then the next, and I can tell that he's starting to take this seriously.
“Well?” I ask finally. “Do you think it could mean something? Or is it just a load of coincidences?”
Again I wait, but again he seems utterly engrossed. This time I don't disturb him, and I wait until he's checked several more pages. When he eventually turns to me again, I can see that he's not going to dismiss this as pure speculation.
