Ripping Time

by Robert Asprin

  “There’s nothing more to be done, here, in this weather,” Malcolm shouted above the crash of thunder.

  Margo’s performance inside the hansom cab, weeping distraughtly and leaning against Shahdi Feroz, left Mr. Shannon clearing his throat in sympathy. Maeve Shannon stepped up onto the running board and leaned in to put a comforting hand on Margo’s shoulder, said something too low for Malcolm to hear, at which Margo nodded and replied, “Thank you, Miss Shannon. Thank you . . .”

  “I’m that sorry, I am, miss, but I’m sure it’ll come right.” Maeve smiled at Margo, then stepped back down to the pavement and called her dog to heel. Malcolm handed over Mr. Shannon’s fee for the night’s work and a bonus for Maeve’s unexpected sympathy to Margo, which he felt deserved recognition of some kind. The Shannons might be accustomed to the harshness of life in Whitechapel, where they kept their inquiry agency, but they were good and decent people, nonetheless. The inquiry agent and his granddaughter wished him luck and hurried off into the downpour with Alfie trotting between them, seeking shelter from the rising storm. Malcolm sighed heavily, then secured a cab of his own to follow Margo and Shahdi Feroz back to Spaldergate, and settled down for a clattering ride through night-shrouded streets. Stoddard, riding silently beside him, was grim in the actinic glare of lightning bolts streaking through London’s night sky.

  Somewhere out there, Benny Catlin was known, to someone.

  Malcolm intended finding that someone. All it required was a bit of luck added to the hard work ahead. In the swaying darkness of the hansom, Malcolm grimaced. This was not a good time for reminding himself that before Margo had come into his life, Malcolm’s luck had run to the notoriously bad. Malcolm Moore was not a superstitious man by nature, but he couldn’t quite shake the feeling that on this particular hunt, luck just might not be with him.

  He could only pray that it had been with Benny Catlin.

  If not, they might yet locate him in a morgue.

  Chapter Nine

  Gideon Guthrie poured a drink from an expensive cut-crystal decanter and moved quietly to the window. Night had fallen across the city, turning the filthy sprawl of New York into a fairy-land jewel at his feet. Behind him, the television flickered silently, sound muted. Gideon frowned slowly, then sipped at his scotch. John Caddrick had given quite a performance for the press today. How the sociopathic bastard was able to summon tears for the cameras, Gideon didn’t know. But the press had eaten it up, delighted with the ratings points Caddrick’s grief gave them. Which played quite nicely into Gideon’s plans. What worried Gideon, however, and it worried his boss, as well, was Caddrick’s tendency to explosive fits of temper. They played a very delicate game, Gideon and Cyril Barris and the senator, a damned delicate game. Caddrick’s notorious temperament was just as likely to prove a liability as an asset.

  It was too bad about the girl, in a sense, although Caddrick didn’t seem to give a damn that Gideon had ordered a fatal hit on the Senator’s own daughter. Of course, Caddrick wasn’t stupid and there’d never been any love lost between those two. If Gideon and his political ally played it right, Cassie Tyrol’s impulsive decision to tell her niece would play into Cyril Barris’ long-range plans brilliantly. All Gideon had to do was keep Caddrick’s temper from screwing things up. A man like John Caddrick was priceless in Congress, where that temper and his ruthless ability to play the filthy game of politics made him a devastating enemy and a cunning advocate. But Caddrick’s flair for playing the press could easily backfire, if they weren’t incredibly careful. The senator’s call for investigating the Ansar Majlis, claiming they’d kidnapped his daughter, worked wonders for television ratings. And it would doubtless fire up a world-wide demand for the destruction of the very terrorists Gideon had chosen to further his employer’s plans. Which was, ultimately, the precise outcome both Cyril Barris and Gideon, himself, wanted.

  But too close an investigation into the Ansar Majlis could prove risky.

  Very risky.

  He’d have to keep a close watch on John Caddrick, all right. Their timetable was moving along right on schedule, with only one minor hitch, which ought to’ve been effectively eliminated, by now. He’d sent a good team onto TT-86 to destroy Ianira and her whole family, not to mention finishing up the job with Jenna Caddrick and that miserable, meddlesome detective, Noah Armstrong. Gideon scowled and poured himself another scotch. That was one complication he hadn’t anticipated. Cassie Tyrol, actress, six-time divorcee, and scatter-brained Templar, was the last person Gideon had expected to hire a detective, for God’s sake, to investigate her own brother-in-law’s business practices. And who’d have guessed she would come so damned unglued over the seemingly accidental death of that little bastard, Alston Corliss, who’d taped all the evidence on Caddrick? How, in fact, had she even known about it, so soon? She’d bolted hours before the FBI had leaked word to the press. Armstrong again, no doubt.

  Alston Corliss was yet another reason to worry about the senator. If a goddamned actor could ferret out that kind of evidence on the senator’s activities. . . .When this was over and done with, maybe it would be a good idea to bring about Caddrick’s political downfall. Do it subtly, so Caddrick would never suspect Gideon had orchestrated it. Yes, he’d have to look into that. Suggest it to Cyril Barris as a potential course of action for the future, after they’d culled everything useful they could from Caddrick’s position in government. Meanwhile, Noah Armstrong had somehow absconded with a copy of that goddamned, incriminating tape, the original of which they’d found and destroyed. Maybe Corliss had used the stinking Internet to send it, with streaming video technology. However he’d gotten the tape to Armstrong, out in California, it spelled certain disaster for their plans if they didn’t get it back before Armstrong found a way to contact the authorities.

  Gideon knocked back the scotch and swore under his breath. Complications like this, he did not need. But he had the situation under control again, thank God, so all he had to do now was keep an eye on John Caddrick and make sure nothing else went wrong. If anything else did . . . Heads would by God roll. Gideon scowled. The senator had believed for years he was calling the shots. Fine. Let him. If Caddrick screwed up one more time, he’d find out the bitter truth, fast. It would almost be worth the trouble, to see the shock on his face.

  Gideon switched off the television and settled himself to set in motion the events necessary to bring about the end of a powerful politician’s career.

  Chapter Ten

  It was a vastly subdued Margo who returned to Spaldergate House in a driving downpour, with lightning sizzling in the night skies and Benny Catlin missing and wounded somewhere beyond their reach. After the preoccupation of their abortive search, it was actually a shock to return to the warmth and brightness of Spaldergate and the lively discussion amongst the Ripper scholars, who cared absolutely nothing about a missing time tourist. All except Shahdi Feroz. Margo still wondered why she’d volunteered to accompany them.

  An argument broke out the moment they returned, as to which scholars would go into the East End to help place the final surveillance equipment at the first murder scene. Not to be outdone, Dominica Nosette and Guy Pendergast joined the fray.

  “We’re coming along, as well.”

  Pavel Kostenka said, “You are not qualified—“

  “I’ve been on more undercover photoshoots than you have credentials strung out behind your name!”

  “And you are a two-bit, muckraking—“

  “Two-bit my arse! I’ll have you know—“

  “Enough!” Malcolm’s stern voice cut through the babble and silenced the entire lot of them. “I’ll make the decision as to who goes and who stays! Is that clear?”

  Even Margo gulped, staring wide-eyed at her infuriated fiancé.

  “Now. Miss Nosette, Mr. Pendergast, the terms of the Ripper Watch contract include you as the only journalists. It would be remiss of us if you did not accompany the team members placing the equipment, tonight, to recor
d the attempt for posterity. I presume you’ve brought low-light, miniaturized cameras?”

  “I know my trade,” the blond reporter said with an icy chill in her voice, glaring at Kostenka. “And my equipment.”

  Kostenka just shrugged and pretended to find the carpet utterly absorbing.

  “Very well. I would suggest you go and get that equipment ready. We’ll leave the house at two A.M. If you’re not dressed for the East End and waiting in the carriage drive, we’ll leave without you. Now then, Margo, please be good enough to help them select costumes. They haven’t been into the East End. Assist Dr. Feroz with that as well. I’ll want you along, Inspector,” he glanced at Conroy Melvyn, the Scotland Yard chief inspector who’d been named head of the Ripper Watch team, “and the others can prepare the relay and recording equipment on the roof and down in the vault.”

  There were grumbles, but clearly, the Ripper Watch team had grown accustomed to taking Malcolm’s orders when it came to his decisions as head guide.

  “Very good. I expect you all have someplace better to be than standing about in the parlour, with your mouths hanging open.”

  The assembled scholars and journalists dispersed quickly. Only Conroy Melvyn seemed to find the situation humorous. The police inspector winked at Malcolm as he strolled out in the wake of the disgruntled scholars. Then Margo was alone with Malcolm, at last.

  “Margo, I’m afraid you’re not going to like what I have to say next.”

  “Oh, no, Malcolm, please let me come with you!”

  He grimaced. “That isn’t it. Quite the opposite, in fact.” He rubbed the back of his neck distractedly. “It’s this blasted business with Catlin. Thank God you’ve come. I’ve got to work with the Gilberts, organize some plan of attack to search for him. We’ll try the hospitals, the workhouse infirmaries, anywhere Catlin might have gone seeking medical attention.”

  Margo gulped, seeing abruptly where this was leading. “Malcolm . . . I—I’m not ready to guide that bunch by myself—“

  Malcolm grinned. “Good. I’m glad you’ve the sense to admit it. I didn’t intend sending you alone. Tanglewood’s a good man, an experienced guide, and he’s been in the East End a fair bit.”

  Margo frowned. “Isn’t that kind of an odd place for tourists to go?”

  Malcolm merely cleared his throat. “Zipper jockey tours.”

  Oh. “That’s disgusting!”

  “It isn’t his fault, Margo. He’s a Time Tours employee. If he wants to keep his job, he goes where the paying customers want to visit. Even if it’s some back-alley brothel in Wapping.”

  “Huh. I hope they catch a good dose of something nasty!”

  “Occasionally,” Malcolm said drily, “they do. Spaldergate’s resident surgeon keeps rather a generous supply of penicillin on hand. There is a reason London’s courtesans wore death’s-head rings, even as early as the eighteenth century.”

  Margo shivered. Poor women, reduced to such poverty they’d no choice but to risk syphillis and its slow, certain deterioration toward madness and death in an era predating antibiotics.

  “Very well,” Malcolm said tiredly, “that’s settled, then. I would suggest you go in costume as a girl, rather than a street ruffian. You’ll be less apt to run into serious trouble, particularly in company with the members of the Ripper Watch team. But go armed, love. It’s no busman’s holiday I’m sending you into, out there.”

  She nodded. “Believe me, I will be. I’ll watch over them, get them back here safe again, as soon as their equipment is in place.”

  Malcolm held out his arms and she walked into his embrace, just holding onto him tightly for a long moment. He kissed her with such hunger, it left her head swimming. Then he broke the contact and leaned his brow against hers and sighed. “I would give anything . . . But I must get on with the search for Benny Catlin.”

  “I know.”

  He kissed her one last time, then went in search of the Spaldergate House gatekeepers. Margo found her way upstairs and helped the new arrivals pick out costumes ragged enough for the East End, then showed Dominica Nosette how to get into the costume. Shahdi Feroz had, at least, been down the Britannia before.

  “In the West End, mostly” she said with a slight smile, glancing at the garments Margo had authorized. “But I do know how the underthings, at least, go on.”

  Dominica Nosette expected Margo to assist her as lady’s maid, a task she did not relish. Three months of this? Margo groused silently, yanking at the strings on Miss Nosette’s stays. I’ll lop off her pretty blond hair and put her in a boy’s tog’s, first!

  By the time the mantle clocks throughout Spaldergate chimed two A.M. and they were ready to leave in one of the Time Tours carriages, which would take them as far as the Tower of London, Malcolm had been gone for hours, out combing the hospitals and workhouse infirmaries for some trace of their missing tourist. Douglas Tanglewood ushered them all into a stylish Calash Coach, which possessed a hard, covered roof and curtains to screen them from outside scrutiny, since they were dressed as roughly as any dockhand out of Stepney. They rode in a silence electric with anticipation. Even Margo, who fretted over Malcolm’s safety, searching for a man who had already been involved in two fatal shootings, found herself caught up in the air of excitement.

  In three hours, they would know.

  After more than a century and a half of mystery, they would finally know.

  If nothing went wrong. If she did her job right. If the equipment didn’t fail . . .

  When they finally alighted at the Tower, which stood at the very gateway to the East End, dividing it from more prosperous areas to the west, Dominica Nosette gasped in astonishment and pointed through the darkness toward a misshapen silhouette outlined now and again by flashes of lightning.

  “The Bridge!” she gasped. “What’s wrong with the Bridge? Who’s destroyed it?”

  Douglas Tanglewood chuckled softly. “Miss Nosette, Tower Bridge hasn’t suffered any damage. They simply haven’t finished building it, yet.” Flickers of lightning revealed naked iron girders which only partly spanned the River Thames in the darkness. The famous stone covering had not yet been put into place. “There’s been quite a controversy raging about the Bridge, you know. Stone over iron, unheard of, risky.”

  “Controversy?” the blonde sniffed, clearly thinking Tanglewood was feeding her a line. “Absurd. Tower Bridge is a national monument!”

  “Will be,” Margo put in. “Right now, it’s just another bridge. Convenient for trans-shipping cargo from the docks on this bank to the docks on the South Side, since it’ll cut five miles out of the draymen’s one-way journey, but just a bridge, for all its convenience.”

  “Nonsense!”

  Margo shrugged. “Suit yourself. This isn’t the London you left a couple of days ago, Miss Nosette. I’d advise you to keep that in mind. Let’s get moving, all right? We don’t have any time to waste, standing around arguing about a stupid bridge that isn’t even finished, yet.”

  They set out, Doug Tanglewood in the lead, Margo and Shahdi Feroz bringing up the rear, while Dominica Nosette and Guy Pendergast, voices low, deadlocked in a debate with Conroy Melvyn of Scotland Yard as they walked through the dark, rainy streets. Pubs had just closed down and houses were mostly dark, gas lights turned out while the working poor found what sleep they could before dawn sent them reeling out once more to earn a living however they could manage.

  “There’s a lot of evidence against Frederick Bailey Deeming, isn’t there?” Pendergast asked softly.

  “A small-time swindler with brain fever,” Conroy Melvyn said with a dismissive air. “Killed his wife and children, slashed their throats. They hanged him in ‘92.”

  “Didn’t the press dub him the official Ripper, though?” Dominica Nosette pressed the argument. “And Scotland Yard, as well? For years, the Yard exhibited his death mask as the Ripper’s.”

  Conroy Melvyn shrugged. “Well, he was a right popular chap at the time, so he was, vi
olent and known t’be in Whitechapel during the murders. Carried knives, so witnesses told police. Not,” the up-time Scotland Yard inspector added drily, “that anybody had any real evidence against him. Prob’ly just an epileptic, drunken lout of a sailor with a violent temper and a nasty habit of killing off family when they got inconveniently expensive to support.”

  “Nice guy,” Margo muttered, earning a sardonic glance from Shahdi Feroz.

  Dominica Nosette, who had secreted a miniature video camera system under her clothing and bonnet, turned to glance at the Scotland Yard inspector—thus adroitly filming the “interview” as well.

  “Who do you think did it, then?”

  “I dunno, ma’am, and that’s what we’re doin’ tonight, innit? Taking a bit of a look-see for ourselves, eh?”

  Dominica Nosette, clearly not one to be dismissed so easily, dropped back to where Margo and Shahdi Feroz walked behind the chief inspector and Guy Pendergast. “Who do you think did it, Dr. Feroz? You never did name your top suspect, back on the station, despite all those marvelous theories about Satanists and mad lesbian midwives. Come, now, Dr. Feroz, who’s your favorite suspect?”

  Neither Shahdi Feroz nor Dominica Nosette noticed the sharp stare from a roughly dressed man nearly invisible in the shadows of a dark alleyway. A man who abruptly changed course to follow them. But Margo did. And she noticed the heavy sap in his hand and the covetous look he cast at Shahdi Feroz and her carpet bag. He’d clearly heard Dominica Nosette call Shahdi Feroz “doctor” and doubtless figured there was something valuable in her satchel. Medicines, maybe, which could be sold for cash. Margo rounded on him in scalding language that brought the ill-dressed villain—and the entire Ripper Watch Team—to a screeching halt in the middle of Whitechapel Road.

  “Cor, ‘ave a nice butcher’s, will you?” Margo shrilled, fists clenched as she advanced menacingly on him. “Ain’t you never clapped yer bleedin’ minces on no missionary doctor before, you gob-smacked lager lout? Takin’ ‘er to London Horse Piddle, so I am, an’ you lay a German on ‘er, I’ll clout you upside yer pink an’ shell-like, so I will! I ain’t no gormless git, I ain’t, I know wot a blagger like you is up to, when ‘e follows a lady, so g’wan, then, ‘ave it away on yer buttons! Before I smack you in the ‘ampsteads wiv a bleedin’ sap! C’mon, get yer finger out!”