Bloodline

by Jill Jones

  “Treason!” Jonathan had never heard of anything so preposterous. And he didn’t believe for a minute that Huntley-Ames was in the Queen’s secret service. His wife certainly hadn’t. “I’m not turning over anything until I talk to the head of this outfit.”

  Lord Chastain let out a heavy, impatient sigh. “I’m afraid that will be impossible. You see, he was called away on an important assignment today. In Scotland.”

  He went to Victoria and glanced at the materials she had in her hands. Materials they had so foolishly believed were of interest to the Queen. Jonathan was furious at himself. They’d walked into a trap.

  “May I?” Huntley-Ames asked, indicating he wanted her to turn the precious items over to him.

  “You sure as hell may not!” she lashed out, backing away from him. But she ran into the wall of one of Lord Chastain’s henchmen who easily wrestled the goods from her and handed them to the Queen’s would-be protector. He set the hat on the conference table and proceeded to peruse the two diaries with interest.

  “So the old man did have Gull’s diary,” he commented. “I thought he was just blowing smoke. Too bad he met with such an untimely end. I hadn’t planned on running him over, but the opportunity presented itself, and it seemed the thing to do at the time. Prevention, you know. Being dead, he couldn’t cause trouble.”

  He fanned the pages of the other diary. “Interesting. I didn’t know about this one. Hmmm. Supposedly written by J.K. Stephen. A hoax, I’m sure. But we mustn’t take chances.”

  He rose and took the two small books to the shredder.

  “No!” Victoria shouted and dashed after him. But the second man intercepted her, wrapping his arms tightly around her while she flailed her fists at Lord Chastain.

  Jonathan attempted to bolt to Victoria’s rescue but was himself restrained by one of the goons. “Let her go,” he demanded.

  But Huntley-Ames only smiled blandly. “Relax, both of you, and you won’t get hurt.”

  “You’re insane to even think about destroying those artifacts,” Victoria cried desperately. “What possible harm could come of finally resolving the Ripper murders?”

  The self-styled operative turned on the machine, tore a few pages from the green diary and fed them into the teeth of the beast. Despair tightened Jonathan’s stomach. He hardly heard the man’s explanation.

  “I’m an old man now,” he told them. “Ready to retire. I have things all set up in the Caribbean. But I could not leave until I secured this secret forever. It is a duty that has been handed down in my family for generations. But I have no heir, and therefore no choice but to destroy the evidence that has been in my charge all these years. I must thank you for providing that second diary as well. I doubt if J.K. Stephen kept a duplicate anywhere. We should have all the evidence in our possession now.” More pages went into the shredder. When he was finished with the content of the diaries, he took an elegant gold lighter from his vest pocket and set fire to the board covers of each, watching them burn in a metal trash bin. When the flames rose brightly, he added the hat to the mix. The odor of scorched fabric filled the room. Jonathan hoped the smoke would set off the alarms, but it didn’t.

  Huntley-Ames turned to Jonathan. “Now, may we please have your set of documents, or are you going to make these lads earn their keep?”

  Jonathan looked at him with contempt. “These documents are priceless. They belong in a museum.”

  “They belong in the shredder. I should have destroyed them years ago.”

  With that, the older man strode to Jonathan and tried to wrench the manila envelopes from his grasp. Jonathan was able to shrug off the man who had been restraining him, and managed to give Huntley-Ames a rough shove in the stomach. But he was outnumbered three-to-one, for both of the henchmen were on him in an instant, one of them delivering a blow to his chin that sent him crashing to the floor. The three manila envelopes went flying across the room.

  “Jonathan!” He heard Victoria cry out angrily and turned in time to see her race across the room and kick one of the bullies between the legs from the rear, effectively rendering him useless. But the other one whirled and grabbed her securely.

  Finding his footing again, Jonathan lunged at Lord Chastain, knocking him off balance. The two men tumbled to the floor, skirmishing for control. Jonathan became aware in his peripheral vision that someone else had entered the room. He glanced around and saw the woman who had delivered the summons to this insanity hurrying through the room, gathering up the precious documents.

  “Shred them, Penelope,” Lord Chastain called out her.

  “No!” Jonathan cried, but his protest was silenced by the blow of something heavy against his head.

  When he came to, the room was quiet. Victoria knelt over him, stroking his forehead. The three men and the woman had gone. The conference table was empty. There was no sign of the shredder or the trash bin.

  All that remained as testimony to what had taken place here was the faint scent of smoke and Jonathan’s splitting headache.

  Later that day, Victoria pressed a cold cloth across the ugly lump on Jonathan’s forehead. He lay on the bed in his flat, looking more forlorn than she’d ever seen him, and she had to admit that she, too, had never felt so defeated.

  After the men had left, Victoria had run into the adjoining offices, calling out for help. But the entire wing of the building was curiously deserted. Worried about Jonathan, she’d returned to care for him just as he was regaining consciousness.

  “We have to report this,” she’d insisted when he sat up, but he’d simply shaken his head.

  “No. There’s no point. I don’t know if Huntley-Ames is in the secret service or not, but he managed to pull off his hijacking in the offices of some very powerful people here at Scotland Yard. I don’t think he did it on his own.”

  When he managed to get to his feet, they had returned to Jonathan’s office, picked up the rest of his belongings and left. Jonathan walked in silence, and Victoria searched for some way to lighten his disappointment.

  “We have photocopies of everything,” she’d pointed out.

  “Nothing that could be forensically proven as authentic. We’d just be laughed at as creating yet another hoax.”

  She hated to admit it, but he was right.

  “I’m sorry things turned out this way,” Victoria said, changing the compress tenderly.

  Jonathan rolled over on the bed and tugged her into his arms. “It doesn’t matter,” he said, grinning and running his hands through her hair. “I have all I want in my arms right now.”

  Historical Notes

  The Whitechapel murders of 1888 ceased as abruptly as they began. With the death of Montague John Druitt in December 1888, many at Scotland Yard believed that the man who called himself Jack the Ripper was gone.

  J.K. Stephen continued his tormented existence, doing all in his power to thwart the demands of his overbearing father while sinking ever deeper into madness. He saw little of his beloved Prince Eddy in the two remaining years of his life.

  Prince Albert Victor Edward was sent to India by his parents after recovering from the “illness” that kept him confined in Dr.Gull’s asylum for several months after the Ripper murders ceased. Upon his return, the Queen announced his engagement to Princess Helene, a Catholic, the daughter of the Comte de Paris, the pretender to the French throne. The engagement was later cancelled, ostensibly for religious reasons. The royals chose another bride for him the following year, his cousin, Princess May of Teck, a Protestant. The wedding was to be held on February 27, 1892.

  On November 21, 1891, J.K. Stephen was admitted to St. Andrew’s Hospital, Northampton, where he lived until his death. Admitting diagnosis: “Extreme depression, almost mute. Has had episodes of depression lasting some weeks followed by periods of unusual excitability. This morning (at home) threw a looking glass into the street and stood naked in the window. Believed there was a warrant out for his detention.”

  Hospital records
describe him as a “tall, well built, rather stout man in good physical health.” His condition generally improved and by January 1, 1892, he was described as being more cheerful and joining in activities.

  On January 7, 1892, Prince Albert Victor Edward, “Prince Eddy,” the Duke of Clarence, became fatally ill at Sandringham after participating in a vigorous hunt the day before despite the fact that he was suffering from influenza. The following day after lunch he was taken seriously ill with abdominal pains and dizziness. He suffered a high fever and a rattling cough, and was diagnosed with incipient pneumonia, although the gastric attacks continued. For the next week, he slipped in and out of consciousness and became delirious. He died on the morning of January 14, 1892.

  Curiously, no records concerning the medical treatment of the Prince have ever been found. From the description of the last days of his life, however, it is believed that Prince Eddy died in the advanced stages of syphilis, which he contracted during a shore party in the West Indies years before.

  On January 15, 1892, J.K. Stephen, unaware that his beloved Prince had died, suddenly began refusing all food and had to be tube fed. This circumstance remained until February 2, when his physical condition collapsed. He died on February 3, 1892. Cause of death is listed as “Mania, refusal of food, and exhaustion.”

  The identity of Jack the Ripper has never been proven.

  More from Jill Jones

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  Soon Alex finds himself trying to decipher the mystery of an old letter, an ancient family curse, and a beautiful and mysterious woman who may hold the key to Emily Brontë’s secret. A unique and absorbing tale, Emily’s Secret pieces together the puzzle of an untimely death.

  My Lady Caroline

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  When Alison arrives at the old house to begin her search, she finds an arrogant British antique dealer there instead, also seeking the potentially incendiary memoirs. Suspicion and anger flare between the seekers—but so too does a passionate desire as electric as that of Caroline and her once adoring poet.

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  When Private Investigator Jack Knight finds the body of Genevieve Sloan in a London hotel, his investigation leads him to the isolated island of Keinadraig—and to Keely.

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