Ripped, a Jack the Ripper Time-Travel Thriller

by Shelly Dickson Carr

  “Come on!” Collin pivoted around.

  Katie watched her cousin trot across the hall and dart back toward the archway. Redheads have a tendency to look either very young, or wrinkly and old, like little gnomes. Collin, though almost eighteen, looked impossibly young. And his shirt, a violent purple striped pattern (a gift from his mother, of course) didn’t help matters. It only added to the overall impression of Collin as young and dorky rather than intellectual and sophisticated, which is how he liked to think of himself.

  Toby was studying Katie from under his dark brows, an amused expression spreading over his face. “Ahem! That wasn’t so bad, now, was it?”

  Katie grabbed his elbow. “Okay, okay,” she said in a pacifying tone. “Lead on.”

  “Where to, ma petite?” He grinned. “The London Stone? The godawful Rosy Lee tea shop with its shepherd’s plaid, er, bad tea? Or the bleedin’ Ripper finale?”

  “Jacques le Ripper, mon petit gars.”

  Chapter Five

  Pancakes and Fritters say the Bells of St Peter’s

  Katie thrust her head into the long exhibition room. Behind her came the sound of heavy footsteps as a crowd of kids pushed forward to see the final Ripper exhibit. Katie and Toby let them pass and then slipped in behind the smallest boy at the end.

  The long gallery was illuminated by low-hanging chandeliers that held dozens of electric candles, with great gobs of fake wax dripping down. It was a very big room, with black-and-white glazed floor tiles and two rows of faux marble pillars—spaced about eight feet apart—going to the back of the room where a wide Plexiglas staircase, in a direct line from where Katie and Toby stood, ascended to an open balcony above.

  Set into the two side walls stretched a row of arched niches displaying waxwork figures, seven on either side. At the rear, to the right of the staircase as one faced it, was a “Ladies” restroom door with a cameo of Queen Victoria.

  Extending down the middle of the room, between the marble pillars, ran a long, flat, glass-topped display case with Jack the Ripper memorabilia. Nestled in velvet in the end of the display case closest to Katie lay a set of old keys, a worn notecase, a watch and chain, fragments of a jar or bottle, and loose coins stamped “Britannia.”

  No eerie unreality here, Katie thought with relief. No waxwork dead bodies or eviscerated girls; nothing grotesque to catch the eye. The waxwork figures, positioned in the arched niches down the right- and left-hand walls, didn’t move or jump out at you. It was just an ordinary gallery exhibit.

  “I can handle this,” she assured herself, but her breathing quickened when she glanced down the row of seven victims, looming large and lifelike along the left-hand wall, unnatural smiles plastered on their wax faces, eyes scornful as if mocking their impending fates. Katie caught a glimpse of a feathered hat, a parasol, the flounce of a petticoat on the first girl, Mary Ann Nichols, before averting her eyes and fastening them on Collin in a throng of kids, his bright red head sticking out from the crowd like a roasted yam in a pot of other, bland vegetables.

  To their right, a low-hanging chandelier threw wagon wheels of light in front of the first Jack the Ripper suspect with a sign that read

  Who was Jack the Ripper?

  How did he manage to walk the streets of Whitechapel unimpeded when the whole of the metropolitan police force was standing guard on every corner?

  Was he a supernatural phantom who could materialize at will?

  Or a flesh-and-blood man bent on harrowing destruction?

  Katie heard a click and tumble sound like a lock being turned, coming from the first suspect. Katie moved hesitantly forward, Toby at her side.

  Take a guess!

  What sort of man could walk the streets of London and not look out of place? What manner of individual would have been above suspicion?

  Could Jack the Ripper

  have been a minister?

  . . . The Right Honourable Jack?

  Standing on a pedestal, the waxwork figure showed a tall, lean man with a white clerical collar round his neck. The wheel of light from above caught the wax bulge of his Adam’s apple in a long, thin neck like a turkey’s. Red blotches in his cheeks extended to the tip of his long nose, with eyeglasses drawn low on the bridge. Clutched in knobby fingers was a gilt-clasped Bible.

  The next sign read

  Or was Jack the Ripper

  a physician?

  . . . Doctor Jack?

  This next statue showed a man with a shiny bald head, a too-red face, large nose, and flabby jowls swelling over the turned-up collar of his long black coat. Wax fingers, sprouting hair from the knuckles, clutched a leather medical bag, and he had crinkled, suspicious-looking eyes.

  The next sign asked if Jack might have been an aristocrat:

  Or was Jack the Ripper a nobleman,

  whose family connections would make it

  impossible to prosecute him?

  . . . Sir Jack?

  . . . Lord Jack?

  . . . The Duke of Jack?

  This wax figure was of a short, barrel-chested man wearing an ermine-trimmed cloak and velvet sash, looking very much like the future King of England, Prince Edward.

  Or was Jack the Ripper

  a butcher by trade?

  There were slaughterhouses in the East End of London. Butcher boys proudly walked the streets with their trademark leather aprons stained in blood.

  . . . Jack the butcher lad?

  Here was a young man of about sixteen in knee breeches, a tweed cap perched low on his forehead, and a bloody leather apron around his waist.

  Or a reporter looking to capitalize

  on the story, prowling the streets and interviewing people, trying to get the latest inside scoop on Jack the Ripper for his newspaper?

  Several prominent writers at the time used

  gore and grisly scenes as well as the supernatural

  as part of their stock in trade.

  . . . Novelist Jack?

  . . . Journalist Jack?

  This waxwork was of two men: Oscar Wilde, flamboyantly dressed with a red gardenia in his lapel, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle with deerstalker cap and meerschaum pipe.

  Katie jerked to a stop and shook her head. “Give me a break! That’s ridiculous! Oscar Wilde as Jack the Ripper? Conan Doyle as Sir Jack? Puh-leeze!”

  “Bleedin’ far-fetched, true enough.” Toby smiled. “But the Ripper could easily have been a writer. Bram Stoker was writing blood-sucking scenes of grisly death; Oscar Wilde was into grotesque supernatural death; and Sherlock Holmes was all about solving murder mysteries. Maybe”—Toby’s smile broadened into an even wider grin — “Jack the Ripper was a psycho ink-slinger doing murder research in the East End.”

  Katie shot him an incredulous look and scooted past the last waxwork suspect, that of “Constable Jack,” depicting a police officer in a crisp blue uniform, brass buttons gleaming, the patent-leather rim of his black helmet sitting high on his head, the leather chin strap tight around his double chin.

  As they moved past, Toby pointed to the wooden truncheon, rattle, and bright silver whistle hooked into the belt around Constable Jack’s waist.

  “I’m done here,” Katie said. “We’ve gone from the grotesque to the ridiculous. They are really grasping at straws here.”

  “But don’t you see?” Toby put in. “People don’t like to have their heroes debunked. If you can’t stand the thought of the author of Sherlock Holmes being a mass murderer, think how the Victorians must have scoffed at the idea—making it the perfect cover for the Ripper. Oh, I’m not saying the Ripper was any of these literary guys. But you can’t rule out that he could have been a local hero . . . an East End writer . . . or actor . . . a musician . . . a performer the people knew and loved. Remember, they would have been much more gullible back then.”

  “How so?”

  “A stage actor who played the white knight on stage would remain that way in the minds of young, impressionable girls. We know that actors aren’t
who they portray on the screen, but we’re often just as smitten. Back then if a girl had paid a farthing to see a theatrical play, she might easily fall in love with the leading man. Then, if she saw him on the street, she’d never dream he wasn’t the stage hero she’d fallen in love with.”

  “Good point. But how many young girls were in love with Oscar Wilde, do you think?”

  “Plenty of boys; dunno how many girls.” Toby winked at her.

  Katie laughed. “I’m out of here. I’ll just go find Collin and tell him I’m done. I’ll meet you guys at the London Stone exhibit.”

  “I’ll come, too.”

  But when they went to find Collin, their search brought them to the left-hand wall. Katie moved quickly down the line of waxwork girls, hardly daring to look at them, starting with Mary Ann Nichols, then Dark Annie, and the twin silhouette of a pregnant Molly Potter standing next to Catherine Eddowes on the same platform because they’d been murdered on the same night, then Elizabeth Stride, followed by Mary Jane Kelly and Dora Fowler. They reached the last Ripper victim, Lady Beatrix Twyford.

  In frustration, Katie hurried past, wrenching her eyes away so as not to even glance at this last waxwork girl. She was halfway to the rear of the room, intent on mounting the Plexiglas staircase, when she heard Toby’s rumbling voice.

  “H’mf! Would you look at that? This bleedin’ one is the spittin’ image of the twist ’n’ swirl from the Metro Chicks. Can they do that, d’ya think? Just steal someone’s likeness and put it on a wax dummy? Bet the bloke that created her has a thing for the Metro Chicks’ lead singer.”

  Katie heard Collin’s voice: “Confound it! What are you talking about?”

  Katie spun around and looped back.

  “Look!” Toby pointed. “Burn me alive if that isn’t the spitting image of the lead singer, Courtney, in the Metro Chicks. Same boat race. I should know. She’s bleedin’ peasy. Got a bit of a thing fer her m’self. I dream about that face.”

  “Peasy?” Collin’s forehead wrinkled up.

  “Peas in the pot, mate. Hot. You too, eh?”

  Katie drew closer.

  “Are you daft?” sputtered Collin, his blue eyes fixed on the waxwork girl. “I’m not hot for my own, er—for Courtney! Looks nothing like her. Not the same face at all.” Collin inclined his head and continued to study the wax figure while tugging at his lower lip with thumb and forefinger, a nervous gesture Aunt Pru was always after him about.

  “Hair color’s different, for sure.” Toby’s eyes moved slowly up and down the wax girl’s form, and he seemed to be holding back a smile. “But I swear they used the singer’s face when they did this wax model. Look—”

  Katie wedged herself between the two boys to get a better look. Her mind was racing. At the edges of her consciousness something was niggling. She raised her gaze to the wax girl’s face, and the realization struck Katie like a blow. She let out a gasp.

  Then, in a dry, barely audible voice, “That’s not Courtney . . . that’s Lady Beatrix!”

  “Of course, it’s Lady Beatrix, birdbrain,” grumbled Collin. “Like the sign says.” He pointed to the inscription on the pedestal: “Lady Beatrix Twyford. 1865–1888.”

  “No. I mean that’s the girl in the portrait. The one Grandma Cleaves found in the attic and hung over my mantelpiece.”

  Part II:

  The London Stone

  Chapter Six

  Two Sticks and an Apple say the Bells of Whitechapel

  Twenty minutes later, her grandmother’s expression “Beware of what you wish for” hammered in Katie’s brain.

  “Katie!” She heard Toby’s voice from the doorway of the atrium where she was standing alone.

  She glanced over her shoulder at Toby, then back at the London Stone. For a good while now, Katie had been staring at the London Stone, a large boulder, balanced on top of what appeared to be an old, crumbling wishing well. The rocks at the base of the well were blackish-brown and set in dark concrete, in contrast to the London Stone, which was a bright whitish-grey. Leading up to the Stone from the entrance was a broad, squishy line of footprints tracked across a long mat, like an Oscar-night red carpet.

  Toby strode toward her. “Beware of pots and dishes . . .” he said in a dead-serious voice, reaching out his hand to stop her from touching the Stone.

  Katie jerked back her hand. It wasn’t possible to touch the Stone, nestled on top of the well, because it was encased in a prickly, wire-mesh cage. What had startled Katie were the words “pots and dishes.”

  Please don’t let “pots and dishes” mean wishes, Katie thought, peering at Toby, who seemed to have an uncanny ability to read her mind.

  “Huh?” Collin sputtered, stumbling through the doorway, following close on Toby’s heels. “Pots and dishes? Er . . . ya mean bitches?”

  “Just an expression, mate. ‘Beware of what you wish for, because it might—’”

  “ ‘Come true,’ ” Katie finished his sentence.

  Toby’s eyes fastened on Katie’s and didn’t waver.

  Collin tugged on his lower lip with his thumb and forefinger. “You don’t . . . really . . . believe the legend, right? I mean . . . you weren’t going to try—”

  Katie flinched. “Of course not.”

  Collin was pinching his lip out so far that Katie wanted to swat his hand from his mouth, like Aunt Pru always did, but resisted. It was a nervous habit. Collin couldn’t help it.

  “Of course, I don’t believe in the legend,” Katie answered, inching around the London Stone, which appeared from this angle to be rising up out of the well. No muddy footprints straggled around the back of the well, and as she followed it around, she ran her hand over the small, waist-high rocks jutting out just below its rim, rough and flinty against her palm like the boundary walls surrounding Grandma Cleaves’s garden.

  As she came to the back, Katie heard a weird sort of thrashing sound and glanced over her shoulder. Behind her was a solid, cinder-block wall.

  “It’s a rum thing about this bleedin’ Stone,” said Toby, following her around the well. His voice was jovial and light, but there were deep furrows in his forehead. “Legend has it that those who believe, truly believe, can rewrite history. Change the past.”

  Katie nodded. “Most historians think the Stone was part of a pre-Roman stone circle.”

  “Like Stonehenge,” Collin muttered, tugging at his lip so that the word Stonehenge came out sounding like sternage. “Thousands of people flock to Stonehenge at the summer solstice. I’ve seen it on the telly. They do all those weird dances and chanting.”

  Toby frowned. “The London Stone has nothing to do with Neolithic stone circles. It’s the stone of Brutus, part of a Druid altar. That’s what historians believe.”

  “So it was used for . . . sacrificial stuff?” Collin’s red brows rose. “Cool!”

  “Or creepy,” Katie said. “But you’re wrong.” Katie glanced at Toby. She had done a lot of research on the London Stone. The only thing that historians did agree on was the fact that the Stone had resided in London as far back as written records existed, along with the fable — or curse—that if the Stone were ever to leave London, the city would instantly cease to exist.

  “Sign over there says it could be the stone King Arthur drew his sword from.” Collin let go of his lip and puffed out his freckled cheeks.

  Toby’s eyes fastened on Katie with an odd watchfulness.

  Katie took a step closer to the Stone, and the room suddenly filled with darting light. Shadows chased one another around the Stone—not unusual, Katie thought. This was Madame Tussauds, after all, known for its weird special effects. But what was that strange smell? Like peanut butter and smoky cheese, so strong it was as if someone had opened a jar of Skippy peanut butter and placed it directly under her nose.

  “What’s that smell?”

  “What smell?”

  “Like stinky cheese and peanut butter. What’s in your pocket, Collin?” Much to Collin’s chagrin, Aunt P
ru often tucked cheese sandwiches into his pockets, “lest the darling boy starve.”

  Collin yanked out a smushed box of Milk Duds. “These? S’all I got. I swear.” He tossed the box to Katie and she caught it in midair. Expelling her breath, she reached inside and tugged out two chocolate Milk Duds. She popped one into her mouth, savoring the chewy caramel, then Frisbeed the box back to Collin.

  “Katie,” Toby said, so close to her ear it made her jump. When she glanced up, she saw that he was standing at least three feet away. Then she heard a sound as if someone had just kicked a tin can and it was rattling its way across the tiled floor, near the strip of red carpet. But when she looked down, there was nothing.

  She peered into the corners of the room, then over her shoulder.

  No tin cans.

  More special effects, Katie wondered?

  “Katie,” Toby repeated, the sound of her name pounding so loudly in her ears, she clamped her hands over them.

  “Stop shouting!”

  “Not shouting, Katie.” Toby looked at her oddly, then lowered his voice to a whisper. “Did you ever read ‘The Raven’s Claw’?”

  Katie darted behind the London Stone, effectively muffling the booming sound of his voice.

  “It’s a short story.” Toby’s words pursued her, bouncing loudly off the cinder-block walls. “It’s one of those gothic horror stories written around the time of Edgar Allan Poe, ’bout a bloke who gets three wishes if he rubs this shriveled-up raven’s claw. But what happens after he gets his first wish is so freakin’ awful, he spends his last two wishes trying to undo the first.”

  Perplexed, Katie popped her head back around the London Stone. “Meaning . . . ?”

  “If you interfere with fate, Katie, you do so at your own peril.” Toby’s voice was back to normal, but it had been so piercingly loud just the moment before that it left a ringing void against her eardrums.