by Laird Barron
Newcomen was perplexed. “I am sure that the police are doing all they can. Abberline is a fine man, as is Bond. I am sure they will catch the perpetrator of these horrid crimes, and the murderer will be brought to justice.”
“You misunderstand us, Inspector; we do not care about justice. We want these killings to end, and we want you to be the instrument we employ to end them. Perhaps, in doing this you will no longer be haunted by your failure to deal with Mr. Hyde.” The look on Newcomen’s face made the Professor elaborate: “Additionally, we will use our influence with certain agencies to create for you a new position. Not law enforcement mind you, but a place for you in one of our many legitimate private security companies. We have ties to the Continental Agency. A man of your talents has a place with us, if you want it.”
Newcomen smiled. “That’s a fair deal, and I would be more than willing to take it, but for certain obvious problems. I have no suspects. I don’t have access to the files, the evidence or the resources I would need. Even if I did, I’m not sure I am smart enough to figure out something my betters can’t. You need to approach someone else, perhaps Mr. Hol—”
“THAT IS NOT AN OPTION!” the Professor roared. “That man cannot be involved in this, though his interference is expected. He will be dealt with, managed, and misled. False leads and patsies are being created to distract him. This is one game he will not be joining.” He took a deep breath and coughed with a wheeze. “As for the files, that has all been taken care of. The Gentleman Thief has supplied us with copies of all the evidence and files available to Inspector Swanson and his underlings. We supplemented this information with our own investigations and observations. We have resources, capabilities; a lack of restrictions that allow us to do things the Police cannot, or will not. In this manner our logicians Mr. Fogg and Mr. Loveless have not only identified those who have committed these crimes, but their motives and hiding place. Even now our agent, a man we recently recruited from Paris, an expert in the art of remaining unobserved, and of subterranean labyrinths, has them under observation. When the time comes, he will act as your guide.”
“So you’ve confirmed that there is more than one man committing these crimes? That has always been the suspicion, but surely they cannot be working in together? With such varied methods, that would be almost inconceivable.”
Suddenly the Chinese Doctor was clapping, but his eyes were not on Newcomen, but rather on his fellow crime lord. Finally, the Devil Doctor himself spoke: “Congratulations, my dear Professor, your point is made. Your theory concerning the minds of those in law enforcement, as opposed to those involved in criminal exploits, is all but proven.” He turned to look at Newcomen. “It seems that we must lay things out for you, dear sir. The murders in Whitechapel have indeed been committed by more than one person, but it is not a pair of men that have done these deeds. There are twelve of them. A dozen maniacs stalk the streets of London seeking revenge on those they believed have harmed them, twelve individuals and most assuredly not men.”
“Not men? The Whitechapel murders were committed by a gang of women? Surely not?”
The Professor was suddenly sniggering. “Please, Inspector Newcomen, London has not been beset by the Dowager Calipash and her daughters. The culprits are all male, the sons of your nemesis, Mr. Hyde.” Newcomen’s face went pale as the man continued. “Surely you realized that Mr. Hyde was, how did Beccon put it, ‘Sowing wild oats’? What did you think he was doing with all those London whores, playing cribbage? He impregnated them, and they like so many others in their profession gave the children away. Now they have come home, and they seek revenge on those who have harmed them, their own mothers.
The aged inspector’s mind reeled as something dawned on him. “But Hyde was only with those women five years ago. His children couldn’t be more than four years old.”
The Devil Doctor sat back down. The Professor wrung his hands before grudgingly speaking once more: “Is that a problem? The Colonel did say you were the man for the job.”
Inspector Thomas Newcomen reflected back on his life and what was being offered him. The massacre at Dewangiri had been twenty-five years in the past, but he could still see the faces of the child soldiers that the enemy had sent in a futile attempt to drive back the British Forces. The Colonel had ordered a retreat, but Newcomen had refused, and instead held the position. He had killed dozens before the opposing forces had fallen back. Even then he kept firing at the fleeing boys who had been armed only with daggers and wearing little more than rags. The company surgeon had wanted him discharged, but the Colonel had ignored such nonsense. Newcomen would never forget those faces, the screams, and the sight of blood and gore exploding from bodies. He should have been discharged, for what he had done still haunted him. It was because of these memories that he had turned to opium in the first place. Not to drown the images from his mind, but to quench the desire he felt to relive the experience. He hated those memories, not because of what he had done, but because he couldn’t do it again. And now, he was being offered another opportunity to kill children, monstrous children, but still just children.
A smile crept across his face as they handed him a rifle. The weapon felt good in his hand, like it belonged there. “A problem? No, not at all.” For the first time in years, he felt complete.
When the Means Just Defy the End
Stanley C. Sargent
London, East End, late night November 8, 1888
A bone-chilling cold pervaded the late night air, and those few individuals out and about on the streets were not immune to the chill. They were brave souls indeed, ignoring not only the cold but the persistent warnings that the savage killer who had of late been so generously providing the newspapers with shrill headlines was likely still stalking the streets. The fog, actually more pollution than anything else, blurred visibility as it lingered above the slippery cobblestones. This eerie, almost impenetrable atmosphere conspired with those who lurked with ill intent, hiding them from sight till they should emerge to pounce on the foolish and the unsuspecting. Somehow the predators, at home in the clammy miasma, could see through it, counting on their prey being equally unable to see any more than a few paces ahead.
It was generally considered that those who haunted the particularly restive, poverty-stricken streets late at night were little more than human refuse, although many of them truly were penniless, homeless and desperately attempting to survive. It was not uncommon to encounter entire families huddled beneath makeshift shelters in an attempt to remain warm and safe while sleeping.
The rest of the nightly population was fleshed out by scatterings of pathetic drunks, gaudy “daughters of joy,” men of every rank seeking sexual satisfaction for a few paltry shillings, simple-minded miscreants, filthy street urchins, and other ne’er-do-wells. Nor was it rare to stumble upon a corpse lying in a gutter or secreted away in some dark doorway, the victim of the cold, starvation or foul play. Most residents had long ago learned the importance of keeping a bloodshot eye cocked skyward in order to avoid unannounced splashes of urine and fecal matter tossed from the windows of doss houses that reached as high as two or three stories. Along with the stench of offal that crept from gutters and many shops hereabout, the Whitechapel and Spitalfields districts had earned from London’s Daily Mirror the unflattering honorific of “Satan’s Cesspool.”
On this particular night, one lone figure, different and apart from the others, remained in the deepest shadows, quickening his pace only when forced into view by the dull luminescence of distantly separated gaslights. For over an hour, he continuously stalked a small area around Church Street, slipping from doorway to alley, intent on remaining unseen without losing sight of the main entry to the Ten Bells Public House. His was a very different mission, a mission indeed unique. Arthur Belmont would not have thought to call himself a hero, but if someday someone should call him one, he could not disagree. But in fact no one would ever call him that.
He had taken his name years earlier, no
t so much to conceal his identity as to sever all connections with his past. Unlike most, he did not despise everything and everyone in this urban hellhole; he knew the vast majority of people who populated these streets yearned for better lives and living conditions but were able to do little or nothing to bring about such improvements. This knowledge had been personally ingrained in him during the first eight years of his life, which were spent in Whitechapel before a stroke of luck brought him to better station elsewhere. He still retained deep and jagged scars within his soul from those early years, scars that relentlessly reminded him not only of what he himself had suffered in this place but of the countless other youngsters whose lives were still being destroyed on a daily basis. And yet he himself had performed terrible, unspeakable things in these very streets.
Every fifteen minutes, he stopped, momentarily standing motionless despite the chill and dampness of the night air that seeped into his flesh. Thus he had contrived, these many nights, to escape detection whenever the light of a bullseye lantern signaled the familiar patter of a stalwart police constable’s boots passing uncomfortably near.
It was equally vital that he remain alert to sweet little Mary’s anticipated exit from the Ten Bells. She would not be in good condition after an evening of heavy drinking and, if he were lucky, she would be alone. She had already taken leave of the place once, nearly two hours earlier, taking just enough time to service a staggering client in a nearby alley before hastily returning to the pub. Arthur had observed her actions but decided to do nothing until he could get her alone.
Fleeting glances of her since that tryst revealed her carousing in the pub, surrounded by friends, while clasping a pint of bitter.
Arthur was reminded of the first time he had seen Mary and how difficult it had been for him to believe anyone could look so much like his late mother. He took it as a sign from, if not on high, then below. After all, Hell for many, including himself, began with “mother.” He had followed Mary to her home that very day, only to discover she resided in Miller’s Court, in the very same room in which he had spent the first eight years of his life. All of this seemed so far beyond the realm of coincidence that he immediately dismissed any and all lingering doubts about including her in his plan. It was almost as if he was being guided by some unseen hand beckoning him toward a preordained destiny.
The very next day, he had returned to the doss house at Miller’s Court in an effort to collect as much information about Mary and her habits as he could without arousing suspicion. He learned she had lived in her rented bedsit with a man for more than a year. According to neighbors, the man had recently moved out, apparently fed up with Mary’s constant drinking and whoring. Arthur’s father, a merchant seaman by trade, had left Arthur’s mother for the same reasons when the boy was only five years of age. He remembered how he had often prayed his father would return for him until the day news arrived that his father’s ship had gone down with all hands somewhere in the vast Atlantic. She continued to receive a portion of her seafaring husband’s pay for a time but, when it ran out, Arthur’s mother was compelled to seek some other means to pay the rent and keep food on the table. Decent-paying jobs for untrained laborers were exceedingly rare, so mother and child struggled endlessly just to make ends meet, and too often the ends were left dangling. In time, like so many before her, Arthur’s mother had taken to walking the streets each night. Here was one skill she could turn to her advantage. It was disgusting and degrading work and, as time passed, she felt obliged to consume more and more alcohol to fortify her tolerance for it. That was the only way it ever got easier.
As a mere child, Arthur did what he could to bring in extra money, but he could earn a mere tuppence per week at best. Thus, it was inevitable that, in the end, his desperate mother felt compelled to follow the example of her gaggle of cronies, all low-grade prostitutes living, like her, in Miller’s Court, or in nearby Dorset or Thrawl streets. What she did was to force her terrified son to submit to loathsome sexual encounters with some of the strangers she brought back to her room. With this added thrill for clients who were pederasts, she was able to double and, at times, even triple her nightly income. For the next three years, Arthur suffered abuse he considered worse than anything Hell could offer. Plying herself with boozy assurances that it was for her son’s own good, since otherwise he should most likely starve, his mother soon became stolidly immune to his suffering. Sometimes she would hold the struggling boy down as a client buggered him. The most unnerving part of the ordeal was the way his mother seemed fascinated by the agony young Arthur endured, staring intently into his eyes as it occurred. She would cover his mouth with her hand to stifle his screams until they died away from weakness. Afterward, both mother and son avoided each other’s gaze while she washed the blood from his legs and torn behind. He never forgave her the betrayal, refusing to be in the same room with her when she chose to drink away the extra earnings rather than use them to buy food. The boy made no serious attempt to run away because he knew he would likely fare even worse by himself in the streets. And so he drifted day to day in a waking coma of dull despair.
To his great astonishment, Arthur had eventually been rescued, albeit due to very dismal circumstances. One night after drinking more than usual, his mother brought a novice client home with her, hoping the man would be interested in a more expensive session that included her son’s unwilling participation. She assured the fellow he need not fear anyone interrupting them as her husband was deceased. When she suggested the boy join in, the man was shocked and repulsed. As he prepared to depart, his self-loathing was palpable, and he refused even to listen to any alternative offer the woman stammered out. When Arthur’s mother realized she was not about to change the man’s mind, she launched into a mad rage and lunged upon him with an upraised butcher’s knife she kept under the bedclothes. Shocked and terrified, young Arthur witnessed a life-or-death struggle for which he was ill prepared.
Instinctively he grabbed his mother’s arm in an attempt to stop her from stabbing the man. Moments later, man and woman were struggling on the bed, entangled in blankets and sheets, all in a semi-darkness relieved only by the dim illumination of an oil lamp. When the lamp toppled from the bedside table, the combatants were deprived of all light. The breathless, sweat-soaked man eventually managed to extricate himself from the covers and rekindle the lamp, only to find himself staring at a fount of dark blood gushing from a horrendous slash across the woman’s throat. Her jugular vein had been severed. The knife lay beside her, having fallen from her hand in the darkness. Taking great care to avoid getting blood on his clothing, the man carefully checked to see if she was still breathing while the boy sat calmly to one side of his mother’s body. He found neither signs of breathing nor a pulse. Although he had no clear sense of what had occurred once the light was extinguished, he very much feared that he might have accidentally knocked the blade into the woman’s throat while attempting to fend off her clumsy assault.
Suddenly recognizing the position in which he found himself, the man panicked, unsure if, despite all the chaos, he might be held responsible for the woman’s demise. He was nearly out the door before he glanced back briefly at the pathetic little boy still poised helplessly by his mother’s motionless form. Fortunately for Arthur, the good-hearted gentleman found himself incapable of leaving an innocent child alone with a corpse. He knew the boy would inevitably be relegated to some foul orphanage, forced to fend for himself on the streets or, worst of all, be charged with matricide should his recounting of events not be believed. Fighting the natural urge to flee, the man encouraged Arthur to go with him, promising him a good home in the country where he would be treated as if he were the man’s own offspring. Perhaps in this way the man sought to atone for his uncharacteristic yielding to the temptation of infidelity.
What choice had Arthur than to trust the man and believe his promises? After pulling from a stinking heap a threadbare coat to protect the already shivering youth from the chill
outside, the would-be rescuer hurriedly shoved a few necessities into a pillow case; they then fled the scene together. Hailing a hansom cab, they headed for the train station where both slept until morning. They boarded the first train from London to the man’s family residence in Reading.
While on the train, the first he had ever ridden, Arthur learned his benefactor’s name was Robert Ornin. He owned a small but thriving demolition and clearance concern based in London. The pair put their wits together, devising a story they hoped Ornin’s wife would find believable. The couple had no children of their own, despite their great desire for a family, so it might work if Ornin introduced Arthur as a half-starved street urchin who had won his heart begging on a cold street corner. The boy, they would tell her, had been abandoned by his father after his mother died of consumption, and had survived by totting, rummaging through garbage and refuse for salable items. Unfortunately, Ornin would say, they dare not attempt to legally adopt Arthur for fear of his step-father returning and making trouble. The man and the boy agreed not tell Ornin’s wife the truth of how Arthur’s mother had died, fearing any slip of the tongue by either of them might lead to Ornin being accused of murder. Both of them knew Ornin had not intentionally harmed the woman but, for Ornin, the details of those crucial moments would forever remain unclear in his mind. He and the boy believed that the less his wife knew, the better it would be for all concerned.
After learning something of the horrors the lad had endured, Ornin found himself yielding to a warm, parental attitude toward him. The more Ornin thought about it, the more he dismissed all possibility that his wife would receive the boy with anything other than a lovingly embrace. Together they would provide Arthur with a fine home and a good education. And, assuming all went well, they would eventually make him their legal heir.
