Ripper Read online

  He opened the door, effectively sealing our conversation in the pharmacy.

  Then he took the box of empty bottles into the utility room in the adjoining laboratory. I heard the bottles being thrust around in the sink. As I glued labels to the jars and re­labeled the bottles, tears slid down my face and my hands trembled. I felt deeply affected by something. But I could not sort out my feelings. I felt fearful, for him and for myself. Confused about what was going on, and if I was doing the right thing by not telling him about the visions. But then again, he was withholding information from me.

  I tried to dry my face with my apron. I took a few deep breaths. William had not returned to the pharmacy. I did not want him to see me crying.

  “Abbie.”

  It was too late.

  He set the box of dripping bottles down.

  “Don’t cry.” He said this in a voice he had never used with me before. It was a voice he reserved for hushing infants in the nursery. I had heard him use the tone with his aunt a few times, that evening when I had visited.

  I turned around, past the point of caring if William saw me cry. He wiped the tears from my cheek. His finger brushed the tears away as he would remove a gnat, an eyelash. Before I knew what I was doing, I kissed his finger.

  “Oh God,” I gasped. The cliff again. I had fallen.

  William jumped back, jolted, and stumbled a little against the shelves. At that point, a bottle from the rows of herbal medicines crashed to the floor.

  “I’m sorry.” Overwhelmed with embarrassment, I knelt and began wiping the strong-smelling herbs and glass fragments into my hands. I hardly knew what to do with the irrational surges of emotion coursing through me.

  Then came a horrible moment where we both looked at each other. William, who was always so transparent, became closed off. A sealed book. I felt terrible that my action might have caused him to react in that way. So I returned my focus to scooping up the particles on the floor, and William remained still, frozen, with his back against the shelves.

  “These herbs are certainly contaminated now. I am sorry to have wasted them.” My voice cracked.

  William said nothing as he knelt beside me to help scoop up the pieces, and I was afraid to look at his face.

  The situation began to feel a bit ridiculous, and I laughed a little amidst tears.

  He established eye contact with me, and smiled.

  “Don’t worry, Abbie. I was the one who knocked the bottle to the floor.” He laughed a little.

  There was a moment of awkwardness, neither one of us knowing how to move on from what had just happened. But slowly, tediously, we meandered back into small talk and the immediate tasks at hand. We worked late into the night. William was thorough and meticulous. The hours ticked away. The pharmacy closet gradually returned to order.

  By the time Mary showed up at the pharmacy door, it was well after midnight. She seemed a bit hurried. In her hands she clutched a piece of paper that she thrust at William. I knew she was still a little angry at him for locking us in the closet during the riot. I made a mental note to ask her about how Scribby was doing when I got the chance.

  “Dr. St. John needs these medicines. Soon if possible.”

  “Does he need my help?” I asked.

  She eyed William and then me. “He might. If you can pull yourself away from Dr. Siddal.”

  William merely smiled at Mary’s sarcasm. “I’ll be fine here. Abbie, go see if you can give Simon a hand.”

  After Mary left, William put Simon’s requested medicine bottles in a small box for me.

  I began to descend the dark stairs with the box of bottles in my arms. My time with William had been emotional and puzzling. I felt a rising fear, and I wondered about the web in which we were caught up. I also worried that my feelings for William were too strong. I blushed as I thought of my actions in the pharmacy—to act as I had was unlike me.

  I had almost reached the second floor landing when the vision struck me. I clutched the banister to keep from falling and dropped the box, shattering the bottles upon the stairs.

  In my vision, Liz Stride laughed near a street­lamp in a small courtyard somewhere. I saw the long shadows of a wrought-iron fence pass across her face in the lamplight. A figure, shrouded in a black cape and wearing a tall dark hat, gave her small bag. She ate from the bag. She laughed and stroked her hair. A bright red carnation had been pinned to her greasy dress lapel.

  She was about to die.

  I had to move. Fast.

  I felt my way down the staircase. The vision stayed with me, pulsating up and down within my consciousness of my immediate surroundings.

  He was with her—the Ripper. I had to find her.

  I ran down the stairs and out the front door of the hospital, searching my mind. Whenever the vision mushroomed up, I clung to it, trying to pinpoint Liz’s destination.

  Where were they?

  If I could just see a landmark in my mind, a business name or a street sign.

  Liz’s nearly toothless smile flashed in my mind.

  She was still alive.

  They stood just inside a fenced court on a dark street. Where? Where?

  While running away from the hospital, I heard a few shouts behind me but ignored them, grasping at the vision. My brain hurt as I stretched to see beyond Liz’s face, to see and hear her surroundings. In the vision, I heard a train. Guessing that she must be near the railways, I began running in the direction of Commercial Street.

  As I ran, I realized that I had no idea how to protect Liz or myself. I had no plan except to fight. I didn’t even have a weapon. My stomach sank in fear.

  After I had run a stretch of Whitechapel Road, I came to Commercial Street. Along the way, I passed cottages, warehouses, pubs. Few East Enders were out. Once I passed the last pub on Commercial, the streets were mostly abandoned, and I heard the increasingly close rattle of a train. I had no idea where they were and hoped that I was close to their location.

  The vision swirled in my mind again—a street sign, first blurry and then clear: Berner Street. They were one block away—very close.

  Silently, taking care not to make noise, I eased quickly through a connecting street—more of an alley in its darkness and smallness—and paused against the side of an abandoned sweatshop. The entire time, I tried to remain in the shadows.

  I stepped carefully onto the next street. It was Berner.

  The hair stood up on my neck when I saw Liz and the Ripper. They were directly across the street from me, about fifty yards away in a darkened courtyard. The vision had stopped now that they were in front of me. I remained in the shadows of the sweatshop and squinted, trying to see their faces. But I could see very little.

  It was then that I heard Liz bid the stranger goodbye and turn away from him. She had not quite reached the streetlamp when he lunged from behind, pulling her back into the shadows.

  No! I tried to scream, but only a croak escaped from my lips.

  He must have cut her windpipe before she could cry out. I heard the knife slashing through fabric and then skin.

  My stomach wretched and before I could stop it, a soft splash of my vomit hit the concrete at my feet.

  The ripping noises stopped.

  The shadow across the street looked up, directly at me. The rest of his figure was too shrouded for me to see anything else.

  He straightened up.

  I gasped and backed into the shadows of the sweatshop.

  When I looked in the Ripper’s direction again, he was gone. This frightened me almost more than seeing him across the street.

  He might be anywhere.

  Noise broke out from somewhere in the depths of the courtyard where the body lay. It was the creaking of a cart, perhaps a railway worker’s cart, bringing supplies to an early m
orning shift.

  I was torn. Part of me felt as if I should run to Liz; I hated leaving her on the street. But I knew she could not have survived that attack, and in the back of my mind I thought I should run back to the hospital.

  The person pushing the cart stopped as his cart hit the body. It made a soft thud.

  “Dammit, you drunken … ” The cart-pusher must have seen blood, because within seconds he shouted, “God! ” and then “Police! Police!”

  As I cowered near the building, I felt a bit of relief at the whistles of constables. The man with the cart shouted to them.

  “Body here! There’s a body here !”

  But I seemed too far away from the comforting noise of police whistles and shouts. The Ripper had seen me, and I felt as if I was still in danger. I stood near my puddle of vomit, afraid to scream. I had just witnessed the speed at which he could murder and escape. If he was anywhere near me, no constables, even if only yards away, could reach me in time to save me.

  Several policemen had already arrived on the scene.

  “She’s still warm!” someone shouted. “He can’t be far.”

  Then I heard Abberline’s voice. “Search all the surrounding buildings!”

  Someone grabbed me from behind, pulling me back into the shadows, and then thrust my back against a closed door at the side of the sweatshop.

  I tried to scream, but a hand clamped tightly over

  my mouth.

  I saw William’s face, inches from my own.

  “Don’t speak,” he mouthed, though no sound came out. “He’s here.”

  Rainwater dripped from the broken guttering above us into a nearby puddle. I tried to see beyond William, to see anything. My eyes ached with the strain.

  I heard footsteps—steady, sharp.

  He had to know we were there. He must know.

  My vomit lay only a few feet away. It was then that I heard splashing sounds, very light ones, in the puddle of rainwater.

  Then I saw him.

  The Ripper stood in front of a doorway, not facing us, but wiping his hands on what looked like a handkerchief. Though he was so close we could hear him breathe, I could not see his face; he was only a darker outline against the already dark night.

  William smashed me flatter against the door. My chest was pressed so hard against his body that I could barely breathe.

  I held my breath when the Ripper paused, still in the doorway, his back toward us. At that point, he tilted his head slightly, very slightly, toward us.

  He knew we were there.

  William tensed.

  Then he turned and walked away from us. I heard his steps proceed, unhurriedly, away from Berner Street.

  After several minutes, William relaxed. He released me and I reeled.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  “He murdered Liz. Liz Stride.” I was breathless, trying to push away the image of her murder.

  “Liz?” William said. And then, suddenly, “My God.”

  Lights were quickly going on in the windows of the houses behind the courtyard. And I heard shouts and orders coming from the street. They were searching the homes and buildings. Abberline’s force thought the killer might still be there. They had no idea that he had already eluded them.

  “Come on. We have to tell them which direction he went,” I said.

  “It won’t do any good. The police cannot and will not catch him.”

  I looked at William, not knowing what he meant. But it did not matter. I had to talk to the police myself. I hated involving myself in the investigation; I had sworn since my meeting with Abberline to keep uninvolved with Scotland Yard. But this time, I had witnessed a murder, of a patient I had cared for. I owed it to Liz to try to do whatever I could to help in the investigation. The least I could do was tell them what I had seen and that the Ripper was no longer anywhere near Berner Street.

  I pushed past William, but then stopped in my tracks. The puddle of rainwater was clouded with blood.

  My voice came out hoarse. “He washed his hands, or possibly the knife, in this puddle.”

  “Abbie, why were you out here?”

  I had no logical answer. Should I tell him about the visions?

  Suddenly another image rushed over my mind, so quickly and with such force that I doubled over. I thought I might wretch again.

  “He’s not done. He is not done!”

  “Abbie? What’s going on? Are you sick? What do you mean … ” William seemed more fearful now than he had when the Ripper was standing near us.

  To my horror, I saw Cate Eddows in my mind, a smile on her face as she greeted someone. The shadowed figure placed a small bag, identical to the one offered to Liz, in her hand.

  “We have to find her. He’s going to kill her!” I yelled.

  William looked at me as if I were out of my mind. I ignored him and tried to focus on the vision, which had left me as quickly as it came.

  “We need to get you back to the hospital. You’re not thinking clearly. You might be in shock.”

  A square—an open square—appeared in my head. Flagstones. Mitre Square!

  I began to bolt in the direction the Ripper had gone.

  “Abbie, no!” William held my arm in a vice grip and blinked at my rage. “Let’s stop this nonsense and go back to Whitechapel Hospital. I cannot leave you alone on the streets now.”

  I saw that he was not going to let me go.

  He should have known better.

  “I’m sorry William.”

  I disengaged his grip with a sharp kick to the groin, followed by a single kick at his chest. I heard a small crack and winced, knowing that I might have broken, or at least cracked, a rib.

  He doubled over in pain. But I knew that he would be fine. Eventually. I bolted in the direction toward Mitre Square.

  As I ran, the vision returned.

  Cate still had no idea that she was in danger. Underneath her mold-stained black bonnet, she smiled. I noticed, as I had when I’d brought her medicine in the hospital one time, that she had a prominent scar on her lower jaw. I saw the back of the caped figure, who, maddeningly, never clearly revealed his face to me in these visions. And I saw what she did not—a knife in his hand, gleaming.

  I sucked in my breath in horror as I saw the Ripper snatch her into the shadows before she could make a sound.

  I had reached Church Passage, which opened out into Mitre Square. I stopped halfway down the road, knowing that I no longer needed the vision when the crime unfolded in my immediate vicinity. And this time, the Ripper was doing his bloody work even closer to me. I dared not step out into the court. I heard him breathing. I heard the ripping of skin, the wet tearing of organs. I clamped my hand over my mouth, fighting the overwhelming feeling of fear, of nausea. Of loss. He gutted his victims as if they were animals in the slaughterhouse.

  I tried to back away, silently, back up into Church Passage. I held my breath when my heel accidently kicked a bottle, sending it loudly against a brick wall. This time, the Ripper did not stop at the sound. I felt horrified when I heard him emit a chuckle. I was certain, at that point, that the Ripper knew I was near him.

  It seemed as if the visions were nothing less than invitations. I shuddered.

  After what must have been only five minutes but seemed like an eternity, he stopped. The sounds ceased completely. I heard him leave, this time not with steely steps but with swifter, silent movements. I heard the air catch under his cape, and he was gone.

  Everything remained quiet as I crouched against a building. As before, I hesitated, having no idea which direction I should run.

  Other footsteps, not the Ripper’s, entered the square; the footsteps of a night watchman. I heard the rattle of a whistle and more footsteps, panicked now. A shout: �
�For God’s sake, mate, come to my assistance! It’s another murder.”

  Then someone grabbed my shoulder, throwing me face-first against the wet, dirty side of the building. I smelled the tangy, yeasty odor of blood and heard the chuckle I had heard only minutes earlier.

  He was behind me now.

  I felt oddly giddy, caught off-guard like this. It would be very difficult to fight. I wondered how Grandmother, amidst her real sorrow at my death, would handle the despair and humiliation of me being murdered in a little dirty passage by the Ripper. Killed in the same manner as the common prostitutes.

  I thought about all of this with bitter humor as I felt the knife stab into me.

  Then all became blackness.

  Seventeen

  Heaven was pretty much as I always thought it might be, if it existed at all.

  I found myself lying on my back at the bottom of a pond of cool, clear water. The shock of the cold water was a pleasant sensation; my skin, indeed every part of my body, felt—sensed—more acutely than ever before. Looking up through the wavy surface of the water at a late afternoon sky, I watched kingfishers cut through my view, slicing through the air just above the water with unbelievable force. Everything seemed colorful, alive—not the slightest bit dreamlike. I began swimming upwards.

  Up.

  Up.

  As I broke the surface, the sharp ammonia smells of Whitechapel Hospital assaulted my nose. I now lay not on my back in the pond, but on my stomach, face down. I could not move or even speak. My muscles seemed dead.

  It was then that I felt searing pain in the back of my right thigh, just below my buttocks. I realized I was lying under a light blanket on the third floor operating table. In my peripheral vision, I saw a small amount of early morning, pumpkin-tinted sunlight seeping through a window.

  The Ripper. The pain reminded me of what had knocked me unconscious. The last thing I remembered was the smell of the wet brick wall, the blood odor of the Ripper, the thrust of the knife. I began to hear my heartbeat pound in my ears. Was he nearby? I panicked, trying to move, but remained paralyzed.