Ripper. Part 3

A shadow crossed his face, and I guessed that he was thinking of William.

"And you, why are you here?" he asked me, pointedly.

I sighed. The truth seemed best.

"I do nothing that matters in my life with Grandmother. I've lived with her for two months, and she is now requiring that I work at the hospital-punishment for my unrest. But it's not punishment at all. I've had very little exercise-mental or otherwise-since arriving at Kensington Court."

Simon smiled in cool amus.e.m.e.nt. "Did you know that I'm your neighbor?"

"Excuse me?" Simon did not seem like a typical Kensington resident.

"My mother, Elinor St. John, lives a mere block from Lady Westfield. She's a very good friend of your grandmother. In fact, we have known Lady Westfield since my childhood. You probably have not met my mother yet, as she is spending much of this year at our seaside residence."

I felt almost too astonished to speak. "I hope I did not offend ... "

Simon waved his hand in gentle dismissal. "Not at all. You have no idea how alike we are in our sentiments."

The carriage stopped.

"Truly, I ... "

"I insist." He lifted me into his arms.

I felt more humiliated now than when William had found me in such a position. If I returned to Grandmother, wounded on my first day of work, she would feel more than mildly vindicated.

Simon knocked, and the door swung open. I panicked when I saw that it was Ellen who had opened it.

Her freckled face puckered and her eyes bulged before the shrieking began: "Lady Westfield! Lady Westfield! Dr. St. John is here with th' Miss Abbie! She's 'urt, she is! Dreadful 'urt! "

She turned, running upstairs to fetch Grandmother.

Simon cast a wry smile down upon me, and I felt, in that moment, an affinity with him. He seemed to know Ellen's nature quite well. Unaffected by her hysterics, Simon stepped inside, still carrying me in his arms. Richard arrived in the front entrance hall to attend to us as Ellen screamed from the second floor landing.

"Richard, would you be so good as to bring Miss Sharp some warm wine or brandy?" Simon asked as he carried me toward the parlor.

The moment Simon settled me onto the couch, Richard arrived with the brandy. As I sipped it, I saw that Grandmother had stepped into the parlor doorway. Her beaky face remained shadowed as the sun glared through a window behind her.

"It is merely a sprained ankle," Simon said, standing and turning to face her. "She fell down some steps today." He repeated to her the directions he had just given me regarding its care-rest, cool compresses.

Grandmother stepped a bit away from the glare. "Thank you, Simon. I will make certain that she rests over the next week."

"But that will not be necessary. I am returning to the hospital on Monday," I said, feeling already emboldened by the warm rush of brandy. I sat up straighter on the couch. "Dr. St. John said that I would be feeling better after the weekend, so I see no reason, if that is indeed the case, as to why I should not return to work on Monday."

Simon considered me coolly, and I saw the corner of his mouth curve-very slightly.

Grandmother glared at me and then turned her attention back to Simon. "That cannot be the case, Simon. I mean, she is not used to hard labor and must allow for recovery time from this injury. Am I not correct?"

Simon's eyes remained on me, "I see no reason why, if she is not in pain, that she should not return to work on Monday."

I smiled at him, grateful, and finished off the gla.s.s of brandy.

Grandmother exhaled in exasperation. "Fine, Simon."

She hated losing-even small battles.

"How is your mother?" she asked Simon suddenly. "When might I expect to see her again?"

"Mother plans to return sometime before Christmas." His reply came out kind, solicitous.

"We shall have dinner then. I have missed her during these months."

I could tell by Grandmother's demeanor that she respected Simon and seemed particularly fond of him.

"She would be delighted to see you again. She mentions you in many of her letters." Simon glanced at the clock over the mantelpiece. "You must excuse me, Lady Westfield. It is time that I return to work, and I am certain that Miss Sharp needs to rest."

"Yes, yes." Grandmother seemed almost irritated when he brought up my name.

"Goodbye." He bowed slightly to her and then to me.

The moment when Grandmother and I were alone, she came over to stand above me. I braced myself for one of her lectures, but she surprised me. She bent over me, and then lightly brushed my hair away from my forehead. Her touch was methodical, her expression one of concern. Then she sat on the edge of the couch, her hand swiping away another lock of hair. In an entirely rare moment of transparency, I saw her search my face, and I knew that she sought my mother. She was looking for shadows of Caroline-it was a faulty but sincere affection.

"You are pale, Arabella, even after the drink," she said finally, in her most guarded voice.

"It is only a sprained ankle. I have had sprained ankles before-it will be better in a few days."

She seemed to hear nothing that I said.

"You may spend the night here in the parlor, if you wish. You should not climb the stairs with your foot."

She felt awkward; in her awkwardness, she became efficient. Without another word, she swiftly closed the blinds, and, shutting the door behind her, left me alone in the parlor.

As the fire in the fireplace died down and evening set in, I thought of how this move to Kensington should not have jarred me so much-my previous life had been marked by near constant flux. After my father drowned in a swimming accident when I was still an infant, Mother and I had lived in Edinburgh, Suss.e.x, and Dorchester while she worked as a governess. Our time in Dublin had been our longest stay in one place-seven years-as she tutored the children of the wealthy Edgeworth family. Each day, while Mother gave the children lessons, I completed my own studies in the cottage we shared behind the family's mansion.

If I finished early, I played outside the Edgeworth property's gates with some of the local children. During those times, I learned the hierarchies among Dublin street youth. If I wanted to play in certain circles, I had to learn some of the local activities, namely fighting. Sometimes the fighting was play, sometimes self-defense. But in seven years, I learned a great deal about it.

That life had been so textured compared to these past two months with Grandmother, which had made me listless and bored. I still ached for Mother, and fought feelings of guilt that I could do nothing for her when she fell ill. She had caught a violent case of dysentery that had been going around the city; it took her life within two days. Looking back, I wished that I had paid more attention to the increasing number of episodes or seizures she had had in the weeks before her death. But she had suffered from those my whole life.

Mother had an interest in art, and sometimes when she worked on a painting she would become lost to me, snap into a fixed stare. Sometimes she went months without having an episode, but they had intensified shortly before her death. Only two weeks before she died, we had been working in our small garden together and she fell back hard, her sunbonnet falling off her head. She stared at the sky for a full ten seconds as I called her name. I feared she was having a seizure. But she seemed to see something elsewhere; she seemed focused on something I could not see. Then, suddenly, she came out of the trance and returned to normal. Her explanation was that she had just become overheated. I thought that she might have had a touch of epilepsy, but now, ever since my bizarre encounter with the pickpocket, I was considering whether she might have had visions.

I s.h.i.+vered as I thought about the pickpocket; that experience had been a crack, a tear, in my reality. The robes, the chanting, the child's radically different expression-none of it made any sense. Nothing like that had ever happened to me, and I wondered, once again, if I was losing my mind. Yet whether Mother had had visions or not, I still wished that I could talk to her about what had happened to me, because I knew that she would understand.

As I became sleepier, my thoughts turned to my first day at the hospital. Dr. Bartlett's invitation seemed to be an open door to a place where I could be active again and move forward from my loss. He intrigued me. Our discussion about Whitechapel Hospital, the future possibility of building a school for children, of expanding the wards, all stirred within me a desire to be part of that establishment.

Eventually, the ticking clock and parlor shadows became increasingly lost to me, and I fell asleep. Like darting minnows, scenes from the day drifted in and out of my consciousness. William's focused expression as he performed the caesarean. Simon's face above my own when he caught me after my fall. Ellen's hysterical outburst upon my return. The girl's face as she died.

All of these memories blurred and faded until I found myself in a more solid dream facing the front doors of Whitechapel Hospital. The road was abandoned, the night cool and foggy. I could see my breath puffing out into the air surrounding me as I stared up at the building.

A window on the third floor opened. I felt my blood freeze as a man crawled headfirst down the brick front wall of the hospital. It was an impossible act, and, even in the darkness, I had to cover my mouth to keep from crying out in terror. I could not see his face; he wore black and his figure was shadowed. He turned his head slightly to his right toward me, and it was then that I knew he was aware of my presence. Whatever his purpose, my intuition told me that it was predatory. I tried to sink into the shadows of the hospital entrance, and I glanced toward the front doors, wondering if they were locked. When I looked back, he was gone. Vanished.

I felt hot breath on my neck, and, horrified, I knew that he stood behind me.

I awoke, choking on a scream. Chills shook my body, and yet sweat dripped down my brows.

The clock over the fireplace showed that it was three o'clock in the morning.

Five.

T.

he next morning, with great effort, I met Grandmother at the breakfast table. I felt exhausted, having not slept well after the early morning nightmare-it had seemed so vivid. Also, my foot was still swollen from the day before, and it hurt quite a bit. It would be impossible for me to return to the hospital before Monday. Nonetheless, I forced myself to walk on it. The more I walked, the better it felt.

Grandmother sat across from me, reading a note from Violet and barely looking up except to take a sip of tea. On the east side of the dining room, immediately to my left, Mother's portrait loomed against rose-patterned wallpaper. Sometimes I wondered why Grandmother kept the portrait up in the room where we ate most of our meals. Mother had been about my age when the portrait had been painted. She looked strikingly similar to me-except that she was beautiful. Her red hair escaped the confines of a ribbon, and I saw my dark eyes in hers. A chill swept through me as I remembered my dream, and I took a burning sip of coffee. She was rotting and wasted now. Nothing could change that.

Grandmother tapped her fork impatiently against her plate. When I glanced at her, I saw that she was not irritated with me; rather, she was staring through the dining room window at Ellen, who still clutched the milk bottles as she chattered ceaselessly with another maid. Their gossip must have been enticing, as Ellen kept clapping her hand over her mouth and shrieking in astonishment.

When Ellen finally ended her conversation to run inside, she burst through the front door.

"We're all going to be murdered in our beds! Richard! Lady Westfield! Miss Abbie!"

Grandmother almost dropped her teacup. Ellen, in her hysteria, did drop a milk bottle, shattering it on the floor. Jupe ran around the corner, lapping eagerly at the white puddle.

"Ellen!" Grandmother pressed her fingers to her temples, exasperated. "Must you affront us with this drama so early in the day?"

"I'm sorry, Ma'am. But a woman was killed last night, a 'hor it seems from the likes of her."

I saw Grandmother's shoulders straighten at Ellen's language. Ellen had only been in her employ since the time I had arrived, and I did not antic.i.p.ate that Grandmother would keep her for very long.

"'Er body was in the East End at Buck's Row, near the Whitechapel Hospital where Miss Arabella works."

Both Grandmother and I looked sharply at Ellen. The memory of the predator in my nightmare came back upon me full force.

Now that Ellen had our attention, her dramatics only intensified. "She had her stomach cut out, 'er throat slashed!" Ellen tried to reenact the murder by slicing at her own abdomen and neck with her finger in the air.

Richard had just entered the room. He began mopping up the spilled milk.

Grandmother turned to him. "Is this true, Richard?"

I flashed a look at Richard and barely shook my head. Apart from my own horror at the murder, I feared that Grandmother would forbid me from working at the hospital any longer.

Richard saw my look. "Yes, madam. But the lady, with her lifework ... " He cleared his throat. "Death by murder is not an uncommon end for many of them."

Grandmother turned, staring at me in apprehension.

"Grandmother, I would like to continue working at Whitechapel Hospital. I've been planning to return on Monday. My first day was ... enlightening."

"You nearly broke your ankle."

I had no plans to tell her about the caesarean and the death of the girl. The sprained ankle, as far as Grandmother knew, was the worst of my experiences.

After a moment of serious contemplation, she waved her hand a little. Her response shocked me. "Never mind, Arabella. Julian Bartlett is an old friend, and you may continue to work for him."

She cast a pained glance at the portrait of my mother. I knew that her relations.h.i.+p with me was based on a careful balance between directing my life in the way she would have it go and not driving me away.

"However, although you may continue to work there, you cannot neglect your current social obligations."

Grandmother took a sip of tea as Richard finished mopping up the floor. Ellen walked in with a vase of roses. She seemed calmer. A little. She dropped a pair of pruning scissors twice as she arranged the flowers in the vase on the sideboard.

Grandmother put on her spectacles as she peered more closely at the note she had been reading: "We have a dinner party at Violet's next Wednesday evening. I want you to meet a young man who will be there."

I narrowed my eyes at her. It was starting: her quest to find me a husband.

Dr. Bartlett met me in his carriage on Monday morning. Though he said nothing, I wondered if his presence meant that Grandmother had contacted him.

He inquired politely about my ankle, and we exchanged small talk as the carriage jolted its way through the early morning traffic. He opened the carriage window and as we turned onto Whitechapel Road, he lit a cigar. Before the smoke wafted about the carriage interior, I thought that he smelled pleasant-of candle smoke and tea leaves.

The story of the Buck's Row murder had been widely popular news, even in Kensington. Whitechapel Hospital worked so closely with such women, and the murder had taken place in the vicinity, so I wondered if the victim had ever been a patient. Unfortunately, I could not bring myself to broach the topic with Dr. Bartlett.

The moment Dr. Bartlett and I entered the hospital, two uniformed constables and a Scotland Yard Inspector greeted us.

Dr. Bartlett nodded politely at them as he helped to remove my coat.

"Abberline," the Inspector said as he shook Dr. Bartlett's hand. He was tall, stout, appeared to be in his mid-forties, and had a notepad tucked under his arm.

He acknowledged me with only a slight nod.

"Ah yes," Dr. Bartlett replied, "and Barry and John, your two excellent constables, who have proved quite helpful with our unruly patients."

John chucked. "A nice way of putting it, doc. I think you mean drunk patients."

Abberline cleared his throat, silencing his constable. He seemed stiff, overly professional as he removed a pencil from his pocket and began scratching notes on the pad with his thick fingers. "We have a few questions to ask you about Polly Nichols, murdered early on Friday morning."

Inspector Abberline seemed almost apologetic as he questioned Dr. Bartlett. "You are by no means a suspect. But it did come to our attention that Miss Nichols had been a patient here once."

"Yes. She had a severe problem with alcohol when she came into our care and, unfortunately, proved resistant to our rehabilitation practice. It is my policy to insist that patients cooperate with our methods. Miss Nichols did not, and she left our care twice to return to the streets."

A child began screaming in the nearby ward.

Abberline shuffled his feet awkwardly. "When did this happen?"

"The second time occurred the night before her murder, probably only hours before her death."

Abberline raised his bushy eyebrows as he continued to scratch notes into the pad.