use to you.”
The inspector looked up from the victim, taking in my uncle and then me and Thomas. If he, an American inspector, was annoyed that an Englishman was tossing him out of his own crime scene, it didn’t show. “All right, boys. Let’s give Dr. Wadsworth some time. Go ask the neighbors if they’ve seen or heard anything. The housekeeper said she saw a man—get me a description.” He glanced at my uncle. “How long’s she been here?”
Uncle twisted the ends of his mustache, his green eyes scanning the body in that clinical way he’d taught both me and Thomas. “No more than half a day. Maybe less.”
Inspector Byrnes nodded as if he’d suspected the same. “Witnesses say she rented a room between the hours of ten thirty and eleven last night.”
Uncle observed the victim again and seemed to stare through her into that calm place necessary to locate clues. People in London thought him heartless. They didn’t understand he needed to harden his heart in order to save them the pain of never knowing what happened to their loved ones.
“We’ll know more once we perform a postmortem,” he said, motioning for his medical satchel, “but an initial glance—based on the current state of rigor mortis—indicates she might’ve perished between the hours of five and six. Though that may well change once we’ve gathered more scientific fact.”
Inspector Byrnes paused in the doorway, his expression unreadable. “You inspected the Ripper murders.” It was a statement of fact, not a question. Uncle hesitated for only a moment before nodding. “If this is the work of that sick bastard…” The inspector shook his head. “We can’t let this news get out. I won’t have any panic or riots in this city. I said it before; I’ll say it again—this ain’t London. We’re not going to muck this up like Scotland Yard. We will have a suspect—or Jack the damn Ripper himself—in the jug in thirty-six hours or less. This is New York City. We don’t mess around with depraved killers here.”
“Of course, Inspector Byrnes.”
Uncle shifted his gaze to mine. He’d never asked me directly about the events of last November, but he knew as well as I did that Jack the Ripper could not be responsible for this murder. We were privy to something neither Inspector Byrnes nor anyone else knew.
Jack the Ripper, scourge of both London and the world, was dead.
FOUR
OLD SHAKESPEARE
EAST RIVER HOTEL
LOWER EAST SIDE, NEW YORK CITY
21 JANUARY 1889
“Describe the scene, Audrey Rose.” Uncle shoved a journal into Thomas’s hands. “Record everything and include a sketch. Inspectors have photographed the body, but I want every detail, every speck, on paper.” He jabbed the paper, punctuating each point a bit more emphatically than the last. “We will not have another mass hysteria on our hands. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Professor.” Thomas moved to do as he was bid.
I rolled my shoulders back, slipping into that familiar cool calm as I stared at the body and divorced myself from imagining her alive and well. What was left of this woman was a puzzle to solve. Later, once her murderer had been caught, I might remember her humanity.
“Victim is a woman roughly fifty-five to sixty years of age.” I glanced around the crime scene, no longer sickened by the blood that coated nearly everything like a layer of macabre rain. A small wooden pail lay upturned on the ground near my feet. Judging from the strong scent of hops and barley, it had been filled with beer. Another swift appraisal of the room suggested she may have been well into her cups—alcohol thinned the blood and made it hard to clot. Which explained why there was an excess of it splattered everywhere.
“She was possibly too inebriated to fight off her attacker.” I pointed to the upturned pail. Uncle—despite the ghastly scene surrounding us—seemed pleased by this observation and motioned for me to continue. I bent over the body, ignoring the pitter-patter of my pulse. She’d sustained so much trauma that a foul odor was already present. Even with coldness seeping in from cracks near the window, the putrid scent hit the back of my throat.
I swallowed rising bile quickly. There was no preparing for that tangy-sweet smell and no forgetting it. The stench of human rot haunted me almost as much as the victims we inspected.
“Bruising around the neck indicates strangulation.” I reached for the clothing covering her face and paused, turning to Thomas. “Are you through with this part of your sketch?”
“Almost.”