A Lady's Guide to Mischief and Mayhem - Manda Collins Page 0,3

imagine.” Caro frowned. “There is little men dislike more than having a woman disrupt what they consider their own personal territory.”

Kate removed a notebook from a desk drawer and took up the fountain pen lying on the blotter. “Now, let’s talk about our first column. It should be about the Commandments Killer, yes?”

Removing her own notebook from the little purse she carried at her wrist, Caro agreed. “As two of the victims have been women, I think it’s more important than ever that we offer a female perspective on the case. Women are frightened. And rightly so.”

Deciding they’d better get a handle on the case itself before they wrote about it, Kate asked, “What do we know about the investigation so far?”

“There have been four victims, two men and two women.” Caro read the names of the victims from her notebook, where she’d already written them down. “Each has been left in a conspicuous location, with a note bearing one of the Ten Commandments left somewhere at the scene.”

“Here.” Kate moved to where a slate like those found in most schoolrooms lay propped against the wall. Lifting it, she hung it on a blank bit of wall from a hook on the back. Taking a piece of chalk, she neatly wrote the names of each victim in one column, the location of the body in another, and the Commandment that had been left with each body in the last. “Now, what can we conclude from this list?”

“The Commandments are out of order,” Caro said after staring at the list for a moment. “Nate Slade, the first victim, was marked with the Tenth Commandment, ‘Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods,’ but the second victim, Martha Peters, was left with the Fifth, ‘Honor thy father and thy mother.’ And so on.”

“Good point,” Kate said thoughtfully. “I wonder why.”

“It’s possible the killer selects his victims based on things they’ve said or done and so chooses the Commandment to fit the victim and not the other way round,” Caro said. “I read in an article about Slade that he was known for his jealousy of his brother’s boots, which he himself could never have afforded on his wages. He’d complained rather vocally about them in his local pub the day before he was found dead.”

“Oh!” Kate began shuffling through a stack of newspapers on her desk. When she found what she was looking for, she said with triumph, “Here it is. The fourth victim, Betsy Creamer, was overheard at a chophouse, near where her body was found, declaring that she’d not been to church in over a year. She was marked with ‘Remember to keep holy the Sabbath.’”

It took them some time, but after the two ladies had read through the accumulated stories about the four victims, they found associations between each of the victims and something they’d done or said that went against the Commandments that had been left with their bodies.

“This is important.” Kate shook her head in disbelief. “But we’ve had our best reporters on this story for weeks, and they’ve heard nothing about Scotland Yard making this connection.”

“It’s possible they’ve already come to the same conclusions we have and haven’t told the public about it,” Caro said. “It’s my understanding that they don’t especially care for the press.”

“But there should be some sort of warning,” Kate said. “People are in danger from this killer, and there’s been no warning about this.”

“To be fair,” Caro said, “I wouldn’t know how to phrase such a warning and I’ve written four books. They were about cookery, mind you, but I’m not unfamiliar with words. Not to mention the fact that a great many people in London break the Commandments on a daily basis.”

“I suppose that makes some degree of sense. We don’t wish to sound as judgmental as the killer, after all.” But Kate still believed the Yard could be doing a better job of getting the word out about the possible motives behind the killings. “And perhaps our column can do something to warn those at risk.”

Quickly, they agreed on a basic outline for what they wished to convey in their first foray into writing as a team. Both thought it would be best to give an outline of who had been killed so far, a sketch of their ages and occupations, and whom they’d left behind. Neither wished to dwell on the “sins” that the killer had deemed serious enough to warrant death, so they kept their discussion of the