Ellery Queen - A Study in Terror

“Still another, Watson,” was his portentous greeting.

Dr. Murray and the imbecile were also present. Murray stood silently by the table, but Michael-Pierre cringed by the wall, naked fear upon his face.

As Murray remained motionless, Holmes frowned. Said he, sharply, “Dr. Murray, you do not question Dr. Watson’s stomach for it?”

“No, no,” replied Murray, and drew back the sheet. But my stomach was tested, nonetheless. It was the most incredible job of butchery on a human body that the sane mind could conceive. With demented skill the Ripper had gone berserk. In decency, I refrain from setting down the details, save for my gasp, “The missing breast, Holmes!”

“This time,” responded Holmes, grimly, “our madman took away a trophy.”

I could endure it no longer; I stepped down from the platform. Holmes followed. “In God’s name, Holmes,” cried I, “the beast must be stopped!”

“You are in good company with that prayer, Watson.”

“Has Scotland Yard been of any aid to you?”

“Rather, Watson,” replied he, sombrely, “have I been of any aid to Scotland Yard? Very little, I fear.”

We took our leave of Murray and the imbecile. In the swirling fog of the street, I shuddered. “That wreck who was once Michael Osbourne… Is it my fancy, Holmes, or did he crouch there for all the world like Murray’s faithful hound, expecting a kick for some transgression?”

“Or,” replied Holmes, “like a faithful hound sensing his master’s horror and seeking to share it. You are obsessed with Michael Osbourne, Watson.”

“Perhaps I am.” I forced my mind to turn back. “Holmes, were you able to apprehend the messenger who took to his heels?”

“I clung to his trail for several blocks, but he knew London’s labyrinths as well as I. I lost him.”

“And you spent the rest of the day how, may I ask?”

“A portion of it in the Bow Street Library, attempting to devise a pattern from a hypothetical projection of the madman’s brain.”

He began walking slowly through the fog-bank, I by his side. “Where are we going, Holmes?”

“To a particular section of Whitechapel. I laid out the pattern, Watson, a positioning of all the known Ripper murders, super-imposed upon a map of the area which they cover. I spent several hours studying it. I am convinced that the Ripper works from a central location, a room, or a flat, a sanctuary from which he ventures forth and to which he returns.”

“You propose to search?”

“Yes. We shall see if shoe-leather will reward us where the arm-chair has failed.”

“In this fog it will take leg-work indeed.”

“True, but we have certain advantages on our side. For example, I have made it a point to question the witnesses.”

This startled me. “Holmes! I did not know there were any.”

“Of a sort, Watson, of a sort. On several occasions, the Ripper has worked perilously close to detection. In fact, I suspect that he deliberately arranges his murders in that fashion, out of contempt and bravado. You will recall our brush with him.”

“Well do I!”

“At any rate, I have decided, from the sounds of his retreating footsteps, that he moves from the perimeter of a circle toward its centre. It is within the centre of that circle that we shall search.”

Thus we plunged, that fog-choked night, towards the cesspools of Whitechapel into which the human sewage from the great city drained. Holmes moved with a sure-footedness that bespoke his familiarity with those malodorous depths. We were silent, save when Holmes paused to inquire, “By the way, Watson, I trust you thought to drop a revolver into your pocket.”

“It was the last thing I did before I left to join you.”

“I, too, am armed.”

We ventured first into what proved to be an opium-den. Struggling for breath in the foul fumes, I followed as Holmes moved down the line of bunks, where the addicted victims lay wrapped in their shabby dreams. Holmes paused here and there for a closer inspection. To some he spoke a word; at times, he received a word in return. When we left, he appeared to have garnered nothing of value.

From there we invaded a series of low public-houses, where we were greeted for the most part by sullen silence. Here, also, Holmes spoke sotto voce with certain of the individuals we came upon, in such a manner that I was sure he was acquainted with some of them. On occasion, a coin or two passed from his hand into a filthy palm. But always we moved on.

We had left the third dive, more evil than the others, when I could contain myself no longer.

“Holmes, the Ripper is not a cause. He is a result.”

“A result, Watson?”

“Of such corrupt places as these.”

Holmes shrugged his shoulders.

“Does it not stir you to indignation?”

“I would of course welcome a sweeping change, Watson. Perchance in some future, enlightened time, it will come about. In the meanwhile, I am a realist. Utopia is a luxury upon which I have no time to dream.”

Before I could reply, he pushed open another door, and we found ourselves in a brothel. The reek of cheap scent almost staggered me. The room into which we entered was a parlour, with half a dozen partially-naked females seated about in lewd poses as they awaited whoever might emerge from the fog.

Quite candidly, I kept shifting my eyes from the inviting smiles and lascivious gestures that greeted us on all sides. Holmes rose to the occasion with his usual equanimity. Giving his attention to one of the girls, a pale, pretty little thing who sat clad in nothing but a carelessly open robe, he said, “Good-evening, Jenny.”

“Evenin’, Mr. ’Olmes.”

“That address I gave you, of the doctor. Did you visit him?”

“That I did, sir. ’E gave me a clean bill o’ ’ealth, ’e did.”

A beaded curtain parted and a fat madame with eyes like raisins stood regarding us. “What brings you out on a night like this, Mr. Holmes?”

“I am sure you know, Leona.”

Her face turned sulky. “Why do you think my girls are off the streets? I don’t want to lose any of them!”

A plump, over-painted creature spoke angrily. “H’it’s a bloody shyme, h’it is―a poor gel gettin’ pushed by bobbies all the time.”

Another commented, “Better than a bloody blade in yer gut, dearie.”

“Almost ’ad me a gent, h’l did, wot lives at the Pacquin. ’E was a-goin’ up the stairs, all w’ite tie an’ cape, ’e was, an’ ’e stops w’en ’e sees me. Then this bobby shoves ’is dish outa the fog. ‘ ’Ere now, dearie,’ says ’e. ‘Off to yer crib. This is no night to be about.’ ” The girl spat viciously upon the floor.

Holmes’s voice was even as he said, “The gentleman fled, I presume?”

“Up t’ ’is room, w’ere else? But not a-takin’ me with ’im!”

“An odd place for a gentleman to live, would you not say?”

The girl wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “ ’E can live w’ere ’e pleases, blarst ’is eyes!”

Holmes was already moving towards the door. As he passed me, he whispered, “Come, Watson. Hurry, hurry!”

Back in the fog, he gripped my hand and pulled me recklessly forward. “We have him, Watson! I’m certain of it! Visits―questions―a dropped comment―and we come upon the trail of a fiend who can do many things. But making himself invisible is not one of them!”

Sheer exultancy rang out from every word as Holmes dragged me after him. A few moments later I found myself stumbling up a flight of narrow stairs against a wooden wall.

The exertion of the chase had taxed even Holmes’s superb stamina; and, as we climbed, he gasped out his words. “This Pacquin is a sordid rooming-house, Watson. Whitechapel abounds with them. Fortunately, I was familiar with the name.”