Colin Wilson - Ritual in the Dark

Sorme looked cautiously around him and saw set, unemotional faces. There was none of the curiosity or morbid excitement he had expected. He whispered:

They look pretty grim.

Payne nodded briefly, staring across, the square. The police formed a circle around the body, and the pathologist knelt beside it. His examination was brief; he dictated something to a girl, who scribbled on a notepad. He stood up and made a sign to the ambulance men, who carried a grey metal shell and placed it beside the body. Their legs masked it as they lifted it; Sorme could see only the torn hem of a skirt that trailed on the ground as the body swung into the shell. A moment later the doors of the ambulance closed behind it, and the engine started. The policeman removed the rope again, saying: Make way there.

The crowd began to break up. From the warehouse across the square an old man emerged carrying a bucket and a sweeping brush; he splashed water on the pavement where the body had lain, and scrubbed at it with the brush. The ambulance moved slowly out of the square. A sudden feeling of chill passed down Sorme's back, making him shiver. He turned away, past the window of the small shop, meeting briefly the cardboard smile of a girl in a toothpaste advertisement. For a moment, he experienced an intuition of the state of mind of the murderer, the revolt against the abstract blandishments, the timeless grimaces, the wooden benedictions that preside over railway carriages and roadside hoardings.

Payne said:

Let's go and get some tea.

Good idea, Mozely said.

Coming, Gerard?

Yes.

You look all in. Tired still?

A little.

A group of photographers walked in front of them. The sky was light now. He allowed himself to lag behind both groups, anxious to concentrate on the insight until it faded, aware of his inability to express it in words. He was hungry: in the cafe he would eat. How could any insight survive the unending tides of the blood, the body's seasons?

The struggle was lost in advance.

Payne said:

You sit down, Gerard. I'll bring the teas over.

I want something to eat too.

All right. I'll get it. Cheese roll?

He sat beside Mozely at a corner table; the reporter was making shorthand notes on a pad. The photographers were occupying a table near the window. He felt tired, discouraged by the prospect of the ride back to Camden Town. Mozely looked up at him suddenly:

What did you think of it?

Of what?

The way everybody reacted?

They all seemed pretty subdued, I must say.

That's the word. Subdued.

Payne sat down opposite them. He said:

Can you wonder? This makes six murders in a few months. They're beginning to wonder how many more.

Do you think it's the fault of the police?

What can they do? They can only follow up every clue and keep hoping he'll slip up.

Happened in the Cummins case, Mozely said.

What was that? Sorme asked.

During the war. He was a sexual maniac. He killed four women — mostly prostitutes — in the Soho area. Finally, someone interrupted him while he was strangling a girl in a doorway in the Haymarket. He ran off and left his gasmask case behind, so they got him… But the interesting thing is this. When he was interrupted in the last case, he promptly went off and found another girl in Paddington, and tried to kill her too. She got away as well.

Payne said:

That was before my time. Anyway, do you really think this bloke's a sexual maniac?

Mozely said, shrugging:

He's a maniac of some sort; that's a dead cert.

Sorme ate the cheese roll hungrily; when he had finished it, he crossed to the counter and bought another. When he returned to the table, Payne was saying:

… and he saw someone bending over the body. He shouted Is there anything wrong? And the man said: Yes. I think she's dead. Go and get a copper, quick! When the man got back five minutes later, the man had gone — there was only this woman.

What's this? Sorme asked.

The first murder last night.

Do they think the man was the murderer?

I don't know. It sounds likely.

Mozely said:

They'll soon find out when they discover how long she'd been dead.

Sorme said:

Could the man describe the bloke who sent him for the policeman?

No. It was in the dark, and he says he didn't go within ten yards. I shouldn't be surprised if he wasn't afraid of bumping into the murderer!

How was she killed?

A blow on the head. It must have been a tremendous blow with a bar of some kind.

And the other woman had her throat cut? He certainly varies his methods!

Sorme asked:

Do you think it sounds like the Greenwich killer?

Mozely shook his head.

I doubt it. You know what it sounds like, don't you?

Payne interrupted:

As if the killer got a bit fed-up about the headlines asking if he'd moved south of the river?

Exactly.

The three of them drank their tea in silence.

Mozely said finally:

What I can't understand is this. He must have got blood on his clothes after that second murder. And he must have passed a policeman as he was getting away. The place was alive with them. How did he do it?

He could have had a car parked near the scene of the murder, Sorme said.

Too dangerous. The police take the number of every car parked around here at night. The risk would be too great.

Payne said:

Whoever he is, he either has amazing courage or he's insane.

Insane, Mozely said.

But he must be after something in Whitechapel… either that, or he lives here. Or why should he stick to this area?

He's not after anything, Mozely said. How could he be? He doesn't seem to pick his victims. He just takes anybody who comes along. Have you come across this Leather Apron idea?

No. What's that?

Oh, a lot of people think it's a chap called Leather Apron. Nobody seems to know who he is or what he does, except that he's a foreigner, and terrorises some of the whores around here.

Payne asked:

Have you mentioned him in your story?

Yes. I don't think it'll come to anything, but I heard his name mentioned half a dozen times this morning.

Did you ask any questions?

Of course. No luck. He seems to be just a name.

It might be worth following up, Payne said.

Have you heard this story about the foreign crime experts? They say there are several on the case now.

Sorme said:

I've heard about that. There's some German… I forget his name..

Mozely said: By the way, did you read that letter in The Times yesterday?

No.

Very interesting. Apparently there were several murders at a place called Bochum in Germany after the war — just like these. The man apparently wrote a letter to the police saying he'd kill six more women, then stop. The murders stopped immediately after his letter.

And they never caught him?

No.

Payne laughed softly:

I heard a theory the murderer was a Turk who killed several women in Istanbul.

They'd need a special branch of the United Nations to follow up all the stories!

Sorme finished drinking his tea, staring at the crumbs left on his plate; he was trying to imagine what he would do if he met the murderer on a dark night in Whitechapel. He imagined him as a thin man, middle-aged and bald-headed, with bloodless lips, and the eyes of a fanatic. The thought that, at that moment, somewhere in London, the murderer was free, perhaps drinking tea beside some woman in a cafe, or hanging on a strap in the Underground, produced a lurching sensation of the stomach.

Mozely stood up suddenly. He said:

Oh well, back to work! You coming yet, Bill?

No. I'll have another cup of tea first.

Sorme stood up, pushing his chair forward, to allow Mozely to pass, Mozely said: