Lyndsay Faye - Dust and Shadow

An iron fence separated the East London Cemetery from the road, and beyond the gate an expanse of grass edged with alder, field maple, and young wych elm trees shimmered in the mist. The fog hung in the air like a spectral presence, and I drew my muffler tighter about my throat.

“Holmes, where is the chapel?”

“There is none. This cemetery is hardly more than fifteen years old. It was built by professionals of the district to provide a resting place for locals. One of the overlooked consequences of a city doubling in size to four million in fifty years’ time, Watson—what to do with the dead?”

A group of ten or so men and women waited near a low shack, clustered around a cart holding a long bundle wrapped in torn burlap. A police constable stood a few yards away observing the Dr. Moore Agar proceedings.

“Good morning, Officer,” Holmes greeted him. “What brings you here?”

“Good morning, sir. Inspector Lestrade thought it best that there be a representative of the force at the victims’ ceremonies, sir.”

“Very thorough of him too.”

“Yes, Mr. Holmes, though whether it’s to keep the peace or simply be visible to the public I can’t say.”

Holmes laughed. “I suppose even the appearance of work is of some use to the Yard.”

“Well, I didn’t say that, sir,” the constable replied judiciously, adjusting his collar. “But there are expectations of us, if you take my meaning.”

“Assuredly. The chaplain has arrived. Shall we join the procession?”

An employee of the parish, with the white collar of a clergyman just discernible beneath his overcoat, came puffing up the path toward the cart, slick-faced and scowling darkly. We followed the body at some little distance, far enough to avoid comment but close enough that I could catch some of the mutterings of the other mourners. I doubted not that Holmes, with his keener senses, heard still more.

“Not much of a showing, eh?” said a blond fellow who even from yards away smelled sharply of fish.

“You know well enough Liz had no kin,” replied a young female in a black straw hat and shawl.

“Never had much of anything. She always was unlucky.”

“At least she weren’t slit up like the other girl. I call that lucky enough.”

“If I could take my mind off who’ll it be next for half a moment, I might sleep again,” came a gentler voice, heavy with tears. “A rat jumped out of an alley last night and set me screaming.”

“Not I. You won’t catch me in a dark corner with the Knife on the loose.”

“Aye, true enough for today, but tomorrow you’ll be wanting a drop of gin, and then where’ll I find you?”

“Back of White’s Row with her skirts over her head.”

“Leave off Molly, Michael.”

“He’s right enough. Molly no more than any of us can keep off the streets for long.”

We arrived at an area which more closely resembled the efforts of enormous moles than of any gravediggers. Much of the earth was overturned, the freshest of it piled next to a hole in the ground six feet long and six feet deep. I could see no monuments of any kind, and the scene reminded me piteously of the hasty burials I had witnessed all too often in the war.

“This is it, then, Hawkes?” asked the chaplain.

“Here she’ll stay,” growled the undertaker. “Number one-five-five-oh-nine.”

The chaplain lost no time in beginning a rapid recitation of the prayer for the dead while Hawkes and one of the male attendants lifted the shrouded body from the cart and dropped it in the grave.

“Elizabeth Stride was penniless,” my friend remarked quietly, “and the cost of her burial thus deferred to the parish. Still, it is heartless to think that a fellow creature who had already suffered so cruelly should end like this.”

Shortly thereafter the mourners, such as they were, began to disperse. Soon the only one remaining was a rust-haired, dark-eyed man of middle age, who had all along appeared more enraged than grieved by the proceedings. At length he picked up a stone and hurled it in the direction of Hawkes the undertaker, crying out, “That woman was like a queen to me, and here you’re shoveling dirt as if she weren’t of no more consequence than a dead dog to throw in the river!”

“Move along, you,” Hawkes barked in return. “I’m doing my duty, for I’m paid for naught else. Bury her yourself if you’ve a mind to.”

Passing the three of us, the wild-eyed fellow caught sight of the constable’s rounded helmet and striped armlet* and slowed ominously, cursing under his breath, “If I’d been a bluebottle patrolling the Chapel that night, I’d lose no time killing myself for the shame.”

“You’d best shove off, mister,” answered the officer. “We all of us do what we can.”

“Take a knife to your own worthless throat, and lose no time about it!”

“I’ll have you for public drunkenness, if you insist.”

“Better still, find him as killed Liz or you can go to the devil,” the man sneered.

“And who might you be, sir?” queried Sherlock Holmes.

“Michael Kidney,” said he, drawing himself up with an effort, for balance seemed to be largely eluding him. “I was her man, and I mean to find her killer while you pigs sniff about in the mud.”

“Ah, he of the padlock,” Holmes commented. “Tell me, did she come to love you after you imprisoned her, or before?”

“You sly devil!” Kidney snarled. “It was only when she drank she ever thought to leave me. Who are you, then, and how do you come to know aught of it?”

“My name is Sherlock Holmes.”

“Oh, Sherlock Holmes, are you?” This information incensed Kidney all the more. “From what I hear of you, you’re as likely as anyone to be the Ripper yourself.”

“So I have been given to understand.”

“What in blazes do you think you’re doing at her funeral, then?”

“Nothing which need trouble you. Take my advice, Kidney, and keep out of it.”

“Come to see what you’ve accomplished, have you?” he screamed. “Gloating over her funeral, before God and all who loved her!”

Kidney, disheveled and frantic, swung a fist at Holmes, but the blow was easily avoided by my friend, who sidestepped deftly. I dived to restrain Kidney’s arms, and the officer stepped in close with his truncheon under the ruffian’s nose.

“If you make so much as another sound,” he said, “I will see to it your own mother won’t recognize you. Now come with us, and remember—one more word gives me license to do as I please with you.”

Between us we dragged the struggling brute down to the street, where good fortune blessed us with a second constable patrolling his beat. I left Kidney in their capable hands and returned to where Holmes remained on the grass, adjusting his sling thoughtfully, rotating his arm in tiny circles.

“That constable appears to have a temper,” I remarked.

“No more than Kidney,” Holmes returned wryly. “I am grateful that he made no serious effort to fight me. He would have gotten hurt.”

“You are a formidable match even when injured, and I am very pleased to point out that you are looking less injured every hour. But Holmes, I must know—did you find what you expected?”

“I suppose dragging you out in this wretched damp demands some degree of explanation,” he conceded as we walked back to the open road. “Strange as it may sound, I had the same idea as Michael Kidney. These murders—their glory in excess, their delight in the press—have been conducted in the most public manner conceivable. And what could possibly be more public than the victim’s funeral?”

“Surely the Ripper would be very obtuse to show himself.”

“I did not imagine that he would, but there is a streak of vanity about his correspondence which had invested me with hope. He is growing ever more sure of himself and will soon enough bluff his way into a corner,” my friend predicted. “I only hope he will do so before anyone else is killed.”