Gideon Smith and the Mask of the Ripper (15 page)

“I wasn’t going to do nothing,” he said miserably. “It’s just … for God’s sake, Lizzie, I never had a wife. I never needed one. I always got what I wanted at your house and besides, look at me, who’d marry a face like that?” He dropped his voice to a wheedling tone unbecoming, Lottie thought, of such a big man. “I’m desperate for a fuck, Lizzie.”

“Well fuck off and catch Jack the Ripper, and you can have one on the house,” she sneered. “Balls, I’ll do you myself if you catch him. Now skedaddle.”

As Henry buttoned himself up and sidled out of the alley, the woman he’d called Lizzie looked Lottie up and down. Eventually she asked, “And what’s your game, pet?”

Lottie held her head high, though she was as terrified of this woman as she had been of Henry Savage. “I’m a common prostitute, just plying my trade. Who are you?”

There was a collective intake of breath from the three women, and their leader put her face close. “I’m Lizzie fucking Strutter, my love, and you are pissing on my manor. I don’t know what you’re up to, but I think you and me need a friendly little chat.”

I
NTERMEDIO
: A C
ESSPIT
OF
S
UCH
V
ILENESS
AND
R
OT

He knew this much: He hated London. Detested it. Felt trapped, imprisoned, caged. Yes, the walls of his cell were distant; he could barely walk from the north one to the south in a single day. But it was no less a prison for that. It was only when he slipped and sank into what he had now come to always refer to as the “intermedio” that he felt somewhat unshackled, as though he had given his jailers the slip, or they were turning a blind eye to his actions, just for a few hours.

He hated London because he was submerged in it, and had been for so long. He had almost forgotten that any other place existed, could almost believe that the reports he read in the newspapers of far-off lands were mere fiction. It was as though London were the only place in the world, and sometimes that seemed the only explanation for its power, reach, and influence. How could a cesspit of such vileness and rot really rule the world?

He slipped back into the shadows to watch the grimy little passion play unfolding in front of him. The big man had been about to ravish the young woman, but now four other, harder-looking women had turned up to spoil his fun.

It was all rather entertaining, in a somewhat squalid way, for him and those like him. Those who traveled by the tunnel of night, those who clothed themselves in darkness.

He had come close, tonight, but the jagged teeth of his instruments had yet to taste blood. His black soul puckered as though blindly demanding to be fed. He turned away from the little scene at the end of the alley and carefully made his way back through the darkness, the intermedio heightening his senses, taking him unerringly onward in search of prey.

He passed out from the mouth of the alley to a brightly lit thoroughfare he would have to cross to melt into the night again. A long, soot-blackened brick wall curved to the right; on it, someone had painted foot-high white letters, a message in broad, blocky brushstrokes.

COPPERS GET JACKY T. RIPER OR WE WILL & WE DONT CARE WHO WE KILLS WILE WE DUZ IT.

He knew he was taking a risk walking the streets of Whitechapel while the vigilante mobs prowled. He had already seen their handiwork, the bodies strung up from the gas lampposts, the freezing weather keeping them fresh and preserved, their faces frozen in the final, horrified expressions of claimed innocents.

I’m not him,
they would have screamed, as men like that ravisher in the alley punched them in the stomach and slipped a noose over their necks.
I’m not Jack the Ripper!

Of course you are not,
he thought to himself as he crossed the filth-strewn road without incident and disappeared into the yawning maw of another alley, the lights in the street behind him quickly fading from view.
Of course you are not Jack the Ripper.

Up ahead, he heard the scuff of heel on cobble, a quick step that could only belong to a woman.

There is only one Jack the Ripper.

Without breaking stride, he quietly unclipped his bag.

10

T
AIT
AND
L
YALL

He awoke in darkness—close, choking darkness that stank to high heaven. Water lapped at his boots, and his head roared with sharp, stabbing agony. For a moment he thought something heavy lay across him, so tight was his chest, so trapped and immobile did he feel. Something bobbed up from the blackness within him, a dim memory of being carried, as a child, out of tunnels into the sunlight and gentle wash of the sea against a pebbly shore. Then he realized it was fear and panic that kept him frozen to the damp, slimy bricks.

Your fear is a lie.

He tried to latch on to the thought, but it popped like a bubble on the surface of a black lake. He tried to sit up, and something skittered on the stone beside him, claws scrabbling for purchase and a heavy black shape sliding into the sluggish river that flowed by. A rat, a big one. His eyes became more accustomed to the gloom, because it was not total blackness that surrounded him. High above he could see a tiny crescent of white light that allowed a grayness to dilute the darkness. He rubbed his head. Of course. The manhole cover, in the alley where he had fled the mob. He must be in the sewers.

With some effort, because panic still hung around him like a pall of smoke, and his head—he must have hit it when he fell—ached terribly, he rose to a crouch. Around him were the petrified remains of the ladder he had begun to descend … last night? That must be daylight above, so he must have knocked himself unconscious and lain there, among the rats and filth, for hours. The ladder had rusted almost to crumbs, collapsing with his weight and bringing him down onto the narrow ledge that ran on either side of the stream of effluent. He wrinkled his nose. There was no way up; the wall was too smooth and slimy for him to climb. But there must be another manhole, a ladder in better condition, farther along the curved tunnel.

As he considered the crescent of light tantalizingly out of reach, there was more chattering behind him. More rats, and he didn’t have so much as a stick to defend himself. He had heard—though he didn’t recall where, of course—that London’s sewers were home to huge, vicious vermin which, when they gathered into packs, could kill a man. Just like the streets above.

But it was not a rat that chattered behind him. He turned to see, on the opposite ledge, a tiny figure with pinprick eyes chewing thoughtfully on a scrap of food, perhaps a nut.

It was a monkey.

The thing kept its eyes, which reflected the dim light most curiously, upon him as it tossed the fragments of its snack into the stinking water, and despite the stench he felt his stomach rumble. When had he last eaten? The monkey cocked its black and white head and scratched its arm absently. It wore a faded little red waistcoat, braided with thick gold thread, and its tail slapped, serpentlike, on the stone ledge as though it were impatient to see what he would do next.

The monkey suddenly turned its head toward the darkness. He hadn’t heard anything, but … yes, there it was. A faint noise … singing? And the palest of lights, illuminating the brickwork of the curving sewer tunnel. Someone was coming.

When he looked back, the monkey had gone. But whoever was down with him was coming closer, because he heard clearer the sonorous voice, even made out the words as they drifted through the cold, fetid air.

“In Westminster not long ago / There lived a ratcatcher’s daughter. / She was not born at Westminster / But on t’other side of the water. / Her father killed rats and she sold sprats / All round, and over the water / And the gentlefolks, they all bought sprats / Of the pretty ratcatcher’s daughter.…”

He remained in a crouch as two figures rounded the bend, one of them holding a staff from which dangled an oil lamp, flooding the tunnel with welcome light. They were both dressed in leather waders that came up to their chests, one tall and thin, the other portly and no taller than the other’s shoulder. The taller man had added height thanks to a battered felt top hat; the shorter wore a derby as round as his belly. Both had skin as white as paper, hair the color of snow. The hems of their thick coats dragged in the black water they strode through, pots and cutlery festooning the heavy backpacks each wore and clanking in rhythm with their stride.

“She wore no hat upon her head / Nor cap, nor dandy bonnet / Her hair of her head it hung down her neck / Like a bunch of carrots … oh!” The singing of the shorter man tailed off and they both stopped in the flowing filth as they sighted him.

“Well,” said the taller. “What
have
we here?”

“Mud lark. Shit-hawk. Waif. Stray,” said the other, counting off on fat, dirty digits that poked through frayed woolen fingerless gloves.

The taller man raised the oil lamp higher, squinting through the shadows. “Does he know we’re armed?” he wondered. “We’ll stick him like a pig if he tries anything.”

“He does now.” The fatter man nodded with satisfaction. He raised his voice. “Who are you? And what’s your business here? This is our patch, don’t you know?”

He straightened up, holding out his hands to show he had no weapon. “I don’t mean you any harm. I fell down … I need to get out.”

“Fell like manna from heaven,” said the tall man. They resumed their sloshing walk toward him. “Wants to get out. What do you make of that?”

“I say it’s a good job we found him.” The short man nodded. “What do they call you, then?”

The thin one clambered up onto the ledge, holding out a long arm to haul his companion up with him.

His name? He recalled the sign on the hardware shop above, which had plucked at something in his dim mind, like idle fingers at a loose thread.

“Smith,” he said, rolling the word around his mouth. “My name is Smith.”

The shorter man screwed up an eye. “Christian name or surname?”

“Not both, I hope,” said the other. “Can’t abide men who have names that are either-or. Remember Walter Edward? Hated him.”

The short man smiled. “I found him quite palatable company.”

“And Peter John. Ridiculous.”

“Smith,” said Smith. “It’s just Smith. And you are…?”

The tall man removed his top hat and bowed low. “We forget our manners. I am Mr. Tait.”

The other gave a curt nod. “And I am Mr. Lyall.”

“Tait and Lyall?” said Smith dubiously.

“Tait with an ‘i’,” said Tait, standing up straight.

“And Lyall with an ‘a’. Though a man who calls himself
Smith, just Smith,
ought not to be casting nasturtiums on the appellations of gentlemen he’s just met.”

“It’s aspersions,” said Tait, replacing his hat. “Not nasturtiums. Those are flowers.”

Lyall broke into song again, his deep voice echoing off the brick walls. “A flower gal by profession, I earns my smokes and drinks, I does just wot I likes, and sez just wot I finks!”

“But what are you doing down here in this dreadful place?” said Smith.

Tait looked at him aghast. “Dreadful place? My dear Smith, you are standing in one of the great engineering marvels of the modern age! Sir Joseph William Bazalgette’s sewer system! The large intestine of London!”

Smith wrinkled his nose. Lyall nudged Tait in the ribs. “I bet he doesn’t remember the Great Stink.”

Tait nodded. “Too young, by half. The Great Stink, Smith. Summer of ’fifty-eight. London was awash with … well, we’re all men here, aren’t we? Shit, Smith. Shit. London was drowning in it.”

“Dropping like flies, they were. The cholera, don’t you know. That’s why Sir Joseph—”

“God bless him!” shouted Lyall.

“Indeed. That’s why he created the sewer system. Bloody genius.”

“But what are you
doing
here?” asked Smith again.

“Doing here? This is where we earn our living, isn’t that right, Mr. Lyall?”

Lyall nodded. “Correct, Mr. Tait. We’re toshers, Smith, that’s what we are. Toshers.”

*   *   *

“Toshers,” said Lyall as they walked down the tunnel, Smith on the ledge and the two men splashing through the filth, “provide an invaluable service to the City of London.”

“It’s an honorable trade,” said Tait. “A profession.”

“But what do you do?” asked Smith.

Tait swung his lantern wide, and a pair of rats splashed out of their way, nosing ahead of them in the water. He said, “We find that which is lost.”

“Down here?”

Lyall nodded. “You wouldn’t believe what ends up in the sewers. Money. Jewelry. Scrap iron. Why, once we found a whole steam-cab.” He shook his head. “Heaven knows how
that
got down here.”

“And you … salvage these lost items? Sell them?”

“That we do,” said Tait. “There’s a handsome living to be made as a tosher, which is why we’re very particular about who we find on our patch.”

“I’m not after your business,” said Smith. “I just want to get out of here. Did you say there’ll be another ladder…?”

“Soon,” said Lyall. “And yes, we sell what we find. Thing is, we tend to spend more time down here than up there, these days. Sometime we even sleep down here, me and Mr. Tait, bundled up in our blankets, under our bivouac.”

“But the smell…,” said Smith.

Tait smiled. “I don’t mind. You get used to Mr. Lyall after a spell.”

“Cheeky blighter,” said Lyall with good humor.

“What of the rats?”

“Quite tasty, sometimes,” said Tait.

Smith gaped at him. “You eat them?”

“They have a taste of chicken.” Lyall nodded. “That’s not all we eat. There’s hogs over in Hampstead, you know. In the sewers. They can be vicious buggers, but get one of ’em on their own … why, we can eat for a week. Not to mention the cats and dogs that find their way down here.”

Smith felt his bile rise. “But you said you sell the things you find … don’t you make enough money to buy food?”