The Diabolical Miss Hyde (14 page)

Perhaps the Queen was dead. Or kept as a lunatic, like so many unwanted women. Locked in a cold cellar on starvation rations, her screams unheeded.

Eliza strode up the steps, skirts whispering. The constable behind the entry desk was laboriously consuming T
HE
B
LOODY
D
EATH OF
B
ILLY
B
EANE
, running his finger beneath each line and mouthing the words under his breath. Like many of the Met's officers, he'd likely grown up in the slums, amongst the very people he now policed. A job was a job. Probably pure luck he hadn't ended up a criminal himself.

It didn't increase her faith in the justice system.

Hastily, he hid the pamphlet beneath his papers as she approached. His buttons were meticulously polished, his chin shaven clean. “Yes, madam?”

She flashed her police credentials at him. “I just spoke with Inspector Griffin. I need to examine a cadaver.”

Not a lie, precisely. But the other inspectors weren't exactly her allies, and Griffin needn't discover her interest in
the Beane case, not yet. Not until she'd established beyond doubt that Lizzie wasn't involved.

Or otherwise.

“Right you are, Doctor.” The constable smiled uneasily. Like many people, he didn't understand the concept of a female physician, let alone a female police doctor and crime scene investigator. Possibly, he thought her a little crazy.

She gave her best maniacal grin and plonked Hippocrates down. “Come along, Hipp. Let's slice up some meat.” And she flounced away before the constable had time to react.

The morgue lay downstairs, in a cold room lit only by electric coils. She shivered as she descended, Hipp's brass feet clanking on the stone steps. The door creaked open, and she was alone with the dead.

Two rows of slabs, six on each side. The bodies lay covered with pale sheets, all but a few of the slabs occupied. Harsh lights flickered,
bzzt! bzzt!
The sickly sweet scent of death wormed up her nose.

She lifted four sheets before she found Billy Beane.

There he lay, unclothed, his trademark green coat and hat removed. His thin body was pale, with dark patches of hair. His face was slack, untroubled in death. He looked smaller. Skinnier. Not so monstrous.

Arsehole,
spat Lizzie coldly, and Eliza's lip curled, the shadows in her heart muttering black mutiny. Appearances meant less than nothing. Billy deserved to be dead. No one would miss him . . .

She shook herself, fighting the dark cloud that threatened to swamp her.
Lizzie, what did you do?

But Lizzie just muttered dark curses and didn't answer.

Eliza pulled on her white gloves. The body had already been hastily washed, the trace evidence probably wiped away. The police had already seen whatever clues they could be bothered to look for. No time to lose. “Post-mortem examination, Hipp. Take a recording.”

“Yes, Doctor.” His little electric voice buzzed, fussy.

“Billy Beane, about thirty years old, dead since six this morning at the latest, probably longer.” Hippocrates clicked and jittered, recording her words. “Visual examination. Our Billy appears to have been stabbed in the throat. Large bloody wound under the left side of the chin, angled towards the base of the skull, flesh sliced downwards on exit, not torn. The weapon stabbed upwards, then withdrew, probably releasing a large gout of blood. I'd say an edged blade.”

Potentially not Lizzie's stiletto. So far, so good. And she'd noticed no voluminous bloodstains on Lizzie's dress. Still, it wasn't proof.

“In addition, three . . . no, four . . . more. Multiple stab wounds to the abdomen and chest. Some shallow, some deep, maybe three inches. Narrow weapon, sharp point. Bruises on the temples and ribs. Also the belly and private parts. He seems to have suffered some pain. What a shame.”

She picked up Billy's hand. “Body stinks of gin, despite partial washing. Defense wounds, deep scratches on the palms and wrists of his left hand. He fought back, but with one hand only. The killer stabs; Billy clutches his bleeding throat with his right hand, fends the killer off with his left . . . Oh, hold on. Something's caught beneath his nails.”

She peered closer, angling the dead fingers to the light. Billy's nails were disgusting, chewed ragged and stuffed with
dirt. She popped on her optical, gazed through the magnifier, pulled out her tweezers, and carefully extracted . . . “It's hair. Coarse, yellow-brown in color, torn out by the root. Not the same color as Billy's.”

She opened a brass flap on top of Hippocrates's head and slipped the hair onto the glass slide within. “Hair sample, Hipp. Identify.”

Hippocrates flashed his lights, accessing his records of her sample collection. “Inconclusive,” he reported. “Closest comparable specifications:
canis lupus familiaris
.”

“This is dog hair? Are you sure? Could it be human?”

“Inconclusive. Require further data. Information please.”

“Hmm. Perhaps his body was savaged by a starving animal. Even better than I thought.” She popped the hair into a tube. “Moving on. Two long narrow wounds across the left shoulder and chest, probably the same blade . . . actually, no.” She frowned. “These look like . . . ah.” She brandished her tweezers again. “Another hair, similar in appearance, caught in one of the chest wounds. These have bled freely, their edges ragged. Not post-mortem.”

She frowned. “Conclusion: Billy Beane was beaten, then stabbed to death. But before he died, he was clawed across the chest and hands by an animal. Through at least one layer of clothing, probably two.”

How bizarre.

What did this mean? Did the murderer use an attack dog? Perhaps a fighting animal from the pits, or a ratter. Stranger things had happened in Seven Dials. And there'd be plenty of people who'd relish the idea of setting a dog on Billy the Bastard.

She bent to pick up the hessian sack that lay in shadow beneath the slab. “Billy's effects, put into a sack by the police. One black hat, squashed.” She laid it aside, the greasy odor wrinkling her nose. “One shirt, one famously smelly green coat, both torn and bloodied, with other organic stains. Small puncture marks in the shirt, possibly matching the multiple stab wounds, measurements required. Small size of bloodstains suggests stabbings performed—”

The mortuary door banged open, and a short man with bristling mustaches and a bowler hat barreled in. “What the devil are you doing?”

She jumped back, and cursed inwardly. “Detective Inspector Reeve,” she said calmly, though her heart was thumping. “How nice to see you again.”

Reeve strode up, left thumb tucked in his braces, and chewed on his cigar. Just a little man, with a little man's inflated self-pride, and it irritated him to no end that Griffin had the Commissioner's ear. Griffin was younger, better educated, and well regarded by his superiors, which in Reeve's mind were three perfectly good reasons to hinder him at every turn.

“Oh, it's you,” he grunted. “Griffin send you to poke your nose into my business, did he?”

“Merely doing my job, sir.” Calmly she replaced the clothing in the sack. Someone's informer, indeed. Reeve was just the kind of man who'd give money to a beast like Billy Beane.

“No,
Doctor
”—Reeve salted the word with sarcasm and blew smoke into her face—“this is
not
your job. I'm about to close this case, and I'm damned if I'll allow some bookish missy who's been left on the shelf to meddle with my corpses.”

The childish insult washed over her and away, rainwater on glass. “Indeed, sir,” she said coolly. “You've done so well without medical evidence in the Moorfields Monster case, after all. How many victims now? Is it five?” A low blow, she knew. But his stubborn ignorance grated on her nerves. For a reasonably intelligent man, he certainly did a fine impression of a stupid one.

Reeve grunted. “Be damned to your swabs and squeezings, missy. Proper police work, that's what's needed, by proper police officers. We've found an eyewitness to the Beane murder.”

Her heart skipped. “What?”

“Your fancy science didn't tell you that, did it?” He was practically crowing. “Yes, we have a little girly snout who saw the murderer. Or murderess, I should say, some uppity whore in a red dress. I'll soon find her, mark my words. It's open and shut!”

Her thoughts clattered like a rockfall. “But . . . how? Who is this witness? What did she see?”

“I can't reveal details of an official investigation to you.” He chewed on his cigar. “Fancy yourself a police officer, don't you? Look, you just have to accept that girls don't have the wits for this kind of work. Stick to your embroidery. That's what you're good at. Leave the dirty jobs to the men, can't you? It isn't ladylike to have you grubbing around in the mud.”

His patronizing tone stung. “Inspector, this man has been savaged by an animal. I believe there's more to this case than—”

“I didn't ask what you believe, missy, and I don't care. You can tell Griffin he'll not steal my thunder this time.” Reeve
stood aside and jerked his whiskered chin towards the door. “Now let me do my job, and get out.”

Sweet rage whispered in her heart, and the urge to punch his arrogant face washed over her like a red tide.

Her fist clenched. She stepped up to him, her nose level with his. “If you're so eager,
Inspector,
” she spat, “you can tell him yourself. And I'll thank you to address me with respect, sir. It's ‘madam,' if you please, or ‘Dr. Jekyll.' I believe I've earned it. If you ever call me ‘missy' again, I'll take that stinking cigar away from you and shove it up your nose.”

And she slung her bag over her shoulder and stalked out, Hippocrates scuttling in her wake.

In the corridor, she stumbled against the wall, squeezing her eyes shut. Her pulse thudded, her blood coursing wild. She couldn't catch her breath. Crimson mist buzzed over her mind, an evil swarm of biting insects. God, she wanted to squeeze that horrid man's throat until his eyes bulged bloody . . .

She strangled a scream and slammed her fist into the wall.
Crunch!
Pain stabbed to her elbow, and the shock ripped her out into the real world.

The red mist dissolved like a breath, revealing the dim corridor, the single flickering arc-light.

She panted, trying to calm her sprinting pulse, control the angry shadow that threatened to smother her. She needed her remedy, Mr. Finch's powder, tucked away safely in her bag.

But so soon, after drinking the elixir only last night? Unprecedented. Something was wrong. Was the powder failing?

She shook her bruised hand. Ouch. Not very clever.

But Lizzie didn't think. She just reacted. And sometimes, when Eliza got angry, Lizzie bubbled to the surface like hot poisoned mud, ready to pop. Ready to protect herself at all costs from interfering guttersnipes like Reeve.

It felt good.

“Injury,” reported Hippocrates, unruffled. “Seek medical attention.”

“Thank you, Hipp.” She had to calm down. Discover what Lizzie had done, exactly what Reeve's eyewitness had seen, what the clue of the strange hair under Beane's fingernails meant.

At the top of the stairs, she briskly straightened her skirts and arranged her professional face. “Constable?”

The avid reader glanced up. “All done, ma'am?”

“One more thing. I must follow up on the eyewitness statement for the Beane case. What was the girl's name and abode?”

“Name and abode,” intoned Hippocrates. “Information please.”

The constable frowned. “I don't think I'm allowed to tell that.”

She glanced over her shoulder. Reeve was already emerging from the stairway. “Outstanding medical issues,” she improvised swiftly. “Female problems, you understand. Did you know that a quarter of all women suffer paranoid delusions at the onset of their menses?”

His cheeks reddened. “No, I, er, never knew that.”

“Well, then. It's a danger to society, you know. Hysterical bleeding madwomen roaming around everywhere. I must conduct a thorough internal examination of this girl's—”

“Right you are,” he interrupted hastily, and searched through his papers, word by word.

Eliza fidgeted.
Come on . . .

“Miss Jemima Clark,” he read laboriously at last, “unfortunate.” By which he meant “prostitute.” “Age fifteen, Great Eel Street . . . No, Earl. Great Earl Street.”

Frilled blue skirts, limp curls hanging over a low-cut bodice, a dull green stare of hatred . . .

I'll be damned,
whispered Lizzie.
Jemima Half-Cut. That jealous cow.

Eliza reeled. She knew the name. She didn't know it. She had no idea why this Jemima should be jealous. She had every idea.

But deep inside, her heart burned like poison, and she pasted a bland smile over her face and walked away.

Just before dusk, Eliza picked her way over the soil-stained puddles on Great Earl Street and stood before the Cockatrice public house.

Shadows stretched, the setting sun already hidden behind ramshackle buildings. The street was packed, strange-faced beggars and children with rat's tails and prowling whores with dirty skirts above their ankles. The slanting twilight threw an evil glint into every eye, turned every movement into an ambush, every whisper into a threat.

Lizzie had never minded the people, or the smell, which crawled like a living thing, damp and insidious. Eliza felt faintly sick, as if the air were poisoned.

The rooster-headed dragon above the crooked stone lintel stared down at her with insane, hungry black eyes, as if she were prey. Threatening.
Go away,
he seemed to growl.
I don't know you. You don't belong here.

She shivered, suddenly sorry she'd taken her remedy, mixed with water just as Mr. Finch prescribed. The bitter powder had stung her throat as it went down. Now, Lizzie seemed but a distant haunting, her confidence a sadly faded dream. And this strange world—
her
world—was no longer homely or welcoming. Instead, it was filled with monsters.