Mercifully, she’d’ve felt no lingering pain from the garrote or the fire.” “Thank you, Doctor.”
“Trauma of the attack itself would’ve been like an attack of chills to the system, but I suspect her last thoughts were of you.”
Ransom held back a tear.
“All guesswork, but I believe we must try to understand both the victim and him—our killer—in order to prevent future killings.”
They sat in silence, imagining the horror this monster had brought to Chicago. A pair of warriors fighting a ghostly plague they didn’t understand. And they felt alone against the enemy. “What next indeed,” Ransom muttered.
“The killer is mobile. Moves ’bout the city effortlessly.
Likely means money, well-to-do family, I fear and so—”
“Yes, has his own carriage and driver.” Ransom brightened. “They theorized old Jack the Ripper did it that way.”
“Blends.”
“And is well versed on our city terrain.”
“He’s cunning and quite possibly enjoys working with his hands. Perhaps likes to make things . . . as with his garrote.
It is unique to him. He loves his weapon. It grants him power.”
“Ahhh . . . but it’s not so unique after all.” Ransom held up the same garrote—crisscrossed with a diamond center.
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“There is then something unique about this man’s relationship with the weapon, I tell you. It’s that twisted.”
“All right, perhaps he talks to it. I won’t argue the point.”
“And one more thing.”
“Yes?”
“While he may be as well off as Mr. Field himself, he is small in stature.”
“How can you possibly know his stature, Doctor?”
“The angle of the garrote—the force—pulling downward.
Polly was as tall as you, yet—”
“Yes, he’d pulled downward even on Purvis. It appears the killer is rather short. Clever of you to’ve noticed, and right.”
“I find the so-called investigation full of holes.”
“Ahhh . . . you would. Look, we’ll soon have a break in the case. I get reports daily from Dot’n’Carry.”
“Dot and who?”
“My street snitch. My most reliable spy. If ever I write my memoir, my homeless friend will have to be acknowledged.
The poor wretched gimp.”
“Gimp?”
“He has been with you for days, Doctor, so unobtrusive you’ve not noticed. Blends as you put it.”
Jane did a 360-degree turn, taking in everyone here and on the street through the window where Chicago’s teeming life passed by. Commerce continued unabated. Vendors rolled portable carts, selling anything imaginable. A number of people with canes limped by, along with black hansom cabs rolling in and out of the window frame.
The fiddler in the corner had stopped to swill his ale, halving the glass before starting up a lively rendition of “Comin’
Through the Rye.” The tune livened up the patrons all round, and even Ransom’s toe began to tap, although he seemed unaware of this, as his thoughts remained on the killings, how the only witness they had said the killer was whistling this same popular tune.
190
ROBERT W. WALKER
Dr. Tewes was not unaware of Ransom’s toe-tapping, as he was tapping on Tewes’s shoe—a man’s size seven, stuffed at the toes. A man with a harmonica joined in with the fiddler. Patrons began to clap as if clawing their way from a dull hell.
Young Waldo Denton entered and ordered up a bucket of beer. “Fetchin’ for Philo, no doubt,” said Ransom to Tewes.
Waldo gave a glance in Ransom’s direction and nodded at him and Tewes, grinned before rushing out again, the bucket of beer slopping along his pants leg. “Boy acts as if Philo might beat him if he dallies.” Ransom then looked with a mix of disdain and admiration at those having fun.
“Garroting’s a cowardly method of dispatching someone, catching ’im from behind, not facing your victim, eye to eye,” he began. “And yet twice now he’s killed victims before a mirror.”
“If you’re right . . . he likes to watch ’em die—”
“And to see himself in the act.”
“Behavior says something about who he is,” Jane explained.
“I believe a lot of what you say about the makeup of this monster is well . . . useful information.”
“Almost sounded like a compliment in there somewhere.
Now . . . with whom do I speak about recompense?”
“Recompense?”
“Yes, I’m sure you’ve heard the word before. I expect pay as an independent consultant to you, Inspector.”
“Aha . . . like any other leech on the Chicago payroll.”
“Have you seen the cost of bread lately? Been to the fair?”
“I’ve no time for such trivialities.”
“Perhaps had you taken time . . .”
“Go on.”
“. . . you’d’ve been on that wheel in the sky with Merielle last night instead of pumping me for information.”
“Damn your hide, Doctor! What about your daughter, Gabrielle? Have you given a moment’s thought to the possibility that she, rather than Purvis, could’ve been killed that night they were at the fair?”
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“It has indeed kept me awake nights.”
“Perhaps had you bothered taking Gabby to the fair, she’d not’ve been with Purvis that night! And what about your sister, the one you treat like a housemaid?”
“Leave Jane out of this, and Gabby as well. They’re none of your affair.” Jane sensed her ruse was finally up with him, but she could not be certain. She held her silence. She wanted so much to reveal her true self to Alastair, as she had Dr. Fenger,
As if taking up a challenge, Ransom boldly replied, “I just may call on your sister, Dr. Tewes.”
“What?” Tewes was clearly stunned by this.
“She’s new to the city. She must be curious about the fair.”
“Is this some sort of threat, Alastair?”
“Threat?”
“Worm information out of my sister to get—”
“I’m merely wondering if she’s curious about the wheel, the fair, the pavilions?”
“Of course she is but—”
“But you’ve had no time to show Jane the city or the fair?”
