the vicissitudes of a long life brought her to low circumstances, they might have been shocked. At times, she would have looked up to Polly Nichols or Lulu Schon as a scullery maid looks up to a Duchess.
The atmosphere of the Ten Bells was steam-hot; thick with tobacco, beer and spilled blood. As she stepped through the doorway, her eye-teeth slid from their gumsheaths. She pinched shut her mouth, breathing through her nostrils. Animals trussed behind the bar squealed and fought their leather straps. Woodbridge, the barrel-bellied potman, took a sow by the ear and yanked her head around: the spigot-mouth of the tap driven into her neck was clotted. He gouged out the coagulated gore and turned the handle, disgorging a gushing dribble into a glass tankard. Pulling the pint, he joked in a rich Devon dialect with a new-born market porter. Genevieve knew too well the gamey taste of pig’s blood. It could keep the red thirst at bay, but never slake it. She swallowed her spittle. These nights, she did not have the opportunity to form attachments. Her work occupied so much time that she fed only rarely and then not well. Although strong with the strength of centuries, she could not push herself beyond certain limits. She needed a willing partner and the tang of blood in her mouth.
She knew most of the regulars, at least by sight. Rose Mylett, a warm prostitute Genevieve thought was Lily’s mother, was cutting her finger with a penknife and bleeding into tiny glasses of gin which she sold for a penny. Woodbridge’s slightly hare-lipped son, Georgie, a soft-faced youth in an apron, darted between the tables, collecting the empties and wiping away glass-rings. Johnny Thain, a constable who had been putting in a deal of extra hours since he got a look at what Silver Knife left of Polly Nichols, was at a corner table with a couple of detectives, a tweed coat over his uniform. The casual trade fell into obvious groups: itinerant workmen hoping for a shift at the market, soldiers and sailors looking for a girl or two, new-borns thirsty for more than liquid pork.
By the bar, Cathy Eddowes was simpering up at a big man, stroking the tangle of his hair, pressing her cheek to a blocky shoulder. She turned from her potential client and waved at Genevieve. Her hand was wrapped in cloth, fingers sticking stiffly out of the bundle. If there were more time, she’d have been concerned. Mick Ripper, a knife- sharpener reputed to be the best three-fingered pickpocket in London, closed on Cathy’s beau. He got near enough to see the man’s face and backed off, plunging his hands deep into his pockets.
‘Evenin’, Miss Dee,’ said Georgie. ‘Rushed off ’em tonight, we are.’
‘So I see,’ she said. ‘I hope we shall see you at the Hall for the new course of lectures.’
Georgie looked doubtful but smiled. ‘If ’n Dad lets me off of an evenin’. An’ if ’n it’s safe to go out by night.’
‘Mr Druitt will be taking a class in the mornings in the new year, Georgie,’ she said. ‘Mathematics. You’re one of our promising young men. Never forget your potential.’
The lad had a gift for figures; he could keep in his head at once the details and totals of three separate rounds of varied drinks. That talent, nurtured in Druitt’s classes, might lead him to a position. Georgie might exceed the high-water-mark of his father, and become a landlord rather than a potman.
She took a small table to herself and did not order a drink. She was stopping here just to put off her return to the Hall. She’d have to give a report on the inquest to Jack Seward, and did not just now want to think too much about the last moments of Lulu Schon’s life. As an accordionist murdered ‘The Little Yellow Bird’, a few maudlin drunks tried, with only marginal success, to remember all the words in the right order.
‘
‘
A group of noisy newcomers barged through the doors, bringing a gust of night’s chill with them. The noise of the pub momentarily abated, and was then redoubled.
Cathy’s prospective beau turned away from the bar, roughly pushing the new-born away. She rearranged a shawl around scab-dotted shoulders, and walked off with broken-heeled dignity. The man was Kostaki, the Carpathian who had been at the inquest. The three who had come in were his fellows, grim examples of the barbarian type Vlad Tepes had imported from his mountain homeland and set loose in London. She recognised Ezzelin von Klatka, a grey-faced Austrian with a close-cropped scalp and a moss-thick black beard. He had a reputation as an animal tamer.
Kostaki and von Klatka embraced, breastplates grinding as they grunted greetings in German, the language of preference for the mongrel
Woodbridge offered the Guardsmen a pull of the pig, and von Klatka stared him into silence. The Prince Consort’s Own did not favour animal blood. The group had the collective saunter Genevieve associated with Prussians or Mongols, the universal attitude of officers in an army of occupation. Carpathians marched around in a cloud of their own arrogance, condescending as much to the newborn as the warm.
Von Klatka picked a table in the centre of the room and stared down a couple of sailors until they chose to remove themselves to the bar, leaving their whores behind. The knight dismissed two of the girls, a new-born and a warm tart with no teeth, but let stay the last, a self-possessed gypsy who bore with pride the scars on her neck.
The Carpathians took chairs and leaned back in them, evidently at ease. They were illegitimate children of Bismarck and Geronimo: all wore highly polished boots and carried heavy swords, but their uniforms were augmented with oddments scavenged through the years. Von Klatka had around his neck a golden lanyard upon which were strung withered lumps of flesh she understood to be human ears. Cuda’s helmet was adorned with a wolf’s skin: head surmounting the crown and ringing the visor with teeth, eye-sockets sewn shut with red thread; thick-furred hide hanging down to the centre of his back, tail dangling almost to the floor.
Vardalek was the most extraordinary figure, his jacket a puffy affair of pleats and flounces, covered with kaleidoscope designs of spangle and sparkle. His face was powdered to conceal suppurating skin. Pantomime circles of rouge covered his cheeks and a scarlet cupid’s-bow was painted over lips constantly distended by the two-inch fangs. His hair was stiff and golden, elaborately done up in bows and curls, twin braids dangling from the nape of his neck like rat’s tails. This was the Count’s party, and he was being escorted by the others on his tour of the fleshpots. Vardalek was one of those vampires who fussed about how close he was to the Prince Consort, claiming a dynastic connection as well as the obvious tie of bloodline. In a minute’s chatter and on the flimsiest of pretexts, he mentioned the Royal Person no fewer than three times, always with mock-casual prefixes like ‘as I was saying to Dracula...’ or ‘as our dear Prince mentioned the other night...’
The Hungarian surveyed the room and burst into high-pitched giggles, hiding his mouth behind a thin, green- nailed hand that protruded from an explosion of lace at his cuffs. He whispered to von Klatka, who grinned ferally and signalled to Woodbridge.
‘That boy,’ von Klatka said in approximate English, pointing a talon at Georgie. ‘How much for that boy?’
The potman mumbled that Georgie was not for sale.
‘Silly man, you understand not,’ insisted von Klatka. ‘How much?’
‘He’s my son,’ Woodbridge protested.
‘Then you should be honoured indeed,’ shrilled Vardalek. ‘That your plumptious whelp should excite the interest of fine gentlemen.’
‘This is the Count Vardalek,’ explained Cuda, whom Genevieve had marked as the snivelling toady of the group. ‘He is very close to the Prince Consort.’
Kostaki alone sat quietly, eyes forever watchful.
By now, everyone had shut up and was watching. Genevieve was sorry that Thain and the detectives had left, but these bullies were hardly likely to feel outranked by mere policemen.
‘Such a pretty lad,’ said Vardalek, trying to wrestle the youth into his lap. Georgie was stiff with terror, and the elder was strong in the wrist. A long red tongue darted out of his cupid’s bow and scraped Georgie’s cheek.
Von Klatka had out a wallet as fat as a meat pie. He threw a cloud of bank-notes in Woodbridge’s face. The ruddy-cheeked potman went grey, eyes heavy with tears.
‘You don’t want to be botherin’ with the boy,’ said Cathy Eddowes, squeezing between von Klatka and Cuda, slipping her arms around their waists. ‘You gents wants yourselves a real woman, a woman as ’as the
Von Klatka pushed Cathy away, shoving her on to the flagstone floor. Cuda clapped his comrade on the
