41
The murder of Mary Kelly was an opera. It was the climax of a wonderful piece of theatre and had been partly of my creation. The newspapers fed off it for months. The gruesome details flew around the world, bounced off every wall in England, and Whitechapel was forever cast as the epitome of grotesque London.
I spent a lot of time with my notebooks and clippings in the ensuing days and weeks. There was no need to squirrel them away in the back dining room now that Mrs Wiggs was no longer there to pry, and I found that it was not only interesting, and absorbing, to read through all my old accounts, but useful too. It helped me reflect on what I had done, what I had become, and why. I tried not to punish myself for my hobby too much, and to think of Dr Shivershev’s words when he’d explained why he collected those specimens. It was about understanding, and knowledge. He was correct, it was not always obvious in the beginning where our curiosity will take us, we wish to learn something but we are not sure what. I understood that my curiosity was driven out of a need to understand in some small way what my mother had been through, to assuage the guilt I felt over her demise. I understood enough now, I only wanted to close the remaining chapters, to tidy up the ends. Then I would close this experience down, file it away for what it was, and move on.
First, I described the last evening of Mary Kelly – or Marie Jeanette, as I called her, although of course neither was the real identity of the mutilated corpse, it being that of Mrs Wiggs.
Next, I sent my imagination back into the past, to the day three years prior when I had finally found myself free to leave Reading and begin my career as a nurse, at the London. I wanted to look at the person I was before I met Thomas, before I met Aisling, to try and see myself through these other, distant eyes I had now. Was I already of abandoned character, like my grandmother had insisted? Had my father’s blood, and my first five years in the Nichol, tainted me?
Over time, the Nichol went the same way as Whitechapel’s other degenerate and labyrinthine slums. It was built through, built on, and rendered invisible beneath new roads and shiny new tenement blocks laid on top. Some of the old roads remained, but Dorset Street and Miller’s Court were gone.
After Mary Kelly, the Ripper murders stopped. Vulnerable women were still beaten and killed in Whitechapel, but they were back to being murdered by their menfolk, behind closed doors, dying quietly without attention. The papers said the Ripper had perhaps succumbed to syphilis, infected by the whores he sought revenge on, or maybe he’d killed himself through madness, or been imprisoned for something else. Or perhaps he’d emigrated?
*
It was in the summer of 1889 that I received a package marked from California, the United States of America. A brown box, battered and thrown about on its travels. Intrigued, I took it into the front dining room and tore it open.
Inside the package was a small wooden box, and inside this, two envelopes, one addressed to me and the other to Detective Inspector Abberline. The box was full of sawdust, and nestled in the top was something wrapped in red velvet. It had a piece of brocade attached to it and the edges were jagged, as if it had been torn or hacked at. I ripped open the envelope addressed to me and read the letter inside:
Dear Susannah,
I could not be more pleased to hear that you have decided to join our illustrious ranks. I wish you all the best and think of you often.
I’m afraid our friends in London require one more task to be completed. I ask you to take a fresh envelope and from a different spot in London post the enclosed letter to Detective Inspector Abberline of the Metropolitan Police. Do not touch it. Wear gloves, and be aware of a new science they call fingerprinting.
Your husband frequented many places to meet likeminded individuals; one of these is to be found in Cleveland Street. Our friends and sponsors wish to assist the police and give them some gentle encouragement so that they might seek adventure in this new direction and occupy themselves with the ‘criminal’ behaviour therein. The letter is a present of information about these premises and the activities taking place there. Hopefully, it will give poor old Abberline something more fruitful to focus on. Who knows, our business might go back to running smoothly again.
I enclose a gift. I hope you appreciate the humour with which it is intended. I did deliberate, but I am sure that even if it does not amuse you, you will find it useful in your work one day. Forgive me for the shock.
Your trustworthy Russian,
V
I unwrapped the velvet and out fell a long, thin, silver knife. It was the one he had used on Mrs Wiggs in the dark of Mary Kelly’s room, and the one I had taken and cleaned for him. It was also the knife Dr Shivershev had used to cut my throat.
I had no idea how to feel. I burst out laughing and picked it up. The light bounced off the blade and I recalled the flash of silver before I’d felt its blade being dragged across my neck.
There was no one around to hear me. Mabel was at work and the others somewhere out of sight. Sarah, our old scullery maid, was now housekeeper. She came back when I placed an advertisement in The Times. She told me she hadn’t left of her own accord but that Mrs Wiggs had fired
