“Her ear, Doctor.”
There was Miss Monk, peering down at the desecrated remains. Her high tone of voice gave the only clue as to the strain she was under. “You see her ear?”
“Yes. A small part of the right ear has been cut off.”
“You remember the letter?”
Miss Monk’s words brought it flooding back to me as if it were before my very eyes. “Of course!” I cried. “Just such a mutilation was mentioned. Do you recall the exact wording, Miss Monk?”
“‘The next job I do I shall clip the lady’s ears off and send to the police officers just for jolly wouldn’t you,’” she replied rapidly, under her breath.
“I think I should be most gratified to learn who received this letter,” said Major Smith evenly.
“It was sent to the Central News Agency last Thursday,” I replied. “The letter references clipping off the next victim’s ears, if possible, and sending them to the police, as Miss Monk has said.”
“Does it indeed! The missive has not been published, as I understand you?”
I shook my head. “Holmes returned it to the Central News. The letter was signed with the name ‘Jack the Ripper.’”
“It’s true,” Lestrade said through his teeth, “but we supposed it a hoax. Now it seems this lunatic is not merely running about ripping whores to shreds, he’s appointed himself a pen name and mailed his agenda to the national press.”
“It would on the surface appear so.”
Lestrade struck his head gently with the flat of his hand. “I cannot be expected to endure much more of this. We’ve been torn to pieces in the papers for weeks, and now he gets away with two murders in one night? The whole country will be in an uproar!”
“Calm yourself, Inspector,” Major Smith reproved. “Both these deeds have been freshly committed. It is impossible that a man could perform such acts without leaving a trace of his own identity. We may well have this ‘Jack the Ripper’ in our hands this very night.”
Miss Monk, I realized, had wandered off of her own accord. She now arrived at my elbow again wearing a look of puzzlement. “I can’t seem to find it here.”
“Find what, Miss Monk?”
“Her apron,” she replied, pointing. “She couldn’t rightly have worn it so. I’d not a’ been half surprised if it had a ruddy hole in it, but the ties have been cut clean through where the piece is missing. She’d have mended it, surely, or used the cloth for scrap.”
Major Smith advanced to see for himself. “You are entirely correct, Miss Monk. Constable Watkins,” he called out, “spread the word that a piece of apron has been taken from the body, most likely by the killer.” He then turned and engaged in a quiet, businesslike conversation with Inspector Lestrade.
It was by now past three a.m. I had neither the implements nor the right to begin the postmortem, and surely Holmes realized that I was no more capable of crawling about on my hands and knees scrutinizing cigar ash and footprints than I was of returning the stiffening corpse before me to life. The City Police had no doubt already completed their investigation, it seemed with scant enough results, and a crushing feeling of inferiority swept over me as I wondered whether they had missed the key to the entire matter, and if it were now my responsibility to find the piece of twig, scrap of paper, or smear of mud that would make all clear to Holmes.
Just as Miss Monk and I had resigned ourselves to the conclusion of a long and unspeakable night, we heard the heavy, thudding boots of a running policeman.
“There’s been a discovery, Major Smith!” he managed, his chest heaving. “That missing apron piece—a Metropolitan constable encountered it on his beat and told the Leman Street station, who wired Sir Charles Warren. Our man Daniel Halse is on the scene, sir, but the message is on Metropolitan ground. Goulston Street. Sir Charles wants it rubbed out!”
“What message, my good man? Pull yourself together.”
“Left by the murderer, sir. He used that scrap of apron to clean his knife. It was found on the ground beneath a note he’d scrawled on the wall.”
“By George—we must have a look at it at once.”
“Our men in Dorset Street have also found a clue, Major. There is a bloody basin where the killer may well have washed his hands.”
“Then I shall accompany you immediately to Dorset Street,” replied Major Henry Smith promptly. “Inspector Lestrade, we enter your territory as regards Goulston Street. If you would be so good as to take your companions and see what may be found there, communicating any fresh finds to our man Halse, I should be obliged to you. Dr. Watson, please convey my regards to Mr. Holmes,” he added as he turned abruptly and exited the square.
Lestrade’s close-set, ferretlike eyes glinted with the light of hope. “I’ll be damned if Sir Charles, Commissioner or no, destroys any evidence before I’ve had a look at it. And you, Doctor, shall take note as well. When he recovers, Sherlock Holmes will want to know of it, whatever it may be.”
CHAPTER TEN The Destruction of the Clue
I experienced a thin thrill of anticipation on our journey as I realized we were now taking the very path used by the killer in his flight. A walk of ten minutes was reduced to a drive of three, and before we knew it we had pulled up to the aptly titled Goulston Street. The culprit had evidently fled up Stoney Lane, crossed Middlesex Street, and proceeded a block up Wentworth Street before ducking into the more secluded Goulston Street.
When we reached the doorway where Detective Daniel Halse stood guard in the starless darkness like a gargoyle over a turret, we met with a curious sight. There stood a Scotland Yard inspector smiling indomitably, holding a large piece of sponge, and there also stood a quantity of both Metropolitan and City constables, saying nothing but clearly awaiting the arrival of a superior to judge a hostile dispute.
“I still say, Inspector Fry,” declared Detective Halse, as if repeating the crux of his earlier argument for our fresh ears, “that the idea of destroying evidence against this fiend is contrary to every notion of scientific inquiry.”
“And I maintain, Detective Halse,” said Inspector Fry doggedly, “that the civil unrest which allowing this message to remain in view would foment is against the principles of conscience and of British decency. Are you against the principles of British decency, Detective?”
The two appeared as if they were about to come to blows when Inspector Lestrade interposed his lean frame between the antagonists. “For the moment, I shall decide what course we will take in this matter. If you would be so kind as to step aside.”
Lestrade lifted the lantern in his hand and directed its beam at the black bricks. The remarkable riddle, chalked upon the wall in an oddly sloping hand, went in this way:
“You see the trouble, Inspector Lestrade—it is Lestrade, is it not?” inquired Inspector Fry placidly. “Riots on our hands, that’s what we’ll have. I’ll not be the one caught in the middle of them. Besides, there is no evidence the killer wrote these words. More likely the hand of an unbalanced youth.”
“Where is the piece of apron?” Lestrade questioned a constable.
“It has been taken to the Commercial Street police station, sir. The dark smears upon it followed exactly the pattern produced by wiping a soiled knife blade.”
“Then surely he left it deliberately,” I remarked to Lestrade. “As in the past he has left no traces, there is every likelihood he dropped that bloody cloth in order to draw attention to this disquieting epigram.”
“I’m of your mind, Dr. Watson,” Lestrade replied in low tones. “We must prevent them destroying it, if we
