Dust and Shadow

stringently curtailed.

“Curse the scoundrel!” Holmes exclaimed, folding the poisonous print out of sight. “What a tortuous argument, to be sure! A delusive pressman gives rise to a police investigation, then cites a police investigation as a further cause for alarm.”

“But how could he know that you attended the funerals?”

“If Stephen Dunlevy had a hand in this, so help me, I will wring the truth out of his miserable neck.”

He set off again down the street, his pace redoubled.

“What are we to do, Holmes?”

“We are going to get inside as quickly as possible.”

I realized with a quick stab of apprehension what he meant; every day we read news of mob activity in the East-end, directed with barren fury against any handy immigrant or meandering pedestrian. There had been multiple reports of near lynchings. If any suspicious-minded citizenry identified Holmes abroad by night in Whitechapel, I dared not imagine the consequences.

“This is Tavistock’s doing, I trust?”

“Whose else?”

“Oh, if I had him here!” I cried. “I would make him regret he’d ever set foot in a news office!”

“The wretch prints what is true in such an inverted fashion that every fact stands on its head,” Holmes growled. Suddenly he stopped. “Look here, my boy, odd as it may sound, the danger at the moment is in crowds.”

He turned into a pathway which must officially have been termed an alley and I would have better characterized as a crevice. The only beings we encountered at first were vermin and half-crazed dogs who stared at us with baleful hunger in their yellow eyes.

“Holmes, what do you intend to do?”

“Your idea of expressing ourselves with our fists was attractive but sadly untenable. We must determine where the insolent wretch is getting his information.”

We had gone halfway down a block marred everywhere with eroding stone when I realized that the clatter of trains to our left had mingled with another sound; footsteps now echoed our own. I knew better than to look behind me, but a glance at Holmes told me that he too had heard our shadowy companion.

My friend ducked into a side street, changing our direction, but still the curious trudge followed us in the gloom.

“We are walking north on Mansel Street, and any second should pass the railway depot,” he murmured. “We have to take Aldgate High Street, and in a moment we’ll be in the City.”

“I’d prefer Westminster.”

“Baker Street is but a cab fare away from us.”

As we emerged onto Aldgate High Street very near the place where it became Whitechapel High Street, it seemed for a moment as if our troubles were over. Then the man behind us began to make his presence more keenly felt.

“Is that Mr. Sherlock Holmes?” he cried out.

The better-lit, better-populated expanse of road seemed at once a hostile landscape, for every head within hearing distance swiveled round to confront my friend’s justly famous countenance.

“Here now!” the man yelled. “That’s Sherlock Holmes, it is! Strolling down dark alleys wi’out a care in the world!”

A few bystanders, men with surly faces and no better occupation, joined our unwelcome associate and marched along behind.

“Hey! You! You’ve a great deal to answer for in these parts!”

An inauspicious grumble of assent erupted from the gathering crowd.

“Turn around and tell us all what the devil you think you’re doing in the Chapel, you bleeding pig!”

Holmes rolled his eyes at this equation of him with a Scotland Yard detective but otherwise made no sign.

“You think,” screamed the fellow, whose voice I was beginning heartily to loathe, “that you’ll get away with it? Knifing all those beauties, you think there’s no one of us with a knife for you?”

“Watson, if you happen to lay eyes on an officer before I do, just signal him, will you?” Holmes remarked, his right hand in his pocket and the other tightening its grip on his weighted stick.

“So help us, we protect our own, don’t we, lads?” cried our antagonist.

“How is your arm?”

“Good for a blow or two at best. I would welcome your revolver.”

“You’ll have to make do with my fists.” Though my eyes searched the streets for police, by a great stroke of misfortune I could see none.

“We are close enough to the Aldgate underground stop,” Holmes noted.

“What are our chances at running?”

“Poor, with your leg to consider. We’ve already walked—”

“Holmes, they don’t want me.”

“If I knew that to be true, I might take to my heels. As matters stand, you’ll have to endure my company a while longer.”

Just when we reached a crossroads, several of the gang behind us burst forward and encircled us from the front. I turned slowly round. To my dismay, nearly thirty men had joined the preposterous procession, and ten more lined up to prevent our progress.

“I don’t suppose we could have a word with them?” I asked in as easy a tone as I could manage.

“We’ll serve them as they served Catherine Eddowes!” shouted the odious little devil.

Holmes at last turned with a look of deadly resolve in his iron-grey eyes. “It is not a scheme which is likely to work, you realize.”

“Still, for lack of a better one…” I hissed.

“Gentlemen,” Holmes announced, “I have no notion of what you are pursuing, but as it appears to mean a great deal to you, I am prepared to offer my wholehearted assistance!”

This remark did not soothe the mob, but it had the distinct virtue of puzzling it. One or two people chuckled morbidly, and others raised their fists.

“You know what we’re after right enough, or you’d ha’ been walking a good deal slower, you bloody ’tec.”

“It appears that you are pursuing me,” Holmes replied pleasantly. “But I can think of no reason for doing so unless you meant to procure my help. I am known for my skills in the art of detection. I will say this once, and once only: I have been seen in the vicinity of the Ripper because I have been striving with all my might to rid your neighbourhood of him.”

Several members of the crowd regarded Holmes with fresh interest at this defiant declaration, but their sympathy proved to be short-lived.

“You were seen!” mocked a club-wielding ruffian, starting forward. “What good is the word of a cold-blooded killer?”

“You, sir, are from West Yorkshire, I observe.”

The brute stopped in his tracks. “Here now! How in hell d’ye know that?”

“You have hunted rabbits in your time, I suppose?”

“So what if I have done,” he scowled.

“You were very near them when you did so. Have you ever been mistaken for one?”

The metaphor, apt as it was, drew laughter from several patches of the assembly while others, sensing an oblique insult, tightened their grips on their makeshift weapons and advanced spitting curses at the pair of us.

“Perhaps something a shade more conciliatory,” I suggested.

“You truly imagined I could argue our way out of this?” Holmes demanded, sidestepping so that we were back to back.

“No,” I replied quietly, turning my head, “but they have now allowed a slight gap. I am going to tackle that pockmarked lad with the shovel. When I’ve knocked him down, I fully expect you to run like the devil.”

We pivoted slowly, our eyes fixed on the hostile circle. “You are mad,” Holmes hissed, “if you think I am—”