Krewe of Hunters 3 Sacred Evil (10 page)

The dog lingered just a moment longer.

But the woman disappeared, and then, more slowly, the dog. Whitney was left to wonder if the images had really been there, of if she had imagined both the woman and canine in the desperate hope that she could learn something from the beyond.

I
t was barely the crack of dawn when Jude pulled the last of his information sheets from the printer in his home office and arranged his discourse for the task force meeting the next morning. He had pictures and every note taken on the Jane Does, and he had every note they’d thus far acquired regarding Virginia Rockford as well. And, he had drawn up a time line of Jack the Ripper in London, the murder of Carrie Brown and everything he could find on the House of Spiritualism as well. There was nothing to be found on the mysterious Jonathan Black other than what had been written by his contemporaries. Hannah was searching records, but she had found nothing that registered he’d been in the country, or in the city of New York.

It was possible, of course, that the murders were not related in any way, and that the murder of Virginia Rockford was unrelated to any past or present Ripper. But Deputy Chief Green had been disturbed enough by the similarities to call in a special unit, and there was no reason not to entertain anything that might help in the investigation.

He dreaded the thought that another victim would tell them whether or not they were moving in the right direction.

Allison, his blue-eyed mixed-breed cat, meowed, cleaning her paws as she sat at the edge of his desk.

“Too damn bad they hadn’t invented credit cards back then,” he told the cat.

He was startled by a knock at the side door to his office.

When his dad had bought the apartments, they’d discovered that the place had once been owned by a notorious madam, Madam Shelley, who had been a voyeur. What had appeared to be wall actually hid a door, and that door led to the apartment next door. When he’d had to fix the wall because of water damage from a leaking pipe on the floor above, they’d found out that there had been an entrance and exit between the two apartments—and a way for the madam to spy on her clients.

They’d kept the exit/entrance something of a secret door. Jude’s father had never interfered with his life, and it was nice that he was close. He could feed Allison when Jude wound up working crazy hours on a case.

He stood to unlock the door, letting his dad in.

Andrew remained on his side of the doorway, hands behind his back, waiting for an invitation in. Jude smiled, looking into his dad’s back parlor. A lot of the things crammed in here had been his own—a huge desk and computer and game player, for example; the shelves were crowded with books, and more. Animal skulls, comics, Star Trek and Star Wars toys and all kinds of collectibles.

“Sorry, I know it’s early but I heard you rattling around in here,” Andrew said. He grinned and drew his hands from behind his back, producing a large paper coffee cup. “Didn’t know if you’d bothered to brew yourself any.”

Jude took the cup, stepping back. “Thanks. Good and strong?” he asked.

“You bet, killer strong, just the way you like it.”

“Come on in. You know I always appreciate your advice.”

“The media just keeps going crazy. Slow day for catastrophes yesterday,” Andrew said with a shrug. “No storms or oil spills or other such activity. The major cable stations have all hopped on the bandwagon. Everyone across the globe has to be getting information regarding Virginia Rockford. I can’t help but wonder if she’s happy in heaven. She found her fifteen minutes of fame—a lot more than fifteen minutes. There are even some takes from that movie on the internet—don’t know how people got them. Well, barriers can only keep onlookers so far—it’s gone viral. That movie is going to make a fortune!”

“Yes, I guess it is,” Jude said.

“And don’t hesitate, son, if you want any help on anything, let me know. There’s got to be something else useful in my book collection. if you want any research done and your folks are bogged down—though I guess you have half the department on it—let me know, okay. Even if it’s just coffee.”

“Thanks, I’ll take you up on that. And, hey, I’m going to leave my side of the door unlocked. Will you check in on Allison this evening, give her an ear rub and make sure she has water and food?” Jude asked.

Andrew laughed. “I’ll even clean the litter box! I can see you gotta get out of here. Talk to you later.” He turned to close the door.

“Hey, wait,” Jude said.

His dad paused, brows arching with anticipation.

“Yeah, we’ve got lots of people, but you are a reader and you have one of the best book collections I’ve ever seen. Keep reading. See what you can find on the House of Spiritualism, Jonathan Black—and Blair House.”

“Of course,” Andrew said.

He left, closing the door between the two apartments. Jude headed out. As he did so, he picked up the morning paper at his door, flipping it over:

Have You Seen This Woman?

He was pleased to see that Hannah had gotten Jake Mallory’s computer rendition of his victim on the lower-right side of the first page of the paper. Since he’d spent the night preparing for the meeting and grimly realizing how little they had to go on, it was a pleasant perk to see that the likeness was in the paper, and just as he had wanted it placed.

The paper was on the front passenger’s seat of the car when he picked up Whitney; she was in front of the house, waiting for him at precisely 7:30 a.m. He couldn’t help think again that everything about her was gleaming, from the pert curls in her hair to the tone of her skin and on to her eyes. She was entirely unique—and absolutely mesmerizing. She would surely draw attention no matter where she went. He did wonder if that would prove to be an asset or a distraction.

He admitted grudgingly to himself that she had probably drawn more from Angus Avery than he would have managed.

“Nice,” she said, accepting the newspaper and seeing where the picture had been displayed.

“How was your night?” he asked.

“Quiet,” she assured him.

“You slept well?”

“Like a baby.”

“Well, I won’t have to be worried tonight. You won’t be alone. The rest of your team gets in today.”

“I wasn’t worried last night,” she assured him. “But I like my team. I’ll be glad when they’re here. And, I think you’ll like them, too.”

“I’ll like anyone who can move this investigation in a forward direction. The news has picked up on the unknown victims we discovered. It’s a media frenzy.”

“Strange,” Whitney murmured. “Or maybe not so strange.”

“What’s that?”

“Think about the late eighteen hundreds in London. There were murders that occurred constantly, especially in the East End. But the Ripper murders were the first to really gain attention. They were so ghastly that people were forced to notice people and the horrendous conditions under which they were living.”

“That’s not a comparison. They don’t need to notice this area. Five Points is really long gone.”

“Yes, but Five Points wasn’t cleaned up until the 1880s, 1890s. The Bowery was filled with seedy bars and hotels—it wasn’t a nice area! And what happened to Carrie Brown turned into a huge case as well, with the media heavily involved. Some people believe that Jack the Ripper was out to draw attention to the absolute misery of life.”

“Personally,” Jude told her, “I don’t think that Jack the Ripper was hoping to clean up the Whitechapel area of London. I think he was a psychopath with a bitter hatred of women, and there was nothing about him that should have been romanticized. I don’t believe he was in the royal family, and I don’t believe any of the half-cocked theories that have come out about him in books in the last few years. Possibly, he was a butcher—the degree of his anatomical skills has been argued throughout the years—who suffered from a sexually transmitted disease. And it’s likely that he got that disease from a prostitute. Or maybe his mother had been a prostitute, and he’d spent his formative years watching her ply her trade. Today, he wouldn’t have gotten away with his crimes—we rely so heavily on forensics now. Back then, there were slaughterhouses in the area and a lot of the population walked around bloodstained—people walking around bloodstained are noticed these days, even in New York City. The populace might be busy and impatient, but they’re not blind or ignorant.”

“Ah, careful! The head of the New York police force at the time made a big mistake mocking the English police over the Ripper—and then he couldn’t catch the man who killed Carrie Brown, and possibly others,” Whitney warned. “They were desperate—and a man innocent of the crime went to prison for years because they were grasping at straws.”

“I don’t knock the London police, they worked with what they had. Thing is, since I do know a lot of our less-than-prime neighborhoods well, I can imagine what it was like for them. They were amidst an absolute stream of humanity, and knifings and bar fights were the norm. Prostitution has always been a dangerous profession, and clever killers—and even not-so-clever killers—have eluded law enforcement in every age. And the New York police force was first created by the city in 1844 and reorganized a year later—and modeled after the Metropolitan force in London. It was the first police department in the United States.” He glanced at her apologetically. “Can’t be my father’s son for nothing, you know.”

“Let’s pray that we get this guy,” Whitney said.

The task force was set to meet in one of the spacious conference rooms. There was a large rolling poster board that Jude could use for his presentation and organization, and he began tacking up pictures, lists, maps and assignments. Hannah walked in while he was working and Whitney was reading the book his father had loaned her, having understood he really didn’t want her help setting up. He liked that about her; she didn’t insist.

He introduced the two women, and Hannah spoke with enthusiasm. “I can’t wait to meet the rest of your team. I’m sure I will, unless we get him right away, which, of course, is impossible…sorry. Jude is a great detective, it’s just that—”

“Hannah, it’s all right,” Jude said.

“Anyway,” Hannah said, “I know just about every program out there, but I’ve seldom seen anyone find a computer program that could work so well with
morgue
photos. She’s so real—it looks like the picture was just shot!”

“And you got it right into the paper at the last minute,” Whitney told her.

Patrolman Smith arrived looking a little awed to be there, and the seven detectives working with him and Ellis Sayer filed in one by one soon after Ellis arrived, before it became 8:00 a.m. exactly.

Deputy Chief Green came into the room at eight.

“I’m only at this meeting as an observer, everyone. And to let you know that I have ultimate faith in your talents as investigators. This is our highest-priority case in the city right now, and you have access to any form of backup at any time—beat patrols, patrol cars—the mounted unit if you need it. Now, we all know that the media seized on the information regarding the victim almost before we were in on it ourselves—not much you can do to stop people from talking. I and our public information officer have given them what we can, though we will try to keep further information to a minimum to weed out the nuts. Agent Whitney Tremont is the first of the assisting FBI unit to arrive.” He paused to indicate her; Jude saw a few lips tighten, but mostly the others noted her with grim nods.

Jude didn’t really believe in rivalries between federal and local jurisdiction—whatever it took to get it done was important—but there had been times when local investigations and federal interests had clashed, and that did create problems.

“The team is here because they specialize in unusual circumstances and they have an excellent track record. I know you’re all aware that we have two Jane Does who were murdered, and because of those two women and the especially heinous nature of Virginia Rockford’s death, we’re entertaining the possibility that someone is trying to re-create deaths from Victorian London. I don’t believe that any journalists yet realize that we do have victims with injuries similar to those of the victims of Jack the Ripper. I realize that this killer has us by the balls, but he must be caught. Jude, I’ll turn it over to you.”

Jude stood before his board, pointing out the two women who were not believed to have been Ripper victims, but who coincided with their Jane Does. He reminded the team that they weren’t to draw assumptions, but that they needed to be wary. He went on to describe the five victims of the Ripper—per “experts”—and then the New York victim of the 1890s, and pointed out the fact that the filming that had taken place on the day that Virginia Rockford had been killed was where the Ripper was rumored to have lived, if he had come to New York.

“All right, our one eyewitness—albeit a burned-out Viet vet—saw a man on the streets who resembled the gaslight-movie version of Jack the Ripper. Cloak, stovepipe hat, medical bag. So we do believe it’s going to be important to understand the past regarding the murders in London and the murder of Carrie Brown in New York City. But we’re not discounting the idea that the Jane Does and the murder of Virginia Rockford are unrelated. As yet, the medical examiner has only been able to tell us that our victim was ripped up exactly the same way as Jack the Ripper’s first victim—sadly, he has not reported DNA discovered on the body or clothing, or any scrap of forensic evidence that could help us. We now have a reasonable likeness of Jane Doe wet in the paper, so we’re hopeful that we’ll hear from someone who knew her, or knew her identity. Our real-life suspects could be just about anyone in the state of New York. Obviously, we’re going to start by focusing on the movie cast and crew. Sayer?”

“We’re on it, Jude. It’s just a hell of a lot of people,” Sayer told him.

“We spent yesterday interviewing hundreds of people,” one of his men added quietly.

“Find the costume designer and everyone in costumes. If Tyler saw a man in a stovepipe hat and cloak, I believe he exists. He’s burned out—not blind,” Jude said. He looked at Whitney. “Agent Tremont?”

She might have been surprised that he was asking for her input at this point of the investigation, but she didn’t show it. She stood and walked forward. “If our killer is playing out a reenactment of the nineteenth-century Ripper murders, he’s doing it in his own way, since he killed an attractive young woman and didn’t target an older prostitute with missing teeth, as did the Ripper. I believe this discrepancy might indicate the killer is a narcissist—whatever route he takes can be twisted into anything that he wants, because he is all important. Therefore, he’s doubly difficult to catch. Although it appears he is trying to recreate a time of terror, he will also consider expediency in everything that he does. He’s organized, despite the savagery of the crime. I think it’s going to be important that we study the past, because he likely knows all the stories regarding New York and London in the late eighteen hundreds. He may not believe that the voice of Jack the Ripper is in his head…he may just be using the crimes of the past because of their shocking brutality. This killer is going to prove to be the average or even handsome next-door neighbor. If you knew him, you’d probably want to talk about the crimes with him—you’d never suspect him of being a functioning psychopath. Also,” Whitney said, and paused, glancing over at Jude, “I don’t believe that this man is acting alone. Although I don’t particularly subscribe to any of the conspiracy theories, it is possible that the real Ripper worked with a partner. In with the royal conspiracy theory is the concept that a carriage came and took the Ripper away from the crime scenes, and thus he wasn’t seen walking around Whitechapel covered in blood. Obviously, then, the carriage driver was in on the killings. Others claim that there were so many butchers and slaughterhouse workers at the time that people were accustomed to others walking around covered in blood.”