The Devil's Workshop

She turned the card over and read the inscription: Let’s speak soon. Yours — Adrian.

She stuck the cotton back in the big half of the box and nested the key inside. She placed the card on top, closed the lid, and stuck the whole thing in her apron pocket. She wadded the ruined brown paper and set it aside on the little occasional table in the hall. She needed to rewrap it all before presenting it to Mr Day. She wouldn’t want him to think she’d opened his mail on purpose.

Fiona glanced back at the door and then gathered the cloth to her breast again and hurried down the hall. Her father had given her busywork and she knew it. He’d given her the same task he’d set for Constable Winthrop. There was something more important she could do with her time while Claire struggled with labor.

She just hoped she could get the blood out.

52

A wagon sped past Jack and around the corner onto Phoenix Street. Jack slowed down and followed it cautiously. He hung back and watched as four coppers jumped out of the wagon and joined three others who were already standing in the lane. Jack sniffed and pressed a finger to his lips. All seven of the policemen rushed through the black gate, across the garden, and in through the red door. Jack wondered what his silly little fly had done to merit the attention of so many policemen.

He stepped into the middle of the street and walked to the wagons, which were resting next to each other, front to back and back to front, blocking the lane. The two young drivers were ignoring each other. One had a deck of cards and was shuffling them repeatedly. The other was engrossed in a tabloid of some sort. Jack caught the attention of the boy with the cards.

“What’s happening in there?” He poked his thumb in the general direction of the red door.

“Caught some dangerous murderers in there,” the boy said. “Bloody-eyed madmen they are, too. You’d do well to stand back, Doctor, and let ’em do their job.”

Doctor? Jack looked down at the black leather bag he was holding and smiled.

“They sent for me,” he said. “Someone’s been hurt?”

“Yes, sir. They cut off somebody’s face, cut out his eyes, cut off his fingers, even cut out his tongue.”

Well, part of that was true, at least, Jack thought. Unless that silly fly had been very busy since Jack left the house.

“I’d better go take a look, then, hadn’t I?”

“You be careful and stay well back, like I say. Let them boys do their work.”

“I certainly will. Thank you for your help, son.”

There was an old lady talking to a little girl and a boy with a bicycle. Jack walked past them without being noticed and walked right through the door and into the house he now thought of as his own.

53

The house was empty.

Tiffany dispatched two of the constables to check the bedrooms upstairs. The other two went into the parlor, and Hammersmith went with them. Tiffany and Blacker proceeded down the hallway to the kitchen.

There was an odor of rotting meat in the parlor. A single ray of sunlight beamed through the front window, but did little to dispel the gloom. A bee buzzed lazily through the room and back out.