Whitechapel Conspiracy

Remus jumped as if he had been frightened half out of his wits.

“Sergeant Tellman! What the devil are—” Then he stopped abruptly.

“Looking for you,” Tellman answered the question, even though it had not been completed.

Remus effected innocence. “Why?” He started to say something more, then thought better of it. He knew about protesting too much.

“Oh, a lot of things,” Tellman said casually, but without letting go of Remus’s arm. He could feel the muscles clenched under his fingers. “We can start with Annie Crook, go on through her abduction to Guy’s Hospital and whatever happened to her, and the death of her father, and the man you met in Regent’s Park, and the other man you quarreled with in Hyde Park…”

Remus was too badly shaken to conceal it. His face was white, fine beads of sweat on his lip and brow, but he said nothing.

“And we could go on to the coach driver who tried to run down the child, Alice Crook, and then threw himself into the river, only he swam out of it again,” Tellman went on. “But most of all I want to know about the man inside the coach that drove around Hanbury Street and Buck’s Row in the autumn of ’88, and cut the throats of five women, ending up disemboweling Catherine Eddowes in Mitre Square, where you were last night …” He stopped because he thought Remus was going to faint. He retained his grasp on him now as much to hold him up as to prevent him from running away.

Remus was shuddering violently. He tried to swallow, and nearly choked.

“You know who Jack is.” Tellman made it a statement.

Remus’s whole body was rigid, every muscle locked.

Tellman felt his own breath rasping. “He’s still alive … isn’t he?” he said hoarsely.

Remus jerked his head in a nod, but in spite of his fear there was a light returning to his eyes, almost a brilliance. He was sweating profusely. “It’s the story of the century,” he said, licking his lips nervously. “It’ll change the world … I swear!”

Tellman was doubtful, but he could see that Remus believed it. “If it catches Jack that’ll be enough for me,” he said quietly. “But you had better do some explaining, and now.” He could not think of a sufficiently effective threat, so he did not add one.

The challenge returned to Remus’s eyes. He snatched his arm loose from Tellman’s grip. “You won’t prove it without me. You’ll be lucky if you ever prove it at all!”

“Maybe it isn’t true.”

“Oh, it’s true!” Remus assured him, his voice ringing with certainty. “I just need a few more pieces. Gull’s dead, but there’ll be enough left, one way or another. And Stephen’s dead too, poor devil … and Eddy, but I’ll still prove it, in spite of them.”

“We,” Tellman corrected him grimly. “We’ll prove it.”

“I don’t need you.”

“Yes you do, or I’ll blow it wide open,” Tellman threatened. “I don’t care about making a story, you’re welcome to that, but I want the truth for other reasons, and I’ll get it, whether I make your story or ruin it.”

“Then come away from the shop,” Remus urged, glancing over his shoulder and back again at Tellman. “We can’t afford to wait around here and be noticed.” He turned as he spoke and started off towards the Mile End Road again.

The air smelled like thunder, damp and heavy.

Tellman hurried after him. “Explain it to me,” he ordered. “And no lies. I know a great deal. I just haven’t worked out how it all connects up … not yet.”

Remus walked a few paces without answering.

“Who is Annie Crook?” Tellman asked, matching him step for step. “And more important, where is she now?”

Remus deliberately ignored the first question. “I don’t know where she is,” he answered without looking at him. Then, before Tellman could become angry, he added, “Bedlam, by now, I should think. She was declared insane and put away. I don’t know whether she’s still alive. There’s no proper record of her at Guy’s, but I know she went there and was kept there for months.”

“And who was her lover?” Tellman went on. In the distance thunder rumbled over the rooftops and a few heavy spots of rain fell.

Remus stopped dead, so abruptly Tellman was a couple of steps beyond him before he stopped too.

Remus’s eyes were wide; he started to laugh, a high, sharp, hysterical sound. Several people turned in the street to look at him.

“Stop it!” Tellman wanted to slap him, but it would have drawn even more attention to them. “Be quiet!”

Remus gulped and controlled himself with an effort. “You don’t know a damn thing, do you? You’re just guessing. Go away. I don’t need you.”

“Yes, you do,” Tellman contradicted him with certainty. “You haven’t got all the answers yet, and you can’t get them, or you would have. But you know enough to be frightened. What else do you need? Maybe I can help. I’m police; I can ask questions you can’t.”

“Police!” Remus gave a guffaw of laughter, full of anger and derision. “Police? Abberline was police—and Warren! As high as you like … commissioner, even.”

“I know who they are,” Tellman retorted sharply.