A Study in Terror

Chapter IX The Lair of the Ripper

I could do nothing but wait. Infected by Holmes’s fever of impatience, trying to occupy the hours, I assessed the situation, endeavouring to apply the methods I had so long witnessed Holmes employ.

His identification of the Ripper as one of four men came in for its share of my ponderings, you may be sure, but I was confused by other elements of the puzzle―Mycroft’s assertion that, as yet, his brother did not have all the pieces, and Holmes’s yearning to come to grips with the “tiger” prowling London’s by-ways. If the Ripper was one of four persons whom Holmes had already met, where did the “tiger” fit in? And why was it necessary to locate him before the Ripper could be brought to book?

Elation would have been mine, had I known that at that moment I myself held the key. But I was blind to both the key and its significance; and, when this knowledge did come to me, it brought only humiliation.

Thus I fretted away the hours with but a single break in the monotony. This occurred when a note was delivered to Baker Street by a smartly-uniformed page-boy. “Sir, a message from Mr. Mycroft Holmes to Mr. Sherlock Holmes.”

“Mr. Holmes is absent at the moment,” said I. “You may leave the note.”

After I had dismissed the page, I examined the note. It was in a sealed envelope, from the Foreign Office. The Foreign Office was where Mycroft had his being.

My fingers were itching to tear the flap, but of course I did not. I pocketed the missive and went on with my pacing. The hours passed, with no sign of Holmes. At times, I went to the window and watched the fog that was settling in over London. As twilight fell, I remarked to myself what a fortuitous night this would be for the Ripper.

This had evidently occurred to the maniac also. Quite dramatically, upon the heels of my thought, there came a message from Holmes, delivered by an urchin. I tore it open with trembling fingers as the boy waited.

The urchin, a bright-faced lad, had never before received such a handsome pourboire, I am certain. In my relief, I gave him a crown.

In no time at all I was in a hansom, urging the cab-man on through the thickening pea-soup that befogged the streets. Fortunately, the jehu had the instincts of a homing-pigeon. In a remarkably short time he said, “The right-’and door, guv’ner. Walk strite on and watch yer nose, or yer’ll bang into the ruddy gite.”

I found the gate with some groping, went in, and through the court, and found Holmes by the raised table in the mortuary.

“Still another, Watson,” was his portentous greeting.

Dr. Murray and the imbecile were also present. Murray stood silently by the table, but Michael-Pierre cringed by the wall, naked fear upon his face.

As Murray remained motionless, Holmes frowned. Said he, sharply, “Dr. Murray, you do not question Dr. Watson’s stomach for it?”

“No, no,” replied Murray, and drew back the sheet. But my stomach was tested, nonetheless. It was the most incredible job of butchery on a human body that the sane mind could conceive. With demented skill the Ripper had gone berserk. In decency, I refrain from setting down the details, save for my gasp, “The missing breast, Holmes!”

“This time,” responded Holmes, grimly, “our madman took away a trophy.”

I could endure it no longer; I stepped down from the platform. Holmes followed. “In God’s name, Holmes,” cried I, “the beast must be stopped!”

“You are in good company with that prayer, Watson.”

“Has Scotland Yard been of any aid to you?”

“Rather, Watson,” replied he, sombrely, “have I been of any aid to Scotland Yard? Very little, I fear.”

We took our leave of Murray and the imbecile. In the swirling fog of the street, I shuddered. “That wreck who was once Michael Osbourne… Is it my fancy, Holmes, or did he crouch there for all the world like Murray’s faithful hound, expecting a kick for some transgression?”

“Or,” replied Holmes, “like a faithful hound sensing his master’s horror and seeking to share it. You are obsessed with Michael Osbourne, Watson.”

“Perhaps I am.” I forced my mind to turn back. “Holmes, were you able to apprehend the messenger who took to his heels?”

“I clung to his trail for several blocks, but he knew London’s labyrinths as well as I. I lost him.”

“And you spent the rest of the day how, may I ask?”

“A portion of it in the Bow Street Library, attempting to devise a pattern from a hypothetical projection of the madman’s brain.”

He began walking slowly through the fog-bank, I by his side. “Where are we going, Holmes?”

“To a particular section of Whitechapel. I laid out the pattern, Watson, a positioning of all the known Ripper murders, super-imposed upon a map of the area which they cover. I spent several hours studying it. I am convinced that the Ripper works from a central location, a room, or a flat, a sanctuary from which he ventures forth and to which he returns.”

“You propose to search?”

“Yes. We shall see if shoe-leather will reward us where the arm-chair has failed.”

“In this fog it will take leg-work indeed.”

“True, but we have certain advantages on our side. For example, I have made it a point to question the witnesses.”

This startled me. “Holmes! I did not know there were any.”

“Of a sort, Watson, of a sort. On several occasions, the Ripper has worked perilously close to detection. In fact, I suspect that he deliberately arranges his murders in that fashion, out of contempt and bravado. You will recall our brush with him.”

“Well do I!”

“At any rate, I have decided, from the sounds of his retreating footsteps, that he moves from the perimeter of a circle toward its centre. It is within the centre of that circle that we shall search.”

Thus we plunged, that fog-choked night, towards the cesspools of Whitechapel into which the human sewage from the great city drained. Holmes moved with a sure-footedness that bespoke his familiarity with those malodorous depths. We were silent, save when Holmes paused to inquire, “By the way, Watson, I trust you thought to drop a revolver into your pocket.”

“It was the last thing I did before I left to join you.”

“I, too, am armed.”

We ventured first into what proved to be an opium-den. Struggling for breath in the foul fumes, I followed as Holmes moved down the line of bunks, where the addicted victims lay wrapped in their shabby dreams. Holmes paused here and there for a closer inspection. To some he spoke a word; at times, he received a word in return. When we left, he appeared to have garnered nothing of value.

From there we invaded a series of low public-houses, where we were greeted for the most part by sullen silence. Here, also, Holmes spoke sotto voce with certain of the individuals we came upon, in such a manner that I was sure he was acquainted with some of them. On occasion, a coin or two passed from his hand into a filthy palm. But always we moved on.

We had left the third dive, more evil than the others, when I could contain myself no longer.

“Holmes, the Ripper is not a cause. He is a result.”

“A result, Watson?”

“Of such corrupt places as these.”

Holmes shrugged his shoulders.

“Does it not stir you to indignation?”

“I would of course welcome a sweeping change, Watson. Perchance in some future, enlightened time, it will come about. In the meanwhile, I am a realist. Utopia is a luxury upon which I have no time to dream.”

Before I could reply, he pushed open another door, and we found ourselves in a brothel. The reek of cheap scent almost staggered me. The room into which we entered was a parlour, with half a dozen partially-naked females seated about in lewd poses as they awaited whoever might emerge from the fog.

Quite candidly, I kept shifting my eyes from the inviting smiles and lascivious gestures that greeted us on all sides. Holmes rose to the occasion with his usual equanimity. Giving his attention to one of the girls, a pale, pretty little thing who sat clad in nothing but a carelessly open robe, he said, “Good-evening, Jenny.”

“Evenin’, Mr. ’Olmes.”

“That address I gave you, of the doctor. Did you visit him?”

“That I did, sir. ’E gave me a clean bill o’ ’ealth, ’e did.”

A beaded curtain parted and a fat madame with eyes like raisins stood regarding us. “What brings you out on a night like this, Mr. Holmes?”

“I am sure you know, Leona.”

Her face turned sulky. “Why do you think my girls are off the streets? I don’t want to lose any of them!”

A plump, over-painted creature spoke angrily. “H’it’s a bloody shyme, h’it is―a poor gel gettin’ pushed by bobbies all the time.”

Another commented, “Better than a bloody blade in yer gut, dearie.”

“Almost ’ad me a gent, h’l did, wot lives at the Pacquin. ’E was a-goin’ up the stairs, all w’ite tie an’ cape, ’e was, an’ ’e stops w’en ’e sees me. Then this bobby shoves ’is dish outa the fog. ‘ ’Ere now, dearie,’ says ’e. ‘Off to yer crib. This is no night to be about.’ ” The girl spat viciously upon the floor.

Holmes’s voice was even as he said, “The gentleman fled, I presume?”

“Up t’ ’is room, w’ere else? But not a-takin’ me with ’im!”

“An odd place for a gentleman to live, would you not say?”

The girl wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “ ’E can live w’ere ’e pleases, blarst ’is eyes!”

Holmes was already moving towards the door. As he passed me, he whispered, “Come, Watson. Hurry, hurry!”

Back in the fog, he gripped my hand and pulled me recklessly forward. “We have him, Watson! I’m certain of it! Visits―questions―a dropped comment―and we come upon the trail of a fiend who can do many things. But making himself invisible is not one of them!”

Sheer exultancy rang out from every word as Holmes dragged me after him. A few moments later I found myself stumbling up a flight of narrow stairs against a wooden wall.

The exertion of the chase had taxed even Holmes’s superb stamina; and, as we climbed, he gasped out his words. “This Pacquin is a sordid rooming-house, Watson. Whitechapel abounds with them. Fortunately, I was familiar with the name.”

I glanced upwards, and saw that we were approaching a partly-open door. We reached the top of the stairs, and Holmes hurled himself inside. I staggered after him.

“What accursed luck!” cried he. “Some-one has been here before us!”

Not in all our days together had I seen Holmes present such an image of bitter frustration. He loomed in the middle of a small, shabbily-furnished room, revolver in hand, grey eyes a-blaze.

“If this was the lair of the Ripper,” cried I, “he has fled.”

“And for good, no doubt of that!”

“Perhaps Lestrade was also on his trail.”

“I wager not! Lestrade is off bumbling through some alley.”

The room had been well-torn up in the Ripper’s haste to get away. As I sought words to ease Holmes’s disappointment, he grimly took my arm. “If you doubt that the maniac operates from this den, Watson, look there.”

I followed his pointing finger. And saw it. The grisly trophy―the breast missing from the corpse in the Montague Street morgue.

I have seen violence and death enough, but this was worse. There was no heat here, no anger; only dank horror, and my stomach revolted against it.

“I must leave, Holmes. I shall wait for you below.”

“There is no point in my remaining, either. What is to be seen here is to be seen quickly. Our quarry is far too cunning to leave the slightest clew behind.”

At that moment, possibly because my mind sought a diversion, I remembered the message. “By the way, Holmes, a messenger brought a note to Baker Street this afternoon from your brother Mycroft. In the excitement, I forgot.” I handed him the envelope forthwith, and he tore it open.

If I expected his thanks, I was disappointed. After reading the missive, Holmes raised cold eyes. “Would you care to hear what Mycroft writes?”

“Indeed I would.”

“The note reads: ‘Dear Sherlock: A bit of information has come to me, in a way I shall explain later, which will be of value to you. A man named Max Klein is the proprietor of a Whitechapel sink named The Angel and Crown. Klein, however, purchased the place only recently; some four months ago, in fact, Your brother, Mycroft.’ ”

I was too confounded to suspect which way the wind lay. I give myself that grace, at least, because so much more can be explained only by admitting to an abysmal stupidity. At any rate, I blurted forth, “Oh, yes, Holmes. I was aware of that. I got the information from the girl with whom I talked during my visit to The Angel and Crown.”

“Did you indeed?” asked Holmes, dangerously.

“A redoubtable fellow, this Klein. It occurred to me that it had not taken him long to impress his personality upon the place.”

Holmes exploded, raising his fists. “Great God in Heaven! I wade knee-deep in idiots!”

The wind I had not suspected struck me with its blast. My mouth dropped open. I managed feebly to say, “Holmes, I do not understand.”

“Then there is no hope for you, Watson! First, you garner the exact information that would have enabled me to solve this case, and you blithely keep it to yourself. Then, you forget to give me the note containing that same vital fact. Watson! Watson! Whose side are you on?”

If I had been confused before, I was now completely at sea. No protest was possible; and defiance, defence of my self-esteem, was out of the question.

But Holmes was never a man to belabour a point. “The Angel and Crown, Watson!” cried he, leaping toward the door. “No, to the morgue first! We shall present that devil with a sample of his own handiwork!”