What Alice Knew: A Most Curious Tale of Henry James and Jack the Ripper

Chapter 40

Alice had spent the morning listening to Katherine’s report on her sister: Louisa’s appetite was back, and she had put on weight, all the result of Katherine’s diligent care. Hadn’t she done the same many times for Alice—nursed her back to relative health from the brink of hypothetical death? That was Katherine’s genius after all, to make people make an effort and continue living their lives.

Generally, Alice was jealous when Katherine spoke about her sister, who was, though fragile, fortunately not as fragile as Alice. But today, she listened patiently. She was grateful to have Katherine back and was willing to indulge her more than usual. They had had a pleasant reunion the night before, dining together over a mutton stew that Sally had whipped up entirely on her own. The girl had begun to put ingredients together, a sign, they agreed, that she could think for herself. “Perhaps she will be a cook,” said Alice, “and Archie can be a footman.” They had laughed delightedly at the idea. Despite her reformist impulses, Alice agreed with Henry that the lower orders had no reason to aspire to the occupations and desires of the higher ones. Comfortable servitude seemed to her to have much to recommend it.

On the subject of Sickert, she had said little to Katherine except that her portrait was done, and the artist would deliver it in its frame in a few days.

“I look forward to it,” said Katherine shortly, and Alice was glad that she did not pursue the subject. Her relationship with Sickert seemed too private to discuss even with—indeed especially with—her most intimate companion.

After an early luncheon, Katherine left to do errands, and Alice turned over in her head what ought to be done with regard to the Ripper investigation. It was wearisome. They were going to have to start again, comb through the membership lists of the art societies, look through the exhibition catalogs, interrogate John Sargent about the gossip in the art world. She still believed that the murderer was an artist, but everything else they had assumed before now struck her as dubious. Convinced as she was of Sickert’s innocence, she could hardly say that the idea of a Whistler connection carried much weight. P of W—“pupil of Whistler.” It was, upon consideration, a silly hypothesis. The line between the letters might not be “of,” and PW could stand for anything.

She had been jotting some notes in her diary and dozing, when Archie came to the door with a package.

“This here been dropped off for you, milady,” he said, presenting it with the characteristic flourish that Alice found both amusing and pathetic. He would be less charming, she thought, when the novelty of his circumstances wore off, and yet she could only hope that they would, that he would forget that he ought to be grateful for regular meals and people who cared about him, that he would come in time to take such things for granted.

“Who left it?” she asked, looking curiously at the box on which her name was scrawled, not very tidily, in red ink.

“Don’ know that,” said Archie. “It was lyin’ on the mat when I went out to wash the stoop. I was out an hour afore to shake the rug, and it weren’t there then, so I’d say it were left within the hour.”

“Thank you, Archie. That shows good reasoning. You can take the afternoon to play if you like. Just be sure you’re back by dinner so that Sally won’t be left shorthanded.”

The boy seemed to find this warning to his liking and trotted away, presumably to win more marbles off the neighbor’s boy, who had lost almost all of them to him already.

Alice turned to the package. It was small, no more than four or five inches long, and very light, so it was not books, which was what people usually sent her. There was no address, which meant it must have been placed by hand on the stoop where Archie had found it. She took the letter opener on her night table and slit the top, which had been glued together using brown paper. She opened the flaps of the box. What lay inside took a moment to take in. First she felt her throat constrict, and she gagged. Regaining her breath, she screamed.

Inside the box, nestled in tissue paper that had been soaked crimson, was a bloody piece of a woman’s breast.