Anno Dracula - Kim Newman [120]
‘There have been vampire traitors before.’
‘But not, I think, like our Sergeant. I am only beginning to make out the extent of his activities. He is the tool of greater forces. Perhaps greater forces than a simple policeman and a soldier can hope to best.’
They emerged from the alley and stood by the Sergeant’s building. Without discussion, they understood that they would now break in and search the murderer’s rooms.
While Mackenzie looked both ways, Kostaki splintered the door-lock with a firm grip. In the Old Jago, this would not be unusual or suspicious behaviour. A sailor, pockets pulled out and empty, zigzagged past, eyes rolling from gin or opium.
They slipped into the lodging house, and climbed three flights of narrow, precipitous stairs. Eyes looked at them through holes in doors, but no one intervened. They came to the room where the light had been. Kostaki broke another lock – somewhat stouter than he would have expected in this pit – and they were inside.
Mackenzie lit a stub of candle. The room was tidy, almost military in its precision. There was a cot, sheet tighter than a wrestler’s stomach muscles. On a desk, writing materials were laid out square as if for an inspection.
‘I have cause to believe our fox not only the destroyer of Ezzelin von Klatka,’ Mackenzie declared, ‘but also the would-be assassin who put a bullet into John Jago.’
‘That makes little sense.’
‘To a soldier, maybe not. But to a copper, it’s the oldest game in town. You stir up both sides, set them at each other like dogs. Then sit back and watch the fireworks.’
Mackenzie was going through papers on the desk. There was a fresh bottle of red ink and a neat pot of pens beside the blotter.
‘Are we dealing with an anarchist faction?’
‘Quite the opposite, I should think. Sergeants do not make good anarchists. They have no imagination. Sergeants always serve. You can carve an Empire with Sergeants behind you.’
‘He is following orders, then.’
‘Of course. This whole business has the whiff of the ancien régime, don’t you think?’
Kostaki had an intuition. ‘You admire this man? Or at least, admire his cause?’
‘These nights, that would be a very unwise opinion to harbour.’
‘Nevertheless...’
Mackenzie smiled. ‘It would be hypocritical of me to mourn for von Klatka, or even to express sympathy for John Jago.’
‘What if it had not been von Klatka, what if it had been...’
‘You? Then, things might have seemed different. But only seemed. The Sergeant would make no distinction between you and your comrade. That is where I part company from his masters’ thinking.’
Kostaki thought for a moment. ‘I may lose my leg,’ he said.
‘I am sorry for that.’
‘What do you intend to do about the Sergeant? Will you let him continue to serve his unknown cause?’
‘I told you I was a copper before I was warm. When I have a case Warren can’t ignore, I’ll lay it before him.’
‘Thank you, Scotsman.’
‘For what?’
‘For your trust.’
There were a great many pages of loose paper, covered with a cypher or shorthand that resembled hieroglyphic script.
‘Hello,’ Mackenzie said, ‘what have we here?’ He held up a pencilled draft of a letter. It was in plain English. ‘Lestrade will be sick with envy,’ Mackenzie said. ‘And Fred Abberline. Kostaki, look...’
Kostaki glanced at the paper. ‘Dear Boss,’ it began, and it was signed ‘Yours truly, Jack the Ripper.’
44
ON THE WATERFRONT
The body had washed up on Cuckold’s Point, at the curve of Limehouse Reach. It had taken three men to drag it out of the sucking mud and deposit it on the nearest wharf. Before Geneviève and Morrison arrived, someone took the trouble to lay the corpse out into a semblance of dignity, untangling the limbs and arranging the water- and dirt-clogged clothes.