Bloody Hands Of The Ripper

Just another night in The City. Two million people, and it seems like half of them must be awake, despite the hour. It’s the kind of night where the cold settles into your bones like a disease, eating at you, and you can’t get rid of it no matter how much whiskey you drink or how many suspects you chase down dark alleyways, hoping that this time isn’t the last time, hoping this night isn’t the night you catch a knife in the dark.

I’m seated at the counter at Mickey’s, nursing a glass of rye and going over the details of my latest case. A string of murders, each one more grisly than the last. All the victims are girls working the streets in the poorest quarter of The City. A regular Jack The Ripper this guy is, I figure. A copycat of the worst kind.

But all of that goes out the window when this dame walks in and sits on the stool next to mine.

The smoke in Mickey’s is so thick you could cut it with a knife. This dame, she moves through it all like a divine wind, and when she turns her eyes on me, it’s everything I can do not to drop my shriveled cigarette right there on top of my notes.

“Detective William Gray?” She asks, and I can hardly think straight enough to remember my name or agree with her that must be the one I’m supposed to have. This dame, she’s a tall drink of crimson sin, all legs, red dress, ruby lips and a figure that could put a man on his knees quicker than any bullet could. “I need your help, Will.”

“Yeah?” I pull myself together enough to stub out my cigarette and string some words into a sentence that’s as sharp as it is slurred. “What can a half-drunk private dick like me do for a dame like you at this time of night?”

“It’s my sister,” she says, and there are tears at the edges of her eyes. “She’s gone missing and I fear the worst.”

“Well, where did you last see her?” I ask, turning my notepad to a new page and picking up my nub of a pencil.

“The boards,” the dame says, and it comes shaky. She glances around, nervous, then leans in. “She’s a, well, she’s a working girl, if you know what I mean. She likes to help the sailors spend their money.”

“Sounds like a nice way of putting it,” I tell her. “How long ago did she go missing?”

“Three days now,” the dame says, swallowing. “I’m just really worried sick about her, you know?”

“Yeah, I can imagine,” I nod, pulling in a deep breath to try to steady myself. It doesn’t help. This dame, she’s just too intoxicating. Either that, or I’m already too drunk. “Listen, a lot of working girls have been going missing down by the boards. I’m working a case right now about a copycat killer that seems to think he’s Jack The Ripper. If your sister’s been missing for three days, well,” I shake my head, unable to finish as this pretty dame suddenly turns on the waterworks. It’s near enough to make me cry myself, just seeing a broad this beautiful reduced to tears. Damn shame.

“I just can’t live without my sister,” she says, and when I reach out to touch her shoulder, she’s as hot as the dress she’s wrapped in. “Please, Detective! Please tell me you’ll look for her! Please tell me you’ll search the boards and find my sister!”

“Okay, okay,” I nod, patting her on the shoulder. “Listen, what’s her name? It’s late, but I guess there’s no harm in taking a look. Not the first time I’ve wandered through the boards at night. Hell, I’ll do it as soon as I get upright if it’ll stop the waterworks.”

“Oh thank you, thank you, detective!” She says, wiping the tears from her eyes suddenly and then wrapping me in a strong, fierce hug. Just about knocks the wind out of me too, when she does it. The dame’s got arms, and she’s strong like a man who’s been tossing sacks of grain around all his life. As soon as she lets go, I drain the last of my glass and grimace through the kick. I’m going to need all the courage I can get for what’s ahead, I figure, liquid or otherwise. “Her name is Doris, and she usually works the north end, where the military ships dock.”

“North end,” I nod, scooping up my notepad and slipping it into my pocket. “Right. I’ll go there now. I’ll catch a cab, take in the night air, ask around, see what I find.”

“You’re a hero, detective, a real hero,” she says, beaming at me.

“Hardly,” I manage, picking up my fedora and squaring it on my head. “Leave your number with the bartender here. I’ll call if I find anything.”

*

It’s well after midnight and treading toward dawn when the cab drops me off at the north end of the boards. The inky waters lap against the creosote-soaked pilings, carrying in a chill wind that no amount of whiskey can keep out. Even at this time of night, the boards are alive with activity, with music and shouting and the sounds of people rutting together in the shadows. It’s the kind of place where the dregs of humanity congregate to skirt the straight and narrow. It’s the closest place to hell I’ve ever seen in this city.

There are plenty of working girls showing their wares out in the open. Some are dressed in furs, some are so caked in makeup you can hardly see the sores on their faces. I ask every one of them about Doris, and in every case, they all say the same thing. They don’t know any Doris. They’ve never seen her, never heard of her.

And then I hear the scream.

  I’m talking with a couple of street girls when it happens. The shriek cuts through the night so sharp that I just about lose my hat turning toward it. The two girls I’m talking with look at each other, stub out their cigarettes and run, but not me. No, I hone in on the sound. I draw my gun, holding it against my thigh, and I walk straight into the darkness.

There’s movement, a twist of shadows on shadows. I see the color red, flashing and splashing against the bricks of the alleyway. My gun comes up, my finger right there on the trigger, but I can’t fire. The flash, the red, the shape that comes walking out of the shadows, dragging a corpse by the hair, it’s her.

The woman from the bar, the woman who sent me here to find her sister.

Advertisement

“Detective William Gray? You’re right on time,” she says, and her grin is as sharp as the knife in her hand. “I found my sister.”

“I’m thinking you better put that knife down,” I offer, keeping the gun on her. The confidence in her eyes is enough to throw me off, to make me shake, but I still manage to keep my pistol level between us. “We can go down to the precinct together, okay? Get this sorted out.”

“You don’t understand, detective,” she says, still grinning. “Doris is just my latest sister. I’ve been collecting them, and you’re like a moth to a flame when it comes to my handiwork. I’ve watched you since the beginning, since I chose my first sister and made a blood pact with her. I’ve watched you as you’ve studied my art. You must be my most ardent admirer, and yet all along, you never knew that it was me until this moment. Now, I have revealed myself. Now, you know that I am the artist behind all of this art.”

“Just stay right there, Miss,” I shout. My finger is quivering at the edge of pulling the trigger. The lady in red, she’s stalking toward me slow and deliberate, her dress and her skin splashed with dripping crimson.

“There’s only one piece of art left to make,” she says, heaving the butchered body of her sister forward so it lands with a heavy squish at my feet. Doris’s stricken face yawns up at me, pale and bloodless, and I’m so transfixed by the horror of it all that I take my gun off the lady in red. I look away for an instant, only for an instant, but it’s enough. When she starts to move, when the knife rises and glitters in the moonlight, I know it’s too late.

My gun snaps up, but there’s no time to fire. Blood-spattered and grinning, the lady in red takes the knife to herself there in the dark alley and starts to stab her own chest over and over again, scream-laughing and grunting until she can take no more. When she collapses against the bricks, she still has that damn knife jutting out of her chest, and she’s all smiles, chuckling sadistically as her life drains away.

I’m with her in an instant. I try to prop her up against the wall and keep her from sagging into the dirt. I get my hands on the knife, blood-slick and sticky, but before I can pull it out of her, she’s got her hands on mine, guiding the knife deeper, twisting it, getting her blood all over me.

“You’re the ripper now,” she whispers with her last breath, and then she’s gone.

I’m shaking. I’m shocked to my core. The lady in red sags and the knife comes free of her chest, then someone screams. When I turn, I still have the knife in my hands. My coat and shirt and sleeves are covered in blood.

“It’s the killer!” A woman at the entrance to the alleyway screams as she jabs an accusing finger at me. “It’s the ripper! It’s the guy who killed all those girls!”

I don’t get enough time to do more than stutter. I don’t get enough time to explain. A dozen hookers stride out of the shadows on either side of the alleyway, and every one of them is armed. Baseball bats and tire irons, truncheons and shovels– I see it all.

And as these ladies of the night stalk toward me, I know those weapons are the last things I’ll ever see.

This story is featured in...

Twisted Pulp Magazine Issue #42