Pearce sighed heavily, then retook his cigarette and inhaled deeply. “Detective Merylo. Have you ever heard of a man known as Jack the Ripper?”
Merylo searched his mind. “Think so. Some kind of murderer, right? In England?”
“What do you know about him?”
“I-don’t really remember.”
“Jack the Ripper stalked the streets of London in the 1880s,” Pearce explained, “in Whitechapel, one of the poorest and most decadent parts of the city-not unlike Kingsbury Run. Took at least five victims. Taunted the police with cryptic messages. Used a knife. But he wasn’t content to simply kill his victims. He destroyed them. With such anatomical accuracy that some people suspected he might be a doctor. Or a butcher. He seemed particularly interested in destroying female reproductive systems. Ripped them to shreds. Hence the name.”
“Was he ever caught?”
“Never.”
Merylo squinted. “And you’re saying this… Jack the Ripper might be the one who’s killing people in Cleveland?”
Pearce’s eyes drifted heavenward. “No, that is not what I’m saying. Detective, have you considered the possibility of consulting an alienist?”
Merylo blinked twice. “A what?”
“A doctor of the mind.”
“How’s he supposed to catch a killer?”
“By understanding how he thinks.”
“How’s that going to help?”
“If the killer is not behaving rationally, traditional methods of crime solving will be of no avail. You must develop new approaches.”
“Sounds like a load of hogwash to me.”
“If you understand how the killer thinks, you might be able to anticipate his next move.”
“I don’t want a next move! I want to catch him before he strikes again.”
Pearce blew a dense cloud of smoke into the air. “Have either of you gentlemen heard of a Viennese doctor called Sigmund Freud?”
“No,” Merylo said gruffly. “We haven’t.”
“Um, actually…” Zalewski shuffled his feet. “I have.”
Merylo stared at him as if he were some kind of bug.
“What do you know about him?”
Zalewski’s face flushed. “A few years ago, I was having these really bad dreams. Nightmares, you know? I’d dream I woke up in the morning and parts of my body were missing. Or I’d be coming to work, except with no clothes on.”
“That’s just weird,” Merylo grumbled.
“Not really,” Pearce said. “Those are universal fears. Haven’t you ever had dreams like that?”
Merylo’s face hardened. “No. Never.”
“Anyway,” Zalewski continued, “my ma was worried about me. So she got me this book by that guy you were talking about, that Freud. The Interpretation of Dreams. Turns out this guy thinks your dreams are like symbols, and by examining your dreams you can learn about yourself.”
“What did you learn about yourself from the book?” Pearce asked.
Zalewski stared at the floor. “Tell you the truth-I thought it was kinda tough goin’.”
Pearce smiled slightly, possibly for the first time Merylo had ever seen. “You’re not the first to think so. Doctor Freud is perhaps a greater doctor than a writer. And there have been questions about the accuracy of his English translator.” Pearce paused, taking another drag on his cigarette. “If you’re interested, I could put you in touch with an alienist of my acquaintance. He lives in New York but for a case of this significance, I’m sure-”
“Thanks very much, Doctor,” Merylo said abruptly, “but I don’t think we need any newfangled college-boy nonsense. We’ll solve this case the old-fashioned way. By beating the streets and doing good solid detective work.”
“As you wish. But if you change your mind-”
“Thanks, Doc, but I won’t. Andrassy may have been a punk, but he was still a criminal and he hung with criminals. If we sniff around long enough, we’ll find out who wanted him dead bad enough to-”
All at once, the door to the coroner’s office flew open. “Detective Merylo!”
Merylo recognized the kid as one of the boys from Bertillon, but he couldn’t remember his name. “Yeah?”
“We’ve identified the new corpse.”
Merylo’s eyes ballooned. “Yeah?”
“Took awhile-the fingers were in such poor condition. But we managed it. Turns out we have her prints on file.”
A smile spread from one end of Merylo’s face to the other. “Because she has a criminal record?”
“Exactly.”
“Swell.” Merylo gave Zalewski a little shove toward the door. “We’ve identified two victims now. All we have to do now is figure out what-or who-they have in common.”
He waved at Dr. Pearce as he passed through the door. “Thanks for nothing, Doctor. Turns out we don’t need you after all.”
19
Ness had been to The Thomas Club before. And he’d been thinking about it ever since.
Predictably, his failed raid had been all over the papers. He knew he couldn’t afford another flop, not if he wanted to get the funding he needed for all his plans to make the city safer.
Chief Matowitz had opted not to join him tonight. Funny how quickly a man could go from camera-ready to camera-shy. He had at least loaned Ness some of his men. Ness would need them.
Chamberlin came to the front of the building after making his final inspection tour. He was efficient as ever, perhaps even more so now that he had a permanent assignment to the Office of the Safety Director.
“Everything in order?”
“Yes, everyone is where they should be. But I still don’t understand-”
“Humor me.”
If Ness weren’t mistaken, the front façade of The Thomas Club had been gussied up in the short time since his last raid. It was looking not so much New Orleans as bordello. Was the gambling business that profitable? Or was this simply Frescone’s way of thumbing his nose at the cops, and Ness in particular? You can’t touch me, he was saying. I’ll build an opulent, garish, neon-lit pleasure palace right under your nose, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Ness felt his jaw setting together. We’ll see.
“Watches synchronized, sir.”
“Excellent.”
“Perhaps we should give them three more minutes. Just to be sure.”
“Two will be enough.”
“Sometimes people don’t move too fast when they’ve been drinking.”
“They moved pretty fast the other night.”
Chamberlin almost smiled. “Threat of imprisonment is probably a decent motivator.”
“Exactly. About time?”
“It is.”
Ness knew Chamberlin hated being kept in the dark. Regrettable, but unavoidable.
“I’m moving to the east side of the building,” Ness announced, buttoning up his camel-hair overcoat. It was still bitterly cold outside. “I want to be able to watch both sides of the operation.”
Precisely two minutes later, every car parked in the lot facing The Thomas Club-all of them owned by police officers-turned on its headlights. The tacky gambling den was bathed in white.
“And as if that weren’t enough…” Ness muttered quietly to himself.
The horns blared in every car, creating a fearful din. Ness reluctantly covered his ears with his hands. The combined trumpet of all those horns was head-splitting, even worse than he had imagined.
Ness could hear the migration begin. Someone opened the front door, peeked out, saw the array of cars, and slammed the door shut again.
Two minutes was too long, Ness thought. Next time go with one, unless they’re moving from another city.
He waved his left arm, signaling Chamberlin to proceed. An instant later, another row of vehicles turned on their lights. These were trucks, heavy-duty freight vehicles. And in the bright, almost blinding light, it was clear that each had been fitted with a metal battering ram attached to the front grill. Chamberlin had gotten the idea from observing the cowcatcher on a train passing through Kingsbury Run.
An instant later, the trucks roared into action. They raced their engines for a few moments-a warning to anyone who hadn’t already moved to the front lobby. Then the trucks lurched into action. They rushed forward, tires squealing, moving so fast Ness could feel the wind rush against his face. All pointed toward the rear of the building. The secret annex Chamberlin discovered on the blueprints.