Imagination is a most terrible thing.

This was the thought that occurred to Mr Bartholomew Bartleby. There had been other thoughts before this, in the series of events that had led up to this moment, but none of them had been with any measure of clarity as to be called cohesive.

In many circumstances, an imagination might prove a most wonderful boon, a gift upon one’s creative expression. But in an improper time and place, the very strength of the imaginative mind can become its curse; it can be, simply put, a most terrible thing. 

In this instance, when one had the singular misfortune of fate to find themselves bound, blindfolded, and gagged upon the floor of a fast moving carriage, imagination instead filled all the gaps of the denied senses with possibilities most dreadful and final.

It was noted idly by Bartleby that this was an unusual experience in his line of work. Unusual, but perhaps not wholly unexpected—which was part of the reason he felt a sense of inevitable acceptance. As though an event long anticipated and feared had come to pass, and now the sufferer could be resigned to it. 

But he had to admit, this was not exactly a comfort.

In fact, if he was able to properly verbalise, or at least express himself, he would surely have done so to illustrate the depth of his affront in the matter. Instead, all he could do was lay where he was, bound and gagged, left to wonder.

All he had done was ask questions. Curious ones that pertained to the most burning mystery of the time. True, they were questions with blood upon them. Older blood than the other perpetual stains, old enough that such inquiry should not have eschewed such a response. 

He had asked those questions, and asked some more, and written the answers in his little book. And slowly, a picture began to form around them. A picture with a singular, gaping hole in its heart, a void which bore a face, a name… and a fear. Surrounded by all the questions, all the inquiries, there was a white page mystery, a blank space where the story should have been, and Bartleby was determined to fill it.

His mission had driven him onward and eastward, into the belly of the wretched beast. The bloated streets of blood, arteries that were choked with filth and refuse, the unwanted and unforgivable. That empty picture yet ever beckoned, and so he had scurried from one cloying alleyway to the next, from one dank drinking house to another, where the smell of slow dying pickled upon the air, and found himself on the grimy, Godless streets of deepest, darkest London.

The answers had come harder, but they were there and all the more profitable. A few tuppence here, even a shilling there, as long as his hand was kept fast to his purse when the urchins with hard eyes and fast fingers came brushing against him. This patient purveyor of truth and revelation came ever closer to finding the brush strokes, and thus he pressed on, a slight man in a threadbare suit with a notebook clutched in his hand like a protective badge—a sight so incongruous that the roaming beasts in tattered cloaks with tattered faces made of old violence had not touched him. But they had watched, and they had waited.

He had been getting closer to the prize. He could feel it with the worry that was in the air, the space between the words that were filled with a treacle thick silence, the hard looks, the raised prices. The twinge of anticipation began to be replaced by its sister sensation of dread. The wolves had ceased their circling, and he had not had the chance to realise when the balance had tipped, before a bag was thrown over his head and a club had struck the back of his skull. Dimly, he had been dragged by wordless, heavy men with heavier scents of sweat, tobacco, bad food, and dreadful efficiency of violence, and thrown thus into the very carriage that had then become his entire world.

The first question he could have asked had been answered by the gag, the hood lifted enough for it to be stuffed forcefully between his teeth, filling his mouth with the flavour of mothballs and other unspeakable humours. The second question was answered with a foot that had set his ribs to creaking. That ache about his chest now set itself in symphony with his skull, as Bartleby lay still, waiting and imagining, and hating what imagination was now rendering unto him.

The carriage never slowed. He was aware of it beneath him, his body lifting and bouncing with its rough movements. This immediately lent him to realise that this was an expensive carriage. A cheaper carriage was a noisy affair—especially at this speed—and there was speed, a sensation of fierce motion that made his poor addled head swirl disagreeably. But the insulated interior kept the majority of the sound out; for the most part the discomfort instead came from the vibration that rose up from the hard wheel over ground—ground, but not cobblestone. 

They were outside of London surely by this point. Just how long had he lain in a stupor? It was admittedly a less pressing thought than the ever growing dread of where he was going, but there was no answering that question either.

His hands ached. The cord that held them together bit through his coat along with the autumn chill, bringing with it the shudder that promised the coming winter. With his hands bound, his options of movement were rather limited—not least because the shifting of a boot alerted him to the fact he was once more under observation—but he nevertheless opened and closed his hands to get blood moving again. A most uncomfortable journey, but to what end? Were the questions he had dared to ask so dreadful in their answering that this was the conclusion? He shifted his head then, trying to rub his face against the floor to pry the gag loose. 

A faint sound, a whickering of metal against leather. Then a soft tang, right in front of his face. Even through the hood, he could sense a cold hardness of steel, and the faint hint of oil from the scabbard to keep the draw loose and swift. 

A voice spoke somewhere above him, the tone thick with phlegm.

“You be quiet and easy as a mouse there, mister. Wriggle too much and I’ll nail you down.”

It was a rusty voice, rumbling from the pit of the stomach, wrought wicked by rot and liquor. There was a grin in those words, but there was no humour in it, and even less in the long blade that rested but scant inches from Bartleby's quivering nose.

His spirit quailed. The unspoken questions that had risen so stridently in his heart withered into darkened silence. He shifted no more, huddled and shivering from more than just the cold, as he was raced towards the unknown on the unwilling wings of fear.

 ***

The horses were near played out when the carriage wheels changed in tone. A grinding sound, the rasp of fine gravel underneath that muted the clop of the hooves and the rattle of the carriage as it slowed to a stop. That change in sound and tempo had been anticipated for some long minutes by Bartleby, denoting an approaching end to his journey. He startled as the door was opened and his legs were seized. Unceremoniously, he was dragged clear, landing with a sharp retort upon the ground, where he lay groaning.

Words were said above him, words he focused on despite the roaring of his own panicked breathing. Words such as ‘payment’, and ‘stables’, and ‘resting’, that ‘the matter would be handled’.

The matter would be handled. He being the matter, he being the thing to be handled. There was no comfort in that statement, and so he hunched inwards, hoping against hope to be forgotten as a whimper escaped him.

Strong hands took his arms and shoulders and pulled him to his feet, but they would not work beneath him. The hands were much stronger than he was, and they were well practiced in the handling of menfolk who were in no condition to move under their own power. They dragged him onwards, over gravel, up stairs. A door creaked open, and a voice spoke in wintry tones. 

“This way,” and that indeed was the way that Bartleby was dragged along.

They were inside the building. A large, cold building, scarcely warmed by fire. There was little light either. Dim candles here and there, provided brief radiance that was only barely visible through the hood that Bartleby wore. Another door was opened, and then warmth flowed out upon him—blessed warmth—and more light. A fire was burning, not fiercely, but comforting nonetheless and, for the first time, Bartleby was fully aware of how cold he was. His teeth would have chattered together were it not for the gag that denied him.

He was shifted about, moved with ease; a joint preparing to be dressed by a butcher. A chair with a hard back and a soft bottom was set under him. A knife shone in the dark with razor-edged intent, and the cords were cut at the wrist. There were sensations of movement, though the gag and hood were left alone, and then the large thudding footsteps retreated, and the door closed. Bartholomew Bartleby was left alone.

No. Not alone.

The realisation came quick and sudden, but there was no indication to reveal it. There was no sound of a presence, though there was not silence. The room was awash with other sounds, of crackling fire logs, of creaking floorboards, of panicked heartbeat and rushed breath. But amongst that there was a stillness, a sensation to the air that was patient and watching.

His fingers shook as Bartleby reached up to the awful gag, pulling it from his mouth with a gasp of relief. He swallowed with a dry tongue and tried to rasp a question to the air, feeling both certain and a fool at the same time. 

“Is there someone there?” A squeaking voice, dried by lack of saliva and abject terror, forcing the words out.

An oppressive silence that grew by the moment. And then—

“You have come a long way today, Mr Bartleby.”

The voice that spoke was cold. Cold as winter seas and just as bleak. The voice of God for all Bartleby could guess, and though it was blasphemy to think of it, it nevertheless held a power to it—the power of life or death as Bartleby knew.

A deliberate step, and then another, and through the veil of the hood covering his face still, Bartleby could make out a tall, dark shape looming over him, moving out of the shadow into the firelight. He moved, flowing through his limited vision with a slow, deliberate pace, to sit down in a chair opposite him.

“You can remove the hood, if you wish.”

The accent was difficult to place; a gentleman’s delivery, a Romani roll, a Frenchman’s burr, and an Englishman’s lacquer laid upon every word. Again, that cold bleakness, a hardness to the words of cracking ice and steel. The voice was not pleased with him. It was not pleased at all and there was, in that voice, a promise of a baleful stare and a stony expression.

Bartleby removed the hated hood slowly, blinking in the bright light of the fire until his eyes stopped watering and, though he might have looked around the room, his vision was arrested instead by the seated presence in front of him.

The promise of the voice had been kept. Grey eyes watched him with the ferocity of flint, sharp and waiting. The man before him was handsome, in that his features were clean, but somewhat unkempt. There were scars, faint but noticeable, and hard lines at his brow and jaw that could tighten easily into either stern disapproval or cold, hard rage. A close cut, but still scruffy, beard and moustache, neither overgrown, the black hair speckled with grey and swept back. The cheeks were hollow, the bones sharp. It was an unremarkable face, and it gave nothing away, save for an inexplicable—and intense—degree of anger. It was not a look that inspired much hope.

Bartleby could not pull his gaze clear to look properly at his surroundings. So, the edge of his vision took in details instead. The figure before him was lounging in his high backed, velvet lined chair. One hand laid across his midsection. He wore a long coat of darkened grey gabardine, the collar wide, high, and somewhat severe. His waistcoat was plain and functional black. High boots, not simple shoes, rested upon the richly carpeted floor. There were marks upon the boots, marks of wear and work, of scrubbed off mud. Despite how well-dressed he was, there was a seeming shabbiness to the man in how he held himself—hardly the decorum of a gentleman. But that expression was one of razor-edged command, and he watched Bartleby now with waning patience.

Bartleby could take it no longer, and cleared his throat.

“I am glad we can finally meet, circumstances aside, sir. You are the one I have been looking for, are you not?” His voice was raspy still, his throat dry. Reaching up, Bartleby adjusted his cravat and collar as best he could, but it did little to soothe. Without moving otherwise, the figure opposite him shifted his grasp and pointed a single finger to Bartleby’s right, away from the fire. Following that directing digit, the suffering man’s gaze alighted upon—blessed be!—a steaming teapot, a plain teacup, a saucer of sugar cubes, and other wondrous indicators of the presence of a finely-brewed pot of tea, the scent of which now struck Bartleby and brought with it a sense of relief. He nodded his thanks to the figure, who did not answer or change his rigid, unwelcome expression.

An awkward moment followed. The stare remained, the silence with it, and were the situation not so dire, it might have been viewed as almost comical with the way Bartleby poured his tea, added milk and sugar, and then held it in his hand, his fingerless gloves grasping it firmly. A saucer was considered and dismissed—his nerves would have set it to rattling. So he clasped it and huddled on his seat, raising his eyes to the figure opposite him again.

“If you do not think it too forward of me, sir.” He took a sip of the tea, feeling it soothe his parched throat and return his senses. “But you are him.” The figure did not stir, but something thickened in the air. 

Who was he, to make this accusation at all? A little man, shorter than average, skinny and starved and seemingly half grown. Younger than he looked—not yet twenty winters—soft-skinned with a thin, pale face topped by a shock of mousey brown hair. Green eyes that were afraid and yet determined, and shifted around the room rapidly, ever returning to the seated figure as though dragged there, who appeared to have reached an internal conclusion.

“This is the point of the conversation where I illuminate you, Mister Bartleby, though it may have come swifter than you prefer.” The seated figure watched the fire as he spoke. “You are here because I wished to ask you questions, not indulge you the chance to ask your own. Therefore, I will forgive your impertinence in your first statements, but will not allow further until I deem that you may do so.” There was a clipped finality to the words, and Bartleby blinked as he stared, somewhat struck by the sheer audacity. Here he was, kidnapped from the streets by a man who looked more akin to a highwayman than his surroundings accounted. 

But his mind suddenly halted and reversed back over the previous conversation, such as it was. Unable to stop himself, Bartleby realised just how he had been addressed, by his name and not by one of his many, many easily given pseudonyms. A name he had never given to any whom he had questioned, in the hope to avoid this very situation.

The man opposite him tilted his head. “Let us begin this matter with yourself. You are Mister Bartholomew Bartleby, employed, by charter, to the Historical Society of London, occasional writer and informer for the The Times, and of 15b Lancashire Lane, London.” He leaned back. “Tell me, did your parents begrudge you entering into the world before they cast you aside?”

“I beg your pardon?” The response burst forth from his lips before Bartleby could stop himself, as if a finger was suddenly and unexpectedly pressed upon a raw nerve. 

“You can beg for such if you like, but I am in no mood to grant you anything beyond that cup of tea.” The response was quick and hard. “You are a ward of the state, and you have a name given to you of such incongruity that it feels almost vindictive to grant it. Based on what little evidence I have, I am inclined to believe you were unwanted from the start.” The lounging man steepled his hands. “You are certainly unwanted here. It was not my wish but necessity that brought you to me, and not my choosing. Now, answer me clearly. How came you by such an unfortunate naming?”

Bartleby set his jaw. “My name is a fine one, sir, for it is mine. As for my parents, I could not attest to them, but I am sure they had their reasons. And begging your pardon once again, granted or no, it was not my idea to come to your home.” He was amazed that he kept his voice level; his head was pounding with rushing blood and the dull, agonising ache of the blow he had taken earlier, but he was steadfast in that moment, clutching his teacup so tightly that the liquid trembled.

“This is not my home. This is simply a building in which I dwell.” A quiet correction, but Bartleby was betrayed by a moment of confusion. Was that not the very definition of a home, after all? The figure shrouded in shadows and half-lit by firelight continued. 

“As for you not deciding to be here, your choices are what led you to this place. The fact you could not see the result of such choices is the fault of nothing but the lack of your own foresight in the matter.” The eyes glowered a moment. “You really felt you could ask about such events as you did, and get neither response nor consequence, when all around you were silent? I had hoped you were intelligent.” He sank into the high backed chair, a spectre falling into shadow and out of the firelight.

As fragile as his ego was in such matters, Bartleby felt a scorching sense of embarrassment in that moment, but it was met by a wall of anger. What little veneer of manners faded; he set his teacup down firmly on the saucer with a clinking sound.

“Sir.” He intoned it firmly, his voice steadying in his rising wrath. “Be damned to your pardon. I asked those questions to find a man. The one man who could answer the question that has haunted the city of London for six years, and each time blood runs down a dark alleyway, people ask again if he is back.”

The shadow in the chair was still. Though they seemed to merely be listening, the air became colder, the fire somehow becoming muted and wan. But Bartleby would not be daunted, not now, not after so long. 

Not when he was so sure, at last.

“I have searched and hunted in the deepest corners of London, and found answers to questions I did not even know to ask. But I found you. I found the answer to the riddle of him.” Bartleby’s voice grew in confidence. “Because you are the man who killed him, are you not? You are the one who killed Jack the Ripper.”

The stillness and unspoken words returned, but Bartleby could see the hands of the seated man. They tightened upon each other, with a gathering anger and fearsome purpose. 

There was a knock upon the door. Bartleby leapt in his chair as the boom of knuckles upon wood went off like a cannon shot. But the seated figure did not move, he merely responded to the knock. “Come in.” Flatly stated, caught in a moment which did not desire interruption.

Bartleby turned his head as a door behind him opened with a creak, and a man stepped inside, halting after a few steps at rigid attention. The newcomer was elderly, thin, and severe, with a grey bun at the back of their head, pulled so tightly it seemed to wrench all the skin of their face back. The thin flesh that remained gave them the uncomfortable appearance of a living skull. Nevertheless, despite such a villainous visage, they stood straight backed and tall. Their clothing—black and white with a long tailed coat—was perfectly tailored and bereft of creases, but entirely humble. This man was a butler in every conceivable way, yet he defied his description of being a servant, and was instead something else. Above all, he was intimidating to Bartleby, in a way the other man in the room was not, but he could not put his finger on why.

“Sir.” If the voice of the seated man was cold, this was the voice of frozen, empty expanses of glacier ice, a winter given words. The butler did not look upon Bartleby, but he disapproved. He radiated a never-ceasing sense of disapproval, and that sensation focused upon Bartleby as though through a lens. 

“Master… Cutter wished to inform you that he forgot to bring in our guest’s luggage, as it was quite bulky. He wishes to let you know it can be brought inside forthwith once payment is made.” Acid dripped from select syllables. The figure in the chair did not move. Finally, there was a shadow of a shrug from the depths of the chair, and what might have been a nod. 

Bartleby found himself sweating again and, without thinking, he pushed himself to his feet as the butler turned, closing the door firmly behind him, even as Bartleby stepped towards it.

“So it was important to you, what you brought.” The words came from behind him, and he turned once more, straightening up.

“It is, sir. I spent all I have on it.” He stood still but radiating anxiousness, watching the door through which the butler had departed until a shadow appeared at his shoulder just as the door opened once again, and Bartleby tried to look in two directions so abruptly that he near whipped his head clean off of his shoulders.

The seated man had approached without making a sound. He was simply there, at his shoulder and standing still. Closer, those hard grey eyes looked past him, and Bartleby backtracked away from the doorway.

The butler had returned, and handed over, with great difficulty, a rather large and curious carry bag, done in an arrangement of straps to be borne upon the back. He handed it over to the man, who took it—and Bartleby, who had carried the heavy device for many months, was surprised that he made no indication of the obvious weight whatsoever.

Wordlessly, the figure carried it over to a table and set it down. Once more, the butler faded into non-observance behind the clicking of a door. Bartleby moved towards the man, who was intently unveiling the lacquered wooden box within the carry bag, set in a square around eighteen inches along each side, and half again as high. Bartleby reached him just as he opened the lid.

The device within was carefully set; the wax cylinders adjacent it on each side, a curious collapsed brass metal flower stowed atop it. It was a box, with a small crank upon one side, much like a music box. There were signs of careful work and painstaking metal crafting on the device, which appeared to have been folded down into its current state, but could well be taken out of it and made to function. It was the pride and joy of its owner, and the way that Bartleby leaned towards it longingly, was plain to see.

“A phonograph. I have not seen one like it before, however.” The cold voice had a note of fascination in it. A hand rested on the wood, moving carefully along it.

Bartleby could bear it no longer. He stepped in close and interposed himself, protecting the box from the inspecting figure. Getting the point, the older man stepped clear and away, putting both his hands behind his back to watch in silence. 

“There is no other like it,” Bartleby stated. “I designed it myself.”

The box was a bit battered. One of the waxen cylinders was damaged, but the remainder were intact. The mechanism on top of the device itself was slightly misaligned, but a few movements, and the tightening of a pair of bolts soon put it right. He breathed a sigh of relief, running his fingers over the damaged cylinder regretfully.

“I found a damaged, discarded one, and purchased it with what little I owned. I then figured out how it worked, how to use it, and then I set about improving it. There is no other like it in all the world.” Reverently, he set the cylinder down and opened the lid of the device, revealing the etching needles, the turning clockwork windmill, currently set and still, but waiting. “I have been carrying it around, recording what I find when I find the people I am looking for. People who do not want to be found, but have stories that need to be heard. People like yourself, sir.”

The standing figure was eyeing the mechanism of the device with a calculating air, speculative and thoughtful. Hoping to bridge the distance somewhat, Bartleby spoke hopefully. “Do you like it, sir? I note you have a touch of fascination to your eye, as you look upon it.”

The grey eye just spoken of flickered in his direction with a faint hum from the one it belonged to. “No. In fact, I despise it entirely. If you attempt to turn it on in my presence, I shall cast it into the fire, and yourself along with it, should you protest.” He turned away and moved to stand before said fire, which to Bartleby’s eye now appeared worryingly short on fuel to burn.

Bartleby’s heart raced. He had been threatened before; many a time, actually, in his life and in his line of work. But there was something entirely coldblooded and factual about how he had been threatened now. It was disquieting, and he paused in his half-hearted attempt to wind up the clockwork mechanism that would allow the device to record the conversation. He lowered his hand and stepped back from it. 

“Can I ask why it upsets you so?” He worded it carefully, while remaining protectively in front of the phonograph to ward off any sudden attacks. 

The man standing at the fire shrugged without turning, broad shoulders rising and falling slowly. “I have my reasons. And they are mine alone.”

Bartleby took a deep breath, steadying himself. “I seek answers, sir. I shall not be leaving this place until I secure them, either.”

A hand reached out and collected a cast iron poker by the fireplace, setting about to disturbing and breaking apart the burning coals. “You are not wanted here, Mister Bartleby,” he said in a level tone, without looking at him. “You are the very picture of the unwanted, in all aspects of your unhappy life. You were brought here because I willed it, but not because I wished it. I would have been happier if I had never known of your existence at all, and that is no one’s doing but your own.”

“You do not strike me as an all together cheerful sort of person, sir.” Bartleby tried to force some humour into his voice, but it fell flat. He coughed instead, to cover for the lack of laughter, and closed the lid on his portable phonograph.

He turned to face the man who now stood by the fire, his expression dour and grim as he watched Bartleby. “You asked before if I was unwanted. I may be unwanted here, sir, but I would like to think that, for the world at large, I am needed. People need to hear this story, sir. They need to hear that the man they still fear is dead.”

He held out his hand, his eyes intent as he met the older man’s eyes with an energised confidence born out of nervousness. “Mister Bartholomew Bartleby, sir. Might I know your name? For the purpose of the record?”

The older man watched him with the look that a lion might wear when the prey managed to thwart it. The hand remained hovering in the air, unshaken and inviting thus. It was stared at briefly with baleful eyes, and then the man approached Bartleby, towards the outstretched hand, and then right past it, towards a counter and decanter of amber liquid upon it.

“The Whitechapel Killer was no man.” He spoke succinctly, firmly, and ignored the request to give his name—not even allowing that slight concession as he busied himself, just at the edge of the firelight. Liquid poured out of the crystal into another, a delicate glass that was lifted. “He was not a man at all.”

There was a moment of purest confusion. Bartleby sat perplexed and aghast, before speaking in shock and confusion. “Are you saying Jack the Ripper was a woman, sir? I refuse to believe such a thing.”

A snort of disgust was his answer, and nothing more, the man shaking his head as he returned back to his sunken chair, sitting back down into it. Bartleby shifted in place and then sat down opposite, looking warily to his phonograph, unsure if he should ignore the demand and start the recording, or if this was some sort of game. A pointed nose and part of a face peered out of the shadows at him, and those glittering, gleaming eyes watched Bartleby, gauging his reaction. He opened his mouth to speak, but the shadow was ahead of him, rather than following, and cut him off.

“Before I tell you anything, you tell me this. How did you find me, and what drove you to do so? What drives Mr Bartholomew Bartleby to dig so deeply to find that which I worked very hard to ensure would never be found?” There was menace in those words, but curiosity as well. A frustration tempered with professionalism. 

Bartleby took a deep breath, rubbing his hands together and suddenly missing the warmth and comfort of his tea. 

“My work for the historical society involves making a record of stories of the times, of recording snippets of history, and grasping what might be missed as part of it, lost along the wayside. A scholar records history, but that recording is based upon the information that people like me uncover.” He turned, and grasped his teacup, holding it in both hands again. “I ask questions. I am quite skilled at it—I ask questions people do not see the harm in answering, because they do not realise the story that they are in fact truly privy to. I ask about days, and dates, and things that they saw, who did what.” He turned the cup around in his hands, and took a sip of the cooling tea, his gaze drifting downwards, a frown on his face. “The Ripper mystery has been one that has been on the mind of London—indeed, on the entire civilised world—ever since the headlines first struck. Five dead women, torn to pieces, each worse than the last. And no killer caught.” He shook his head. “A mystery. Even now, six years later, people have not forgotten him, and people still think he is out there. The Ripper mystery was my case, my piece of history to record, so I went out into Whitechapel and started to ask questions, to see what part of the story could be gleaned, to see if there was more to it for the books.

“I started to hear things. Between each memory, there were these… strange silences, or words and phrases. Talk of a man who asked strange questions, not like the ones the police asked, on strange subjects they did not understand. Who had a strange smell about him, like spices or herbs. Who never gave his name, but some nevertheless seemed to know who he was. When I found one of the ones who knew him,, they would not say. I wanted to know why the man asked such strange questions. About what drove him to do things, and why no one spoke of him.” He looked up from his teacup. “A man whom people feared but would not name. And I found that strange, sir. I found it strange that people who would talk about ‘Old Merry Jack’ would not speak of the man with strange questions. They would tell me as little as possible.”

A finger lifted from the glass, hovering out of the darkness, and pointed at him. “But you did get a name. You would not be here without having a name first. I shall not ask who said it you—I already know who told you. I suppose I should have expected it. But you learned a name. All the police and all the journalists and investigators of London, all asking for names and this and that, crawling through the muck and you, little Mr Bartleby, you found out things other people could not or would not.” The levelled finger lowered. “It was either luck and providence, or skill and effort. I would know which.”

Bartleby was muted a touch, saying nothing as he held his tea, but his grip tightened as a flicker of smugness lit a fire in his soul then, a surety of knowledge. It smouldered there, with the confidence that he had found who it was he had been looking for. 

For a moment, the silence dragged, and he wondered if it would simply roll on, two men in shadow by firelight, unwilling to speak, dragging on until dawn and the ending of the world, unless one or the other dispelled the quiet.

Another of those contemptuous snorts was his sarcastic salvation. “All the effort in the world could be expended in fruitless endeavours, and most lives are wasted in such ways.” The glass vanished into the shadow again. “Perhaps hard work came into it as well, experience guiding you on the road. However, luck is something else. Luck is something you cannot account for, but sometimes have to rely on.” The glass reappeared, and the man opposite leaned forward. “But I would wager on your luck now, Mister Bartholomew Bartleby. I would wager heavily upon it. Can you guess upon which way I would place the gamble to fall?” 

There was something in the way he said it. Something about those words had a dagger in it, giving Bartleby reason to pause and hesitate. He did not answer the question, seeing a trap of presumption when presented with it, but instead spoke hesitantly. “The man who told me your name… a Mister Caldwell… may I ask what became of him? For I assure you, he did not mean to tell me what he knew. I caught him unawares. There was no malice in his admission.”

The hard set eyes did not waver. “I shall let you guess upon what happened to Mister Caldwell. He knew full well that the betrayal of confidence would cost him dearly, and it is a price I have ensured he has paid already.” Bartleby’s mind swarmed with images of bodies wrapped in sackcloth, set with stones and cast into the Thames, the great graveyard of the underbelly of London.

“Do you intend to kill me, sir?” He spoke it quietly, surprised at how clearly he said it. For he was shaking within, his heart pounding in his throat as his fear rose up, but his voice was somehow steady. He looked the man opposite him full in the face.

A flicker of the lips into a smile, but it was bereft of humour. “Say my name.”

Bartleby took a deep, ragged breath, holding it for a heartbeat before letting it out. The man before him had not answered his question, and that, perhaps, was confirmation in of itself, as his dreadful imagination then promised him. Then, falsifying a confidence he did not feel, he spoke. 

“You are the man who killed Jack the Ripper. You are Jean Reynard.”