Special Assignments (23 page)

The other individuals present reacted more violently to the Collegiate Counsellor's brash announcement.

'You must be out of your mind' exclaimed Head Police Master Yurovsky.

'It's absolutely incredible!' bleated the Prosecutor.

The Investigator for Especially Important Cases did not dare to say anything out loud, because his rank was too low to permit the taking of such liberties, but he did purse his plump lips as if he were outraged by Fandorin's insane outburst.

'What do you mean - cancelled?' Dolgorukoi repeated in a flat voice.

The door leading to the inner chambers opened slightly, and the valet's face emerged halfway from behind it.

The Governor began speaking with extreme agitation, hurrying so much that he swallowed syllables and even entire words: 'Erast Petrovich, it's not the first year... you... idle words... But cancel His Majesty's visit? Why, that's a scandal of unprecedented proportions! You've no idea what effort I ... For me, for all of us, it's

Fandorin frowned, wrinkling his high, clear forehead. He knew perfectly well how long Dolgorukoi had manoeuvred and intrigued in order to arrange the Emperor's visit, and how the hostile St Petersburg 'camarilla' had plotted and schemed against it - they had been trying for twenty years to unseat the cunning old Governor from his enviable position! His Majesty's Easter
impromptu
would be a triumph for the Prince, sure testimony to the invincibility of his position. And next year His Excellency had a highly important anniversary: sixty years of service at officer's rank. With an event like that he could even hope for the Order of St Andrew. How could he suddenly turn around and ask for the trip to be cancelled!

'I understand all th-that, Your Excellency, but if it is not cancelled, things will be even worse. This case of mutilation is not the last.' The Collegiate Counsellor's face became more sombre with every word that he spoke. 'I am afraid that Jack the Ripper has moved to Moscow'

Once again, as several minutes earlier, Erast Petrovich's declaration provoked a chorus of protests.

'What do you mean - not the last?' the Governor-General asked indignantly.

The Head Police Master and the Public Prosecutor spoke almost with a single voice: 'Jack the Ripper?'

Izhitsin gathered his courage and snorted. 'Stuff and nonsense!'

'What ripper's that?' Frol Vedishchev croaked from behind his little door in the natural pause that followed.

'Yes, yes, who is this Jack?' His Excellency gazed at his subordinates in obvious displeasure. 'Everybody knows; I'm the only one who hasn't been informed. It's always the same with you.'

'Your Excellency, he is a famous English murderer who kills streetwalkers in London,' the District Prosecutor explained in his pompous fashion.

'If you will permit me, Your Excellency, I will explain in detail.'

Erast Petrovich took a notebook out of his pocket and skimmed through several pages.

The Prince cupped one hand round his ear, Vedishchev put on a pair of spectacles with thick lenses and Izhitsin smiled ironically.

'As Your Excellency no doubt remembers, last year I spent several months in England in connection with a case with which you are familiar: the disappearance of the correspondence of Catherine the Great. Indeed, Vladimir Andreevich, you even expressed your dissatisfaction at my extended absence. I stayed in London longer than absolutely necessary because I was following very closely the attempts of the local police to find a monstrous killer who had committed eight brutal murders in the East End in the space of eight months, from April to December. The killer acted in a most audacious fashion. He wrote notes to the police, in which he called himself "Jack the Ripper" and on one occasion he even sent the commissioner who was in charge of the case half of a kidney that he had cut out of one of his victims.'

'Cut out? But what for?' the Prince asked in amazement.

'The Popper's outrages had a tremendously distressing effect on the public, but not simply because of the murders. In a city as large and ill-favoured as London there is naturally no shortage of crimes, including those that involve bloodshed. But the manner in which the Ripper despatched his victims was genuinely monstrous. He usually cut the poor women's throats and then disembowelled them, like partridges, and laid out their entrails in a kind of nightmarish still life.'

'Holy Mother of God!' Vedishchev gasped and crossed himself.

'The abominations you speak of!' the Governor said with feeling: 'Well then, did they not catch the villain?'

'No, but since December the distinctive murders have ceased. The police have concluded that the criminal has either committed suicide or ... left England.'

'And what else would he do except come to see us in Moscow?' said the Head Police Master, with a sceptical shake of his head. 'But if that is the case, finding and catching an English cut-throat is child's play'

Why are you so sure that he is English?' Fandorin asked, turning to the general. All the murders were committed in the slums of London, the home of many immigrants from the continent of Europe, including Russians. Indeed, in the first instance the English police suspected immigrant doctors.'

And why doctors in particular?' Izhitsin asked.

'Because in every case the internal organs were extracted from the victims with great skill, with excellent knowledge of anatomy and also almost certainly with the use of a surgical scalpel. The London police were absolutely convinced that Jack the Ripper was a doctor or a medical student.'

Public Prosecutor Kozlyatnikov raised a well-tended white finger and the diamond ring on it glinted.

'But what makes you think that the spinster Andreichkina was killed and mutilated by the Ripper from London? As if we had no murderers of our own? Some son of a bitch got so tanked up on drink he didn't know what he was doing and imagined he was fighting some dragon or other. We have any number of those.'

The Collegiate Counsellor sighed and replied patiently: 'My dear sir, you've read the report from the forensic medical expert. No one in a drunken fury can dissect so precisely, and use "a cutting tool of surgical sharpness". That is one. And also, just as in the East End cases, there are none of the signs of sexual debauchery which are usual in crimes of this kind. That is two. The most sinister point is the imprint of a bloody kiss on the victim's cheek, and that is three. All of the Ripper's victims had that imprint - on the forehead, on the cheek, sometimes on the temple. Inspector Gilson, from whom I learned this detail, was not inclined to attach any importance to it, since the Ripper had plenty of other freakish whims. However, from the limited amount of information that forensic science possesses on maniacal murderers, we know that these fiends attach great significance to ritual. Serial killings with the features of manic behaviour are always based on some kind of "idea" that prompts the monster into repeatedly killing strangers. While I was in London, I tried to explain to the officers in charge of the investigation that their main task was to guess the maniac's "idea" and the rest was merely a matter of investigative technique. There can be no doubt at all that the typical features of Jack the Ripper's ritual and that of our Moscow murderer are identical in every respect.'

'But even so, it's just too fantastic,' said General Yurovsky with a shake of his head. 'For Jack the Ripper to disappear from London and turn up in a woodshed on Samotechnaya Street... And then, you must agree, cancelling the sovereign's visit just because some prostitute has been killed ...'

Erast Petrovich's patience was clearly almost exhausted, because he said rather sharply: 'Permit me to remind Your Excellency that the case of Jack the Ripper cost the head of London's police his job, and the Home Secretary also lost his position, because they refused for too long to attach any importance to the murders of "some prostitutes or other". Even if we assume that we now have our own, home-grown Ivan the Ripper, that does not improve the situation. Once he has tasted blood, he won't stop. Just imagine the situation if the killer hands us another present like today's during the Emperor's visit! And if it comes out that it is not the first such crime? The old capital will have a fine Easter Sunday.'

Prince Dolgorukoi crossed himself in fright and General Yurovsky raised a hand to unbutton his gold-embroidered collar.

'It is a genuine miracle that this time we have managed to hush up such a fantastic case.' The Collegiate Counsellor ran his fingers over his foppish black moustache, seeming preoccupied. 'But have we really managed it?'

A deadly silence fell.

'Do as you wish, Prince,' Vedishchev said from behind his door, 'but he's right. Write to our father the Tsar. Tell him this and that, and there's been a bit of a muddle. It's to our own detriment, but for the sake of Your Majesty's peace of mind we humbly request you not to come to Moscow.'

'Oh, Lord.' The Governor's voice trembled pitifully

Izhitsin stood up and, gazing loyally at his exalted superior, suggested a possible way out: 'Your Excellency, could you not refer to the exceptionally high water? As they say, the Lord of Heaven must take the blame for that.'

'Well done, Pizhitsin, well done,' said the Prince, brightening up. 'You have a good head. That's what I shall write. If only the newspapers don't manage to ferret out this business of the mutilation.'

Investigator Izhitsin glanced condescendingly at Erast Petrovich and sat down, but not in the same way as before, with half a buttock on a quarter of the stool, but fully at his ease, as an equal among equals.

However, the expression of relief that had appeared on the Prince's face was almost immediately replaced by dismay.

'It won't do any good! The truth will come out anyway. If Erast Petrovich says this won't be the last atrocity, then it won't be. He is rarely mistaken.'

Fandorin cast an emphatically quizzical glance at the Governor, as if to say: Ah, I see, so there are times when I am mistaken!'

At this point the Head Police Master began breathing heavily through his nose, lowered his head guiltily and said in a deep voice: 'I don't know if it's the last case or not, but it probably isn't the first. I am to blame, Governor; I didn't attach any importance to it, I did not wish to bother you over trifles. But today's murder looked too provocative altogether, and so I decided to report it to you in view of the Emperor's visit. However, I recall now that in recent times brutal murders of streetwalkers and female vagrants have probably been on the increase. During Shrovetide, I think it was, there was a report of a female beggar found on Seleznevskaya Street with her stomach slashed to ribbons. And before that, at the Sukharev Market, they found a prostitute with her womb cut out. We didn't even investigate the case of the beggar - there was no point - and we decided the prostitute's ponce had mutilated her in a drunken fit. We took the fellow in, but he still hasn't confessed; he's being stubborn.'

Ah, General Yurovsky how could you?' said the Governor, throwing his hands in the air. 'If we had launched an investigation straight away and set Erast Petrovich on the case, perhaps we might have already caught this villain! And we wouldn't have had to cancel His Highness's visit!'

'But Your Excellency, who could have known? - there was no deliberate deception. You know yourself what the city is like, and the people are blackguards; there's something of the kind every single day! I can't bother Your Excellency with every petty incident!' the General said, almost whining in his attempt to justify himself, and he looked round at the Public Prosecutor and the investigator for support, but Kozlyatnikov was gazing sternly at the chief of police and Izhitsin shook his head reproachfully, as if to say: 'This is not good.'

Collegiate Counsellor Fandorin interrupted the General's lament with a curt question: "Where are the bodies?'

'Where else would they be but at the Bozhedomka? That's where they bury all the dissolutes, idlers and people without passports. If there are any signs of violence, they take them to the police morgue first, to Egor Zakharov, and after that they ship them over to the cemetery there. That's the procedure.'

'We have to carry out an exhumation,' Fandorin said, with a grimace of disgust. 'And with no delay. Check the records at the morgue to see which female individuals have recently - let's say, since the New Year - been brought in with indications of violent death. And exhume them. Check for similarities in the picture of the crime. See if there have been any similar incidents. The ground has not thawed out yet, the c-corpses ought to be perfectly preserved.'

The Public Prosecutor nodded: 'I'll issue instructions. You deal with this, Izhitsin. And how about you, Erast Petrovich -would you not care to be present? It would be most desirable to have your participation.'

Izhitsin grinned sourly - apparently he did not consider the Collegiate Counsellor's participation to be so very desirable.

Fandorin suddenly turned pale - he had remembered his recent shameful attack of nausea. He struggled with himself for a moment, but failed to master his weakness: ‘I’ll assign m-my assistant Tulipov to help Izhitsin. I think that will be adequate.'

The heavy job was finished after eight in the evening, by the light of flaming torches.

As a finishing touch, the ink-black sky began pouring down a cold, sticky rain and the landscape of the cemetery, which was bleak in any case, became dismal enough to make you want to fall face down into one of the excavated graves and sleep in the embrace of mother earth - anything not to see those puddles of filth, waterlogged mounds of soil and crooked crosses.

Izhitsin was giving the orders. There were six men digging: two of the constables who had been at the scene of the crime, kept on the investigation in order not to extend the circle of people who knew about the case, two long-serving gendarmes and two of the Bozhedomka gravediggers, without whom they would not have been able to manage the job. First they had thrown the thick, spongy mud aside with their spades and then, when the metal blades struck the unthawed ground, they had taken up their picks. The cemetery's watchman had showed them where to dig.