Chapter 46

His superior was quiet, puffing absently on his carved walnut pipe as he listened attentively. He couldn’t afford not to, Alec supposed. The old man was of a Victorian vintage and had been a thrusting young whip during the Ripper case and one of the senior detectives involved in the Sidney Street siege. He understood all too well that prevention was better than cure. His reputation was a good one. Yes, he played the game of politics well. But he had come up through the ranks and he understood what it was like to actually be on the streets trying to catch criminals.

Alec laid out what he had observed himself, what the pathologist had found, and what the witnesses had attested.

“So, you think there’s something, erm…peculiar…going on, do you?” he asked, once Alec had finished, blinking at the ridiculousness of his own story.