“Officially, we say learn what possible motive set all this in motion.”
“Good luck, my friend, but beware the truth.”
Ransom reacted with a deep glare into Philo’s eyes. “Waste no time putting distance between Chicago and the ladies. Off to Mackinaw, and tell no one your destination.”
“Promise.”
“And try…try to explain to Jane and Gabby for me, please.”
“No one is likely to applaud your actions, Ransom.”
“I want no applause, nor expect absolution afterward.”
“How long then until we might expect to hear from you?”
“As long as it takes. Look…look at him, sitting atop his cab now, moving off as if…so damn smug.”
“I suppose even if you could get the goods on him, it would take a long time to see justice done, and they’d likely give him a suite at Straight-jacket Academy.”
“Cook County Asylum, where at everyone’s expense Christian Fenger will be his keeper to study him like a zoological wonder.”
“And what justice for the dead?”
The question hung in the air between the two men, both of whom had lost people they’d loved to the fiend.
“You naive wonder, Philo.”
“Naive? How so?”
“Whenever have you seen real justice meted out?”
“I-I…dunno, really.”
“You haven’t. Few have! When does it happen? True justice found in this life?”
As he spoke, Ransom had watched Denton take on a new fare. The hansom cab carrying a new passenger from this section of the fair to another with Waldo Denton sitting taller, prouder atop it. Alastair then saw Chief Kohler closely watching Ransom’s reaction to facing his dead partner. Kohler had been made curious of the whispers passing between Ransom and the former suspect, Philo Keane. What scheme is Nathan now hatching?
Philo asked, “What do you want, Rance?”
“What do I want?”
“Yes, in the best possible world?”
Ransom shook inside with what he wanted as an outcome. He walked in a small circle, contemplating the depth of his hatred for the so-called Phantom. His new wolf’s-head cane tapped at the pavement like small-caliber fire.
Finally, Ransom answered his friend. “What do I want to see happen? Eye for eye, tooth for tooth. And it shall come to pass in a time of my choosing.”
Just then Dr. Tewes himself stood alongside Ransom, pushing between him and Philo. She saw Griffin Drimmer’s body being eased down by Shanks and Gwinn, and she saw Dr. Christian Fenger crossing himself where he stood alongside as the body was laid on a stretcher. Fenger leaned in so close, while the county prosecutor, Hiram Kehoe, stood off to one side, whispering in Nathan Kohler’s ear. Carmichael, the Herald reporter, and a small army of others of his profession were crawling all over this new fresh kill, headlines in their eyes: the phantom returns. A spectacular return it was, too, and obviously meant to strike at Ransom.
Something about the scene reminded Jane of a crucifixion and a sacrifice, as though it had been inevitable that young Griffin give up his life on the altar of these men’s egos and their political wrangling, and to some degree she could not help but blame Alastair Ransom as well. The war between him and Nathan Kohler had brought this about, and young Griff had died a horrible death as a result of their petty differences and the hatred between Ransom and Kohler-which after all had contributed to Denton’s release.
Her voice broke when she shouted, “This is all your faults! All of you!”
She pulled from Alastair’s attempted touch meant to calm Dr. Tewes here in public. She saw that he wanted to console her, take her in his arms and hold her.
She rushed off after her own carriage, and he looked for Gabrielle to be hanging from the window, giving Ransom a slight wave of one hand, two fingers extended as was her habit, but Gabby did not appear. Perhaps young Gabby was the only one in the city who truly did not judge him…up till now. If she were with Jane, perhaps Gabby could not face him, knowing that Griffin had been killed just after taking his place.
“Follow Tewes, Philo. Convince him that he must get his women out of the city.”
“You’d have me baby-sitting Dr. Tewes as well?”
“Tewes as well, yes! Tell Tewes that I confided in you everything. She will understand.”
“You mean he will understand, don’t you?”
“Philo, just do it.”
“Of course. But how safe are you with those jackals there?” His eyes indicated Kehoe, Kohler, and Carmichael. “And when did Carmichael stop being a reporter and turn into a lackey?”
“Philo…go. Pack a few things and quietly get them down to the train station and out of harm’s way. If I’m right, it could’ve been any one of you left disfigured and dangling here.”
“But if you’re right about Denton, and what you say about his infatuation with Gabrielle Tewes is correct, then-”
“No! I will not use her to bait this monster. Now do as I bloody well said!”
“All right, all right, calm down.” Philo finally started off for his assignment.
“Use the girl for bait,” Ransom muttered. The awful idea had crossed his mind but was at once instantly rejected. It’d be like using his own daughter to lure a fiend out of hiding. He would not place her in such jeopardy, and if left in the city much longer, she would likely come to think of doing just that on her own. No, he must relocate her and her mother to a far place.
Like a patient, all-knowing wolf, at the right moment he would pounce on Denton and tear him to pieces with his bare hands, his bear claws. He would send Denton out of this world and to the Hades from which he’d come, but first he would know why Denton killed as he did, and what possible personal connection they had-why the vendetta aimed at him from the beginning?
From the beginning he’d planned on killing his Polly-Merielle and of framing Philo Keane, the two people closest to Ransom-and now this. Killing young Griff and shoving it into Ransom’s face. Public humiliation and private punishment for what wrongs, he could not know for certain, but he’d begun to approach a damned good guess.
He slid to the stones of the Science and Industry Pavilion, one of the few permanent structures built here at the fair, one that would remain forever as a marker and a reminder of the greatest fair the city had ever known. He knew he must sit now or else go to his knees, and he chose to allow no one to see him on his knees, not to this fiend-not a second time.
CHAPTER 5
Gabrielle was suddenly standing before the seated Inspector Ransom on the pavilion steps below an intense sun. Griffin’s body had been hauled off, but the stain of where his remains had been defiled remained nearby. “Inspector Drimmer requested this information, sir, and learning that he…that he is…no longer among us…well, I know he was working in close tandem with you, Inspector.”
“Gabby?” He looked up from where he sat on the hot steps of the museum pavilion. His face telegraphed how stunned he was to see her. “I thought you were in the carriage with your mother. I asked Philo to get the two of you out of the city for a few days while…until there’s an end to this madness.”
“I’m not going anywhere, and I doubt my mother would agree to it either. She called me at the Des Plaines station house-”
“Called for you at my station house?”
“Yes, I’ve a job there now.” She handed him one manila file while holding back a second.
“Wait, hold on…what…Just what’re you doing with an official police report?” He waved the papers she’d handed him. “And what’re you doing here?”
“Look…look at the report, Inspector.”
Ransom read the official police report. It was a list of aliases for a name he had hoped never to see again, Campaneua.
“Who put you up to this?” His voice startled her.
“I told you. Inspector Drimmer. He requested it last night over the phone.”