He kept running, turning left and right at random, using the narrowness of the streets, always shying away from a light in the sky behind him. He was in Whitechapel proper now, and wasn’t that ironic! A great story was building here. He wondered how he’d tell it. He’d be the potential victim, obviously. ‘I Faced the Ripper … and Lived!’ The story would help him if anyone started wondering about his connection to the deaths tonight.
He ran out into a municipal open space, a playground with nobody in it, with narrow walkways between houses in all directions. Perfect! He chose one at random and ran for it.
A second before he reached the corner, the illumination washed over him like a searchlight and he felt his breath and adrenalin pump again. He flattened himself around the corner. Had she seen him? The light had stopped. He dared a glance around the wet brickwork.
She was just standing there, in the playground, silver now streaming from the eyes of the mask. It was billowing off her, up into the sky, lit up by the street lights. She looked like a crashed aircraft. The suit looked as if it was hanging on a stick figure. The hat fell from her head. She dropped to her knees. She made gestures to try to rise. He heard faint sounds from her mouth.
He stepped out from his hiding place. She looked up at him and he flinched, ready to run again. But she made no move towards him. A great pool of freezing silver was slowly spreading out around her like blood. The melting snow woman. She was still following his programming for her, to allow the victim to see everything of his pursuer, even now, when the victim was meant to be him. She was jerking, trying to make anything work, and with every movement she lost more fuel.
He took a step closer to her, relishing his victory. He was panting with exertion and relief, alive with the blood pounding in his veins, every muscle feeling it. He was even erect. He felt the sweat between him and his shirt, felt his muscles fresh from a workout at the edge of vitality, felt the arousal of the chase, of having survived it. He silenced a laugh of relief.
She was subsiding, the material of her body dissolving. She was trying to say something to him, it seemed — some last curse. But the volume was so low it sounded almost gentle.
Now all that was left was a mask and a bagful of bones in some discarded clothes, swimming in a pool of silver. As Vincent watched, the mask and clothes began to dissolve too.
Vincent stepped quickly through the silver liquid, aware of how cold it made his feet through his shoes. He’d have to be quick. He took a handkerchief out of his pocket. If the mask would stay together, he wanted it, wanted to get himself photographed with it, the image that would sell the story that he too had been hunted by the Ripper tonight.
He squatted, reached down towards the puddle of silver, his handkerchief wrapped around his hand. He was just about to touch the mask when he saw something moving in the liquid silver in front of him.
A hand burst up out of it and grabbed his tie. It was an old woman’s hand, covered in some sort of dye.
He was about to wrench himself back in panic when her other hand rose up out of the silver. This one held the razor he had made for her.
‘No!’ he shouted. ‘No!’
The rest of his words became a long scream.
* * *
Costain and Quill looked down at the butchered body of Russell Vincent. He had been slashed many times across the chest and neck, and the space between his legs was torn open. His dead eyes looked up in horror and lack of understanding. He was surrounded by a pool of his own blood and by a pool of gently billowing silver. They’d followed the Twitter trail here and, in the absence of any other officers, would surely fail to create any sort of barrier between the crime scene and the news teams that were bound to start arriving shortly.
‘Was that what you wanted?’ Costain asked Quill.
Quill couldn’t find an answer. What he wanted was for there to be a law that applied equally to Vincent and to himself, to those who saw themselves above it, and to those who enforced it. He’d had no other ideas of how to bring this to an end. His only consolation was how empty it left him feeling. He hoped he hadn’t done this as the result of a cycle of abuse. ‘If only this had been a Ripper we could have caught, that we could have shown to London in handcuffs. There’s no reason now for Londoners to think the killings will stop. And when the media hear the Ripper’s killed Russell Vincent, it’ll increase the sense of chaos exponentially. How do we prove that the law still works and turn this shit around?’
There was a noise from behind them. Lofthouse arrived. She was staring in amazement at Quill.
‘Yeah,’ he said. He wondered if she’d hug him or something.
She looked him up and down and finally nodded. ‘Right,’ she said.
‘Indeed.’
‘Good,’ she said, then seemed to decide she had to put a stop to this unseemly outpouring of emotion. ‘There’s been a vote of no confidence. There’s going to be a general election.’
‘What about Vincent’s allies in the military?’ said Costain.
‘The military are actually containing a lot of the far right protests,’ said Lofthouse. ‘The death of Vincent, which has now hit the media as the biggest headline of the lot, means that a lot of people who were thinking of acting rashly have now thought better of it.’
Costain’s phone rang, and he answered it. He suddenly looked urgent when he heard who was on the other end, held his hand up for silence. He seemed to be deciding what to say. ‘No,’ he said, speaking carefully. ‘I’m another police officer, but DI Quill is right here beside me. I’ll hand you over.’ He mouthed the name of the caller as he handed Quill the phone.
Quill took it. ‘Hello Mary,’ he said.
* * *
They waited at the corner of the street, underneath dripping arches, watching dawn make its way into the narrow streets. Costain, because Quill didn’t feel he could call up any police yet and announce he was still alive, had found some National Crime Agency staff who’d stayed at their post at the Hill, and so a car with a driver stood ready round the corner to take their guest into what they now were sure would be safe protective custody. Costain was trying only to think of the moment, though his thoughts kept leaping back to Ross, just as, with the chemicals draining from his system, his brain kept reaching out for dreams. He wished he could see her. He desperately wanted to hear news of her, though he couldn’t bring himself to text Sefton and ask. He wanted to touch her. He’d never get to do that again. The Lisa Ross of his dreams and the real one were, for several moments as the sun rose, mixed up. He felt he’d been told something reassuring by her. Then, a moment later, he knew that wasn’t true.
A taxi pulled up. Out of it stepped someone he had never seen in the flesh before, only on CCTV images — Mary Arthur. She looked very young and very scared. Costain showed her his warrant card and told her his name and rank. Quill and Lofthouse did the same.
‘Is Russell Vincent really dead?’ she asked.
‘Yeah,’ said Quill. ‘Which makes it a lot easier for us to protect you. If, that is, you’re willing to give evidence in the matter of your dealings with Michael Spatley MP, and what happened on the night of the death of Rupert Rudlin.’
That, thought Costain, might begin to sell a new narrative to the public, one which might indeed send London stumbling off on a different course.
Mary seemed to consider for a moment.
‘There won’t be any reward involved,’ said Lofthouse, gently. ‘There can’t be.’
She looked suddenly angry. ‘I’ll tell you all about it,’ she said. ‘Money isn’t everything.’
EPILOGUE
Sarah Quill was startled to see the name appear on her phone. She felt dizzy, felt the blood come to her face, felt anger rising. She was standing in the hallway, having just stood up from buttoning Jessica into her coat. She answered the call. ‘Who is this?’