Ripping Time

Chapter Thirteen

Cold and rainy weather inflicts enormous suffering on those with lung ailments. The dampness and the chill seep down into the chest, worsening congestion until each breath drawn is a struggle to lift the weight of a boulder which has settled atop the ribcage, crushing the lungs down against the spine. Worse than the aching heaviness, however, are the prolonged coughing spells which leave devastating weakness in their wake, transforming a simple stroll across six feet of floor space into a marathon-distance struggle.

Cold, wet weather is bad enough when the air is clean. Add to it the smoke of multiple millions of coal-burning fireplaces and stoves, the industrial spewage of factory smokestacks, smelting plants, and iron works, and the rot and mold of anything organic left lying on the ground or in the streets or stacked along water-logged, dockside marshes, and the resulting putrid filth will irritate already-burdened lungs into a state of chronic misery. Toss in the systemic, wasting effects of tuberculosis and the slow deterioration of organs, brain tissues, and mental clarity brought on by advanced syphilis and the result is a slow, pain-riddled slide toward death.

Eliza Anne Chapman had been sliding down that fatal slope for a long time.

The summer and early autumn of 1888 had broken records for chilly temperatures and heavy rainfall. By the first week of September, Annie was so ill, she was unable to pay for her room at Crossingham's lodging house on Dorset Street with anything approaching regularity. Most of what she earned or was given by Edward Stanley—a bricklayer's mate with whom she had established a long-term relationship after the death of her husband—went to pay for medicines. A serious fight with Eliza Cooper, whom Annie had caught trying to palm a florin belonging to a mutual acquaintance, substituting a penny for the more valuable coin, had left Annie bruised and aching, with a swollen temple, blackened eye, and bruised breast where the other woman had punched her.

She had confidently expected to receive money soon for the letters she'd bought from Polly Nichols, to pay for the medicines she desperately needed. But no money was forthcoming from Polly or from the anonymous writer of the letters she carried in her pocket. Then, to Annie's intense shock, Polly was brutally murdered, more hideously stabbed and mutilated than poor Martha Tabram had been, back on August Bank Holiday. Even if Annie had wanted to ask Polly who the letter writer had been, it was now impossible. So Annie had dug out the letters to look at them more closely—and realized immediately there would be no money coming, either, not anytime soon. Had Annie been able to read Welsh, she might have been able to turn the letters into a substantial amount of cash very quickly. But Annie couldn't read Welsh. Nor did she know anyone who could.

Which left her with a commodity worth a great deal of money and no way to realize the fortune it represented. So she did the only thing she could. She sold the letters, just as Polly had sold them to her. One went to a long-time acquaintance from the lodging houses along Dorset Street. Long Liz Stride was a kind-hearted soul born in Sweden, who bought the first letter for sixpence, which was enough for Annie to go to Spitalfields workhouse infirmary and buy one of the medications she needed.

The second letter went to Catharine Eddowes for a groat, and the third Annie sold to Mr. Joseph Barnett, a fish-porter who'd lost his job and was living in Miller's Court with the beautiful young Mary Kelly. Mr. Barnett paid Annie a shilling for the last letter, giving her a wink and a kiss. "My Mary lived in Cardiff, y'know, speaks Welsh like a native, for all she was born in Ireland. Mary'll read it out for me, so she will. And if it's as good as you say, I'll come back and give you a bonus from the payout!"

The groat, worth four pence, and the shilling, worth twelve, bought Annie the rest of the medicine she needed from Whitechapel workhouse infirmary, plus a steady supply of beer and rum for the next couple of days. Alcohol was the only form of pain medication Annie could afford to buy and she was in pain constantly. She felt too ill most of the time to walk the streets, particularly all the way down to Stratford, where she normally plied her trade; but the medicine helped. If only the weather would clear, she might be able to breathe more easily again.

Annie regretted the sale of the letters. But a woman had to live, hadn't she? And blackmail was such a distasteful trade, no matter how a body looked at it. Polly had dazzled her with fanciful dreams of real comfort and proper medicines, but in Annie's world, such dreams were only for the foolish, people who didn't realize they couldn't afford to indulge their fancies when there was food to be gotten into the stomach and medicine to be obtained and a roof and bed to be paid for, somehow...

Being a practical woman, Annie put those brief, glittering dreams firmly behind her and got back to the business of staying alive as long as humanly possible in a world which did not care about the fate of one aging and consumptive widow driven to prostitution by sheer poverty. It wasn't much of a life, perhaps. But it was all she had. So, like countless thousands before her, "Dark Annie" Chapman made the best of it she could and kept on living—without the faintest premonition that utter disaster hung over her head like the executioner's sword.

Skeeter Jackson had an uncanny nose for trouble.

And this time, he landed right in the middle of it. One moment, he was intent on reaching Urbs Romae to join the Festival of Mars procession, having been delayed by a man moving suspiciously behind a woman gowned in expensive Japanese silk. The next, Skeeter found himself stranded between a solid wall of Angels of Grace Militia on his left and a whole pack of Ansar Majlis sympathizers and construction workers to his right.

He tried to backpedal, but it was far too late. Somebody's fist connected with an Ansar Majlis sympathizer's nose. Blood spurted. A roar went up from both sides, Ansar Majlis Brotherhood and Angels of Grace Militia. The crowd surged, fists swinging. A kiosk full of t-shirts and Ripper photo books toppled. Someone yelled obscenities as merchandise was trampled underfoot. A reek of sweat abused Skeeter's nostrils. Combatants plunged, dripping, into Edo Castletown's goldfish ponds, sending prehistoric birds flapping and screeching in protest from the trampled shrubbery. Then a ham-handed fist clouted his shoulder and the riot engulfed him.

Skeeter spun away from the blow. He tripped and teetered over the edge of the overturned kiosk, trying to keep his balance. Somebody hit him from the side. Skeeter yelled and slammed face first into a total stranger. He found himself tangled up with a viciously swearing woman, who sported a bleeding nose and a black uniform. Her eyes narrowed savagely. Angels of Grace hated all men, unless they worshipped the Lady of Heaven, and even then, they were suspicious of treason. Skeeter swore—and ducked a thick-knuckled fist aimed at his nose. He twisted, using moves he'd learned scrapping in the camp of the Yakka Mongols, trying to stay alive when the camp's other boys had decided to test the fighting skills and agility of their newly arrived bogdo.

Skeeter's lightning move sent the screeching woman into the waiting arms of a roaring Ansar Majlis construction worker. The collision was spectacular. Skeeter winced. Then yelped and ducked behind the toppled kiosk, dodging another pair of locked, grappling combatants. He stared wildly around for a way out and didn't find anything remotely resembling an escape route. Not four feet away, Kit Carson stood calmly at the center of the riot, casually tossing bodies this way and that, regardless of size, mass, onrushing speed, or religious and political affiliations. The retired scout's expression wavered between disgust and boredom. A whole pile of bodies had accumulated at his feet, growing steadily even as Skeeter watched, awestruck.

Then a crash of drums and a screaming wail from a piper jerked Skeeter's attention around. The Festival of Mars processional had arrived. Just in time to be engulfed in battle. Skeeter caught a confused glimpse of misshapen, shaggy shapes like hirsute kodiak bears. Women in ring-mail armor who resembled a cartoonist's vision of ancient valkyries staggered into view, complete with shields, spears, and swords. Mixed in were several keen-eyed old women in ragged skins, whose screeches in Old Norse lifted the hair on Skeeter's nape.

Kynan Rhys Gower appeared from out of the melee, dressed in the uniform he'd been wearing when the Welsh bowman had stumbled through that unstable gate into the Battle of Orleans, fighting the French army under the command of Joan of Arc. Several other down-timers sported Roman-style armor, hand-made for this very festival out of metal cans and other scraps salvaged from the station's refuse bins. There was even a Spaniard clutching a blunderbuss, wild-eyed and shouting in medieval Spanish as the procession slammed headlong into the riot.

The shock of collision drove tourists scattering for their very lives.

Shangri-La's down-timers fought a pitched battle—and they fought dirty.

A wild-eyed construction worker reeled back from a sword blow, blood streaming down his face from the gash in his scalp. A black-unformed ferret staggered past, locked in mortal combat with a six-foot bearskin draped over the head and down the back of a six-foot-eight Viking berserker. Skeeter dimly recognized the man under the bearskin as Eigil Bjarneson, a down-timer who'd stumbled through Valhalla's Thor's Gate several months previously. A sushi lunch stand swayed and crashed to the floor, spilling water and live fish underfoot. Several combatants slipped on the wriggling, slippery contents of the broken aquarium and fell. Skeeter caught a glimpse of onrushing motion from the corner of one eye and jumped back instinctively. A spear missed his midriff by inches, whistling past to embed itself in the wooden slats of a bench behind him

The spear's intended victim, a roaring Ansar Majlis sympathizer, pulled a mortar trowel from his tool belt and launched himself at the ring-mail clad woman who'd thrown the spear. Then a giant Angel in black, screaming obscenities in tones to bend metal, lunged right at Skeeter. Obligingly, Skeeter grasped the woman's outstretched arms and assisted her on her way, planting one foot and turning his hip in an effortless Aikido move he'd been practicing for months, now. For just an instant, the startled Militia Angel was airborne. Then the park bench behind Skeeter, complete with protruding spear, splintered under the Angel's landing. If Skeeter hadn't been practicing—and teaching his down-time friends—martial arts moves like that one, he'd have been under that mountain of curse-spitting Angel.

Then a man in a red shirt and burnoose, eyes wild and distorted, came in from Skeeter's off-side, and caught him while he still teetered off balance. Skeeter went down hard. He knew, at least, how to fall without doing himself injury, another legacy of scrapping fights with Yakka Mongol youngsters heavier and stronger than he was. Unfortunately, the man in red was heavy, too. A great deal heavier than Skeeter. And he landed right on top of Skeeter's chest, fists pounding everything within reach. Which mainly constituted Skeeter. A blow caught his ribs. Skeeter grunted, half-stunned. His own jab at the man's eyes narrowly missed the mark, but he raked the bastard's nose with a fist and popped his Adam's apple with the side of his arm. Blood welled from both nostrils. The man roared, even as Skeeter twisted under him, trying to wriggle free. Another smashing blow landed against Skeeter's ribs. He gasped, trying to breathe against blossoming pain—

And somebody snatched the bastard up by his red shirt and dragged him off. Skeeter heard a meaty blow and a howl of pain, a curse in Arabic... Skeeter rolled to his hands and knees, gasping and cursing a little, himself. His ribs ached, but nothing felt broken. He staggered to his feet, aware of his exposed vulnerability on the floor. Then he blinked. The roar of battle had died away, almost to a whimper. Security had arrived in force. Several dozen uniformed officers were tossing weighted nets and swinging honest-to-God lassos, bringing down combatants five and six at a time. And the Arabian Nights construction foreman was directing more of his crew to help Security, throwing nets across enraged construction workers and dragging them out none too gently, holding them for security to handcuff. In seconds, the fight was effectively over.

Skeeter caught his breath as uniformed bodies waded in, yanking combatants off balance and cuffing them with rough efficiency. Weapons clattered to the cobblestones and lay where they'd fallen, abandoned by owners who found themselves abruptly under arrest. As Skeeter stood swaying, his shirt in shreds where he'd tried to wriggle away from the guy in the red shirt, he realized who'd helped him out. None other than Kit Carson was standing over the fallen Ansar Majlis sympathizer, breathing easily, gripping a cotton rag mop in both hands like a quarterstaff. An overturned mop bucket spread a puddle of dirty water behind the retired time scout, where someone on the maintenance crew had been caught up in the riot, as well. At least it wasn't Bergitta—she wasn't anywhere in sight. Judging from the trail of bruised, groaning figures behind Kit, leading from the jumbled pile of combatants Kit had already put down, the retired time scout knew how to use a quarterstaff effectively, too. The jerk in red on the floor was moaning and not moving much.

Then Kit glanced up, caught Skeeter's gaze, and relaxed fractionally. "You okay, Skeeter?"

He nodded, then winced at the bruising along his ribs. "Yeah. Thanks."

"My pleasure." He said it like he meant it. Literally. A feral grin had begun to stretch his lips. "Whoops, here comes Mike Benson. Him, you don't need breathing down your neck. Scoot, Skeeter. I'll catch you later."

Skeeter blinked, then made tracks. Kit was right about one thing. The last person Skeeter wanted to tangle with was Mike Benson cleaning up a riot. Skeeter disappeared into the stunned crowd as Rachel Eisenstein's medical team arrived, setting broken bones and sewing up gashes. Fortunately, from the look of things, they wouldn't be dealing with anything fatal. How, he wasn't sure. Spears, swords, knives, construction tools of half-a-dozen shapes and lethal potentialities... He shook his head in amazement. One member of the Angels of Grace Militia sported gashes down her face from a fistful of bear claws, where she'd made the mistake of taking a swing at Eigil Bjarneson.

And right at the edge of the riot zone, down at the border between Edo Castletown and Victoria Station, Skeeter found Ann Vinh Mulhaney, totally unscathed despite her tiny size. The petite firearms instructor was sitting calmly atop a wrought iron lamp post, with a small, lethal-looking revolver clutched in each hand. It was clear from the path of wreckage that no one had cared to challenge either her position or her person. Skeeter grinned and waved. Ann smiled and nodded, then holstered her pistols and slithered down the lamp post, lithe and agile as a sleek hunting cat. She landed lightly on the cobbles and headed Skeeter's way.

"Good God, Ann," he said, eying the guns she'd used to defend her perch, "you could've held off an army from up there. Those pistols of yours are cute little things. What are they?"

The petite instructor chuckled. "Webleys, of course. The Royal Irish Constabulary Webley, a different animal altogether from your later military Webley. Pack quite a punch for their size, too, in a delightfully concealable package. Lots of Britannia tourists have been renting them for the Ripper tours."

"No wonder nobody challenged you up there."

She laughed easily. "Occasionally, we get a tourist or two with brains. I don't know about anybody else, but after all that excitement, I could use a drink to cool my throat. Come with us, why don't you, Skeeter?"

He flushed crimson, aware that what little money he had left wouldn't even cover the cost of a beer. "Uh, thanks, but I've got work to do. I'll, uh, take a raincheck, okay?" She probably knew he'd been fired, the whole station knew that, by now, but a guy had his pride, after all.

"Well, all right," she said slowly, studying him with her head tilted to one side. "See you around, then, Skeeter. Hey, Kit! Over here! I saw Robert headed toward Urbs Romae. What say we stop at the Down Time for a quick drink before Primary cycles? We'll probably catch up to Robert there and I heard they had a cask of Falernian..."

Skeeter edged his way deeper into the crowd as Kit exclaimed, "Falernian? When did they bring in a cask of heaven?"

Even Skeeter knew that Falernian was the Dom Perignon of ancient Roman wines. And Kit Carson was a connoisseur of fine wines and other potent potables. Skeeter sighed, wondering how marvellous it really tasted, aware that he wouldn't have been able to afford a glass of Falernian even if he had still been employed. But since he wasn't...

He cut around the damaged riot zone the long way, heading for Primary again. Skeeter dodged around one corner of the Shinto Shrine which had been built in the heart of Edo Castletown, and wheeled full-tilt into a short, stout woman. The collision rocked her back on her heels. Skeeter shot out a steadying hand to keep her from falling. Familiar blue eyes flashed indignantly up at him. "Cor, blimey, put a butcher's out, won't you, luv? Right near squashed me thrip'nny bits, you ‘ave!"

That patter identified her faster than Skeeter could focus on her features. Molly, the down-timer Cockney barmaid who worked at the Down Time Bar & Grill, favorite haunt of station residents, was rubbing her substantial chest with one arm and grimacing. "Molly! What are you doing halfway to Primary Precinct?" Skeeter had to shout above the roar of voices as she tugged her dress to rights and glared sourly up at him. "I thought you were working late today? Did you get caught up in the Festival of Mars procession after all?"

Molly's expressive grimace encapsulated a wealth of disdain, loathing, and irritated anger into one twist of her mobile face. "Nah. Bleedin' newsies invaded, bad as any whirlin' dervishes, they are, wot broke a British square. Devil tyke ‘em! I'd like t'see ‘em done up like kippers, so I would. Got the manners of a gutter snipe, won't let a lady put ‘er past be'ind ‘er, not for all the quid in the Owd Lady of Threadneedle Street." When Skeeter drew a blank on that reference, as he often did with Molly's colorful Cockney, she chuckled and patted his arm. "Bank of England, me owd china, that's wot we called ‘er, Owd Lady of Threadneedle Street."

"Oh." Skeeter grinned. "Me owd china, is it? I'm honored, Molly." She didn't admit friendship to many, not even among the down-timers. He wondered what he'd done to earn her good opinion. Her next words gave him the answer.

"I come up ‘ere t'find Bergitta. Needs a place t'stay, is afraid o' that blagger wot blacked ‘er face, livin' alone an' all, an' I got room in me flat, so I ‘ave. It'd be cheaper, too, wiv two of us sharin' the bills."

Skeeter didn't know what to say. He found himself swallowing hard.

"You ain't seen ‘er, then?"

He shook his head. "No. I was heading for Primary, when that riot broke out."

"Might come along, me own self," Molly mused. "Got nuffink better to do, ‘til I finds Bergitta, anyway."

Skeeter grinned. "I'd be honored to escort you, Molly."

She fell into step beside him.

"I've never seen this many people at an opening of Primary." Skeeter had to shout above the roar of voices. Using elbows and a few underhanded moves, Skeeter shoved his way through the mob until he found a good vantage point where he and Molly could settle themselves to wait.

Gaudy splashes of color marked long lines of departing tourists and the hundreds of spectators arriving just to watch the show. Montgomery Wilkes, ruling head of BATF on station, wasn't in sight yet. Security officers were scarce, too, in the wake of the riot.

BATF carels, manned by tax-collection agents of the Bureau of Access Time Functions, carefully clad in dress-uniform red, lined the route into and out of Primary Precinct. Once past the BATF carels, inbound tourists and visitors arriving at TT-86 had to run a gauntlet of medical stations, a whole double row of them, which formed the entryway into the time terminal.

Tourists inbound had to scan their medical records into the station's database files before entering Shangri-La. This gave station medical baseline data to compare the tourists' health with, once they returned from their time tours. All departing tourists were required to undergo an intensive physical before leaving the station, as a quarantine procedure against exporting anything nasty up time. The system had stopped an outbreak of black death a couple of years back on TT-13, keeping the deadly plague from reaching the up-time world. The medical screening system wasn't foolproof, of course—nothing in life was—but it kept time tourism operational, which was the lifeblood of a station like Shangri-La.

Skeeter just hoped, with a superstitious shiver, that the irate up-time senator whose daughter had been kidnapped failed to swing enough votes to shut down the time terminals. If station violence on TT-86 continued much longer, he just might get those votes. If BATF was worried about it, however, that worry didn't show in the attitudes of its agents. They were as rude as ever, from what Skeeter could see of the check-out procedures underway. BATF agents ignored the increasing crush of onlookers, busy valuing souvenirs brought back from down-time gates. The agents' main job on station was to establish taxes due on whatever was brought up time from the gates and to levy fines for anyone caught smuggling out contraband. They searched luggage—and occasionally, the tourists and the couriers who ran supplies and mail back and forth through Primary—for anything undeclared that might be considered taxable. At one tax kiosk, a middle-aged lady with diamonds on every finger was protesting loudly that she hadn't any idea how those granulated Etruscan gold earrings and necklaces had come to be sewn into her Victorian corset. She hadn't put them in her suitcase, why, they must have been planted in her luggage by some ruffian...

"Tell it to the judge," the red-clad BATF agent said in a bored tone, "or pay the taxes."

"But I tell you—"

"Lady, you can either pay the five-thousand-dollar tax fine due on this jewelry, or you can turn it over to a representative of the International Federation of Art Temporally Stolen, to see that it's returned to its proper place of origin, or you can go to prison for violating the Prime Rule of time travel. You can't profit illegally from a time gate. Robert Li is the designated IFARTS agent for Shangri-La Station. His studio is in Little Agora. You have exactly a quarter of an hour to dispose of it there or pay the taxes due here."

The woman sputtered indignantly for a long moment, then snapped, "Oh, all right! Will you take a check?"

"Yes, ma'am, if you have three forms of identification with a permanent address that matches the information you gave in your records when you entered Shangri-La Station. Make it payable to the Bureau of Access Time Functions."

"Fine!" She was digging into a large, exquisitely wrought handbag. That bag had walked out of some designer's studio in Paris, or Skeeter didn't know high fashion. And since Skeeter had made it a lifelong practice to keep tabs on haute couture as well as cheap knock-offs, as a way of distinguishing rich, potential marks from wannabe pretenders, he was pretty sure it was the real McCoy. She dragged out a checkbook cover made from genuine ostrich leather with a diamond insignia in one corner and scribbled out a check. Five thousand was probably what she dropped on restaurant tables as tips in the course of an average month. Skeeter shook his head. The richer they were, the more they tried to pull, sneaking out contraband past customs.

The BATF agent verified her identification and accepted the check.

The lady stuffed her Etruscan gold back into her corset with wounded dignity and snapped shut the case, moving deeper into the departures area with an autocratic sniff.

"Next!"

Gate announcements sounded every ten minutes until the five-minute mark, after which the loudspeaker warnings began coming every minute, reminding stragglers they were running out of time. At the three-minute warning, a familiar voice from somewhere behind him startled Skeeter into glancing around.

"Skeeter!"

He caught a glimpse of Rachel Eisenstein pushing through the crowd. She was panting hard, clearly having run most of the way from the infirmary.

"Rachel? What's wrong?" He entertained momentary, panic-stricken visions of Bergitta having thrown a blood clot from that beating or something else equally life threatening. As Shangri-La's Station's chief of medicine pushed her way through to Skeeter and Molly, he grasped her hand. "What is it? What's wrong?"

Rachel blinked in startled surprise. "Wrong? Oh, Skeeter, I'm sorry, of course you'd think something's happened to Bergitta. Nothing's wrong at all, other than I just finished triage from that riot and decided I'd better work Primary, too, just in case." She patted a heavy hip pack. "Brought all the essentials. I was just trying to get here before the gate opened, hoping I might find someone I recognized who already had a good spot. Hi, Molly!"

Skeeter drew a long, deep breath and slowly relaxed. "Well, we've got a decent spot. You're welcome to share."

"Thanks, this is a great spot." Rachel pushed back damp hair from her brow. "God, I hope we don't have another riot on the heels of that mess."

"Me, either," Skeeter muttered. "Because now I've got two ladies to look out for, if the fists start flying."

The slim surgeon smiled, dark eyes sparkling. "Skeeter, I'm touched, really. I didn't know you cared. What brings you out here in all this madness?"

"Me?" Skeeter shrugged, wondering if she'd believe the truth. "I, uh, was wondering how many pickpockets and con artists I might spot on their way in."

Rachel Eisenstein shot him a surprisingly intent stare. "I have been paying attention, you know, Skeeter. I'm not sure, exactly, what triggered it, although I suspect it had something to do with Ianira."

He flushed. "You could say that." Skeeter shrugged. "I'm just trying to make things better around here. For the down-timers." He glanced at Molly, whose eyes reflected a quiet pride that closed his throat. "Folks like Molly, here, they've got a rough enough time as it is, trying to survive, without some jerk stealing them blind." Skeeter shrugged again and changed the subject. "I've been keeping count of outgoing departures. I was up to nearly a hundred before you got here. Want to bet we get more inbound than we send back outbound?"

Rachel chuckled. "No bets!"

Skeeter grinned. "Wise woman."

The klaxon sounded again, blasting away at Skeeter's eardrums. "Your attention please. Gate One is due to open in one minute. All departures, be advised that if you have not cleared Station Medical, you will not be permitted to pass Primary. Please have your baggage ready for customs..."

The departures in line hastily gathered up their luggage. Those still at the customs tables scrambled to pay the astromical taxes demanded as a condition of departure. Then the savage lash of subharmonics which heralded the opening of a major temporal gate struck Skeeter square in the skull bones. A fierce headache comprised of equal parts low blood sugar, stress, and gate subharmonics blossomed, causing him to wince. Skeeter resisted the urge to cover his ears, knowing it wouldn't shut out the painful noise that wasn't a noise, and simply waited.

The sight was always impressive as Primary opened up out of thin air. A point of darkness appeared five feet above the Commons floor. It grew rapidly, amoeba-like, its black, widening center an oil stain spreading across the air. The outer edges of the dark hole in reality dopplered through the whole visible spectrum, with the spreading fringes shimmering like a runaway rainbow. A stir ran through the spectators. Every person in the station had seen temporal gates open before, of course, but the phenomenon never failed to raise chill bumps or the fine hairs along the back of the neck as the fabric of reality shifted and split itself wide open...

A flurry of startled grunts and a rising flood of profanities sounded behind them. Skeeter turned to crane his head above the crowd. "Aw, nuts..."

Literally.

The Angels of Grace Militia, at least the portion that had escaped arrest during the riot, was on a crash-course drive for Primary, shoving their way through by brute force.

"What is it?" Rachel asked, trying to see.

"Angel Squad, inbound."

Molly's comment was in obscure Cockney, defying translation.

Rachel rolled her eyes. "Oh, God. Please don't tell me they're expecting reinforcements from up time, too?"

"Well," Skeeter scratched his ear, "scuttlebutt has it their captain was seen buying a ticket for some general of theirs who's coming in for a Philosopher's Gate tour. Wants to see the city where Ianira lived in subjugation to an evil male of the species."

"Oh, God, Skeeter, I told you not to tell me they were bringing in reinforcements!"

"Sorry," he grinned sheepishly.

Rachel scowled up at him and stood on tiptoe, trying to spot the onrushing Angels. Molly just thinned her lips and moved into a slightly aggressive stance, waiting for whatever might come next. Moving in a close-packed wedge, the Angel Squad drove through the waiting crowd on an unstoppable course, shoving and bullying their way through. One brief altercation ended with a tourist clutching at a bloodied nose while Angels burst past him on a course that would bring them out right about where Skeeter stood with Molly and Rachel. He braced for bad trouble for the second time in a quarter hour, wondering whether it might not be wiser to simply cut and run, taking himself, Molly, and Rachel out of their path, or whether he ought to stand his ground on general principles.

At that instant, an ear-splitting klaxon shattered the air.

Skeeter jerked his gaze around just in time to see it. Primary had opened wide enough to begin the transfer of out-bound tourists. Only they hadn't gotten very far. A writhing, entangled mass of humanity crashed straight through Primary, inbound.

Rachel gasped. "What in the world—? Nobody crashes Primary!"

But a howling swarm of people had done just that, shoving through into Shangri-La Station before the outgoing departures could get off to a good start. Klaxons blared insanely. The mad, hooting rhythm all but deafened. Nearly a hundred shouting people stormed into Shangri-La Station in a seething mass, rushing past medical stations, past screaming tourists and howling BATF agents, past everything in their path, as though they owned the entire universe.

"Has every nut in the universe decided to converge on Primary today?"

"I don't know!" Rachel shook her head. "But this could get ugly, whoever they are."

Skeeter agreed. Whoever the new arrivals were, they were headed right this way. And where were those damned Angels? He tried to peer back through the crowd where the Angels of Grace still plowed toward them, a juggernaut at full steam. At that moment, Montgomery Wilkes shot from his office at a dead run, driving forward like a hurtled war spear straight into the boiling knot of close-packed humanity crashing through Primary. The head of BATF wielded his authority like a machete. "HALT! Every one of you! Stop right now! And I mean—"

Monty never finished.

Someone in that on-rushing maelstrom shoved him. Hard.

The seething head of BATF slammed sideways, completely out of the swarm inbound through Primary. Wilkes careened headlong into the chaos of the departure line. Windmilling wildly, he inadvertently knocked down a woman, three kids, and a crate of sixteenth-century Japanese porcelain which had just been valued and taxed by Monty's agents. Its owner, a departing businessman, teetered for an instant, as well. Monty, staggering and stumbling in a half circle, caromed off the businessman and continued on through the line into the concrete wall beyond. They connected—Monty's face and the wall—with a sickening SPLAT!

Wilkes slid, visibly dazed, to the floor just as the Japanese businessman went down. He landed as badly as his irreplacable porcelain. That didn't fare nearly as well when it hit the concrete. Japanese curses—which followed the confirmation of utter ruin—poured out above the noise of yelling voices and screaming klaxons. Monty Wilkes simply sat on the floor blinking wet eyes. His agents gaped, open-mouthed, for a long instant, motionless with shock. Then they scattered, antlike. Some broke toward the gate crashers and others raced to their employer's rescue. Sirens and klaxons wailed like storm winds on the Gobi—

Skeeter abruptly found himself tangled up in the outer edges of a churning cyclone of vid-cam crews, remote-lighting technicians, and shouting newsies. Skeeter staggered. A long boom microphone attached to a human being slammed violently sideways. It very nearly knocked him off his feet. Pain blossomed down the side of his head and through his shoulder. Skeeter spat curses and tried to protect Rachel's head when a heavy camera swung straight toward her skull. Molly went spinning under a body slam from someone twice her height.

Then another jostling, shouting mob slammed into them from behind.

The Angels of Grace had arrived.

The seething chaos crashing Primary staggered as the juggernaut of black-clad Angels crashed into it, full speed. Skeeter heard shouts and threats and screeches of protest. A fist connected with someone's nose. An ugly exchange of profanity exploded into the supercharged air...

"Armstrong!"

Hard, grasping hands forcibly jerked Skeeter around. A tall, powerful stranger yanked him forward. "Armstrong, you son-of-a-bitch! Where's my daughter?"

Over the shoulder of the gorilla breaking his arm, Skeeter glimpsed a living wall of newsies and camera operators. They stared right at him, eyes and mouths rounded. Skeeter blinked stupidly into a dimly familiar face...

One that darkened as sudden shock and anger registered. "You're not Noah Armstrong! Who the hell are you?"

"Who am I?" Skeeter's brain finally caught up. He dislodged the man's grip with a violent jerk of his arm. "Who the hell are you?"

Before anybody could utter a single syllable, the embattled Angels exploded.

"Death to tyrants!"

"Get him!"

For just an instant, Skeeter saw a look of stupefied surprise cross the stranger's face. The man's mouth sagged open. Then his whole face drained absolutely white. Not in fear. In fury. The explosion went off straight into Skeeter's face. "What in hell is going on in this God-cursed station?"

Skeeter's mouth worked, but no sound emerged.

"What are those lunatics"—he jabbed a finger at the Angels—"doing brawling with my staff? Answer me! Where's your station security? You!" The man who'd mistaken him for somebody named Noah Armstrong grabbed Skeeter's arm again, yanked him off balance. "Take me to your station manager's office! Now!"

"Hey! Take your hands off me!" Skeeter wrenched free. "Didn't anybody teach you assault's illegal?"

The stranger's eyes widened fractionally, then narrowed into angry grey slits. "Just who do you think you're talking to? I'd better get some cooperation out of this station, starting with you, whoever you are, or this station's jail is going to be full of petty officials charged with obstruction of justice!"

Skeeter opened his mouth again, not really sure what might come out of it, but at that moment, Bull Morgan, himself, strode through the chaos at Primary. The station manager moved with jerky strides as he maneuvered his fireplug-shaped self on a collision course with Skeeter and the irate stranger.

"Out of the way," Bull growled, shouldering aside newsie crews and BATF agents with equal disregard for their status. He puffed his way up like a tugboat and stuck out one ham-sized hand. "Bull Morgan, Station Manager, Time Terminal Eighty-Six. I understand you wanted to see me?"

Skeeter glanced from Bull's closed and wary expression to the stranger's flushed jowls and seething grey eyes and decided other climes were doubtless healthier places to take himself...

"Marshal!" the stranger snapped.

A red-faced bull moose in a federal marshal's uniform detached itself from the chaos boiling around them. Said moose produced a set of handcuffs, which he promptly snapped around Bull Morgan's wrists.

Skeeter's jaw dropped.

So did Bull's. His unlit cigar hit the floor with an inaudible thud.

"Mr. Clarence Morgan, you are hereby placed under arrest on charges of kidnapping, misuse of public office, willful disregard of public safety, violation of the prime directive of temporal travel—"

"What?"

"—and tax evasion. You are hereby remanded to federal custody. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law—"

From somewhere directly behind Skeeter, a woman in a black uniform let out a strangled bellow. "You slimy little dictator! Take your trumped up charges and your Stalinist terror tactics off our station!"

Somebody threw a punch...

The riot erupted in every direction. A camera smashed to the concrete floor. Somebody sprawled into Skeeter's line of vision, clutching at a bloody nose and loosened teeth. Another black-clad Angel loomed out of the crowd, fists cocked. Molly's gutter Cockney scalded someone's ears. A newsie went flying and somebody screamed—

The tear gas hit them all at the same instant.

Riot turned abruptly to rout.

Skeeter coughed violently, eyes burning. Rachel Eisenstein staggered into him, bent almost double. A ring of uniformed federal officers materialized out of the spreading cloud, masked against the gas, spewing chemical spray from cannisters in a three-sixty degree swath. They surrounded Bull Morgan and the infuriated, cursing stranger, making sure the latter didn't collapse onto the floor. Moving with neat, deadly calm, more than a dozen federal agents took charge. Snub-nosed riot guns flashed into a bristling circle, muzzles pointed outward.

Newsies fell over one another as they tried to evade armed feds, livid BATF officers, residents trying to get away through the chaos, Shangri-La Security arriving too late to prevent disaster, screaming Angels, and panic-stricken tourists. As the tear gas spread, the inbound traffic arriving through Primary disintegrated into a shambles.

Skeeter grabbed Rachel's wrist and hauled her bodily toward Edo Castletown. They had to get clear of this insanity. Weird, distorted shouts and cries rose on all sides. He couldn't see Molly anywhere. He could barely see, at all. They slithered feet-first into a goldfish pond and nearly fell, then splashed through knee-deep water and ran into screaming, wailing tourists and floating timbers where one of the Edo Castletown bridge railings had collapsed. Skeeter scrambled up the other side of the pond, pulling Rachel up behind him, and half-fell through a screen of shrubbery, then they stumbled into a miraculous pocket of clear air. Skeeter dragged down a double lungful of it, coughing violently. He tried to keep Rachel on her feet, but was hardly able to keep his own.

"Let me help!"

The familiar voice rang practically in his ear. Someone got an arm around Rachel and drew her forward, then somebody grasped Skeeter's elbow and hauled him out of the chaos on tottering feet. Blinded by the tear gas, Skeeter allowed himself to be propelled along. Noise and confusion faded. Then someone else got an arm around him and a few moments later, he found his face buried in blessedly cool, running water. He coughed again and again, blinked streaming, burning eyes. He managed to choke out, "Rachel?"

"She's all right, Skeeter. Damned good job you did, getting her out of that mess."

He heard her coughing somewhere beside him and wondered with an anxious jolt what had become of Molly. Skeeter rinsed his eyes again, swearing under his breath, furious with himself for failing yet again to protect a friend in the middle of a station riot. He was finally able to blink his eyes and keep them open without burning pain sending new tears streaming down his face.

Skeeter was standing, improbably, in what looked like the bathrooms off the Neo Edo Hotel lobby. The mirror showed him a sodden mess that had once been his face. He shook his head, spraying water, and started to scrub his face with both hands. Someone grabbed his wrists and said hastily, "Wash them off, first. They're covered with CS." Slippery liquid soap cascaded across his fingers.

That voice sounded so familiar, Skeeter glanced up, startled. And found himself staring eyeball to reddened eyeball with Kit Carson.

Skeeter's mouth fell open. The lean and grizzled former time scout smiled, a trifle grimly. "Wash your hands, Skeeter. Before you rub tear gas into your eyes again." Behind Kit's shoulder, Robert Li, the station's resident antiquarian, bent over another sink, helping Rachel rinse tear gas out of her eyes. Belatedly, Skeeter noticed the floppy rubber gas mask dangling from Kit's neck. Where the devil had Kit Carson found a gas mask? Surely he hadn't bought one from that Templar selling them down in Little Agora? Wherever he'd stashed it—probably that fabled safe of his, up in the Neo Edo Hotel's office—there'd been two of ‘em, because Robert Li wore one, too. Well, maybe Kit had bought them from that Templar, after all. He was smart enough to prepare for any kind of trouble. Wordlessly, Skeeter washed his hands.

When he'd completed the ritual, which helped him regain his composure and some measure of his equilibrium, he straightened up and met Kit's gaze again. He was startled by the respect he found there. "Thanks," Skeeter mumbled, embarrassed.

Kit merely nodded. "Better strip off those clothes. The Neo Edo's laundry staff can clean the tear gas out of them."

Well, why not? Skeeter had done stranger things in his life than strip naked in front of Kit Carson and the station's leading antiquities expert in the middle of the most expensive bathroom in Shangri-La Station while a riot raged outside. He was down to his skivvies when Hashim Ibn Fahd, a down-time teenager who'd stumbled, shocked, through the new Arabian Nights gate, arrived. Dressed in Neo Edo Hotel bellhop livery, which startled Skeeter, since Hashim hadn't been employed two days previously, the boy carried a bundle of clothing under one arm and a large plastic sack.

"Here," Hashim said, holding out the sack. "Put everything inside, Skeeter."

"Have you seen Molly?"

"No, Skeeter. But I will search, if Mr. Carson allows?"

Kit nodded. "I didn't realize she was caught in that mess, too, or I'd have pulled her out along with Skeeter and Rachel."

The down-timer boy handed over his plastic sack and ran for the door. Skeeter dumped in his dress slacks and his shirt, the one the irate construction worker had ripped not thirty minutes previously. The jingle of important things rattled in his pockets. "Uh, my stuff's in there."

"We'll salvage everything, Skeeter," Kit assured him. "There's an emergency shower in that last stall, back there. Sluice off and get dressed. This is going to get mighty ugly, mighty fast. I don't want you anyplace where that asshole out there," he nodded toward the riot still underway outside the Neo Edo, "can lay hands on you. Not without witnesses."

That sounded even more ominous than the riot.

"Uh, Kit?" he asked uncertainly.

The retired time scout glanced around. "Yes?"

Skeeter swallowed nervously. "Just who was that guy, anyway? He looked sorta familiar..."

Kit's eyes widened. "You didn't recognize him? Good God. And here I thought you had a set the size of Everest. That was Senator John Caddrick."

Skeeter's knees jellied.

Kit gripped his shoulder. "Buck up, man. I don't think you'll be going to jail anytime in next ten minutes, anyway, so shower that stuff off. We'll convene a council of war, after, shall we?"

There being nothing of intelligence Skeeter could say in response to that, he simply padded off barefooted across the marble floor of the Neo Edo's luxurious bathroom, wondering how in hell Kit Carson proposed to get Skeeter out of this one. He groaned. Oh, God, this was all they needed, with Ianira Cassondra's suspicious disappearance, fatal shootings on station during two major station riots, not counting today's multiple disasters...

Why Senator Caddrick, of all people? And why now? If Caddrick was here, did that mean his missing, kidnapped kid had been brought here, too? By the Ansar Majlis? Skeeter held back a groan. He had an awful feeling Shangri-La Station was in fatal trouble.

Where that left Skeeter's adopted, down-timer family...

Skeeter ground his molars and turned on the emergency shower. Shangri-La Station wasn't going down without a fight! If Senator Caddrick meant to shut them down, he was in for the biggest battle of his life. Skeeter Jackson was fighting for the very survival of his adopted clan, for everything he held sacred and decent in the world.

Yakka Mongols, even adopted ones, were notoriously dirty fighters.

And they did not like to lose.

Chief Inspector Conroy Melvyn, as head of the Ripper Watch Team, had the right to tell Malcolm what he wanted to try when it came to searching for the Ripper's identity, and what Conroy Melvyn wanted was to know who this mysterious doctor was, assisting James Maybrick. Malcolm, exhausted by days of searching for Benny Catlin, didn't think Melvyn's latest scheme was going to work. But he was, as they said in the States, the boss, and what the boss wanted...

Nor could Margo tackle this particular guiding job. Not even Douglas Tanglewood was properly qualified. But Malcolm was. So Malcolm Moore dressed to the nines and ordered the best carriage Time Tours' Gatehouse maintained, and set his teeth against weariness as they jolted through the evening toward Pall Mall and the gentlemen's clubs for some trace of a doctor answering their mystery Ripper's description.

Conroy Melvyn, Guy Pendergast, and Pavel Kostenka rode with him, the latter agreeing to remain silent throughout the evening, since men of foreign birth were not welcomed in such clubs unless they were widely known as prominent international celebrities, which Pavel Kostenka was not—at least, not in 1888. And he was still very much shaken by the riot which had endangered his life in Whitechapel earlier in the week. Conroy Melvyn would also have to remain close-mouthed in these elite environs, given his working-class accent; if pressed, Malcolm would explain that he was with the police, investigating a case, but hoped to avoid any such scene, which would irretrievably damage his own reputation. No gentleman would be forgiven for bringing a low and vulgar creature like a policeman into an establishment such as the Carlton Club, their first destination for the evening.

Of the three men Malcolm would be guiding this evening, Guy Pendergast would be the least restrained by circumstances. And he remained the most ebulliently convinced of his own immortality, as well, constantly suggesting mad "research" schemes which Malcolm and Douglas and Margo had to veto, sometimes forcefully. Undaunted, Pendergast chatted amiably the whole ride, trying to draw out the Ripper scholars on the subject of the evening's search and chuckling at their close-mouthed irritation.

They finally reached Robert Smirke's famous clubhouse of 1836, which was fated for destruction by Nazi bombs in 1940, and Malcolm told the carriage driver to wait for an hour, then entered the ornately popular Carlton Club, which lay situated beautifully between ultra-fashionable St. James's Square—with its statue of William III and the minaret-steepled church of St. James's Piccadilly visible above the tall, stately buildings—and Carlton House Terrace on the opposite side. The lovely Carlton Gardens ran along Carlton Club's open, easterly facing side, completing the stately club's picturesque, fashionable setting.

Malcolm was known here, as he was in all of the gentlemen's clubs of Pall Mall and Waterloo Place, having procured memberships in each for business purposes as a temporal guide. He greeted the doorman with a nod and introduced his guests, anglicizing Dr. Kostenka's name, then ushered them into the familiar, tobacco-scented halls of the gentleman's private domain. Massive mahogany furniture and dark, rich colors dominated. There was no trace of feminine frills, of the crowding of bric-a-brac, or the typical housewifely clutter which dominated most gentlemen's private homes. Malcolm and his guests checked their tall evening hats, canes, and gloves, but Malcolm declined to check his valise, which held his log and ATLS, pleading business matters.

"I would suggest, gentlemen," he told his charges, "that we begin in one of the gaming rooms where card tables have been set up."

Conversation flowed thick as the brandy and the heavy port wines in evidence at every elbow. Voices raised in laughter swirled around others engaged in conversation which was not deemed socially proper for mixed company, accompanied by blue-grey clouds of tobacco smoke. Copies of infamous publications such as The Pearl, a short-lived but popular pornographic magazine, could be seen in a few hands where gentlemen lounged beneath gas lights, reading and trading jokes.

"—meeting of the Theosophists, this evening?" a passing gentleman asked his companion.

"Where, here? No, I hadn't realized. What an intriguing set of gentlemen, although I daresay they would do well to be rid of that horrid Madame Blavatsky!"

Both gentlemen laughed and climbed an ornate staircase for the second floor of the club. Malcolm paused, wondering if he ought not follow his instincts.

"What is it?" Pendergast asked.

"Those gentlemen just spoke of a Theosophical meeting here this evening."

Pendergast frowned. "A what meeting?"

"Theosophical Society. One of London's foremost occult research organizations."

Pendergast chuckled. "Bunch of lunatics, no doubt. Too bad Dr. Feroz couldn't accompany us, eh?"

Conroy Melvyn, keeping his voice carefully low, said, "You thinkin' what I am, Moore? Our man might be a member, eh? Respected doctor, what? Any number of medical men were attracted to such groups."

"Precisely. I believe it might be worth our while to attend this evening's meeting."

They fell in behind a group of gentlemen heading for the same staircase, following a snatch of conversation which marked them as probable Theosophists.

"—spoke to an American fellow once, from some cotton-mill town in South Carolina. Claimed he'd spoken to an elderly gentlemen who raised the dead."

"Oh, come now, what guff! It's one thing to debate the existence of an ability to converse with the departed. I've seen what a spiritualist medium can do, in seances and with automatic writing and what have you, but raise the dead? Stuff and falderol! I suppose next you'll be claiming this Yank thought himself Christ Jesus?"

Malcolm moved his hand unobtrusively, very carefully switching on the scout's log concealed in the valise he carried, with its tiny digital camera disguised as the stickpin in his cravat. He followed the gentlemen, listening curiously as they crossed a grand lounge and neared the staircase.

"No, no," the first gentleman was protesting, "not literally raise the dead, raise the spirit of the dead, to converse with it, you know. Without a medium or a mysteriously thumping table tapping out inscrutable messages. To accomplish the feat, one had to procure the rope used to hang a man, stake it out around the grave of the chap you wished to raise and repeat some gibberish in Latin, I don't recall what, now, then the poor sod's spirit would appear inside the rope and voila! You're able to converse at your leisure until cock crow. Of course, the spirit couldn't leave the confines of the roped-off ground..."

"And you didn't tumble to the fact that this Yank was having you on?"

A low rumbling chuckle reached through the pall of smoke. "No, I assure you, he was not. Senile as they come, I daresay, the chap was ninety if he was a day, but perfectly sincere in his beliefs."

Malcolm was about to take his first step toward the second floor when a voice hailed him by name. "I say, it's Moore, isn't it!"

The unexpected voice startled him into swinging around. Malcolm found himself looking into the bemused and vivid blue eyes of a gentleman he vaguely thought he was supposed to know. He was a young man, barely past his early twenties, handsome in a Beau Brummel sort of fashion, with wavy dark hair, the brilliant blue eyes and fair skin of an Irishman, and the same elegant, almost effete fastidiousness of the trend setter whose name had been synonymous with fashion during the Regency period some sixty-eight years previously.

"It is Malcolm Moore, isn't it?" the young man added with a wry smile. A trace of Dubliner Irish in the man's voice echoed in familiar ways, telling Malcolm he was, indeed, supposed to know this friendly faced young man.

"Yes, I am, but I fear you've the advantage of me, sir."

"O'Downett's the name, Bevin O'Downett. We met, let me see, it would have been nearly a year ago, I believe, at last summer's Ascot Races." Eyes twinkling merrily, Mr. O'Downett chuckled, a good-natured sound. "I recall it quite distinctly, you see. We bet on the same rotten nag, came in dead last."

The face and name clicked in Malcolm's memory. "Of course! Mr. O'Downett, how good to see you again!" They shook hands cordially as Malcolm grimaced in rueful remembrance. He, too, had excellent cause to recall that race. He'd placed that losing bet on behalf of a client who'd hired him as guide, a millionaire who considered himself an expert on sport, particularly on the subject of horse racing. Malcolm had warned the fool not to bet on that particular horse, aware as he was of its record in past races, but the client is, as they say, always right... Both Malcolm and this young Irishman, Mr. O'Downett, here, had lost spectacularly.

Malcolm introduced his unexpected acquaintance to his guests. "Mr. O'Downett, may I present Mr. Conroy Melvyn and Mr. Guy Pendergast, of London, and Dr. Kosten, of America."

"Pleasure to meet you," O'Downett smiled, shaking hands all around. "I say," he added, "where've you been keeping yourself, Moore? Oh, wait, I recall now, you're from the West Indies, knock about the world a good bit. Envy you that, you know."

Malcolm was trying for the life of him to recall anything about Mr. O'Downett, other than one ill-placed bet. "And you?" he asked a bit lamely.

"Ah, well, fortune smiles and then she frowns, as they say. But I did manage to publish a volume of poetry. A slim one, true, but published, nonetheless." His eyes twinkled again, laughing at himself, this time. "Druidic rubbish, nothing like the serious verse I prefer, but it sells, God knows, it does sell. This Celtic renaissance will make gentlemen of us Dubliners, yet." He winked solemnly.

Malcolm smiled. "It does seem to be rather popular. Have you been to the Eisteddfod, then, since Druidic verse appeals to the book-buying masses?"

"Hmm, that Welsh bardic thing they put together over in Llangollen? No, I haven't, although I suppose if I'm to represent the Celtic pen, I had probably ought to go, eh? Have you attended one?"

"As a matter of fact, no, although I intend to do so when they hold another." Malcolm laughed easily. "Moore's a French name, you know, originally, anyway. It's whispered that the back of our family closet might have contained a Gaulish Celt or two rattling round as skeletons."

O'Downett clapped him heartily on the shoulder. "Well said, Moore! Well said! It is, indeed, the day of the Celtic Fringe, is it not? I've spoken to gentlemen whose grandsires were Prussian generals who were ‘Celts' and pure London Saxons who were ‘Celts' and, God forbid, a half-caste Indian fellow in service as a footman who was a ‘Celt' at least on his father's side!"

Malcolm shared the chuckle, finding it doubly humorous, since there was a wealth of evidence—linguistic, literary, musical, legal, and archaeological—to suggest that the Celtic laws, languages, customs and arts of Ireland, Wales, Cornwall, Scotland, and Gaulish France bore direct and striking ties to Vedic India.

"And speaking of grand and glorious Celts," Mr. O'Downett said, eyes twinkling wickedly, "here comes the grandest of all us Celtic poets. I say, Willie, have you come for our little meeting this evening? I'd thought you would be haunting Madame Blavatsky's parlour tonight."

Malcolm Moore turned... and had to catch his breath to keep from exclaiming out loud. His chance acquaintance had just greeted the most profoundly gifted poet ever born in Ireland, the soon-to-be world-famous William Butler Yeats.

"Willie" Yeats smiled at O'Downett, his own eyes glowing with a fire-eaten look that spoke of a massively restless intellect. "No, not tonight, Bevin. The good lady had other plans. Occasionally, even our peripatetic madame pursues other interests." Yeats was clearly laughing at himself. The Dubliner Irish was far more pronounced in the newcomer's voice. Yeats was still in his twenties, having arrived with his parents from Dublin only the previous year, 1887.

Bevin O'Downett smiled and made introductions. "Willie, I say, have you met Mr. Malcolm Moore? West Indian gentleman, travels about a good bit, met him at Ascot last year. Mr. Moore, my dear friend, Mr. William Butler Yeats."

Malcolm found himself shaking the hand of one of the greatest poets ever to set pen to paper in the English language. "I'm honored, sir."

"Pleasure to meet you, Mr. Moore," Yeats smiled easily.

Malcolm felt almost like the air was fizzing. Yeats was already considered an occult authority, despite his relative youth. Malcolm thanked that unknown American ghost-summoner for inducing him to turn on the scout's log in his valise. He managed to retain enough presence of mind to introduce his own companions, who shook Yeats' hand in turn. Guy Pendergast didn't appear to have the faintest notion who Yeats was—or would be—but Conroy Melvyn's face had taken on a thunderstruck look and even Pavel Kostenka was staring, round-eyed, at the young poet who would legitimize Irish folk lore as a serious art form and subject of scholarly interest, as no other Irishman had managed in the stormy history of Irish-Anglo relations, and would be branded the most gifted mystic writer since William Blake.

Bevin O'Downett winked at his fellow Irishman. "Mr. Moore, here, was just sharing a piece of his family history," he chuckled. "A Gaulic Celt or two, he says, rattled about in earlier branches of the family's gnarled old tree."

Yeats broke out into an enthusiastic smile. "Are you a Celtic scholar, then, Mr. Moore?" he asked, eyes alight with interest.

"No, not really." Malcolm smiled, although he probably knew more about Celtic and Druidic history than any expert alive in Great Britain tonight. "My real interest is antiquity of another sort. Roman, mostly."

O'Downett grinned, bending a fond look on his friend. "Willie is quite the antiquarian, himself."

Yeats flushed, acutely embarrassed. "Hardly, old bean, hardly. I dabble in Celtic studies, really, is all."

"Stuff and nonsense, Willie here is a most serious scholar. Helped co-found the Dublin Hermetic Society, didn't you? And Madame Blavatsky finds your scholarship most serious, indeed."

Malcolm, anxious to put the young poet at ease, gave Yeats a warm, encouraging smile. "You're interested in Theosophy, then, Mr. Yeats?" He knew, of course, that Yeats pursued a profound interest in Theosophy and any other studies which touched on the occult. The new and wildly popular organization established by Madame Blavatsky devoted itself to psychical and occult studies along the lines of the "Esoteric Buddhism" which she and so many other practitioners were popularizing.

Clearly uncertain where Malcolm stood on the issue, the young Irish poet cleared his throat nervously. "Well, sir, yes, I am, sir. Most interested in Theosophy and, ah, many such studies."

Malcolm nodded, endeavoring to keep his expression friendly, rather than awestruck. "You've read Wise's new History of Paganism in Caledonia? Intriguing ideas on the development of religion and philosophy."

The young poet brightened. "Yes, sir, I have, indeed, read it! Borrowed a copy as soon as I arrived in London last year, as it had just been published. And I've read Edward Davies, of course, and D.W. Nash on Taliesin."

"Ah, the British druid who was said to have met Pythagoras. Yes, I've read that, as well."

Malcolm did not share his opinion on Nash's theories about the so-called British druid, whose existence had been fabricated whole cloth. Probably not by Nash, for the myth was widespread and persistent, but it was myth, nonetheless. "And have you read Charles Graves' latest work?"

"The Royal Commission's study of ancient Irish Brehon laws? Absolutely, sir!"

And the young poet's smile was brilliant, filled with understandable pride in the accomplishments of his forebears, who had been recognized throughout the western world in past centuries as the finest physicians, poets, musicians, and religious scholars of medieval Europe. The Brehon legal system of medieval Ireland had included such "modern" concepts as universal health care and even workman's compensation laws.

"Excellent!" Malcolm enthused. "Marvellous scholarship in that work. Graves is expanding the knowledge of ancient Britain tremendously. And do you, Mr. Yeats, hold that the Druids built Stonehenge?"

Yeats flushed again, although his eyes glowed with delighted interest. "Well, sir, I'm not an archaeologist, but it strikes me that the standing stones must be of considerable antiquity. At least centuries old, I should think?"

Malcolm smiled again. "Indeed. Millennia, to be more precise. Definitely pre-Roman, most definitely. Even the greatest Egyptologist of our day, Mr. W.M. Flinders Petrie, agrees on that point. Keep up the scholarship, Mr. Yeats. We need good, strong research into our own islands' histories, eh? By God, ancient Britain has a history to be proud of! This Celtic revival is a fine thing, a very fine thing, indeed!"

Bevin O'Downett nodded vehement agreement. "Quite so, sir! I say, have you heard that fellow speak down at the Egyptian Hall? That Lithuanian-looking chap, although he's as British as a gold sovereign, what's he calling himself? I heard some reporter say he used to go by some Egyptian sounding moniker, back in his younger days over in SoHo, before he studied medicine and the occult and became a respectable mesmeric physician."

Malcolm hadn't the faintest idea who O'Downett might mean, although he did notice Guy Pendergast lean forward, sudden interest sharp in his eyes. Once a reporter, always a reporter, although Malcolm couldn't imagine why Guy Pendergast would be so acutely interested in a SoHo occultist.

Yeats, however, nodded at once, clearly familiar with the fellow Bevin O'Downett had mentioned. "Yes, I have seen him speak. Intriguing fellow, although he hasn't actually gone by the name of Johnny Anubis in several years. Oh, I know it's an absurd name," Yeats said, noticing the amused tilt of Bevin O'Downett's brows, "but a man must have some way to attract the attention of the public when he's come up from that sort of background. And despite the theatrics of his early career, his scholarship really is sound, astonishing for a self-made man from Middlesex Street, Whitechapel."

Malcolm paused, caught as much by the edge of bitterness in the young poet's voice as by the niggling suspicion that he was missing something important, here. He glanced into Yeats' brilliant, fire-eaten eyes—and was struck motionless by the pain, the anger and pride that burned in this young Irishman's soul. Forthright fury blazed in those eyes for every slight ever made by an Englishman against the Irish race, fury and pain that the achievements of the Celtic peoples were only now, in the latter half of the nineteenth century, being hailed as genius by overbearing English scholars—and then, only by some scholars, in a decade when Welshmen, descendants of the original Celtic settlers of Britain, were still belittled as savage subhumans and advised to give up their barbarous tongue if they would ever redeem themselves into the human race, while the Irishman was kicked and maltreated as the mangiest dog of Europe. Yet despite the kicks and slurs, there blazed in Yeats' brilliant, volcanic eyes a fierce, soul-igniting pride, lightning through stormclouds, a shining pride for the history of a nation which for centuries had carried the torch of civilization in Europe.

Malcolm stood transfixed, caught up in the power of the young poet's presence, aware with a chill of awe that he was witnessing the birth of an extraordinary religious and literary blaze, one which would sweep into its path the ancient lore, the mysterious rite and religious philosophy of the entire world, a blaze which would burn that extraordinary learning in the crucible of the poet's fiery and far-reaching intellect, until what burst forth was not so much resounding music as rolling, thunderous prophecy:

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity...

Now I know

That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,

And what rough beast, its hour come

round at last,

Slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?

Malcolm's favorite Yeats poem, "The Second Coming," could easily have been written in prophecy of Malcolm's own time, when mad cults multiplied like malignant mushrooms and insanity seemed to be the rule of the day. To be standing here, speaking with Yeats, before the poem had even been written...

"I say, Mr. Moore," Bevin O'Downett chuckled, shattering with a shock like icewater the spell of Yeats' as-yet-embryonic power, "you might want to close your mouth before a bird seizes the chance to perch on your teeth!"

Malcolm blinked guiltily. Then gathered his wits and composure with profound difficulty. "Sorry. I've just been trying to recall whether I'd read anything by this fellow you were just mentioning. Er, what's his name, did you say? Anubis?"

Yeats nodded. "Yes, but he doesn't use that name any longer. The man's a physician, actually, an accomplished mesmerist, Dr. John Lachley. Holds public lectures and spiritualist seances at places like the Egyptian Hall, but he keeps a perfectly ordinary medical surgery in his rooms in Cleveland Street, calls his house Tibor, I believe, after some ancient holy place out of East European myth. He's quite a serious scholar, you know. An acquaintance of mine, Mr. Waite, invited him to join an organization he's recently founded, and was absolutely delighted when Dr. Lachley agreed. He's been awarded Druidic orders, at the Gorsedd, carries the Druidic wand, the slat an draoichta. Lachley's been called the most learned scholar of antiquities ever to come out of SoHo."

Malcolm's gaze sharpened. Waite? The famous co-founder of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn? Waite had helped develop the most famous Tarot deck in existence. This mesmeric scholar moved in most intriguing circles. "John Lachley, you say? No, I'm afraid I haven't heard of him. Of course," Malcolm gave the intense young Irishman a rueful smile, "I travel so widely, I often find myself having to catch up on months of scholarly as well as social activities which have transpired in my absence. I shall certainly keep his name in mind. Thank you for bringing his work to my attention."

"Well, that's grand," Bevin O'Downett smiled, visibly delighted at having introduced Malcolm to his scholarly young friend. "I say, Moore, you were just on your way up when I detained you. Have I interrupted any plans?"

Malcolm smiled. "Actually, we'd heard there was to be a meeting here this evening, of Theosophists, and wanted to learn a bit more."

Yeats brightened. "Splendid! We'll be meeting upstairs, sir, in a quarter of an hour."

Malcolm glanced at Conroy Melvyn, who nodded slightly. "Excellent! I believe I'll tell my carriage driver to return rather later than I'd anticipated. We'll join you shortly, I hope?"

The two Irish poets took their leave, heading upstairs, and Malcolm turned towards the entrance, intent on letting the driver know they'd be longer than an hour—and paused, startled. Their party was one short. "Where the devil is Mr. Pendergast?"

Conroy Melvyn, who had been peering up the staircase after the poets, started slightly. The police inspector looked around with a sheepish expression. "Eh?"

"Pendergast," Malcolm repeated, "where the deuce has he gone?"

Pavel Kostenka swallowed nervously and said in a whisper that wouldn't carry very far, "I cannot imagine. He was here just a moment ago."

"Yes," Malcolm said irritably, "he was. And now he isn't. Bloody reporters! We'd better search for him at once."

Within ten minutes, it was clear that Guy Pendergast was no longer anywhere inside the Carlton Club, because he had been seen retrieving his hat, cane, and gloves. The doorman said, "Why, yes, Mr. Moore, he left in a tearing hurry, caught a hansom cab."

"Did you hear him give the driver directions?"

"No, sir, I'm afraid I didn't."

Malcolm swore under his breath. "Damn that idiot journalist! Gentlemen, I'm afraid our mission on your behalf will simply have to wait for another evening. Dr. Kostenka, Mr. Melvyn, we must return to Spaldergate immediately. This is very serious. Bloody damned serious. A reporter on his own without a guide, poking about London and asking questions at a time like this... He'll have to be found immediately and brought back, before he gets himself into fatal trouble."

The Ripper scholars were visibly furious at having their evening's mission cut short, particularly with the meeting getting underway upstairs, but even they realized the crisis another missing up-timer represented. The Scotland Yard inspector at least had the good grace to be embarassed that he'd allowed the reporter to give them the slip so easily. The driver of the Time Tours carriage which had brought them to the Carlton Club hadn't noticed Pendergast leave, either, and berated himself all the way back to Spaldergate House for his careless inattention. "Might've followed the bloody fool," the driver muttered under his breath every few moments. "Dammit, why'd the idiot go and hire a hansom cab? I'd have taken him anywhere he wanted to go!"

Malcolm had his own ideas about that, which were confirmed less than half an hour later, when they re-entered Time Tours' London gatehouse. Guy Pendergast had returned to Spaldergate, very briefly. Then he and Dominica Nosette had left again, taking with them all their luggage and one of Spaldergate's carriages—without obtaining the Gilberts' permission first.

Fresh disaster was literally staring them square in the face.

Not only had they lost the tourist Benny Catlin, they had now lost two members of the Ripper Watch team, who clearly had defected to pursue the case on their own. Malcolm, operating on less than three hours' sleep a night for several weeks straight, tried to think what Guy Pendergast might possibly have seen or heard tonight to send him haring off on his own, defying all rules set for members of the Ripper Watch tour. Malcolm had been so focused on Yeats, he hadn't been doing his job. And that was inexcusable. Only once before had Malcolm lost a tourist: Margo, that ghastly day in Rome, in the middle of the Hilaria celebrations. It did not improve his temper to recall that both times, he'd been focused on his own desires, rather than the job at hand.

Without the faintest idea where to begin searching for the renegade reporters, Malcolm did the only thing he could do and still remain calm. He stalked into the parlour, poured himself a stiff scotch, and started reviewing potential alternative career options.

Crossingham's doss house smelled of mildew and unwashed clothes, of sweat and stale food and despair. When Margo and Shahdi Feroz stepped into the kitchen, it was well after dark and bitterly cold. They found a sullen, smoking coal fire burning low in the hearth and nearly twenty people crowded nearby, most of them women. There were no chairs available. Most of the room's chairs had been dragged over to the hearth by those lucky enough to have arrived early. The rest of the exhausted, grubby occupants of Crossingham's kitchen sat on the floor as close to the fire as they could manage. The floor was at least neat and well-swept despite its worn, plain boards and deep scuffs from thousands of booted feet which had passed across it.

Margo paid the lodging house's caretaker, Timothy Donovan, for a cuppa and handed it over to Shahdi, then paid for another for herself. " ‘ere, luv," Margo said quietly to the Ripper scholar, using her best Cockney voice, "got a cuppa tea for you, this'll warm you up nice."

The tea was weak and bitter, with neither sugar nor milk to alter the nasty flavor. Margo pulled a face and sipped again. Recycled tea leaves, no doubt—if there was even any real tea in this stuff. The demand for tea was so high and the price of new leaves so steep, an enormous market existed for recycled tea. Used leaves, carefully collected by housewives and servants, were sold to the tea men who came door-to-door, buying them up in bulk. The tea men, in turn, redried them, dyed them dark again, pressed them into "new" bricks, and resold them to cheaper chandlers' shops scattered throughout the East End. There was even a black market in counterfeit tea, with leaves of God-alone knew what and even bits of paper dyed to look like tea, sold in carefully pressed little bricks to those unable to afford real tea often enough to know the difference in taste.

Margo tucked up her skirts and found a spot as close to the fire as she could manage, then balanced Shahdi's teacup for her so the scholar could sit down. Both of them carefully adjusted their frayed carpet bags with the irreplaceable scout logs inside, so they lay across their laps and out of reach of anybody with lighter-than-average fingers. Margo noticed curious—and covetous—glances from several nearby women and most of the men. Very few of the people in Crossingham's owned enough goods in this world to put into a carpet bag.

"Wotcher got in the bag, eh, lovie?" The woman beside Margo was a thin, elderly woman, somewhere in her mid-sixties, Margo guessed. She stank of gin and spilt ale and clothes too many months—or years—unlaundered.

Margo made herself smile, despite the stench. "Me owd clothes, wot I'm aimin' to pawn, soon's I got a place to sleep. That an' me lovin' father's shirts, may God send ‘im to burn, drunken bastard as ‘e is. Was, I mean. They ‘anged ‘im last week, for ‘is tea leafin' ways."

"Never easy, is it," another woman muttered, "when the owd bastard thieves ‘is way through life ‘til ‘e's caught an' ‘anged, leavin' a body to make ‘er own way or starve. Better a live blagger, I says, than a dead ‘usband or father wot ain't no use to anybody. Nobody save the grave digger an' the bleedin' worms."

"Least ‘e won't black me face never again," Margo muttered, "nor drink me wages down to boozer. Good riddance, I says, good riddance to the owd bastard. Could've ‘anged ‘im years ago, they could, an' I'd ‘ave been that ‘appy, I would, that I would ‘ave."

"You got a job, then?" a girl no older than Margo asked, eyes curious despite the fear lurking in their depths. She reminded Margo of a rabbit hit once too often by a butcher's practice blows.

"Me?" Margo shrugged. "Got nuffink but me own self, that an' me mother, ‘ere." She nodded to Shahdi Feroz. "But we'll find something, we will, trust in that. Ain't afraid t' work ‘ard, I ain't. I'll do wot a body ‘as t' do, to keep a roof over an' bread in me Limehouse an' a bite or two in me ma's, so I will."

A timid looking girl of fourteen swallowed hard. "You mean, you'd walk the streets?"

Margo glanced at her, then at Shahdi Feroz, who—as her "mother"—cast a distressed look at her "daughter." Margo shrugged. "Done it before, so I ‘ave. Won't be surprised if it comes to the day I ‘as to do it again. Me ma ain't well, after all, gets all tired out, quick like, an' feels the winter's cowd more every year. Me, I'd sleep rough, but me ma's got to ‘ave a bed, don't she?"

Over in the corner, a woman in her forties who wore a dress and bonnet shabby as last summer's grubby canvas shoes, started to rock back and forth, arms clenched around her knees. "Going to die out there," she moaned, eyes clenched shut, "going to die out there and who'd care if we did, eh? Not them constables, they don't give a fig, for all they say as how they're here to protect us. We'll end like poor Polly Nichols, we will." Several women, presumably Irish Catholics, crossed themselves and muttered fearfully. Another produced a bottle from her pocket and upended it, swallowing rapidly. "Poor Polly..." the woman in the corner was still rocking, eyes shut over wetness. Her voice was rough, although she'd clearly had more education than the other women in the room. Margo wondered what had driven her to such desperate circumstances. "Oh, God, poor Polly... Bloody constable saw me on the street this morning, told me to move on or he'd black my eye for me. Or I could pay him to stay on my territory. And if I hadn't any money, I'd just have to give him a four-penny knee-trembler, for free. Stinking bastards! They don't care, not so long as they get theirs. As for us, it's walk or starve, with that murdering maniac out there..." She'd begun to cry messily, silently, rocking like a madwoman in her corner beside the hearth.

Margo couldn't say anything, could scarcely swallow. She clenched her teeth over the memories welling up from her own past. No, they didn't care, damn them... The cops never cared when it was a prostitute lying dead on the street. Or the kitchen floor. They didn't give a damn what they did or said or how young the children listening might be...

"I knew Polly," a new voice said quietly, grief etched in every word. "Kinder, nicer woman I never knew."

The speaker was a woman in her fifties, faded and probably never pretty, but she had a solemn, honest face and her eyes were stricken puddles, leaking wetness down her cheeks.

"Saw her that morning, that very morning. She'd been drinking again, poor thing, the bells of St. Mary Matfellon had just struck the hour, two-thirty it was, and she hadn't her doss money yet. She'd drunk it, every last penny of it. How many's the time I've told her, ‘Polly, it's drink will be the ruin of you'?" A single sob broke loose and the woman covered her face with both hands. "I had fourpence! I could've loaned it to her! Why didn't I just give her the money, and her so drunk and needing a bed?"

A nearby woman put an arm around her shoulders. "Hush, Emily, she'd just have drunk it, too, you know how she was when she'd been on the gin."

"But she'd be alive!" Emily cried, refusing to be comforted. "She'd be alive, not hacked to pieces..."

This was Emily Holland, then, Margo realized with a slow chill of shock. One of the last people to see Polly Nichols alive. The two women had been friends, often sharing a room in one of the area's hundreds of doss houses. How many of these women knew the five Ripper victims well enough to cry for them? Twelve hundred prostitutes walking the East End had sounded like a lot of people, but there'd been more students than twelve hundred in Margo's high school and she'd known all of them at least by sight. Certainly well enough to've been deeply upset if some maniac had carved them into little bits of acquaintance.

Margo gulped down acrid tea, wishing it were still hot enough to drive away the chill inside. At least they were gathering valuable data. She hadn't read anywhere, for instance, about London's constables shaking down the very women they were supposed to be protecting. So much for the image of British police as gentlemen. Margo snorted silently. From what she'd seen, most men walking the streets of Great Britain tonight viewed any woman of lower status not decently married as sexually available. And in the East End and in many a so-called "respectable" house, where young girls from streets like these went into service as scullery maids, the gentlemen weren't overly fussy about taking to bed girls far too young to be married. It hadn't been that long since laws had been passed raising the age of consent from twelve.

No, the fact that corrupt police constables were forcing London's prostitutes to sleep with them didn't surprise Margo at all. Maybe that explained why Jack had been able to strike without the women raising a cry for help? Not even Elizabeth Stride had screamed out loudly enough to attract the attention of a meeting hall full of people. A woman in trouble couldn't count on the police to be anything but worse trouble than the customer.

Shahdi Feroz, with her keen eye for detail, asked quietly, "Are you cold, my dear?"

Margo shook her head, not quite willing to trust her voice.

"Nonsense, you are shaking. Here, can you scoot closer to the fire?"

Margo gave up and scooted. It was easier than admitting the real reason she was trembling. Sitting here surrounded by women who reminded her, with every word spoken, exactly how her entire world had shattered was more difficult than she'd expected it would be, back on station studying these murders. And she'd known, even then, it wouldn't be easy. Get used to it, she told herself angrily. Because later tonight, Annie Chapman was going to walk into this kitchen and then she was going to walk out of it again and end up butchered all over the yard at number twenty-nine Hanbury Street. And Margo would just have to cope, because it was going to be a long, long night. Somehow, between now and five-thirty tomorrow morning, she would have to slip into that pitch-dark yard and set up the team's low-light surveillance equipment.

Maybe she'd climb the fence? She certainly didn't want to risk that creaking door again. Yes, that was what she'd better do, go over the wall like a common thief, which meant she'd need to ditch the skirts and dress as a boy. Climbing fences in this getup was out of the question. She wondered bleakly what Malcolm was doing, on his search for their unknown co-killer, and sighed, resting her chin on her knees. She'd a thousand times rather have gone with Malcolm, whatever he was doing, than end up stuck on the kitchen floor in Crossingham's, trying vainly to ignore how her own mother had died.

As she blinked back unshed tears, Margo realized she had one more excellent reason she couldn't risk falling apart, out here. Kit might—just might—forgive her for screwing up on a job, might chalk it up to field experience she had to get some time. But if she came completely unglued out here, Malcolm would know the reason why or have her skin, one or the other. And if she was forced to tell Malcolm that she'd messed up because she couldn't stop thinking about how her mother had died, he was going to discover the truth about that, too.

Try as she might, Margo simply could not imagine that Malcolm Moore would be willing to marry a girl whose drunken father had died in prison while serving a life sentence for murder, after beating to death his wife in front of his little girl because he'd discovered she was a whore. Far worse than losing Malcolm, though—and Margo loved Malcolm so much, the thought of losing him left her cold and bleak and empty—would be the look in her grandfather's eyes if Kit Carson ever found out how and why his only daughter had really died.

For the first time in her young life, Margo Smith discovered that hurting the people you loved was even worse than being hurt, yourself. Which was why, perhaps, in the final analysis, her mother and so many of the women in this room and out on these streets had sunk to the level of common prostitute. They were trying to support families any way they could. Margo's mouth trembled violently. Then she simply squeezed shut her eyes and cried, no longer caring who saw the tears. She'd think up a good reason to give Shahdi Feroz later.

Just now, she needed to cry.

She wasn't even sure who she was crying for.

When Shahdi Feroz slipped an arm around her shoulder and pulled her close, just holding her, Margo realized it wasn't important at all, knowing who her tears were for. In the end, it didn't matter. The only thing that really mattered was protecting the people you cared about. In that moment, Margo forgave her mother everything. And cried harder than she had since those terrible moments in a blood-spattered Minnesota kitchen, with the toast burnt on the counter and the stink of death in her nostrils and her father's rage pursuing her out the door into the snow.

I'm sorry, Mom, I'm sorry...

I'm sorry I couldn't stop him.

I'm sorry I hated you...

Did Annie Georgina Chapman, Dark Annie Chapman's daughter, who'd run away from her poverty-stricken, prostituted mother to join a French touring circus, hate her mother, too? Margo hoped not. She blinked burning salt from her eyes and offered up one last apology. And I'm sorry I can't stop him from killing you, Annie Chapman...

Margo understood at last.

Kit had warned her that time scouting was the toughest job in the world.

Now she knew why.