The Witches of Chiswick

13

“Excellent,” said Hugo Rune. “Unsurpassed, incomparable, quintessential and prototypical also.”

Will shook his bewildered head. “And this would be the Australian aardvark in aspic, or possibly the Bavarian brown bear in blueberry sauce, or even the cranberry-covered Carpathian coypu? Or is it the Dalmatian dog in the Danish pastry?”

A meat feast of heroic proportions spanned the table’s distance between himself and The One and Only. Rune had ordered all but everything on the Café Royal’s menu.

“Each and all.” The Lad Himself took up a napkin and wiped away jellied eel from the corner of his mouth. “But above and beyond that, your earlier assertion that the case of Jack the Ripper cannot be solved. It will certainly put the mongoose amongst the cobras when you solve it, don’t you think?” And he forked up a helping of fried French ferret and plunged it into his mouth.

Will shook his bewildered head a second time, noting ruefully as he had upon so many previous occasions, that Hugo Rune’s mode of food consumption mirrored exactly that of Will’s own father. Like father, like son, like father, like son and so on down, or up, the ages.

“The case of Jack the Ripper cannot be solved,” Will said once more. “It’s never solved.”

“Have I taught you so very little?” Rune enquired. He dined from several plates simultaneously and fed as he spoke.

“You have taught me nothing,” Will replied. “Well, perhaps a few things. Which hand to hold my eel fork in, for instance.”

“Then let me tell you this. And I will keep it brief for fear that the grilled goat gets a skin upon its gravy. You, my boy, have been returned to this period in time to use what knowledge you possess in putting things to right. Your presence here affords us the opportunity to change the future. To create a new and better future. To thwart the plans of the evil ones who seek to alter it for their own advantage.”

“The Chiswick Townswomen’s Guild.” Will’s face once more had a sneer painted over it.

“Evil in human form,” said the sage. “And pass the sage and onion sauce if you will.”

“I will,” said Will, passing it.

“All right.” Rune poured the sauce all over his hummingbird hotpot. “In order that you might be returned to your own time it is necessary that we change things. By changing things we change the course of history.”

“I really don’t understand.” Will helped himself to a slice of impala. “It’s all rather complicated.”

“It’s simplicity itself.” Rune pulled a platter of Jamaican jackdaw in his direction. “We are going to cause a few ripples in the ice cream of time. According to your history, Jack the Ripper was never brought to book for his horrendous crimes. What if you were to rewrite the menu of history? Strike off the first course and add a delicacy of your own.”

“And that would help to make things right?”

“It’s a starter,” said Rune. “And speaking of starters, did I finish all those kiwi kebabs?”

Will nodded. “You did. And you ordered a second portion which you similarly consumed.”

“So much to eat, so little time. Life in a coconut shell.”

Will pushed lemur in lemongrass sorbet about on his plate. “But what I also don’t understand,” said he, “is why both you and Mr Holmes want me to take on this impossible case. If Mr Holmes isn’t going to take it on himself, why don’t you do it?”

“Me?” Will now found himself sprayed with half-masticated morsels of marmoset meringue. “I am a mystic,” quoth Rune. “A magician. An avatar. A perfect master. I am not a mere detective.”

“But I’ll bet you’ll take the credit if I do solve it,” Will said. “And all the reward money.”

“What was that, boy?”

“Nothing.” Will helped himself to some neck of newt. “But the case cannot be solved. So it’s all neither here nor there, really.”

Hugo Rune shook his great bald head. “There is nothing that cannot be done,” he said and again he tucked into his tucker.

They ate on in silence but for Rune’s occasional belchings and calls to the waiter for further wine. Will, all alone with his thoughts, pondered upon the situation. What, just what, might happen if the most unlikely event was to occur and he was actually able to bring Jack the Ripper to justice? Jack was one of the most notorious criminals in all history, not because of the scale of his crimes, but because of the mystery that was attached to them, his motives and the fact that he was never caught. History would record Will, if Will could stop Rune taking the credit, pile accolades upon him. He would be forever known as the man who caught Jack the Ripper, when the police and Sherlock Holmes had failed. That would be big kudos.

And it would change history: a bit, anyway.

But a big bit as far as Will was concerned.

But then, and then a big “but then” crossed Will’s mind.

But then, Jack the Ripper was a psychopathic killer. Not a man to be trifled with. Tackling him would be a risky business: a very risky business.

Did the pros outweigh the cons?

A great big smile spread up either side of Will Starling’s face. How often was an opportunity like this ever to occur in a lifetime? Never at all, was the answer to that. But as it had … well.

“I’ll do it,” said Will.

Rune grinned through a face-load of ostrich a l’orange. “I knew that you would,” said he.

At considerable length, their vast repast concluded, even down to the wallaby in wild woodbine and the zebra in a basket, Rune called for the bill. He then took issue over the cost and quality of each and every item on it. He called for the manager and took him to task about the quality of the champagne. Then he produced a small bone, which he claimed to be a rat’s pelvis, that he said had lodged in his throat during his consumption of the terrapin terrine. He issued protests and threats of litigation and eventually settled “out of court” for twenty guineas compensation up front and at once.

“A job well done,” said Rune as he and Will left the Café Royal, never again to return.

“Was that really necessary?” Will asked. “Mr Holmes was paying for the meal.”

“I know,” said Rune. “But Holmes is a friend and the champagne was inferior.”

Will and Rune walked together along the Strand. It was after midnight now. There had been rain earlier but it had since cleared up, leaving only puddles which reflected the glow of the neon lights shining from the bow-fronted windows of the exclusive shops. An electric carriage slid soundlessly past. Within the glazed dome, fashionable fellows joked with painted ladies of the night-time calling.

At Piccadilly Rune and Will halted.

“I am going on to my club now,” said Rune. “The Pussycat in Greek Street. Perhaps you would care to join me?”

“I think I’ll return to our lodgings,” Will said. “Think things over. Come up with some sort of plan. I have the envelope of case notes. I have all sorts of stuff about Jack the Ripper on file in my palm-top. Most of it is probably rubbish, but you never know. I might come up with something.”

“Good boy,” Rune patted Will upon the shoulder. “Although you do not have faith in me, I have faith in you. Together we will triumph. This is just the beginning, but it will facilitate the end.”

Will nodded thoughtfully.

“As surely as the errant bicycle is viewed through the veil of cucumber,” said Rune, “then so does the spotty youth of time dwell upon the doorknob of pasta. Muse upon these truths.”

Will shook his head.

“Good night,” said he.

“Good night,” said Rune, “and see you on the morrow.”

And so they parted company, Rune, chuckling to himself and steering his sizeable slippers in the direction of the Pussycat Club, and Will heading back to their present humble lodgings in Shoreditch.

Will sat long into the night, a lighted candle as his elbow, his palm-top on his knee and many cockroaches hurrying about their business all around him. He trawled the pages of his files on Saucy Jack. He came up with the usual suspects, shook his head at the conspiracy theories, made notes of all that he considered relevant. He leafed through the case notes, deciphering with difficulty the spidery cursive penmanship of the hardly literate constables and the observational findings of the coroner. At length, when his eyelids began to droop, Will closed up his palm-top, shook vermin from his bed and tucked himself into it still fully clothed.

He blew out the candle and lay in the darkness, wondering where all this might lead to. Concluding that he didn’t have the faintest idea, he eventually fell into a deep but troubled sleep.

Sunlight awakened Will. He yawned and stretched and plucked away the web that a spider had woven over his face. Will smiled somewhat at this. There was no explaining Hugo Rune. The guru’s guru always demanded first-class treatment, even though he was never prepared to actually pay for it. But still he thought nothing of sleeping in the poorest of accommodation. Although similarly he thought nothing at all about actually paying for that either. The man was an enigma. Charlatan or sage? Will really didn’t know. But he certainly had charisma. And charisma is ultimately what sorts out the somebodies from the nobodies.

“Are you awake?” Will asked and he turned to view the wretched pallet of the perfect master. The perfect master however was not to be seen. And his wretched pallet showed no signs of having been slept upon.

“Didn’t get back,” said Will to himself. “Well, he said nothing about us doing a moonlight flit last night, so I assume he must have stayed at his club.”

Will rose and washed his face in a bowl of cold and doubtful-looking water and then he took himself downstairs. There was always the possibility that he could charm the landlady into offering him some breakfast. Not that he felt particularly hungry. Last night’s gargantuan feast still padded his stomach. Will paid a visit to a communal toilet of terrible aspect and, once hastily done with his ablutions there, removed himself from the boarding house to stretch his limbs in the street.

It was a long walk to Rune’s club and Will did not have the fare for a hansom cab, let alone one of the new electric flyers. So he stood in the doorway of the rooming house, taking in the morning air and the sights and sounds and smells of Victorian London.

“Read orl abowt it! Read orl abowt it!” A paperboy flourished papers. Will recognised the paperboy, the lad who had accosted him upon his undignified arrival in the time machine.

“Good morning, young Winston” said Will. “We meet again.”

“Gawd lop off me love truncheon,” said the lad. “I remember you, guv’nor. Care for a paper. It’s the Shoreditch Sun. First with the news, and the best news there is. And a lady in a corset on page three.”

“No thanks,” said Will.

“Please yourself then. Read orl abowt it!” he bawled once again. “Hideous murder in Whitechapel. Ripper strikes again.”

“What?” went Will.

“Ripper strikes again!” bawled the lad.

“Not so loud,” said Will. “But that isn’t right. A sixth murder. That’s not right.”

“Hideous murder,” bawled the lad. “Blood and guts all over the place. Police as ever baffled.”

“Give me a newspaper,” said Will.

“Halfpenny,” said Winston.

Will dipped into his pocket and brought out a silver threepenny bit.

Winston snatched it from his hand and trousered it with haste.

“Sorry, no change,” he grinned, handing Will a newspaper.

Will unrolled the broadsheet and cast his eye over the headline and the words that were printed beneath it.

TERRIBLE MURDER IN WHITECHAPEL

Ripper claims sixth victim

Will read the dreadful details. A gentleman had taken his leave from a well-known house of ill repute, after a dispute with the madam of that establishment regarding her charges. He had then apparently been pursued through the night-time streets by Jack the Ripper and brutally done to death. The chase had been witnessed by several gatherers of the pure,[15] who were working the nightshift. The actual murder had not been witnessed. The body had been later found by a patrolling constable.

“Upon the arrival of the corpse at Whitechapel Police Station, the victim had been positively identified by Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard, who was there playing whist with the station sergeant.

“‘I knew the murder victim,’ he told our reporter. ‘He owed me five guineas. His name was Hugo Rune.’”

The newspaper fell from Will’s fingers and drifted down into the gutter.

His world was suddenly all in little pieces.

Hugo Rune was dead.