Requiem For The Ripper E-Book

Brian L. Porter

• Herausgeber: Next Chapter
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

William Forbes is desperate. The former solicitor to Jack Reid, he believes that the soul of the notorious Victorian serial killer, Jack the Ripper is haunting him. 

Seeking help, William contacts criminal psychologist David Hemswell who invites William to his remote Scottish island home, Skerries Rock. 

Together with David's friend Kate, a paranormal investigator, they begin to understand the terror that Forbes is facing.

But what are they really up against, and can they survive the final confrontation in Requiem For The Ripper?

Leseprobe

REQUIEM FOR THE RIPPER

THE STUDY IN RED TRILOGY BOOK 3

BRIAN L PORTER

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements 2020

Acknowledgments 2010

Introduction to The Study in Red

A Study in Red - The Secret Journal of Jack the Ripper

Legacy of The Ripper

And now the final instalment begins

1. Skerries Rock

2. Preparations

3. William Forbes

4. A Piece of Yellowed Paper

5. The Story Begins

6. The Birth of a Monster?

7. The Crimes of Jack the Ripper

8. The Confession of Burton Cleveland Cavendish

9. The Cavendish Legacy

10. A Phone Call in the Night

11. Kate’s Arrival

12. First Impressions

13. A Question

14. Jack

15. Kate’s Revelation

16. A Shadow in the Night

17. The Music of the Night?

18. Discordant Melody

19. The Journal

20. An Eternal Entity?

21. Jack Reid’s Confession

22. A New Day Dawns

23. Transformation

24. A Walk on the Wild Side

25. Who is it?

26. Something and Nothing

27. A Grim Realisation

28. Screaming Walls

29. The Fires of Hell?

30. Requiem

Epilogue

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About the Author

Copyright (C) 2020 Brian L Porter

Layout design and Copyright (C) 2021 by Next Chapter

Published 2021 by Next Chapter

Edited by Debbie Poole

Cover art by CoverMint

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the author’s permission.

‘Requiem for The Ripper’ is dedicated to the memory of Enid Ann Porter, (1914 – 2004). Her belief in me and my work never wavered even though she never lived to see the first book in publication, and to Juliet, who provides the help and support without which none of my books would ever be completed.

And to Sasha xxxx

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 2020

When the original publisher of my Jack the Ripper trilogy ceased trading in 2020, I feared that the books would sink without trace without a publisher behind them. However, I approached Miika Hannila, CEO of Next Chapter, who have published my work for the last eight years hoping he would be interested in publishing new editions of the three Ripper books, plus Pestilence, also previously published by my Canadian publisher. To my delight, Miika was more than happy to offer to publish new updated versions of the books, which will bring all my books under the umbrella of a single publisher. Next Chapter’s art department has been responsible for the terrific new cover designs for the four books which I’m delighted with, so I owe a big thank you to Miika and the team at Next Chapter.

I have to thank my researcher and proof reader Debbie Poole who as always, does her best to keep my work precise and accurate.

As always, my dear wife Juliet has played her part as she does for every book in providing me with her support and advice as the new edition took shape.

It wouldn’t be fair to omit the original acknowledgements from the first publication of the book as the people mentioned below all played a part in helping me bring my fictional trilogy to print.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 2010

Requiem for the Ripper is the final part of my fictional trilogy based on the gruesome Jack the Ripper murders, committed in the space of a few short weeks during the autumn of 1888 in Whitechapel, London. Over the years, much debate and research has taken place in an attempt to identify and name the man responsible for those killings. So far, no authoritative answer has been provided and the mystery of who Jack the Ripper’s identity remains just that, a mystery.

My own research for this book and those that preceded it was helped along the way by a number of people without whose help the final book could not have appeared.

My thanks are therefore due to my fellow members of the Jack The Ripper Forums.com for their help and support, in particular to Howard Brown and Mike Covell, and also to the members of The Whitechapel Society 1888, who took the trouble to invite me to judge their first short story contest during 2009.

Science fiction author Carole Gill joined my group of critique readers, which includes publisher Graeme S Houston and my lovely wife Juliet, and my thanks go to all who have helped with their critique and comments during the writing of ‘Requiem’. Without their continued support and occasional inspirational ideas, the finished article might not be quite so ‘finished’.

Finally, to all who have read and enjoyed the first two books in the trilogy, I pass on my thanks, for giving me the will and the inspiration to go on and complete this final episode.

INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY IN RED

Requiem for The Ripper is the third and final part of the trilogy of novels that began with A Study in Red – The Secret Journal of Jack the Ripper, which was followed by Legacy of The Ripper.For anyone unfamiliar with the first two books the following introductory pages give a brief outline of the first two books, and will I hope add to the reading pleasure of this, the third and final part of the trilogy.

A STUDY IN RED - THE SECRET JOURNAL OF JACK THE RIPPER

Following the death of his father, psychiatrist Robert Cavendish is bequeathed a set of papers and a strange age-yellowed journal. As he unpacks and begins to read the papers he is astounded to discover that he is holding the journal of the infamous Whitechapel Murderer who stalked the streets of the East End of London in the autumn of 1888. The pages are warm to the touch, and a force of great malevolence seems to guide Robert's journey through the mists of time as he is transported by the words upon the pages into the mind, and the world of the one and only Jack the Ripper! His mind begins to feel the pull of another time, another place, as images of the Ripper's crimes fill his thoughts and Robert is beset by waking nightmares of such sadistic and terrible bloodletting that he begins to doubt his sanity. As he delves further and further into the demented world of the killer Robert begins to sense that his family has been hiding a terrible secret for over a century, a secret that he knows will only be revealed when he completes the task of reading `The Secret Journal of Jack the Ripper'.

An Excerpt

The London of the 1880s differed greatly from the city of today. Poverty and wealth existed side by side, the defining line between the two often marked only by the turning of a corner, from the well-lit suburban streets of the middle-classes and the wealthy, to the seedy, crime and rat infested slums, where poverty, homelessness, desperation and deprivation walked hand in hand with drunkenness, immorality, and crime most foul. In the teeming slums of the city by night the most commonly heard cry in the darkness was thought to be that of 'Murder!' So inured were the people who lived amongst such squalor and amidst the fever of criminal intimidation that it is said, in time, no-one took any notice of such cries.

It was into this swirling maelstrom of vice and human degradation, London's East End, that there appeared a malevolent force, a merciless killer who stalked the mean streets by night in search of his prey and gave the great metropolis that was London its first taste of the now increasingly common phenomenon, the serial killer! The streets of Whitechapel were to become the stalking ground of that mysterious and as yet still unidentified slayer known to history as 'Jack the Ripper!'

AN EXTRACT FROM THE JOURNAL

Blood, beautiful, thick, rich, red, venous blood.

Its colour fills my eyes, its scent assaults my nostrils,

Its taste hangs sweetly on my lips.

Last night once more the voices called to me,

And I did venture forth, their bidding, their unholy quest to undertake.

Through mean, gas lit, fog shrouded streets, I wandered in the night, selected, struck, with flashing blade,

And oh, how the blood did run, pouring out upon the street, soaking through the cobbled cracks, spurting, like a fountain of pure red.

Viscera leaking from ripped red gut, my clothes assumed the smell of freshly butchered meat. The squalid, dark, street shadows beckoned, and under leaning darkened eaves, like a wraith I disappeared once more into the cheerless night,

The bloodlust of the voices again fulfilled, for a while…

They will call again, and I once more will prowl the streets upon the night,

The blood will flow like a river once again.

Beware all those who would stand against the call,

I shall not be stopped or taken, no, not I.

Sleep fair city, while you can, while the voices within are still,

I am resting, but my time shall come again. I shall rise in a glorious bloodfest,

I shall taste again the fear as the blade slices sharply through yielding flesh,

when the voices raise the clarion call, and my time shall come again.

So I say again, good citizens, sleep, for there will be a next time…

To my dearest nephew, Jack,

This testament, the journal, and all the papers that accompany it are yours upon my death, as they became mine upon my father's death. Aunt Sarah, and I were never fortunate enough to have children of our own, so it is with a heavy heart that I write this note to accompany these pages. Had I any alternative, I would spare you the curse of our family's deepest secret, or perhaps I should say, secrets! Having read what you are about to read, I had neither the courage to destroy it, nor to reveal the secrets contained within these pages. I beg you, as my father begged me, to read the journal and the notes that go with it, and be guided by your conscience and your intelligence in deciding what course of action to take when you have done so. Whatever you decide to do, dear nephew, I beg you, do not judge those who have gone before you too harshly, for the curse of the journal you are about to read is as real as these words I now write to you.

Be safe, Jack, but be warned.

Your loving uncle,

Robert

LEGACY OF THE RIPPER

Jack Thomas Reid, nephew of Robert Cavendish who first appeared in A Study in Red - The Secret Journal of Jack the Ripper, languishes in the secure Ravenswood Psychiatric Hospital, sentenced to confinement 'at Her Majesty's Pleasure' for a series of apparent 'Jack the Ripper' copycat killings in the picturesque English coastal resort of Brighton. Jack's defence at his trial, that he is a descendant of Jack the Ripper and that the crimes were conducted by an unknown 'mystery man' and that Jack had been drugged and made to appear as the killer came to be regarded as so preposterous and unbelievable that his sentence was never in doubt. When one of the policemen who conducted the original investigation into the murders begins to doubt the truth of the case against Reid, Sergeant George Wright and Ripperologist Alice Nickels begin an investigation into his story. What they find is told through the voice of Doctor Ruth Truman, Jack's psychiatrist at Ravenswood, and through a series of events that take place as far afield as the beautiful island of Malta and in Warsaw, Poland. Slowly but surely and with the help of Wright's boss, Inspector Mike Holland, the link between the events that shocked and terrorised Whitechapel over a century ago, and their link with the case of Jack Thomas Reid and the 'Legacy of Jack the Ripper' is revealed.

An Excerpt

My Name is Jack, A Statement by the Patient.

When did it start? That’s what they all want to know. Doctor Ruth is always asking me:

“When did it start? What are your earliest recollections of these feelings?”

I keep telling her the same as I’m telling you all now. It’s hard to put a time or a place on when it began, though I was young, incredibly young, maybe four or five years old when I first realised I was ‘different’ to other children of my age. Even then I knew that my life was mapped out ahead of me, that I had a destiny to fulfil. At such a tender age, of course, it was impossible for me to comprehend what that destiny was. Only much later did I realise that I was being guided by a hand far more powerful than mine, one whose intelligence and guile was such that I had no doubts, when the time came, of the course of action I must take.

I was different you see, different from all of those children who made my life a misery, the ones who called me names because I didn’t want to join in their silly games or take part in stupid group activities after school. When I was very young, I didn’t know that I held the power and the means within me to put an end to their taunting and name calling. Only when I reached the age of nine did I suddenly make a stand against those silly, laughing, taunting voices. That was the day when a group of children cornered me in the school playground, out of sight of the watchful teachers and playground assistants. Somehow, they’d heard about my regular visits to the child psychologist. My going in itself wasn’t a secret of course. They all knew that I had to attend regular doctor’s appointments, but, as happens from time to time, word spread around the school about the real reason for my appointments.

“Bloodsucker, Dracula, do you eat your meat raw, Jack Reid?” they shouted in a cacophony of screeching, childish screams.

“He’s a vampire, he sucks the blood from living cats, that’s what I’ve heard,” screeched Andrew Denning, one of the ringleaders of the haranguing group.

“You’re a weirdo, Reid, that’s what you are,” Camilla Hunt shouted in my face.

I’d had enough. As Denning came closer to scream in my face once again, I waited until he was within touching distance, and, quick as a flash, I grabbed my tormentor with both hands, one either side of his face, and pulled him close to me. He struggled as I bent my head to the side and the others screamed in panic, but no-one came to his aid as my teeth sunk deeply into his flesh, biting hard on the tender mass of sinews and muscle that made up his ear. That was when the loudest scream of all erupted, this time from Andrew Denning himself, as I pulled my head back from his, to reveal a large chunk of his ear still stuck between my teeth. Blood pumped from the side of the boy’s head and the other children stood screaming, rooted to the spot in their fear and fascination. In seconds, the sound of an adult voice could be heard shouting,

“What’s all this commotion? If you boys have been fighting I’ll…. Oh my God! Jack! What have you done?”

Miss Plummer almost fainted on the spot, but, to her credit, she maintained her equilibrium enough to send two of the other children running for help. How she did it I can’t remember, but she made me open my mouth long enough for her to retrieve the bitten remains of Andrew Denning’s ear, which she quickly wrapped in a handkerchief she pulled from a pocket in the side of her skirt. The others were quickly dismissed, and Miss Plummer stayed with me and Andrew, who continued to scream until another teacher arrived and escorted him away. Soon afterwards a car disappeared through the school gates carrying the injured boy to the hospital. I learned afterwards that the doctors had sewn what they could of his ear back together, but in truth it would never look right again, and Andrew Denning I’m sure will never forget our encounter. I say that because I only heard these things second-hand. After that incident, the headmaster summoned my parents to the school and I was removed from that particular place of education and sent to what is laughingly called a ‘special school’, where children with ‘special needs’ are taught. I thought it odd at the time, that no-one really seemed to appreciate what my own peculiar ‘special needs’ were.

It wasn’t until much later that I would begin to realise just where my life was heading, and what I was destined to fulfil, just after my eighteenth birthday in fact, my ‘coming of age’ as they call it. That was when things really began to fall into place in my mind, and that is why you and all those who follow you, and Doctor Ruth especially, will never, ever forget me. I’m sorry, I’ve been remiss. Perhaps I should introduce myself before going any further. My name is Jack, Jack Thomas Reid, and this is the letter that began everything that transpired after that fateful day when I received my legacy from Uncle Robert.

As for the rest, I suggest you go and talk to Doctor Ruth. She’s the expert after all.

AND NOW THE FINAL INSTALMENT BEGINS

Welcome to

‘Requiem for The Ripper’

ONE

SKERRIES ROCK

Skerries Rock is, to most people who’ve heard of it, one of the most desolate and unwelcoming places in the whole of the British Isles. Lying just a mile off the coast of Cape Wrath, the most north-westerly point of the Scottish mainland, the island, which is rarely if ever shown on any maps is barely one and a half miles long and less than a half mile across at its widest point. Once home to a small band of hardy crofters who long ago abandoned their tiny homes and sought wealth, or at least a decent living on the mainland, it has long been my personal idyll, the place where if I could, I always promised myself I’d retire to one day, living in splendid isolation with nothing more than the seabirds and the sound of the constantly buffeting Atlantic winds for company.

I’d visited Skerries Rock as a child when my father had brought me to the place during a fishing trip. We’d hired a boat from the village of Balnakiel, where my ex-ship’s captain father was well known, and where he holidayed often, enjoying the panoramic views and the relaxation afforded by the local golf course and staying in the village’s only decent hotel. We landed on Skerries Rock on the third day of our fishing trip, accompanied by Hamish Foyle, and his son Angus who comprised the crew of the oddly named ‘Whispering Lady’. I never found out why the boat carried its odd name, but at ten years of age such things were of little interest to me.

What did catch my attention however was the sheer beauty of the tiny island that my father had brought me to. Small as it may have been, it held a grandeur that penetrated my young mind and left a lasting impression upon me. On the cliffs that appeared to rise almost vertically from the sea on its eastern shore, I watched in awe as thousands (or so I estimated) of puffins with their brightly coloured beaks nestled together, gathered, as my father explained, for their annual mating season. Dolphins broke through the dark blue-green surface of the ocean as we approached the only practical landing point a mile east of the towering cliffs. Here a small wooden quay jutted out from a rocky beach. It stood in good repair, and Hamish Foyle explained that the crofters who once lived on the Rock had used this place for the receiving of supplies from the mainland, and also for putting to sea in their own small fishing boats, from which they’d cast their nets close to shore in an attempt to augment their supplies with a regular infusion of fresh fish. They’d possessed the sense to build the quay on the leeward side of the island where a degree of shelter from the towering Atlantic breakers existed. Anywhere else on the island would have made landing ashore a physical impossibility. When not in use, their small but highly seaworthy fishing vessels would be hauled by hand onto the shore, where they’d await their owners’ next voyage out to sea.

Nowadays, Hamish told me, the island was privately owned and only rarely visited by birdwatchers and conservationists. The owner, a philanthropic millionaire, had decreed that the quay be kept in good repair so that those who wished to land and take advantage of the sights and sounds of the island could do so.

I think my father knew I’d be captivated by the place. He knew only too well that his son had a love for the natural world and for all the creatures that inhabit it, and the puffins and the myriad gulls, terns, skuas and petrels that swirled in the skies above us made the whole place seem alive. I felt as though I’d stumbled on to one of the last truly wild places on Earth, and perhaps I had.

The place left such an impression on my receptive young mind that memories of Skerries Rock filled my head so many times during my teenage years and I would beg my father to take me there whenever he visited Scotland. My mother, reconciled to the knowledge that her husband and son were about to embark on one of their treks to the north, would usually remain at home in our comfortable house in the port of Hull on the East Coast of Yorkshire, and I’d cheerfully wave goodbye to her and sadly, scarcely give her another thought as we headed towards the border, following the coast road along the east coast and them traversing the width of Scotland once Edinburgh trailed in the wake of our exhaust. I say sadly, because, shortly after I’d attained the age of sixteen, my mother fell victim to a cruel cancer and within six months of her contracting the dreaded disease, she’d passed away, and my father and I were left alone with our joint grief and horror at the ravages the illness had wrought in my poor mother.

So it transpired that years passed without another visit to Skerries Rock, years in which I attended university, gained a degree and slowly built a career for myself. I became successful in my chosen profession and became able to afford to ensconce myself in a house that overlooked the North Sea in the coastal resort of Scarborough, a brass plaque on the wall announcing my trade and my surgery hours, from where I carried out my work as a consultant psychologist. I carried out much of that work of course at the local hospital, and as time passed and my star rose, I became known to the police as something of an expert in the field of criminal psychology, not only in the local area but across the north of England and I was often called in to provide suspect profiling in cases where such expertise was required or desired.

As with many childhood dreams, my thoughts of Skerries Rock remained firmly embedded in my mind, though they grew fainter and less vivid with the passage of time. I would occasionally promise myself that I’d visit the place again one day, but after the death of my father, (another awful cancer, dammit), fifteen years after the loss of my mother, such ambitions assumed less of a priority in my life.

My success continued and then, at the age of fifty, while idly reading through a copy of The Times one day as I waited for lunch to be served in my favourite restaurant, my eyes were suddenly drawn to an advertisement on the property page.

The words Skerries Rock leaped out at me from the page as I read the advertisement offering my dream island for sale!

I could scarcely believe my eyes. The millionaire philanthropist who’d originally bought the place had died and the executors of his estate were selling Skerries Rock for a knock-down price. After all, they’d probably surmised, who the hell would want to own such a place, even less likely, who might want to live there? They probably saw the tiny island as an encumbrance to the estate and seemed to be determined to off-load it quickly, or so the asking price implied.

From that day forward the idea of owning Skerries Rock and having the opportunity to live my childhood dream became an obsession. I’d become financially sound, certainly I could afford the asking price, and I quickly came to the conclusion that I could also easily give up my general practice in Scarborough and augment my income through consultancy work which could just as easily be conducted from a home on the island. After all, most of such work came via the internet and the telephone, and therein I realised the enormity of what I’d just suggested to myself. Skerries Rock possessed no mains electricity supply, nor gas or telephone links to the mainland. It would take some creative thinking and a fair amount of investment to install a private generator and arrange for a telephone line to be installed.

My mind had been made up however, and I knew I had to try. So, with a lot of help from my solicitor, I found myself able to place a ridiculously low bid for the island of my dreams that even I was surprised to find accepted by the executors of the estate. The generator cost less than I’d anticipated, and the telephone line wouldn’t be a problem with the advances in modern technology. All I had to do was build a habitable home for myself and Skerries Rock could become my home. I hired a team of builders from Balnakiel, in fact, the only builders in Balnakiel, owned oddly enough by Angus Foyle, with whom I’d first set sight on the island. In less than six months he and his men had converted two of the old crofts into a single, warmly insulated and completely adequate dwelling for a single man such as me. Power came from the use of the newly acquired generator, the telephone and computer links were soon established and in far less time than I’d imagined I found myself unscrewing the brass plaque from the wall outside my Scarborough home. As I took it down from its place of prominence I read it one last time. Listing my name, David Hemswell, and my professional qualifications, that plaque seemed at that moment to stand for everything I’d worked so hard to achieve and was now poised to leave behind. I placed it almost reverently into one of the packing cases that would be used to transport my goods and chattels northwards and left the house on a warm Saturday afternoon in June, without looking back once as I drove towards my future.

In less than a year, I’d made myself feel totally at home in my new environment. As I’d expected, consultancy work came my way on a regular basis, and I found myself easily able to attend to most of it through the mediums of computer or telephone. Only twice did I deem it necessary to leave the island and conduct hands-on inquiries in connection with a couple of rather complicated cases that had been presented to me by the police. I’d spend time each day walking and observing the life that abounded on my own personal dream world. Little appeared to have changed since my childhood days. Puffins and gulls and all the other seabirds still used my island as their home, at least for the time they required to set foot on dry land. Entire pods of dolphins continued to make their presence known, occasionally leaping from the sea, riding the waves in playful abandon until they’d become bored with their game and disappear once more beneath the mantle of the Atlantic waves. The wind would howl, not fearfully, but as a lullaby that would gently send me to sleep each night, blissfully happy and contented with my place in the world. Skerries Rock had become my world at that point, and I felt as though nothing could ever bring discord or disharmony into my new life. I found myself living the idyllic life I’d dreamed of living since my childhood. I felt supremely happy, happier than I’d ever believed possible. With no wife, no family ties and no one to answer to except my own conscience, I now entered without doubt the happiest period of my life.

The only thing I hadn’t factored in to my new life, my world of tranquillity and being at one with nature was the telephone call that I received one dark winter’s night in January.

“Doctor Hemswell?” a stranger’s voice inquired when I picked up the receiver.

“Yes, who’s speaking, please?”

“You don’t know me Doctor, but I’ve heard of you and your reputation. I got your number from Chief Inspector Gould of the Strathclyde Police. He said you were the best man to help with my, er, problem. I wondered if I might visit you and talk to you about a matter of the gravest importance.”

“I’m sorry, but I don’t even know your name yet, or what this matter of importance is. Could you please enlighten me before I agree to any sort of meeting? I don’t usually receive visitors here you know. I am rather isolated.”

“Yes, I know. You live on a private island off the coast of Cape Wrath. Chief Inspector Gould told me about it.”

“Correct. Now, your story?”

“Oh, yes, I’m sorry. Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Forbes, William Forbes, and until recently I was a solicitor. That is, until something odd began to happen and I found myself becoming embroiled in something I didn’t, and still don’t understand.”

“Mr. Forbes, you’re not making a lot of sense,” I said, in an attempt to force the caller to get to the point.

“Yes, I know, I apologise. Look, have you heard of Jack Reid, Doctor?”

“Yes of course, I think almost everyone has. He was accused of a series of copycat crimes that mirrored Jack the Ripper’s Whitechapel murders, was convicted, then released from a secure hospital due to new evidence, then years later he was convicted of another series of murders. Is that the Jack Reid you mean?”

“Yes, that’s him. Look, Doctor Hemswell, I know it sounds preposterous, and you’ll think I’m mad, but, well, Jack Reid was my client and he died a few weeks ago. Since then I’ve come into possession of a document that makes me believe things I don’t want to believe, and I admit to being in fear for my life. Please, I don’t want to say too much on the telephone. I’m begging you doctor, please let me come and see you and talk to you in person. Perhaps then you’ll understand what I’m getting at.”

The Jack Reid case had become notorious in the recent annals of crime. Only a fool or someone who’d been shut away on a desert island for years could have failed to possess at least a rudimentary knowledge of the so-called ‘Ripper Copycat’ killer who had stalked the streets of Brighton and finally, Whitechapel itself in his fiendish lust to recreate the murders of Jack the Ripper. Somehow, this man had become embroiled in the life and the case of Jack Reid and though he sounded agitated and afraid, his occupation at least merited granting him a little leeway.

“Listen Mr Forbes. You say you feel as though your life is in danger and yet you also tell me that Reid died a short time ago. I hadn’t heard of his demise, but please, all things being equal, who do you believe you’re in danger from?”

Just before the man replied a sudden howling gust of wind shook the house, and perhaps that same blast of chilled Atlantic air caused the generator to miss a beat and made the lights flicker briefly off, and then on again. His voice, when it came, delivered his reply in a deadpan, totally serious monotone.

“Who? Why, Jack the Ripper of course.”

From that moment onwards, life at Skerries Rock would never be quite the same again. Without knowing if my new client were deranged or just deluded in some way, I gave him directions and agreed to meet with him two days hence. I’d rendezvous with him on the mainland in my own motor launch and ferry him to the island. I explained that I wasn’t geared up for receiving guests, but he assured me he expected nothing from me except the opportunity to talk and to show me the document which he insisted had been the cause of so much of his current grief.

Finalising the conversation, I said my goodbyes to the mysterious Mr Forbes, and sat thoughtfully ruminating on our conversation for a minute. He’d said very little and given away even less and yet here I sat, ready to receive this stranger in to my home, a man who appeared to be under the delusion that his life was in danger from a serial killer who’d died over a hundred and twenty years ago.

The lights suddenly dimmed once more, the wind gathered in intensity and the windows of my home, despite being triple glazed to keep out the wind and the draughts, visibly appeared to shake in their frames. I made a mental note to check the fuel lines to my oil-fired generator in the light of the following morning and turned in for the night, though in truth, my mind felt more disturbed than I’d imagined at the strange phone call from Mr William Forbes, and sleep eluded me until the sheer weight of exhaustion forced my eyes to finally close at a little before three in the morning.

After a mere three hours sleep. I woke as usual at six a.m. only to find that the generator had failed during the night. I found myself without heat, light and power of any description. Forbes would be arriving the next day and it appeared I had much work to do. The wind had died, and the sea rolled in to the island in a gentle flat calm, unusual at any time of the year on Skerries Rock. As I worked on restoring power to my isolated home that day, even the sounds of the seabird’s calls sounded muted, and an air of hesitant expectancy appeared to presage the arrival of William Forbes, solicitor, of London.

TWO

PREPARATIONS

Repairing the generator had proved a simple task, even for a ham-fisted townie like me. The power failure had resulted from nothing more sinister than a blocked fuel line, caused by a build-up air in one of the bends of the pipes that fed the diesel oil into the generator. The comprehensive instructions supplied by the makers enabled me to get the machine up and running again in just under an hour and I cleaned up and spent most of the remainder of that day preparing the spare bedroom for my expected guest.