Page 54 of Who Cries for the Lost

“How do you see evil?” said Sebastian.

“Me? I see it as the result of selfishness—the elevation of self-interest and personal desires above all else. That, and a lack of any sense of our interdependence or the value of other living things.”

“ ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’ ” quoted Sebastian quietly.

Tiptoff nodded. “That’s the first act of true evil in the Bible, is it not—when Cain gives way to his jealous urge to remove his brother as a rival? Or at least it is if we are talking about evil and not mere sin, which is distinctly different, wouldn’t you say?” He stared down at the Celtic head of a bull in his hands, then set it aside to continue his rummaging. “I’ve sometimes wondered if the worldwide incidence of werewolf legends stems from our human need to explain evil. In most werewolf stories, a normal man—often through no fault of his own—becomes an animal. Sometimes he is bitten or clawed; sometimes he simply steps where he should not. But as an animal, he does great harm to others, committing unspeakable acts—murdering and devouring men, women, children, all without remorse. Then he goes back to being a seemingly normal man, although sometimes he bears some wound, something to show what he has been and what he has done.”

“And witches?”

“Ah, yes, witches. There’s a slight difference there, don’t you think? The belief in witches seems less driven by the need to explain human evil and more by the need to explain natural calamities—the death of a cow, the sickness of a child, the destructiveness of a storm that comes out of nowhere.” He paused, then said, “Or at least that was true until the fifteenth century, when churchmen such as your Sinclair Palmer began to equate witchcraft with Satanism. But in one sense I suppose both are the same: They’re driven by the need to explain evil as something that comes from outside human nature rather than—” He broke off. “Ah, here it is!”

He stood up and turned, a small bronze statue of a boar held proudly in his hands. “Lovely, isn’t it?”

“It is, yes,” said Sebastian.

“Believe it or not, it’s an ancient Norse symbol of peace. They saw the boar as a representation of Freyr, the god of peace, sunshine, and prosperity. He was the twin brother of Freyja, you know—rode a golden boar and ruled over the kingdom of the elves. Of course, he was also associated with fertility and virility, which is why he’s sometimes represented by a phallus.”

Tiptoff was silent for a moment, his gaze on the ancient object in his hands. Then he looked up, his features pinched. “I hear what people on the street are saying, that whoever is mutilating these men and throwing their bodies in the Thames must be some sort of inhuman monster.”

Sebastian studied the man’s earnest, bespectacled face. “You don’t think so?”

Tiptoff shook his head. “What is more human than evil? Hmm?”

Sebastian came out of the house a few minutes later to find his groom, Giles, walking the chestnuts up and down Bury Street.

“Go ahead and take the curricle home, Giles,” said Sebastian as the groom brought the horses to a stand before him. “I need to stretch my legs.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Sebastian stood for a moment watching his groom drive off toward Mayfair. Then he turned down Great Russell Street.

The afternoon was bright and surprisingly hot, and he tipped his hat brim lower on his forehead to shield his eyes from the westering sun. It had now been nearly a week since someone tossed Miles Sedgewick’s mutilated corpse into the Thames; five days since Alexi chanced to identify him as he lay on Gibson’s granite slab. If she hadn’t recognized the scars she herself had once bandaged, the Marquis’s son would by now be just another anonymous corpse covered with quicklime in the local parish’s overflowing poor hole.

Was that what his killer had intended? Sebastian wondered. To rob Sedgewick and the other victims not only of their lives but of a decent burial? To deny anyone who loved them the knowledge of their ultimate fate? Is that why he mutilated them? Not in revenge for some unprincipled seduction or as part of an archaic religious superstition but simply to prevent their identification? How could he have been so certain none of his victims would be reported missing in time? Had he known them that well? Known them and hated them because...

Why?

If they could somehow discover the identities of the other two men, it might all begin to make sense. Was that another reason for the mutilations? Because by hiding his victims’ identities the murderer also hid his own?

Perhaps if he hadn’t been so lost in thought, Sebastian would have noticed the man following him sooner. Whoever he was, he was careful never to draw too near, but neither did he allow Sebastian to pull too far ahead. When Sebastian turned the corner onto Oxford Street he caught a glimpse of his shadow: Of medium height with slightly overlong dark hair, the man wore the neat, conservatively cut coat and trousers of a comfortably situated merchant or banker.

Sebastian knew it was more than possible that the man was simply, like Sebastian himself, walking toward Bond Street. But Sebastian found himself remembering another man of average height with overlong dark hair, a Frenchman dressed in a shabby coat and trousers that enabled him to fade into the background on the mean streets of someplace like St. Giles.

Damn, thought Sebastian. Damn, damn, damn. He was aware of the ache from his wounded leg growing more insistent and wished like hell he’d brought his walking stick—both for the sake of his leg and for the handy sword hidden within it. Without either the sword stick or the neat little double-barreled flintlock he sometimes carried, he would be forced to rely on only his wits and the knife he habitually wore hidden in a sheath in his boot.

He was suddenly acutely aware of his surroundings: of the stout woman in a lightweight bright turquoise pelisse and plumed turban walking a small white dog on the far side of the street; of the housemaid sweeping the steps of a house two doors down; of the boy of perhaps twelve washing the windows of a nearby greengrocer. Sebastian was looking for his French shadow’s overgrown companion from St. Giles. But the giant was conspicuous enough that for the moment, at least, he was evidently staying out of sight.

Sebastian’s attention shifted then to an aged hackney carriage rolling slowly up behind him. The carriage’s windows were empty, but its body still swayed heavily on its springs.

“Oy, you there!” shouted the jarvey at the exact moment the Frenchman behind Sebastian broke into a run.

Chapter 33

Sebastian spun around as the near door of the hackney flew open, revealing the big overgrown oaf crouched awkwardly on the floorboards within. He felt the Frenchman slam into his back, sending him hurtling toward the open door, where the oaf, his craggy face breaking into a wide smile, was waiting to drag him inside. Gritting his teeth, Sebastian caught the edge of the swinging door with one hand and kicked out with his good leg, hooking his bootheel on the hackney’s iron step so he could push back with all his strength.

The unexpected jolt caught the Frenchman off-balance, sending him reeling back. Sebastian felt his wounded leg buckle beneath him and staggered, but he didn’t go down. Whirling, he grabbed the Frenchman by the front of his coat and threw him into the brick wall of the shop beside them.

With a roar, the overgrown oaf erupted from the carriage, his massive arms reaching out to enclose Sebastian in a deadly bear hug. Dropping to a crouch, Sebastian yanked the knife from his boot and came up in a lunge, stepping neatly between the oaf’s massive reaching arms to drive his blade up under the man’s ribs, straight into his heart.

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