Page 63 of The Business of Blood
“He’s not at home, either.” Croft followed me into the dim square box that passed for a star reporter’s office atTheLondon Evening Examiner. He opened the heavy damask drapes, revealing an untidy mahogany desk that took up half the meager office, and a beleaguered leather chair. No other furniture ornamented the room, certainly nothing that invited one to stay. No art adorned the walls, but several plaques, diplomas, and trophies were strewn on and about the desk as though Comstock had only just taken possession of this office and meant to set it to rights at any moment.
“Must be in the field.” Leventhorpe made a valiant effort to protect the chaos of Comstock’s desk from Inspector Croft’s curiosity. But alas, he was swept aside with as much ease as the damask drapes. “You are not privy to that. Everything in this office is privileged information protected by the integrity of the free press.”
“Since when did the press have integrity?” A humorless scoff escaped Croft’s throat as he scanned a hand-written list. “In my experience, you lot are the most unscrupulous of rabble-rousers, who are regularly bought at great expense and with astounding regularity.” He tossed the list onto the desk and retrieved a letter to which the seal had been broken. “The free press. Don’t make me laugh.”
I tried to remember if I’d ever heard Croft laugh and came up with an absolute blank.
I did my best to distract the sputtering, red-faced editor with questions of my own. “When was the last time you were in contact with Mr. Comstock?” I found a gas lamp and lit it when I noted Croft squinting in the pallid light provided by the window.
Leventhorpe leveled me a distasteful look, obviously considering whether or not he felt beholden to answer a woman’s inquiries.
“It would behoove you to not makemerepeat the question,” Croft threatened without looking up.
“Two mornings ago. After he turned in his article.”
Croft glanced over at me. “Do you know where he was the night prior? At say, four a.m.?”
“At home asleep, I would assume. Like I was. What’s this about? Just who is this woman?” He eyed us both suspiciously.
I avoided the question. I’d already introduced myself, and if he couldn’t remember, that wasn’t my concern. “What can you tell me about Mr. Comstock’s…um…vernacular?”
Leventhorpe’s eyes became narrow slits of distemper. “I don’t intuit your meaning.”
He gathered every bit of my meaning, it was all over his priggish face. “Would you say his dialect is rather…” Feminine, anemic, waspy… “Does he have a lisp?”
“What a ridiculous question.”
“Perhaps, but I’d like the answer.”
Scowling, the editor crossed defensive arms over his chest. “It’s not a lisp, per se, it’s more like a—oh, I don’t know—a serpentine pattern of speech. A sign of sophistication, I’d say. Half the nobility is affected, utilizing a similar dialect.” He plucked one of Comstock’s plaques out of my hands, a trophy for excellence of some kind or another.
Afflictedwas a more apropos word than affected, especially where the aristocracy was concerned.
“This is empty,” I tapped on a rectangular glass case with pronged pillars upon which something should be displayed. “What goes in it?”
“A bayonet, if you must know. From the Crimea.”
“Do you know where it is?” Croft met my eyes once more. Some believed Martha Tabrum to have been stabbed over and over with just such a weapon.
“How long has it been missing from this case?” Croft set down the papers and drifted toward it.
“Why ever would I know that?” The editor’s brows drew together. “Just what are you looking for?”
“You may see yourself out, Mr. Leventhorpe.” Croft held the door open for him.
“You-you cannot dismiss me from my own—”
“If I have to tell you to piss off one more time, I’ll take you to Leman Street for questioning.”
Off he pissed.
“I’d give my eyeteeth for that bayonet,” Croft grumbled once we were alone.
“You’re not alone in that.” The first few drops of rain plunked against the window as I joined Croft back at the desk and leafed through a few papers, bills, article notes, and a heavily used datebook. I checked the journal. Comstock was supposed to meet someone here in his office today. A half hour ago. Someone with the initials of DRP. The letter had been traced with an idle pen a number of times and thrice underlined.
He’d missed his very important appointment.
Just then, a bothersome thought struck me. “Don’t you find it odd that Comstock, a self-proclaimed Ripper aficionado—”
