Chapter 40

“There is nothing so deceptive as the distance of a light upon a pitch-dark night, and sometimes the glimmer seemed to be far away upon the horizon and sometimes it might have been within a few yards of us.”

-Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles

We’d gone past Madison and were well up north in Wisconsin when Tom stirred.

“Feeling any better?” I asked, hoping he had recovered some strength.

He nodded. “Some. Where are we?”

“North of Madison. About 40 more miles. Should take us about three-quarters of an hour,” I said, pointing at the GPS as my phone rang.

“I better take this. It might be Morgan. Hello,” I answered.

All I could hear on the line was static. It was a terrible connection.

“Hello, hello,” I repeated.

I heard Mitch say, “DD.”

“Mitch, Mitch,” I shouted. “I’m in a dead zone.”

I picked out a word or two, but then there was silence, and the silence morphed into a long beep.

“Dead,” I said and dropped the cell onto the seat.

“There’s not enough signal up here in the wilds,” Tom said groggily.

“I know. I just hope Mitch doesn’t think I hung up on him,”

“Problems?”

“Not really, but we’ve been having trouble connecting lately. I call him, and he’s going to a meeting. He calls me, and I’m breaking and entering and my phone is turned off, or I’m in God’s country with no signal towers. I’m upset about it.”

Tom settled into his seat. I shifted again, trying to get the pressure on a different part of my butt. I was tired, and I knew Tom must be too. I suspected all that was keeping him together was his keen interest in the hunt for the Ripper. At least he was awake.

“Tom, I’m dying to know moreabout Conan Doyle and

Jack the Ripper. Who do you think Doyle named as the Ripper?”

“DD, people have been arguing about the Ripper’s identity for over century. Why? What set these murders apart was the sheer butchery involved and the public taunting of the police.”

“So was the Ripper completely wacko?”

“DD, those murders were not the work of a sane mind. But everyone agrees that the Ripper was also strong, intelligent and oblivious to risk. A few of the named suspects meet these criteria. In fact, good circumstantial cases can be made against some of them. But all these cases ignore two things. One is that the people involved in the case at the top levels - people who’d be most likely to know - said that they knew who the Ripper was. And two, no one - absolutely no one - named him. Do you think they would keep quiet about it for immigrants, artists, butchers, Masons or misogynists?”

I shifted again, stiff from driving. “No,” I said. “They must have been protecting someone very important. That’s the only reason a police cover up makes any sense.”

Tom nodded. “And that’s precisely why the cover up itself, which Ripperologists largely ignore, is in my view an essential clue to the identity of the Ripper. Think about Watergate. The cover-up revealed the crime and grew bigger than the crime.”

Tom was nearly shouting to make his point. Wolfie awoke, sat up and looked around. I wondered how connected Tom was, with all the drugs still in him.

“That sort of treatment is reserved for the wealthy and privileged,” Tom continued in a more normal tone. Wolfie, sensing all was now okay, curled up again.

Tom began looking at his laptop again. “Debra sent us something interesting, DD. She researched the timetable of the murders. She found that after Mary Kelly’s murder, and after the inquest - where incidentally some of the witnesses didn’t testify - the case died down almost immediately. She says someone wrote at the time, ‘It’s almost as if somebody had just switched off a switch and the whole interest in the case virtually died.’”

“That reinforces the police claims that they knew who did it.” I added.

“And it also strongly supports the theory that it was someone very important,” Tom added. “You can be sure interest would have died down if the Ripper was someone of no social or political consequence. They’d have hunted that person down like hounds to the fox until they cornered him.”

I nodded, watching for exit signs.

“This is why I’m going so hard after the Doyle papers. It will finally be the end of the cover-up - 125 years after the fact.”

“But if there’s no smoking gun...?” I let the rest of my thought hang there, unspoken. I hated to throw cold water on his high hopes, but...

“You’re right, DD. There may be no smoking gun. But those clues that Grange said were in Conan Doyle’s notes may finally provide the threads to resolve the question.”

“As I remember, you said the clues he listed were... a Royal Pardon, a red handkerchief...”

Tom counted out three more, “collar and cuffs; the word ‘Lipski;’ and the eye-witness at the Police Seaside Home. Debra’s concentrating on researching them.”

“Didn’t you mention six clues?”

“Oh yeah, that other was a diagnosis by Dr. Gull,” he reminded me.

“I’d like to know more about that Royal Pardon. That bolsters the idea that the Ripper was someone untouchable.”

“Good point. Let’s see if Debra found out anything on that yet. I’m looking... Here. Yes, here it is. Queen Victoria issued a pardon on November 12th, 1888.

‘Murder-Pardon,-Whereas on November 8 or 9 in Miller-Court, Dorset-Street, Spitalfields, Mary Jane Kelly was murdered by some person or persons unknown: the Secretary of State will advise the grant of Her Majesty’s gracious pardon to accomplice, not being a person who contrived, or actually committed the murder.’

“Wow,” I exclaimed. “The pardon was for an accomplice, not the actual Ripper. That’s significant.”

“I agree,” Tom said as he kept reading Debra’s e-mail. After a minute, he continued: “Debra says that the granting of Her Majesty’s Gracious Pardon required the involvement of both parliament and crown; and according to her research, such a royal pardon for a capital offence has never before or since been issued or granted.”

“So,” I said, “the logical conclusion is that someone they knew was involved but didn’t commit the murders. By the way, it only mentions Mary Jane Kelly, the last victim.”

Tom nodded. “And this connects directly to what Debra sent us earlier, that the police dropped the case right after Mary Kelly’s inquest.”

“You’re beginning to make a believer of me, Tom.I’m

starting to realize how important this is and why you broke out of the hospital in your condition.”

A small plane took off somewhere nearby.

I used the GPS and found the airport. It was the Carlton

Airport. “There’s the sign for an airport,” I pointed to our right. “We could have flown.”

He brushed away the idea. “Probably only private planes. Anyhow Wolfie doesn’t like to fly, especially in those little jobs. That’s how they first brought him out of the wilderness. He was a lot smaller then and a real handful. I wouldn’t like to try it now. He’d eat the pilot and go on from there.”

I silently agreed. There were no lights and few signs. The only noises were our tires and Wolfie. I wanted to ask Tom to turn on his computer again and pull up Google Earth and pinpoint the Havens so we could pinpoint the buildings and the terrain, but he’d relaxed again, and Wolfie was making contented snuffling noises.

Finally there was an exit sign for the Dells. As I checked

the GPS, Tom moved and grunted.

“The turnoff to the Haven should be coming up shortly.”

“I’ll keep my eyes open,” he said. “That sleep was exactly what I needed. I’m raring to go again.”

I doubted that. He looked like death warmed over. He

closed his eyes again and leaned back. I was sure he was asleep again, but he tapped my shoulder and said, “DD, there’s the sign for the Haven. The turnoff will be right up ahead.”

The disembodied voice of the GPS told us where and

when to turn. “Good thing you’ve got this gadget,” I said. “It’s so dark and nothing is well marked.”

“They probably don’t care. Up till now, it’s been a

private residence. But you’re right. It’s totally dark and isolated.”

I hoped that article on the Haven mean that its mystique was its isolation and not something more sinister.