"Whoa-now that is one for the books," Sean admitted.

"There's a little more to it-as far as your interest in the story might go," Daniel said.

"Yeah?" Sean said.

Daniel took a long swig of his microbrew. "Good batch, this, wouldn't you say?"

"Dad, are you trying to provoke violence?"

Daniel grinned. "The kid's mother was best friends with Mary Montgomery-who must have been your girl's great-great-grandmother, maybe. Mary pleaded for the boy at the trial. Despite her prestige, the boy was condemned. They say that she was the last one with him before he killed himself."

"Interesting, indeed," Sean said. What was it with everyone? Trying to make Maggie's family out to be cursed or the like.

So then why did he feel himself as if there were something so d.a.m.ned strange about her?

"The bayou is full of ghost stories," Daniel reminded him.

"Thanks."

"Full moons bring out werewolves. Naturally, there is basis in such legends. The gravitational pull of the moon causes physiological responses. Luna-lunatic. Anyone working in the emergency ward of a hospital can tell you that violence escalates during the full moon."

"What a help," Sean said dryly.

"I'm doing my best. Then, the city is big on vampire cults, you know."

"Yeah, yeah."

Daniel grinned. "Your cross is silver. Wonder if old Marie was worried about werewolves or vampires."

"Dad-"

"The Montgomerys-and a Canady, come to think of it- supposedly killed a man once, suspecting him of such foul habits. Remember? We were talking about it the other night. Some say they killed him just for being French, but that's a little drastic, don't you think, especially in a city like New Orleans? Then, of course, that gave rise to legends that the Montgomerys popped out a vampire now and then, every other generation or so- something in the genes, I imagine. There have been strange rumors about the Canadys as well."

Sean groaned.

"Well, h.e.l.l, we couldn't all be heroes. Though, of course, it's nice to have a few in the family line, don't you think?"

"Sure, Dad. Nice."

"Honest to G.o.d," Daniel said, "I wish I could be more helpful." He shrugged. "As far as Jack the Ripper goes, we'll probably never know. We didn't have the technology then that we have now. But there were truly those back then who believed that the very air in the East End was so rank with poverty, cruelty, and crime that evil actually lived there. You've been there, remember the trip we took to Europe your senior year of high school? You've toured the Ripper's haunts, and you know that there are still areas that desperately need renovation, where mist still hides murder, and where you can really believe in evil. Not just in London. In most cities. And throughout history-across the world-there have been reports of supernatural creatures. Some people today are convinced that angels guard them. And in the Middle Ages, well, men thought they had reason to believe in haunts and vampires. There are dozens of cases, legally doc.u.mented by sane officials, of outbreaks of vampirism. Some of it can be explained. Sadly, people were sometimes buried alive, and so, if dug up, their corpses appeared fresh. Also, even after death, some bodily functions continue, and so corpses have 'sat up' after death. As for vampires, blood pools to the downward position of the body after death, leaving the face extremely pale."

"So, uneducated men believed natural phenomena created vampires," Sean said.

Daniel shrugged. "Ah, but there are other historically doc.u.mented cases as well. Many in Europe, not so many in the United States. There was a New England family who lost a daughter who then began to appear at night to her sisters. Five children died before the father determined to dig up the offspring he had buried, stake their hearts, cut them out, and burn them to ash. The deaths then stopped."

"The children probably had a contagious disease they pa.s.sed to one another."

"But the four remaining children survived-after the five had been disinterred, dealt with, and reburied."

"So, a vampire is doing all this?"

"There have been those who historically think they are vampires. Countess Bathory took the lives of hundreds of young women, believing that their blood would give her youth. There was a case here in the early twenties when several people were murdered by men who drank their blood. Real or imagined, you need to look at every angle, and study what you're up against."

Sean stood, patting his father on the shoulder. "Thanks, Dad. You were a big help.

Honest to G.o.d."

Daniel smiled. "I try. You leaving already?"

"Have to-there are just so d.a.m.ned many corpses around these days, I don't seem to have a choice."

His father waved, and he did the same, returning to his car.

As he drove, he replayed all the conversations of the day in his mind.

He'd just reached the French Quarter when he realized that his end of the pager he'd given Mamie was vibrating in his pocket.

He pulled out the device, and scanned the neon lights that platted out the city. He frowned for a minute, getting his bearings. She was in an alley, off Bourbon Street.

He flipped mental pages to see the area with his mind's eye.

He floored the car. He sweated every moment of the drive.

The alley was dark, dingy, flanked by ancient structures that were nearly all condemned.

There were a few shops on the street, a few poverty-level homes.

In fact ...

The alley was remarkably like many a street ...

In old London. Whitechapel, Spitalfields.

The Ripper's old haunt.

London November 9, 1888

Megan didn't find Peter until nearly five in the morning, in the dark shadows of an alley, fallen against the wall of a tenement. He sat, his hands bloodied in front of him, his eyes on his hands. She called his name, hurrying to him and enveloping him in her arms.

"You didn't do it, you didn't do it!" she a.s.sured him. "You didn't kill her, Peter."

"How do you know I'm not a monster?"

"I know."

"How can you?"

"Because I know. I've seen monsters, Peter, and you're not one. You didn't kill her."

"Her?" Peter said, and he began to laugh hoa.r.s.ely, but in a way that frightened her, for he verged on hysteria. "Haven't you heard? It's been a double slaying tonight. Two women dead. Two. One at George's Yard, the other in Mitre Square. And, ah, you should hear what they already whisper about the second. The things that were done to her, the violence! She was mutilated beyond recognition!" He started to laugh again, and then to cry. Megan shook him fiercely. "Peter, you are stronger than this!"

She forced him to his feet, and then, when he continued to seem to have no will of his own, she slapped his cheek. "You have not done this! Understand the truth. You could not have done this!"

"No, no, I don't believe that I could have done such a thing, but I don't know where I was, or what I have done. The time is gone, the past is gone, there is nothing but this blackness and the blood. Oh, G.o.d, look at the blood on my hands, look at the blood ..."

She maneuvered him home. They slipped through the remaining darkness of night.

Daylight came at last to wash away the shadows.

But no amount of light could take away the new terror. The first victim, eventually identified as Liz Stride, or Long Liz, was a Swedish prost.i.tute. She had been spared mutilation.

The killer made up for it with Catherine, or Kate, Eddowes. She had been even more cruelly ripped and torn than Polly Chapman. "Butchered like a pig," one witness to the finding of the body reported. Stomach slashed open, organs removed ... organs gone. Though killed within a mile of each other, Liz had died in the jurisdiction of the Metropolitan Police; Kate had been killed in that of the City Police. Ma.s.sive manhunts by both forces were instantly underway. A piece of bloodied ap.r.o.n was found, and written in white chalk on the fascia of black bricks at the edge of the nearby doorway were the words, "The Juwes are The men That Will not be Blamed for nothing."

What was written came to the people through word of mouth, for Sir Charles Warren, afraid that the words might cause anti-Semitic riots, immediately ordered them erased. And so began the pondering on exactly what the words meant- and if they had even been written by the killer.

Once again, the city went berserk. Peter was at first ill with fear, then he began to believe Megan's a.s.surances, and he became determined that he would prove to himself that he was not guilty of the heinous crimes.

Immediately after the killings, a major newspaper let out the information that a letter had been received- prior to the latest killings-written by a man claiming to be the murderer. It was addressed "Dear Boss," talked about the foolish police and the sharpness of his knife, promised to send a lady's ears in next, and was signed, "Jack the Ripper." Another letter had been received soon after by the same author- promising a double event.

And more awful offerings were to arrive in the mail.

George Lusk, chairman of the Mile End Vigilance Committee, received a small brown parcel. It contained half a kidney, and a message from the killer that he had "prasarved it" for Lusk- while he fried and ate the other half.

The foremost pathologists were approached by the police and the consensus confirmed that the kidney was human, most probably female.

London went wild with fury and panic.

Peter spent hours staring into s.p.a.ce.

Megan took to the streets alone, seeking Jack the Ripper.

October pa.s.sed. Laura became ill, and Peter tried to rouse himself from his lethargy and fear. He tended to his wife, and as she seemed to recover somewhat from the influenza that plagued her along with her pregnancy, he began to notice that Megan left night after night.

He followed her, demanding to know what she was doing. "Saving your sanity!"

she told him.

"At the cost of your own life, little fool!" he charged her. "If you're about on this fool notion, I must be with you."

"Who can I solicit if you're with me?" she inquired Peter became angry, warning her that she dared not taunt such a killer. She tried to a.s.sure him she was in no danger, she was young and strong and seldom drank.

Still, that night, she shared a pint with him. And they commiserated together that rumors grew more absurd daily. Doctors were suspected, butchers, tradesmen, foreigners- even members of the Royal household, despite the fact that Queen Victoria herself was appalled and demanding answers from the police. "Since the letters have been published, the police have received more confessions than they can count!" Megan reminded Peter, and he was much better.

They made a pact that night. Peter would work again, and believe in himself. And they would hunt the killer together.

Throughout October, the killer lay dormant. Yet, like the police, Megan and Peter hunted the streets. It was easy enough for them to do so; Peter had legitimate business among his patients.

Friday, the ninth of November, was to be the day of the Lord Mayor's Show. The new Lord Mayor of London would drive in state with tremendous pageantry down the streets of the city to take his oath of office at the Royal Courts of Justice in the Strand.

Peter and Megan talked about the pageantry as they walked through Whitechapel that night.

It was a strange night, the temperature growing chill, and yet, a fog swirling in the darkness and shadows. As they walked, they suddenly heard a soft cry.

"Murder!"

"My G.o.d!" Peter cried. "Stay close!"

And he ran forward.

Yet somehow, in the darkness and the shadows and the relentless swirling of the fog, Megan lost him. She cried his name, running through the night. She ran, and ran, and ran. When dawn came, she had still not found him. She kept walking, and realized at last that morning had come, and she had walked home.

She was alarmed to see that Peter's and Laura's door stood open. With dread filling her heart, she hurried forward. She hesitated just briefly, then heard the sound of a wretched sobbing so deep it was unbearable. She rushed in then, and found Peter on his knees by the side of the sofa where Laura lay, dead still. Megan walked carefully into the room. Laura lay on the sofa, pale as snow, beautiful, frail. . .

"Peter?"

"She's dead," he sobbed.

And she realized that Laura's condition had worsened in the night, and that she had died while she and Peter had hunted the killer. Laura had died alone. Perhaps, if he had been with her, she might have been saved. At the very least, she would not have died alone and abandoned.

"Oh, Peter!" she whispered, and tried to soothe him.

But he would not forgive himself. "I am cursed! Again, I awakened with blood, and G.o.d has punished me for the lives I have taken with this most precious of lives!"

"Peter, no! For the sake of your immortal soul, you mustn't believe such a thing-"

"What do you know of the immortal soul?" he demanded brokenly.

"Only that it is the most precious part of us," she told him evenly. "Peter, Laura is with G.o.d, and you must realize that you are not at fault, and you must continue to help others."

He shook, still clinging to his wife's body. "Megan... you've been so good to us both. She loved you so dearly, you know," he said, speaking as if confused, broken.

"Megan, would you get me a brandy? For the love of G.o.d, I need some help now, oh, G.o.d, oh, my Laura ..."

"I'll get you brandy," Megan said quickly. She hurried to do so.

As she left the room, she heard a shot.

She froze, and turned back.

Peter had taken a pistol to his head. He'd fired one clean shot into his temple.