must have learned something with the FBI,’ I said. My shoulders hunched instinctively and it sounded like a criticism. It wasn’t the tone I was looking for, but old habits die hard …
‘The FBI have unsolved cases too,’ he said snippily. ‘The Ripper has chosen these girls carefully. At the moment only he knows the reason – but he’s marked them with a signature that keeps changing.’ DI Bancho turned to look at me. ‘He hunts his prey – knows all about them. At the moment he’s scouring the brothels of Leith but, as I’ve said, the bastard keeps changing.’
DI Bancho and I stood in front of the photographs, a heavy silence between us as we stared at the girls.
‘What’s his signature … you’ve said it’s changing … how did it start?’
‘With Catalina you can see her body is badly decomposed, but he’s cut off her feet and hands to stop her escaping. Then he sewed her eyelids open using heavy black twine. Florenta got the same treatment, but look here.’ He tapped an eight-by-ten photograph. ‘He tore her tongue out by the root. Finally he cut her throat from ear to ear.’
‘What about this one?’ An unknown girl, her mouth twisted into an obscene scream, stared at me.
‘I told you he varies it slightly … he’s taken the skin off her left knee. And this one …’ He pointed to the other unidentified victim. Her breast had been cut open and her heart removed. Bancho coughed. ‘The media didn’t dub him the Ripper – that’s what he calls himself. These aspects of his signature, along with the torn-out tongue, are taken directly from the history books.
‘There’s also speculation that the original Jack the Ripper was a Mason; he scrawled an incriminating message on the wall at the murder scene. The chief constable at the time rubbed it out and that’s why he was never caught. It’s no secret there are some pretty powerful Masons in this city. How often have there been calls for public declaration of membership among police and the judiciary? You can see why I am trying to keep this secret – especially after your recent publicity stunt.’
He offered me a Mars bar from a stash of sweeties in his desk and I couldn’t resist. I always use food as comfort; it was late and we were both sick and exhausted. A sigh of weariness escaped from his lips as we stared at the dead girls. Christmas was coming but to Bancho and me, the season of goodwill had never felt further away.
‘What do they look like to you?’ His finger reached out to touch the portrait of Bianca Kowalski, the third body to be found. ‘They’re all redheads for a start – foreign—’
‘So far …’ he said, interrupting me. I looked back at the gallery of death, recalling the training that Patch, my Professor of Forensics, had given me.
‘Good nutrition in childhood has strengthened her bone structure – see the Slavic high cheekbones – but her mother worked in the fields, I’d guess. Her dress is cheap but she’s copied it from something like American Vogue. It’s bloody sad – she was the prettiest girl in the village, probably dreamed of something more. I bet that all she wanted was to get out, away from the arranged marriage, anything to escape. Jesus, the price was too high,’ I said the final words under my voice. I had to admit that it made me sad and the words slipped out as I thought about the girls.
‘Tell me something I don’t know.’ Bancho’s shoulders slumped, and he turned away from the girls to place his cup down.
‘Okay,’ I said. ‘I thought the papers had named him the Ripper for no good reason … but I suppose he is following Jack the Ripper’s signature to an extent.’
‘The media would have a feeding frenzy over the tongues,’ said Bancho, shuddering. ‘I mean, they’re torn out by the root … well, it’s obviously difficult so he helps the separation along using a serrated knife … he wants it to look like it’s torn out.’
I turned to another part of the wall, on which was a printed, blown-up image of a text message. I’d heard about it at court, but I thought it was an urban myth. Unfortunately, for Bancho, it was not.
Hi i’m jack c ur still having no luck finding me
i respect u duncan but ur boys are letting u down
u have no chance of catching me
warn the whores i will strike again and again
‘How did that go down in the canteen?’ I asked, turning to face him.
‘Depends who you speak to,’ he said, scratching his head. ‘Some of the older men are saying that I sent it to myself.’
‘Meaning that they think you’re a big-headed bastard?’ I said. It raised a weak smile on his face.
‘That, I can handle. Others, including most of my superiors, think I’m being taken for a ride. I’ve overheard whispers as I pass – “He’s just like that detective in charge of the Yorkshire Ripper murders in the eighties – the fool’s being hoaxed by some prankster.” I swear the next one to make comments like that gets punched, no matter how many stripes on their shoulders … Fortunately, they can’t pull me off the case because of the fuss they made about me going on that profiling course at Quantico.’ DI Bancho tightened his jaw, and rolled his tongue along his lips.
‘Maybe both schools of thought are right,’ I said. It was out before I could give it any thought. Christ, even Bancho needed some sympathy. He rolled his eyes like he gave a fuck about my opinion.
Bancho’s mobile rang and I strained to eavesdrop. I could make out parts – the constable on the other end was excited and shouting loudly. Bancho made noncommittal noises and tried to calm the man down. ‘I need you to stay calm, Constable McLeod. We’ve had tip-offs before … Yes, we’ve had what we thought were reliable tip-offs before too.’ Bancho sighed and punched his ‘loudspeaker’ option so that I could hear the words he had probably heard many times before. Bancho’s ego was such that he felt the need to justify himself, particularly to me, one of his harshest critics.
‘But this is the real thing, boss. We can’t move on him for a couple of hours because he won’t be in place until then – but, after that, it’s fucking guaranteed. You’ll have your man. The Ripper’s yours … boss.’
‘I’ll be with you in an hour,’ Bancho said, closing his phone. Despite his words to the other man, he rubbed his hands together. How many times has he really been down this road before? I wondered, but I kept my thoughts to myself.
St Leonards Police Station, Edinburgh Sunday 23 December, 3 a.m.
DI Bancho couldn’t wait to get rid of me; he practically threw me out of the operations room. I assumed that the detective inspector didn’t want to make a phone call to his boss until he heard me clumping up the stairs in my heavy bike boots. I jumped up and down on the bottom step and he thought I’d left. He hadn’t even bothered to close the door, although in his defence the office was down in the bowels of St Leonards and it was very late.
I peered in the open door. He was holding his breath. Opening his bottom drawer, he pulled out a can of Arrid Extra-Dry, sprayed each armpit and sighed.
