7. Chapter 7

Chapter seven

T he first part of the next evening was strangely quiet. The air felt heavy and oppressive, like just before a storm. It licked at his skin beneath Hugh’s heavy uniform, making sweat break out on his face and breathing a bit more difficult. The few people out on the street hurried past him with their heads down, and darkness fell over the city like a wool blanket. Hugh traced back the route from The Bull and Parasol to the area where Christopher had been killed, again finding nothing. He felt the eyes of Spring-Heeled Jack on him again, and he tried not to sigh in frustration. He almost wished that if Jack was going to do something to him, he would just do it so that they could stop playing this odd game of Follow the Leader.

He wasn’t sure what it was that finally caught his attention. Some sort of sound that his body sensed, even if his brain did not. It was a few blocks from the site of Christopher’s death, and he passed the mouth of a dark alley, the kind that would make him nervous whenever he walked by it on patrol, as it was long and shrouded in darkness so thick that he could not see the end of it. Something felt off. He could feel it crawling on his skin like a plague of flies. He lit his police lantern, lifting it to cast at least a little light into the void before he stepped into the alley.

He could hear something toward the other end of it. He couldn’t place the sound exactly, a muffled sort of ripping, dragging noise, and a sort of snuffling sound. Perhaps a dog foraging for scraps in a waste bin? Hugh’s footsteps echoed softly against the walls of the buildings that loomed to either side, preventing most of the light from the street from penetrating that far. He was more than halfway down the alley before his feeble lantern finally illuminated something close to the ground a short distance away.

Something dark was hunched over a prostrate form. Hugh could see a limp hand lying on the ground, pale in the sickly light. The scene was much too reminiscent of when he had found Toby, and now it seemed that someone else was dead. He was determined that this time Spring-Heeled Jack would not get away from him. He pulled his truncheon from his belt. “Jack!” he said loudly, his voice echoing off the brick and stone around him.

The creature lifted its head from where it had been stooped over. Long legs unfolded, bent almost like a dog’s. An elegant, black cape was thrown over its shoulders, and atop its head was a gentleman’s top hat. It rose up, its bulk becoming more apparent as it unfurled from its crouched position. The moonlight struck the face of the creature as it turned toward Hugh, and, for a moment, he was confused about what he was seeing. Whoever- whatever- it was was not Spring-Heeled Jack. What looked back at him might have been a man, but it was no manner of man that Hugh had ever seen before. Stringy, dark hair, covered in a variety of viscera, hung over its craggy face, a face sharp with angles that cast much of it into shadow. There seemed to be no lips, the mouth stretched unnaturally wide and long to reveal thin, pointed teeth. He could not see eyes beneath the shadow of the top hat and the hair falling over it, but he could feel what he could not see. The creature held him frozen, paralyzed in place as the mouth stretched wider still. It let out a sound, somewhere between a hiss and a growl, a sound he had never heard before but one that he knew he would never forget.

The vile creature took a step toward him. Run! Hugh tried to command himself. But his body felt as though it were locked in place, unable to do anything but stare. His truncheon fell from his hand and hit the ground, the wooden sound echoing in the alleyway as loud as a tree being felled by a woodsman. The creature took another step, then crouched, coiled like a cat about to pounce upon a mouse. Hugh’s breath froze in his lungs.

Something suddenly dropped to the ground in front of him, in a swirl of black and white, landing almost silently except for the snap of a dark cape. Hugh nearly leaped out of his skin. He wondered for a moment if the creature had moved that quickly, but he realized that the figure in front of him had his back to him and was facing down the monstrous creature, poised in a similar crouch. Light glinted off of metallic claws at the end of hands that were spread wide. It was Spring-Heeled Jack, his arms up to keep Hugh away from the creature, or the creature away from Hugh, he wasn’t quite sure which yet.

The creature at the end of the alley let out a snarl, the sound making every hair on Hugh’s body stand on end. It suddenly charged forward, dropping onto all fours to run like a canine.

The next moment, the alley was suddenly almost as bright as daylight. White and blue flames erupted from Spring-Heeled Jack’s mouth in an almost biblical torrent of flame that Hugh felt heat his skin even with the man’s back to him. The creature was still moving, but it had ceased its dash, now flailing and roaring, the sound echoing off the walls so loudly that he had to put his hands over his ears. The flames licked over its body, consuming it as the roars died away, and the creature collapsed into a heap of charred flesh and bone in the middle of the alley. The air smelled of smoke and singed hair and burning flesh.

And then Jack turned to look at him. Without breaking his gaze, he reached down and scooped up Hugh’s truncheon from the ground where it had fallen, holding it out to him, handle pointed toward Hugh. “Glittering guinea pigs, I was almost too late. Are you all right?”

Hugh reached up to take it, wrapping his palm around the handle. For just a moment, they both held it, before Jack let go, and Hugh let his arm fall to his side.

“I…” Hugh realized with a start that Jack had asked a question. “Yes, I’m all right,” he said. “Are you?”

Jack laughed, a sound so lyrical it might have been arranged by an Austrian composer. It was the exact opposite of the sound the smoldering creature had made when the flames had encased its body. “I am fine.”

“What was that thing?” Hugh asked, glancing past Jack to the burning pile of flesh and fabric.

“I believe that is the reason I am here,” Jack said.

That cryptic answer was not helpful in the moment, and Hugh had a thousand more questions flying about in his head like a flock of starlings. “I… I need to report this,” he said, his voice dropping a little. How was he going to explain any of this to Sergeant Reardon?

“Oh, of course,” Jack replied with a polite smile that showed off the pointed tips of his sharp teeth. “I shall retire away from the scene while you alert your authorities. I shall return for you when the coast is clear. But please wait a moment on that blasted whistle blast. It really is terribly aggravating to my ears.”

And then Jack bent his knees and gave a great leap, landing on the sill of a window three stories above Hugh’s head. With another leap, he had reached the rooftop of the tenement building and disappeared up and over the edge of it.

And suddenly, Hugh was alone again, in the dark alleyway with its monstrous shadows from the flames that still licked and lapped at the monster not far from him. He wondered for a moment if he had simply imagined this whole thing. But the blazing corpse at his feet beleaguered that question. He certainly had not set the creature aflame.

The sound of feet running alerted him to the presence of others, and several men in work clothes appeared at the entrance of the alleyway, one holding a broken bottle, another a sharp knife. All of them stared at Hugh, then at the mess on the ground. Hugh saw the tension ease from them as they realized that the threat was no longer a threat. “Are you all right, sir?” one of them asked, pulling off his bowler hat to scratch at his balding head.

“Yes,” Hugh said, starting toward the men before realizing that his legs were trembling. He could not appear weak or collapse. He had to be strong and do his duty. “Excuse me, I must call additional officers.” He raised his whistle to his lips and blew a note on it. It rang off the walls, and more than one window opened, sleepy heads poking out to see what the commotion was about. A moment later, he heard an answering whistle.

“That fella, he’s dead?” asked one of the men, gesturing to the pile of charred and smoking flesh with the knife he held. Hugh realized it was a steak knife; the man must have grabbed it off of a table at a nearby tavern when he and his friends came running to help.

“Yes. Very much so.” Hugh’s mind turned back to what the creature had been crouched over when he had come upon it. “I must check the victim, please wait here.”

The three men did not look all that eager to follow him past the flaming pile of meat and blackened clothing. Hugh edged carefully past it, half-afraid the beast would suddenly lunge in a shower of fiery sparks and latch onto him, but it did not move, beyond the flames continuing their mad dance over the gentleman’s cape.

He smelled the body of the victim before he saw it clearly, the scent of fresh blood and other innards thick in the air, coating his tongue and the inside of his nostrils. Hugh shifted to try to get as much light from the alley entrance and the flames as he could.

The victim was definitely dead, ripped open from throat to groin, ribs broken and pulled aside, as if the creature had been searching for the organs beneath it. The internal body cavity was a mess of meat and blood and bile. Hugh gagged but pressed his hand to his mouth to keep back any additional reaction.

The victim’s head was turned away from him, and he shifted around, trying to avoid stepping in any blood or other things that littered the ground. It was a man, with blond hair that lay ragged, coated in sticky clumps of drying blood. He was not a child, but neither was he very old. Perhaps late 20’s, though it was obvious that London streets had not been kind to him. He had healing bruises on one cheek. Whether he was a prostitute, Hugh could not immediately say, as his clothes were strewn about as nothing more than rags; they looked as if they had been ripped or slashed off of him.

He heard shouts and feet approaching, and then another constable reached the alley mouth where the laborers still stood with their makeshift weapons. Two more followed close behind him as they began to talk to the men there. One constable detached himself from the group, and he recognized Depesh. He gave the Indian man a tired look. “Another one,” he said, and Depesh nodded, looking pale in the dim lights around them. “Deceased.”

“What is this?” Depesh asked, pointing to the smoldering remains, the flames nearly out now.

“Whatever it was, it was… I think it was eating the victim,” Hugh said. There was so much viscera and not enough light for him to tell if the boy at his feet was missing anything from inside of him, but he couldn’t think of any other explanation for what the monstrous figure had been doing stooped over the body like that.

Depesh pressed a hand to his mouth quickly. “Good God…”

Hugh nodded. He had no other words for it himself.

As he walked back into Scotland Yard with Constable Depesh after interviewing witnesses, in what was becoming a very familiar and uncomfortable pattern, Hugh saw no sign of Spring-Heeled Jack. He sat down with Sergeant Reardon to give his statement about what he had found, describing how he had stumbled upon the monster in the alley, with the body of the dead blond man.

“Surely you don’t expect me to believe that there are creatures of the supernatural sort traversing around London, preying on people in the black of night,” Reardon said as Hugh described the monstrous creature that had attacked him.

“I might not have myself, sir,” Hugh said, heat rising in his cheeks as he realized what he was about to tell his sergeant. “But I encountered someone else in the alley as well.”

“Oh? And who might that have been?” Reardon asked, his voice dripping with detestation.

“Spring-Heeled Jack.” The words sounded ridiculous coming out of his mouth, and Hugh thought that he would not have been surprised if his commanding officer thought that he had gone mad.

Reardon snorted. “Spring-Heeled Jack? What sort of a fool do you think I am, Danbury?”

“No fool, sir,” Hugh said with a frown. “But I swear that I did.”

Reardon laughed, slapping his thigh as if Hugh had told a most thrilling joke. “Are you on opium, Constable?”

“No, sir. I know it seems unlikely, but I swear that it was Spring-Heeled Jack, as clearly as I see you before me now.” He debated telling Reardon that he had seen Spring-Heeled Jack at the site of Toby Kelly’s murder as well, but he realized he wouldn’t sound any less mad than he already did, and that he would be admitting to lying on his report about finding Toby’s body.

Reardon snorted again, and Hugh imagined him as a large ferret-faced bull in a pen. “You are obviously overworked, trying to solve the other cases assigned to you. Take the rest of the night off.”

“But, sir-”

“That’s an order, Constable,” Reardon said firmly. “Go, now.”

Hugh opened his mouth to protest, but Reardon just gave him a pointed look. Hugh closed his mouth again, nodding and getting to his feet. He hadn’t been dreaming or overworked. He knew he hadn’t been. He could still feel the heat from Jack’s blue and white flames on his skin as it ignited the charging monster that would likely have torn him apart the same as it had that young man.

He nodded to Depesh and told him he was going home on Reardon’s orders and would return tomorrow to check in with Dr. Ledbetter about the autopsy before stepping outside and onto the quiet, gaslit street.

It was the middle of the night, and very little stirred around him. The sounds and smells that normally accompanied the daylight hours were absent now. No hackneys and their horses and drivers, no vendors selling wares, only a few people walking the streets, and most of them were swift, keeping their heads down and their eyes up, watching for footpads or other ne’er-do-wells. He looked around but saw no one waiting for him, either in the shadows or atop the rooftops. Perhaps Jack had vanished in the chaos that had ensued after the other constables had arrived on the scene. He headed for his flat, keeping to the light from the streetlamps as much as he could. He turned off the main thoroughfare and onto a more residential one.

Hugh nearly leaped out of his skin as Spring-Heeled Jack suddenly slid down a pipe attached to a fire escape to land gracefully and nearly silently on the pavement next to him. It was no wonder that people were encountering Spring-Heeled Jack and being so frightened by him. “H… Hello,” Hugh said, giving him a smile as he tried to calm his racing heart.

Jack nodded to him, and Hugh still found himself fascinated by how tall the man was. “Have the police combed the scene?”

“They have.” He gazed back at the man in front of him. Perhaps Reardon did not believe him, but the spectre before him was solid as any man. Of that, he was sure. “My sergeant does not believe that I was saved by Spring-Heeled Jack.”

“Ah. I am not surprised,” Jack said with a bit of a chuckle. “It is hardly the sort of thing one encounters on the streets of London.”

“Neither is that creature that attacked us,” Hugh said, not sure why he had suddenly used ‘us’ instead of ‘me’ in that statement. The creature had no doubt been coming for him, and might have reached him too without Jack’s interference. “I… thank you, for saving me.”

Jack nodded and waved his hand with a dramatic flourish. “It was my pleasure, Hugh.”

“What was that thing?”

Jack suddenly stepped back into the shadows and lifted his cape up to shield himself, seeming to become no more than a shadow in the mouth of the alley as a middle-aged man walked past Hugh. “Good night, constable,” he said, touching the brim of his hat politely. Hugh returned the gesture. The man did not seem even slightly aware that Spring-Heeled Jack stood less than two feet away. When the man had walked on beyond earshot, Jack stepped out of the shadows again. “Is there a place where we may go? I would be delighted to answer all of your questions, but surely the middle of the street is no place for such. Tea is not required.”

Hugh glanced around. He too was suddenly feeling the need to get out of the darkness and fog, and into some place warm and familiar. “My home is just a few blocks away.”

“Excellent,” Jack said and started to walk off at a fast pace. Hugh raised a brow. How did Jack know where his rooms were?

“Have you been following me home?” he asked.

“Of course. I’ve been following you everywhere.”

“What? Why?” Hugh asked, having to jog to catch up to Jack’s longer, more rapid strides.

“All in good time,” Jack replied.

Hugh frowned. His room was on the fourth floor of the building, but knowing Jack’s ability to easily jump up and down from great heights, that was not reassuring. “Have you been watching me at home?”

“Oh, muskrat’s whiskers, no,” Jack said, giving him a polite smile. “Your home’s privacy and virtue remain unmolested by my eyes.”

Hugh’s cheeks went red. Jack followed him around all of London, but he drew the line at peeping in Hugh’s bedroom window? At least Hugh kept the bedroom curtains closed when he slept, so he didn’t have to worry about Jack finding out about the times he had woken up in a sticky mess after dreaming about Jack pushing him against the alley wall.

They reached his building, but Hugh could already hear some voices in the hallways and foyer. “Can you put your cape over your horns or something?”

Jack looked affronted. “Don’t you like them?” he said, a tease of mischief in his voice.

Hugh glowered, his cheeks going red again. “You can’t just walk into my building like this.” He gestured to Jack’s horns and his lack of proper attire. The white oilcloth left very little of his chest to the imagination.

“Which window is yours?” Jack asked.

Hugh motioned around the building. “Fourth floor, second from the right.”

Jack nodded. “Excellent. I shall meet you at the window forthwith.”

“Don’t let anyone see you!” Hugh hissed. He could only imagine what that headline might be, and the last thing he needed was to draw more attention to himself.

“I shall be as sneaky as a lamb’s tail!” Jack declared, and then he turned and vanished around the side of the building.

Hugh hoped that a lamb’s tail was very sneaky as he made his way inside the building, nodding at a few of the residents who were up and talking. Even in the middle of the night, there was always someone up; London was never fully asleep. He headed up the stairs to his rooms on the fourth floor. He unlocked the door and lit several candles, then turned on the gas lamps to illuminate the space. His front living room and kitchen were small but clean, furnished with second-hand furniture. He moved over to the fireplace grate, bending to stir the embers back to life. The little room was fairly cold, as it usually was. He fed several pieces of wood and paper into the fire to help build it up. Then he headed into his bedroom. He pulled back the curtains and found Jack gazing back at him through the window. Hugh jumped, clamping a hand to his mouth to stifle a yell of surprise. He threw up the sash, and Jack slid inside with ease, despite his height.

“If you do that in other windows, it’s no wonder you are frightening people half to death!” Hugh scolded as he closed the window and pulled the curtains again.

Jack rolled his eyes, glancing around the small bedroom. “I am no snoop. This is your abode?”

Hugh nodded. “This is my bedroom. The kitchen and parlor are here.” He gestured through the door. “It’s warmer in there too, I got the fire going.”

“Please, do not go to trouble on my account,” Jack said, giving a slight bow before heading out into the main room.

Hugh looked around, realizing with consternation that he had very little in the way of seating for guests. He so rarely had them, there had never been the need. He gestured to his own comfortable armchair in front of the fireplace. “Please, sit.” Jack glanced at him, and Hugh nodded encouragingly. “Oh, may I… take your cape?” He glanced at the almost batwing-like cloak around Jack’s shoulders.

Jack smiled and removed his cape with a flourish before handing it over. Hugh hung it on the hat rack by the door as Jack moved to sit in the armchair. Hugh bustled into the kitchen, beginning to prep things for tea. He glanced over at Jack to see the man looking curiously about from his spot in the chair. He smiled a bit when Jack stood up again and crossed over to the mantle to look at a photograph there. “Who are these?”

“My mother and father,” Hugh said as he grabbed china from his cupboards, giving them a cursory wipe to ensure they were not dusty. “They both passed away a few years ago.”

“I am dreadfully sorry to hear that,” Jack said, his fingers brushing lightly over the corner of the frame as if caressing a loved one’s cheek. “I am sure they would be proud of you being a police constable.”

Hugh smiled a little at that. “I would like to think so.”

“Do you have other family?”

“Two older sisters,” Hugh replied as he prepped the tea kettle. “Both of them are married and have children, so I don’t see them very often.”

Jack nodded, continuing to wander about the room, peeking into the washroom before returning once more to settle into the armchair. Hugh dragged one of his wooden kitchen chairs over to face the armchair before returning to the kitchen to fetch the tea things. He laid them out on the hassock in between them. “May I ask you questions now?”

“Yes, of course,” Jack said.

“What was that thing in the alley?” Hugh asked as he set down the tea pot and poured both himself and Jack a steaming mug. “It looked like it might have once been human.”

“It still was,” Jack said, as Hugh held up the milk, and he shook his head in silent response.

Hugh frowned. “It certainly didn’t look that way.”

Jack picked up his own cup, and Hugh was surprised that he took a sip straightaway of the hot brew without so much as a flinch. “It was human, but a twisted, evil aberration. A creature of vileness. Evil and cruelty brought forth.” His bonfire eyes flickered like the flames dancing on the hearth, his voice rising in both pitch and volume with each word until he was nearly leaning out of his chair with what one could almost say was excitement.

“But how?” Hugh asked.

Jack shook his head slowly as he sat back, taking another sip of his tea. “I wish I could say. I only know that something is causing this vileness to awaken within them.”

“Them?” Hugh asked in surprise. “You mean, there is more than one person like that?”

“Yes,” Jack said. “I am unsure what is causing the transformation. I am only aware that it is happening.”

“Have you seen more than the one we encountered tonight?”

“Yes,” Jack said.

That thought chilled Hugh despite the warm fire only a few paces away. “How many are there?”

“I do not know,” Jack said with a frown that etched darkness into the sharpness of his forehead and cheeks. “Besides the one we encountered tonight, I have seen one other. Whomever killed that first boy.”

“Christopher?” Hugh asked in surprise.

Jack nodded, taking another large swallow of the hot tea.

“You saw him kill Christopher?”

“No, but I saw him running off when the man with the big mustache approached. I didn’t get a good look at his face, but he had a long, whippy tail. He looked different than the man who attacked the red-haired boy.”

“Toby Kelly,” Hugh supplied, and Jack nodded.

“But I do believe whomever attacked Toby Kelly is also the creature we encountered tonight,” Jack said thoughtfully.

He had so many more questions pertaining to the thing in the alley, but he realized he knew almost nothing about the man sitting across from him that he had just invited into his home. “You knew my name, before I had ever introduced myself to you,” Hugh said. “You said that you knew more about me than I would expect. So, tell me, Spring-Heeled Jack. Who are you, and why have you been following me?” Hugh set down his teacup and looked up at Jack curiously.

Jack laughed in his musical way. “Alas, my powers of concealment were not as stealthy as I had hoped. You are an observant man, Hugh. Or I am terrible at sneaking.”

Hugh suspected it was probably a bit of both. Hopefully he had not been observed jumping up to Hugh’s bedroom window. “When did you first start following me?”

“The night of that Christopher’s murder. I arrived here, and I was drawn to a commotion that turned out to be someone running away from Christopher’s body.”

“You ‘arrived’ here? From where?” Hugh asked.

“Tell me first. Do you believe in magic?” Jack asked, gazing at him with intrigue.

Hugh blinked, then really thought about the question for a moment. “If you had asked me a week ago, I would have said no. But after some of the things I’ve seen recently with these killings and transformations, I am very much reconsidering my position on it.”

Jack smiled, the firelight catching his pointed teeth. “That is a fair assessment. If you believe in magic and the supernatural, it will make what I’m about to tell you make a lot more sense.”

Hugh nodded, waving his hand for Jack to continue as he picked up his tea again. Jack was thoughtful for a moment. “I will try to explain as best I can. Beyond this world lies hundreds of other worlds. They all exist at different times and in different places. You can’t see them unless you have very special magic. I have the ability to travel through these different times and places. I am not from this world and this time originally.”

The universe beyond London suddenly had gotten much bigger in the last few seconds, and Hugh swallowed a bit of tea down the wrong tube, coughing and clearing his throat. “You are magical?” he asked when he was able to speak again.

Jack’s smile was a little self-indulgent. “I am.”

“So where are you originally from?” Hugh asked, as if Jack would say that he was from some place he knew like Ireland or one of the Americas, and not some place outside of the planet they currently resided on.

“That is also a little difficult to explain,” Jack said. “This body is a form I have been given to emulate yours. But my natural form would not be recognizable as human. It would appear to you as… I think you might call it a will-o-the-whisp. A sort of figure of light, similar to the flame you saw earlier.”

“What do you mean, to emulate my form?” Hugh asked.

Jack took another sip of his tea. “I am not human, obviously. I suppose the closest equivalent that you might understand is to consider me a corporeal soul.”

“You mean, a ghost?” Hugh said with a bit of a frown.

Jack laughed. “Ah, yes, we do live in such times. Not a ghost, though many may believe so based on my appearance. Allow me to try to explain. In my original form, I do not have needs and desires the way you do. I simply exist, with knowledge of the many worlds at my disposal, as do the rest of my kind. Our… essence, I suppose, is a good way to put it. Our essence is drawn to specific events in various places and times. When that place and time beckons each of us, we travel to it.”

This was much more existential than Hugh had ever considered himself to be, and he wondered if this was like trying to understand the existence of God before there was anything else created. “What beckons you?”

Jack smiled a little, setting down his teacup and saucer with a soft clink. “Our soulmate.”

Hugh blinked. “You used that word before. But I still don’t understand what it means.”

“The reason for our existence. When the time comes, we are drawn to that individual, wherever they may be, and it is our sacred duty to protect our soulmate and help them with the problem assigned to them.”

“Assigned to them?” Hugh said, raising a brow.

“Well, that does make it sound rather intentional. Really, it is simply random chance,” Jack said. “But then, relationships often are, aren’t they? Two or more people in the same time and place under the right circumstances. It is quite scientific, I’m sure. Perhaps there will be studies in the future. Ah, I am speculating again, my sincerest apologies. It really doesn’t help answer your question.”

“What question?” Hugh asked.

“There is another question!” Jack said with a wave of his hand. “But your original question was about the problem assigned to you. You may have already figured out that there is something vile afoot.”

“I got that impression,” Hugh said flatly. “What does that have to do with problems and soulmates?”

“Ah, yes. You see, the universe has assigned you as my soulmate. Therefore, it is my duty to help you solve these ghastly crimes, and then do whatever it is you do in the pursuit of justice.”

“What does that mean though, that you are my soulmate?” Hugh asked. His mind wandered once more to his dreams of Jack pressing him against the wall, his hand moving between his legs, and he shifted a little as his prick stirred to life in his trousers.

Jack sprawled in the chair with an arm dramatically up to his head. “Ah, I know it sounds theatrical and lovelorn. A Shakespearean tragedy, lovers locked together in mutual passion and pining. It is simply that our souls are connected because we can help one another in some way.”

Hugh brushed his hands uneasily over the sides of his pants. “You have been specifically sent to help me then? To solve these murders?”

“It would seem so,” Jack replied. “The specifics are yet to be determined. I have no knowledge of what the future holds or what my role is to be, other than support you and protect you.”

“Can you read my mind or anything like that?” Hugh asked.

Jack laughed his deep, resounding laugh. “Jumping giraffes, that would certainly make things much simpler, wouldn’t it? No, I am afraid my mental capacities and capabilities are quite similar to yours.”

“But physically, you are different,” Hugh said.

“Oh, yes. As I said, we take on a form that is similar to that of our soulmate.”

“I do not have horns and pointed ears,” Hugh said with just a bit of a huff.

“I’m afraid that the universe is not precise,” Jack said with a bit of melancholy, his hand coming up to trace over the mask of bone that seemed to cover under his cheeks.

Hugh had to laugh. “The universe knows when I’m in trouble and sends you to help, but it cannot be bothered to give you a fully human appearance?”

Jack snickered and clicked his tongue against his pointed teeth. “Perhaps it knows what you seek.”

Hugh stiffened at that. “What?”

Jack suddenly leaped up onto the chair, spreading his arms wide. “You are a police officer. You seek protection. You seek justice. You seek truth. Perhaps this form encompasses all of those things.” He cocked one hip to the side and rested a clawed hand on it. “Or perhaps it is simply that you find this form pleasing.”

Hugh felt his cheeks go bright red. “I… I do not.”

“Oh? Did I mistake your assessment of me?” Jack said, raising a brow, which still seemed strange to Hugh that his brows were on the skull-like mask over his upper face. “Do you not find aspects alluring?”

Hugh’s mouth opened, but all that came out was a soft exhalation of air. Jack smirked and tossed his head. “I see that I have hit the nail upon its head! I do hope you won’t find this form too distracting, as I’m afraid I cannot do much to change it.”

“It is less that I find it distracting and more that you easily attract unwanted attention this way,” Hugh said defensively, gesturing to the horns on Jack’s head. He might as well have had goat hooves and a tail to go with it.

“Perhaps that is part of the plan,” Jack said, spreading his arms wide to show off his physique. “A boon from the universe to help solve this mystery!”

Hugh had no idea how anyone with the horns of a devil and eyes like flames could help solve these dreadful murders, but Jack was here. He had come to help. That had to mean something, didn’t it? And Jack wasn’t entirely wrong. He did find this form pleasing. A little odd, perhaps, but the man’s firelight eyes were entrancing, and his face was exquisitely crafted, as if made by a Roman sculptor. And what he could see of Jack’s body in the strange garments he wore was also stunning. It was probably why his mind had gone to fantasizing about Jack in the alley.

“Well,” he said, not sure what else he could really say. “I… suppose we should work together then. Though I very much doubt the Metropolitan Police will be willing to enlist Spring-Heeled Jack to the force.”

“Of course. I do not expect that I shall be working in an official capacity,” Jack said with a chuckle. “But I shall do what I can to help you solve this mystery.”

“I appreciate any help I can get,” Hugh said with a sigh. “Hopefully the autopsy on whatever killed that young man will turn up some clues tomorrow.”

“You have a good heart, Hugh Danbury,” Jack said. “I am certain that we will solve this case, if for no other reason than because you care.”

“I hope that’s enough,” Hugh said with a weak smile. “It hasn’t been so far.”

“Ah, but now you have me!” Jack added with a mischievous twinkle in his eye. “I have a feeling that with both of us working together, we’ll be unstoppable.”

Hugh chuckled at that. “We really only just met each other, Jack.”

“No matter,” Jack said, waving his hand. “When two people are destined to be together, they make things work.”

Hugh hoped that Jack was right about that. This case was perplexing, and he wanted to stop anyone else from being killed. “Thank you,” he said. “I’m sure we have much we will need to discuss, but for now, I should probably get some rest. Where are you staying?”

Jack blinked in confusion. “Staying?”

“Yes. Where do you live?”

“I do not have a permanent home here,” Jack said with a long-suffering sigh. “I have been staying in cemeteries when I am not on the rooftops.”

Hugh stared, then put his head down into his hands. “Well, no wonder people have been frightened out of their wits by you,” he said with a grumble.

“I have not intended to scare anyone,” Jack said, petulance like a child filling his voice.

“I know, but cemeteries are frightening places for some people, made even more so by unknown apparitions.”

“Point taken,” Jack said. “What do you propose I do?”

Hugh glanced around his tiny rooms. He was not exactly set up for guests, nor would his landlady be pleased to find that he had a gentleman staying with him under his roof, even if nothing untoward was happening. But he couldn’t just turn Spring-Heeled Jack back out onto the streets. If they were supposed to work together, if Jack was supposed to be his soulmate… “I suppose you shall stay here,” he said, giving him a wan smile. “You may have the bed. I’ll sleep here in my chair.”

Jack initially looked delighted by the suggestion, but then he frowned. “I shall not put you out of your own bed, Hugh.”

“It is no trouble.”

“I shall sleep in the chair,” Jack declared. He stretched out over it, draping his knees over one of the arms like an oversized cat. “See? I am quite comfortable.”

Hugh snorted a laugh. He himself would not have been very comfortable in that position, and Jack probably even less so being so much taller than him. But he just nodded. “Very well. There is a blanket in the corner if you need it, and the washroom is over there.” He gestured, and Jack nodded.

“Thank you, Hugh, you are most kind.”

Hugh grinned and shook his head. “Well, having a terrifying spectre in my house who could incinerate me at any moment tends to make one put on their best manners.”

Jack threw back his head and laughed. “Really, now, do not be so dramatic, Hugh. I would never harm you.”

“How can you know that?” Hugh asked with a slight frown.

Jack gave him a surprisingly solemn look. “Because there is goodness in you. You are a very kind and compassionate person.”

Hugh flushed a little. He was so unused to compliments, especially not from handsome strangers sitting in his living room. He ran his hand through his curly hair and gave Jack a slightly nervous smile. “Well, good night.” And he hurried into the bedroom, closing the door behind him so Jack would not see the blush that burned his face or the bulge that was starting to tent the front of his trousers.

Sleeping in his own home, knowing Spring-Heeled Jack was just on the other side of the door, was strange. Hugh wasn’t exactly afraid. He trusted Jack when the man had said he wasn’t going to hurt him. He had had countless opportunities to do so if he wanted to. But he had learned so much tonight, as well as had a brush with death, and he was unsure what to think anymore. The universe was suddenly much bigger, his own knowledge and part to play in it so small.

And all of this strange talk of ‘soulmates.’ While he still wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, he rather liked the sound of it. His life since his parents had passed had been rather lonely. He counted Constable Depesh and Dr. Ledbetter as friends, but it was not as if he spent time with them outside of work. Having someone to talk to had been pleasant, and Jack, in spite of his eccentricities, was delightful to talk to. And quite handsome to look at. The most handsome man Hugh had ever seen, he had to admit. They had barely touched, but Hugh’s mind still drifted back to a few days ago in the alley when Jack had nearly kissed him. What would it feel like? He had kissed before, but, as with any of his sexual encounters, they had been furtive and hurried. Here, in his apartment with no one to see them, maybe he could actually kiss Jack without fear or hesitation, assuming Jack was still interested in kissing as well. Hugh fell asleep with that hopeful thought running through his mind.