Page 36 of Secrets in the Dark
“I’m ready. Are we driving?”
“No,” he told her. “Mr. Gary Hudson is a bartender. Right on Whitechapel Road.”
“Isn’t it too early for the pubs to be open?” Della asked.
“They’ll be setting up—a perfect time for a little chat. And apparently, Mr. Hudson was interested in the case, very happy to help the police. With luck, he’ll want to talk to us.”
“Ah!” Abigail said. “Those who try to put themselves into a case are often involved?”
“Sometimes,” Della said, glancing at Mason. “Profilers, officers and agents who study human behavior, believe that it’s often possible that certain criminals do like to ingratiate themselves, become involved with investigations, perhaps to determine just what police know, and also to prove their own prowess over law enforcement. And you knew that because—”
“I often haunt the home of one of my great-great-great grandchildren,” she said, smiling. “And I do love to watch their television set. I’ve even managed to push that little box thing—”
“Remote control,” Mason said.
“Yes. I can change the channels.”
“And no one suspects?” Della asked. “They don’t think that they live in ahauntedhouse?”
Abigail laughed. “Oh, they just roll their eyes and say that the cable company is crazy,” she explained. “There are some wonderful programs. Many silly ones that are a waste of one’s time, but some very good ones, too.”
“Of course. We shall see you later,” Della said.
She turned to Mason.
“We’re off!” he said.
Mason looked up at the sign that read simply Ye Olde Pub.
The place was certainly in an area that would allow for easy access to almost any of the dark alleys that remained in the original Ripper’s old haunts. He’d always believed and still believed that if modern forensic techniques had existed during the original Ripper’s time, the man would have certainly been caught.
And here they were today. With all manner of forensic techniques.
Then again, the original Ripper hadn’t known not to leave fingerprints or a single hair or fiber that might be traced back to him. He didn’t know that he needed to avoid security cameras that were placed at banks and so many other establishments.
Stephan Dante had been aware. And while the knowledge to take care because of the ever-evolving field of forensics might suggest that someone in forensics or law enforcement might be involved, the internet allowed for knowledge to spread across the world—for those who sought to study and delve further and further and from site to site.
Dante had never been in law enforcement. He might have learned all he needed to know from his time in prison, from those who had fallen to whatever detection or forensics had been out there. More than anything, Dante had known how to use people.
And he had surely taught his disciples to do the same.
“Mason?” Della said, nudging him lightly. “We can’t talk to him if we don’t reach him.”
“Right.”
Mason put his hand on the door and quickly discovered that it was locked. But within, he could see that waitresses were setting the last of little battery-operated “candles” on the tables and that one of the three young women moving about was setting up a small poster board with the pub’s daily specials.
One of them noticed him at the entrance and hurried over to the door, opening it. She was a pretty young woman, dark-haired, in her early twenties, Mason surmised.
“I’m so sorry,” she told him. “We do need a sign on the door. I’m afraid that we don’t open until eleven.”
“And I’m sorry to disturb you,” Mason said. “But we’re here to see Gary Hudson. I realized that he might be with the night crew and that you stay open—”
“We all switch up now and then,” the young woman said. “As it happens, we had a meeting this morning and Gary is here. Are you friends of his?”
“We’ve never met,” Della explained politely. “We’re hoping to meet him now.”
And they were about to meet him. Mason saw that a man had come out a door behind the bar that must have led to offices or stockrooms or both.
