“Jack.”
Bell wondered whether Emily could have confused the name of the boy she fell for. It seemed unlikely. “Did you know George Spelvin?”
“There is no George Spelvin. It’s a pseudonym, a nom de guerre, when we don’t want the audience aware we’re on the stage. Rather more commonly used in America.”
“Is it used in London?”
“Occasionally. The language volleys of back and forth; actors who tour across the pond end up speaking almost similar English. Here, we’re more likely to bill ourselves as Walter Plinge instead of George Spelvin.”
“But not Jack?”
“Never heard of a Jack Spelvin.”
Bell had to wonder. The Ripper loved his games. Maybe Emily’s callboy actually was the same man who tried to kill her, a murderer with a sense of humor.
“I gather,” said Bell, “he was a sort of boy-of-all-work.”
“Excellent means for an apprentice seeking a toehold on the stage,” said Mapes. “Callboy, prompter, assistant stage manager, a walk-on, and up you go. Or if he discovers he’s got a head for business, he’ll shift to the front of the house—sell souvenir programs, rent opera glasses, assist the treasurer in the box office. By now, Jack Spelvin could own a bloody theater—though you can be sure he’d have changed his name from Spelvin.”
Mapes gazed mournfully into his glass, which was empty again, and Bell realized he had better get to business before any more whiskey went down the hatch. “Mr. Mapes,” he said, “it is my honor to offer you a job. It’s only a one-night stand, but it will pay equal to a full month on the West End.”
“May I presume wardrobe is included?”
“My tailor will fit you for whatever suit of clothes, shirts, ties, hat, and coat you decide that you need for the role. The costume, of course, is yours to keep.”
“Railway tickets?”
“It will be right here in London. We will go by cab,” said Bell, keeping to himself that the entire job would likely take place inside a cab.
“Why me?”
“The role demands a charismatic actor with nerves of steel.”
Mapes considered the prospect. “‘Nerves of steel’ implies some possibility of danger.”
Isaac Bell looked him in the eye, and the actor saw the American’s amiable expression harden perceptibly as he reassured him with a promise. “You will never be out of my sight.”
“When will the curtain rise?”
“You’ve got a busy morning with my tailor. Curtain rises tomorrow evening at eight.”
“Do you remember Nellie Bly?” asked the Cutthroat.
The girl—her name was Dorothy—was silent.
“Famous newspaperwoman? . . . No?”
Dorothy lay on her back beside an empty steel oil drum in the warehouse of a Cleveland refinery. She was wrapped head to toe in his cape. He had left her face showing. Her blue eyes had popped open, staring at a sky she would never see.
“What am I saying? Nellie Bly was famous before you were born.” He glanced agai
n at the girl. Still staring, still silent.
“Beautiful girl. Nellie had a lot of nerve. She got herself locked up in a lunatic asylum once just to report on what it was like to be locked up in a lunatic asylum. She wrote a book about it: Ten Days in a Mad-House. I always wondered—did Nellie worry that her editor would forget to get her out? What if he fell off a train or died in a fire while she was still locked up? . . . But the reason I ask is, Nellie went on to be a wealthy businesswoman. Not only that, she became an inventor. In fact, she invented this astonishing new kind of barrel.”
He slapped the steel drum and it gave a melodious boom.
“That’s right—an easily sealed fifty-five-gallon oil barrel that never rots or leaks and is strong enough to hoist onto ships and railcars and be transported anywhere in the world. John D. Rockefeller is forever in her debt. And so am I. For another ‘perfect crime.’”