Chapter 16
METROPOLITAN POLICE, SCOTLAND YARD, 4, WHITEHALL PLACE, LONDON
CENTRAL OFFICE: CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION DEPARTMENT
WEDNESDAY JULY 28th, 1888
DETECTIVE CHIEF INSPECTOR CHARLES COLLINGWOOD laid down the file on Katherine Pellew, also known as Katie Cornfields. He flexed the fingers and wrist of his right hand, only just realising how copious were the notes he had made on all the cases. He had worked systematically through all the files relative to each victim, his anger rising as the details of each atrocity was laid out before him in the cold black print of police and pathology reports.
He stretched again to ease knotted shoulder muscles and then laboriously performed the ancient ritual of carving, shredding, filling, tamping, and igniting tobacco in the charred bowl of his br
