Dr. Van Ripple pauses before a statue of Osiris to mop his brow with a handkerchief. “Our Mr. Smith was nothing more than a faux-tographer, it would seem.”
“Your card trick was most impressive!” Ann says.
“You are too kind. Allow me to present myself properly. I am Dr. Theodore Van Ripple, master illusionist, scholar, and gentleman, at your service.”
“How do you do? I am Gemma Dowd,” I say, giving my mother’s maiden name. Ann holds fast to “Nan Washbrad” whilst Felicity becomes “Miss Anthrope.”
“Dr. Van Ripple, I do recall hearing of you,” I begin. “I believe my mother attended one of your shows.”
His eyes sparkle with interest. “Ah! Here, in London? Or was it perhaps in Vienna or Paris? I have played for both princes and the populace.”
“It was here in London, I am sure,” I offer. “Yes, she said it was a most marvelous spectacle. She was amazed by your talents.”
The doctor positively glows with the adulation. “Splendid! Splendid! Tell me, which illusion did she prefer—the disappearing doll or the glass of ruby smoke?”
“Ah…yes, em, I think she rather fancied both.”
“They are my specialties. How marvelous!” He cranes, searching the crowd. “And is your dear mother with you here tonight?”
“I’m afraid not,” I say. “I do remember that she said there was one illusion which thrilled her beyond all the others. It was one in which a beautiful lady was placed into a trance and instructed to write upon a slate.”
Dr. Van Ripple regards me warily. His voice has a chill in it. “The illusion you speak of belonged to my assistant. She was a medium of sorts. I no longer perform that trick—not since her tragic disappearance three years ago.”
“She disappeared during the performance?” Ann gasps.
“Dear me, no,” Dr. Van Ripple replies. He fluffs his collar, and I imagine that in his day he was quite the dandy.
“What happened to her?” I prod.
“My associates suggested she ran away with a sailor or perhaps joined a circus.” He shakes his head. “But I think otherwise, for she claimed she was being hunted by dark forces. I am quite certain she was murdered.”
“Murdered!” we say as one. Dr. Van Ripple is not one to lose an audience of any sort, even for a tale so unseemly as this one promises to be.
“Indeed. She was a woman of many secrets, and, I am sorry to say, she proved quite untrustworthy. She came to me when she was but a girl of twenty, and I knew very little of her life other than that she was an orphan who had lived away at school for a time.”
“She didn’t speak of her past?” I ask.
“She could not, dear lady, for she was a mute. She had a remarkable talent for drawing and transcendental writing.” The doctor takes a bit of snuff from an enameled box and sneezes into a handkerchief.
“What is transcendental writing?” Ann asks.
“The medium goes into a trance, and whilst communing with the spirits, she receives messages from beyond which are communicated through writing. We turned a tidy profit….” He coughs. “That is, we aided those poor grieving souls desperate to speak with loved ones who had passed on to the spirit realm.
“Then one day, she came to the theater quite merry. When I asked her why she was so happy, she wrote upon the slate—for that was how we spoke to one another—that her dear sister had visited her, and they had a plan to ‘restore what has been too long lost.’ I did not know what she meant, nor did she explain. I was rather astonished at the mention of a sister, as I knew of no family she had. It seems the lady in question was a cherished friend from her school days. When I asked if I might meet her sister, she was evasive, callous.
“‘That would not be possible,’ she wrote, smiling. She was one for small cruelties, and I was quite certain she felt her dear friend to be far above my station.
“Soon after, she changed. One day, I found her in the shop among our many tricks and properties, holding fast to her slate. ‘My sister has deceived us,’ she wrote. ‘She is a monster. Such a wicked, wicked plan.’ When I asked her what could have caused her such distress, she wrote that she had had a vision—‘a most terrible vision of what should come to pass, for what I took as fair is foul and all shall be lost.’”
“Did she tell you what she saw in the vision?” I press.
“I’m afraid not.” The doctor’s brow furrows. “I should say that she had an unfortunate habit—a fondness for cocaine. She could not be without it. I believe it began to destroy her, body and soul.”