A Brittle Thread Ripper Street

This programme contains prolonged violent scenes, very strong language

and some scenes which some viewers may find upsetting.

-SHINE:

-Who was this man Croker?

A wharfinger, a nobody.

A nobody ended Bennet Drake?

That is not a nobody.

-MATHILDA:

-Father, Mr Swift.

Why would you put him there, in the cellar that was once my home?

Drum?

They set a trap for him, Shine and Frank Thatcher.

REID: They construct this animal fight to draw us out,

but we shall see Shine's claws pulled from him first.

DS Thatcher.

CROWD JEERS

-CROWD:

-Reid! Reid! Reid!

-WHISTLE BLOWS

Reid! Reid! Reid!

I want him found - now!

TRAIN PASSES OUTSIDE

-When?

-This morning.

Or night before, perhaps.

We said fresh. This man is in rigor.

Look, do you want him or not?

Will he serve?

Well, look at him. He's...he's rigid.

Can he be made to serve?

< What do you want it for?

Mm-mm.

All will be well, Myrtle.

Only do as you've promised, no more.

Of course, my love.

Promise me you will be vigilant. Take no risks.

I will be the meekest man you ever did see.

Last stop, calling Hackney Marshes, ladies and gentlemen.

CLOCK CHIMES

First day, is it?

Handyman, to work about the house.

Name?

Waters, Leonard.

In you go.

You may think me ignorant, Drum, but I ain't no imbecile.

You and your Mathilda,

her hand on your Thomas,

tugging your loyalty from you,

plotting how best we here might be embarrassed.

Come on, then.

-Aah! UNIFORM AND CID:

-Oh!

When you say WE, Frank, is it, in fact, YOU you talk of?

Are your knackers still chafed, are they, from that pony's backside?

THATCHER YELLS, BOTH GROAN

-SHINE:

-Thatcher?

DRUMMOND GROANS Aah!

What horseplay is this?

We have urgent business to go about and you two stop for a cuddle.

Thatcher, explain yourself.

The whole world knows it's this shandygaff who's blown on our plans.

You'd best do a better job of proving that with your words than your fists.

-THATCHER ROARS SHINE:

-No, Thatcher.

I mean explain to me how you have allowed this fight to develop.

As I say, Inspector, it's this wet-soaped clown!

No, Sergeant. I know WHY you might hope to batter the man.

I am more concerned that you have found yourself unable.

You see, his reach is longer than yours

and he is a sight more calculating.

Now, if you are to fight such a man,

you must know before you begin that you will win.

-Oh!

-OFFICER:

-Ooh!

I do that by way of demonstration

of how you might in future overcome your disadvantages.

DRUMMOND COUGHS

But you do not mind, do you, Sergeant Drum?

What's a pair of sore knackers between comrades?

Or are we not comrades no more?

We are, Mr Shine.

And I'm glad to hear it.

Thatcher, you are to repeat such accusations in the future,

you will do so with articles of proof.

Drummond...

DRUMMOND GROANS

..you are to deny them,

you best find men who believe such denials.

Now, I am to Hackney, to tell Mr Dove how we are made monkeys of.

-CHUDLEIGH:

-When Mr Dove was a boy,

I made sure he sat for breakfast at the same time each morning.

This boy must do likewise.

He cannot learn punctuality otherwise,

and if he does not learn punctuality, he cannot learn discipline.

Yes, Miss.

-You are Waters?

-Yes, ma'am.

Why do you call me "Ma'am"? I'm not married.

"Miss Chudleigh" will serve.

As you prefer, Miss.

You make the fire for the master's study?

I do.

Then be sure to knock.

DOVE AND SHINE TALK

-DOVE:

-Check the brothels in case the woman Hart returns to her former work.

-DOVE:

-Come.

Coal for the fire, Mr Dove.

-Of course. Mr Waters, is it not?

-It is, sir.

-DOVE:

-Well, don't let us stop you.

And they had stripped Sergeant Thatcher?

All but for that flashman's hat he sports

and the carnations in his gob.

Who can say why they love Ed Reid?

Although it must be said - it makes good copy.

I'd have you make better, Inspector, and catch him.

You have the town rousted?

The brothels, in case the woman Hart returns to her former work?

Oh, yes, Mr Dove.

All gaming houses for word of the American.

Mr Dove, do you doubt my vigour?

Of course not, Inspector.

Then perhaps you will answer me something.

-If I can.

-These dogfights.

Reid and Jackson emerge from wherever they are hid for dogfights.

So I understand.

Or, rather, one particular fight-dog

and one particular man who has thieved that fight-dog.

Why does Edmund Reid have such an itch in his britches

that he breaks cover to trap him?

SCUTTLE SCRAPES

Thank you, Waters.

RATTLING

DOOR OPENS

DOOR CLOSES

THEY TALK INSIDE

TOY CLINKS

Hush, Connor. I am a friend.

-DOVE:

-Go on.

-SHINE:

-Whereas I now understand it,

Reid had his own theories on this cannibal killer.

He disagrees it was this man Croker killed those men.

Bennet Drake also.

He would be misguided in that belief, however.

Seems he clings to it with some determination, however.

Desk Sergeant Drummond,

I'd bet my liver it is he who forewarned Reid.

You have no proof of such betrayal?

Well, then, you leave him in peace.

That station house needs balance and stability,

not fear and retribution.

As you wish, Mr Dove.

Good day to you, sir.

Inspector Shine.

-Miss Chudleigh?

-Yes, Mr Dove.

Oh! To your room!

-Your guardian and father must have peace for his work.

-Wait, Miss Chudleigh.

I have business this morning in a place that...

were I still a small boy, well, it would fill me with wonder.

See him readied, if you please. The two of you will join me.

Yes, Mr Dove.

"Mr Edmund Reid may have cause to reflect

"on whether, as H Division's head man,

"he ever knew the popularity he now does

"as its most urgent quarry."

-The people are fickle.

-Oh, they are that.

It seems you too are also on the road to redemption.

Listen to this.

"More enquiring minds might also ask themselves the question

"of what need and purpose it is now sees Miss Hart,

"a woman who once gave great civic care to her community,

"now united with Mr Reid in their fugitive status."

-This is Miss Castello's pen?

-She herself.

What is it irks you, Mr Judge?

Is it that she does not even once make mention of your notoriety?

Not as if she never once met me.

Perhaps you are easily forgot?

Perhaps she does not know which name to call you.

Oh, aren't you all so cute? Maybe I ought to hand you in myself.

You know, broker an amnesty, live in peace, ALONE.

Still, I am entirely uncertain how to respond to YOUR notoriety.

-What am I to make of your bizarre requests?

-You have them?

The falsies?

A healthy selection.

Yes, but to what end?

Pulling the tiger's tail.

-This is the first step, darling.

-No, not good enough. Please.

Will one of you explain?

Your latest victim?

Natural causes, Miss Morton.

Let me rephrase that. Have you killed him?

I said we should have waited till she'd gone home.

Excuse me. I will not be spoken of as if I am some irksome landlady.

If we wait any longer, this stiff's going to be beyond purpose.

And what purpose that?

They wish to make a scandal, Miss Morton.

Show Augustus Dove the limits of his control.

-And for that you require dental...

-We require TEETH.

Oh!

Good God. Do you intend to make another victim?

We need to break the mortis first.

JACKSON GROANS

CRUNCHING

OK, move around one.

Could be a child's parlour game.

CRUNCHING

All right. Do you have them?

-REID:

-I believe the records had had their uses when I took them.

I hadn't anticipated imitation, however.

Going to have to screw down hard, prize the flesh away.

-How charming.

-Yes.

Men's work, I believe. Shall we?

Let us.

MEN SHOUT

DOG BARKS

I will stop just a moment or two.

Then we shall be on our way.

Mr Dove.

Appointments are there to be made.

But you, it seems, feel yourself above

the simple act of a knock upon a door.

Fugitives from justice

conduct themselves with more refinement, do they?

Mr Dove, surely you understand.

I hear that the former Police Detective Edmund Reid

is cheered to the skies as he runs through our streets.

Well, that is an event worthy of report, in my opinion.

And yet, Miss Castello,

but three editions past, you penned the report,

true facts of how THIS man, whose reputation you now burnish,

most likely placed a defenceless old man in an underground dungeon

and left him there to starve and rot,

and then, here today, you make as if he might in fact be a folk hero.

Our readers are fickle, sir, and it is they who pay my wages.

No!

This neighbourhood, the people require simple paradigms,

good, bad, justice, villainy.

These ideas become confused in their heads,

well, the social fabric of these streets

is sewn with a brittle thread.

That thread breaks, the carapace of civility falls away with it

and what will be left but naked savagery?

Edmund Reid did evil.

Long Susan Hart did evil. Captain Homer Jackson likewise.

If you wish to remain friend to the police...

that is the story you ought to tell.

Do you threaten me, Mr Dove?

Well, you interpret it how you wish, Miss Castello.

But you see it done.

BIRDS TWEET

PUPPY BARKS

See how they love to play, Connor?

CONNOR LAUGHS

PUPPY BARKS

I fear only that the boy will become spoiled, sir.

There is nothing spoiling in joy, Miss Chudleigh.

All young boys need a dog.

Do you know, Connor, when I was only a little older than you are now,

I lost my mother and was alone.

But then I was found and cared for

by a man who showed me that a way may be made

from the lonely boy I was,

to a new life - a better life.

Connor, I intend to be that man for you.

You have my oath on it.

Until you yourself are become a man,

it will be my greatest endeavour

to see you do not lack for a single thing.

I will be a father to you.

You choose your favourite, Connor, then we shall bring it home.

I thought to settle your invoice in cash, Mr Sparks.

We are grateful, Mr Dove.

As am I for your efforts.

The beasts were not too hard to find?

Sir. This is Jamrach's.

There is not a creature alive that we here cannot locate for you.

And the other conditions we agreed?

Full anonymity, sir, as promised.

Thatcher.

Inspector. My apologies, sir.

A snitch reports, sir, and I thought his intelligence worth a coin.

That being?

Captain Jackson. He and Miss Hart.

I mean, it's not as if she was the sole focus

of his ardour down the years.

If we roust each and every twat that man has inspected,

the pair of us will be old and grey.

Yes, sir. I know, sir. But there was one other

who, word had it, he stayed loyal to.

Only for a little while, but the talk was that she kept him in order.

Look, the pair of them were tight till Miss Susan got locked down and then he made his choice.

You have paid a snitch for old gossip, Thatcher?

No, sir, I paid him because he brought word

that this other is once more in Whitechapel.

Who this lady?

Well-to-do. Fine silk, fine hair, fine carriage, you know.

-Slum tourist?

-Yeah, of a kind.

What kind?

The dramatic, sir. Playhouses.

Your games are ended, then?

KNOCKING AT DOOR

Are you expecting visitors, Mimi?

-THATCHER:

-Oi, Police! You will open these doors!

In there!

-KNOCKING AT DOOR THATCHER:

-Open! Open up, I say! >

Police! >

Open this door! >

Quick, up into the lighting rigs.

-Miss Morton?

-Yes.

We've come for a show, lady.

One man here, other stage door.

Watch your step.

-There are lights?

-There are.

SWITCHES CLICK

-Ah... Look at that, a theatre.

-Hm.

So, it is the case that you and Captain Jackson once stepped out?

Stepped out?

Hm, that's a delicate phrase for a man in a velvet collar.

Well, we know you theatricals, how you like to use words

to describe a thing that ain't actually the thing itself.

Oh, you mean a simile?

Although "stepped out" is perhaps more of a metaphor.

Perhaps you'd best describe the thing itself?

All right, then, let me ask you this...

-Were you...

-Mm-hm?

..and the man most widely known as Homer Jackson

once joined by cock and cunny?

Oh! Oh, so much clearer.

Language is so much better for an accurate expression, I find.

-Well, then, Miss. Were you?

-Yes.

My God, that is a loathsome hat.

When did contact cease?

When he chose to join that cock to his wife's cunny instead.

You got friends visiting, Miss Morton?

Do you see us ready to admit audiences yet?

No?

That is because there is a renovation taking place

and because I have yet to establish for myself

how best a collapsing wall may be buttressed

and my plastering is not all I'd wish it to be.

I must employ workmen

and workmen, not unlike policemen, are fond of tea and biscuits.

It's not the only items we police have a liking for.

SLAP

WHISPERS: Wait, wait, wait, wait.

You know, Miss Morton,

you grow ever more fetching to my eye.

Now, it is in your interest to be candid with me, lady.

The risk of a fire in a place so full of the flammable.

My theatre burns, that fire will not stop till it meets the river.

Well, best you tell me, then. Have you seen him?

Have you hid him?

I'll tell you something about Captain Homer Jackson.

I'm sure a great many believe he cuts quite the dash

with his cool eye

for all that the world, in its foolishness, considers of value.

And I'll admit, such a cynicism quite had me taken for a while.

LIGHTER CLICKS

But that nonchalance is just a pose

behind which he hides a tearful, fearful, treacherous heart.

Further to which,

for a man to spend so much of his life in the service of his manhood,

when that manhood is...

well...

more of a boyhood.

You get my meaning, Mr Shine.

Thatcher.

With me, Thatcher.

Run along.

SIGHING

Miss Morton, any damage incurred while you keep us here,

I will foot the bill myself.

And what will you do, Miss Hart? Set armed men to rob another train?

Now, let us hope it doesn't come to that, all right?

Are you OK, Mimi?

I will not have you soft-soap me, either.

Perhaps, after all, we have overstayed our welcome.

Jedediah Shine is not a man I would have set any further sights on you.

Come. It's becoming dark. We may go.

Find ourselves alternative concealment.

-MIMI LAUGHS

-And then, when you're caught

and your severed heads are displayed on the iron railings

that line the new station house on Leman Street,

I shall have eternal guilt

to add to the catalogue of vexations I suffer

as a result of YOU coming back into my life.

No.

This profanity is part of some strategy

that, at its end, sees you restored,

these two gone away, and that man Dove punished for all he has done?

It is no easy task, Miss Morton, but, yes, that is the goal.

Best you and your merry band get about it, then, Mr Reid.

Where you go, you trust these people?

They are not one-time lovers of mine but, that aside, yes, I do.

What am I today? The world's chopping block?

I want to know you're safe is all.

Just get about your work, husband, and I shall get about mine.

-WHISPERS:

-Leonard. Myrtle.

Miss Susan. Quick, before you're seen.

DOOR CLOSES

Look at you, Myrtle. You must be near term.

I am, Miss Susan. And you? Is all safe with you?

Oh, you must not fear, neither of you.

You do quite enough for me as it is.

But there's never enough we could do for you, Miss. Not never.

Tell me, Leonard, how fares my boy?

Oh, but he is a stout and fine young man, as only could be expected.

He is well, then?

He is well cared for, certainly.

But not...

..happy?

How could a boy be happy without his ma?

But he is kept on a short line. The woman Chudleigh.

The governess?

As fierce and shrewish a harridan as ever scolded a boy.

But, Mr Dove, he has some feeling for the boy, I believe.

Took him to Jamrach's today and bought him a puppy,

so to ease his loneliness.

But, Leonard, do you think...

do you see a way when the time comes that he might be taken away?

There are Westminster Police on guard day and night,

but the woman Chudleigh must eat and sleep,

and the gardens...

Mr Dove's gardens, they are bordered at the back only by the marshes

and that puppy must be exercised.

I see, Leonard.

Albeit slight, there are opportunities there.

There are.

How do you find Mr Dove?

Too upright by half, as you ask,

and he is distracted by something which makes him fearful anxious.

Leonard, do you think it's possible,

whilst always, of course, being most careful,

that you may discover what it is that makes him so anxious?

Please, Miss Susan.

He already risks so much. What if he is found out? Leonard?

No, now, come, Myrtle.

We must remind ourselves of all this good lady has done for us.

I was only a daily fix-it,

paid a penny to clear the guttering at Tenter Street when the leaves got in

and she encouraged my love for you,

saw that you need earn in that way no more,

handed us the deposit for our home here.

Hush, Leonard. You need not go on.

But...

..he's my Leonard and I would be lost without him.

He means to name the child after you, if it is a girl.

And even if it is not.

Leonard!

A boy named...Susan?

Strong a name as ever there was.

THEY LAUGH

Um...

The, er...the house,

entrances, bedchambers of the occupants.

Do you think you might be able to draw it for me?

I'm sure I may.

Here, the back stairwell.

This, Mr Dove's rooms, and this, where your Connor sleeps.

JACKSON: That's the way, brother. Almost home.

WHISPERS: Right, quick, over here.

Well, do we say a prayer?

-REID:

-Pray that one deception is believed over the other.

Now, I go to watch for Mathilda's candle.

-MATHILDA:

-I'm sorry, Drum.

It's not you that lumped me, Tilda.

I might as well have, however.

My father would be grateful for such loyalty.

They know it was me told you and you that told him

and he that tied Frank Thatcher starkers to that pony.

-I am watched.

-By Mr Shine?

He wishes to dice me for his cooking pot.

SHE SIGHS

I shall not ask it of you again, Drum.

Come, please. Do not sleep on the floor tonight.

Tilda, do you not fear for what folk will say?

Do you not want to be...proper?

Proper? I'm not sure I know what that means.

But I certainly do not care for others' definition of it.

All that is proper and true is that this is good.

All else can go hang.

-Come, Samuel.

-No. No, no, Tilda.

It's not that I lack the...desire.

It does not feel right.

In your heart?

No.

Then we must stay true to that.

TRAIN RUMBLES

TRAIN RUMBLES

PEOPLE SHOUT

-THATCHER:

-Move! Move! Oi! Oi!

Move! Keep them back.

-MAN SHOUTS:

-I've seen this before. We are not slaves!

WOMAN SHOUTS

-WOMAN:

-My children are not safe in their beds!

WOMAN SHOUTS

DOVE: What's that you say?

-POLICEMAN:

-A new body with bite marks has been found, Mr Dove.

Another! Where found? By whom?

The wire says only that they need your urgent attendance at Leman Street, sir.

Telephone Leman Street. They are to expect me within the hour.

And wire Jamrach's for the latest shipping times.

-Now!

-Yes, Mr Dove.

Miss Chudleigh.

Good morning.

Waters. The scuttle.

DOG WHINES

Of course, Miss Chudleigh.

DOOR OPENS

Where is it he was found?

Yard off the back of Half Moon Passage, sir.

That is but a spit from this address here.

The murdering maniacs of this town lack all respect.

This man Croker, your case was made sound, Mr Dove,

for there is fearful likeness here.

-You will send for a surgeon.

-To what end, sir?

For full autopsy! For certainty!

Certainty? Well...

..that is a luxury, in my experience, sir.

Nonetheless.

Sergeant Drummond, you will please send to the Yard.

Yes, Mr Dove.

Sirs, the press come.

Mr Dove!

Might I have some confirmation concerning the dead man's body

recovered this morning from Half Moon Passage?

Has this force once more assumed their tormentor dead when he is not?

There are over 15 witnesses all describing the work done to the body.

What use our word on it, then, girl?

Mr Dove?

You are the ranking officer here.

May I have it from you?

Assistant Commissioner?

Sergeant Drummond, will you brew a pot of tea

and show Miss Castello to the private office above?

That is if Mr Shine will allow for the loan of it.

Be my guest.

I am to be granted private interview, am I?

Perhaps you'll begin by telling me on what evidence you named the man Croker

and if, as it now seems likely, it was not he performed these savage acts...

..you will now be reopening the investigation

into the murder of Inspector Bennet Drake.

I shall not be taking questions on this matter until autopsy is met.

Then why bring me here?

Why not simply make your denial and cast me out?

You believe yourself a good journalist, I am sure.

Good, I mean, in that you understand the moral imperative of the truth.

I do.

Perhaps you believe I have, in the past,

been eager to hide such truth from you.

Well, I am tearing it up from the roots now.

That is a copy, yours to take.

But what you will find is that

the fate to have befallen Mr Theodore Swift,

buried alive by Edmund Reid, was far from an isolated occurrence.

Within, the testimony of a man who once served him.

Proof of this station house's past iniquity.

Corroborated, extra-judicial murder.

You wish to fill your next front page with speculation...

you be my guest.

But this, this is fact.

And were you not to print fact, Miss Castello,

well, I'd need to ask myself why that was.

Care to share, Mr Dove?

All in good time...

..Mr Shine.

BOBBY GRACE: Despite our sternest efforts,

neither myself, Inspector Drake nor Captain Jackson

could break down the iron grille

which Inspector Reid had locked behind him.

He would not open it and...and set about the suspect, Mr Buckley.

Mr Reid took Mr Buckley's head between his hands and...

Hold the evening run!

DOOR CREAKS SHUT

What?

Well, you've made the front page.

Just not all of it.

Jesus, Reid.

Horace Buckley. They have everything.

Oh, Mathilda.

No, no, no. Mathilda.

-BOBBY GRACE:

-..He would not open it and...

and set about the suspect, Mr Buckley.

Mr Reid took Mr Buckley's head between his hands and...

Well, I cannot think of a better word for it...

popped it against the wooden pillar.

I believe Mr Buckley died after the second strike.

Mr Thatcher, what has befallen this neighbourhood

that it is a-burst with women

who wish to hide their information from the police?

I don't know what it is, sir.

Perhaps you'd best tell me, then, Miss Castello.

I am accustomed to those of your sex

being a sight more pliant than this.

Our Assistant Commissioner Dove has given you intelligence

that now sees fugitive Reid damned

in the pages where he was so recently celebrated.

And what if it were?

Hm.

Do you see?

There you go again and I tire of it, girlie.

-Inspector, sir...

-What? You object to my questioning?

No.

You see, Miss... Now, listen. SHE GASPS

There is a battle currently played out,

its field of conflict - the pages of YOUR DIRTY RAG!

Right?

Now,

its antagonists are

my Mr Dove

and Mr Edmund Reid.

SHE GASPS

No!

SHE WHIMPERS

Please! I do not know what you mean.

Do you not? Huh? It's that corpse. It's that corpse.

Yeah? Which all assume is your cannibal-killer back about it.

It is not.

Mr Dove...

..he is a clever cat, now,

but he ain't seen near enough dead bodies.

Them bite marks, hm?

The yellow round the edges?

No lividity, see.

Carried out a good long day or so

after death came down.

In other words, a hoax.

The skilled hand of Ed Reid's Yankee.

Now, what I drive at is this.

Why? Hm? Why?

What is the message

Reid sends the Assistant Commissioner of Police?

-SHOUTS: What is it? What is it?

-Please! I don't know!

-What is it?

-Inspector Shine! Please!

-Oh!

-Aah!

-You moan like a bitch, I shall slap you like one.

You don't have the stomach for my work.

Get out.

And shut the door behind you.

SHE WHIMPERS

Get out.

-Please, Mr Thatcher, please!

-Get out now!

Shut the door behind you!

SHE GASPS AND PANTS

SHE GROANS

Mm. You speak.

Mm.

Or you shall know the full majesty of Jedediah Shine's displeasure.

It is his brother.

Whose?

Mr Dove's.

You be clear now.

Be clear.

What does Mr Dove's brother do?

Reid believed him to have been the killer,

hidden away for his mania,

escaping to murder,

and Mr Dove, by necessity, moving mountains to see blame shifted

and that man protected.

Where's this man now?

-SOBS:

-I do not know.

SHE CRIES

Mr Dove, Mr Dove, his...

His displeasure at the sight of that hoax corpse...

..that might tell you something, Miss.

You see, he does not know, neither,

where this killer brother of his is now hid.

His fear is that Reid will trap him first.

SHE SOBS

Now.

CHAIR CREAKS

Come on, you're all right, you're all right.

Now, an exemplary hacker, such as yourself,

would not entertain such stories

-without also gathering your own evidence, would you? SOBS:

-No.

Then you shall hand that evidence to me now, hey?

SHE SOBS

Oh, shhh.

CREAKING

SHE SOBS

SHE SOBS

SHE SOBS

JACKSON: Young Leonard took some risk in thieving this for you.

-REID:

-Jamrach's?

It's the menagerie.

Leonard told me Dove had bought him a puppy.

Well, these ain't puppies.

Canis lupus lupus, the Middle Russian forest wolf.

I have heard tales of such wolves in such forests.

Augustus Dove, philanthropic benefactor?

He does not draw breath without strategy.

Such rare beasts, coming in from the Thames for tax and clearance.

Word of their arrival will be seething on that dockside.

A dockside well known to the creature Nathaniel Dove

and where he's surely hid somewhere.

It is not such a leap of faith to imagine him being drawn

to the same creatures who have so indelibly marked his soul.

The same creatures as took their mother from them,

brought to London from one brother to draw the other one out.

They are a lure.

But if Dove hopes to use these creatures to trap his brother,

we may use them also and set a trap for them both.

WOLVES WHINE

BARKING

WOLF BARKS

WOLF WHIMPERS

WOLF BARKS

FOOTSTEPS APPROACH

Tilda! Tilda, please, do not be frightened.

Will you take this to Drummond? Within are instructions.

If he follows the instructions and brings men,

they will capture this monster, the true beast of Whitechapel.

Much then will be revealed, and I hope...

I hope that we may return to our lives together.

And that would be a good thing, would it?

Yes, Mathilda, it would.

The world will be safer. Your Uncle Bennet, others too, they will have their justice.

And what of you, Father?

All of which you stand accused?

There is much explaining I would do. I do not say that I am blameless.

-But there is mitigation?

-I hope so.

Mr Buckley was not a big man.

Not nearly as big as you, Father.

Mathilda.

Mathilda, please, we will...

talk of that man in due course,

but first, please hand this note to Drummond.

You broke his head open on a wood pillar.

You smashed his brains from him.

There is a testimony from Bobby Grace.

No shard of glass, no necessary defence of yourself. Only murder.

A defenceless man killed in cold blood by YOUR hand.

I was told that you were dead,

dead for all that he had done to you,

terrible, dread things done to you in his captivity.

-But he did not...

-Yes, but I was TOLD this.

I was assured this. I cannot be blamed...

He took you FROM me, Mathilda! Do you not see?

No!

He kept me safe!

From you.

Mathilda, Mathilda, I will explain. All will be explained.

The Captain. Susan Hart, she who lied to me.

But first...

The note. Tell Drummond.

All will be right again.

-MAN SHOUTS

-Please.

WOMAN LAUGHS

Must I take you by the throat again,

pin you to the wall and accuse you of all the evil ever born?

Mr Reid. I will talk to her.

My word on it.

Should we live, be free, I will not leave this city

until I have made her understand the truth.

No. Not you.

Not by my side. You are no ally of mine.

Get to Leonard. He has done all he might for us now.

Get him out of there. We'll meet you after.

DOOR CLOSES

WOLF HOWLS

WINDOW SMASHES

BIRDS SCREECH

Shhh.

-WHISPERS:

-Oh, my, my...

WOLF WHINES

Shhh!

Oh, my.

My, but ain't you both beauties, hey?

DOOR CLICKS

WOLVES BARK AND GROWL

WOLVES SNARL

-NATHANIEL:

-'Gustus?

WOLVES SNARL

I'm glad to have found you, brother.

-Have you...?

-It doesn't matter.

But I was certain the news of such rare beasts

landing on this shoreline would draw you out.

Nathaniel, there is a savaged man found.

-It is not...by your action?

-'Gustus, I have not...

Felt the hunger?

Well...

I feel it, yes.

But I feel also that it may be withstood.

Then I am glad.

They are magnificent.

Oh. 'Gustus.

They are perfect.

WOLVES GROWL AND BARK

They would offer you their affection and yet they fear me.

Perhaps they see you for what you are.

Calm, brother.

Hello, Mr Reid.

Captain.

You seem very sure of yourself, sir.

Of certain things, Mr Reid, yes, I am.

And so how will you explain your kinship with this man

when the men of H Division arrive?

'Gustus?

The men of H Division cannot arrive if they are not instructed to do so.

And yet they are so instructed.

By these instructions?

Those you handed to your daughter?

Drummond.

Not he alone.

The two, she AND he.

Your Mathilda, her world now so terribly shaken

by the sudden understanding of her father's true character.

She understands where her future lies,

with Samuel Drummond and with the police, with the true police.

-I'm going to shoot the pair of them.

-No, wait, wait!

WOLVES WHINE AND BARK

Mr Reid is wise, Captain.

-'Gustus!

-Do not think me ignorant

of how the intelligence of these wolves' importation came to you.

Your wife's friend Mr Waters.

Oh, Christ.

He will leave a pregnant widow, I believe.

GUNS COCK

'Gustus, please!

No! No!

If I kill him, there is no way back for you. No case ever to be made.

But your boy will be well.

I give you my word.

He will grow strong, live in bright light and clean air.

And if I put a bullet in your head, Mr Dove?

I've left instruction with Miss Chudleigh, should I not return.

She cares for children, but she has no care FOR them,

if you understand my meaning.

WOLVES SNARL AND BARK

WOLVES WHINE

-JACKSON:

-Now what?

He would have sent word.

-It's gone midnight.

-Myrtle, it is Leonard.

-SHE SOBS

-Dear, sweet Leonard.

And what harm can come to such a man?

Take your murderous hands off me. You are death.

Out, woman.

-YELLS:

-Get out!

MYRTLE SOBS

MYRTLE SOBS

SHE CRIES

FLOORBOARD CREAKS

All that you have heard, Tilda...

all that you must feel.

But you know this, the love that I feel for you, it only swells further.

This is Mr Reid's bed.

No, Samuel.

It is ours now.

GUN COCKS

Evening to you, sirs.

-Madam.

-Thatcher.

I always knew you were the one with the brains.

Cadogan's Dental Supplies.

Ain't none of you in need of falsies, last time I saw you.

And there's a chewed-up cadaver in your dead room, Captain,

which is now pronounced a hoax.

Fine work, Thatcher.

I'm sure your new master will see you rewarded.

Where is Shine?

Drowning in his own poison and conceit, for all I care.

So, do you have three sets of irons with you?

I do not.

Mr Thatcher...

..what may we do for you, then?

He is as wicked a man as any I've met.

Shine?

Despite your low opinion of me, Mr Reid,

I would see some good done in this uniform.

Now, I don't know if all that's now said of you three is true or no...

...but I will not serve him.

Do you mean to help us, then, son?

There is fishing and there is peace.

You will live quiet, easy...

..until all that may harm us will be put to rest.

Thank you, 'Gustus.

-NATHANIEL:

-The hunger.

There are days I feel it abate.

I've not seen a single soul.

It is only until Edmund Reid

is reckoned for.

We have need for an extra pair of hands.

You should have stayed away.