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blood, filled with death’s lamentation. Listening to Christine playing the number one, it was as if I were dying. Gin took care of that. Days of inebriation, two week’ worth, and on September 29 th , I paced through my basement apartment, splashing through the rainwater there, beating dilapidated pianos with the leg of a bench, furious over my own avarice and cowardice. And still the gin beat me into submission with a switch of fire.
    I waited for Davyss to come. I did not have long to wait. At midnight, the knock came on my door.
    I flung it open, revealing the villain in his coat. This time, he had a small case filled with six vials, three marked as number three, three as number four. Two women had been butchered, all because I wanted to eat. Because I had vainglorious dreams of wealth and fame.
    Our eyes locked.
    Like the last time, he was mellow, his whole manner one of passive relaxation.
    “May I come in?” he asked.
    Wordless, I acquiesced.
    Once inside, Davyss’ voice came out even. “Mr. Lewand, you think that I am murdering women in Whitechapel so that Christine’s playing will move the hearts of her listeners. Is that correct?”
    I nodded, stifled a belch, though I knew he could ascertain my level of intoxication by smell alone.
    Davyss smiled. “Oh, Mr. Lewand, that is not the case, I can assure you. At the hospital I have access to all types of blood. Do not let your imagination get the better of you.” He paused. “And do not let alcohol become your master. You have worked too hard and too long to be locked up as mentally incompetent due to excessive intemperance.”
    “Is that a threat?” I asked, hardly breathing.
    “Oh, no,” he said, still grinning. “I would be doing it for your own good. As I have done for others who so desperately needed help with their drinking. Do you understand my meaning, sir?”
    “I understand,” I whispered. His lies did not fool me. The truth of his crimes whispered to me through the tormented notes Christine played.
    He left me with the blood of the two Whitechapel women. I read about them in the newspaper later that day. They were killed just down the street from my basement apartment. The newspaper had a name for the murderer, a horrible name, part fairly-tale everyman, and part description of how he killed the women. He ripped them open. He was a ripper. A monster. And I knew his identity.
    Yet, because of the qualities in the blood Davyss brought me, our Sunday concert went perfectly, absolutely perfectly. In an effort to keep our Christine novel, Davyss declared we would not have another performance until November. Let six weeks pass so that word of mouth could make Christine’s next appearance the biggest, the best, and the most profitable.
    Already, other pioneers of the self-playing piano, men such as Misters Wilcox and White, were asking Davyss to see Christine, but of course he refused them. As he also refused the Aeolian Company despite their offer of lucre. Christine was ours, his and mine, along with his deranged secret, which I could not tell a soul on penalty of incarceration in the London Hospital’s insane asylum.
    Six weeks until another murder. Six weeks until our next performance, on Friday, November 9 th .
    What could I do? Nothing. I drank gin. I listened to Christine play, not remembering what pieces I had given her. Impossible, that she could play without the perforated music, and yet, it seemed I would find scrolls of music in piles on the floor and her fingers still moved over the keys—her face only a porcelain mask, unmoving, unmoved, with the same blank expression I had painted on it.
    I moved my cabinet player about nonsensically in my inebriation. How else could she travel to the door, to the wall, to the corner? One morning I woke with a start to find her looming over me, hands hooked into claws. I admonished myself as I moved her back to her place in front of the piano, thumbs above middle C.
    Randomly, Davyss would come to