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her up,” he said, his voice almost a whisper.
    He groped in his coat pocket for his magnifying glass and proceeded to examine the woman’s fingernails, first the right hand, then the left. After several minutes he arose from his crouched position and shook his head. “Nothing,” he said, “not a thing. One would have hoped to have found a hair or a sample of blood, even a fragment of torn skin or flesh, but there is nothing!”
    He stood looking down at the woman’s body for a long moment as if his gaze alone would extract the information he sought.
    Finally Abberline spoke: “Is there anything else you wish to see?”
    Holmes shook his head. “No. We are finished here, I think. Let us leave this dismal place.”
    It was almost dawn before Watson and Holmes returned to Baker Street. Both were tired and somewhat disheveled from their labors, the distinctive mud of Spitalfields now caking their shoes and trouser bottoms.
    After leaving the mortuary, despite the lateness of the hour and lack of light, Holmes had insisted upon a visit to the scene of the crime. As anticipated, the visit was unfruitful. Holmes could do little more than ascertain where the body was first discovered, and “take the lay of the land,” as he put it. Buck’s Row, where the body had been found, was much like any of the other mean streets of Spitalfields, a narrow, gloomy passageway lined with rows of ramshackle tenements smelling of rotting garbage. One end of the alley let out into Baker’s Row, the other into Brady Street.
    “If it were me,” said Thicke, “I would ‘ave made straightaway forBrady Street and thence for the underground station at Whitechapel Road. Easy to get lost in the crowd there.”
    “You have as good a chance of being right as wrong,” responded Holmes, “inasmuch as there were only two ways our man could have gone.”
    “Of course we questioned everyone who lives in the alley,” Abberline said. “No one saw or heard anything, which is what you might expect them to say — to us, in any event. Although Thicke here is well known by the locals, and is probably trusted by them more than most of us. They would talk to him if to anyone.”
    “And none of them heard anything?” asked Watson.
    “No,” replied Thicke, shaking his head. “The closest would have been Mrs. Green, who lives down there just a few doors away, and she said she didn’t ‘ear a thing, not a blessed thing, even though she was awake. Couldn’t sleep, she said. I know ‘er; I think she’d tell me if she knew something. Mrs. Emma Green is ‘er name, a decent sort really.”
    Holmes shrugged. “Me for my bed, gentlemen. There is nothing to be learned here.”
    Abberline would not leave it at that, however. “Do you not have any thoughts at all, Mr. Holmes? Or suggestions?”
    “Only one, I’m afraid. Wait for the next murder.”
    Watson and the two policemen stared at him.
    “Oh, there will be another one, have no doubt. Have no doubt whatsoever.”
    The first gray light of dawn was filtering through the window draperies when Holmes finally climbed into his bed, his once-immaculate evening clothes an untidy pile in the corner by the dressing table. No sooner had he pulled the covers over his shoulder than there was a light tap at the door and Watson stuck his head in.
    “Forgive me, Holmes, but there is one thing I fail to understand.”
    “Only one? How simply wonderful for you,” Holmes said sleepily.
    “Last night in Simpson’s — you recall?”
    “As if it were only yesterday.”
    “That American chap sitting at the table across from us. You said he was in railroads, I believe.”
    “Quite so.”
    “However did you know that? You never did tell me.”
    Holmes yawned. “Oh, that. Why, I overheard him say so, old fellow.”
    Watson stood there. “Good night, Holmes!” he snapped.
    “Good night, old fellow.”

Four

    S UNDAY , S EPTEMBER 2-S ATURDAY , S EPTEMBER 8, 1888
    “Her cuisine is a little limited, but she