The Samsara Project, David Burgess [most popular ebook readers txt] 📗

and soon became the largest clothing factory outside the industrial areas of Lancashire. The business made the Dupree family very wealthy and with wealth came privileges. As a result, over the years the family lost most of its French connections. There was though one typically French attribute that did not leave the family. Throughout the generations the men all, without exception, took mistresses or had numerous affairs. For most of the time the men were very discrete. The wife and the mistress would never meet, and both would be well looked after and provided for. William Dupree, Jacqueline’s father did not follow this ‘noble’ tradition. He did not take a mistress, one woman was not enough for him and neither was it enough for his ‘unusual’ sexual needs. William Dupree was a regular visitor to Whitechapel brothels and Whitechapel streets.
It did not take too long for William to catch syphilis, something that was incurable in Victorian times. At first William did not know he had the disease and passed it onto his wife. The syphilis affected his wife far more severely than it had him. William was able, with the help of his doctors, to keep the infection under control. In fact his doctors were amazed at how he managed to do so. His wife, Jacqueline’s mother was not so lucky. The infection took hold and over a period of time spread thorough her system. Annette Dupree died just a few days before Jacqueline’s sixteenth birthday. Family members who were around her at the time all remember one thing. Jacqueline never turned her back on her father; she never once blamed him for causing her mother’s death. In Jacqueline’s mind whoever it was that gave her father syphilis was the one who had killed her mother. That is the person who should bear the responsibility.
It was also reported that after her mother’s death Jacqueline became very involved in her local church. She regularly attended bible study classes and would read the Holy Book over and over again until, it was thought, she knew every verse by heart.
Andrew summed up his findings and finished by saying, “I can only conclude from all of this evidence that Jacqueline Dupree was Jack the Ripper.” He then walked back over to a seat next to John and Pat.
“I don’t know what to say to you Andrew,” said Pat, “Would you mind if I can study your evidence?”
“Of course you can,” Andrew replied.
Pat then turned to John, “Does Andrew know about your trip yesterday?”
Andrew looked at John, “You went up to see your brother-in-law didn’t you?”
John had to look away from Andrew for a minute. “I also asked him to check something out for me, something that might be connected to the murder and what you have discovered.”
“John,” said Pat, “did Peter say what gender the blood sample was?”
“No just that they matched. Why?”
“When you test DNA you can tell lots of things, genetic illnesses for example, another is gender. Call Peter now, ask him for the gender of the samples he tested yesterday. We know they match. Let’s see if we can get young Andrew’s theory past its first test.”
John opened his phone, scrolled through his contacts menu, selected his brother-in-laws number, selected call, then waited for it to be answered. It was Shareena who answered the call.
“Hi Shareena, this is John, Peter’s brother-in-law. Is he around?”
“Alright John,” she replied “Dr. Livingstone has had to leave for a meeting; he won’t be back for a couple of days. Is there anything I can help you with?”
“I had a DNA match confirmed on two blood samples yesterday, I just wanted to know if a gender test was done as well.”
“No problem, I’ll find out for you. Hold on John, Carla just come in.”
Shareena put the phone down and called Carla over. The two spoke for a couple of minutes after which Shareena picked up the phone. “John.”
“Yes Shareena.”
“Female, John. I just spoke to Carla who did the test, if she says’ female then that’s it. Carla doesn’t make mistakes.”
“Shareena, you’re an angel. I owe you a big favour.”
“I’ll be sure to collect then.” she replied.
“You’re on.”
John hung up. “Female, he said, “The samples tested yesterday were female.”
“Where do we go from here?” asked John.
“The pub,” said Pat, “come on you two. We’ll talk about this over a pint or two.”
“Sounds good to me”, “Let’s go then,” said John and Andrew in unison.
They all started to gather up their bits and pieces. Outside the auditorium door the two HSS agents pulled back the audio and video leads, picked up everything and ran back towards the store cupboard. They just managed to make it to the second corridor as Pat, John and Andrew walked out of the auditorium. Pat stopped. “John, what’s this?”
Pat was looking down at the carpet outside of the auditorium door. On it were two small pieces of black insulating tape. One end of the tape was stuck to the carpet, the other end was free. John and Pat shrugged. Andrew looked more closely. He looked at the tape, then at the closed door.
“Are you sure we were on our own in here Pat?”
“Definitely, there is no one else shifted in today.”
“Well, someone else was here. This tape was used to hold something down on the floor, a wire of some sort.”
Andrew ran a finger across the tape, starting at the where it was stuck to the carpet. “Look at this,” he said.
Pat and John crouched down. The tape was parallel to the door. “Whatever this was holding down was pushed under this gap between the bottom of the door and the carpet. It has to be a video feed of some kind, maybe a fibre optic cable. Someone, for some reason recorded our meeting, any ideas why?”
Pat and John both said no.
“Why video?” asked Pat. “How can you be so sure?”
“If you’re recording audio it doesn’t matter what direction the microphone is, so long as it’s pointing towards the sound source. With video the camera has to be the right way up, not on its side or off on an angle. To do that under these conditions it would have to be taped in place to stop it moving position. Like it or not, someone is taking a very serious interest in what we are doing and if none of us knows why, or who then I’d say it’s someone very serious. I think we’re in big trouble and we all need to watch our own and each other’s back. We’ll see what ideas we can come up with in the pub.”
 
Chapter 11

The side door of the crew bus slid open and the two HSS agents scrambled in. “That was a close call,” said agent two.
“Closer than you think,” replied agent one. He starred at the two of them. “They know you were there, or at least they know someone was there, and,” he emphasised, “they know they were videoed.”
Agent two looked perplexed. Agent three just shrugged. “How, they never saw us. We left everything exactly the way it was.”
“The tape you used to hold the wire in place under the door, they found it. Andrew Cleaver, the kid, he figured out what had happened.”
Agent three joined in, “They can’t have any idea why there were videoed.”
“I’m sure they haven’t,” replied agent one, “our problem is that they now know they have been. In future they will be more careful. They may even realise they have been bugged. This is not ideal; we have to be even more careful in future. No more slip ups.”
Pat pulled the large door of the museum shut, he locked it then turned to John and Andrew, “Where do you fancy going to?”
Andrew stopped them on the pavement just outside the main museum doors. “My Granddad was in the army during the Second World War and he was always telling stories about this and that. One thing he would talk about was if you wanted to hide, the best place was out in the open. It was always better to blend in than to actually hide.”
Andrew looked around, not keeping his eyes in any one place for too long. He then looked back at Pat and John. “Across the road is a light blue Ford Transit minibus, looks a bit rough, as though it’s been a workhorse.”
“What about it said Pat?”
“How many old and battered Transit minibuses have heavily blacked out side windows? Just looks wrong. We can’t see in but they can see out, the ideal surveillance van. If it hadn’t been for the tape that Pat found we would never have noticed it. Come on, let’s go and just act as though we have no idea.”
The three men walked for a while. The weather was dry but overcast, the temperature was a few degrees above freezing but the wind chill made it feel a lot colder than that. They decided it was too cold for walking. John flagged down a taxi, “The Carter’s Arms Whitworth Street please.”
The taxi was just over twenty minutes away. John was banking on the taxi driver knowing his way around the warren of back streets and alleys that still criss-crossed London. If, as Andrew thought, anyone was following them it would be obvious, even to John. When the three got into the taxi John had let Pat and Andrew take the rear bench seat, he sat in one of the folding occasional seats. Not the most comfortable of seats but it did mean his view was out of the back window, ideal to see what was behind them.
The HSS agents were very good at their job. They knew about the tape so decided not to follow. It would be easy enough to find them later on and sooner or later one of them would make or receive a call on their mobile that would immediately pin point their position to within one square foot. It was Andrew who received the call when they were still in the taxi. It was Geoffrey Adamson, the private detective. He seemed eager to talk to Andrew and John. “Where are you now?” he asked
“Just on our way to the Carter’s Arms for lunch,” replied Andrew. At the same time he mouthed to John who was on the phone. John nodded.
“I’m about three quarters of an hour from there, save me a seat, I’ll join you, haven’t had a decent pub meal for ages. See you soon.”
“I think it’s time we had a decent pub meal as well,” said agent one, “and I know just the place.”
John, Pat and Andrew sat at a round table for four. They told the waitress that a fourth person would be joining shortly and they would order then. In the mean time they ordered a round of drinks and waited for Geoffrey. They also decided to tell Geoffrey about their tail in the hope he might be able to shed some light on it for them.
Forty minutes later Geoffrey arrived. Andrew waved him over to their table, he sat down with them and introductions made and pleasantries exchanged. The waitress, seeing the table was now four people, came over and took their order.
“Gentlemen,” said Geoffrey, starting the main conversation, “I have an apology to make. Yesterday I told Andrew that the unfortunate woman murdered on the Common was not Suzie Reeves, or at least that was not her real name. I said she was Natallia Kolinsky, an ex KGB agent. Now, I’m not so sure.”
“So is she Suzie Reeves then, he asked
“No John, definitely not, you know how I