Backstage

The crowd dispersed slowly, patrons lingering in the lobby to discuss the performance's more gruesome moments with the peculiar excitement of people who'd been safely horrified. Bernie waited near the doors with camera case in hand, watching Moreau accept congratulations from admirers who wanted to shake his cold hands and praise his authenticity.

Detective Flanahan appeared at Bernie's elbow, his scarred face set in an expression of professional neutrality that didn't quite hide his disgust.

"Ready?" he asked quietly.

"Aye." Bernie shifted the camera case. "You'll do the talking. I'm just here to photograph."

"Right." Flanahan straightened his coat. "Follow my lead."

They approached Moreau as the last of the crowd filtered out into the October night. The theater director was removing his surgeon's coat, revealing the evening wear beneath. His gestures were animated with the satisfaction of a performance well-received, shoulders loose and movements fluid with triumph.

"Detective Flanahan." Moreau's smile was genuine, pleased. "I trust the performance met with your approval. No disturbances to report?"

"Performance went smoothly enough." Flanahan's voice was carefully neutral. "Though I have to say, Monsieur Moreau, your knowledge of surgical procedures is remarkably detailed."

"I did train as a surgeon in Paris, as I mentioned to Mr. Abrams earlier this week." Moreau gestured toward Bernie. "Anatomy is essential for creating convincing stage effects. One must understand how the body is constructed to simulate its destruction properly."

"Right." Flanahan paused, then added, "Mr. Abrams here was hoping to photograph some of your backstage areas. The surgical theater set, the props. For his portfolio, he says. Given that I'm already here in official capacity, I thought I'd accompany him. Make sure everything's above board."

Something flickered in Moreau's dark eyes—calculation, maybe, or amusement. "You suspect me of something, Detective?"

"I suspect everyone of everything. It's my job." Flanahan's tone remained pleasant. "Though if you'd prefer we didn't photograph backstage, we can arrange another time. Through official channels."

The threat was subtle but present. Refuse now, and Flanahan would return with proper warrants and questions.

Moreau's smile didn't falter. "Not at all. I have nothing to hide. My work is theater, Detective. Illusion and artistry, nothing more." He gestured toward the stage. "Please, photograph what you like. I'm quite proud of our production values."

Bernie nodded her thanks, already moving toward the stage with Flanahan close behind. Behind them, Moreau called out, "I'll be in my office if you need anything. Top floor, end of the hall. Do be careful with the equipment, some of the props are quite valuable."

The moment they were backstage, surrounded by dusty curtains and painted scenery, Flanahan's expression hardened.

"He knows," the detective said quietly. "Knows we're looking for something."

"Aye." Bernie set down the camera case and began unpacking the equipment. "But he let us back here anyway. Either he's confident we won't find anything, or—"

"Or he's arrogant enough to think we won't recognize evidence when we see it." Flanahan pulled a small notebook from his coat. "You photograph. I'll document what we find. Anything that looks off, you tell me."

Bernie nodded and began setting up the tripod. The surgical theater set was still in place from the performance—white tile walls (painted canvas, she could see the texture up close), the metal operating table gleaming under the stage lights, the array of instruments arranged with such precise care on the side table.

Through the camera's ground glass, Bernie studied the instruments. Scalpels, bone saws, retractors, all laid out with professional precision. From this angle, with proper lighting...

She triggered the flash powder. The backstage area lit up brilliantly for a moment, throwing sharp shadows across the surgical tools.

"Can you tell if those are real?" Flanahan asked, moving closer to the instrument table.

Bernie lowered the camera and approached cautiously. Up close, the instruments looked... too clean. Too sharp. The metal caught the light in a way that suggested actual steel rather than painted wood or tin.

"They could be real," Bernie said slowly. "Or very good replicas. Moreau said he trained as a surgeon. He might have kept his old tools for authenticity."

"Right." Flanahan pulled out a pencil, used it to lift one of the scalpels without touching it directly. The blade gleamed, its edge honed to surgical sharpness. "Christ. This isn't a prop. This is an actual surgical scalpel."

Violet's stomach tightened. "Is that illegal? Owning surgical tools?"

"Not if you're a trained surgeon." Flanahan set the scalpel down carefully. "But it's suggestive. Combined with everything else—"

A sound from deeper backstage made them both freeze. Footsteps, light and quick, approaching from the maze of small rooms and corridors.

"Someone's coming," Bernie whispered.

"Keep photographing," Flanahan said quietly. "We're doing nothing wrong. Just documenting a theater production."

The footsteps grew closer, and a woman emerged from the shadows—the actress who'd played Mademoiselle Isabella. She was younger than she'd appeared on stage, perhaps twenty-five, with dark hair pinned up and deep shadows beneath her eyes. Something in her posture spoke of exhaustion mixed with resignation—shoulders curved inward, movements careful, as though she carried a weight no one else could see.

"Messieurs?" Her accent was French, thicker than Moreau's. "Monsieur Moreau, he says you are photographing, yes?"

"With his permission," Flanahan said. "We're not disturbing you, I hope?"

"Non, non." She moved past them to a costume rack, began sorting through the elaborate dresses hanging there. "I am only collecting my things. The performance, it is finished for tonight."

Bernie watched her in the dim backstage light. The woman's hands shook slightly as she gathered her belongings—nerves from the performance, or something else?

"You were very convincing tonight," Bernie said carefully. "The death scenes especially. Very realistic."

The actress's hands stilled for just a moment. "Merci. Monsieur Moreau, he is... particular about authenticity. We rehearse many times to get my movements correct."

"He teaches you actual surgical techniques?" Flanahan's voice was casual, but Bernie could hear the sharpness underneath.

"Oui. He shows us how a real surgeon would cut, how to hold the instruments properly. For the audience, you understand. They can tell when something is fake." She pulled a shawl from the rack, wrapped it around her shoulders. "Monsieur Moreau, he does not believe in fakery. He says art must be true or it is nothing."

"True," Bernie repeated. "Even when depicting murder?"

The actress looked up sharply, her hands stilling on the shawl. Her fingers tightened on the fabric until her knuckles went white. "It is not murder. It is theater. A story, nothing more."

"Of course." Bernie kept her voice gentle. "I didn't mean to suggest otherwise. Just professional curiosity—I photograph crime scenes sometimes, and the similarities were... striking."

"That is Monsieur Moreau's genius." The actress's voice carried an odd flatness now, as though reciting something learned by rote. "He takes the horror of reality and transforms it into art. Makes beautiful what is ugly. Makes meaningful what is senseless."

She gathered the last of her belongings and hurried toward the exit, her footsteps echoing away into the theater's depths.

Flanahan waited until the sound faded completely before speaking. "She's terrified."

"Aye." Violet had seen it too, beneath the Bernie performance, the tremor in her hands, the way she wouldn't meet their eyes, the rehearsed quality of her final words, delivered in that flat monotone of someone reciting a lesson learned under duress. "Terrified of Moreau, or of what he represents."

"Or both." Flanahan pulled out his notebook, made a quick notation. "Her name will be on the program. I'll make inquiries tomorrow, see if she's willing to talk without Moreau present."

Bernie moved to photograph the rest of the backstage area—the costume racks with their elaborate period dresses, the painted backdrops showing torture chambers and surgical theaters, the workshop where scenery was constructed. Everything was theatrical, over-the-top, designed to shock and disturb.

But underneath the theatricality, there was that smell. The same chemical sharpness Violet had noticed on her first visit, stronger now in the enclosed backstage spaces. Not formaldehyde exactly, but something similar. Preservative, maybe. Or—

"Chloroform," Flanahan said suddenly. He'd moved to a different area, was standing near what looked like a storage cabinet. "I can smell chloroform."

Bernie joined him. The cabinet was locked, but the chemical scent was definitely stronger here.

"Medical supply?" Bernie suggested.

"For what purpose?" Flanahan tested the cabinet lock—solid, professionally installed. "Theater doesn't need chloroform for performances. It's an anesthetic."

"Could be for the actress. If she needed motivation, or—"

"Or it's what he uses to sedate his victims before he operates on them." Flanahan's voice was grim. "The spirits said they were drugged. Given something to drink that made everything 'soft and distant.' Could have been chloroform mixed into alcohol."

Violet's chest tightened beneath the binding corset. This was evidence—not conclusive, but suggestive. A theater director who kept actual surgical instruments and chloroform, who taught his actresses anatomically correct cutting techniques, who staged plays that mirrored real murders almost exactly.

"We need to see what's in that cabinet," Bernie said.

"Not without a warrant." Flanahan stepped back, his professional training overriding his obvious desire to break the lock open. "And I can't get a warrant based on 'it smells like chloroform and I have a bad feeling.' I need more."

"Then let's keep looking." Bernie returned to the camera, began photographing the locked cabinet from multiple angles. If nothing else, they'd have documentation. Proof that they'd been here, that they'd seen this.

They worked their way deeper backstage, through the warren of small rooms and corridors. More costumes, more props, more painted scenery. A dressing room that smelled of greasepaint and sweat. A storage area filled with lumber and fabric and the accumulated debris of past productions.

And then, at the very back, they found the workshop.

It was larger than the other rooms, with a high ceiling and better ventilation—a window stood half-open, letting in cold October air. Workbenches lined the walls, covered with tools for carpentry and metalwork, painting supplies, bolts of fabric. This was where the magic happened, where illusions were built and sets constructed.

But on one bench, separated from the others, there was an array of glass jars.

Bernie approached slowly, camera forgotten for the moment. The jars were empty now, their contents removed, but they'd clearly been used recently. And on each jar, a small label written in precise handwriting:

Project specimens - DO NOT DISTURB

Flanahan was already beside her, notebook out. "Project specimens. What kind of specimens?"

"For the play," Bernie said, though her voice lacked conviction. "The preserved body parts shown on stage. They had to be stored somewhere between performances."

"Right." Flanahan crouched, examining the jars more closely. "But these aren't prop storage jars. These are medical specimen jars. Laboratory quality."

He was right. Violet had seen similar jars in the few doctors' offices she'd visited—thick glass, ground-glass stoppers, designed to preserve actual biological samples in alcohol or formaldehyde.

"Photograph them," Flanahan said. "All of them. Every angle. And get the labels clear."

Bernie set up the camera with shaking hands and began the careful work of documentation. Six jars total. Six empty jars that might have held stage props or might have held something far worse.

Three murders so far. Three victims, each missing one piece.

Three jars accounted for.

Which meant the other three were waiting for victims not yet discovered.

Or not yet chosen.

The thought made Violet's hands shake so badly she nearly knocked over the tripod. She steadied herself, forced Bernie's gruff professionalism back into place, and kept photographing.

Behind her, Flanahan was searching the rest of the workshop with methodical care. Opening drawers, checking shelves, documenting everything in his notebook with precise annotations.

"Mr. Abrams," he said quietly. "Come look at this."

Bernie left the camera and joined him at a different workbench. Flanahan had opened a drawer filled with sketches—anatomical drawings, beautifully rendered, showing the human body in various stages of dissection.

"Medical illustrations," Flanahan said. "Standard teaching materials for surgery students."

"But look at these." Bernie pointed to a separate stack of drawings. These showed not generic bodies but specific women—different ages, different features, each one carefully detailed. And on each drawing, a single body part had been highlighted in red ink. Eyes on one. Tongue on another. Hands on a third.

Heart on the fourth.

"Christ," Flanahan breathed. "These are his victims."

"Or his potential victims." Bernie's voice came out barely above a whisper. "He's been planning this. Choosing them, studying them, deciding which part to take."

Flanahan gathered the drawings carefully. "This is evidence. Real evidence. I'm confiscating these."

"Can you do that? Without a warrant?"

"He gave us permission to be back here. Didn't say we couldn't remove anything suspicious." Flanahan's jaw set hard. "And if this gets thrown out of court later, so be it. At least we'll have stopped him."

A sound from the doorway made them both spin around.

Moreau stood in the entrance to the workshop, his evening coat draped over one arm, his dark eyes taking in the scene with calm assessment. He moved into the workshop with fluid, unhurried grace—a man completely at ease in his own domain.

"Detective," he said pleasantly. "I see you've found my anatomical studies. Beautiful work, aren't they? I spent years perfecting those renderings."

"These are drawings of your victims," Flanahan said flatly.

"These are studies from life," Moreau corrected, his tone patient, almost indulgent. "Women I've observed in the theater, on the streets, in my daily rounds. Artists study the human form, Detective. It's how we learn to replicate it convincingly on stage."

"And the highlighted portions? The specific body parts marked in red?"

"Design notes for the production." Moreau moved closer, gesturing to the drawings with an artist's pride. "Each character in our performances is built from observation. I note which features would be most effective for which roles. The woman with the striking eyes might inspire one character, the woman with graceful hands another. It's called reference material."

"It's called obsession with dismemberment," Flanahan shot back.

"It's called art." Moreau's voice remained pleasant, reasonable. He spread his hands in a gesture of openness. "You're looking for patterns where there are only coincidences, Detective. My production happens to mirror recent crimes because violence is universal—the themes I explore in theater exist in the real world too. That doesn't make me a murderer."

"The chloroform—"

"For cleaning costumes and props. It's an excellent solvent." Moreau smiled. "Surely you don't think a theater director who stages surgical scenes is suspicious simply for owning the tools of the trade. By that logic, every actor who plays a murderer should be arrested."

He paused, then leaned forward slightly, his expression shifting to one of concern—a man eager to help, troubled by the implication he might be hindering justice.

"Detective Flanahan, I understand your position. These murders are horrific, and I can see how my theatrical work might seem... coincidental. Too coincidental, perhaps." Moreau moved to a shelf, pulled down a leather-bound ledger. "Let me be completely transparent with you. This is my supplier book—every shop in London where I purchase materials for the theater. Surgical instruments, anatomical models, preservation fluids, everything."

He held out the ledger to Flanahan. "You're welcome to take it. Interview every supplier I work with. And I should mention—there are at least three other Grand Guignol-style theaters that have opened in London in the past year. The Crimson Theatre in Shoreditch, Le Théâtre Macabre near Covent Garden, the Dark House Theatre in Southwark. All staging similar productions, all purchasing similar materials. Perhaps your investigation would benefit from examining their work as well?"

Flanahan took the ledger, his expression unreadable. "You're very eager to help."

"I'm eager to clear my name and see justice done." Moreau's voice rang with sincerity. "I create theater, Detective. I don't destroy lives. If there's a monster loose in Whitechapel, I want him caught as much as you do. I have actresses to protect, after all. A reputation to maintain. The thought that someone might use theatrical arts as cover for actual murder..." He shook his head, seeming genuinely disturbed. "It's an abomination."

Bernie watched the performance—and it was a performance, perfectly calibrated—with growing unease. This was what made Moreau dangerous. Not obvious guilt or nervous deflection, but this... this helpful concern, this artistic indignation, this offer of cooperation that made refusing seem petty and suspicious.

Flanahan's hands clenched on the drawings and the ledger. "I'm taking these. For investigation."

"Of course." Moreau inclined his head graciously. "Though I wonder what your Captain Morris will say when you return with sketches from a theater production and a supplier list that will only confirm I purchase materials legally from reputable shops. You've been in my workshop for—what, twenty minutes now? And the best you can find is anatomical reference drawings that any art student might own and a helpful list of my competitors."

Because that's all there was, Violet realized with sinking certainty. The surgical tools could be explained as props or professional equipment. The chloroform as cleaning solvent. The glass jars as storage for stage effects. The drawings as reference material.

Everything incriminating had a plausible alternative explanation.

Moreau had been careful. Extraordinarily careful.

"We'll be going now," Flanahan said stiffly. "But I'll be back, Monsieur Moreau. With proper warrants and proper questions."

"I look forward to it." Moreau turned to Bernie. "And Mr. Abrams, did you get the photographs you needed? I do hope our backstage areas proved... illuminating."

"Illuminating," Bernie echoed. The word felt heavy with double meaning.

They gathered the camera equipment in tense silence, Flanahan's jaw set tight with frustration, Moreau watching them with that same calm amusement. Bernie packed away the plates with shaking hands, very aware of the evidence they contained—evidence that might mean everything or nothing, depending on how it was interpreted.

As they moved toward the exit, Moreau called out one last time.

"Detective? A word of advice, if you'll permit it." He didn't wait for permission. "You're looking for a monster. Something inhuman, something evil. But the truth is often more mundane than that. Sometimes what appears monstrous is simply art misunderstood."

"And sometimes," Flanahan said quietly, "art is just murder dressed up in pretty words."

"Touché." Moreau's smile never wavered. "Good evening, gentlemen. Do come back when you have more... substantial accusations to make."

Outside, in the October cold, Bernie and Flanahan walked in silence until they were several streets away from the Grand Guignol. Only then did Flanahan stop, lean against a lamppost, and let out a long, frustrated breath.

"He's guilty," the detective said. "Every instinct I have says he's guilty. But proving it..."

"The drawings help," Bernie offered.

"The drawings are circumstantial. Defense counsel would tear them apart in minutes." Flanahan pulled off his hat, ran his hand through his unruly blond hair. "We need a victim. Someone who can identify him. Someone still alive who can testify he approached them, drugged them, attempted to—"

He stopped. Looked at Bernie sharply.

"The actress," Flanahan said. "The one we spoke to backstage. She was terrified, you saw it too. And she said Moreau teaches them surgical techniques, has them rehearse the movements. What if he's been... practicing on them? The actresses in his company?"

"Testing them," Bernie said slowly. Understanding dawned cold and sick in Violet's stomach. "Seeing which ones are suitable. Which ones have the perfect features he's looking for."

"And the rest he just terrorizes into silence." Flanahan's scarred face was grim. "I need to find that actress. Interview her properly, without Moreau present. If she's willing to testify—"

"She won't be." Violet had seen the resignation in the woman's posture, heard it in her flat, rehearsed words, even while maintaining Bernie's gruff tone. "She's too frightened. And she needs the work—theater jobs aren't easy to find, especially for French actresses in London."

"Then I'll offer her protection. Safe housing, police guard, whatever she needs."

"Will your Captain Morris approve that kind of expense?"

Flanahan's silence was answer enough.

Bernie shifted the camera case to her other hand. The weight of it felt different now—heavier with the burden of what they'd photographed, what they'd found and couldn't prove. "I'll develop these photographs tonight. Get you copies tomorrow. Maybe there's something in the images we didn't see in person. Some detail that could help."

"Maybe." Flanahan didn't sound hopeful. He turned to face Bernie directly, and something in his expression shifted—the professional detective falling away to reveal something more personal underneath. "Thank you, Mr. Abrams. For tonight. For... understanding what we're dealing with here."

"Aye." Bernie extended her hand. Flanahan took it, his grip warm despite the October cold, and held it perhaps a moment longer than strictly professional. His blue eyes were intense in the lamplight, studying Bernie's face with an attention that made Violet's pulse quicken beneath the disguise.

"Be careful," the detective said, his voice dropping lower, more urgent. "If Moreau suspects you know something, if he thinks you're a threat—"

"I'm a photographer. Not a threat to anyone."

"You're a witness who's seen too much. That makes you dangerous to a man like Moreau." Flanahan's thumb brushed across Bernie's knuckles—unconscious, probably, but Violet felt it like a brand. "Promise me you'll be careful. Lock your doors. Don't go anywhere alone at night. And if you see or hear anything suspicious, you send word to Five Corners Station immediately. Not tomorrow, not when it's convenient. Immediately."

The intensity of his concern went beyond professional duty. Violet recognized it because she'd been trying not to name the corresponding feeling in her own chest every time she saw him—this warm, complicated thing that had no place between a detective and a photographer he'd hired for a case.

Between a man and another man, her mind corrected. Because that's what Flanahan thought Bernie was.

"I promise," Bernie said, and meant it.

They parted ways at the corner—Flanahan heading toward the station to file his report, Violet toward Carter Square and the studio and the darkroom where she could finally shed Bernie's suffocating disguise.

The walk home felt longer than usual. Every shadow seemed to hide threats. Every footstep behind her might be Moreau or one of his associates. The camera case grew heavier with each block, weighed down not just with equipment but with the knowledge of what they'd found and what it might mean.

Moreau was guilty. She knew it with the same certainty she knew her own name.

But knowing and proving were different things, and without proof, he'd keep killing. Keep collecting his perfect pieces. Keep transforming women into art without their consent.

She touched Madame Helena's charm through her shirt and walked faster.