Escaping from Houdini (Stalking Jack the Ripper #3)

by Kerri Maniscalco

What morbid creatures we were, craving danger and mystery in place of happily-ever-afters.

Captain Norwood visibly sank with relief. If one more body turned up this evening, I imagined he’d row himself back to England.

“Look at those knots,” Mrs. Harvey whispered, “he’ll have a dickens of a time getting out of those. I wonder if he’s got a knife stashed in his trousers… certainly appears that way.” Thomas choked on his water, shooting our chaperone an incredulous look.

“You cannot be serious.” Thomas tossed his hands in the air. “It would seem an awful lot better to have crew members posted along the decks than to see dismembered body parts floating about while first-class patrons made their way to breakfast and tea. ‘Oh, look, Miss Eldridge, there’s a mauled torso. Won’t you pass the cream and sugar?’”

Knives clattered to plates, gasps went around the room, and, judging from the sound of a body slamming into a surface, at least one passenger had passed out.

Understanding dawned bright as the sunrise. “All we have to do is figure out who this refers to and then we’ll have our murderer.” Mephistopheles sidled up to my other side and snorted. “Oh, is that all? That shouldn’t be difficult in the slightest.”

“Ah. I understand now.” Mephistopheles’s lips twitched. “You’re a lunatic.”

Perhaps Houdini wasn’t the one Liza needed to escape from after all.

You want to set your world on fire, I’ll give you a matchbox.”