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Chapter 1

It was a cold September night as I was slowly making my way up the hard cobbled steps as I heard someone running behind me, I stopped where I was on the second step from the bottom, I spun around quite quickly ready to see who had been running behind me. I looked down and saw a child standing in front of me, he wasn't that tall just above waist height, he was wearing a small brown and black checkered jacket, his cap matched the jacket, I saw that his trousers were torn and covered in patches of mud that seemed to have dried. I looked at him in puzzlement, questions raced through my mind, who was he? What did he wan't? I stood there waiting for the boy to speak to me. I saw the boy raise his head slightly, I saw that he was holding a letter in his hand, it looked as though it had dried mud on the envelope. He slowly lifted the end of his cap so it wasn't covering his eyes, he looked at me and started to speak.

"All right gov'ner, are you detective Edmund Harm?" asked the child
"That is what people normally call me" I replied
"I got asked to deliver this letter to you"
"Do you know who sent it" I asked the boy, the boy seemed to just stand there for a moment trying to remember the name of the person that had sent the letter.
"I'm sorry gov'ner, but I can't recall the name of the man that gave me this letter"
"Did they say anything else to you?"
"They told me to say that it was urgent that you get this right away"
"Any idea what the letter is about?" I asked, still wondering who would have sent a letter so late at night.
"No idea at all gov'ner i'm just the messanger" he said as he slowly raised his hand that held the envelope.

I took the envelope from the child and handed him a shilling and watched as he ran away back across the cobbled stone path. I guessed he was heading back home, that or he was looking for somewhere to spend the money I had just handed to him. I continued to walk up the steps towards my office, I reached the top of the stairs and I reached into my pocket, I felt my hand grasp the key and pulled it out of my pocket and unlocked the door. All the time while doing this I was still wondering what was in the letter and where it had came from, I had it in my hand, but I wanted to get indoors first before I opened it. My hands were feeling numb as I lifted my hand towards the door handle, as my hand made contact with the metal door handle I started to shiver, I hadn't realised how cold I was standing outside for those few minutes.

I turned the door handle and walked into my office and dropped the letter onto the desk, I walked over and lit a few candles, I hung my jacket up on the back of my chair. I took a seat at my desk and picked up the envelope that the boy had delivered to me, I looked on my desk and picked up a pen knife that I had left on the top of some old ducuments. I slid the knife along the top of the envelope and dropped the letter onto the table, I picked the letter up, but I noticed the newspaper that was lying on the desk. I didn't get one today so I was wondering how it had got here, had someone been in my office while I was out and left it here, if so then who would it have been. I picked the paper up and unfolded it and started to read the fron page, the headline gave me a hint to what I thought the letter would be about. The title read "Body of local girl found in alleyway", I continued to read through the newspaper story, after I finished it I put the paper back on the desk and went to pick up the letter, just as I went to the telephone had rang. I picked up the phone and began to talk into the reciever.

"Hello, detective Edmund Harm speaking, how may I help you?" I asked and waited patiantly for a response, I didn't have to wait too long, I heard a quite quiet voice when the unknown caller began to talk.
"Umm, hello sir, I was just calling to see if you were in, I called a little earlier but you must have been away" from his voice he sounded like he was in his early 20s maybe 22 of 23.
"So it was you who left the newspaper on my desk?"
"Oh, yes I did sir, I was trying to remember where I had left it."
"So why did you call in to see me?" I asked, but I could already guess the answer, I thought it had something to do with the story on the front page of the newspaper.
"I can't talk about it over the phone, if you give me 10 minutes I will meet you in your office"
"Thats fine with me, I will leave the door unlocked, that reminds me, how did you get in my office when I had the door locked?"
"You must have forgot to lock it, it was open when I tried it"
"Well I will see you in 10 minutes, bye for now"
"Bye detective, I will see you soon" I slowly put the phone back down where it belonged.

I picked up the letter and I looked at the date at the top corner on the letter, it was dated "3rd September 1884" it was yesterdays date, I continued to read through the letter, the letter was from the police sergent asking me to help him on a case they had going, they had found another body and there were certain clues at the crime scene that linked the murder of the girl in the newspaper with another murder. The letter had asked me to visit the police station tomorrow to meet with him, so we could discuss my decision. I heard a knock on the door, I stood up out of my old wodden chair, I turned around slowly and saw the door open slowly.