News ! (standard:horror, 683 words)
Author: Michael Lance Kersting	Added: Apr 04 2009	Views/Reads: 3209/2	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Heath Gilmore had a great idea for making news for his newspapers

Whitechapel,London,1888 

Heath Gilmore, reporter, bought a newspaper from a paper boy and went up
to his room at the lodging house . 

In his room, he brewed himself some tea and finally sat down by the
fireside and began reading: 

London, Nov. 9. 

The city is again stirred to its very center, and again mysterious
murder is the cause. The cause, this time, is evidently another in the 
dread Whitechapel series, though it differs from the others in some 
particulars. In the first place, this latest addition to the list of 
horrors was made indoors. A house in Dorset street, near Hamburg 
street, was the scene of the murder. A woman was the victim, as in the 
other cases, and her body was shockingly mutilated. It was found not 
many hours after the violence had been done. The murder had been 
committed in the woman's own room. News of the discovery spread rapidly 
after it was once given out, and in a short time the vicinity was 
thronged with excited and morbidly curious people. The police 
authorities took charge of the body and the house at once after the 
fact of the murder became known to them. They brought into use 
bloodhounds, which were lately tested for the purpose of hunting own 
the Whitechapel murderer in hope that the brutes could catch the scent 
and follow up the trail of the assassin. The Lord Mayor's parade made 
an emergency which called a great portion of the police force to 
special duty in controlling the crowds in the streets. Hence the rigid 
patrol which has been kept up in the Whitechapel district was somewhat 
relaxed. This gave the murderer his opportunity, which he was not slow 
to seize. He is evidently more vigilant than the police, and has the 
advantage that he can study their movements without being himself 
subject to espionage. The present victim is the eighth who has fallen 
before the Whitechapel fiend. The fourth one was found in Hamburg 
street, not far from the location of this one, and at the time she was 
discovered there was written on the wall near the body the legend: 
"Fifteen before I surrender." According to this, seven more lives are 
yet to be taken, and from the success which has thus far attended the 
murderer's operations, it seems entirely possible, perhaps probably, 
that he will be able to fulfil his horrible intentions. The appearance 
of the remains found last night was frightful, and the mutilation was 
even greater than in the previous cases. The head had been severed and 
placed beneath one of the arms. The ears and nose had been cut off. The 
body had been disemboweled and the flesh was torn from the thighs. The 
womb and other organs were missing. The skin had been torn off the 
forehead and cheeks. One hand had been pushed into the stomach. The 
victim, like all the others, was a lewd woman. She was married, and her 
husband was a porter. They had lived together at spasmodic intervals. 
Her name is believed to have been Lizzie Fisher, but to most of the 
habitués of the haunts she visited she was known as Mary Jane. She had 
a room in the house where she was murdered. She carried a latch key, 
and no one knows at what hour she entered the house last night, and 
probably no one saw the man who accompanied her. Therefore it is hardly 
likely that he will ever be identified. He might easily have left the 
house at any time between 1 and 6 o'clock this morning without 
attracting attention. The doctors who have examined the remains refuse 
to make any statement until the inquest is held. and placed on the 
scent of the murderer, but they were unable to keep it for any great 
distance, and all hope to running the assassin down with their 
assistance will have to be abandoned." 

Closing the papers, Heath Gilmore sighed and thought  I must try some
other method of making news for my newspaper. 

Heath Gilmore left the city and the murders stopped 


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