Ripper Secret, The / Jack Steel

Paperback

August 1888. Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Charles Warren has a precious artefact in his possession. Once an engineer working in Jerusalem to build a new water system, he discovered the solid gold ancient Jewish menorah while excavating a forbidden path under the Temple Mount, and smuggled it back to England. When a group of Russian delegates pays Charles a visit, he is terrified to discover that they are on the trail of the missing object, but with his entire reputation at stake he denies all knowledge of it, little knowing just how far the Russians are prepared to go to destroy him. That's when the first Ripper murder takes place - Mary Ann Nichols is found with her throat cut and her abdomen slashed open in London's Whitechapel. A brutal murderer is on the loose in London and the police are under immense pressure to catch the Ripper before he kills again. But Warren can't shift the suspicion that, somehow, this case could be personal.