Stalking Jack the Ripper

Lord Edmund Wadsworth is Audrey and Nathaniel’s father. He has an opium addiction that developed after his wife’s death five years earlier. His addiction and his grief over his wife’s passing from a transmittable disease, make him fanatically protective of Audrey; Lord Wadsworth believes that the outside world is a dangerous, contagious place, particularly for a young woman. The restrictions he places upon Audrey—including forbidding her from going to her uncle’s laboratory—drive her away, and his furtive actions—which are the result of his hidden addiction—make his activities seem suspicious. He is an antagonistic character through most of the narrative, leading Audrey to suspect that Lord Wadsworth is Jack the Ripper.

Lord Wadsworth is a dynamic character who evolves significantly during the novel. His strange, strict behavior, including betrothing Audrey to Police Superintendent Blackburn, is intended to keep Audrey safe, but those intentions are easy to misread as controlling and volatile. After he discovers that his son is Jack the Ripper, Lord Wadsworth relaxes his strict rules around Audrey’s movements and interests; he realizes that he cannot protect her from danger because danger is everywhere—even at home. Lord Wadsworth, who once condemned Audrey’s interest in forensic science as improper, ends up paying for her to go to a forensic science school in Romania so that she can learn how to fight diseases, rather than keeping her in her “gilded prison” to protect her from them.

Nathaniel Wadsworth is Audrey’s brother and the novel’s antagonist, Jack the Ripper. He is initially characterized as likeably roguish and a loving brother; he often helps her sneak out to their uncle’s laboratory. Nathaniel has a gentle nature; Audrey details the way that her brother used to save animals and insects. This characterization makes him an unlikely suspect for Jack the Ripper, but no one, including Audrey, realizes that he is nursing a dark, desperate grief.

Ironically, Nathaniel’s murders are motivated by his desire to save. His scheme to resurrect his deceased mother requires him to harvest organs from other women. The morality of his plan is deeply flawed in that he neither respects the lives of the women he kills, nor does he consider what kind of being he would bring to life if his experiment worked.

The duality in Nathaniel’s nature is evident in the hidden laboratory. Just like their father’s hidden addiction made his behavior erratic and dangerous, Nathaniel’s hidden grief has brought out his monstrous cruelty. His death by electrocution symbolizes the danger of scientific hubris when it is used for cruel, immoral ends.

Thomas Cresswell is a pupil of Dr. Jonathan Wadsworth and is passionately interested in forensic science. He is motivated in his studies by the death of his mother, who died of a gallbladder infection. Thomas studies cadavers, particularly organ removal; he hopes that medical knowledge will extend to organ transplants—believing that this might have saved his mother’s life.

Thomas’s manner is arrogant yet charming. Like Audrey, he snubs many of the conventions of aristocratic society, and he is not concerned with being socially acceptable. Thomas’s warm and loving nature is revealed as the novel progresses; he initially appears cold and emotionally distant but later confides to Audrey that this is an intentional affectation that allows him to examine situations without being clouded by emotion. His love for Audrey becomes increasingly clear through the novel, and he finally comes to her rescue at Nathaniel’s secret laboratory. His engagement to Audrey is foreshadowed in the closing chapters of the book, as is his plan to travel to Romania with Audrey to study forensic science. Thomas is a foil for Nathaniel because both men are interested in using cadavers for organ transplants and medical research. However, each differs in how he deals with the grief of his mother’s passing. Nathaniel’s grief drives him to create a monstrous version of his mother using the extracted organs of his murder victims while Thomas uses ethically sourced human remains to find a way, not to bring his mother back, but to help save the lives of others.

Dr. Jonathan Wadsworth, known affectionately as Uncle Jonathan, is Audrey’s uncle. He is a celebrated and widely respected expert in forensic science, and is frequently consulted by Scotland Yard to assist with murder cases. His basement laboratory, where he allows his niece to visit and assist, motivates Audrey to specialize in forensic science herself.

Uncle Jonathan’s interest and expertise in the Jack the Ripper case places him under suspicion, and he is arrested for a time and held in Bethlem Royal Hospital, as the suspected killer. This references the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde trope of the mild-mannered scientist who has a murderous monstrous side. However, this association is a red herring (i.e., a false lead) as he is freed when further murders take place while he is incarcerated. Uncle Jonathan is a mentor figure and a foil for Audrey’s father. He is a male authority figure in her family, but unlike her father, he does not try to curb Audrey’s interest in the sciences. He does maintain some traditional ideas about young women and decorum, as when he gets flustered when Thomas refers to sex work in front of Audrey early in the novel. However, in the end, he influences Audrey’s father to allow her to be her own person and study medicine abroad.