Damn that interfering and utterly meddlesome reporter!

I carefully place his heart in the small sturdy cold box filled with ice that I had earlier procured in Harrod's and stow away the last of my surgical instruments in my immaculately maintained turn of the century carry-all.

As I hunker down to rinse my hands with rainwater borne from a newly formed puddle and listen to the approaching sirens of Scotland Yard's finest (how very droll!), I steal a sideways glance at the young man lying crumpled at the other end of the alleyway. As the arterial blood and skin matter scoured from my hands begin to render the gathered pool of rainwater with a dark rich crimson hue even here in this dark filth-strewn place, I suffer a momentary miniscule pang of regret for my decision to cleanse this man of his sins. I found his amateurish scribblings in THAT deplorable rag about the fearsome 'Doctor Valentine' quite amusing and must admit that I haven't come this close to being discovered since my dealings with the wily Inspector Frederick Abberline back  in 1888. Back then I was laughingly known as 'Jack the Ripper', a moniker I still have a chuckle about to myself  even today when my thoughts turn to the past and the wondrous deeds I have carried out in order to maintain my state of sustained  immortality.

My true age must now number close to two hundred years.

Born into an extremely wealthy aristocratic Austrian family in the year after the fall of the old Holy Roman Empire in 1806, it was not until the very week before my fortieth birthday that I learned from my frail, syphilitic father and my seemingly ageless grandfather how to take those first tentative steps on the path of my true destiny. Already scornful of the pitiful existence of the lower classes and secretly harbouring a distinct lack of respect for the so-called sanctity of religion. I devoured my elders' tale of blood drenched sacrificial offerings and the sweet alluring gift of life everlasting. A total of six offerings were required every twenty years to continue the cycle. In the dying months of the final year of the twenty, a total of six female hearts must boil in a broth and be consumed immediately after a series of wonderful, near seductive, incantations to the dark lord himself.

I never felt any regret for my actions even from my very first collection of innocents. I abused their bodies, bathed in the blood  of those six carefully chosen women, and lovingly savoured every exquisite bite of their nourishing organs. Yes...the taste....the aroma...I shudder involuntarily at the very thought of my next meal - a meal almost spoiled by the dying prone 'newsboy' lying now not more than a mere six feet away from me. He had to be punished... he deserved to meet this fate. I have prided myself in my choice of  vessels over the years. Honed my operating skills to that of the greatest surgeon ever to have handled a scalpel. Effortlessly disposed of countless empty husks. Baffled and confused the many law keepers of their times through intelligence, trickery and subterfuge. Derived great satisfaction in my ability to pass through countless cities completely undetected, taking what I need to survive again for a further score of years. I, Vicktor Daanhoffen, am an immortal, godlike in my decisions, spirit-like in my freedom to pass like an Angel of Death over the land and no little shit of an impudent writing man will try to halt me...pah!

Lifting my refrigerated box and carry-all, and, with a final glance at the man who ultimately knew too much, I exit the alleyway, glad that the rain has finally ceased and with my mind set on mailing the little fucker's heart to his boss in the morning.... I still have two more women to choose for my feast. Time is fleeting and this year is almost at an end. I had my heart (Ha! The irony) set on taking that American pole dancer but I fear that she has escaped me for now...not to worry..there are plenty more where that one came from.............