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Lucy said, the moment she drew level with the doorway. ‘Grace hasn’t disappeared at all. Ruby saw her going off with a punter.’
    Marie gasped with relief, but then, almost immediately, fresh worries and doubts began to set in.
    â€˜And we know him, do we?’ she asked hopefully. ‘Is he a regular?’
    â€˜Ruby didn’t interview him, to see if he was suitable, you know,’ Lucy said with a smile. ‘She only saw them from a distance. But he was definitely driving a big car, and it was definitely Grace getting into it.’
    â€˜And when was this?’ Marie asked.
    â€˜Ruby said it was just after it went dark. So what would that make it? Five hours ago?’
    Five hours! Five whole bloody hours!
    â€˜That’s a long time for her to be away,’ Marie said, as the fear bubbled up inside her.
    â€˜Driving off in cars, with men, is what we do,’ Lucy countered. ‘And it’s not as if it’s unheard of to take that long – a bit uncommon, I’ll grant you, but not unheard of.’
    Yet two words kept pounding away mercilessly at Marie’s brain like a steam hammer.
    Five hours . . . five hours . . . five hours . . .
    â€˜What if it was him ?’ she asked tremulously.
    â€˜What if it was who ?’ Lucy asked – though she knew well enough who Marie meant.
    â€˜What if it was the Ripper !’ Marie replied, almost choking on the name.
    Lucy clamped her hands on her hips in a show of exasperation.
    â€˜I should have put my foot down the moment the rest of you girls started calling him that,’ she told her friend. ‘I should never have allowed it.’
    And despite the situation – despite her own, still-present fear – Marie could not help herself from smiling at what Lucy had just said.
    I should have put my foot down!
    I should never have allowed it!
    As if Lucy thought of herself as their leader!
    And then it struck Marie that, in a lot of ways, Lucy was just that.
    When one of the girls had a problem, it was Lucy she talked it out with. When a helping hand was required, it would more likely than not be Lucy who provided it. And it was Lucy who had come up with the idea of these safety patrols.
    â€˜I should have insisted we called him the Dribbler or the Panter,’ Lucy continued. ‘Calling him the Ripper was just stupid – it makes him sound much more frightening than he actually is.’
    â€˜But he is frightening,’ Marie insisted. ‘Just thinking about him is enough to scare the crap out of me.’
    Lucy laughed again. ‘Then look on the bright side – you must be saving yourself a fortune in laxatives,’ she said. ‘Seriously,’ she continued, ‘I know he’s not a nice man, but then most of the men we have to deal with aren’t nice – in fact, you can count on the fingers of one hand the ones who are. And he’s never done any real damage, now has he?’
    â€˜Try telling that to Denise,’ Marie countered. ‘She had to have ten stitches in her arm.’
    â€˜Yes, she did,’ Lucy agreed. ‘But that’s almost as much down to her as it is down to him.’
    â€˜What do you mean?’
    â€˜She won’t learn how to handle the punters. She always says the wrong thing, or does something to annoy them. And there’s really no need for that, because this is a business like any other business – and the customer is always right.’
    â€˜In most businesses, the customers don’t carry a razor around,’ Marie pointed out.
    â€˜And neither do most of our customers,’ Lucy said soothingly. ‘Listen, if it had been you or me in that situation, we probably wouldn’t have got cut at all. And anyway, cutting her must have frightened him as much as it frightened her. He’s nothing to worry about.’
    â€˜If he’s nothing to worry about, why do we take it in