“Just toddle back t’ bed now, like a good chap. Wot business you ’as out there will keep till—whoa!”
Quite gently I set him out of my path, for they were good Christian folk who operated the shelter, and they had served me well—aye, better than they knew. I threw the bar aside, and bent my waning strength, one hand to push and one to pull, upon the lock. It was strong, but not to be classed with those gorilla-manacles. Presently I heard the splintering of old wood, and could feel metal bend beneath my fingers. To pay for the damage I tossed a gold sovereign behind me as I left, and I silently vowed a future donation upon a grander scale.
The greasy fog had grown even thicker. A few paces along the street, away from the flaring gaslight, and I was out of human ken. A silent pause of a few moments was required, in which to reorganize my restored powers; then in the form of bat I let the pavement drop away beneath my feet, and sought the free winds of the higher air.
Once risen past the heaviest of the mist, I took my bearings from the stars, and set a course to the southwest. In my estimation the best hidden of my caches deposited in 1891 lay beneath the floor of a disused stable, behind a house in Bermondsey.
Even in bat-form, I could still feel the back of my head throbbing from that accursed bludgeon-blow. Whose arm had held the wood that struck it? Whilst flying over the river I could not help but look for one particular large rowboat among the myriad craft that lined the wharves; but of course any such search would have been hopeless, even without the heavy, swirling London fog which grew but deeper and chiller as the night wore on.
Nor could I guess which of the shrouded buildings was the one in which I had been held a prisoner—I only knew it must be somewhere near the water. Nor had I any idea where to begin a search for the blond, arrogant young doctor, whose nameless face burned in my memory. Nor for Matthews, nor for the “other lads” who served the same infamous cause, whatever it might be. Perhaps, I mused, I would have to begin by tracking down the shadowy Barley, who “ ’ad ’opes” of being able to furnish the evildoers with something that they needed—before June 22, which date meant nothing to me.
There was of course another associate of the plotters whose name and face had been left in my possession. Sally, though a dweller in the abyss of poverty and crime, had suffered torture and risked death in trying to set me free, and thereby had established a claim upon my honor as great as any the greatest and most lovely queen on earth could ever have created. Now I should never be able to go peaceably about my own affairs until I had avenged Sal’s injuries as well as my own, and had done all I could to see her through the whole affair in safety. The recent incident on the pier had gone some way toward accomplishing these goals; it had been, however, no more than a good beginning. But before planning the satisfaction of honor, I must first make sure of my own survival.
Whilst crossing the river I remarked to myself upon the changes that had in six short years so altered London’s face. There was of course the continuing proliferation of electric lights. And there were the two newly complete bridges, Lambeth and Tower. Stretched across one of these was a vast banner:
VR 1837 1897 VR
The love of all thy sons encompass thee
The love of all thy daughters cherish thee
The love of all thy people comfort thee
Of course, VR, Victoria Regina, ’37 to ’97—the grand old queen had reigned for sixty years, and her people who had grown to love her held Jubilee again as in ’87…I remembered reading about that, in preparation for my first visit.
London’s vast murmuring voice, now muted by the lateness of the hour and by the fog, but never really stilled by day or night, rose to greet me as I descended to the south bank. The roof-slates of Bermondsey were soon beneath my leathery wings, and I had no difficulty in finding Leathermarket Street.
To my consternation it was soon apparent that change had struck closer to home, for me, than Tower Bridge. The house and grounds which had so admirably suited me in 1891 had obviously passed since then to different ownership. The occupants I recalled were an elderly, moribund couple, unshakably settled into routine, and far too dim of sense to pay the least attention to my comings and goings by day or night. But the place was now inhabited—I should perhaps say garrisoned—by a vast and evidently insomniac family, who had a snoring reserve quartered in every upstairs bedroom, whilst even now, long past midnight, their main body held noisy carousal on the main floor.
In the face of this bedlam I did not even land, but flew away again without bothering to try the stable, from whence sounded not only the snorts of restive horses, but the half-smothered laughter of some lickerish kitchen wench. I considered that I still had strength enough to fly on to my next cache, in Mile End, and, if conditions there should somehow prove even more inhospitable, fly back again. Or I might try Carfax, the estate I had so briefly occupied in 1891, whose large, wild grounds I thought must still hold hospitable soil. That was in Purfleet, a suburb to the north…
The tide was turning now, making my passage over running water smooth and easy. North of the river again, I found to my relief that in a poorer neighborhood change had been less. The tiny Mile End churchyard that I sought was to all appearances unaltered. Six years previous, by what stratagems and strivings I need not relate here, I had interred in this place a coffin-sized box half-filled with my own rich imported graveyard earth; I had trusted that here it would remain hidden, one alien leaf in the midst of an English forest.
My trust was justified. Wraith-like I now melted into the ground, found the box just where I had buried it, and inside it resumed man-shape. My body rested—rested, ah!—upon the soft soil of my homeland. A blessed peace bathed my tormented limbs, and awareness faded utterly from my exhausted brain.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Lestrade, Peter Moore, and I were still standing around the oilcloth bag, and the surprise with which we gazed at its contents and at each other was still fresh, when a ring at the bell was followed by the delivery of a telegram. The message was from Holmes himself, addressed to me:
AM ON A FRESH TRAIL. WILL TRY TO RETURN TONIGHT, BUT NO CAUSE FOR CONCERN IF I DO NOT. SH.
Even as I finished reading this aloud, the inspector voiced his suddenly developed suspicions regarding Peter Moore: “If you’re asking me to believe, Dr. Watson, that this gentleman is just visiting here upon some other business entirely, when I just happen to bring in these darbies, and he just happens to be the man who made ’em—well, no policeman worth his badge is going to accept that sort of thing as a coincidence.”
“Accept it or not, as you choose,” Moore answered, with some irritation. “I tell you, my firm built these restraints, and I saw them packed off with John Scott to Sumatra. And I saw them again—either these very items, or others from the same lot—less than a month ago, in a warehouse here in London.”
Lestrade’s gaze, fixed on the young American, grew sharper than ever. “I should like to know, sir, just what connection your business with Mr. Holmes has with a certain murder that I have under investigation.”
Moore returned Lestrade’s gaze stonily. “A murder? As far as I know, there is no connection at all.”
“Then you would have no objection to discussing with the police the business that has brought you to Mr. Holmes?”
“As a matter of fact, I have already tried to do so.” Moore’s irritation had grown to anger. “Yesterday morning Miss Sarah Tarlton and I were at Scotland Yard, doing our best to impress the men there with the importance of the matter. It is not our fault that we were put off.”
Lestrade was silenced for the moment. I took the opportunity to outline for him the problem of the missing American physician and his equipment. The inspector listened intently, and I judged that again a new evaluation of the case—of both cases, which now seemed more than ever to be connected—was developing in his mind.
When I was done, Peter Moore inquired: “See here, I now seem to be the only one present who knows only half t
he story. What is this murder you keep speaking of? Who was killed, and by whom? Is there any evidence that John Scott might have been in any way involved?”
“I don’t see him as the killer at all, sir,” Lestrade answered. “The man who took the things from the warehouse was a cool customer, if nothing else, while our killer’s an absolute maniac if there ever was one. But some connection there must be...Mr. Moore, I apologize in the name of Scotland Yard, for not giving your problem the attention it undoubtedly deserves. Now if you and this young lady, Miss…”
“Sarah Tarlton. She and John were engaged to be married.”
“Ah, yes. Now if you and I were to go and call at Miss Tarlton’s hotel, do you suppose that she would be willing to come along to the Yard with us and tell her story again? I’ll give my solemn word that this time she’ll be listened to.”
“I’m sure Sarah will agree, if it will help to find him.”
Carrying off his oilcloth bag of evidence in one hand, while the other rested in most friendly fashion on the arm of Peter Moore, Lestrade very soon bade me good-bye. I stood for a moment at the window, and watched the two men get into a four-wheeler.
It was to be a busy evening at Baker Street. Scarcely had I finished my solitary dinner, when two visitors were announced. Once again Sarah Tarlton and Peter Moore entered our sitting room, this time together. Both were badly upset, and Miss Tarlton in particular was almost speechless with indignant rage. It did not take me long to learn the cause.
“Oh, Dr. Watson, that dreadful little man! We had been talking to him in his office for five minutes before I got the drift of his questions...oh, it makes my blood boil to think of it! He suspects. John of...oh, I can’t talk about it!”
Moore, himself pale but much less distraught than the young lady, alternately held her hand and patted her arm, with a concern perhaps something more than merely friendly. “It was just as Sarah says, Dr. Watson. The inspector wouldn’t come right out and say so, but I’m sure this sudden interest of the police in finding John is only because they suspect him of being—involved— in this horrible murder. As I understand it, they think some violent patient of his must have escaped...it’s really completely stupid. Where’s Mr. Holmes? Is he ever coming back?”
Suddenly Miss Tarlton’s anger was temporarily exhausted, and she trembled on the verge of tears. “If only they would simply look for John—I keep picturing them shooting him down like a dog, on sight...”
Glad to be able at last to say something genuinely helpful, I hastened to reassure her that the Metropolitan Police were not generally in the habit of carrying firearms (though I knew that Lestrade for one was seldom without his pocket pistol), let alone discharging them promiscuously at suspects. When I had repeated my assurances several times Miss Tarlton seemed at last willing to believe them, but her general anxiety for her fiancé was scarcely abated.
She dabbed at her eyes. “Dr. Watson, we are abusing your kindness, taking up your time...”
“Not at all. Not a bit.”
“Did Mr. Holmes seem hopeful when he went out? Have you no idea at all when he’ll be back?”
“Hopeful? That would be difficult to say,” I replied. “I do not even know whether the fresh trail he mentions in his telegram is connected with Dr. Scott’s case or some other. As to when he will return, I speak from long experience when I say it may not be till morning, or even later.”
Peter Moore pressed the girl’s hand again. “Come along now, Sarah. I’ll see you back to the hotel.”
“I will not be soothed and quieted!” she burst out.
“Not while they are hunting John, who may be out there somewhere, needing me! He could be ill or dying—God, how can I simply rest?”
“Sarah, you must save your strength. If later—”
“Never mind later, they are hunting him now. Peter, I am going to go back to Scotland Yard and wait. If John is brought in I’ll be there. After coming all the way across the Atlantic, I am not going to be sent off like a child to bed. You may go to your hotel and rest if you are tired.”
There followed some five minutes’ dispute between the two, which I found rather embarrassing. Moore’s angry pleas and arguments had no more effect upon the lady’s determination than did the milder protests that I, at intervals, dared to interject. At last I judged it would be wiser to comply with her ideas as far as I reasonably could, and shortly all three of us were in a cab and headed for Scotland Yard. It seemed to me that her return visit there would be less difficult for all concerned if I were present to act as intermediary; I was well known in those precincts after so many years as Holmes’ associate. His parting instructions were, of course, also fresh in my mind.
Our old acquaintance Tobias Gregson was, as I soon found out, the detective in charge of tracing all connections between the Scott case and the Grafenstein killing, while his old rival Lestrade continued to direct the overall search for the murderer.
Gregson, tall, stooped, and fair, quite courteously led the two young Americans to a comfortably furnished anteroom where, as he said, they were welcome to wait, and where any fresh news of John Scott would be brought to them at once. Then the detective beckoned me away, asking for a word in private. As soon as we were alone, I detected something like triumph in his pale face.
“Well, Dr. Watson, I suppose Mr. Holmes is close on the heels of some suspect in the killing?”
“I am sure he is very busy.”
“But not on the brink of a solution?”
“Not to my knowledge.”
“Then, Doctor, I’d just like you to hear this.”
So saying, Gregson led me along a narrow corridor. Stopping before a plain door, my guide motioned me to silence, and then opened a small spy-hole in the door, indicating with a gesture that I should look in. The room revealed was large enough to hold on one of its walls a vast map of London, and a couple of policemen seated with their backs toward me. In another chair, facing the spy-hole, sat an emaciated old man, wrapped from his shoulders down in a prison blanket that he kept clutched about him.
“And is that your mad killer, Gregson?” I asked, closing the judas window and turning away.
“Him?” The detective laughed softly. “Not by a long way. No, he’s charged only with stealing a blanket—not the one he has wrapped about him now, but one he pinched through an open window in Whitechapel. Nor has he the least idea that a murder’s under investigation. But I think you and Mr. Holmes are both going to be mighty interested in what he has to say.”
Gregson opened the door and we both went in. The old man, who by his speech and manners gave the impression of belonging to the lower classes, looked up briefly startled, and then went on with what he had been saying:
“I tells you gentlemen, I took that bit o’ cloth only in the name o’ common decency, and meanin’ to bring it back in the morning when the shops and stalls opened, and I could buy some proper clothes.”
Bit by bit, under the prodding questions of the policemen, the man’s story came out, interspersed with his objections at being made to repeat it to them once again. The essence of his account was that he had reached into someone’s window for the blanket only because he had been compelled, during the night, to sell almost all the clothing he had been wearing to a stranger. The mysterious man who had forced him into the transaction under threat of bodily harm had then paid him for his rags with gold.
“Oh, come off it, now!” Gregson’s voice was suddenly thick with convincing doubt. He picked up an envelope from a desk in the center of the room, and slid a gold coin out of it into his hand. “You stole this sovereign just as you stole the blanket. Now didn’t you?”
“I never! Nossir! Beggin’ yer pardon, sir, but I sold my clothes for that. Sold ’em fair, I did, and I was just a-borryin’ the blanket to see me over until—”
“Yes, yes. Let’s hear just once again how you came to sell your clothes. Who bought ’em?”
The man unburdened himself of a hopelessly weary si
gh. “You’ve ’eard all that.”
“The good doctor here hasn’t,” Gregson prodded, meanwhile casting a faintly triumphant glance in my direction. “Now, once more, if you please.”
“Well, sir.” The old man sighed again, this time resignedly. “It were this ’ere madman, like.”
“Who?”
“Lor’ bless you, sir, I didn’t know ’im. And I wish I may never see the like of ’im again. Stark nekkid ’e was—talk of decency! Grip like a vise ’e ’ad, I swear.
And ’is eyes—I don’t like t’ think on ’em, and that’s a fact.”
The old man was now warming somewhat to the repetition of the tale, which after all earned him the respectful attention from an assemblage of persons who may perhaps have seemed to him important. “The madman? I’ll tell you. Myke a noise, says ’e, and the next noise ’eard in this ’ere street ’ll be the crunch o’ yer bones a-breakin’. ’Ere, tyke this coin, ’esays, a-’oldin’ up that wery sovereign, an’ toss me over yer rags. An’ I tossed ’em over, sir—you would, too, an’ that’s the Lord’s truth. An’ bless meif ’e didn’t pay me, just as ’e said ’e would.”*
* I said in an earlier chapter that I would return to this point later, and now seems as good a time as any
Those who think me unlikely to pay fairly, even generously, for goods got from the innocent do not know me. They know only the stories told by my enemies and their dupes, from my breathing days in the 15th century, through the 19th when Van Helsing concocted his lurid lies, down to the present. As if by some law of social entropy, when one’s reputation changes, the change is almost always for the worse; and five centuries of life give time for a great deal of change.
That my name is ever going to improve again must be considered problematical at best, but at least its past deterioration can be charted. Let the serious students of 15th century affairs assure more casual readers that in my breathing days, as Prince of Wallachia. I was accused by some of being too scrupulously honest. Certain troublemakers, dissidents in my realm, groaned that I expected too much in the way of trustworthiness from my subjects!
The Holmes-Dracula File Page 9