The Curse Of The Diogenes Club

by Anna Lord

  As Moriarty was trudging up the stairs nursing a sore head he contemplated the advantages of a doormat for a wife. Nah! Making love to a doormat was never going to make his blood run hot. He wondered if the Countess would try bossing him around in the bedroom. That he’d like to see! “No wonder her husband shot himself,” he quipped to Nash.

  The major chuckled, picturing fireworks on the wedding night – and he wasn’t picturing them outside the bedroom. “If she’s too much for you to handle…”

  Bang!

  The sound of a gunshot had them hurtling back down the stairs, past the Countess on the landing, and into the kitchen where the back door had been thrown open. The Negro was giving chase across the rear courtyard. Someone was scaling the wall. The unknown person dropped down the other side and disappeared. The four of them met up a few moments later in the kitchen where the Countess addressed Mr Dixie.

  “What happened?”

  “I comes down here, Missus, to find a man comin’ through yonder door. He takes his best shot but he would have no luck hitting the side of a charabanc.”

  “Did you get a good look at him?”

  Mr Dixie shook his head. “Too dark to see, Missus.”

  “I wonder if it was the other photographer,” she said.

  “Or the killer,” mused Colonel Moriarty.

  “Or the bomb man,” added Major Nash.

  “I wonder if they are one and the same,” she finished. “Let’s get the search underway. That intruder tells us there must be something here worth finding.”

  Half an hour later they reconvened in the kitchen. Between them they found one card for a rival photographer, three cards for traders of new and used cameras and two cards for suppliers of photographic equipment. The Countess collected all six cards.

  “I can put people onto this first thing tomorrow.”

  “Before we part ways,” said Major Nash. “I’ll run an idea past you that may help to flush out the man behind the scheme to kill Mycroft Holmes.”

  They sat around the scrubbed pine table while Major Nash outlined his plan to invite the most likely suspects to Longchamps for the weekend. The Countess nodded encouragingly as she listened, agreeing that having everyone under the same roof was worth a try.

  “You can have as many servants at your disposal as you need. I will dispatch a team of servants to prepare the house this week. The hiring of extra kitchen staff, plus a few more femmes de chambres and possibly two more valets and a boot boy will not go astray. The weekend of the epiphany on the sixth of January will be perfect. It is also Orthodox Christmas that weekend. Mycroft can stress the seriousness of the gathering. I will convince Miss Violet de Merville and Miss Mona Blague how much fun it will be. They will put pressure on their respective fathers. Mrs Klein may decline the invitation but if I put it about that I don’t want her to attend she will be sure to come. Prince Sergei will need coaxing. I may have to flirt outrageously with the old silver fox. It may just work. Excellent plan, Major Nash.”

  Princess Paraskovia was laid to rest in a forest of birch trees in a corner of the estate belonging to the Earl of Winchester. News of her death had not yet been made public so the funeral was a private Orthodox service led by a priest in gold vestments, with only five mourners who had been sworn to secrecy. The priest was persuaded to omit the traditional pre-funeral masses which he was assured would be duly observed once the body was transferred to its proper resting place in Minsk.

  Countess Volodymyrovna attended the funeral, telling the prince that Mycroft Holmes, realizing she was Orthodox, explained to her about the untimely death of the princess and asked her to attend as a mark of respect on his behalf. What the prince made of that explanation was anybody’s guess, but the fact her step-father had been an old comrade added weight to the story.

  In reality, it was an opportunity to put into place the plan to ensure Prince Sergei accepted the invitation to Longchamps when it was offered in the next day or two. A widower was emotionally vulnerable upon the death of a wife and a clever woman could inveigle herself into the sudden void in his life. This did not call for outrageous flirting but the thing women had mastered over thousands of years while being denied an education, vocation and any meaningful activity other than child-bearing. It called for emotional nurturing of the male of the species and it worked like a charm.

  As Prince Sergei walked with her back to her carriage past the leprous white ghosts that were sacred to Slavs she made sure to mention she would be spending Orthodox Christmas (as measured by the Julian calendar) at Longchamps. To those people who were Christian it would be epiphany. And to those who were pagan it would be the twelfth day after the winter solstice and the time of wassailing the apple tree. As one religion trumped another, tradition remained timeless. And though many might claim God was Nature; it was always the other way around.

  9

  Turkish Baths

  The Turkish Baths on Northumberland Avenue had recently changed hands and were now called the Aga Hammam Baths. The baths had previously been modelled on ancient Roman principles with lots of intricate mosaics, heavy stonework and sculptural columns delineating the various areas – tepidarium, caldarium, frigidarium - but the Pompeiian influence now gave way to Moorish design with Arabic-style decorative tiles in soft blues and soothing greens and hidden skylights that picked out the watery colours in the ceramics. There was even a tea room for men to have a refreshing herbal tonic prior to getting dressed.

  Dr Watson stripped off, collected a towel form the attendant, and made his way to the warm room, or tepidarium, to build up a sweat. There were a couple of men perspiring away on the benches but he didn’t recognize any faces. Most of them had their eyes closed and were leaning back against the wall, their minds aimlessly drifting.

  Before too long, he moved into the hot room, or caldarium, where sweat really started pouring and most of the men began to resemble cooked lobsters. He never stayed long in the caldarium. There didn’t seem to be anyone he knew there either.

  A dip in the cold pool, or frigidarium, came next and then he would have a massage in one of the alcoves. That’s what he really enjoyed – a good vigorous rub down.

  A masseur was now referred to as a tellak and the massage table was called a globek tasi, which apparently meant ‘tummy stone’. Despite the changes the massage was as good as ever.

  Another new feature of the hammam was a series of alcoves for napping. The doctor had been sleeping badly and decided to avail himself of one of the pallets. It didn’t take him long to fall into a deep-dreaming sleep.

  Now, it is a curious feature of dreams that something in the real world just beyond the consciousness of the dreamer will sometimes impress itself into the dream. A barking dog or a thunderstorm will feature in a dream that has nothing to do with dogs or thunderstorms. And that seemed to be the case here. Dr Watson was dreaming about birch trees and when he awoke he realized that someone was talking about birches. It was a man in the next alcove with a clipped Russian accent. It wasn’t difficult to overhear every word because the walls only went three-quarters of the way up and were then designed to have a trellis of gaps to encourage the circulation of steam and good ventilation.

  “We call it a banya,” the Russian was saying. “A masseur will whip you with birch twigs. It will make your eyes water but it will get all the poison out of the body.”

  “I tried it once,” said a refined Irish voice the doctor guessed might belong to Sir James Damery. “I was in Moscow in the summer of ’85. Damned painful! I could barely put my shirt back on when the sadist finished flaying me!”

  A third man laughed phlegmatically. “Can’t see something like that taking off here in London. You Russians are a hardy race. We English are growing soft. What we need is another Rorke’s Drift to sort out the mollycoddled sheep from the tough mountain goats. Eleven Victoria Crosses awarded in a single battle! Send all those poncy boys to the Transvaal! Freddy Cazenove will come back a new man. Violet will be a damn
ed lucky girl when she stops all this suffragette nonsense and allows Freddy to put a ring on her finger. She’s turned him down three times. If she’s not careful that little Mona Blague will snatch the prize from under her nose and she will be left with that namby-pamby drip, Pugsy Setterfield. He fainted with fright when the first bomb went off. Captain Thompson thought he was dead and directed him to be carted him off to the stable. Well, you should have heard the ruckus when Pugsy woke up. He’s trying to have the captain court martialled for dereliction of duty.”

  “There’s something queer about those bombs,” said Damery.

  “How do you mean?” asked the Russian.

  “Well, three bombs and hardly any damage. Only five dead. The third bomb was placed under the stairs. What’s the point of a bomb under the stairs?”

  “Are you sure?” asked the third voice, which must have belonged to General de Merville. “Under the stairs?”

  “Quite sure. I got it from Bebbington who got it from Hubbard at the Carlton Club.”

  The Russian coughed to clear his throat. “The bombs, they were meant for the Prince of Wales?”

  “So they say,” said Damery. “Rum business trying to kill the heir to the throne.”

  “Made a complete botch of it,” added de Merville with disgust. “We English can’t even set bombs properly. Not that I am suggesting I want to see the heir to the throne blown to kingdom come.”

  “It would never happen in Russia. Everyone loves the Tsar.”

  “Lucky thing we didn’t stay in the room with the hookahs right up till the fireworks like we intended,” mused Damery. “Lucky thing we went outside for that duel. Lucky you insisted we do the duel before the fireworks, Malamtov, or was it Blague who insisted we get it over and done with?”

  “It was both of us,” said the prince.

  “And me too,” added the general. “I suggested the lamps. It was only you who wanted to wait for first light, Damery. Lucky none of us listened to your damn fool caution. Carpe diem! That’s my motto.”

  Damery grimaced. “Whose idea was it to go up there in the first place?”

  “That was the American,” said the prince. “He heard about the shisha from that Valkyrie - my God but she is magnificent!”

  De Merville laughed heartily. “Mrs Klein was formidable rallying those poncy boys putting out those spot fires. She had them lined up like proper soldiers. Dipping buckets in the lake and handing them up in relay formation. The Transvaal could use her talents. Wasn’t she meant to join us in the dome room?”

  “Yes,” confirmed Damery. “I think I heard Blague mention something like that. Just as well she got caught up somewhere else.”

  “What do you think the Countess was doing up there with the colonel?” asked the prince adopting a curious inflection.

  “I wondered about that too,” said de Merville gravely. “If they were setting up that bomb God help us all.”

  “You have a problem with some of the Irish in the army?” pursued the prince.

  “Some, yes,” replied Damery, sensitive to the question of Fenians. “But the colonel is genuine. I think he and the Countess may have been having an assignation but you won’t hear me say that outside these four walls. Did you ever meet the Countess in Odessa, Malamtov?”

  “Twenty years ago. I knew her step-father. A good man. Not like his sister. Beautiful but mad. She ruined the girl. Varvara Volodymyrovna will need a firm husband.”

  “Do you have anyone in mind, Malamtov?” probed Damery, careful not to smile.

  The prince looked cagily from one man to the other. “You have no doubt heard the rumour, gentlemen, the princess and I are estranged. She moved into Clarges Hotel last week.”

  De Merville pretended to be surprised. “That’s why your wife wasn’t at the ball?”

  “Da, gentlemen,” replied the prince in clipped Slavic tones, curtailing the conversation by pushing to his royal feet. “If you will excuse me? I must take my leave. I am lunching with a Valkyrie at The Criterion.”

  Damery waited for the prince to disappear into the changing room.

  “Don’t repeat this to another soul,” warned Damery sternly, “but O’Connell from the Carlton Club told me a body turned up at the mortuary the night of the ball. His brother is the coroner and he works in the same building. It was someone who remained untagged, in other words, nameless. The body was removed at first light this morning and put in an expensive hearse. It was a lady in her early forties with honey coloured hair. Suicide. Laudanum. No post mortem. She had a strawberry birthmark on her right thigh.”

  De Merville reacted as if he’d just been punched in the gut. “Princess Paraskovia!” he gasped, and in that moment Damery knew that his friend and he had both been making love to the same woman. “So that’s why she wasn’t at the ball. I was worried all night that…” He didn’t finish the sentence; he’d said too much already.

  “I was worried too.”

  De Merville looked up quickly, and in that moment he knew it too. “Et tu, my old friend?”

  “Yes – she was irresistible.”

  For a long interval neither man said anything and Dr Watson thought they might have removed themselves to the changing room but then came more.

  “Suicide?” grunted de Merville. “Not a snowball’s chance in hell. Paraskovia was looking forward to the ball. She had a new costume specially made. I saw her at Clarges earlier that day. I took her some hyacinths.”

  Damery nodded grimly. “Me too. Clarges had to be the worst kept secret in London. I took her some pink tulips. Paraskovia wasn’t the type to commit suicide. She was looking forward to something. She said she had wonderful news. She was going to tell me at the ball.”

  “Me too. She said the same to me. I took it to mean the cold fish had finally agreed to a divorce. When she didn’t turn up I told myself she was trying to avoid the gossip-mongers.”

  “I tried to see her yesterday morning but Fisk-Manders gave me the brush off.”

  “Fisk-Manders wouldn’t allow me past the reception desk. He had a burly porter standing guard at the stairs. I got the impression the fellow was some sort of professional wrestler or single-stick champion.”

  “I don’t like any part of this,” said Damery.

  “There’s something not right about it,” agreed de Merville. “That third bomb under the stairs has put the wind up me too.”

  “Yes, that’s when you rallied and realized Violet was in the pavilion. I haven’t seen you run so fast since that tiger leapt into your tent. Do you think Mycroft knows what’s going on?”

  “The man’s a Machiavellian schemer. Political expediency above Morality is his credo. He knows everything that goes on in London. I think he’s the one who got Freddy that sudden promotion to the Transvaal.”

  Damery’s fair brow creased. “He might be Machiavellian but he always acts with reason and that promotion makes absolutely no bloody sense.”

  De Merville chewed on his moustache. “Hang on! There was a rumour Freddy was bedding the princess.”

  “I heard that rumour too but I thought Freddy had eyes only for Violet?”

  “Yes, of course, but they’re not engaged yet. The boy is still sowing his wild oats and who can blame him. Once he marries Violet he’ll settle down all right.”

  “But I still don’t see what that has to do with Mycroft?”

  “Mycroft might have viewed it as a threat to Anglo-Russian relations. He was trying to patch things up after we gave the Tsar a hiding in the Crimea. Removing Freddy removes any awkwardness with Malamtov.”

  Damery went white. “Good God! Let’s hope Mycroft never finds out we were bedding her as well. I’m not like you. I’m a diplomat not a soldier. I don’t fancy a posting in Swaziland. Not at my age.”

  The general blanched. “I’m past it too, old boy. I wouldn’t last a week in that terrain.”

  Dr Watson rushed straight around to number 6 Mayfair Mews to impart all he had heard before it escaped him. Sherlock
was there helping the Countess transform herself into a butler. While the transformation was taking place he recounted everything, not in any particular order.

  “Well done, Watson,” praised the consulting detective, re-ordering the haphazard details such as whose idea it was to go up to the dome room (Blague), who suggested it to him (Isadora), who was keen to leave quickly (Blague, de Merville and Malamtov), who was keen for them to stay (Damery). He turned to his daughter. “Now, if it is none of my business, just say so, but I must ask: What were you doing in the dome room with Colonel Moriarty?”

  She used an index finger to pat down her moustache and survey herself in the dressing table mirror. “Xenia alerted me to the fact the colonel was wearing Dr Watson’s kilt and that he had raced up the spiral stairs as if his sporran was on fire. I naturally went to investigate.”

  Sherlock nodded with approval and realized there came a time in every father’s life when he knew his off-spring would one day take over from him. Cogitation had always been restricted to him alone with Watson filling any action-inspired gaps where required but perhaps the time had come to share the cogitation part too. “I spoke with Major Nash this morning at the Diogenes Club to ascertain details regarding the duel. Malamtov brought the pistols to the ball, possibly to challenge the Prince of Wales to a duel. It was de Merville’s idea to go down to the lake. After the first two bombs went off, Nash and Moriarty raced back to the pavilion. De Merville and Damery didn’t move until after the third bomb went off. Blague and Malamtov remained by the lake. Nash spotted Blague leaving a short time later in his carriage. Malamtov’s carriage was still there but the prince was nowhere to be seen. De Merville, once he had satisfied himself that his daughter was uninjured, took charge in the guardroom where the injured were being taken. Damery took it upon himself to oversee the orderly departure of carriages from the carriage park. The question that springs to mind is what was Malamtov doing after the bombs went off? This becomes crucial when we take into account the strangling of the studio photographer after the event.”