by David Marcum
I could see Holmes, too, was intrigued by the singer. He had scarcely glanced at the surroundings. Suddenly, her song ended and she left the stage. The on-lookers erupted in heart-felt acclamation, mixed with curiously ribald laughter, their hob-nailed boots pounding the brick floor. The girl shyly returned, curtsied, and then made her way to a small door in the corner of the room that led, presumably, to her dressing-room. “Quick, Watson,” Holmes whispered. “That young woman may hold a vital clue. We mustn’t lose her.”
The audience by now had resumed its customary boisterousness, and we had to elbow our way to the small door. To my surprise, it led immediately into the dressing-room, no bigger than a broom cupboard, and brought us face-to-face with the young soubrette.
“Beg pardon, miss,” said Holmes, in his best Cockney accent, “but me and my mate was so took wiv your song, we just ’ad to meet you in person.” The girl sat motionless facing her mirror, and did not respond. As I studied the reflection of her face, I was surprised to see she was considerably older than her performance had led me to believe. Her face was caked in make-up, and her eyelashes enhanced with ones that were false. Her hair, too, golden as corn on stage, seemed duller now by the light of the solitary oil-lamp on her dressing table.
Holmes continued to ply her with his Cockney charm. “We was wondering, miss, if you’d take a tipple wiv us at the bar.” I was amazed to see him kneel before her, and insolently slide his arm round her waist. I had never seen my friend so intimate with a member of the opposite sex in all the years I had known him. “Yer know,” he said, “your ’air is just like my mother’s was when she was a gel.” I noticed a grin fleet across the girl’s face. “Though ’ers was a permanent fixture.” To my utter surprise, Holmes grabbed a handful of the girl’s golden locks and, with a vicious jerk of his hand, pulled it. My surprise gave way at once to amazement, as I saw that Holmes, springing to his feet, was holding the girl’s full head of hair in his hands - it was a wig!
At the same moment, the girl, with unexpected force, tore my friend’s walrus moustache from his upper lip. “Touché, Mr. Holmes,” said a voice that had descended into a baritone, and seemed irritatingly familiar to me.
“We meet once again, Colonel Goriot!” said Holmes, a broad smile across his face.
“Oh, please,” our American friend responded, “the time for deception is past. Dick Mansfield, thespian. How do you do?”
Whilst Mansfield sat in front of the mirror casually removing his make-up, Holmes began his interrogation. “Perhaps, Mr. Mansfield, you would be good enough to inform us as to the why’s and wherefore’s of this hoax? For I assume that’s what it is?”
“Oh yes, Mr. Holmes,” said Mansfield removing his false eyelashes, “it’s a complete spoof. There never was a recording of Her Majesty, and consequently, no demonstration. It was all cooked up by me.”
“But to what purpose?” I interjected angrily, “To make a fool of Her Majesty’s government?”
“No, no, I assure you,” Mansfield replied as he turned his face towards us, still glistening with the residue of the cold cream he had used to remove his make-up. His eyes were dark and mesmeric, and they held us in their power as he revealed to us the details of his plan.
“My parents were both actors,” he began, “my mother, a classical singer of enormous range - as you heard tonight, I have inherited her vocal skills and can still sing convincingly in the soprano range. But I also have had a fascination for anything scientific, any new invention this great 19th Century has to offer, and there is none greater than Mr. Edison’s Talking Machine, gentlemen. I truly believe that it will change the world. I had this great idea. I put it to Mr. Edison that I could go to Europe ahead of his official representative, and successfully publicise his invention. It wouldn’t do any harm to my theatrical career either, I thought, to be associated with the great man. So, I came to England with his blessing, and in my role as a showman, began collecting recordings of the British great and good.
“But you, Mr. Holmes, riled me. Your dismissal of the phonograph as nothing more than a ‘wonderful toy’ made me decide to show you the power a recorded voice can exert. I learned of your Queen’s vocal idiosyncrasies when I made a recording of the Home Secretary, a most garrulous gentleman, and decided to use this little known information to hold the country and its government to ransom. I knew they would turn to you, and I hoped your failure to solve this non-existent case would teach you a lesson.”
“But as you see, Mr. Mansfield,” said Holmes coolly, “I have not failed. I have caught up with you.”
“You sure have, sir,” laughed Mansfield, “I underestimated your powers. But what harm has been done? No crime has been committed. Mr. Edison’s machine will be talked about in the upper echelons of British society. And you, Mr. Holmes... I hope you have been left with food for thought.”
In the early hours of the morning, Holmes and I were back in Baker Street, musing over the day’s events with the aid of a bottle of Chablis.
“But how did you connect the verse on the second piece of card with Mansfield and his theatrical trickery Holmes?” I asked.
“Terminology, my dear Watson,” Holmes replied. “Every profession has its slang and shorthand terms, mostly unknown to any but its adherents. The theatre is no exception. When we interviewed the Pocket Termagant, she referred to herself as a ‘turn’ - meaning a performer. I recalled that the second piece of doggerel stated ‘she turns in the East’. It seemed obvious to me that the verse did not refer to the Queen as I first thought, but a female music-hall artiste performing in the east End of London. ‘She came from the West’ also referred of course to our friend from America, whose ability to disguise himself almost equals mine - though I had not expected he would be such a convincing female. A quick glance at the trade paper The Era revealed at once to me the name and location of the artiste whose billing was: ‘Of the best she’s the best’ - again not a reference to Her Majesty, as I had originally thought, but a description of ‘Lily Belle, Soprano of the States’. Of the best, she’s the best. If we could catch ‘her’, the obvious instigator of this ludicrous affair, I knew our case would be solved.”
“But when did you deduce that it was all the work of this deuced clever American actor?”
“Ah, Watson,” Holmes sighed, “I knew that after I first read the ‘threat’ on the handbill. The writer consistently referred to your mother-tongue, and your Queen Victoria, which indicated a foreign mind behind the missive. And the American spelling of the word ‘favors’, without its customary ‘u’ after the ‘o’, confirmed my theory that the somewhat preposterous ‘Colonel Goriot’ was a faker. Do Americans really say ‘Jumpin’ Jehosophat’, I wondered? He seemed to be full of all the American clichés an Englishman unacquainted with that country might expect to hear. But as to his motive, that I could not have guessed till we cornered him in Whitechapel.”
He reached for the Persian slipper and filled his briar, a frown crossing his forehead.
“And has Mr. Mansfield left you with food for thought?” I enquired innocently.
“Well, I certainly was mistaken about the potential of Mr. Edison’s phonograph. Mansfield was right, it is more than a toy. I foresee the recorded voice could become a prime source for the communication of vital information - world news or political propaganda, say? - which would be a positive use. Or it might be used for the purposes of blackmail. It might, in time, be possible to reproduce thousands of copies that could be sent throughout the world. I see now that this invention could, for the twentieth century, be as important as the printing press was for the fifteenth century.”
“And just as with novels,” I chipped in, “the phonograph could be used simply to entertain. It could be an instant source of music,” I added, warming to my theme.
“Indeed,” said Holmes gravely, “and be responsible for the preservation of a great deal of b
ad music!”
I laughed at his serious face. “Well, it may turn out to be nothing more than a wonderful toy after all. Let posterity decide.”
And posterity did. Within a few years of this case, almost every home had a gramophone, a development of the phonograph that used discs instead of cylinders which could indeed be reproduced in their thousands as Holmes had predicted. He himself succumbed, as I have recorded in “The Adventure of the Mazarin Stone”, and made recordings of his own violin playing, thereby coming dangerously close to fulfilling his other prediction about bad music!
Mr. Mansfield returned to London, showing once more his protean skills on the West End stage in the dual roles of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. He subsequently became a star of the American stage - and somewhere amongst his possessions there might still exist the cylinder he made of Sherlock Holmes discussing his methods, recorded on that cold October afternoon in 1887. What would the world give now to hear that product of the wonderful toy?
The Adventure of the Cat’s Claws
by Shane Simmons
“That weren’t so hard,” is what I said to nobody who would bother to listen last time I put pen to paper. Don’t know what all the fuss is about. One word comes after the other, you tells it like it happened, and the next thing you know, the whole story’s been told. Dr. Watson gets by, and he’s no writer, he’s a doctor. That Charlie Duckins bloke everybody seems to like so much did heaping piles of it till he was rich. Me, I’m no writer, I’m an Irregular, but I figure I got some stories to tell and why not make a few pennies on the side? Them fellows at The Strand ought to want a look at what I can give them. They do backflips for anything Sherlock Holmes, and I know about some cases Dr. Watson don’t know nothing about.
Like the time the circus came to town.
Now, the way I figure it, a town as big as London ought to have plenty of circuses. Who don’t love a circus, I asks you? But then there’s all those rules about wild animals inside the city limits. What if they got loose and started eating people or trampling them underfoot? Well, I suppose it’s something worth considering. It can happen. I saw so myself.
“Wiggins,” said Ben to me on the street one day, “What’s it say?”
Little Ben had been with us a while at that point and was the youngest of the Irregulars. Too young to know how to read the new poster pasted to the wall. Ten copies of the same one were plastered over old posters and adverts that weren’t so relevant no more. All Ben knew is that there was pictures of lions and tigers and a ringmaster promising a great spectacle. And around those pictures were letters and words, big and bold, telling anybody who might read them what they could expect to see and where they should go to see it.
Ben couldn’t read a word, but few of the other lads would have had much luck sounding them out either. Amongst the Irregulars, I was the man of letters. Even back when this first happened, I knew my alphabet - or at least the best bits of it - and could pick my way through the meaning of what was written on most billboards and street signs.
“Get the rest of the lads,” I instructed Ben. “Round up the lot of them and say Wiggins has called an emergency meeting.”
“What’s the ’mergency?” Ben asked me back, looking concerned there was trouble afoot.
“There’s something grand coming we need to get everybody’s eyes on straight away.”
I called for a vote at the meeting once the Irregulars had all been informed, because sometimes, when you’re the boss, it pays to pretend you’re running a democracy. The results were as unanimous as I’d figured they would be. If there was a circus passing anywhere near our turf - and Ronder’s Wild Beast Show sounded like a circus, sure enough - then time off from work was in order so we could all see it for ourselves.
Wimbledon was far enough removed from the heart of London to keep the animal stink and chance of gorings away from the thickest population. The entire Irregular army, nearly two dozen strong at the time - though the numbers tended to run as irregular as our name - converged at the advertised spot at the agreed upon time. Some of us had to break off from assignments and watch-posts to be there, hitching rides, dangling off the backs of carriages, or hoofing it, but my lads were proper professionals, and not one of them was late or off the mark.
Once assembled, we set about getting a lay of the land and an idea of the setup for the show. It would be a small matter for us to figure out how we were all going to sneak in, or swindle our way into the stands. We had managed that sort of thing before, at swankier venues than this. Remind me sometime to tell how the Irregulars once crashed Covent Garden at the behest of Mr. Sherlock Holmes, who needed a hand boxing in his suspect once he figured out the third duck on the left had been lining slippers with poison in order to get a better billing in the ballet. It was nearly the swan song for Swan Lake, but the show went on thanks to the lads, and we got to catch part of the act as a bonus. Pity it was a bunch of Russians leaping about on their tippy toes to some dusty tunes and not a proper evening’s entertainment, but I can’t argue against an admission price of nothing.
The crew and I made our way to the spot to plan our infiltration. Scouting took no time at all, considering there was nothing to see but an empty field with a distinct lack of performers, human or animal.
“Well, you’re certainly in line early enough to get a front-row seat,” said the groundskeeper we finally managed to locate and question. “Ronder’s Wild Beast Show doesn’t even arrive until later tomorrow. Pitching their tents and setting up the exhibit will be another day or two on top of it.”
Such was the limitations of my literacy in them days. I could read enough to determine the nature of the show and where it was happening. It was the specifics of the when that tripped me up. The lads weren’t so pleased with me, though none of them could have done any better. I suggested intercepting the circus on the road and helping ourselves to a preview of the spectacle, but they weren’t having it. Once again I proved to be the most ambitious of the bunch. The rest wanted to get back to their duties and business in town. No one wanted to come with me on my excursion, so I waved them off with a dirty word and an even filthier gesture. Showing the troops you have the most worldly vocabulary is another good way to remind them who’s boss.
The same man in charge of maintaining the property that would host the coming attraction seemed to know the most about the show’s whereabouts and the route they was taking. Ronder’s exhibit had been bouncing all over England throughout the season, but by his reckoning they were as close as Berkshire. That was as specific as he would get between frets about what terrible creatures were coming to spoil the parcel of land he kept carefully groomed and clear of brush throughout the year. He seemed particularly worried they would have elephants with them, and insisted long past my patience to listen, that he would have no part in shovelling elephant dung, be it of the African or Indian variety.
Within the hour, I had hopped a train to Berkshire - literally so. I jumped aboard well after it had left the station, running alongside and grabbing hold of a door to the first compartment I spied was empty. From there, it was a simple game of dodge-the-conductor for the duration of the short trip. Much like the circus I was on my way to see for free, my attitude towards travel was likewise frugal. As I figure it, it ain’t stealing if you don’t end up with something you can touch or hold in your hand. See a show without buying a ticket, all you’re really getting is something that you can only hold in your mind after the fact. And who can put a price on memories? Same goes for train tickets. It’s all part of a man’s journey through life, from one point to another. Seems to me, the rail company wants to charge you for all the in-between bits where nobody wants to be. Besides, it’s not like the train weren’t going where it was going with or without me on board. A free ride is just a trip that don’t cost you nothing. That’s not theft in my book.
I made another jump just short of the station s
o as not to have any nosy station master wonder how a young lad such as myself, travelling alone, came to afford a ticket, looking as impoverished as I did. Give them a reason to be suspicious and they’ll take it upon themselves to drag you into their office by the ear for a lot of questions that would just have to get asked all over again once the police were summoned. Who has time for that? Better to make the leap early at the risk of a twisted ankle than spend the day lying to authorities.
Once I was off the train and into the nearest town, I started asking after The Wild Beast Show and where it might have got to. Most people were clueless, but a caravan full of exotic animals don’t pass through the countryside without somebody noticing. The tip I got in the end was that the travelling menagerie was currently camped at Abbas Parva. Road signs and shoe leather saw me the rest of the way. Night was starting to fall by the time I found the site. The failing light made it hard to spot, but it was my nose what did the final bit of tracking. Exotic animals have a smell to them that stands out from your typical horse or cow. They’re a bit gamey, although I expect a few of them look at us humans and think to themselves that we smell like some tasty game meat ourselves.