by David Marcum
Mycroft sighed heavily. “Very well then, let me tell you a story. It begins with Shah Jahan, the great Mughal Emperor, descendant of Genghis Khan himself. He was fabulously wealthy, even going so far as erecting the vast Taj Mahal at Agra in memory of his deceased wife. However, his reign proved to be the absolute pinnacle of that empire and, after his death in 1666, his successors became progressively less capable. By 1739, the Mughals were in complete decline. They could not resist an invasion led by Nader Shah of Persia, who sacked Delhi and occupied the Red Fort. In turn, after Nader Shah’s assassination in 1747, his own Empire fell into anarchy. I will not bore you with the details - which are exceedingly complex - of what happened next. However, to make a long story short, in 1780 Captain Popham of the East India Company captured the Gwalior Fort from the Mahrattas. There he found one item of note from the time of Shah Jahan, which had made its roundabout way there via Persia and back again.”
“What was it?” I asked, leaning forward in my excitement.
“The golden, gem-studded throne of Shah Jahan himself. The greatest treasure of the Indian subcontinent. The Peacock Throne.”
My eyebrows rose in astonishment. “What happened to it?”
“Governor-General Hastings determined that it would be unwise to allow the throne to remain in India, where it might serve as a focal point of discontent. Therefore, he took the only course open to him. In 1782, the throne was loaded onto the swiftest East Indiaman clipper and sailed to England. Or such was his intention. Unfortunately, the ship carrying the throne, named the Cheshire, was beset by stormy seas and crashed into rocks off the Wild Coast. Many sailors died in the wreck itself, but a large party of some fifty men managed to make it to shore. However, despite aid from a friendly local tribe, the closest civilized town was an arduous trek through untraversed jungle. It took three months of walking and, when they arrived at Port Elizabeth, only five men remained of that party.”
“Surely they were questioned as to the location of the wreck?” interjected Holmes.
“Of course,” replied Mycroft acerbically. “Several of the men eventually returned to England, where they were interviewed by a predecessor of mine. It is relatively common knowledge that the shipwreck is located at the mouth of the Umzimvubu River. In fact, one attempt to salvage the ship was attempted in 1880, and another syndicate could be formed at any moment. Nonetheless, I am certain that they will not find the Peacock Throne.”
“Why not?” asked my friend.
Mycroft smiled. “Because, according to our records, one of the Cheshire’s boats managed to be launched before the ship foundered. It contained six sailors under the command of the first mate, one Lieutenant Nathanial Hatley.”
“The grandfather of Fletcher Hatley!” I exclaimed.
He trained his steel-gray, deep-set eyes upon me. “Precisely, Dr. Watson. And in addition to the six men, the boat also reportedly contained a large steel-banded box.”
“The throne!” I deduced. “But where did they take it?”
“That is precisely the question, Doctor. When questioned, Lieutenant Hatley was very cagey. He denied any knowledge of the throne, as did the two men, Martin and Leamington, who made their way back to England with him. But Hatley subsequently became very wealthy, and we always wondered the origins of his sudden bounty.”
“So you believe that Hatley plundered the throne?”
“Not exactly, Doctor. Hatley’s wealth was not incredibly prodigious at first. Upon his return to England, he had only sufficient money to buy and outfit a trading vessel. Fortunately for him, his subsequent business interests proved to be quite successful. It is my theory that Hatley must have pried a gem or two off the throne before hiding it away. Ample enough to set him up in business, but certainly not an amount that would account for all the vast riches of the throne. Therefore the throne must remain safely stashed somewhere along the coast of Africa.”
“Pray tell, Mycroft, what is your present interest in the matter?” inquired Holmes. “Surely you do not care about its intrinsic value?”
“What would it be worth?” I wondered aloud.
Mycroft waved his corpulent hand. “Inestimable, Doctor. Need I remind you that the magnificent Koh-i-Noor Diamond, which now resides in the Queen’s brooch, was once but an eye of one of the twelve peacock statues? But its symbolic value is even greater. The Peacock Throne may be lost, but I assure you that it is not forgotten for the followers of the Mughals. Its reappearance would stir up some strong emotions in the colony.” He turned to his brother. “As you may know, Sherlock, if you could be bothered to read anything other than the agony pages, India is still recovering from a major famine. It would be a very poor moment to introduce such an element of chaos. I think it would not be hyperbole to say that we don’t wish a tragic repeat of the Great Mutiny of recent memory.”
Holmes’s eyebrows rose. “You fear that the recovery of the throne could incite another rebellion?”
“I do indeed. Need I remind you of how many lives were lost in the first one? One-hundred-twenty woman and children at Cawnpore alone, Sherlock.”[5]
“So you have been watching Mr. Hatley all of this time?”
Mycroft shook his head. “Not actively, of course, brother. Our resources are not so vast. But his name is on a particular list of persons of interest. I heard from one of my sources this morning that he was inquiring after your services, Sherlock. Naturally, I wondered if he was suddenly short of money and setting out upon a treasure quest, aided by a particular consulting detective of some repute, thanks in no small part to his chronicler.”
Holmes smiled sardonically. “The home of Mr. Hatley was burgled last night.”
“Ah!” Mycroft’s eyes widened with interest. “So there is another party in the game. I can only assume that something was removed that points to the hidden location of the Peacock Throne?”
“Perhaps,” Holmes replied. “And you wish me to stop the thief before he can locate it?”
“This is not simply a request from your brother, Sherlock. You may consider it a task from the Government itself. If you succeed in retrieving the Throne, quietly I may add, I think it likely that a knighthood would be in order.”
I was astonished at this munificent offer, and doubly so when Holmes dismissively waved his hand at the mention of such an honor. He nodded curtly at his brother and took his leave.
When we exited the Diogenes Club, Holmes threw back his head and laughed. “Here’s a pretty problem, eh, Watson? It should teach you a valuable lesson that even the most trivial-appearing case may contain items of the most profound interest. In this instance, a simple robbery evolves into a matter of national importance.”
“I stand corrected, Holmes. What is our next action?”
“If we are to arrest Mr. Lewis, it would be of considerable assistance if we were able to anticipate his next action. We must presume he is attempting to solve the map at this very moment. We must endeavor to do the same.” He considered this for a moment and then pulled the strange diagram from his coat pocket. “Now then, Watson, what does this chart tell us?”
“Presumably, Hatley and his fellows buried the throne near the coast, and this is a map to the spot. Over the years, however, Hatley’s descendants have forgotten how to interpret it.”
“I concur with your analysis so far, Watson. Pray continue.”
I studied the map for a minute. “The circle upon the right must give the compass bearings. The larger semicircle may be the curved edge of a reef or a rock. The figures above are the indications of how to reach the ‘X’ which marks the treasure. Possibly they may give the bearing as one-hundred-eighty-six feet from the ‘4’ upon the semicircle?”
“And the three marks on the left-hand side? What do they tell us?”
I shook my head. “I cannot say. They are a mystery to me. Do you have a theory?”
>
“As a matter of fact, I do, Watson. Recall that this chart was drawn by Lieutenant Hatley. He was a former officer in the Royal Navy. And how do naval ships communicate with one another when out of range of earshot?”
“By semaphore!”
“Very good, Watson. The semaphore was no crude system, but rather could communicate the most profound messages. ‘England expects that every man shall do his duty’, and all that. This system was also a primitive version of a secret code, so that pirates and foreign ships could not interpret the signals. Now, I put to you that, if the Indiaman’s semaphore code was changed every year for the sake of privacy, it may be conjectured that the marks upon this chart are signals from a long-forgotten three-armed semaphore.”
“Holmes, the record of their meaning might be found in the old papers of the India Office!”
“Precisely, Watson. That is where we must begin our search.”
The Foreign Office building was fortuitously situated very near to Mycroft’s club along the Horse Guards Road. A quick walk brought us to the front of that Italianate-style palace, its rich decorations designed to impress foreign visitors to this “drawing room” of the Empire. We strode across the marble pavement of the open courtyard, surrounded by three stories of red and grey columns and arch-supporting piers. Entering the Records Room via a gilded door stamped with the crest of a rampant lion within a medallion, we found ourselves confronted by what appeared to be many miles of shelving. We explained the nature of our quest to the old man, stooped and wizened, in charge of the records. It took him the better part an hour to finally locate the folio-sized tome that held the codes to the East Indiamen of the 1780’s. The ultramarine-dyed leather cover was ornamented with gold-leaf, a sign of the ostentatious wealth brought back by the Company from the Far East. From an inspection of the layer of dust coating the gilded top of its pages, it appeared that we were a step ahead of Mr. Lewis, for it was plain that no one had consulted this volume for at least a decade.
Holmes set the tone down upon the desk and carefully turned the pages, his keen grey eyes seeking symbols that matched the ones upon our chart. “Here, we have one, Watson!” he cried. “The middle symbol, between the ‘B’ and the ‘W’ is the number ‘one’. And the first symbol, the one between the ‘N’ and ‘S’ is the number ‘two’. Only the final symbol remains!” He turned another page and his thin, nervous fingers twitched with excitement. “Here we have it, Watson. The final symbol is the letter ‘H’. Now what does that tell us?”
While Holmes was calling out the answers, I was scrawling them upon a sheet of loose foolscap, and I now stared at the still incomprehensible message: “Two, One, H,” I said. “It is meaningless, Holmes!”
“On the contrary, Watson,” said Holmes. “Do not forget that we are not meant to read solely the semaphore’s symbols, but rather as part of the larger message.”
I wrote out the other letters onto my paper. “N, B, G, Two, One, H, S, W, K. It still tells me nothing,” I protested.
From the twitching of his bushy eyebrows, I could tell that Holmes too was dissatisfied and a bit cross that the meaning of the chart remained an enigma. He clasped his hands behind his back and began to silently pace back and forth along the floor. “I am the dullest man alive, Watson!” he suddenly exclaimed, whipping his magnifying lens from his pocket. He closely inspected the map for a moment before looking up with a smile.
“You have broken the code?” I asked, eagerly.
“I believe so. I first recommend that you free your mind from the traditional method of reading left to right, Watson, and consider that the message may instead be vertical in nature, like flags upon a mast.”
“N, Two, S?”
“Indeed. Now, where have we seen the ‘N’ and ‘S’ before, Watson?”
“Above and below the circle at the right of the chart.”
“Very good. And what do we find upon the vast ocean that is - upon occasion - vaguely circular in shape?”
“An island?”
“Precisely. And what if that island was roughly two miles in diameter along the north - south dimension. Would that not help serve to identify it?”
“It would indeed!” I exclaimed. “However, there must be more than one island in the Indian Ocean that fits such a bill, Holmes. It could take a very long time to search them all.”
“But that is not the sole clue, is it, Watson?”
“No, there is the mysterious ‘B, One, W’. Do you know what that could mean?”
He smiled. “I admit that this took me a moment, Watson. And then I realized that we were making a simple mistake. For this paper is over a hundred years old and the iron gall ink has bled somewhat.” He held forth his magnifying glass. “Perhaps you would care to look at it for yourself? I would counsel that you do so without any preconceived notions of what you might find.”
I took the glass from him and bent over the chart, unsure of his meaning. I examined the ‘B’, the ‘W’, and the semaphore symbol carefully. And then I saw it. “It’s not a ‘B’!” I cried.
“Capital, Watson, you have outdone yourself! The supposed ‘B’ is, in fact, a sloppily written ‘E’ whose ink has bled to the point where it now more closely resembles an entirely different letter. But when the ‘E’ is restored, in conjunction with the first three symbols, the meaning becomes clear.”
“The island is one mile in diameter in the east - west dimension!”
“And the number of possible locations grows exponentially smaller,” concluded Holmes with a smile.
“But what of the last three letters, Holmes? What could ‘G - H - K’ possibly mean?”
He shook his head. “I do not know at the moment, Watson. Nevertheless, I suspect it eventually will help us narrow down the list to an even more precise locale. I suggest that, at this moment, we are missing a critical item to help us come to a definitive conclusion. We are in need of a good map.”
A fifteen-minute hansom cab ride along the Strand and up Kingsway, pausing only long enough for Holmes to spring out and dash off a telegram, found us striding into the Reading Room at the British Library. We were met by Mr. Horace Oliver, a short, kindly gentleman who, by their familiar greetings, had apparently assisted Holmes upon at least one prior occasion.
“We are in need, Mr. Oliver, of a detailed map of the southern Indian Ocean.”
“I have just the thing, Mr. Holmes,” said Oliver, chuckling softly. “Right over here,” he motioned, starting to lead us to the far corner of the room.
But Holmes remained rooted to his spot. “Was there something amusing about my question?”
The man paused to consider this. “No, I suppose not, Mr. Holmes. But I thought it odd that you are the second man today to ask for such a map.”
“What!” Holmes exclaimed. “Can you describe him?”
“Oh, yes,” said the librarian. “He was around five-and-forty years, a bit taller than myself, with dull brown eyes and hair. He had no beard or moustache, nor any other marks of note. Of course, I can do you one better. I can give you his name. He signed the reader’s registrar as a Mr. Randall Martin.”
Holmes’s eyes grew bright when he heard this description, which clearly matched that of the supposed Barney Lewis. He threw a pointed glance in my direction before asking his next question. “And you say that he asked for a map?”
Mr. Oliver nodded. “Yes, he asked for several maps, but the one that he stared at the longest was the Royal Scottish Geographical Society’s 1885 sketch map of South Africa showing British possessions.”
“May we see it?” asked Holmes, an eagerness to his voice which I recognized from when he was hot with the thrill of the chase. Mr. Oliver scurried off to procure this request, and he promptly returned with the item in question. Holmes took the large map and with the help of some pins, he affixed it to the wall, as I
had seen him do a hundred times at our flat with other case-related documents. He lit his black clay pipe and together we stared at it silently for several minutes.
“I don’t see it, Holmes.”
Suddenly he began to laugh, his braying evoking a sense of lunacy. “I say, Watson, you might have to examine me for a softening of the brain. For I almost failed to see the light of truth in this matter.”
“Which is?”
“We are looking for something with the initials ‘G - H - K’ are we not? But what if those words are not in English?”
“What other language would they be in?”
“You are much better versed in history than I, Watson. Pray tell, in the year 1782, to whom did the tip of Africa belong?”
I considered this for a moment. “The Cape Colony would have been under the governance of the Dutch East India Company.”
“Precisely. And thus, could the letters represent a Dutch name?”
“Such as?”
“Such as the Goede Hoop Kaap. Or, as we would call it, the Cape of Good Hope.”
“Of course!” I exclaimed. “I will ask Mr. Oliver for a map of the Cape.” I hurried over to the man’s desk, and within minutes, he had secured what we needed. Here is a reproduction of that map:
Holmes studied it for a moment, his eyes sparkling with pleasure. “This case grows upon me, Watson. There are decidedly some points of interest. Here we have several geographical features which I want to commend to you in relation to Mr. Hatley’s curious chart. First, there is the semi-circle in the lower right corner. What does that suggest to you?”
“It has a similarity to the curved edge of the False Bay!” said I, excitedly.
“Precisely, Watson. So, we have now deciphered the meaning of the semaphores and their letters, as well as the semicircle. But several items remain.”