The Great Game

by Michael Kurland

  "Of course. Excuse my lack of hospitality." The prince waved Moriarty and Madeleine over to a divan that stretched across a corner of the room and settled himself in a high-backed wooden chair against the wall. He turned to one of the guards by the door. "A bottle of the St. Joseph Goldwasser and some glasses—see to it, Karl."

  The big man nodded and disappeared into the hall. In a second he was back, obviously having passed the message along to a servitor. A guard's job, after all, is to guard.

  "A light, fruity, white wine, locally produced," the prince said when the bottle and glasses appeared so quickly that they must have been waiting outside the door. "It seems suitable for the moment. Now—"

  With occasional interruptions for sipping the wine, Moriarty told the prince and princess the entire story of why he had come to Vienna, and what he knew of the Barnett's ordeal, leaving out only the identity of "Paul's" father, which he was sworn not to reveal. He was not interrupted.

  When he had completed the narrative he leaned back on the sofa and stared fixedly at the prince.

  Ariste returned the stare for a moment, and then shook his head. "Amazing!" he said. He turned to Madeleine. "And you, Lady Madeleine, do you verify this?"

  Madeleine nodded. "The parts of it I know first-hand have been accurately recounted. As for the rest, I've worked with the professor before, and he's a square shooter. I've met Paul in prison, and he is an Englishman, and he has, as far as I can tell, been framed. But as to why—that's beyond me."

  "So," the prince said, turning to Moriarty, "you have come here to aid an English spy, and you expect me to help you."

  "No, Your Highness. I do not expect you to help me in freeing Paul. That is my concern. But Benjamin and Cecily Barnett are not involved in any sort of espionage, and you might feel that you owe them something. So I have come to you to give you a chance to repay that debt."

  "And why do you not go to the police?"

  "Because they are ill-equipped to deal with such a thing. An aristocrat kidnaping a foreign couple? Who would believe it? They would go to the door of the castle and ask politely whether the Barnetts were there. Graf von Linsz would say no. They would thank him, tip their hats, and go away. Because further, until I have proof otherwise, I believe the local police to be agents of this graf."

  Prince Ariste turned to his wife, who was staring wide-eyed at Moriarty. "What do you think, my dear?"

  "I think that Mr. Barnett and his dear wife have been kidnaped, and we must do something to help them!"

  "We must? Of course we must!" Ariste turned back to Moriarty. "Is that the only reason you're here? You want our help?"

  "I believe we can probably help each other," Moriarty told him. "And I'm afraid it will take both of us to help the Barnetts."

  The prince stared at a picture on the wall across the room for a while. A mountain landscape, it powerfully evoked the brooding stillness before a coming storm. One could almost feel the increasing wind as the dark clouds skittered across the sky. "Why do you suppose the Barnetts were kidnaped?" he asked. "What could anyone want from them? They have little money."

  "Perhaps, my dear, this is related to the attack on you at the Villa Endorra," Princess Diane suggested.

  "I did not want to think that," Ariste replied. "The idea that, by saving my life, Barnett has put his own in danger is repugnant to me."

  "That may not be the explanation," Moriarty offered.

  "Then you think the two events are unrelated?"

  "No, I believe that they are definitely related, but not as cause and effect. I believe that we have two strands of a larger tapestry that have come together in this way, at this time."

  Prince Ariste stood up. "I wish to hear your ideas," he said, "and I fancy we'll be speaking for some time. So I suggest that we adjourn this discussion for a couple of hours. I am hot and sweaty, and need to wash and change clothes after our gallop, and I'm sure that my wife feels the same. And we should give you a chance to freshen up after your journey." He pulled a pocket watch from an inner pocket of his jacket. "It's almost three o'clock. I'll have a valet take you to rooms, where you can refresh yourselves."

  Princess Diane nodded. "And a lady's maid," she said to Madeleine. "We'll have Bentley send a maid up to your room to assist you."

  "Bentley?" Moriarty raised his eyebrow.

  "The chief steward," Prince Ariste explained. "He's English. English butlers are the best, or so they say."

  "Do they?" Moriarty asked. "How curious."

  "We'll meet again at five in the map room," the prince said. "I'll send someone to show you the way. It's not horribly difficult to get lost in here. I still do myself, sometimes."

  The prince nodded and Karl disappeared through a door. Shortly a large, stalwart young man in yellow velvet knee breeches and a red velvet coat appeared to show Moriarty and Madeleine to their rooms.

  Moriarty was deposited in a small but well-appointed bedroom and Madeleine was taken one door further down the long hall. A minute later there was a knock at Moriarty's door and two maids entered; one carrying his traveling bag and owl-headed stick, which she placed by the bed, and the other bearing a basin and a pitcher of hot water, which she put on the dresser. "If there's anything you require, sir," the basin-carrying maid said, "the bell pull is to the right of the bed." And they left.

  Moriarty hung up his jacket and pulled his shirt off. He washed the grime of travel off his face and hands, and then lay down on the bed and closed his eyes. He had always been able to fall instantly to sleep, and to wake up just as rapidly. It was an ability that had proved useful on more than one occasion.

  Two hours later a man in the black uniform of the prince's guards showed Moriarty and a refreshed and glowing Madeleine through the maze of corridors to the map room. "You look different somehow," Moriarty commented to Madeleine in an undertone as they followed their guide. "You've changed your dress."

  "It's a new dress," Madeleine told him, "sent down by the princess. Bella, the maid, did my hair and helped me touch up my makeup. It was wonderful! I now aspire to having a lady's maid of my very own."

  "A worthy goal," Moriarty agreed.

  "Now that they've had a chance to think over what you told them, do you suppose they're going to help us, or have us arrested?" Madeleine asked softly.

  Moriarty smiled a grim smile. "We'll know in a few moments," he told her.

  The map room was a large room on the second floor with windows overlooking a closed courtyard. It held several dozen massive cabinets full of, presumably, maps. An oversized table surrounded by chairs filled the middle of the room, perfect for spreading the maps out and studying them. "My great grandfather was a field marshal in the war against Napoleon," Prince Ariste explained. "He developed a great fondness for maps."

  "I, myself, have always been fascinated by them," Moriarty admitted.

  "Feel free to peruse the ones in these cabinets when you have the time," Ariste offered. "There are a set of French military maps here that were captured during the Italian Campaign, and we've always fancied that the writing scribbled all over them is in Napoleon's hand. Perhaps the secrets of his military genius are right there in that cabinet, if only someone could read his handwriting."

  "A pleasant conceit," Moriarty offered. "But I fancy that his genius lay not so much in what he did, as in the way he did it. And that is probably not written down."

  "Please sit down everyone," Princess Diane said, seating herself at the far end of the table. "We have excluded the servants and guards from this meeting, as you seem concerned about what they might overhear. There are refreshments on the sideboard under the window. I am anxious to hear about poor Benjamin and Cecily."

  "I'm afraid that their abduction is more my responsibility than yours," Moriarty said, lowering himself into one of the chairs and laying his owl-headed stick along the table top in front of him. "What the Barnett's captors seem most interested in is my whereabouts and my intentions. Since they have knowledge of neither, I
'm very much afraid that the only reason they're being kept alive is to use in negotiating with me, should our antagonists manage to locate me."

  "How could you know that?" Prince Ariste asked.

  "Every night Mummer Tolliver climbs the castle wall and perches outside the barred window to the room in which the Barnetts are being held. They exchange information."

  "Isn't that very dangerous?" Princess Diane asked.

  "Yes," Moriarty replied, "it is."

  "What do these scoundrels want with you?" Prince Ariste asked.

  "They seem to have the notion that I am the mastermind of a vast criminal conspiracy that has connections and branches all over Europe. At the same time they alternate that with the curious notion that I am the head of the British Secret Service, with espionage agents in every chancery ready to steal the plans of whatever-you-fancy and thwart the machinations of whoever these people are."

  "How can they think that?" Princess Diane asked. "Are you either of those things?"

  "I assure you, Your Highness, that I am not. And, at any rate, I could scarcely be both, even if I were one or the other."

  "Then how could they get that idea?" Ariste asked.

  "I can tell you that," Madeleine interjected. "Sherlock Holmes."

  "The consulting detective?" Prince Ariste frowned. "I have heard of him. What about him?"

  Moriarty was silent, perhaps gathering his thoughts. "Well," Madeleine said, stepping into the breach, "Mr. Holmes seems to have concluded some time ago that the professor is some sort of master criminal, and he tells this to anyone who will listen to him, and then swears them to secrecy so he can't be sued for slander."

  "Is this so?" Ariste asked Moriarty.

  The professor nodded. "Lady Madeleine exaggerates slightly, but only slightly, I'm afraid."

  "And thus badly distorted stories of the doings of Professor Moriarty have become—what can I say?—legend, perhaps, throughout Britain and have slowly spread across Europe," Madeleine continued.

  Princess Diane smiled at Madeleine. "You are a strong advocate for your friend," she said.

  "He has been more than good to me," Madeleine told her. "He has shown me, and forced me to believe, that I could be—more than I was."

  Princess Diane nodded slowly. "I see," she said.

  "And these stories told about you have no truth to them?" Prince Ariste asked Moriarty.

  The professor paused, considering what to say. "I cannot say that I have always obeyed the laws or scrupulously followed the mores of my little island," he said, "but I have no gang, and I most assuredly do not head the British Secret Service. Or, for that matter, any other secret service."

  "Then how do you account for Mr. Holmes's accusations?"

  "It is an obsession with him," Moriarty said. "Holmes cannot stand being wrong or, for that matter, being puzzled for long. When he is faced with a crime he cannot solve, he turns to his amanuensis Dr. Watson and exclaims, 'Aha! This is the work of that evil genius, Professor Moriarty. And occasionally he comes over to my house and accuses me of this or that. I believe he has developed what your Dr. Freud calls an 'idée fixe.' " Moriarty sighed. "I had the misfortune, you see, to know him as a youth."

  "The poor man!" Princess Diane said.

  "Indeed," Moriarty agreed.

  "I believe I can understand the conflating of master criminal with master spy in the minds of those who believe the, ah, myth," Prince Ariste said. "After all, a spy is generally regarded as the lowest sort of criminal, a man who would betray his country."

  "And yet spies who are working for their own country, living in a foreign land, speaking a language not their own, are as brave as any soldiers on the battlefield. If they are caught they face an ignominious death," Moriarty remarked. "Curiously, they receive little credit, even from their own side. Napoleon's master spy, Karl Schulmeister, devised the capture of an entire Austrian army. And yet Napoleon refused to allow Schulmeister any military honors. The only thing a spy deserves is pay,' Napoleon reputedly told him, 'not honor.' "

  "And is it honor this young man, Paul, was seeking?" Prince Ariste asked. "If so, he sought it in a strange place."

  Moriarty shook his head. "The young man calling himself Paul Donzhof requires neither money nor honor," he said. "He is one of a number of men who are trying to keep Britain informed of European and Asian affairs despite the British government's apparent lack of interest. They call their enterprise 'the Great Game,' and finance their own travels."

  " 'The Great Game,' " Prince Ariste said. "The English make a game out of everything. They are very sporting."

  "The English upper classes believe that the talented amateur is better than the professional," Moriarty said. "Morally, if not physically. But then they have no need to make a living."

  "You sound like a socialist," Princess Diane said, looking at him curiously.

  Madeleine laughed. "My friend here is disdainful of almost everybody," she said. "He believes that the human race is full of fools and scoundrels."

  Moriarty waved a dismissive hand through the air. "Let me say rather that I have noticed that my fellow men are mostly fools, with a smattering of scoundrels, and I feel free to comment on it."

  "Well!" Princess Diane said. "I hope you exclude us from that listing."

  "Oh, I do," Moriarty assured her. "From what I have heard of you from the mummer, I have respect for both your intelligence and your intentions."

  "And would you tell is if you didn't?" Prince Ariste asked.

  "Actually, he would," Madeleine assured him. "The professor has managed to directly insult a duchess, a marquis, and at least one member of the British royal family, to my knowledge."

  Moriarty grimaced. "Have we not something to discuss of more immediate importance than my character?" he asked.

  "That is so. Tell me, how do you propose we go about freeing the Barnetts?" Prince Ariste asked.

  "That shouldn't prove too difficult, if you can supply a few trustworthy men," Moriarty said. "But I'm afraid that's only part of the job."

  "There is more? What else?"

  "We have a riddle to solve." Moriarty said. Then he shook his head. "That is, I do. I should not, and I will not, ask you to do anything beyond helping me rescue our mutual friends."

  Princess Diane leaned forward, her eyes bright. "Tell us," she said. "What is the riddle?"

  Moriarty screwed his monocle into his eyes and looked at her sternly. "I should not have brought it up," he said. "My problem is frustrating and dangerous, and I should not involve you."

  "Is it related to the Barnetts' abduction?"

  "Almost certainly, but not directly."

  "Ah!" the prince said. "Then please tell us the riddle, and let us judge how deeply we should involve ourselves in your problem."

  "Very good, Your Highness; as you say," Moriarty said. "The riddle is composed of these items." He closed his eyes and recited:

  "One, twenty-four and twenty-five April;

  "two, that Wednesday;

  "three, unknown;

  "four, England, France, Germany, and Russia;

  "five, unknown;

  "six, third and fourth out of six;

  "seven, yes."

  Prince Ariste got up and went to the far wall, where there was a large blackboard. "Recite that again, would you?" he asked. Moriarty did, and the prince wrote the list down on the board. Then he stood back and stared at it. "A riddle indeed," he said. "What does it mean? Wait—that's the wrong question. Where does it come from and how does it relate to our current problem, is what I meant to say."

  "One night at the opera Paul Donzhof was handed a slip of paper by mistake by a minor official of the Foreign Ministry. He told Lady Madeleine about it when she went to see him in prison, posing as his sister. We went to retrieve it from his apartment. It was where he had left it, cleverly concealed by being folded into an envelope and filled with postage stamps. That—" Moriarty pointed to the list on the blackboard, "is how it read."

&nbs
p; "Why do you think it's important?" Prince Ariste asked.

  "Donzhof paid five hundred kronen for the paper. That is, he handed the man five hundred kronen in an attempt to enlist him as a source of information. The man must have expected someone he didn't know to hand him money in exchange for the paper, so he handed Paul the paper. He complained to Paul that he had expected a thousand kronen."

  "So it was worth a thousand kronen to someone," Prince Ariste said. "There are all sorts of reasons that might be so."

  "I went to find the man from whom Paul had received it to ask him what it meant and whom he was expecting. His name was Hermann Loge. He was in the planning department of the Foreign Ministry. I was too late, he was dead. He had been murdered in his bedroom the week before. His throat had been slit while he slept. Nothing was stolen. He and his wife slept apart, and she claimed she had heard nothing. The two maids slept in the basement. The police are operating on the theory that either his wife or one of his two mistresses must have done it, and as of when I found this out they were still trying to discover which so they knew who to arrest."