A click as he pressed a button in the handle and a tranquilliser dart embedded itself in the chest of the hero, like a darning needle that misses its tangent, a rose thorn turned inwards into its own stem. The Bone collapsed, a ripped sack of flesh and adulterated blood.
“Help me lift him. Clear a space there! Now fetch the dog too. I am serious. It will take at least three or four of you.”
Moriarty lay out the unconscious Bone almost tenderly on the surface of the table and applied scissors to the lopsided mask, cutting it off, setting at liberty a young troubled expression, the visage of a vigilante with more enthusiasm than strength, more strength than sense, more sense than luck. A few more snips and the face was fully free.
“Hurry with the hound! Every second counts.”
His medical bag was open beside him, the array of instruments within the voluminous leather depths twinkling and gleaming like icicles in a cave. He selected the ones he required with due care, almost lovingly. Meanwhile, a quartet of the bespectacled professors struggled with the cooling burden near the damaged door, grumbling loudly as they attempted to drag it across the varnished floor. Relying on its own dripping ichor to grease the way, they were uncoordinated and inefficient.
“You are pulling the head while I pull the tail! Push the head or there will be no progress whatsoever tonight—”
“Pah! There is progress every second of every minute of every hour somewhere in the world. A chemical reaction here, a hypothesis there, the discovery of a distant star or new particle.”
Arguing and wheezing, they finally manhandled the beast to the side of Moriarty, but they were quite unable to elevate it on to the table next to the prone Bone. “No matter, gentlemen. What you have achieved will suffice. I bid you sit and recuperate your energies.”
They rested, heads in hands, until the satisfied murmuring of Moriarty proved too much of a temptation; and then they looked. Men who had sawn off the heads of birds for transplantation on to the necks of toads flinched in distaste, recoiled and even grimaced.
“You are blinding him. This it barbaric indeed!”
“No, my friends, I am performing an operation of extreme delicacy, a procedure that is far more of an art than a routine at the present moment and may remain so indefinitely. The eyes of the dog for the eyes of the man. An unprecedented exchange!”
“The purpose of this surgery?”
“It is, I hope, the method by which I will make time travel possible. It is likely that all will be made clear soon.”
Two bodies with craters in their faces now troubled the chamber. The violator of human geometry wiped his hands quickly on a towel and returned to work. The eyes of the living man were cast negligently on to the table like peeled eggs, allowed to roll randomly.
The dead dog’s eyes, in contrast, were treated with devotion, gently inserted into the gaping sockets of the patient and meticulously positioned. Moriarty even swallowed dryly during the task, not flustered but pushed to the limit of his abilities. Yet he was pleased.
“I am confident of success, gentlemen! Let us see!”
They winced at his last word.
He dipped into his bag for a flask of fluid, dampened a cloth with its contents, pressed the cloth hard over the mouth and nose of the Bone; and the shoreline susurrations of his lungs ceased.
The body jerked, kicked out, the heel of a boot catching Moriarty on his left hip quite by accident, without force.
“The antidote to the tranquilliser,” he confirmed.
The Bone sat up, bending at the waist like an open book that wants to shut itself, to hide its words from reviewers.
Moriarty adroitly stood aside, moved far back.
The Bone contracted unusual muscles, propelled himself off the table on to his feet, tottered but did not tumble.
Then he blinked and reached out, gropingly, in awe.
“What is happening? You must tell us!”
Moriarty laughed out of the shadows. “The eyes of a dog are different from those of a man. A dog can only see in black and white. What does this mean? That dogs live permanently in a monochrome world, the same world depicted in old movies and newsreels!”
“We fail to comprehend—”
“The same world, gentlemen, shown nightly on cinema screens before the advent of colour films.”
“The significance of this is beyond our—”
“Have you never wondered what a dog is doing when it interacts with things that are seemingly not there? You tell yourself it is mapping the world with its olfactory sense, sniffing traces of the intangible, and surely that is partly the case. But it is not the whole story.”
Moriarty modulated his voice, projecting it in such a way that it was an echo without a source, confusing the Bone, who listened furiously but was unable to locate it. He added, “A dog can see into the past, into the old times, into the black-and-white world, into the era when motion pictures had just begun. That is real time travel!”
“You arranged all this for what purpose?”
“You are mostly elderly men. The modified hero before you can see into the days of your youth. Back then, you lacked the wisdom, experience, resources and tenacity you have now. You are all survivors, more durable than you like to pretend. Even I could not be certain of defeating you all on my own. You have learned many things over the long decades and those lessons have become conditioned reflexes.
“But remember, my friends, that when you were callow youths you had not yet honed your survival skills. You had weaknesses, your defences were relatively frail, you were not yet survivors because you had not lived enough years or endured sufficient experiences to claim that distinction. So your younger selves are easier to thwart than the tough shrivelled editions you have become. The Bone sees you as you once were.
“And thus he can perceive your weak spots, the glaring chinks in your armour, and take advantage of them. He can destroy you with little trouble by concentrating on those weaknesses, targeting them, for now he exists in two worlds simultaneously, the present and the past. Gentlemen, I must say farewell. I will be leaving your city tonight.”
The Bone had crouched, as if compressing the helix of his soul, and now he suddenly uncoiled and hurled himself about the chamber; and the bodies of broken experts and geniuses bounced off the walls, were flung like rolled-up rugs into corners, while one man watched the carnage with perfect equanimity, not even twirling his cane.
And the unexpected defences of the victims were of no avail to them, but they interested Moriarty. Hidden pistols and concealed knives, phials of acid and hollow teeth containing poison gas. Each defence was a product of the nature of the man they were supposed to protect, a question of his taste, and the Bone could foresee what they would be, whereas Moriarty could not. It was educational and edifying for him.
Not quite ten minutes passed. The screams ceased.
The Bone had finished. He was tired but not exhausted. He turned to confront the master, scanning his bulging and borrowed eyes up and down the entire length of the nonchalant figure. Then his body relaxed, the strips of his torn costume hanging more limply than ever.
“I perceive that in your youth you were no less formidable than you are now. Discretion is still the better part of valour and so I have no intention of engaging with you. I have done enough.”
“As I expected,” said Moriarty.
“Just tell me why? Why did you betray those who wanted to work with you? Who wished to aid your crimes?”
Moriarty was affable but also philosophical. He smiled thinly, rubbed his chin and said, “In a place where there are so many heroes, more than all the jails can hold, the villains will necessarily be superior to those that are encountered elsewhere. In cities where the criminals are in the majority, the outnumbered heroes evolve into mighty beings. Here the opposite is true. I did not want competition I could not deal with. Villains here were improving all the time and would continue to improve until my own privileged position and status were unde
r genuine threat.”
The Bone bowed and clicked his heels and hastened out of the room with the panache of an incontinent ghost.
Moriarty packed away his surgical instruments, tucked his cane under his arm, strolled unhurriedly out of the building.
The night was full of people.
The cinemas were emptying. Posters for the latest colour films, some of them torn, rippled their garish spectra at him. But he walked past. Not far was the train station, a place where the platform, rails, guards, locomotives, soot and unbearable partings were still in black and white, anachronistic, a not yet erased segment of a panoramic past.
He secured a carriage to himself. The train crossed a bridge almost at the top of the city and he was able to peer down.
All was well in Chaud-Mellé.
The Fifth Browning
Jürgen Ehlers
By chance I heard that a Mammoth Book of Adventures of Moriarty was being planned, and so I asked the editor whether I could contribute a few clarifying words about my dear grandfather, Professor James Moriarty. Not enough is widely known about his work.
My grandfather was not a criminal in the true sense of the word. No lesser man than Sherlock Holmes himself once said to Dr Watson: “In calling Moriarty a criminal you are uttering libel!” I will however not deny that my grandfather sometimes did things that could be seen as unlawful in a different context. He always kept an eye on the greater good. Or at least his own good. But don’t we all? The end justifies the means.
James Moriarty kept a detailed diary until shortly before his death. My account is based on this diary. In my report, I would also like to answer a few questions that those learned men researching Sherlock Holmes have thus far not been able to answer satisfactorily. These are:
1.The detailed circumstances of the meeting between Sherlock Holmes and my grandfather in Meiringen in May 1891,
2.The events that took place in spring 1904, which led Sherlock Holmes to retire from public life for an extended period and
3.The crisis of the summer of 1914, when Sherlock Holmes tried one last time to sabotage my grandfather’s work.
These events are inextricably linked. In my grandfather’s diary, they can be found under the heading of “The Case of the Five Brownings”.
Meiringen, May 1891
When in spring 1891 I had Sherlock Holmes know that I would like to meet him, the great detective initially hesitated. His opinion of me was not great, and he suspected that I would, one way or another, double-cross him. His fear, however, was wholly unfounded. I am always honest if the circumstances allow it. In order to exercise discretion, I suggested a meeting abroad. Meiringen in Switzerland seemed suitable. This small town of three thousand citizens in the Bernese Oberland region is so insignificant that nobody would ever guess that decisions of world historic importance could be made here. No reporters would stray here. Meiringen had a train station, which simplified getting there.
We arrived separately. Holmes had difficulties getting rid of his loyal friend and companion Dr Watson, so he arrived two days after our agreed date at the Hotel du Sauvage on Bahnhofsstraße in Meiringen.
“What a lovely spring day,” said Holmes when he joined me at my table on the terrace. “May I?”
“Please. A lovely spring, yes, but there are dark clouds on the horizon.”
“Politically?” Holmes of course knew that as political adviser to the British government I was up to date on all current crises. “The Mahdi Uprising?”
I shook my head. The revolt in the Sudan was indeed dominating the headlines – Muslim fanatics had not only beaten the British troops but also invaded Ethiopia and killed the emperor – but that was unimportant.
“It’s not about Africa,” I said. “It’s about Europe.” I told Holmes what had happened. Kaiser Wilhelm II had been on the throne for three years now. He had sacked Bismarck and terminated the Reinsurance Treaty with Russia. This meant that the stable foreign policy of the German Reich was at an end.
“I know nothing about that,” said Holmes.
He couldn’t have known anything about it, as the Reinsurance Treaty was a secret treaty. Counter-measures were urgently necessary. Holmes said that that was my job as military adviser. I replied that my influence merely stretched to military-technical topics. And that in situations such as this, politicians also needed to be involved. My idea was to establish the necessary contacts via Holmes’s brother Mycroft.
“So, you are thinking of reshuffling the War Office? And who should, in your opinion, get the top job?”
“Not Lansdowne in any case,” I said. “We need to arm ourselves. And we need politicians who will see to that. Your chronicler, this Dr Doyle from Edinburgh, has repeatedly said that England should invest more in arms, and I agree.”
Holmes smiled. Of course he knew that I had invested my considerable fortune into the arms industry.
“You surely won’t begrudge me my enthusiasm, will you?” I said.
“Money is unimportant,” he said. “But arms deals are always criminal. And I don’t like to work with criminals. Do you know Basil Zaharoff?”
I nodded. I had hoped that Holmes would not touch upon this topic. But he was, as ever, too well informed.
“Who is this mysterious man? There is not a single photograph of him. Sometimes I ask myself whether he actually exists.”
“He exists, Mr Holmes. He exists, and he sells weapons. And successfully so, I might add. The first functioning submarine that the Turkish Navy bought …”
“Yes, and people say he has screwed over Maxim, the inventor of the machine gun. Screwed him over good and proper.”
Yes, that was true. “We bought him,” I said.
“People say Zaharoff is responsible for Maxim’s financial difficulties. They say sabotage …”
“Rumours,” I claimed.
“Sometimes, I get the impression, Moriarty, that you are this mysterious man.”
“If this were the case, our country should count itself lucky. Zaharoff has guided us to some of the most powerful weapons currently under development.”
“The submarine? The Nordenfelt-U-boat that Zaharoff sold to the Turks and Greeks?”
I nodded.
“So, you think Great Britain also needs such a submarine?”
“One? We need fifty U-boats!”
“Fifty? Do you know how much that costs? Thus far, the Bruce-Partington Plan is nothing but a plan, isn’t it? And if we buy the submarines from Nordenfelt in Sweden …”
I tried my best not to show my surprise. Bruce-Partington! The construction plans for the submarine were top secret. Obviously Mycroft had got wind of the matter and told his brother all about it. But, in any case, it was out of the question to buy the submarines in Sweden.
“We’ll go about it differently,” I said. “We will buy Nordenfelt.”
“We?”
“Vickers in Sheffield. Talk to your brother Mycroft about it. Convince him. I have already spoken to Tom Vickers. He thinks it’s a great idea. And while you negotiate with the politicians, I will keep the competition at bay.”
It took me some time to eliminate Holmes’s qualms. In order to concentrate all our efforts on our joint aim, it was necessary for us to stop all our other pursuits. This would work best if we were both declared dead. So, we spread the rumour that Holmes and I had been killed in deadly tussle.
Watson was – as ever – easy to deceive. He really believed that we had both plunged to our deaths at the Reichenbach Falls, while in reality we had hidden in a rock crevice until the devastated doctor had disappeared. Thus, the British-German arms race began.
Kiel, July 1905
People who, like me, are financially dependent on a neverending effort to keep the country’s defences up, invariably also have to make contact with the other side. The opponent must always remain so strong that further investments in arms on our own side are absolutely necessary.
Sherlock Holmes, with whom I had worked seam
lessly together until this point, did not approve of this method. He was satisfied that in 1904 John Fisher was made First Sea Lord, which entailed a comprehensive reform of the fleet. Finally, the construction of modern battleships and submarines was given full priority. Holmes believed we had reached our goal. He moved to Sussex to devote his life to beekeeping.
I, meanwhile, made contact with Admiral Alfred Von Tirpitz. He was responsible for realising the emperor’s dream of a powerful German fleet. But in 1905, this was but a dream. I met the admiral in a harbour pub in Kiel, and he was pissed as a newt.
“This is the current situation,” he slurred. “This is the situation: Germany has twenty-two battleships. Together, Great Britain and France have eighty. Germany is hopelessly outnumbered by all its potential opponents. The kaiser may dream of a powerful fleet, but he will never get one. Our place in the sun is gone. We need to end the arms race.”
I had feared this much. My German opponent seemed totally defeated. He merely brightened up a little when I bought him another drink. I said: “Don’t lose hope, Herr Admiral! Admittedly, it doesn’t look too good at the moment. But what would you say, Herr Tirpitz, if we simply scrapped our current fleets and started all over?”
“From scratch?” I had aroused his interest. “How could that work?”
“Simple. Next year, we will launch the Dreadnought. A new type of battleship, which is sure to outperform all other vessels. All you can do is scrap the rest.”
“Congratulations.”
“Thank you. It is great to have such a ship. But it is, of course, just a single ship. And no one can keep Germany from building two ships of this type …”
“For that we would, first of all, need the plans.”
“For the right sum of money, that could easily be arranged …”
* * *
Sherlock Holmes was furious. “You have betrayed our country!” he bellowed when I told him about it.
I shook my head. “Mr Holmes, you understand nothing of arms deals. We need a kind of balance of powers. The Germans need to believe that they can catch up. Our shipyards have a much greater capacity than the German ones. And to get a nice advantage right from the start, I have changed the construction plans slightly. The first new German ships will be significantly slower and not armed quite as well as the British Dreadnoughts.”
The Mammoth Book of the Adventures of Professor Moriarty Page 57