Sherlock Holmes and the Houdini Birthright

by Val Andrews

Eventually I said, 'Mr Houdini, I feel that what you have told me is of sufficient importance to at least bring to the attention of my friend. Only he can tell you if he will become involved. Like myself he is of course a man of science but with a mind open enough to consider your problems from every aspect. Whatever his firm beliefs he discounts nothing.'

  I wired Holmes that Houdini and I would visit him at Fowlhaven upon the following afternoon (he had still refused point blank to install a telephone). When I suggested to Houdini that we catch a certain train upon the morrow from Victoria he would have none of it. Despite all my mild protestations we eventually journeyed to Fowlhaven in Houdini's hired Mercedes, complete with uniformed chauffeur.

  The pleasant parlour of Holmes's rural retreat was aged yet functional enough to have withstood, seemingly without protest, twenty years of misuse. Spilled chemicals seemed to have done less damage than had been the case at Baker Street. As we entered the room I noticed at once Holmes collapsed in a wing chair. He was wearing a black alpaca jacket, strong tweed trousers and linen of perfect presentation. His feet were encased in carpet slippers but I was happy to see that their Turkish cousin still hung upon the wall, well filled with dark shag. His appearance was immaculate if casual and the lines around his eyes were of concentration rather than age. The still dark widow's peak of his hairline was just about holding its own. Although lean, he was, it appeared, in good condition for a man of some seventy years. He worked hard on a calabash, producing clouds of acrid blue smoke.

  With the windows closed despite the season, breathing difficulties were caused for both Houdini and the elderly Scots lady who had admitted and announced us. (She was one of a series of housekeepers who came ad ts who cnd went; all forced to answer to the name of Hudson.) He rose and with only a hint of arthritis shook me warmly by the hand. 'My dear Watson, how good it is to see you, it has been months. Mr Houdini, the years have broadened you and I notice that you have become somewhat short sighted.'

  Houdini grinned, 'Do I squint that much?'

  'Not at all but the marks upon your left cheek and below the eyebrow indicate the fairly frequent use of a monocle. Not the kind with the gallery; rather a glass disc with a milled edge.'

  Houdini dangled such an optical aid upon the end of a silk cord. 'I find it more handy than specs, which I can never lay my hands on when I want them. A sign of age I guess.'

  'Oh but still spry enough to do a little dancing, at least at an afternoon function at, I think, the Ritz Hotel.'

  It was the turn of the man who had amazed millions to be astounded. 'Say I don't remember telling either of you that I was staying at the Ritz or that I had been onto the dance floor!'

  The old detective smiled enigmatically, 'The Great Houdini does not reveal his methods. But alas I am just a retired detective who must explain how it is done lest his deductions be disregarded as pointless or sheer guesswork. By the way I note that you are absent-minded and sartori-ally careless.'

  'That's me! But say, how do you know all this stuff?' Holmes threw me the ghost of a wink and said, 'You are wearing patent leather boots, normally reserved for formal affairs. This tells me that you are not only forgetful but careless about your appearance; the traces of blue chalk on the boots indicating a recent excursion onto a dance floor, probably that at the Ritz where that particular blue chalk is employed. The fact that you are absent-minded, well, you have already told me that yourself in explaining that you have difficulty in remembering where you have left your spectacles.'

  The magician was delighted, 'Bess and I were at the Ritz and I got pulled out onto the dance floor, though not to dance, rather to perform a few parlour tricks for the guests.'

  Ah you see Watson, I am losing my touch. I should have realized that a celebrity might venture onto a dance floor other than to waltz or do the polka!'

  'But you are still astonishing Mr Holmes, enough for me to beg for your aid.' Then Harry Houdini told Holmes everything that he had told me, from the death of his mother, through the campaign against fake mediums and he climaxed his narrative with the story of the automatic writing. He tossed the folded sheet of hotel notepaper onto the table with a gesture that held the desperation of a gambler playing his final card.

  Holmes, who had listened with rising interest, studied the writings carefully, enlisting the aid of a lens. He waved it at Houdini saying, 'More reliable than a monocle and far more powerful!' He returned to the study of the writings. Eventually he said, 'Mr Houdini, spirits may or may not exist, I can doubt but cannot discount their existence. Let us assume that there are spirits and that of your mother is anxious to contact you. Why do you suppose she would need to do this through a third party?'

  I dared to interject, 'Perhaps an expert is required rather like an interpreter?'

  Ht iwidth="olmes snapped at me, 'You assume that our loved ones, having passed on, communicate in a language other than their own. This brings me to a point concerning this so-called spirit writing. What was your mother's name, for I assume that Houdini is a nom de theatre?'

  Houdini replied, 'Of course, my real name is Erich Weiss and my mother was Cecelia Weiss, but her maiden name was Steiner. She was a very small lady and my father was a rabbi. In 1874 they emigrated to the United States from Hungary to escape ignorance, persecution and anti-semitism but they never really settled down in America...'

  Holmes interrupted with a question, 'You were yourself born in the United States?'

  I fancied that Houdini was slightly uncomfortable with the question but replied to it quickly enough, 'Why, er yes, soon after they arrived, in Appleton, Wisconsin.'

  I could see that Holmes had noted the slight hesitation, though he did not press the point, instead saying, 'Please continue with your narrative.'

  'My father was unable to obtain employment as he spoke no English and my mother never learned more than a few words. But to me she was like a queen. In fact after I first made it big I was able to buy for her a dress made for Queen Victoria, which Her Majesty had never worn. I took her on a trip back to the old country and put on a ball for her in Budapest. All our kinsmen and others who had called us losers and no-hopers came and mother was a queen for a night in Victoria's gown.' He stopped, realizing that he had been all but carried away with his oratory. Indeed there had been a shake in his voice. He recovered quickly having given us a very small demonstration of that quality which had made him a very great showman.

  Seemingly unmoved by the histrionics, Holmes said, 'Quite so, Cecelia Weiss, nee Steiner, a Jewish lady who spoke no more than a few words of English. Did she speak German, Hungarian, Yiddish perhaps?'

  Houdini nodded, 'German and Yiddish fluently and she spoke a little Hungarian.'

  Holmes pointed to the cross at the top of the paper and said, 'In view of all this information I find it hard to believe that your mother, a Jewish lady who spoke and wrote practically no English should write these messages so faultlessly, more in the style of a titled lady than that of a simple emigrant. Moreover, would she be likely, spirit or no, to mark the head of the paper with the sign of the cross?'

  'Wow, how could I have missed something like that? The perfect English should have told me and the sign of the cross! But don't get me wrong Mr Holmes, Lady Doyle is a dear sweet woman and I just know that she must have believed what she was producing to be genuine spirit writing.'

  Holmes agreed and I added, 'The human mind, especially that of the devout believer, can play some incredible tricks.'

  The king of escapes and magic, far from being jubilant as might have been expected from one who had gained the point as he wished, was obviously still in a dilemma which he expressed in words. 'What must I do Mr Holmes, surely you can see my problem? I have vowed to expose all spook frauds as I call them but the Doyles are sincere. There is the problem of this doctor and his wife Marina.'

  Houdini had not given Holmes as much detail about Doctor an"7"ut Doctd Marina Blackthorne as he had earlier presented to me. So he rectified this omissi
on with a detailed account of the seance which he and the Doyles had attended. Holmes asked if he had explained the fake methods, which he had spotted, to Sir Arthur.

  Houdini replied, 'Sir Arthur quite failed to see why Marina should have used trickery just because it was possible for her to have done things that way. Moreover, there were these phenomena she produced which I could not explain. Sooner, if not later, the papers will get hold of the fact that I have seen that which I cannot challenge. My career, in recent years, Mr Holmes has been very largely based on the fact that I am a spook-buster. I have even offered large sums of money to any medium who can produce the unexplainable under test conditions. Marina will, I feel sure, gain enough confidence to attempt to ruin me before long.'

  Holmes was thoughtful for a while and we had to wait until he had recharged his pipe before we heard his voice again. Then, through clouds of blue smoke, he thrust his great bill of a nose in Houdini's direction, 'I would have to sit in on one of these seances myself in order to be of any real help. Do you think you could arrange for this to happen?'

  The magician shook his head sadly, saying, 'I doubt if the Blackthornes would put on an act for Sherlock Holmes.'

  'But perhaps they would stage a seance for the Reverend Septimus Carstairs? Clerical impersonation has always been one of my specialities and such roles have proved more than helpful in past investigations, as Watson will tell you. I will put up at the Charing Cross Railway Hotel under that name and in that disguise. There are rooms there that can be hired to hold a seance.'

  This planned deception and the fact that Holmes had clearly agreed to become involved in Houdini's problems cheered the American noticeably. He proved to be a hearty trencherman when Holmes insisted that we all sit down to a repast of cold cuts which he and I washed down with tankards of the local cider. Houdini took only fresh water with his meal, in between the extraction of silver coins from bread rolls and a number of other extremely amusing and puzzling parlour tricks.

  Afterwards, over coffee, Holmes said, 'I have no miracles to show you in return Mr Houdini, except to say that although I have never met your brother I can appreciate that the two of you are very much alike, at least at a glance and from a fair distance.'

  Houdini started, And you say you have never met Theodore, or Dash as I always call him. Perhaps you have seen his picture somewhere?'

  Holmes denied this, 'No, but I have read this morning's newspapers. Most of them carried an item to the effect that only a few hours ago you had been thrown, manacled and encased in a heavily weighted packing case, into the Hudson River.'

  'Tell me Mr Holmes, did I escape safely?'

  'Evidently so! Even the Great Houdini cannot be in two continents at the same time. Obviously then you were impersonated and, knowing that you had a brother in the same line of business as yourself, the thought became obvious. Indeed he must be very like you indeed to pull off such a deception. Not one of my major deductions!'

  Houdini laughed again, 'But to be serious, you make it sound so easy. Yes, I had to be in this country of yours to sign some congaiign somtracts and arrange for promotion of The Man from Beyond when it is shown in London. That's a motion picture by the way. I had arranged the Hudson River stunt months ago and could not cancel it. So Dash and I figured out how to get me out of trouble; not as difficult as all that because we had done the same thing and got away with it way back. He's taller than I am but, if he parts his hair like mine and keeps well back from the people, there is no problem. But just because you have made light of your deductions, as you call them, this does not mean that I am going to tell you how I knew that you had selected the three of spades!' We all laughed as he referred to a card trick that he had shown us minutes earlier.

  I did not return to London with Houdini, preferring to accept an invitation from Holmes to stay the night and return upon the morrow. Houdini departed in the late afternoon, leaving it with me to arrange the details that we had all discussed. As the big Mercedes purred its way towards the London road I re-entered Holmes's parlour to find him taking a bulging file from the shelf which held his scrapbooks. He said, 'No question of looking for H in the books Watson, Houdini has so much written and published about himself that he requires a dossier of his own.'

  I was amazed. Not only with the fact that Holmes had this bulging folder on Houdini but that he continued to keep up with all this research material at all.

  He read my mind when he said, 'Oh yes Watson, the habits of a lifetime do not change with rustication. I will keep up the books and files to my dying day. I will leave my collection to Scotland Yard.'

  As we sat and sorted through the piles of newscuttings Holmes asked me, 'What do you make of friend Houdini and his problems Watson? Am I wise to involve myself in them?'

  'I believe that you are doing so more for the sake of Sir Arthur than for him.'

  'Well, it is true, that like yourself, I have a great respect for Doyle but I have long noted the ease with which he can be manipulated. Do you recall, for example, the case of the two schoolgirls who convinced him that they had captured the images of fairies at the bottom of a garden with a Box Brownie camera? He was far from pleased with me when I proved to him beyond doubt that the whole thing was a hoax.'

  'He so desperately wanted to believe in fairies, Holmes. Maybe at heart we all did. When you showed him the fairy figures cut from a story book and arranged among the grass and stones you all but severed a connection that has been invaluable to us all. It has, after all, made Doyle a fortune, provided me with a livelihood and turned you into a legend in your own lifetime.'

  'You flatter me Watson. Why there are even those who believe me to be a figment of Sir Arthur's imagination. One scholar has expressed in print that Sherlock Holmes was really Sir Arthur's tutor, Doctor Joseph Bell. I have rather mixed emotions concerning my notoriety. I probably would not have retired from active practice at such an early age had Sir Arthur stuck to his historical novels. I became altogether too well known with the public at large to follow my profession comfortably.'

  I was a little taken aback by his words. Of course Holmes had always seemed a little uncharitable in his comments upon his adventures as presented in The Strand, but it had never occurred to me that these published exploits could have been worse than a minor irritant to him.

  'Had I realized the extent of your disapproval I would have long ago ceased to make the material available. Really Holmes, you should have said something to me upon the subject.'

  'And ruin a profitable sideline for a good friend who would otherwise have been just a struggling doctor? Oh no my dear Watson, I could not have been so cruel!'

  I was embarrassed and, as soon as I decently could, I switched the conversation from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle to Harry Houdini. 'What do you make of Houdini?' I asked him.

  'Oh much the same as I made of him twenty years ago Watson,' he replied. 'A self-made man who has pulled himself up by his boot straps. Despite his fame and fortune he is a man of spartan habits. The expensive clothes and the Mercedes are of no real interest to him, he simply feels that the trappings of wealth are expected. He has a friendly and open manner but, surprising in a professional deceiver, he finds it difficult to disguise his emotions. Did you notice for example the very slight hesitance of manner that he displayed when I enquired as to his place of birth? When, after some seconds of hesitation, he told us Appleton, Wisconsin, he all but blushed. Why, I wonder?'

  I too had noted these things but made less of them than did my friend. 'Could it be that Appleton is the kind of small town which would seem unfashionable for a great showman to claim as a birthplace?'

  Holmes shook his head, 'I think not, he claimed Jewish immigrant parentage with pride. The man is certainly no kind of a snob. No matter, it seems of little importance.'

  But I noticed afterwards that Holmes had pencilled question marks beside all the printed references to Houdini's birthplace that occurred in the cuttings from the file.

  A few days later
found Holmes - or rather the Reverend Septimus Carstairs - comfortably installed at the hotel at Charing Cross. I put up at that same establishment for the convenience of being on hand should Holmes require my help. After so many years it was wonderful to be sharing an adventure with him again even if it was as yet but to abet his impersonation of a reverend gentleman.

  The first day was spent in establishing Holmes's new identity; just to make sure that it was deceptive enough for his purpose, that of convincing the Blackthornes that they would be putting on a demonstration not just for the already convinced Sir Arthur, but also for a simple cleric.

  Meanwhile, Houdini had not been idle having contacted his friends the Doyles and the Blackthornes to arrange a seance. He took luncheon with us at the hotel - where we occupied a secluded corner of the dining area - and put us into the picture concerning these arrangements.

  'I have talked with Sir Arthur and Lady Doyle and I'm pleased to tell you that their attitude is fine, great in fact,' he said. 'They actually want another seance with the Blackthornes and are more than happy to let the Reverend Carstairs in on it as an impartial observer.' Then he turned to me, with just a touch of embarrassment and said, 'No offence Doc, but I guess you will need to get lost when the time is near. The Doyles know you pretty well and with due respect you are not an actor, or a master of disguise like Mr Holmes here.'