Sherlock Holmes: Zombies Over London

by Stephen Mertz

  Wells nodded. "I spent a day showing him around the city. The Natural History Museum. A walk along the Thames."

  Jane turned icy eyes on him. "And a visit to the music hall."

  Wells sighed like a man severely and routinely put upon.

  "My dear, Albert might as well observe lowbrow culture as well as highbrow."

  Holmes said, "And why should that be, if I may ask?"

  Jane continued to glare at her husband. "You may well ask that, Mr. Holmes. I’d like to know the answer myself. They went to The Empire in the West End, the most notorious of those so-called ‘pleasure palaces.’"

  "My dear," said Wells, "we’ve dined there ourselves."

  "At your insistence. The comedians were vulgar. The ballet dancers, well, they were far more Eros than Bolshoi, and certainly nothing a naive young man need be exposed to unless you intend to introduce him to vices of your own. Do you go to The Empire often, Herbert?"

  Silence descended.

  Holmes said, "Come, Watson. We’re finished here." A curt nod. "Mrs. Wells, a thousand pardons for this invasion of your privacy."

  She blinked, momentarily taken aback.

  "That’s kind of you to say, Mr. Holmes. We only want Albert found. It’s been a pleasure meeting you. And you, Doctor Watson."

  This last was accompanied by a direct gaze that warmed me as had her touch, right there in front of her husband in their cozy living room!

  "My pleasure, Mrs. Wells."

  "Please, call me Jane."

  Wells said, "I’ll show you gentlemen out."

  A drizzling mist had begun while we were indoors. Holmes and I turned up the collars of our coats in preparation for crossing to the Hansom that Holmes had retained to wait for us.

  He said, "I shall be in touch. You will hear from me directly we have located this wandering lad."

  "But how will you undertake such a task? London is so great a city. Where will you start?"

  "My dear sir," said Holmes, "you have retained me to locate the boy. This I intend to do. But you will kindly respect the fact that my methods are my own. I hold myself accountable to no one until satisfactory results are achieved. That is acceptable to you?"

  "Certainly. I meant no offense." Wells gestured with the manuscript envelopes that had come in the mail, which he still held in his left hand. "I have much work to occupy my attention. My publisher, damn him, wants revisions on a novel in progress! Also there is, er, the, uh, ‘other project’ that I’m constructing and have almost completed. I have much to keep me busy. I will expect to hear from you, Mr. Holmes, when you have located Albert. Good day, gentlemen."

  Chapter 7

  Holmes said, "What do you make of it, Watson?"

  Our horse’s hooves clattered away from Maybury Road.

  I said, "It seems that Wells has his share of domestic difficulty."

  "The wife’s display of jealousy, you mean, about his attending the music hall? Jealousy is the province of woman."

  "I’m not referring to that. Holmes, I’m damned if Mrs. Wells didn’t shamelessly flirt with me after you and her husband left us alone."

  Holmes’ keen eyes glinted with barely muted interest and amusement.

  "And did you resist?"

  "I barely had the chance! But it was overt, I’ll tell you that. There was closeness, touch, and those eyes of hers! It was quite improper."

  "But not intolerable?"

  "Well uh, you and Wells returned. I barely had the opportunity to say anything."

  "You have no doubt considered that her behavior in all likelihood had nothing to do with your manly charms."

  "A diversionary tactic intended to keep me from asking questions?"

  "It would seem likely."

  "Holmes, what do you know that I don’t know?"

  He reached into an inner coat pocket and withdrew a lady’s dainty kerchief, which he handed to me.

  I noted the embroidered initials.

  "S.W.," I read aloud. "Sarah Wells. Where did you find it?"

  "Under a stack of male undergarments in a dresser in Albert Einstein’s room."

  "Did her husband see you find it?"

  "He thinks that he saw what I was doing, but he did not observe what I was doing. He was too busy standing in the hallway, glancing over the return addresses on those envelopes that came in the mail."

  I returned the kerchief to Holmes. Jane’s jasmine perfume, emanating from it, again tantalized my nostrils.

  "Do you think the boy stole it from her belongings?"

  "That is one possibility. Or it could have been a personal, one could say intimate, gift from the lady of the house to their young houseguest."

  "You suspect Mrs. Wells and this Albert of having a romantic dalliance?"

  "Tactfully phrased, Watson, as ever. It is a possibility, is it not?"

  "After her behavior toward me, I suppose so."

  "Tell me, Watson, since you were so favorably impressed by Mr. Wells. How do you think he would react to learning that his wife was guilty of such an infidelity?"

  I tugged an earlobe. "He is an English gentleman, an intense fellow as all artists are, and a proud man."

  "A man of direct action, would you say?"

  "He gives that impression. Are you suggesting that H.G. Wells somehow did away with the boy when he found out that something was going on between his wife and Albert? If that’s the case, then his whole effort to engage you to locate the boy is just a ruse to throw off suspicion."

  "We need more facts," said Holmes. "I should like to know more about Wells’ time machine. But for now, or perhaps as a step in that direction ..." He again dipped a hand into a coat pocket, this time producing a piece of paper that had been neatly folded. He handed it to me. "I found this in a jacket in Albert’s closet after I’d filched the kerchief from the dresser drawer. Incidentally, I also managed a glance at the return addresses as Wells shuffled through his envelopes."

  He named three well-known popular weekly magazines.

  I said, as I unfolded the sheet of paper, "I’m not only familiar with those magazines; two of them have published my stories."

  The piece of paper was a cheaply produced flyer:

  The Empire Music Hall

  Leicester Square

  New Shows Weekly! Matinees Daily!

  Beneath this was an oval picture of a lovely young woman with a wild mane of untamed raven black curls that spilled across bare shoulders. She had a wide smile and an extremely low-cut dress.

  To Albert was written in feminine script across the picture, and was signed, Danielle.

  Holmes said, "Albert, it seems, may be carrying on a dalliance of his own, at the pleasure palace Mrs. Wells so despises."

  "I assume then that our next stop then is to be The Empire Theater."

  "An interview with Danielle could well yield useful information."

  I studied the lovely girl in the picture.

  "There are worse ways to spend a rainy afternoon, I daresay."

  He lapsed into a thoughtful silence as our Hansom cab approached the railway station.

  Edginess coursed through me, drawing taut my nerves with impatience. My encounter with Mrs. Wells had left an unpleasant aftertaste in my mouth, not to mention the possibility, even the likelihood, of her dalliance with the boy we intended to find.

  What a tangled web of human emotions!

  A futurist author.

  His restless, promiscuous wife.

  And a young lad who spent his time poring over mathematical equations while finding time for Lord knows what else in the area of romantic liaisons.

  So many unanswered questions.

  What had become of Moriarty? He was still at large. What ungodly scheme was that twisted, brilliant mind up to?

  Zombies!

  It was unthinkable that such an evil could stalk the civilized world, and worse still that a man of Professor Moriarty’s insane genius could somehow summon them to carry out his nefarious bidding.

&nb
sp; I had no doubt that we would again encounter the Professor.

  But for now, there existed only one immediate objective, and nothing would be gained by heeding distractions.

  Where was Albert Einstein?

  Chapter 8

  Waterloo Station throbbed with the clatter and racket of arriving and departing trains and the chatter of human conversation and movement. The piercing shouts of a newsboy spouting the latest headlines cut through the din.

  The newsboy was a scruffy lad of fourteen. A smattering of freckles dusted his pug nose. The corner of his mouth curled up in a natural sneer. A steady stream of people slowed only slightly to place coins into his right palm. These coins were dropped into a leather pouch worn at his waist while the boy handed over the newspapers in a continuous, smoothly repetitive motion.

  Holmes waited until there was a break in the line of customers.

  "I say, Wiggins, a minute of your time, if you please."

  The boy’s natural sneer became a toothy grin.

  "Mr. Holmes! It’s been awhile. How’ve you been, guv’nor?"

  "I endure life with my usual degree of interest, if not enthusiasm. And you, Wiggins? How are my Baker Street Irregulars?"

  Wiggins was a homeless orphan of the streets. That is all I knew about him. He was one of a network of such street urchins that Holmes had organized, funded and often utilized. No one paid attention to children like Wiggins who came and went seemingly everywhere in the city while in the process managing to hear everything that constituted the gossip of virtually every social class. The original Baker Street Irregulars had been small in number and, as the name suggested, had initially been based out of the immediate vicinity of Holmes’ flat. But over the years their number had grown to the point that the Irregulars had come to serve as Holmes’ finger on the human pulse of the city, able to go everywhere, see everything and overhear everyone.

  Wiggins practically assumed a position of attention.

  "We’re just fine, guv’nor. Me? A fella never has to work if he enjoys his labors and I enjoy selling papers to the toffs right here in Waterloo Station. Now how may I be of service?"

  "For starters while you’re standing here doing what you so love to do, you can keep a lookout for a passenger disembarking from a train from Surrey."

  "I’m your man, guv’nor! I can do that right enough."

  "I have two tasks for you. You will therefore need to delegate authority."

  "Done it before, Mr. Holmes, I can do it again."

  A glance at the boy’s normally reddened knuckles and the scar tissue over one eye bespoke a fondness for brawling. Wiggins did not always get along well with others, even with his fellow Baker Street Irregulars.

  Holmes said, "I trust, Wiggins, that you will keep your baser instincts in check."

  "Aw sir, I don’t mean no harm. Sometimes one of the other fellas just gets on me nerves and, well, I just sort of snap, you could say."

  "I say that this time, you will put the mission first."

  Wiggins looked contrite.

  "I hear and obey, Mr. Holmes."

  The boy’s unusual choice of words, "I hear and obey," was a catch phrase popular of late in everyday conversation, its source a line from the novel She, by H. Rider Haggard, the author whom Wells and I had been discussing earlier. The popular fiction Holmes so despised was exactly that ... popular. I noted copies of Haggard’s latest novel in a bookstall nearby, the Haggard book flanked by several other popular titles, including War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells.

  "With the arriving trains from Surrey under surveillance," said Holmes, "the next step is to locate a young man who is somewhere in the city. Sixteen years of age. Has been described as socially awkward. His name is Albert Einstein and he is presently perhaps wandering idly and seeing the sights, or is perhaps in dalliance with a lady friend or perhaps has been or is about to be a victim of foul play."

  "Uh, that’s not much to go on, guv’nor."

  "Believe me, Wiggins, in that I share in your disappointment. Albert is a visitor to our city. He’s a German national, but speaks English. A gifted mathematician. This needs to be given top priority."

  "A tall order, Mr. Holmes, but if anyone can find that needle in a haystack, I reckon it’s the Baker Street Irregulars."

  "I reckon it is," said Holmes.

  Ignoring the passers-by who wanted to buy his newspapers, Wiggins indicated a scruffy, thin child of eight or so, who was engaged in polishing a gentlemen’s boots.

  "That’s Timmy. He don’t look like much but he flies like an eagle. He’ll see to it that word of missing Albert gets spread and fast. And you say this other gent is coming in from Surrey?"

  "He may, he may not," said Holmes, "but if he comes to London, I want to know about it." He proceeded to render a concise and specific description of H.G. Wells from age to height to appearance to a certain gait in Wells’ walk that I too had noticed.

  Wiggins listened attentively.

  "Is he dangerous, guv’nor? Not that it would matter none to me, of course, but some of the other fellers would be better off knowing in advance."

  "No, he’s not dangerous in the way you mean," said Holmes. "He’s a teacher. A writer. The only danger he poses is abstract."

  "Abstract, guv’nor?"

  "His mind, Wiggins. The mind is the most dangerous weapon. Always remember that."

  "I don’t know about that, Mr. Holmes. A blackjack, well applied, can make scrambled eggs out of anyone’s mind."

  Holmes chuckled. "Quite so, Wiggins. Quite so. You are a man of admirably direct temperament. If the gentleman, a Mr. Wells by name, does show himself, I want him followed."

  "We’ll be on it, sir, me and Timmy. If I spy the gent, we’ll stick to him. One of us ahead, the other behind. He won’t give us the slip, and he won’t know he’s being tailed. Count on us."

  "I do, Wiggins. Pity I don’t have a picture for you."

  I cleared my throat. I crossed to the bookseller.

  While I made my purchase, Holmes and the newsboy summoned Timmy, with whom they conferred.

  When I rejoined them, I handed Holmes a copy of War of the Worlds, the dust jacket’s back flap open to expose a recent photograph of the author.

  "Thank you, Watson. So glad you deigned at last to return from observer to participant status." He handed the book with the photo of Wells to Wiggins, who shared the picture with Timmy. "That’s it then. Wiggins, get the word out on Mr. Einstein, and stay vigilant should Mr. Wells put in an appearance. I will expect regular updates."

  Chapter 9

  The Empire Theater was doing a grand business for a weekday afternoon, or perhaps precisely because it was a gloomy, rainy workday.

  We paused just inside the main entrance.

  Nearly three hundred people crowded the noisy, spacious main room that sported twin bars that faced one another along opposite walls running the length of the establishment. Tables and booths overflowed with boisterous patrons who ate, drank and made merry. The atmosphere was rank, noisy, and hazy with smoke.

  Everywhere there was something to see. High overhead, a lovely woman on a trapeze glided with joy and grace. There were the tableau vivants: small, well-lighted sets where female performers posed as "real life" pictures.

  I had trouble taking my eyes from the one nearest us, which a placard identified as Diane the Huntress. A proud Amazonian blonde, with a stuffed but quite realistic-appearing lion crouched at her feet, stood as if caught in the act of turning away, her left breast and derriere in profile. A perfectly proportioned, shapely, muscular body and she appeared to be nude although I had read that these models actually wore flesh-colored body stockings. Further along was another tableau vivant entitled Nymphs Bathing.

  A family of acrobats was concluding their performance onstage to drunken hooting and heckling amid sparse applause. The acrobats bowed and nimbly pranced off-stage, to be replaced by a pair of comedians. It was impossible to hear their jokes this far back.

&n
bsp; I said, "It is all quite enough to make an impression on a young man visiting London."

  Holmes said, "There’s a table."

  He brought an elbow into play. We made our way through to a table midway back from the stage and off to the side, from which an inebriated fellow in laborer’s clothes and his equally inebriated doxy shambled past us on their way out.

  A portly waiter with a handlebar moustache and a stained apron appeared almost instantly to clear the table.

  "What can I get for you gentlemen?"

  Holmes’ hands steepled so that the fingertips touched his chin. He stared straight ahead, not at the stage.

  "You can fetch us Danielle. We would speak with her on a matter of importance."

  "Uh sorry, gents, but the performers ain’t allowed to mingle."

  "Tell her we’re not the police. Tell her that if she tries to run, we will find her. Sparing us a few minutes of her time now will be a minimal inconvenience compared to trying to dodge us."

  "Yes, sir. And the name, sir?"

  Holmes told him. The waiter withdrew. Holmes assumed an air of patient stoicism.

  Inwardly, I chastised myself for not coming armed but when we’d left Baker Street that day, it had been for no more than a train ride to the Wells home in Surrey.

  The Empire’s clientele had come to have a good time, but a significant percentage of those present, men and women, would not think twice about slipping a stiletto between a man’s ribs from behind for the price of cab fare home.

  I said, "Do you think that was wise, bandying your name about in, well, a place like this?"

  "I thought it best. The social stratum we’re presently dealing with here may not recognize me on sight but they will know my name."

  "Precisely my point. So we’re to expect a less than cordial reception?"

  "The sooner the better then," said he. "We came here for results, did we not?"

  A towering figure materialized from the crowd behind Holmes, roughly shoving people aside. The fellow was broad-shouldered and over six feet tall.