by Mrs Hudson
‘Bloody cab drivers, blocking the road like that! Go and sort him out, man!’
He returned to his seat and I felt the vehicle lurch as our driver got down from his box. A few moments later he returned to his place with a grunt and our journey continued. Now I felt Smale begin to relax. I still lay on the floor of the cab, my hands tied and my mouth gagged so tightly that my first fear was of suffocation. That, however, was soon replaced by worse as Smale turned his attention to me for the first time. He reached down and began to stroke my cheek with his thick, clammy fingers.
‘So, Flotsam, it’s true. You really are mine now.’ He continued to stroke, slowly, without tenderness. The icy menace in his voice was unmistakable. I remembered it from years before, from the moments before his most calculated acts of cruelty. Suddenly he grabbed my hair and pulled me up so hard that I was lifted, gasping with pain, onto the seat beside him.
‘I’m taking you to a quiet place, Flotsam. Not even your Mr Holmes will be able to find us there. And we’ll stay there until you learn to be agreeable.’
With a laugh that flecked my face with saliva, he pushed me back to the floor and began to give directions to the driver. I’d seen enough from where I lay to know that we had turned off the main thoroughfares and were plunging into a world of unlit streets. I thought I could smell the river.
Eventually Smale called on the driver to stop.
‘This is good enough,’ he shouted up. ‘I want to walk the last bit so my friend here can see there’s no place to run. So get yerself out of here and I don’t want to see your face till dawn. Pick me up then at Cable Wharf. The warehouse by the river. You know the place. I’ll be waiting.’
He pulled me out of the carriage without a glance at the driver and from there we went on by foot, Smale pushing and shoving me in the direction he desired. Our progress was slow. More than once his pushing made me stumble and fall. But the pain of his kicks and blows was nothing to the pain caused by my helplessness. My hands were still bound fast. There could be no escape.
After more twists and turns than I could remember, Smale pushed me into a narrow street, in reality little more than a gap between two old warehouses, that ended abruptly with a drop to the river. I could see a small dark doorway in the wall of one of the warehouses, right up by the water’s edge, and it was towards this that Smale prodded me. We were still a few yards short when the sound of horses reached us, moving at speed and coming closer.
‘Mrs Hudson!’ I thought and felt a warm rush of hope. But the sounds were still streets away and with a sudden loss of heart I realised she couldn’t be in time.
Smale realised too and his voice was triumphant.
‘This is the place. No-one’s going to find us in here, you know.’
He pushed me to within a few feet of the door then stepped past me, reaching into his pockets for a key.
‘How right you are!’ came a voice from the doorway. Before I had time to focus properly a tall figure with his arm in a sling stepped out of the shadow and, with a straight left to the jaw, sent Smale spinning away from me and crashing to the water below.
*
Mr Holmes and I were still peering into the murky water when the pair of hansom cabs arrived somewhere behind us and began to disgorge their passengers into the alleyway. The two drivers, having been converted completely to my cause, were quick off their boxes and began to advance menacingly on Mr Holmes until Dr Watson’s assurances persuaded them back to their cabs. Mrs Hudson, meanwhile, advanced to where we stood and eyed us both thoughtfully.
‘Mr Holmes,’ she began.
‘Oh, it was nothing, Mrs Hudson,’ he replied loftily, examining his knuckles.
‘Mr Holmes,’ she continued, ‘you are in disgrace. Your wound is bleeding, you look a fright and if you survive the night at all it will only be because we’re taking you home this instant.’
In reply the great detective swayed a little, gave an embarrassed smile and dropped in a faint to the cobblestones.
The Clear Light of Day
†
That morning, as we rattled homewards, the fog lifted and for the first time in days a blinking city looked dawn squarely in the face. Before it did, while the night still lingered on the street, we had reached our rooms in Baker Street. The effect of his exertions, coupled with his earlier loss of blood, had rendered Mr Holmes insensible for most of the journey, but once brandy had been supplied and he had been laid in Mrs Hudson’s big chair by the kitchen fire, it soon became clear that no damage had been done that a strict regime of rest would not cure.
‘Really only a scratch,’ he murmured as Watson bound the knuckles of his left hand. ‘It was the timing that did the trick, Watson. I wish you could have seen him fall. As sweet a blow as you’ll ever see, eh, Flottie?’
‘Indeed, sir.’ I was leaning against Mrs Hudson on the other side of the fire, shivering with cold and relief. Mrs Hudson, having denied me brandy, was in the process of warming blankets and wrapping them around me in ever greater numbers until my shape had disappeared altogether and I was as round as a winter sparrow. Crouched between Mr Holmes and I, on the low stool, Scraggs was tending the fire, watching intently as the coals hissed and the flames leapt for the chimney. Behind us, in chairs carried off from the study, Mr Rumbelow and Miss Peters wallowed in the warmth, the latter muted by exhaustion and yawning rather beautifully whenever unobserved. Behind and above them, Mr Spencer perched on the kitchen table and swung his legs like a schoolboy.
‘But tell us, Holmes, how the devil did you come to be there tonight? It defies belief!’ Dr Watson puffed out his cheeks in bafflement at his companion’s dramatic reappearance.
‘It was far simpler than you would imagine, my friend.’
‘Simple? That’s typical of your modesty, Holmes. Simple! Huh, I’ve never known anything like it!’
‘Perhaps if I were to explain . . .’ He reached for his pipe with his bandaged hand and Watson helped him with a light. ‘Thanks to the timely arrival of Mr Rumbelow, I was able to join you in your little raid on Fogarty’s quarters. I was lucky enough to be able to secure your retreat with an old length of iron railing. After that I made my way here as quickly as I could on foot.’
He paused to draw deeply on his pipe.
‘I was just turning into Baker Street when I first noticed the carriage. Those of you who know my methods will be aware I have honed my powers of observation to a unique pitch and it was without great thought that I observed the driver had a tattoo of an anchor on one cheek and one of a mermaid on the back of his left hand. I paid a good deal more attention when I observed the carriage stop at our door and a figure dismount. Imagine my alarm when, still some seventy yards away, I witnessed the brutal abduction of Flotsam. The whole thing was too quick for me to prevent but as they sped away I was close enough to hear the kidnapper address an instruction to his driver. I was able to catch the word ‘wharf’ but nothing more. But of course that, coupled with the nautical theme of the tattoos, allowed me to form a very fair idea of their destination.’
‘Incredible, Holmes. And your reasoning proved spot on!’
‘Alas not, my dear Watson. My guess was entirely wrong.’
‘But, Holmes!’ Watson seemed at a loss.
‘I decided that desperate men with nautical connections might well be heading east, out to the pool of London, where all manner of lawlessness still prevails. As soon as I could hail a hansom, I set off with the vague hope that by heading south towards the Embankment I might gain on them, for a hansom is faster than a growler, especially in these crowded streets. It was, however, entirely fortuitous that our paths crossed rather literally just by the Haymarket. Of course, from then on the rest was child’s play.’
‘You followed them?’
‘Really, Watson! That would have been a singularly illogical reaction. If, as I surmised, they were bound for places where the law stands for nothing, I should hardly have been assisting Flottie by accompanying her there, alo
ne and one-armed. No, it seemed more prudent to instruct my driver to pull directly into their path.’
‘Into their path? Good lord, Holmes! And what happened then?’
The detective examined his bandaged left hand with a satisfied air.
‘A certain amount of confusion ensued, leading – as I had hoped – to that blackguard of a driver stepping down from his box. He was clearly no pugilist. A simple upper cut quite removed him from calculations. Finding him too craven to take further punishment, it was the work of a moment to divest him of his cape and take his place on the box. The substitution went unremarked, as I knew it would, and for want of a better plan I headed for Trafalgar Square. I confess the ride was a wild one for my control with one arm was not all it might have been. That policeman on the Strand was perhaps fortunate to avoid serious injury.’
He smiled happily to himself, then considered his pipe before continuing.
‘Had my control been greater, it was my intention to pull up safely in a well-lit area, but it was not until we were across the river that I was able to assert myself and by then the ruffian below me was shouting instructions. Deciding that in those dark streets surprise was my best weapon, I followed his orders. He made it easy by telling me precisely where he wished to be collected. With Flottie all tied up and moving slowly, it was the simplest thing to get there ahead of him and spring my little surprise.’
Watson’s eyes glowed with admiration. ‘I say, Holmes, that really is the most splendid thing. Your brilliance at its very best.’
‘Really, Watson, you quite embarrass me.’ Holmes gave a self-deprecatory wave of the hand and smiled broadly.
Then a thought seemed to strike Watson. ‘But I’m forgetting, Holmes. I still don’t have the slightest idea who it was you sent into the river, or why he was after Flottie. In fact,’ and here he ran his eye around the assembled company in mute appeal, ‘I have to say there’s quite a lot about our recent adventures that I really don’t understand at all.’
Mr Holmes turned to Mrs Hudson with an apologetic flap of his sling.
‘I know that everyone here is waiting for an explanation but I find myself still a little weak. Mrs Hudson, perhaps you would be so kind as to put our friends out of their misery and give them your own views on what has been going on?’ He turned to the rest of us. ‘I am convinced that Mrs Hudson’s grasp of events is scarcely less complete than mine. I recommend that you trust her account as if it were my own.’
‘Hear, hear!’ added Watson. ‘Greatly appreciate it if you spill the beans, Mrs H. Shouldn’t be surprised if you know just about everything.’
A murmur of concurrence rose around the fire and all eyes turned to the stern figure of the housekeeper.
‘Very well, sir,’ she replied with a slow nod of her head. ‘I’m happy to tell the story from the beginning, if that’s what you wish.’
‘Oh, goody!’ squeaked Miss Peters, now thoroughly awake again. ‘I do love a story! I hope I understand it, Rupert. You know how awfully clever Mrs Hudson is.’
‘I think this calls for the old tawny, Mr Rumbelow,’ decided Mrs Hudson, deftly ignoring her. ‘You’ll find it next to the laundry cupboard. I took the liberty of decanting it earlier, in anticipation. Mr Spencer, the correct glasses are on the dresser . . . One for Flotsam too, I think, if you’d be so kind.’
A tingle of excitement ran along my shoulders as, furnished with port, we settled back into our places and Mrs Hudson began the explanation I had waited so long to hear.
‘I think you all know a little about the events that led us here tonight,’ she began cautiously, her voice a little gruff, her forehead drawn into a frown as she sought a starting place. ‘It all really began on our first night in these rooms, when Flottie was so alarmed by the delivery of a letter by a one-eyed servant who slipped away into the darkness.
‘My suspicions about Mr Moran were aroused from the very moment Flottie told us how his letter had been delivered. All that cloak and dagger nonsense . . . well, really! A simple call one morning would have sufficed. And if there’s one thing I can’t abide it’s drama for the sake of it. So, while I couldn’t find any reasons to contradict the conclusions Mr Holmes drew on that first evening, my instincts were telling me that Mr Moran was a man not to be trusted.’
‘But, Mrs Hudson,’ struck in Dr Watson, ‘all the observations Holmes made about that letter seemed to be spot on.’
‘Indeed, sir. And very brilliant observations they were too. But it struck me that all of them were open to more than one interpretation. You see, sir, Mr Holmes is a detective and he looks at things from a certain angle. A detective gathers things together and then looks to see what he’s got. But when a cook goes shopping she already has an idea of what dinner she’s going to prepare. Since my instinct was to distrust Moran, I decided to look for facts to support my theories rather than the other way round. To my surprise, they were rather thick on the ground.’
Mrs Hudson took another sip and signalled to Scraggs with the lift of an eyebrow that it was time to replenish the glasses.
‘My very first step was to find out more about Mr Moran’s whereabouts. From his notepaper I knew he wished us to think him poor, so I instinctively concentrated my search in the better areas of the city. I commissioned Scraggs and a few of his fellows to make enquiries on my behalf. Scraggs and his friends see a great deal. If they weren’t already aware of a tall, scarred, one-eyed servant, recently arrived at a good London address, then I didn’t think the information would be very hard for them to elicit. One of Scraggs’s colleagues called that very afternoon with the news that a gentleman with a servant fitting that description had recently taken rooms in New Buildings on Portman Street. I took the precaution of confirming the fact with Moran when he called that evening and he was unable to deny it.
‘So by the time Moran arrived in this house, I already knew him to be, if not a liar, then at least someone deliberately intent on misleading us. What I didn’t know was why. Why the charade with the cheap paper when he could clearly afford much better? What motive could he have for wishing to foist this fiction upon us? I felt sure that the answer would lie in the story he was to tell us. I awaited his appearance with considerable interest.’
I recalled Moran’s arrival, his nervous air, his alert, watchful eyes as he surveyed the company before him. Mrs Hudson cleared her throat and went on.
‘So what were we left with once he had told his tale? Thanks to Lord Ponsonby, I was quickly able to ascertain that Moran had indeed been in Sumatra; that his company had failed; that the terrible and fatal blindings Moran described did occur, and that the natives of Sumatra felt a very great hostility to Moran’s company at the time of its collapse. All that was in the official report of the Dutch authorities. In addition I knew – whatever the true explanation of those events – that Moran wished us to believe a fanciful tale of a malignant curse and vindictive spirits.’
‘Now, Mrs Hudson,’ Watson frowned, ‘why on earth would he want us to do that?’
‘Obviously, sir, his tale was a deliberate smokescreen to distract us from the true sequence of events. But again, why? No-one appeared to be asking any questions about those events. If any crime had been committed it was under Dutch jurisdiction rather than our own. And if anyone over here had ever wondered about the unfortunate deaths in Sumatra, their concerns were now surely forgotten. Moran had avoided bankruptcy and had no stain on his character more damaging than a failed business venture. Yet for some reason he now felt it vital that Mr Holmes should believe that he and his colleagues were under threat of death from a band of remote and primitive tribesmen.’
‘Absurd!’ snorted Watson.
‘Quite,’ added Holmes, very intent on filling his pipe.
‘I sat down and thought about it. If Moran, for some reason I couldn’t yet fathom, wanted us to believe that Sumatran tribesmen were poised to murder him on the pavements of Oxford Street, he had to provide us with a motive for their obsession. T
he motive he gave us was the insults to their sacred spirits, a rather thin tale which never rang true for a moment. And yet it was clear from the Dutch intelligence reports that there genuinely did exist a great resentment on the part of the local people for Moran and his company. Moran was clearly going to great lengths to hide the true reason for that resentment.’
Dr Watson, who had just raised his glass to his lips, lowered it again and opened his mouth as if to speak. Then he closed it again. ‘It’s beyond me, Mrs H,’ he concluded sadly.
‘Well, sir, clearly the true reason did not reflect well on him or the company and needed to be concealed. I felt if I could discover what it was I would be some way towards understanding the mystery we were meant to be solving. What was Moran’s company doing that was so much worse than a hundred other trading companies up and down those coasts? I’m sorry to say it, but there are many unscrupulous traders in those parts, many who trick and cheat and bully in the name of trade. But although resented, sometimes even threatened, they are rarely forced to flee their quarters, leaving their fortunes behind, in fear of their lives.
‘Then things began to happen quite fast. I had recognised the name Matilda Briggs, a vessel that plies the East Indian routes and which was to come to our attention again. An old friend of mine had lost her son at sea from that very vessel. I remembered vaguely that he had been unwell before he died. On checking I found that at the time he was lost he was suffering all the symptoms of the fatal illnesses that had been reported in Sumatra. Once I had heard his mother’s story again, the connection was made. Her son was given to hard liquor. That was the link I sought.
‘Moran had given us all the clues himself, perhaps from carelessness, perhaps from a desire to bolster his fiction with genuine facts, or perhaps from that tiresome over-confidence that men so often have when they aren’t telling the truth. He told precisely what possessions were found beside the first victim – no food or clothes, only his weapons, some lucky charms and bottles of liquor from Port Mary. Again, when describing the white settler who died soon after, Moran told us he came into Port Mary to trade skins for gin. So was that the cause of all these horrors? Was it the spirits they were drinking? Some gruesome failure on the part of the distillers? It was impossible to be certain, but I was sure that Moran’s fiction was designed to obscure his role in this wretched, shabby episode.’