by william Todd
She smiled and blushed at the comment, seemingly unsure how to respond. I simply turned and left her to attend to her patient while I continued to seek out those needing assistance.
Chapter 10
For twenty more minutes I tended to injuries, some minor, some in need of more acute medical attention. Yet, I was surprised that all the injuries were survivable, which was a blessing, considering the scope of the wreckage.
At last, with the chaos of the situation settling into a more manageable anxiety, I recruited the help of Todd and Henderson for our most critical patient: Oswald. We fashioned a splint from pieces of the coach’s siding, stabilized Oswald’s leg, and carried him from the demolished coach.
It was as we were getting him settled in the grass that I noticed a man standing alone at the edge of the wood some seventy feet away. At that distance, he appeared thin and bald. He did not move, yet he held a firm gaze upon me, which was unsettling. No one paid him any attention, probably thinking he was one of the passengers milling about; yet I became apprehensive as he watched me.
For the first time in some three-quarters of an hour after leaving his side, I thought of Holmes. I felt guilty leaving him in his condition to tend to the more seriously wounded, and I felt even guiltier that I had not even thought about him while tending to the needs of others. And when I looked upon his empty spot near the end of the wreckage, my heart sank. I knew the man at the wood line had something to do with his disappearance.
I warily inspected the timberland behind the man as I approached to see if he had any confederates hiding among the trees and wild shrubbery. He seemed alone. I instinctively reached for my revolver…and realized that it was in the pocket of my waistcoat, which was covering a bloody hand in the mangled first coach. I cursed under my breath for such a clumsy slip but hid my worry from the man in front of me.
“Dr. Watson,” the scrawny man said, “your presence is requested.”
“Where?” I asked
“A few hundred yards through these woods,” he replied nodding behind him.
“Holmes?” I asked
“You will see him soon enough.”
My eyes narrowed. “Who is it that is asking for me?”
“Colonel James Moriarty.” The man then surreptitiously displayed a rifle that had been hidden behind a tree next to him. “And he will not take no for an answer.”
I briefly looked behind me. Everyone else seemed too preoccupied to give any thought to what I was doing, so I walked into the woods with cold steel at my back.
^^^^^
With the forceful prompting of Lestrade, the train managed to pull into the Swindon station twenty minutes early. The great engine let out an explosion of steam once it was at rest. The patrons swiftly departed their coaches with the help of the Scotland Yard officers prodding them along. Soon, the bustle of clapping and shuffling feet, and the worried murmurs of commuters as they were herded from the train, was replaced by the gentle hiss of steam and the songs of birds at play in the unblemished sky above them.
Now alone, Lestrade, Jefferies, and the engine driver were standing on the platform to go over their next step, the other officers having already re-boarded the train.
Lestrade looked at his pocket watch. It was nearing half past five.
The engine driver said, “It will take about a half-hour to get the coaches in the siding, then we can be one our way.”
Lestrade shook his head. “We don’t have time. We will leave the coaches on.”
“But the train can go faster without pulling all that weight behind it.”
“It is less than an hour’s travel to Gloucester. Sherlock Holmes will have gotten our message there and will have stayed instead of heading off to Swansea. We won’t make up the difference in time before reaching Gloucester. It will still be quicker by leaving the coaches on.”
The engine driver took off his hat and wiped sweat from the great creases in his forehead with his shirtsleeve. “You’re the boss, Inspector. Take your seats and we shall be on our way. I can maybe shave another five or six minutes off this stretch if I feed her good.”
At that point, the Swindon station master came running from the arched portico, his unbuttoned jacket flopping about with each quick stride. “We’ve got a problem, Jones,” he said in a harried breath as he approached the engine driver. “The Gloucester train never made it. It’s an hour behind. That cannot be good.”
“Bloody hell!” Lestrade exclaimed. “Jefferies, I fear we may be too late.”
The engine driver pointed to the coaches. “Get on board, inspector. I’ll get us to that train in record time.”
Nodding to Jefferies to follow him back into the first coach, Lestrade replied over his shoulder, “Do what you must. Just get us there as fast as you can make this behemoth go.”
^^^^^
As I and my armed companion cleared the stand of trees through which we had traversed, a robust pond with a boathouse came into view on our right. A great manor house sat at the pinnacle of a grassy hill directly in front of us. To my left was a second, smaller barren hillside, which gave way to more scattered patches of wood in the distance. I could make out what looked to be a uniformed man at the end of the small pier with a chained bundle of something at his feet. As we grew nearer, that bundle became a man and on closer inspection, that man became Sherlock Holmes. He was swaddled in heavy chains with a large padlock at his chest securing it all in place.
Looking back, I am not sure how I kept my composure, but I managed an unfaltering countenance as I stared down Holmes’ abductor at the end of the pier.
The man dressed in brash militaria smiled at me and said, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Dr. Watson. I am Colonel James Moriarty. I believe you knew my brother.”
“What have you done to Holmes!” I demanded.
He cocked his head at me with a displeasing glint in his eyes. “Have it your way, sir. We shall relinquish the formalities. Your master is fine. A nasty bump on the head is all. Of course, that will be changing momentarily.”
I clenched my fists at my side, but an increase of pressure from the muzzle between my shoulder blades reminded me that my captors were armed and I was not. Looking around me, I asked, “So this is your palace of ill-gotten gains?”
Moriarty shook his head vigorously. “On a station master’s salary? Heavens no. I do feel the winds of financial change whipping about me, though,” he said with a sadistic smile. “No, this is the country house of Lord Abbott, a member of the upper House of Parliament. A quick history lesson: When the Great Western was expanding into Wales, Lord Abbott donated the land on which the tracks were to be laid, however there was a caveat to his generosity. You see, anytime he felt the urge to use the train, it had to stop and let him board. Whenever he wanted on, he would have a red flag placed at the tracks in strategic spots, and the train would stop—about where yours abruptly stopped, I should guess.” He leaned forward with a wink and a grin for effect. “I have it on good authority that Lord Abbott is seaside, at the moment, having used the train to Swansea yesterday afternoon.”
With a growing repugnance overtaking me, I said, “I did not know your brother personally, and only saw glimpses of him from a distance all those years ago. But Sherlock Holmes knew your brother all too well, especially with regard to his unique mental faculties and certainly the atrocities of which he was capable. From what he has relayed to me, you may have the same physical features as the professor, but you are nothing like your brother. He at least had the civility to keep this clash between him and Holmes. You, on the other hand, have just ruined the lives of scores of people on that mangled train who had no stake in this whatsoever.”
Waving his hand in a shooing fashion, Moriarty said to the man behind me, “Boyle, you may leave us. The doctor and I must have our privacy.”
The man slung his rifle over his shoulder and trudged up the slope towards the manor house.
The station master’s eyes narrowed and his thin lips p
ursed once we were alone. He produced a small pistol and said, “We are at war, Holmes and I. You must know that. And you must also know that in war innocent people lose their lives.” He shrugged his shoulders matter-of-factly. “It is an unfortunate consequence. I have done my due diligence to make sure there was a minimum loss of life. The only lives left to lose before this war is over is Holmes, here—” he gestured to the unconscious Holmes with a heel to his side “—and of course, you. I am not content with just destroying the general. Like Napoleon I must also destroy the troops, as well, or they may rise up to seek revenge on their beloved leader. No, no, I have made up my mind. If one goes, the other must follow.” A devilish smile overtook the station master’s features. “I’m sure, Dr. Watson, that you would not have it any other way.”
With that, he turned, bent over, and rolled Holmes’ chained body off the end of the pier with a splash.
“No!” I screamed. Not caring for my own safety, I made a mad dash at the colonel, but I had only taken three steps when he quickly turned and shot me in the shoulder. I fell in a heap onto the pier, rolling in pain on the old, desiccated planks.
Moriarty strolled up to me rolling the pistol around his finger, a mock look of concern upon his face. “Sorry about that, old chap, but I had to defend myself. I am a rather decent shot, though. You will find out that the bullet just grazed your shoulder. If you were to survive all of this, a few stitches would have sufficed.” He winked. “But we both know you won’t be needing those stitches.”
Pain contorted the features on my face, but I could not hide my sorrow. “Why did you not just finish me?”
“Oh, that will be your end result,” Moriarty replied, “but I am going to play with you a bit. You see, I think it’s fitting that Holmes should meet his demise in a similar fashion as my brother. I wanted him to abruptly awaken from his stupor buried in that filthy water. I wanted him to gasp in horror at his surroundings only to fill his lungs with water instead of air. He needed to at least have a taste for what it is was like to drown, although his death will not have compared to the death my brother experienced.” He seemed to stare at nothing, deep in thought momentarily. He then shook his head, as if agreeing with his silent contemplation and looked at me directly. “This was his last wish.”
He placed the toe of his shoe on my bullet wound and pressed down hard, making me cry out in pain. “But you…” He wagged his finger at me wearing a merciless smile, which piled wrinkled folds of skin high upon his cheeks. “With you…I get to be more creative when it comes to your death.”
I cried out in pain once more, as he pulled me up by my injured shoulder and pushed me towards the boathouse.
Once inside, I perceived a table in the darker shadows to my right with implements that I could not register. I turned to Moriarty who was standing in the doorway, blocking any route of escape. “What do you plan on doing with me?” I asked.
“All I can say is it most certainly will not be quick, and it will not be pleasant.”
I then saw one of the most remarkable things I have ever witnessed in all my years, although nothing should come as a shock regarding Sherlock Holmes’ abilities of escaping the most inescapable situations. As Colonel Moriarty unlatched the first door and pulled it shut, I saw Holmes quietly crawl from the high reeds at the water’s edge, using the pier to shield himself from Moriarty. I wanted to jump for joy but knew better; Moriarty still had a pistol, and we still had nothing.
I kept the colonel engaged as Holmes crept up from the pier, water dripping from his clothes, hair plastered to his great forehead. “What are your plans for me?” I asked again. “At least do me the service of explaining how my end will come.”
Moriarty turned to face me as he latched the first door in place and stood triumphantly in the small opening the other door would be filling shortly. He was about to say something, but a furtive noise caught his attention. There was nothing Holmes could do to quiet his dripping clothes.
The colonel turned, pistol in hand, as Holmes’ stealthy crawl turned into an all-out run. His only chance now was to get to Moriarty before he had a chance to aim his pistol and shoot.
“No!” I cried. To have Holmes survive one dance with death only to meet his fate on a second was too much to bare.
A shot rang out.
^^^^^
The train was shooting along like a bullet. The countryside was passing in a blur. Lestrade was impressed with the speed that the engine driver was able to tap from the train.
The worried silence of the last few minutes was finally broken by an idle comment from Jefferies. “I must say, Inspector, this is the fastest I think I have ever gone in my life.”
Lestrade only nodded in agreement. He looked out at the rushing countryside. Different shades of green amalgamed into a collage.
“Do you think there was just a mechanical malfunction with the train or something more nefarious?”
Lestrade straightened out his pantleg. “We are talking about Sherlock Holmes here. Nothing he is involved in is ever so innocently explained. Unfortunately, I fear the worst. Our hope now is to get to him before a bad situation becomes intolerably worse.”
The timbre of the clapping train wheels changed as they raced onto a trestle then suddenly, there was a great screech and deceleration that pushed them both forward. Lestrade righted himself and looked from their window. At first, he thought there was something wrong with the trestle, or perhaps someone on the tracks. Then, his breath caught in his throat when he saw the wreckage of a derailed train on the side of the tracks in the distance but fast approaching.
“Bloody hell! There’s a train wreck, and I don’t know if we’ll be able to stop in time.” He yelled out for all to hear, “Brace yourselves!’’
^^^^^
The back of Moriarty’s head exploded in red spray, and he fell limp onto the floor. Holmes still had another ten feet to traverse before he had reached the colonel. The look on his face told me that the bullet did not come from him.
I ran to Holmes, and the two of us looked about for the shooter.
“There,” Holmes said, pointing a dripping finger to the small hill directly across from us. We just made out the small figure of a man slinging a rifle over his shoulder. He stood motionless for a moment gazing down upon us, then he turned and disappeared over the other side of the hill.
I said, “I can’t believe that the colonel’s confederate would have turned on him like that.”
“That wasn’t Boyle,” Holmes replied. “That was Colonel Sebastian Moran. Who else could pull off a shot like that from that distance?”
“But Moran is still in prison for his attempt on your life.”
Holmes offered me a soggy smile. “We have much to discuss, Watson.”
I then turned to him, wonderment awash on my face. “How on earth did you get out of all those chains? I thought you had certainly met your maker this time.”
He pulled from his pocket the little tool he had used in opening the locks back at Baker Street. “Contrary to the observations of others, it seems Providence was indeed on my side today, Watson. When our Mrs. Merrick came to visit us, I, quite absent mindedly, tossed my little unlocking tool into my pocket. It came in very handy under ten feet of water.”
I shook his hand vigorously than winced in pain, forgetting my own injury.
“It seems you have indeed added to that trophy case you alluded to earlier.”
“Only a graze,” I assured him.
At that moment, we heard a great metallic screeching coming from beyond the woods. We both looked at each other, fear awash on both our faces and cried out simultaneously, “Another train!”
Holmes and I raced back through the woods, to what scene, we were uncertain.
Chapter 11
We were both out of breath when we broke from the tree line a few minutes later. To both of our surprise another train had come to a stop five feet from the back of the wreckage of the first train. Both the wounded and unharmed
passengers—what few there were—were making their way to the second train.
From the back of that train’s first coach, several men, two being Lestrade and his right-hand man Jefferies hurriedly exited.
“Is everyone alright?” Lestrade yelled as he ran into the crowd looking over and around everyone. “Is Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson on this train?”
“Lestrade!” Holmes bellowed. “Over here!”
Lestrade spotted us lumbering up the slope from the woods. He turned to his officers. “Help everyone onto our train. Once we are all aboard, we will proceed in reverse back to London.”
As he approached, Lestrade contemplated Holmes’ soggy appearance with a questioning brow.
“All will come to light soon enough,” Sherlock said to him knowingly. “In the meantime, I noticed an electrical line that ran to the manor on the other side of these woods. Since it is the country home to a member of Parliament, I would be surprised if it was not connected to either a telephone or a telegraph. One of your men should message ahead to have multiple ambulances at the ready to get the more seriously injured to a hospital.”
“Excellent idea.” He motioned for Jefferies.
“How did you know that?” I asked Holmes as Jefferies finished giving one of his underlings directions before answering Lestrade’s summons.
“Easy. I was not unconscious, as Moriarty would have had you believe. His malnourished henchman only hit me hard enough to make me see stars. Since Moriarty wanted me unconscious, that is what I gave him. At any rate, I heard your entire conversation.”
“Why could you not have winked at me or given me some subtle hint that you were alive?”
“Hard to do, Watson, when a man with a rifle was right behind you.”
“Yes, well he left.”
“And one shooting implement was replaced by another.”
“And how did you know that?”