Mycroft and Sherlock

by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

  AFTER TAKING TEA WITH DOUGLAS, MYCROFT RETURNED TO St. John’s Wood where he gave the household staff twenty-four hours’ leave. He retired to his spare but elegant bedroom, with its small, comfortable bed, fireplace and padded chair. On either side of the bed were two mahogany end tables, each with a gaslight on the wall above it. He planned to burrow underneath the covers, shut his eyes, and sleep most of the Sunday away—and the night too, for that matter.

  He was so damnably tired. With everyone out of the house or retired to their own rooms, he would not be disturbed until Monday morning. At which point, he would stand on the pavement as always, smelling the incipient rain and waiting for Huan and the carriage to come. He would greet his neighbor, who had reconciled with his wife.

  Lovely day, is it not, Mr. Holmes? the neighbor would proclaim, though it would be nothing of the sort. Then his carriage would pull up, with Huan at the reins waving like a child on a carousel, and Sherlock sullen but determined in the back. Mycroft would grill his brother, deposit him wherever he and Douglas had arranged to meet—at the docks most likely—and then be off again for his bank, and then to his solicitor, where his last will and testament could finally be put to paper.

  For now, he thought, burrowing further under the bedclothes, what I need is sleep… just a touch of sleep.

  And yet, sleep would not come. Those calling cards in Madame de Matalin’s boudoir floated before him, black with finger ridges, like a parlor trick at a séance.

  What were those purposeful soot stains meant to reveal?

  Mycroft, images dancing before his eyes, sat up in bed, reached over in the darkened room and turned on one of the gaslights in the hopes that it would impart figurative as well as literal clarity. It hissed to life but merely illuminated the space around him.

  He opened the watch winder on the end table, checked the time and found it to be well past midnight.

  Perhaps a stroll, he thought. To Piccadilly.

  Why not? It was less than three miles. Walking might even prove bracing on a chilly, bone-dry night like this.

  But once there, what would he do? Bang insistently upon the Madame’s door until her cadaverous butler opened it, and demand to inspect the good woman’s boudoir? Perhaps he could crawl up the side of de Matalin’s house like a spider, pry open her window, tiptoe to the bureau where her bejeweled box of paraphernalia lay and help himself to its contents while she blissfully slept.

  Nonsense, all of it. Why could he not let it go?

  Because in his mind’s eye he could see her window, open just enough to be accessible. When he and Douglas had visited, in spite of the prohibitive weather, it had been left ajar. And though Mycroft had assumed that a servant would surely close it, no one ever did—not while he lay insensate upon her floor, and not later, while she was recounting her many fears. For her chamber windows were directly above the library and were heavy and large. If they had been closed while he and Douglas were still there, surely he would have heard the sound.

  Drug addicts were often contrary in nature, he knew: abusing questionable substances while loudly proclaiming the health benefits of damp or frigid air from open windows, immersions in scalding hot baths, or diets consisting principally of carrots.

  Whatever the reason, the open window continued to beckon him.

  He was about to extinguish the light and attempt to sleep when he was startled by a knock upon his front door, followed by a ring of the bell. Mycroft threw on a robe and slippers and padded downstairs to see who it could be.

  Through the front door glass, he was surprised to see Huan’s concerned face.

  “Why are you about?” Mycroft asked as he opened the door.

  “Why do you have your light on, Mr. Mycroft?” Huan returned accusingly. “I am thinking perhaps you need me.”

  “It is past midnight. You are not in bed?”

  “Bed? No, no!” Huan replied in an offended tone. “I passed by, I saw your light, I must know if you are well. It is my job to protect you, Mr. Mycroft! I must do my job, no?”

  Mycroft shook his head, awed. “You truly are a wonder. Come in, Huan, come in, for I can surely use your help,” he concluded before he could talk himself out of it.

  With that, he hurried back upstairs to change.

  * * *

  From the street, Mycroft could see de Matalin’s second-floor window. Just as he suspected, it was slightly ajar; unreachable from where he stood but perfectly accessible if one were to park one’s carriage as close to the wall as possible, climb up to the top of the vehicle and then reach up the entirety of one’s height, from tiptoes to fingertips.

  Provided, of course, that one was at least six feet tall.

  It had taken some doing to persuade Huan that he would remain the driver and Mycroft the climber. Given Huan’s dexterousness, he likely could have scaled the wall from the street with nothing but a running start. With this fact on his side, Huan had not given up easily.

  Mycroft had finally been forced to remind him who paid whose keep.

  They had timed the route of the single constable whose beat included the Madame’s street: Mycroft had eight minutes in which to squeeze through the window, find the paraphernalia box in the dark, ‘tief ’ the cards, as Huan put it, then climb back out and be on his way. He had racked his brain, trying to come up with a more effective plan than simple purloining, but with limited time and resources, he could think of no other solution.

  Standing on the carriage, Mycroft stretched up towards the window ledge, his height a quarter-inch shy of ideal. As his arms, toes and fingertips stretched to their limit, he spurred himself on with the thought that he had just found another sector in which to deposit his money. If he was not shot this night or dead of heart failure, perhaps he would live long enough to see an invention that could quickly replicate a document, and that could fit inside one’s waistcoat pocket!

  Mycroft finally managed to get a hold of the blasted ledge and pull himself up until his knees were resting on the jutting strip of wood.

  As the carriage underneath him rolled away, he waited a moment, allowing his combative heart to slow, and then furtively pushed the window open far enough to clamber inside.

  * * *

  The scene in the darkened boudoir was very nearly as he had imagined it: he could hear de Matalin’s steady inhale, followed by a noisier, more boisterous exhale. Thanking his keen memory, he walked directly to her bureau and laid a hand on the small Limoges box, with its telltale encrusted stones. He moved aside the vial, the syringe, the needle and the pipe, and dislodged the false bottom, which made a slight cracking sound—causing de Matalin’s breath to catch and his own to halt for a second or two. Once she began to breathe normally again, he lifted out the cards and placed them in his jacket pocket.

  Then, on impulse, he pilfered the magnifying glass as well, shut the box, and bolted out of the window with a few moments to spare.

  He hung by his fingertips, suspended between heaven and earth, waiting for Huan to appear before the constable did, listening for the sound of hooves and wheels coming around the corner. If someone were to spot him now, he was done for.

  Just as his fingertips were cramping and about to cede, the carriage passed underneath him. He released his hold, then balanced atop as Huan drove them away from the scene of his crime.

  From there, he lowered himself back into the seat through the carriage’s open window as if carriages were built for nothing but this.

  “You found what you were after?” he heard Huan say through the trap.

  “Yes, Huan, and I could not have done it without you,” Mycroft replied. “Now, pray you, drive slowly,” he added, “and watch for pits in the road.”

  As the carriage turned the corner past the policeman making his rounds, Mycroft pulled the cards and magnifying glass from his jacket pocket, his hands shaking. By the light of the small lantern that swung from the ceiling of the cab, he took the beaker with Charles’s fingerprints out of the brass vase-holder
on the door where he had placed it. Keeping the cards in their original order, he attempted to match Charles’s finger marks to the smudges on the first card and was pleased with a quick reward.

  * * *

  Mycroft knew that each Saturday night, Douglas stayed over at Nickolus House, for his mythical Mr. Smythe had charged him with accompanying the boys to church each Sunday. Douglas would therefore not find it the least bit odd to be roused from sleep by the occasional childish bickering, the indignant retorts of aggrieved adolescence. But surely he did not expect Mycroft and Huan at his door at three in the morning.

  Mycroft could read it in his friend’s expression as he led them inside.

  Huan let out a yawn and stretched his arms out. “Now you are safe,” he said as Douglas wordlessly led them towards the kitchen, “perhaps I have a little lie-down, yes?”

  “The guest room is yours,” Douglas said, pointing to the second floor, even though there was no need, for Huan knew the way.

  As Huan took the stairs, Douglas turned to Mycroft, eyebrow upraised. “‘Now you are safe’?” he asked.

  “I was never in danger,” Mycroft replied, “strictly speaking.” This caused Douglas’s eyebrow to rise even further.

  They walked down the hall to the kitchen and sat across from each other at the table, Douglas looking about as spent as the fire.

  “Chilly in here,” Mycroft said.

  “Drafty old building,” Douglas replied, making no move to remedy it.

  Mycroft reached into his jacket pocket and did as his brother had: he led with the evidence.

  “Do not reprimand me for stealing,” Mycroft begged as he did so. “Rather, look through the lens and compare the calling card on top with the prints in the beaker.”

  Douglas hesitated, then said: “You went through her window, I assume?”

  “With a bit of assistance from Huan and the carriage,” Mycroft confessed.

  Douglas made a disapproving noise in his throat, but at last picked up the magnifying glass.

  “Naturally there is no ‘science’ to finger ridges,” Mycroft admitted as Douglas peered through it, comparing prints. “We cannot know, for example, if finger marks are unique to the individual or alter over the course of time, or are altered by specific events or even after death, for there has been precious little experimentation done on them. Charles’s fingers, for example, were grossly swollen by pooled blood. A few more hours, and the skin would have begun to split, rendering them all but useless…”

  He would have said more but for Douglas’s pained expression.

  “The point is, his prints in death match those of the top card, would you not agree?”

  “They are identical,” Douglas said quietly.

  “I therefore posit the following scenario,” Mycroft said, keeping his voice low. “This man, William Angel, is a trusted confidante of Madame de Matalin’s, or he is a procurer of street urchins, or both. For the moment, what they are to each other is less intriguing than what they are not.”

  “And why would that be?” Douglas asked.

  “Why a card?” Mycroft said in response. “If he has a willing, capable boy, why not simply appear at her doorstep and say, ‘Here is your willing, capable boy!’ But he does not.”

  “Perhaps he does not wish the close association,” Douglas surmised.

  “Perhaps. But the boy has that association with de Matalin, he sees her manservant, he knows her quarters. Why would Angel protect himself so assiduously, but not his ‘client’? No, there must be a better reason. Let us suppose she wishes to inject various substances into her veins,” Mycroft continued, “but she does not wish to keel over dead because the potency of the latest batch has altered, or because the drug itself is one for which she has developed no tolerance. Street urchins may be expendable and drugs legal, but using a child as a human pincushion is still the sort of shenanigans that would be highly frowned upon in polite society.”

  “One can only hope,” Douglas replied.

  “That said,” Mycroft went on, “Angel still has to ensure that the boy is willing and able, and that he can keep such an odious secret. So he hires the boy but does not bring him directly, for reasons yet unknown. The boy appears at her door, feigning to look for work as a sweep or anything else. In his pocket, he carries Angel’s calling card with the finger marks—the first step in assuring the boy’s legitimacy. De Matalin, or more likely her butler, then observes as the lad makes a new set of prints beside the old.”

  “But wouldn’t any specified object or code word do as well?” Douglas objected.

  “No. An object can be appropriated, a code word overheard. But there is no disguising finger marks. Both sets are inspected, and if a match, everyone is off to the races.”

  “Reasonable and horrific,” Douglas replied. “But what happens tomorrow, when she opens her box and finds the cards gone, along with her magnifying glass?”

  “They were under a false bottom. She will not be putting anything in, or taking anything out, until a new boy is found for her. Charles has been dead less than four days. And Angel must procure another lad that, albeit a drug user, is willing to forsake his own habit, has a strong constitution, can be trusted to keep a secret that practically invites blackmail, and is personable besides.”

  Douglas nodded. “And let us not forget is small enough, or thin enough, that he is a match for de Matalin—for it would do no good to have a big, burly lad with a voracious appetite for narcotics as her laboratory specimen. Still,” Douglas continued, “if she finds that the cards have been purloined, along with the glass…”

  “Then perhaps she will have the fright of her life and cease these horrendous activities,” Mycroft replied. “I would cry no tears over that. Oh, and I was careful to remove the cards from her box in the same order in which she placed them. The most common placement of a series is oldest at bottom, newest on top. I believe Charles was boy number six: the last of the lads who acted as her taster… and who may’ve died of it.”

  Douglas sighed and shook his head. “Six boys? Are you speculating that all died?” he asked.

  “I have no evidence,” Mycroft replied, “merely conjecture. One does not ‘retire’ from this sort of work. I suppose one can outgrow it, if he lives that long. Like the chimney sweeps, he becomes too big to be of use. But even then, allowing such a one to keep secrets for a lifetime seems the height of recklessness.”

  “But what manner of people are these, who can do such ghastly things?”

  “A question like that from you?” Mycroft countered. “After all the evil you have witnessed in your lifetime?”

  “I pray that it always catches me unawares. For the moment I am too tempered, too seasoned to it… I am lost.”

  33

  SUNDAY 1 DECEMBER PASSED WITHOUT INCIDENT AND NARY a drizzle. The morning papers revealed that Saturday’s football match between Scotland and England had resulted in a disappointing zero-all tie. Douglas smiled and lifted a victorious fist for his friend Mycroft’s behind-the-scenes triumph. After that, in the name of the sickly but pious Mr. Smythe, Douglas escorted his young charges to church, then back home to Nickolus House for a hale breakfast. After which, bellies filled, he watched them play a rousing game of football in the chill winter air.

  In terms of rules, the match was haphazard at best, and altogether too vocal, but the players seemed merry. One contingent was England, the other Scotland, for every player in Britain worth his salt was set to putting right the previous day’s wrong via a neighborhood match.

  Towards evening, Douglas planned to visit the docks and secure a translator for Sherlock. He knew Sherlock was staying at Edwardes Square and would get word to him about a place and time to meet. But for the moment, he invested what he could in the children’s game and for a time managed to forget all about Madame de Matalin and chimney sweeps and finger ridges and yellow landaulets and murder.

  He was doubly grateful when George, however tentatively, kicked the ball around.
And he marveled, not for the first time, at the stubborn resilience of children.

  * * *

  Sherlock, in residence on Edwardes Square, made the best of his temporary lot in life. The house was commodious, albeit with that too-new sterility that made every room seem all corners and sharp edges. The twins’ father, Mr. Quince, a barrister whom Sherlock had never met, was once again away on business, though he made his presence known from a side table by the sofa. In a silver frame atop an embroidered doily sat the photograph of a long, pale, balding figure with an equally pale mustache and goatee, who stared out into the room like a man doing his utmost to appear austere, but who succeeded only in looking bewildered. Eli and Asa hardly spoke of him—a pity, Sherlock thought, as he had always been keen to learn more about the man—and he wondered how much time the twins had spent in his company.

  As for Mrs. Quince, she was as wan and spectral as her boys. Sherlock was hard pressed to believe she even cast a shadow. He and the twins saw her only at dinner, when her few whispery words addressed the flavor, consistency and relative portions of the meal at hand, which she usually greeted with something akin to resigned disapproval.

  Sherlock concluded that he had never met anyone as quiet, as downright sepulchral, as Mrs. Quince and her boys.

  All in all, they should have been a brilliant study of “nature versus nurture.” Though anthropologist Francis Galton, Charles Darwin’s cousin, had coined the term of late, the concept had obsessed philosophers for eons. Plato was convinced that Nature determined what personality traits one possessed, whereas Aristotle was certain that environment and experiences defined and directed one’s actions and world view.

  Sherlock had hoped that observing the twins would lead to more grounded theories about the mind: whether it held a primacy of inherited or learned behavior. But although he saw physical similarities between Eli, Asa and their mother, and certain movements and expressions were surely the same, nothing tipped the scale of one path over the other.

  In any event, Latin had temporarily subsumed everything else. Though he would have to meet Mycroft’s exacting standards, he found that, with incentive, it became very nearly tolerable. It simply needed context. And that context had nothing whatever to do with ancient, musty texts that spoke of Caesars long gone and that served no purpose… and everything to do with his desire to get on with the business of sleuthing.