Sherlock Holmes and The Adventure of the Ruby Elephants

by Christopher James

  Inspector Gregson, who had presided over the public farce for the bulk of the day, was well beyond the point of frustration.

  ‘Can’t we hurry this along?’ he asked, retrieving and replacing his pocket watch without even bothering to look at the time.

  ‘If you would prefer to ascend, Inspector,’ said Digby slowly, without taking his eyes off the column, ‘then be my guest.’ He weighed up the column as a chef might survey his ingredients before cooking a delicious dinner. Eventually the climb began. As the offices emptied, the crowd swelled to an even greater size as the show unfolded against the skyline. He inched up, as a sloth might ascend a great tree in the great forests of South America and after ten minutes, he was half way. He had his own elaborate system of ropes and pulleys, which appeared magically from his person rather like thread from a spider. He swung a little to the left and right, dropped down a foot or so while he secured a position, before winching himself up again. He was an artist at work. Within half an hour, he was at the base of the Corinthian capital, where the column flowers outwards and five minutes later he was at the top. A hush fell upon the crowd as they waited for him to pronounce on the fate of the man.

  ‘Dead!’

  The steeplejack’s shout echoed around the hushed square. A low murmur soon replaced the silence, and the crowd began to disperse. The game was up.

  ‘Another notch on the reaper’s belt,’ I heard a man mutter.

  ‘This strange summer grows stranger still,’ I said to an impassive Holmes.

  Presently we heard a squeaking coming from the top of the column. The bosom’s chair was being gently lowered and Gregson was preparing to clamber aboard.

  ‘We always knew you’d rise to the top, sir,’ one of his constables joked. The inspector glared at him. Having safely delivered Gregson, the chair began to lower again. A note pinned to the wooden seat requested that Holmes join them.

  ‘Well,’ said Holmes, ‘I think it’s only fair, in the interests of the public record that you join us too, doctor.’

  All of London lay below us. It was a city of spires and rooftops, towers and thoroughfares. The buildings curved and twisted as if distorted in a hall of mirrors. I don’t know how much time Nelson spent in a crow’s nest himself but I imagine the sensation was similar. We seem to sway in the breeze. Nelson had become a stone god pushing his way up into the clouds, his face as cold and impassive as it was when he sighted the French fleet.

  ‘You’ve gone a little green, Gregson,’ remarked Holmes.

  ‘Thank you, Holmes,’ said the Inspector. ‘I would be grateful if we do not prolong this any longer than is strictly necessary.’

  My friend and I were already one step ahead of Gregson. The dead man was the queer, bald headed fellow we had seen negotiating with Snitterton in the feather factory. Holmes gave me that steely look that told me this information was not to be shared. The body was quite rigid and lying at a haphazard angle face down at Nelson’s feet.

  ‘I say this body fell from a height,’ averred Holmes

  ‘Preposterous,’ scoffed Gregson. ‘Where from? The moon?’

  ‘Close,’ said Holmes. ‘A balloon.’ Gregson stared at him. My friend explained his theory in that clear, reasonable manner of his, showing the path that the hot balloon had taken, crushing the weather vanes and railings along the tops of the buildings. Holmes even picked up a piece of ribbon and a scattering of sand that could, conceivably have spilled from the balloon’s basket. Gregson stare had turned into a look of intense irritation.

  ‘I’m afraid I find that very hard to believe. Help me turn the body, doctor.’

  We grasped the man’s shoulders and with some effort (he was a portly fellow) managed to turn him onto his belly. I leapt back in horror, a dangerous business one hundred and seventy feet above the ground. His eyelids were wide open but where his eyes should have been, there were two gleaming stones.

  ‘Are they diamonds?’ I spluttered.

  ‘No, said, Holmes, bending low over the body, ‘only glass.’

  ‘A ghoulish business,’ said the steeplejack distastefully as he watched the scene unfold.

  ‘There’s something in his hand,’ I said.

  Rigor mortis had set in, and Gregson had to break the poor man’s finger to release the small slip of paper he still clutched. The inspector uncurled the note and read the first line with some astonishment.

  ‘To Mr Sherlock Holmes, Esq.’ He stared at the note and scanned it again. ‘It’s for you!’ he blurted.

  ‘So it appears,’ agreed Holmes. ‘Read on.’

  To Mr Sherlock Holmes, Esq,

  The state of play at lunch

  You have played a fine innings. You have managed to deny my bowlers any easy wickets. Your defensive play is ingenious and your attack has a grace that few possess. But now it is my turn to bat. I feel you have exhausted yourself at the crease. Abandon the match and return to the club house while you still can. This is your final warning.

  GW

  ‘Who is this GW?’ Gregson demanded.

  ‘I have no idea,’ said Holmes.

  ‘I should arrest you now,’ the Inspector threatened. ‘What exactly are you holding back?’

  ‘I assure you,’ said Holmes truthfully. ‘I have to the best of my knowledge, and without consulting my notes, had any dealings with a GW.’ He peered at the finger Gregson was pointing at his chest.

  ‘Are you a cricketing man?’ asked Holmes.

  ‘When I have time, yes,’ said Gregson.

  ‘Then you will know that W.G. Grace scored two centuries in a single match against Yorkshire in the summer before last. Watson, I believe you were there.’

  ‘I certainly was,’ I confirmed. It was a magnificent match.’

  ‘What is your point, Holmes?’

  ‘I’m not sure I have one yet,’ my friend said. ‘But look at those initials, albeit the wrong way around, the cricketing theme and the use of the word ‘grace’ in the second line.’

  ‘Are you implying the finest cricketer this country has yet produced has blood on his hands?’

  ‘I have no idea,’ said Holmes innocently. ‘It is merely an observation. Inspector, I have a thousand enemies in London alone. Any one of them could have sent this note.’

  ‘But how did they know you would be here to receive it?’

  ‘Because of the extraordinary manner of its delivery. They knew you would call me for me at once.’

  ‘I have had quite enough of this,’ said Gregson, his complexion by now an even sicklier shade of green. ‘If you don’t mind gentlemen, I would be grateful if we could continue this discussion on terra firma.’

  FOURTEEN - The Maharajah

  ‘What are your thoughts,’ I asked Holmes, laying down my copy of The Time Machine, ‘on intelligent life on other planets?’

  ‘I sometimes wonder if there is any on our own,’ quipped Holmes.

  The thermometer beneath the portrait of General Gordon confirmed that it was the warmest day of the year so far. The bricks of the houses opposite gleamed as if they were made from nine carat gold and despite the fact that our windows were half open, the air in our stuffy rooms at Baker Street had become so hot and heavy it was a wonder we did not have to spoon it like treacle into our mouths. I could barely think for the heat and loosened my collar.

  I was constantly astonished by Holmes’ ignorance of the celestial bodies. Around the time of our first adventure, he had confessed that he was ignorant of the fact that the Earth revolves around the Sun. He could not point out a single constellation and reached the grand total of four when I asked him to name the planets. I was not therefore expecting any kind of sensible response.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ said Mrs Hudson, appearing at the door with a tray of lemonade and sugar. ‘I thought you might like a cooling glass
of something.’

  ‘Mrs Hudson, how thoughtful and timely; it is as if you escaped from the court of Nebuchadnezzar,’ congratulated Holmes. ‘In a previous life I am convinced that you attended to the needs of a great king or emperor.’

  ‘Well I have come down in the world,’ she said, raising an eyebrow and casting a disapproving look around the room.

  The beverage had a powerful restorative affect on my brain, dousing some of the fires that had taken hold therein.

  ‘Well?’ I prompted Holmes, pressing the side of the glass like a cool balm against my forehead. ‘What is your view of extraterrestrial life and its chances of communicating with our own?’ Holmes sat forward and joined his fingers like a great general about to make his first move.

  ‘I can only provide an answer to this question by applying the sort of hard logic you find so infuriating.’

  ‘Try me,’ I invited.

  ‘We have good reason,’ he began, ‘to believe that we are the very zenith of civilisation. No human society has ever reached our level of scientific advancement, our sheer pitch of reasoning, knowledge or sophistication. It has taken us two thousand million years to reach this point and what have we achieved? We have produced the paperclip. Watson, it is a great leap from a paperclip, or even a steam locomotive to producing a vehicle that can escape the clutches of gravity, pierce the iron roof of the Earth and travel to the stars. It could take another five billion years.

  ‘Let us say, for the sake of argument, that there are a number of Earth-like bodies in the universe capable of sustaining life similar to our own. What stage are they at in their evolution? Are they still grubbing at the mouths of their caves? Have they stumbled yet on the advantages of the wheel or the means to produce fire? Are they at the paperclip stage? Let us infer from the deafening silence of the universe that none of them have gone beyond this. This means that we are the apotheosis of all extant life, which means if we wish to send an olive branch, it is incumbent on us to devise the steel dove that will deliver it.

  ‘By the time we develop such a mechanism, it is possible that we will have exhausted the generosity of the sun and disappeared in a lightning flash and a puff of smoke. I therefore believe that while it may of course be possible that there is intelligent life in the universe, it is unlikely we will ever have the evidence to prove or disprove it either way. This is precisely why I choose not to waste energy on any matters that go beyond the realm of the Earth. There is quite enough incident in our own goldfish bowl to keep us from wondering what other fittings and furnishings can be found in the sitting room.’

  I let Holmes’ words die away and such was their definitive tone, it felt there was no more that could be said on the subject. Indeed it was the sort of pronouncement that might, if overheard south of the river, in all probability cause the gentlemen of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich to shake their heads in defeat, fold up their star charts and pack away their telescopes for good. It was at this moment that Holmes spotted the bird at the window.

  ‘I say, he’s a handsome devil,’ Holmes remarked, pointing to a sparrow hawk that had inexplicably appeared on the sill. It stared at me with a piercing, yellow eye; its black pupil fixing me to the spot.

  ‘It must have escaped from the gardens at Buckingham Palace,’ I said. ‘Shoo it away. There will be pandemonium if it gets into the room.’

  ‘Wait,’ said Holmes. ‘What’s that tied around its leg?’

  He advanced carefully, treading softly across the room in his moccasins. Two feet away from the bird, he pounced, catching it in both hands. He detached a tiny scroll from its left leg then placed the bird back on the sill. It appeared to be entirely unfazed by its molestation.

  ‘Well, well,’ said Holmes, unfurling the message, ‘it’s from the Maharajah.’ He handed the note to me.

  Gentlemen,

  You have proved yourselves highly worthy of my respect. The manner in which you conducted yourselves in Regent’s Park has proved you are brave and resourceful men. I was only too glad to be of some small assistance with my rifle when you ran into difficulties. I am a modest man, but you will understand now why I am said to be fourth best shot in England.

  I have returned from exile to conclude one piece of unfinished business and with this I require your assistance. I would therefore like to invite you both to my estate which has lain dormant these past years. There we will enjoy each other’s company while I explain the particulars. A carriage is waiting outside which will bear you to the station. I will be only too delighted to meet you in person.

  Your friend,

  Maharajah Duleep Singh

  ‘It was him!’ I exclaimed.

  ‘Naturally,’ said Holmes. ‘It had all the hallmarks of a test which he observed throughout. Why else would he ask us to retrieve an object he had placed there himself?’

  ‘Astonishing.’

  Holmes scribbled a reply, rolled it tightly and then with the patience of a veterinarian secured it to the foot of the sparrow hawk. At Holmes’ nod, it blinked its eyes, shook out its wings then soared into the sky.

  ‘Well,’ said Holmes, gathering up his smoking paraphernalia, ‘are you game for a weekend in the country?’

  ‘Never more so,’ I cried. ‘London in August is a dustbowl. Good riddance to it!’

  We packed within minutes and soon found ourselves inside an airy brougham heading in the direction of King’s Cross Station.

  ‘The country!’ I mused, as we bowled along Bishopsgate. ‘The sun setting over the fields, the balmy mists over the lakes; the cool cider served by the smiling maiden...’

  ‘I fail to share your enthusiasm,’ remarked Holmes. ‘Every hour in the city offers a fresh strain of criminality. A decade can pass in a country village without so much as a corrupt postmaster.’

  ‘Come, Holmes,’ I urged. ‘Think of it as a holiday.’

  ‘At least,’ my friend said, gazing at the sun gleaming in an office window, ‘there is the prospect of progress in our case. The Maharajah I feel sure will provide some intelligence on this singular business of the ruby elephants.’

  London slipped away in a blur of red brick, chimney stacks, dusty yards and windowless factories. It gave way to the fields of the Home Counties, cool marshes, long grass, lakes like pools of melted gold, crowds of willows at the edge of the water, farms and the great country houses.

  ‘A perfect tonic, wouldn’t you agree Holmes?’

  ‘A glass of claret for me,’ he replied.

  He was distracted by a volume he had brought with him from 221b Baker Street.

  ‘A remarkable man,’ he murmured, looking up from his book. ‘The Maharajah has been a guest of Queen Victoria since the age of 15. He has been extended every luxury and enjoyed every trapping of the British aristocracy. He has lived in splendour in Northern Britain, in Yorkshire and finally in Elevedon, Norfolk. He has been baptised in the Church of England, taught to shoot, to appreciate art and architecture. And yet, he was a prisoner. He was forbidden to see his mother, to return to India independently lest he rallied the people of the Punjab against the British. Four years ago he left - attempting to return to his homeland - but was prevented by our government. He has converted to Sikhism and now lives in unhappy exile in Paris.’ Holmes closed the book.

  ‘Where is that glass of wine, Watson?’

  Let me find the steward,’ I said and rose from my seat.

  The train was roughly half full; for the most part, it was business types and gentlemen farmers, all semi-obscured by their copies of The Times and the Illustrated London News. Eventually I located the steward who promised that we would receive his prompt attention. Returning to my carriage, I encountered a tall, gaunt looking man in the corridor, distinguished by a scar across his chin and a hollow look in his eye. He pushed past me, without making eye contact.

  �
�I say,’ I said. ‘What’s the hurry?’ He disappeared down the corridor without looking back.

  A sleek black cab was waiting for us at the station, its driver a wily looking old man with uneven features. His nose swerved like a signpost over to the left and his moustache sprouted beneath like a tuft of grass.

  ‘Are you the gentlemen that have come up to see the Maharajah?’ he burred in his local dialect. Holmes nodded. ‘Then you need to come alonga me.’ He climbed down to help us with the luggage, glancing at the station clock. ‘You have made masterous good time.’ Perhaps mistaking me for Holmes’ man servant he stopped and stared at me at moment. ‘Well are you going to mow in with these bags, or will I be doing it all by myself?’

  ‘My name is Doctor Watson,’ I said.

  ‘Beggin’ your pardon, doctor,’ he said, bowing a little too deferentially. There was something about the man I did not like.

  ‘Thass a rare gentlemen, that Maharajah,’ remarked William, the driver, who had introduced himself as we jogged along the lane.

  ‘So I understand,’ replied Holmes.

  ‘I was mighty surprised to find he had returned. Four years he been gone; then last week, there he wuz again. I don’t know what’s brought him back. But he pays a tidy wage and I am obliged of it.’

  Holmes nodded, distractedly. ‘But he ‘ain’t half got a temper,’ the driver said, disloyally as we turned into the drive. ‘He wuz hooly raw wi me when I wuz late the other day.’

  The hall was an imposing Georgian construction that had been subjected to a number of radical alterations over the years. The Maharajah had brought his own ideas to the house, rendering it in the Italian style on the outside while inside it resembled a palace in Lahore. It had strong vertical lines, a pleasing symmetry and stared out over the grounds through its forty windows. Handsome balustrades lined the ramparts.