The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Part IV

by David Marcum

Mycroft frowned. “I do not recall you ever visiting me here before.”

  “I burgled your office when I was fifteen,” Holmes said casually. “Many of these files are still in the same place.”

  Mycroft nodded without any apparent surprise. “Ah, the Suez Canal Affair. Yes, I had forgotten that.”

  “I doubt it,” Holmes rejoined, “as it led to us barely speaking for an entire decade.”

  “We were on opposite sides of a very serious political problem, and your actions were precipitate.”

  “They were correct.”

  “In terms of justice and morality, arguably yes. In terms of international diplomacy, certainly not.” Mycroft waved an enormous hand airily. “Time has passed, however, and we are far downstream from the days of our youth. I was hoping to engage your services on a task which requires some physical activity, and for which I am unable to use any of my own agents. Noting your problems in walking, however, let alone running, I may be barking up the wrong tree.” He glanced between Holmes and me. “Oh, congratulations on the Tulp affair, by the way. Several Ministers will be resigning in the next few days in order to spend more time with their families.”

  “The man was an unpleasant blot on the escutcheon of society,” my friend observed, “and deserved everything that happened to him. But please do not worry about me - if I am required to move rapidly then morphine can cancel out the pain - “ He held up a hand toward me, “ - and if my physician wishes to point out that I would be compounding the damage, then I would propose that he engages in any necessary physical activity, aided by one or another of the many agents that I have in the capital.”

  “Yes, young Wiggins will have passed his twentieth birthday by now, and most of his crew of young vagrants will not be far behind. I had noticed that you still employ them from time to time, as well as the next generation of Irregulars. Very well. In short, and please treat this information with the utmost discretion, we are aware that a group of anarchists based here in London have obtained a list of all the agents that the European governments have infiltrated within their ranks across the entire continent. You will be aware that, since the Haymarket Affair in Chicago a few years ago, in which twelve people died as the result of a bomb thrown by anarchists at a rally, our Government has been forced to take this disorganised and apparently leaderless group of political naifs far more seriously than they had previously. If these anarchists are not curbed, then the killings will continue until they get what they want, which is nothing less than the overthrow of all Governments everywhere and their replacement by some kind of badly defined and idealistic collective effort.”

  “The bomb only killed one person,” Holmes observed drily. “The remaining eleven deaths, which included four police officers, resulted from the Chicago police themselves firing wildly into the crowd. But yes, I am aware that anarchists are a clear and present danger to our values. What can we do to help?”

  “This anarchist cell, as they refer to themselves, intend smuggling this list out of the country to their international associates. The list is too long to memorise, and so must be carried physically. We are aware of the identities of the anarchists, but we must actually catch them with the list in their possession and in circumstances under which they cannot claim that they came by it accidentally, in order that we can make a cast iron legal case against them.”

  Mycroft’s argument seemed surprisingly weak to me, and my friend obviously agreed. “What Mycroft actually means,” he said, glancing over at me, “is that this nest of vipers have previously smuggled information out of the country and he wants to know how they have managed it, lest somebody do it again.”

  “They are associated with a Russian theatrical troupe who are currently performing at the Fortune Theatre in London,” Mycroft went on, ignoring his brother. “Russia is a crucible for anarchist thought, thanks to the theories of Pyotr Kropotkin.” He shook his head and glanced over at me. “The man is a Russian prince by birth, would you believe it? You would have thought he would know better. Anyway, we believe that these performers are involved with the process of smuggling the information somehow, but my brother is correct - we cannot tell what process they follow.”

  “Capital,” Holmes said, clapping his hands together - a process that required him to balance his walking stick against a bookshelf and put his weight onto his undamaged right ankle. “Consider us to be on the team.”

  And so it was that I found myself, on that very evening, standing in a doorway in a side-street in Hoxton. It was cold enough that my breath turned to mist in front of my face, mixing with the smoke from London’s many fires, and I had to stamp my feet to stop them from freezing.

  Mycroft had gone on to tell us that the prime mover in the anarchist cell - the “controlling mind” as the judiciary would have it - was a young Irish woman of good education, recognisable by her mane of flaming red hair. She, he informed us, would undoubtedly be the one who would carry the list of names. He also admitted that the reason he could not - in fact, would not - use his own agents was that they had already failed several times to apprehend the woman with any suspicious materials on her person. Not only were they obviously not up to the job, but their faces were well known to this red-haired anarchist and her friends.

  “I am led to believe,” Mycroft said as we took our leave, “that this will be the woman’s last journey. She leaves for Russia, for a convocation of anarchists, and I think we have to presume that she had planned her exit accordingly. She won’t just get the boat train, as she knows she will be under observation. She will have arranged a covert exit strategy.”

  Holmes had based himself in a cab around the corner, for comfort. The driver was Shinwell Johnson - a small-time boxer who Holmes sometimes employed for this kind of thing.

  Three hours into our vigil, I saw the door to the house open and a slight figure wrapped against the cold emerge. The bustle gave away the fact that it was a woman, and the red hair that cascaded around her milk-white face suggested that it was our quarry. She had timed her exit to coincide with a two-wheeler passing by. She raised a hand to hail it, and as it pulled in to the pavement I heard her say, “The Fortune Theatre, please,” in a throaty but educated voice.

  This was one of several possibilities that Holmes had anticipated. As the cab drew away from the kerb, I quickly held up three fingers to one of the grown-up Baker Street Irregulars who was huddled in a doorway opposite. Confident that he would send the other Irregulars on to the theatre and stay behind to create a minor delay with a horse and cart he had waiting, I ran ahead and climbed into Holmes’s cab.

  “The Fortune Theatre, and quickly!” I called up to Johnson, who was wrapped up like a mummy.

  “The third option,” Holmes murmured. “And the most likely one, to boot.”

  It took twenty minutes to get to the theatre, and Holmes remained silent for the entire journey, his chin on his chest. When we arrived I found a shop doorway to hide in while Holmes limped inside the theatre.

  There was a large crowd around the entrance. The smell of unwashed bodies was detectable beneath the various perfumes, hair oils, aftershaves, and eau de toilettes that the people in the crowd had sprayed or spread on themselves before coming out for the evening. Combined with the various stenches of the horse dung that caked the streets, the guttering gas-lights, and the smoke from coal and wood fires spread across the face of London, I felt as if I could cut the air with the blunt side of a fish-knife. Much as I loved London, the older I grew the more I longed for the clean air and peace of the English countryside.

  I wound my muffler closer around the lower half of my face and tried to breathe through my mouth rather than my nose.

  Waiting there, cold and alone, I mused about what might happen. What if she had changed her destination while moving? What if there were two Fortune Theatres? My mind raced for a few brief seconds while I tried to remember, but the a
nswer popped up quickly from my memory. There was only one Fortune Theatre within sensible driving distance. Unless she was planning on heading all the way to Birmingham, if she was still intending going to the theatre then she was coming here.

  There were posters outside the theatre, advertising whatever was going on inside. Apparently it was a show of illusions and magic tricks. I was not an aficionado - Holmes usually took us to violin recitals, and if I was alone I would choose something with pretty dancers and petticoats - but I was aware that there were several such shows on in London, and that magic had become something of a craze.

  From my position in the shop doorway, I tried to pick out my target from the crowd without actually giving away the fact that I was looking. The shadows in the doorway helped, but the woman was clever, according to Mycroft Holmes, and she was observant.

  Scanning the crowd, I couldn’t see the distinctive red hair that I had glimpsed earlier, and neither could I see a scarf, a wig, or a hat that might be covering it up. My time with Sherlock Holmes had made me sensitive to disguises, and I was sure that I could see through any changes she might make in her appearance.

  A figure appeared out of the fog and stopped beside me. It was Wiggins - once a member of the gang of ragamuffins that Holmes used to run errands for him, but now a coal delivery man. He was always willing to return and help out, however. His collar was up against the cold and his cap was pulled down over his face. Only a fringe of fair hair poked out, and there was frost on that fringe. I had to admit that the lad made a good anonymous follower - no different from half-a-dozen idlers and loungers that I could see from where I stood.

  “Any news?” I asked.

  “Her cab’s caught up at Piccadilly,” Wiggins said. His breath billowed out in front of his mouth like steam from a kettle. “There’s a crush of them, all trying to go in different directions. Lots of shouting, and some fisticuffs. I reckon she’ll be here in five minutes though.”

  “You’re sure she’s still in the cab?”

  Wiggins nodded. “Sure as I know my own mother’s face. I’ve had one door in sight ever since she left her house, and Mellor’s had the other. There’s no way she could have got out without us seeing.”

  “Then we should still be all right. Is there any way she could have seen your face?”

  “Not as far as I can tell. I’ve stayed in the shadows, with my cap pulled down.”

  I took a quick look up and down the street, and made a decision. “Right - you go round the back of the theatre, to the stage door. If she goes inside I don’t want her nipping out of the back before we can get eyes on her.”

  “What should I do if she does come out of the stage door?” Wiggins questioned.

  I tried to work out what Holmes would have said, had he been here. “Follow her, and get word back to me as soon as you can as to where she’s ended up. If it looks like she’s heading for a station, a dock or a quayside, then call a policeman and have her arrested.”

  “On what charge?” Wiggins asked.

  “Oh, let’s say pick-pocketing and leave it at that for the moment. Now go, before she gets here.”

  Wiggins slipped off, crossing the street and heading down a side alley towards the stage door. I looked around again to see if any of my other men were around, but I couldn’t spot any familiar faces. I probably needed five more men right there at the theatre to make sure I didn’t lose her when she arrived, but I only had two - and one of them was me. There were too many possibilities, too many ways it could all go wrong - and if it did then Mycroft Holmes would not be happy. How on Earth did Holmes manage when it was just him, alone, following someone?

  A cab pulled up by the entrance to the theatre, its horse rearing back and snorting as the driver pulled on the reins. A woman slipped out, stepping to the pavement. She turned and handed a coin up to the driver. He tipped his cap. Before the woman had turned away, another fare was stepping inside and calling a destination up.

  I noticed red hair cascading out from beneath the woman’s bonnet. The clothes were the same ones I remembered from earlier. So was the bonnet. This was indeed her. She hadn’t given us the slip after all.

  As I watched, she moved through the crowd towards the theatre doors. I didn’t see her show a ticket, but the uniformed staff on the doors waved her through.

  I left my doorway and crossed the street. A horse nipped at my collar with huge yellow teeth like tombstones as I ran in front of it.

  Holmes had already paid for my ticket and left it with one of the boys on the door - all I had to do was give my name and I was in. Ahead of me I could see the bonnet beneath which was the red hair of the woman I was following. She was making her way down one of the two aisles of the theatre towards the front. As I watched, she took a seat in the front row.

  I slipped into a seat at the end of a row, and waited. Theatre-goers took their seats around me. I looked around, but I could not see Holmes anywhere.

  After a few minutes the gas lamps in the theatre were extinguished, leaving just the ones running along the edge of the stage. The fire curtain slowly rose up into the space above, revealing a backcloth painted with mountains and a stage lined with flat panels decorated with Indian and Asian symbols in mixed profusion.

  In the orchestra pit in front of the stage, the musicians struck up an Oriental tune: all minor keys and discords. A few seconds later a moustachioed man in a flowing blue silk gown embroidered with golden dragons emerged from the wings. His face was shiny with greasepaint, which had been used to give him an Oriental appearance: sallow skin and almond-shaped eyes. His hair was covered with a cap that made him appear bald, apart from a braided queue hanging down his back. For the next ten minutes he produced flowers, playing cards, coins, and flags of all nations in profusion from nowhere, to great applause from the enraptured audience.

  I wasn’t watching. I was fixated on the bonnet that I could see twenty rows in front of me. I had almost persuaded myself that she had passed her bonnet to someone else to wear, and was cursing my own stupidity and my lack of help, when she turned her head briefly. Her profile was the one I had seen outside her house. She was still there, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

  I looked around again for Holmes, and this time I saw him. He was in a box to my right overlooking the stage. He had his strapped foot up on the railing of the box for comfort, and he was watching the red-haired woman through a pair of theatre glasses. After a few seconds he appeared to feel that he was being watched. He lowered his glasses, looked down at me, and nodded.

  The orchestra stopped playing and put down their instruments. I looked back to the stage, where the costumed man had apparently just produced several doves from his hands which fluttered away into the corners of the stage.

  “Ladies and gentlemen!” His voice, pitched precisely, cut through the general hubbub in the theatre. He spoke with a marked Asiatic accent. “I wish to present for you now perhaps the greatest, the most incredible, the most unbelievable trick that has ever been performed in public!” As the expectant audience started to applaud, I added: “And for this trick I will need the help of someone from the audience!” He made a play of looking around. “Someone! Anyone! Do not worry - no harm will come to you. I have not lost an assistant...” He paused momentarily. “Yet!” The orchestra produced a quick musical sting to punctuate the weak jest. As the audience laughed he continued: “The beautiful lady in the front row, perhaps?”

  The red-headed woman in the bonnet glanced left and right, just in case he was talking to someone else. She made a pantomime of pointing to herself inquiringly. I couldn’t see from behind, but I suspected she was miming: “Me?”

  The performer in the Chinese robes nodded, and held out a hand. “Please, my dear lady - join me!”

  I tensed in my seat, and shot another glance towards Holmes in his box. He had taken his foot down so he could lean forward
in his seat, watching closely what was going on. Was this a ploy? Was this how she was going to make her escape?

  She stood up, to more applause from the audience. With a slight nod of her head, she headed for the side of the stage, where five steps led upwards, past the orchestra pit.

  I watched tensely. If she vanished from sight then I would have to rush the stage and damn the consequences.

  Fortunately she stayed in sight all the way up the steps and onto the stage. For the first time I could actually see her from head to foot for more than a split second. She was slim and beautiful, with high cheekbones and a sharp chin. She looked exotic, as if she hailed from some distant country, but I had heard her voice and she had a soft Irish accent. The members of the orchestra craned their necks, watching her climb the steps. They obviously hadn’t seen anyone that attractive, that delicate, for a while either. Or perhaps they could see her ankles beneath the long skirt.

  The conjurer took her hand as she stepped on to the stage. “Ladies and Gentlemen,” he called, “I present to you a trick that was old when the world was young, a trick that has been passed down from master to acolyte in the high mountains of Tibet, a trick that I learned personally from a wizened sage living in a remote cave: I present for your edification and delight a trick that I am pleased to call The Transmogrification of the Angel!”

  As the audience broke into spontaneous applause, and the musicians struck up an ominous but ethereal air redolent of winds on high mountaintops, the conjurer led the red-haired woman to the back of the stage. A flat rose up on hidden wires, revealing several wooden steps leading up to a platform some five feet above the stage. The platform was supported on several wooden pillars. The space beneath it was empty, and the back-cloth clearly visible behind it.

  The conjurer led our quarry to the base of the steps. He let go of her hand and she climbed up to the platform, then turned to face the audience, hands held demurely in front of her and head cast downwards. The conjurer walked beneath the platform and out to the back cloth, then turned around and came back again, clearly demonstrating that there were no hidden mechanisms or spaces. As he strode to the front of the stage again a hoop was lowered from the darkness above the stage, directly over the red-haired woman. A length of diaphanous white material about as tall as she was hung all the way around the hoop. As it descended, it hid the woman from sight.