The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Part IV

by David Marcum

  A dwarf with uneven legs quickly produced a tray, and I was glad to clutch up the hot cup in my hands.

  “We are looking for a friend.” Holmes saucered his coffee to drink it faster. “And as we are late for our appointment, we are wondering if he might have given up and retired to his room.” Faster than I thought possible, he had the tip of a crown under the fellow’s tray.

  “It is late and many of our customers are away,” was the cautious response. “Mind you, they’re alone. We run a respectable place, sir!” He nodded proudly to a table full of sailors, who amongst them wore enough cutlery to suit a butcher’s. Three of them lifted their coffees in salute. I saw the glint of metal inside at least one sleeve and a fourth man clearly wore the scars of extended sword-fighting upon his face.

  “And our friend is equally respectable, else he would not have come here,” was his reassurance. “He is a little fellow, with features like a ferret and a sly look about his pointed yellow face. The sort of chap one might find politely waiting for his customers in a badly-lit alleyway. Oiled hair like a gentleman and proper shoes on his feet. Rather a bit prim, but he kicks like a mule when there’s trouble, and he has a firm voice for the braggarts.”

  “Oh, you mean him!” Our guide beamed. “He’s upstairs in the room with the white-painted door. No one’s seen him much for the week, but he pays in full. Not the first man to toddle off a ship to feel the claws of a fever!”

  Holmes paid the man and we made our way up the stairs, passing a knot of singing merchantmen on their way back out.

  Holmes knocked upon the door in question.

  “Who is it?” asked a sharp voice.

  “A friend or two.”

  There was a rustle from the other side of the heavy door, and who should yank it open but Lestrade himself, clad as an able merchantman for hire with cloth cap, tar-stained trousers, and a black-knitted Guernsey. The little professional was red-cheeked from fever, but his hand was steady as granite as he held open the door. His left hand gripped a revolver small enough to hide in his coat-sleeve.

  “Good Lord!” our old friend exclaimed. “Inside now, move a leg!”

  I could not help but notice that he did not put aside his weapon until we were both in his rude quarters, and he had leaned out to look both ways upon the corridor. With a slam, the door was re-sealed, and he was sinking back upon the narrow folding-bed.

  “You are ill, Lestrade!” I exclaimed. “Let me examine you!”

  “I am not certain we have time,” was his heavy reply. Where his face was normally sharp and sallow, it had drawn tight and high with unnatural colour. “So Tommy made it to you after all?” He struck at his heart. “I was worried sick about him! Dirty business, but he insisted he stick his neck out. I would have sworn those damned Piscinarians would have found him first!”

  Holmes turned pale. He bowed upon one knee on the unvarnished plank floor and sought the equal angle of our old friend’s eye. “Lestrade, I regret to say they did find him.”

  Lestrade flinched as though Holmes had personally struck him across the face. “He is dead?”

  “We examined him ourselves. I promise you, his killers were thwarted. They did not see the message he so carefully concealed, for his first thought was to your safety. That is how I knew to find you here.”

  “Oh, the sentimental old fool.” Lestrade buried his head in his hands. “I told him to forget me! He’d lost everything to his duty... should he have lost his life too?”

  “His duty was to you, and Gregson, and ultimately to this country,” Holmes said quietly. “We shall not let this go to waste.”

  “True, that.” Lestrade reached deep in his lungs for breath, and closed his eyes. “Well. Can we get me out of here without getting shot?”

  “What is your assessment?”

  “We’re safe enough inside the inn. Once we move out I’m less chancy with the odds. I don’t know if anyone saw me come in here, you see! Sir Reginald’s paid for half the blabs in London to find me, but he doesn’t know where to look.” Lestrade smiled wryly. “He’s a strange sort of fool, that one. Told them to look for me, but he was high-handed about it, insulted them even as he paid them - said to only bother him if they saw exactly what he told them to see.”

  “And what are they paid to see, Lestrade?” I took the moment to check his temperature with my hand. It was warm, but not enough to worry me if we could get him away soon.

  “A ragged beggar missing his shoes, with cracked smoked glasses and a full head of white hair.” He chuckled wearily at our surprise. “From what I understand, he was very rude, and they took his money, but most of ‘em will only report what he told them to see. Because that’s what they’re being paid for! But I say - how did you know to find me here?”

  Sherlock Holmes scoffed. “Simplicity itself. You are a married man, as the Force prefers their men in authority, and most unlikely to inhabit a certain type of establishment. Your wife trusts you and that is obvious to anyone who knows you - but that also means you are determined to never abuse that trust. When I saw the unmistakable white blossoms of Mrs. Sword in the window, it confirmed the presence of a rather delicate network of intelligence for Gregson’s men.”

  “Delicate?” Lestrade stared. “Have you seen her temper? She’s got a fist like a fishwife and a right hook like a pickaxe! Oh, this ought to be interesting!” He knelt to toss aside a cheap rush-woven rug and dipped his fingers into a crack between the floor-boards. A small hole emerged, and from it he pulled the more familiar coat and hat of a police inspector, complete with his tea can, watch, cigarette-case, handcuffs, dark lantern, warrant card, and finally a truncheon sewn inside his coat.

  “I am long late for my appointment. If you wish to come along, I would be glad for the company, for I am not certain I trust myself with a fever over your sharp eyes and ears, Mr. Holmes... or your marksman’s trigger, Doctor.” He passed over his weapon without a blink. “Small but useful at close range, does best if you are aiming for anything no further from you than ten yards away. After that the bullet drops low.”

  I quickly transferred the gun to my hand. “Only tell us where to go, Lestrade.”

  “Ah, but that depends on Mr. Holmes.” Lestrade pointed to a bulge at Holmes’s pocket.

  With a smile as smug as a schoolboy caught by the Headmaster at doing something clever, my friend pulled out Rees’ footwraps.

  Lestrade selected the large one, and in seconds had folded it into narrow strips and was wrapping it around his battered old truncheon. It was markedly shorter than the modern weapon, and tapered slightly like a baton.

  “We had the same kind of truncheon,” he smiled at my interest. “Only his was his father’s, from the Runners. Mine is from my old teacher on the Force, a friend of his da’s.”

  “And his truncheon was splintered with his cane, and thrown away.” Holmes grumbled. “More evidence lost.”

  Without a speck of space to spare, we saw letters assemble before our eyes:

  HOW DO YOU POUR A ROUND PAIL INTO A SQUARE HOLE?

  “Oh, dear,” Lestrade sighed. “That’s that. I really will be grateful of your presence. That’s putting us right in the lion’s den.” I did not ask what he meant, for Holmes looked as though he had already divined the code and approved of the action. “Shall we go?”

  “Leave it to us, Friend Lestrade,” Holmes smiled, and I knew to be wary, for that particular smile was the silent form of Holmes’s laugh. It never bodes ill for someone who deserves it. “Watson, are you ready?”

  “Always, Holmes.”

  “Then we shall do as we please. Have your weapon at ready, and Lestrade, can you defend yourself?”

  “I shall pretend I did not hear you ask me that.” Our small friend was still very white with anger, but his voice was cold, and his hands clutched up his clumsy dark-lantern a
nd antique black truncheon, better suited to a museum than a modern officer of the law. If anyone who did not know Lestrade were to look at him now, they would have instantly judged him as a lowest-order thief and bludger, the sort who would plunder a policeman and take his tools of trade for spoils.

  “Very well, Lestrade. We shall be going to our cab, and there may be some unpaid-for drama in our journey. Do you have any objections to sitting between Watson and I?”

  “None at all.” And for the first time, the little professional truly smiled. “You are both considerably larger than I.”

  Part IV

  With our weapons ready, we slipped down the back of the inn and into the waiting cab.

  “Take us to any of the streets behind the Bodkin Mews, my good man.” Holmes grinned at my surprise, but Lestrade was distracted, and his hands rubbed anxiously at his dark lantern.

  “I can’t help it,” the little policeman muttered. “He must have gotten that far...” And then he fell silent for the rest of the trip.

  Last night’s illusion of a peaceful London was gone. In my heightened imagination, I thought an unusual number of ill-kept men were about, looking aimlessly around the streets with one or both hands tucked inside large pockets. Holmes’s good humour had died, and he appeared as tense as Lestrade, who was holding himself in check only by his nervous energy.

  “That looked like Johnny Mark,” Holmes said quietly.

  “Yes. He would ruin me or Gregson in for free.” Lestrade did not look up, but kept his dark lantern in his lap. His fingers played with the lid back and forth.

  “Ah.” Holmes brightened as we slowed to a stop inside a pool of darkness between two derelict buildings. Two uniformed policemen stood at ready, willing to confront anyone hoping to pick over the archaeological site for rewards, but their eyes were hard and angry at a cluster of milling tradesmen, and their attention was usefully away from us. I recognized the shells of the buildings caught in the fire on Bodkin Mews, and even now there was a haze of charcoal and scorch in the wet air.

  “The risk paid off, Lestrade. Sir Reginald would never think to return again to the scene of the crime, would he?”

  “That was the hope,” Lestrade muttered gloomily. “Never can tell with educated men.” But he nodded firmly and sprang out of the cab to nip into the blackened labyrinth without a thought.

  Holmes and I had to follow at a much-slower pace. It was clear Lestrade had the advantage of knowing the lay of land, and his small size made him a natural citizen of this broken place. We had to struggle to keep up, for only the thinnest slips of light from the odd street-lamp were capable of giving us help. Holmes was never without his pocket-lamp, but we both sensed it was better to move without revealing ourselves. I thought unkindly that Lestrade was taunting us with our larger forms, for he never once paused to light his own lamp, and that all of my appellations as to his being “rat-like” were well suited for these dangerous terrains.

  Lestrade suddenly stopped and dropped to the earth, crawling a short distance through a deadly tumble-down of blackened timbers. I flatter myself on not flinching when I am needed, but I admit I was uneasy when I crept on my hands and knees into a dry, dusty gloom. Spiderwebs crossed my eyes, and I batted them away to find the darkness slit open by weak beams of light. Among dust-motes and fluttering insects, I could smell the patient tang of age, an odour that I have only known in the secret places of London.

  With Holmes’s encouragement I moved forward, cautiously, his pocket-lamp inches before my face. Pools of light illuminated the crumbling blue clay that baked into the city’s famous dark brick, and shards of rotting splinter thrust up too close to the thin soil. Very soon, the brick began to break and soft grey stone emerged: the dressed stone blocks of our Roman forefathers. Soon the road itself broke apart. I crawled over crushed stone in cement, then broken slabs of stone set in ancient concrete, and finally, a pad of sand, the first layer of the Roman road.

  Or so I thought at first. Black smears like ink stroked across the sand, and before I realised what I was doing, I set my palm down upon a thick plank of wood. It groaned under my weight and I hastily pulled back, crying out when the back of my head struck something hard. We were upon a large square made of loose board, and I could just barely see a canvas roof overhead, protecting us from the weather.

  “They’ll not see us now,” Lestrade whispered. “Mr. Holmes, I should be glad of your light.”

  “What is wrong with yours?” I whispered back.

  “It is broken, but it is requisitioned property, and I daren’t return without it,” he assured me. “Please, Mr. Holmes, do show a little light this way.”

  Holmes obligingly struck up his pocket-lamp, and we saw the little detective rummaging with his fingers upon the cracks of bare wooden strips. One gave way without warning and he struggled to set it aside without making any noise.

  When he task was done, he sat up, hurriedly doffed his coat, and rolled up his left sleeve as far as it could go, then stretched himself flat in order to plunge his arm almost to the shoulder in a black, gurgling well. I grabbed the lamp from Holmes and peered: it was indeed the old Roman well, its straight squared sides unmistakable, and still sound after the centuries.

  “The papers said the well was flooded.”

  “The papers lied. The well was sealed long ago when the Romans finished the road.” Lestrade swore faintly, and struggled with something, and it was all we could do to not help him, but we both knew he was not to be disturbed. Long minutes passed. Twice he sat up, wrung the life back into his frozen arm, to repeat his search again.

  At last he heard him gasp. “Pull me up. Hurry! Hurry!”

  Holmes did so quickly the water flew from the dank packet clutched in Lestrade’s arm. I blinked spray from my eyes, and Lestrade’s teeth were chattering but his dark eyes were bright.

  “Finally! How’s that safe of yours Mr. Holmes? Any room for a few more baubles?”

  Holmes laughed silently. “Since I parted with the Borgia’s toy? Always, Lestrade.”

  No mother kept their child as close as Lestrade did upon his sodden bundle, and I worried that his health would suffer for it. Thankfully we made good time to Baker Street, and Holmes sat him by the fire as he telephoned the private number for the Chairman of the Museum.

  “H-here.” Lestrade thrust the bundle at Holmes. “My word, you’re welcome to this m-mess. Barking mad, all these scientists!” He sank to the warmest corner and pulled out his tea-can and set it almost inside the bed of coals to warm.

  Holmes sat by the grate and eagerly tugged open the packet to give a single bark of bemusement. A single tooth flashed; a small, bulging round eye burned with an evil-looking glare, and Holmes was lifting up a small, robust metal beast. Its ears were sharp and upright, and triangular, savage teeth froze in the firelight. It was a splendid thing, as noble in spirit as it was savage, a perfect monster of the Celtic past wearing the filth of the ages as proudly as the blood of its enemies.

  But after my admiration paled I saw why Holmes was nonplussed.

  “This is not melted at all, Holmes!”

  “You have it, Watson!” He looked at the shivering little man who was more interested in drawing his knees up to his chest and soaking up the heat of the fire. “Two wolves in the well? But the question remains - where is the half-melted specimen?”

  Lestrade smiled with blue lips and lifted up his requisitioned dark lantern. “Be careful, the door is stuck.”

  I eagerly took up the lantern and pressed until the door creaked open, stiff and battered. Inside was another bundle, equally wrapped to keep from rattling, but smaller than the first. My hands shook with excitement as I worried off the cloth, but soon enough I was holding a half-melted twin to the one in Holmes’s hands.

  “This is wonderful,” I said quietly.

  “Yes,” Lestrade
agreed wistfully.

  Holmes looked at him, and I could see the compassion in his face, for the Inspector was seeing not treasures out of time, or the conclusion of a case or even justice. He was seeing a moment of triumph without a friend who ought to have been there.

  “What happened, Lestrade?” I asked as gently as I could.

  He took a deep breath before replying.

  “Tommy had been on the case from the beginning. He managed to get close enough to get in and steal the wolf from wherever Sir Reginald had it hidden - I’ve no idea how, I swear to you! All I knew was, Gregson sent me to give Tommy a hand. Once we met up, I found out there were two wolves dug out of that well - not one!”

  “The plot was to keep the whole wolf for himself, and to sell the half-melted wolf to whoever paid him an acceptable sum,” Holmes told him grimly. “England’s enemies would be glad of the opportunity to strike such a coup.”

  “That is treason,” Lestrade said tightly. “Theft is one thing - theft of national treasure another, but this is treason.”

  “I can prove it, Lestrade, and you know how I can.”

  Lestrade bowed his head. “What does it gain them?”

  “Precious little, old friend. But tell us, how did you and Rees separate?”

  “Amscott was moving close and we couldn’t risk being together. It was night and we managed to get to the Inn, where we tried to think of some way to baffle them on the chance they caught one or both of us. No matter what, we knew we couldn’t let them get their hands on either wolf, but if we split, we wouldn’t completely lose if we could get at least one back to the Museum, where there were men from the Foreign Office, ready to replace it with a copy.” Lestrade gnawed his lip and looked at me. “Doctor, how much do you - ?”

  “He knows everything and I assure you he will be discreet, Lestrade. Not a word of this will ever reach the news, not until the need for discretion has long since passed, even if we are long since dust.”