by Anthony Read
“Yeah. That was t’rific,” Shiner said. “Better even than them horseless carriages in Windsor. Ain’t that right, Beav?”
Beaver was still trying to get his breath back, and it took a few moments before he could say anything.
“What we gonna do now, Wiggins?” he gasped. “Which way we gonna go?”
“No way,” Wiggins answered. “We wait here.”
“Wait? What for?”
“For that,” said Wiggins, pointing down a street, where the first cab was just coming back into view round a corner.
The driver waved his whip and beckoned to them.
“What’s he doin’?” Gertie asked.
“You’ll see. Go on, drive down there.”
Gertie started the horse again, and they trundled down to the other cab.
As they drew level with it, the driver called out to them. “It worked! We’ve got them!”
Wiggins grinned at him and the others stared as they saw his face and heard his voice. It was Jack Elliot, Mary’s father.
The two cabs pulled up outside a house.
“This is where I dropped him,” Mr Elliot said. “He’s in there.”
They all climbed out and crept silently to the house. The curtains in the front room were drawn, but a chink of light shone through a small gap between them. Wiggins moved to the window and peeped in. A man and a woman were bending over something on the table and the man was holding a vicious-looking knife. Wiggins turned, nodded vigorously to the others, and made a sign towards the door. Mr Elliot tried the handle. It turned. He eased the door open and they all tiptoed in.
The man was using the knife to prise open the locket when the door to the room opened and Wiggins and Mr Elliot burst in, with Beaver, Gertie and Shiner close behind them.
“What the…?” the man snarled in a heavy American accent. “Who the devil are you?”
“What d’you want?” the woman asked. “You can’t come bustin’ into decent law-abidin’ folks’ houses like this.”
“I’ve a good mind to call the cops,” the man joined in.
“No need,” said Mr Elliot. “They’re already on their way.”
“Whaddya mean?”
“Why don’t you read what’s on that?” Wiggins said, pointing to the piece of paper the man had just taken from the locket.
The man hesitated, then unfolded the paper and smoothed it out. Written on it was a simple message: “The game is up.” The man’s eyes blazed and his face turned purple with fury.
“Why, you…!” he roared, grabbing his knife and starting towards Wiggins.
“Stop that!” a new voiced barked. “Stop right there! You are under arrest. Both of you.”
Lestrade strode into the room, followed by two burly police constables.
“I’ll take that, if you don’t mind,” Lestrade said, reaching for the knife. “You will be charged with murder, robbery and kidnapping.”
“Kidnapping?” the man said. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Where is she?” Wiggins demanded.
“Yeah, where’s Rosie?” Beaver joined in.
“Listen!” Gertie called out. “Can you hear something?”
They all stopped talking and listened. From the next room came a muffled cry. Beaver reached the door first, and flung it open. Rosie, still wearing Mary’s stage costume, was lying on a bare bed, her hands and feet bound with rope and her mouth gagged with a strip of once-white cloth. Beaver untied the gag while Gertie released her hands and feet.
“You all right?” Beaver asked anxiously.
“I am now,” Rosie replied, sitting up and flexing her stiff limbs. “You didn’t half take your time getting ’ere. I’m famished!”
“Well, we’re here now,” said Wiggins from the doorway. “And so is half of Scotland Yard, so you’re safe and sound.”
Gertie put her arms round Rosie, and gave her a comforting hug. Then she helped her to stand, and led her through into the other room, where the police were handcuffing the American couple.
“Ah, Rosie,” Inspector Lestrade greeted her. “Are you all right? Did they harm you?”
“Not really,” Rosie replied. “Not me. But they killed poor old Marvin – leastways, he did.” She pointed at the man, who glowered at her sullenly. “Stuck him with a dirty great knife, he did. In the back an’ all, the brute.”
“And you witnessed this?” Lestrade asked her.
“Dunno about that, but I seen it. I seen it all – afore he chucked a blanket over me head and carted me off here.”
“Excellent,” said Lestrade, beaming happily. “I believe that wraps it all up very nicely. Yet another triumph for Scotland Yard.”
Mr Elliot cleared his throat noisily. “With just a little help from the Baker Street Boys,” he said.
Lestrade’s smile shrivelled like a dried prune. “Of course,” he said. “We professionals are always gratified to acknowledge the assistance of members of the public.”
“Cor blimey,” said Wiggins with a broad grin. “He sounds just like Mr Trump, don’t he?”
Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson had arrived back in London that same evening, and Wiggins reported to Mr Holmes first thing the next morning. The great detective was most impressed by what he heard, and congratulated Wiggins and the Boys on their achievement in trapping the murderer. He was particularly pleased to learn that they had foiled his great adversary, Moriarty, and was keen to hear all about this part of the case. When Wiggins had finished, he patted him on the shoulder, said, “Well done, my boy. Well done, indeed,” and gave him a whole gold sovereign as a reward.
That afternoon, all the Boys, well scrubbed and wearing their best clothes, were ushered into a luxury suite in the Grand Metropolitan Hotel. Mr Elliot had moved into the hotel with Mary, and had invited the Boys to a slap-up tea party to thank them for all they had done for his daughter, and to celebrate their latest achievement. A long table had been set up in the drawing room, piled high with scrumptious food – iced cakes and buns, jam tarts and custard pies, chocolate eclairs oozing cream, delicious fruit trifles, sausage rolls and sandwiches of every description – as well as giant jugs of ginger beer and lemonade and, especially for Sparrow and Mary, dandelion and burdock. It was a feast fit for heroes, and the Boys tucked into it with gusto.
Towards the end of the party, there was a knock at the door and Mr Holmes was shown in. After he had introduced himself to Mr Elliot and expressed his admiration for the spread that the Boys were attacking so heartily, he walked over to speak to them.
“I have no wish to interrupt the festivities,” he said, “so I will be brief. I have information which I think you might like to know – especially you, my good friend Beaver, before you begin making a record of this latest adventure.”
“How did you know I—?” Beaver began to ask, but Mr Holmes just smiled mysteriously and tapped the side of his nose with his forefinger.
“Since speaking to Wiggins this morning,” he went on, “I have been making certain enquiries, and I have been able to deduce that Marvin and Moriarty were hatching a plot to deceive one of the noblest ladies in the land in a most cruel fashion. May I see the locket that lies at the centre of this intrigue, if you please?”
Mr Elliot produced the locket from his waistcoat pocket and handed it to him. Mr Holmes clicked it open and looked at the picture inside.
“As I thought,” he declared. “This is a portrait of the Countess of Loamshire. Moriarty’s sinister plot was to use Marvin to gain access to the countess through one of his fake séances, when the poor lady might easily be persuaded that Mary was her long-lost granddaughter. The little girl was drowned, together with her parents, in a yachting accident off the coast of America, but the bodies were never recovered and the countess always cherished the hope that at least one of them might have survived, perhaps on some remote island.”
“Oh, how dreadful,” Mary cried. “Why would Moriarty and Marvin do such a terrible thing?”
“Money,” Mr Holmes replied. “The countess is immensely rich, and as her only grandchild you would have been the sole heiress to the Loamshire fortune.”
“But I wouldn’t do it! I’d never do such a thing.”
“Who knows what you might do under the influence of hypnosis? I have no doubt that once you had been successfully installed, the old lady’s life would have been a very short one.”
“You mean they’d have killed her?”
“I do indeed. And you, too, once you had inherited and they had bled you dry.”
“Oh, how horrible. How absolutely horrible!”
“That is the most dastardly thing I have ever heard,” Mr Elliot exploded. “To think those villains were using my little girl for such a purpose…”
“Fortunately they were thwarted,” Mr Holmes said. “By the actions of my brave Irregulars.”
He stretched out his hand and picked up a glass from the table.
“A toast,” he said. “I raise my glass to the Baker Street Boys!”
“Amen to that,” said Mr Elliot, grabbing a glass for himself.
They both drank. A smile spread slowly across Mr Holmes’s face as the taste brought back memories of his childhood.
“Ah, dandelion and burdock,” he said dreamily. “And an excellent vintage!”
After draining his glass, Mr Holmes headed for the door, saying he would leave the Boys to their festivities. But as he opened it, he saw an elderly man and woman approaching. They looked prosperous and well-dressed. The man had a distinguished short grey beard, was wearing a dark overcoat and a silk top hat, and leaned heavily on a black cane. His wife’s coat was trimmed with fur and her hat, perched on her carefully dressed silver hair, was crowned with imitation flowers and fruit. Mr Holmes took stock of them with a swift glance, instantly calculating who they were and what they wanted, then stood aside to let them enter before going on his way.
“Mr Elliot! Jack!” the elderly man called. “May we come in?”
Mr Elliot stared at them as though he had seen two ghosts.
“Sir Charles!” he exclaimed. “Lady Fleming. What are you doing here?”
“We saw the newspapers, and made enquiries of the police. They told us where you were.”
“What do you want? Why have you come?”
“To say sorry,” Sir Charles said. “For all the pain we have caused you.”
“To ask your forgiveness,” Lady Fleming added. “And try to make amends. It is time to heal old wounds.” She looked at the youngsters around the table and asked, “Which one is my granddaughter?”
Back at HQ that night, the Boys could hardly stop talking about the events of the day. Sherlock Holmes’s revelations about what Marvin and Moriarty had been up to were exciting, but the sudden arrival of Mary’s grandparents and their reconciliation with her father had made them all think of their own lost families. Several of them had found it hard to hold back their tears.
Sir Charles and Lady Fleming had offered to look after Mary, but Mr Elliot had told them he had no need of their money – the explosion that had nearly killed him in his mine, he said, had uncovered a rich seam of gold. He had made his fortune, and was now wealthier than they were. He would take care of Mary himself, but he would be more than happy for her to see them regularly, and to stay with them on their country estate whenever she wanted to.
Mary had begged the Boys to go and live with her and her father, and Mr Elliot had agreed to look after them all. But they had thanked him and refused: how could they possibly leave HQ and Baker Street and all their adventures? And in any case, what would Mr Holmes do without them? So they had said their farewells. Mary had said a special goodbye to Sparrow, giving him a huge hug and a kiss on the cheek. This time he had not pulled away, or even blushed. But he had shed a quiet tear, and so had several of the others, as Mary promised never to forget them.
With all this buzzing around in their heads, the Boys at first found it hard to get to sleep. But eventually tiredness won, and the only sound to be heard in HQ was heavy breathing. When he thought everyone else was asleep, Beaver dug out his notebook and pencil, and sat down at the table to start writing.
After a few minutes, Queenie crept from her bed, tiptoed over to him and peeped over his shoulder. “What you gonna call it this time?” she whispered.
“Dunno for sure. How about ‘The Case of the Captive Clairvoyant’?”
“Yeah,” said Queenie. “That’ll do. I think that’ll do very nicely.”
Anthony Read studied at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London, and was an actor manager at the age of eighteen. He worked in advertising, journalism and publishing and as a television producer before becoming a full-time writer. Anthony has more than two hundred screen credits to his name, for programmes that include Sherlock Holmes, The Professionals and Doctor Who. He has also written non-fiction, and won the Wingate Literary Prize for Kristallnacht.
The Baker Street Boys books, The Case of the Disappearing Detective and The Case of the Captive Clairvoyant, are based on Anthony’s original television series for children, broadcast by the BBC in the 1980s, for which he won the Writer’s Guild TV Award. The series was inspired by references to the “Baker Street Irregulars”, a group of young crimesolvers who helped the detective Sherlock Holmes in the classic stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.
First published 2006 by Walker Books Ltd
87 Vauxhall Walk, London SE11 5HJ
Text © 2006 Anthony Read
Illustrations © 2006 David Frankland
The right of Anthony Read and David Frankland to be identified as author and illustrator respectively of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, taping and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data:
a catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
978-1-4063-4219-2 (ePub)
www.walker.co.uk
Table of Contents
Mystic Marvin and Little Mary
A Message from Moriarty
Rescuing Mary
Learning the Code
Hocus-Pocus
Rosie Disappears
The Black Spot
The Lost Locket
A Special Performance
The Game is Up