“She’s married?” This was a piece of new information. His aunt had said nothing during the intake interview, and the boy had been silent on the subject until now.
“Of course. I assumed you saw the ring.” He frowned at me. “Really, Watson, you need to pay closer attention to the details.”
“Tell me about your uncle.”
“He drives a semi truck. He’s gone most days of the week, but usually makes it home for the weekends. It’s better when he’s not around. He’s got a mean streak in him.” He glanced at his watch. “She should be coming out any minute now.”
There she was, right on time, pushing out the front door of the apartment building at six-fifteen sharp. She crossed the street and got into the old sedan I’d seen her driving before.
“Follow her,” the boy said.
I pulled out and stayed behind her for the next ten minutes.
“Now watch,” the boy said. “This is where it gets interesting.”
The street ran past a large entertainment center called Palladium Pizza. On the big sign out front was a neon Ferris wheel and below that a lit marquee that proclaimed FOOD, FUN, AND GAMES FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY. The parking lot was quite full. The place was clearly a popular enterprise. The boy’s aunt pulled into the lot and parked. I pulled in too but stayed well away. She left the sedan, glanced at her watch, then stood looking expectantly toward the double glass doors of the establishment.
Lo and behold, a clown appeared. He wore a big red wig and his nose was tipped with a little red ball. His clothes were a ridiculous burlesque of elegant evening wear, complete with a large fake flower on his lapel that I was certain shot water. The shoes on his feet were a dozen sizes too big. His mouth was elongated with red face paint into a perpetual and I thought rather frightening grin. He approached the woman. To my amazement, they kissed.
“Who’s that?” I asked. But no sooner had I spoken than the light dawned. “Moriarty.”
The boy gave a single, solemn nod. “Moriarty.”
They walked arm in arm to a van at the other end of the parking lot. The vehicle was decorated with brightly colored balloon decals, and floating among them were the words “Marco the Magnificent: Magic and Buffoonery for All Ages.” They got in, the van pulled onto the street, and it quickly disappeared amid the traffic.
“Your aunt is having an affair with a clown?”
“With Moriarty,” the boy said.
“Your uncle doesn’t know?”
“Clueless.”
“Okay,” I said. “If this is Moriarty, what’s he up to?”
“That’s the question, isn’t it, Watson? I hope to have an answer soon.”
He continued to stare down the street where his aunt and the clown had gone.
“Did you see his face? The painted smile? Such a grotesque mockery of goodwill.” His eyes narrowed in a determined way and he said grimly, “Pure Moriarty.”
When his aunt dropped him off for his next session, I caught her before she rushed away and asked to speak with her privately a moment. She seemed a bit put out, but stepped into my office while Oliver waited outside.
“You’re seeing someone,” I said.
She was clearly startled. “What do you mean?”
“Marco the Magnificent.”
“How—” she started, then her eyes shifted to the office door. “Oliver.” She looked at me again, and I could see that she was trying to decide on a course of action. She finally settled on what seemed to me the truth.
“I don’t love my husband anymore. Morrie makes me feel special. Makes me feel young. Makes me laugh.”
“Morrie? That’s his name?”
“Morris Peterson.”
“When did Morrie enter your life?”
“A while ago.”
“Could you be more specific?”
“Just before Christmas.”
“About the time you gave Oliver the volume of Conan Doyle stories. Look, I believe your nephew is threatened by Morrie. He’s lost his parents. I think he might be afraid of losing you too. You’re all the family he has now.”
“He’s never said anything.”
“You’re having an affair. What could he say? But it comes out in this fantasy of his that he’s Sherlock Holmes. He uses it to justify his feeling of being threatened. And also, I believe, as a way of trying to have some control over the situation.”
She looked again at the door, beyond which her nephew sat, a lonely, orphaned boy dressed in a deerstalker hat and matching cape. I saw the pain in her eyes. But I went on, laying it all out for her.
“Although your nephew claims to understand that he is not in fact Sherlock Holmes, I think that deep down he really believes he is. He’s not just emulating that literary creation, he sees himself as the flesh-and-blood incarnation. He can rationalize it all he wants, but he’s not acting truly rational.”
“And I’m responsible?”
“No. Or at least, not entirely. But your current situation certainly isn’t helping.”
“So you’re saying I have to break it off with Morrie? That will fix Oliver?”
“It’s not a question of fixing. Oliver’s not a broken machine. He’s simply a child, brilliant but lost.”
She looked truly lost herself, and I could tell that pushing her at this point would do no good.
“Take some time to think it over,” I advised. “But not too long. In the meantime, I’ll work with Oliver and do what I can to help him face the truth of the situation.”
“He can’t tell my husband,” she said, and now her eyes bloomed with fear. “He would kill me.”
“I’ll talk to him,” I promised.
When she’d gone, I called the boy into my office and we sat together.
I said, “Moriarty isn’t his real name, you know. His name is Morris Peterson.”
“That’s simply an alias,” the boy said. “He’s using a name similar to his own. A common ploy. Look, Watson, I know the true nature of his interest now.”
I thought I had a pretty good idea of the true nature of his interest myself. The boy’s aunt was a woman desperate for attention. She wanted to feel loved, young, special. And she would probably do almost anything to please the man who made her feel that way. Even a clown.
“You know, of course, about sexual attraction, Oliver.”
“Sherlock,” he said in an icy tone. “My name is Sherlock.” He took a moment to settle himself, then said, “Of course I know that sex is a part of his attraction. Will you just listen to me for a moment, Watson? Let me explain everything to you.”
“You?” I said evenly, after he’d laid it all out for me. “He’s after you?”
“I present a threat to him. And a challenge. I’m the only person alive who is his intellectual equal and moral opposite.”
“And you believe he wants to do you harm?”
“Not just harm, Watson. He wants me dead.”
And there it was, the full manifestation of his delusion. Against my best judgment, I’d come to care about the boy, and this paranoia troubled me greatly.
“I can see that you don’t believe me,” Oliver said. “Just listen to me for a moment, Watson. Moriarty is in fact a fugitive on the run. He has warrants for his arrest in California, Oregon, and Colorado. Any other common criminal would have been taken into custody, but Moriarty is not your common criminal.”
“Warrants for what?”
“Theft, fraud, and one for a particularly nasty incident in Denver.”
“How do you know this?”
“Because of the greatest boon to the modern detective, Watson. The Internet. You know the game of poker?”
“Of course.”
“An experienced poker player watches for what’s called a tell, an unconscious gesture that gives another player away in the heat of betting. Moriarty has a tell.”
“And what would that be?”
“The clown costume. It’s an unusual disguise, to say the least. But it’s clearly one h
e’s comfortable with. I merely did an Internet search for crimes that involved clowns. I came across a case in California several years ago. A clown who called himself Professor Perplexing. He traveled with a small circus as one of their sideshow offerings. He entertained the children with his clown antics and their parents by appearing to read their minds. He also managed to read their credit cards and charged up a hefty sum. He skipped just ahead of the police. According to the circus folks, Professor Perplexing’s real name was Martin Petters.
“The next case I found was in Portland. A clown working for a nonprofit called Smile A Day. The organization provided entertainment for nursing homes and senior residential facilities. In addition to offering the old people a few laughs, he offered to invest their savings. Again, he left town just before the police caught up with him. The nonprofit reported his name was Mark Patterson.
“Finally Denver. A little over a year ago. A man working for a service that provided entertainment at children’s parties was accused of molesting a child during one of these parties. He vanished immediately thereafter. His name, according to the service, was Milton Parks.”
“That’s quite a leap from Denver to the Twin Cities.”
“There’s one more connection, Watson. Moriarty, or Parks, as he was calling himself then, was involved with a widow. Before he fled town, he’d stolen much of the money she’d received from her husband’s life insurance.” Oliver counted off on his fingers. “M. Petters. M. Patterson. M. Parks. And now Morris Peterson. All Moriarty.”
“I still don’t understand why he would want you dead.”
“The insurance money that came from my parents’ deaths is quite a tidy sum—over a million dollars. My aunt isn’t just my legal guardian. In the event of my death, she inherits the money. If Moriarty gets rid of me, he not only eliminates his greatest foe, but all that money becomes available to him.”
“There’s your uncle,” I said. “He’s an obstacle.”
“If she doesn’t divorce him, I suspect Moriarty will find a way to deal with him too.”
“Why would a villain as brilliant as Moriarty stoop to such petty crimes? Even a million dollars, I imagine, would be a paltry sum in his view. If he is Moriarty, why hasn’t he set his sights on grander schemes?”
Young Holmes seemed not at all perplexed by the question. “I’ve wondered that myself, Watson. But I believe he’s simply been biding his time.”
“Until what?”
“Until he could get to me. When I’m out of the way, who’s to stop him from whatever grander design he has in mind? Something needs to be done about Moriarty, Watson, and soon.”
I realized the boy’s delusional behavior had taken a sudden, more troubling turn. “You wouldn’t act on this belief, would you?”
“I already have, my dear fellow.”
Alarm bells went off.
“What have you done, Oliver?”
He gave me an exasperated look and wouldn’t reply.
“Sherlock,” I said. “What have you done?”
“I’ve simply set the wheels in motion, Watson. Moriarty’s own inertia will carry him to his just end.”
“Indulge me. What exactly do you mean?”
“Reichenbach Falls,” the boy said.
“Where Holmes and Moriarty struggle?”
“More importantly, where Moriarty falls to his death.”
“But Holmes falls to his death there too.”
The boy arched an eyebrow. “Does he?”
“There is no Reichenbach Falls in Minnesota.”
“No, Watson, there is not.” He gave me a smile, but so tinged with sadness that it nearly broke my heart.
Our time was up, and a knock came at the door. I desperately wanted to speak with the boy’s aunt alone, but when I opened up, a man stood there. Big, bearded, wearing a ball cap with PETERBILT across the crown. He looked quite put out. “I’ve come for my nephew.”
“Uncle Walter?” the boy said at my back. “Where’s Aunt Louise?”
“She’s too upset to drive. So I’m here to get you.”
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Family business,” Uncle Walter said to me, much on the surly side. “Come on, Ollie. Let’s go.”
I knelt at the door and looked into the boy’s face. “Promise me you won’t do anything until I’ve had a chance to talk to your aunt.”
“It’s too late, Watson. The great mechanism of fate has been set in motion.” He put a hand on my shoulder. “It’s all right, dear friend. I can take care of this.”
I was overcome with a deep concern for the boy. I knew that despite his intellect—or maybe because of it—he was living a profound delusion, one that seemed more and more to promise harm to himself and to another.
Because I had a session immediately afterward, it was quite a while before I could sit down uninterrupted at my computer. I conducted an Internet search in the same way that I imagined young Holmes had. It took me no time at all to find the story he’d referenced in our session about one Milton Parks, still wanted in Denver, Colorado, on a charge of fraud stemming from the scamming of a widowed woman and also a charge of child molestation. I found a picture of him in the clown costume he’d worn while working at children’s parties, a costume very similar to the one I’d seen Morris Peterson wearing. I could find no photograph showing me what he looked like without face paint and ridiculous clothing. In short order, I also found the other incidents the boy had referenced, in Portland and California. But still no photographs of what Moriarty looked like beneath the face paint.
And that’s when I caught myself. I’d begun to think of the clown as Moriarty.
I drove to the building where Oliver lived with his aunt and uncle. I buzzed their apartment. A moment later I heard the gruff voice of Uncle Walter through the speaker in the entryway.
“I need to speak with Oliver’s aunt,” I said.
“It’ll have to wait.”
“It’s rather important,” I said. “It’s about Oliver’s safety.”
“A little late for that,” he said.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Ollie’s gone. Run away, looks like.”
Reichenbach Falls. There was nothing like that in the Twin Cities or anywhere near. But there was a rather famous waterfall in a park across the river in Minneapolis: Minnehaha Falls. It was a thin prospect, but the only one I had.
It was nearing dark when I arrived at the park, and I was greeted with an amazing sight. Near the falls stood a pavilion with a bustling restaurant and outdoor patio. The pavilion was surrounded by tall trees, and on the grass between the trees a multitude of colorful tents had been set up. A huge banner strung between two of the trees declared SOUTH MINNEAPOLIS NEIGHBORHOOD CIRCUS. Temporary floodlights lit the scene. Carnival music blared. On a little stage, a man in a jester’s costume was juggling swords. A tightrope hung a few feet off the ground, and a young woman dressed as a ballerina and carrying a parasol balanced precariously on the line. In front of the tents, local hawkers called to the milling crowd to come inside and see the wonders of two-headed snakes and dogs who did tricks and yogis who could turn themselves into pretzels. There were games of all kinds, and the air was redolent with the smell of cotton candy and mini-doughnuts, and children ran to and fro trailing balloons on long strings. And everywhere there were clowns.
I made my way among the confusion of bodies to the bridge above Minnehaha Creek and its waterfall. We’d had a wet spring. The creek was full, and the water swept in a roaring torrent over the edge of the falls. Laughing children half climbed the stone walls that edged the bridge. Their parents called harsh warnings to them or pulled them back. The bridge was lit with glaring streetlamps that had come on with the dark, and the people on it cast shadows so that it seemed as if the bridge was populated by two species, one of flesh and the other of black silhouettes.
I couldn’t see Oliver anywhere, nor could I see a clown that looked like the one I’d seen coming from Pall
adium Pizza. But I knew Moriarty had used different costumes in the past, so God only knew how he might have been dressed that night. I searched desperately, overwhelmed with a mounting sense of dread.
A scream shot like a rocket above the chaos of sounds around me. It came from the other end of the bridge. The scream of a child. I turned and pushed through the crowd in that direction. Another scream, and my heart raced as the crowd parted before me. I came at last to a place where a little boy stood near a clown who knelt with a huge boa constrictor draped over his shoulders.
“He won’t bite,” the clown assured the boy. “But he might swallow you.”
The clown leaned nearer, with the snake’s head in his hand. The boy screamed again and danced back, but it was clear he was delighted.
The crowd had formed a little circle and was focused on the boy and the snake. That’s when I caught sight of Oliver Wendell Holmes. He was standing off the bridge, in the shadows next to a tree near the edge of the chasm where the creek ran and fell fifty feet to the rocks below. He wore the deerstalker hat and the cape of his own making. He was alone, and I was washed in a great relief.
Then, from behind the tree next to Holmes, the clown emerged, with that grotesque grin painted on his face, that cruel mockery of good intent.
“Oliver!” I cried.
But at that same moment, the boy near the snake screamed again, and the crowd roared with laughter and gave their applause, and my desperate cry was lost.
I watched helplessly as the clown reached out and little Holmes turned suddenly to face him. The clown grasped the boy and shoved him toward the edge of the precipice. Oliver in turn grabbed the clown, and in the next instant, my heart broke as I watched them tumble together over the edge of the precipice.
“Oliver!” I cried again, though I knew it was hopeless. Absolutely hopeless.
I shoved my way across the bridge and off the path to the tree where the boy and the clown had fallen. I knelt, leaned over the edge, and looked down at the bottom of the chasm. The streetlamps on the bridge lit the scene below with a raw glare, and I saw the body of the clown sprawled on the rocks where the water crashed and ran on. But I saw no sign of Oliver.
The Best American Mystery Stories 2017 Page 30