The cabby smiled, but I noticed his eyes were a tad wary, out of long habit, no doubt, but he nodded and opened the door to the front luggage area. I pulled the door fully open, nodded my thanks, and began feverishly unzipping the outer pockets of my garment bag, in my haste all but upending it and sending everything flying again: paperback, Moleskine notebook, spectacles case, tin of peppermints, ballpoint pen; there seemed no end to the contents of those deep pockets, but alas there was no mobile phone. I stuffed everything back, without regard to order or placement, zipping up the pockets and refastening the straps as fast as I could, although I’m sure I must’ve still appeared unduly clumsy. “I was so certain I put it in here,” I said. “Not at all my usual place for it, though; silly of me really.” Then I had a sudden thought and felt along an upper seam of the bag and pulled open the hidden pocket. “Here it is, of course, in the so-called handy secret pocket. Thank heaven for that; I’d so hate to have lost another iPhone. Don’t seem to know where my head is these days.”
The cabby nodded in seeming sympathy and gave me another look. “Right then, sir, now we’ve got that … er … sorted, Baker Street, you said?”
“Ah, no, look, on second thought, I think I better head straight over to St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, Giltspur Street.”
“Barts? Right you are, sir.” He paused, and I’d swear that for a brief moment a shadow flickered across his face. “That new Cancer Centre, is it, sir?”
I shook my head and gave him a reassuring smile. “No, no, nothing so serious; just a visit to the museum, the north wing; the Henry VIII gate will do.”
“With the one-way, I’d best drop you on West Smithfield Road, if that’d be okay?” I nodded. “Right you are, then, sir. If you’d just hop back in.”
So off we set again, my mobile phone now safely in my hand, my canvas shoulder bag by my side. London sped by at what a good and dear friend of mine had deduced was no faster than ever it’d been in the time of horse-drawn hansom cabs. I shook my head. Times and tides, indeed. I have to admit I felt not a little silly about the whole wretched incident and I could only imagine what the cab driver must’ve thought about it all. I took more deep breaths to help calm myself and looked around the interior of the cab. It was bright, airy, and clean, everything one expects of a London taxi, but there was something else besides.
“Excuse me, is this one of those new-style London cabs?” I asked, in a voice loud enough to attract the taxi driver’s attention.
“Yes, very well spotted,” he shouted over his shoulder. “Haven’t had it long, coming up on three or four weeks, now; the LTX4, top of the line, all mod cons, lovely little job; still got that lovely new cab smell.”
“Can’t quite put my finger on it,” I offered, by way of observation, “but it seems so much nicer, all round, somehow.”
“The makers would love to hear you say that,” he chortled. “Take this intercom we’re speaking over, most people don’t even realize the plexiglass partition isn’t open between them and me and they just start talking, normal like. You just press the button back there or I do in here; works a treat. So there’s no need for any more of that looking-back-over-my-shoulder-and-shouting-my-head-off malarkey. Even with a full complement of five passengers, everyone can clearly be heard. There’s even an induction loop for the hard of hearing.”
“How very thoughtful,” I said, surreptitiously checking my iPhone for any e-mails or text messages.
“It is,” he said. “On top of which the cab’s specially designed to accommodate a wheelchair if need be. Add individual head restraints, a child harness, air-conditioning with separate climate controls for the passengers, plus directional spotlights if anyone wants to read a newspaper or catch up on office work, and it’s a real step up in creature comforts. Same goes for me: lumbar support, coil-spring suspension, powerassisted steering, anti-lock braking, the lot. I can even hook my MP3 player in for a bit of music if I want. It’s got a computer and a navigation system, too, should ever I have need.”
He chatted on, amiably, about his new pride and joy and before I knew it we’d arrived at Barts. “How fascinating,” I said, “the continuing evolution of the London taxicab; always the same, only different.” I paused. “Look, I say, I only need ten minutes or so, to take some photographs. Would it be possible for you to wait for me while I go inside?”
He wrinkled his nose. “Yes, I don’t see why not. I’ll just keep the meter running; you take all the time you want. It’s all the same to me.”
“Thank you,” I said. Then, clutching my canvas shoulder bag, I got out of the cab, crossed over the pedestrian divide, slipping between the bollards as I did so, and went to stand in front of the archway. I took photographs of the statue of Henry VIII, turned and waved at the taxi driver, and pointed through the arch. I held up a hand with fingers splayed. “Five minutes,” I mouthed. He nodded back, pulled out a newspaper, and began reading. I, meanwhile, went in through the archway, changed camera lenses, peered at the digital display, and took some more photos. Then I sent a quick three-word text message. After a few more minutes I glanced at my watch. Time enough. I stepped out from beneath the archway and walked back across the median to where the taxi was parked. I got in again and expressed my thanks.
“I’ve had the heater on, so it’s nice and toasty for you,” the cabby said over the intercom. “Off to Baker Street, now, is it?”
“Look, I know I said 221B Baker Street was my ultimate destination, but there are a few other places I’d really like to visit before that. I have a list.”
“A list of points of interest? And I suppose you’d like me to wait for you at each one?” I nodded and he tapped his chin with a finger, as the meter ticked on in the background. “Yes, I suppose I could do that, sir,” he said, nodding. “It still being kipper season and things a bit slack on account of winter weather.”
“It’d really be most helpful,” I said, hurriedly turning to the appropriate page in my Moleskine notebook and holding it up for the cabby to see. He opened the tiny window in the glass partition and I pushed the little black notebook through to the driver’s compartment and he took it and glanced at the list, then he looked at it again even more closely. He turned and looked at me, with eyes narrowed, an inquisitive smile pulling at the corners of his mouth.
“If I’m not mistaken, sir, all these points you’ve got listed feature in stories by Conan Doyle; specifically the adventures of one Sherlock Holmes?” He paused. “Would I be right in presuming you’re one of them ‘Holmesians’; ‘the game’s afoot!’ and all that malarkey?” He smiled openly, then. “Although of course it was you wanting to go to 221B Baker Street that really gave the game away. You’re not the first, you know; I’ve had lots of people like you in the cab—Yanks mostly or ‘Sherlockians’ as they call themselves over there. Though you’d be surprised at the number of people who come all the way from Japan just to say they’ve trodden in the footsteps of Mr. Sherlock Holmes. In full regalia, some of them: deerstalker and Inverness cape; magnifying lens; meerschaum calabash pipe; the whole blinking kit and caboodle; even had a person bring a violin along with them, once, although I couldn’t say whether it was a Stradivarius or not.”
I marshaled my case. “I was thinking, I know the meter’s running, and I can settle that with you now, but could I perhaps hire the cab for the entire morning? Certainly be much more relaxing for me, possibly a little more profitable for you. At whatever rate you think would be appropriate, of course.”
He tapped his chin again. “Bit unusual, but not unheard of. Happens from time to time. Americans, again, mostly, especially when the City was growing with a bang. Before that it was the Japanese, and before them the Arabs, all of them buying up the best properties as fast as they could. Now, of course, it’s as likely to be a Russian businessman or Chinese entrepreneur.”
I continued to press my case. “As you can see, all the destinations are in central London; there’s nothing farther west than Chiswick, north of St
. John’s Wood, or east of Aldgate Underground, and the only place I’ve got listed south of the river is Waterloo Station.” I paused and it was then I played my trump card. “Of course, if you don’t happen to own your cab?”
He slowly slid his eyes in my direction. “I do, as a matter of fact, sir, and always have done, just like me dad and me grandad, and his dad and grandad before him. So, me being a musher, an owner-driver, I can do what I like.” He chuckled. “I take it you’re not a Yank or a Russian oligarch, are you, sir?”
It was my turn to chuckle then. “Nothing so exotic; English, through and through. I’m simply indulging in a little hobby of mine and hoping to use the photographs I get to illustrate a book I intend to write.”
“And that’d be a book about Sherlock Holmes, would it, sir?”
“Hope so, although I don’t have a publisher lined up for it yet.”
“Well, I couldn’t possibly stand in the way of literary endeavor or artistic merit. Alright then, clear what’s on the meter and we can go from there. I can do credit card, debit card, chip-and-pin, whatever you prefer.” I shook my head and handed through a twenty-pound note to cover the journey thus far and what I thought would be a suitably appropriate tip. He nodded. “Cash, is it? The poor man’s credit card, as it was once so described. Thank you much, sir, very generous of you. As for the next two-three hours, I reckon I’d normally do anything up to fifty miles, all told, so let’s call it two hundred quid, even.”
“Agreed,” I said. “And I’ll add a twenty-pound tip. And I’ll pay you now.”
“Again, very generous of you, sir.”
I opened my wallet again and extracted another crisp, new twenty-pound note, together with four crisp, new fifty-pound notes.
His eyes didn’t miss a thing. “No need to go to Cox and Co., near Charing Cross, then? Or Lloyds TSB, as it is now, of course.”
“I always prefer to pay cash, if I can,” I offered without any further explanation. “And, again, you’re sure it’s no bother?”
“As I said, sir, no bother. All in a day’s work.” He nodded and smiled and slid the banknotes inside his own commodious wallet. “Thank you.”
“Good,” I said, removing my overcoat as it was now rather warm inside the taxi. “Glad that’s settled. Now we can truly say: ‘The game’s afoot!’ ”
“And very appropriate, too, if I may say so, but before we step into the unknown, so to speak, would you mind if I ask you something by way of a personal question? Nothing intrusive, just me indulging a little hobby of my own, you could say, founded as it is upon the observance of trifles.”
“Yes, I see no harm,” I said, immediately putting up my guard. “I have rather imposed myself on you, after all. What would you like to know?”
“Are you a doctor, by any chance, sir, and more to the point, ex-military?”
“Well, yes, I am, as a matter of fact. I studied at Barts. Simply wanted to take another look at the old place before it’s changed out of all recognition.”
“After which you were a houseman, possibly a GP? Forgoing private practice until you joined the Royal Army Medical Corps; the old Linseed Lancers, In Arduis Fidelis, ‘Steadfast in Adversity,’ and all that? With whom you completed a couple tours of duty in Afghanistan? And from whom you’ve only very recently been demobbed—in all probability due to that leg wound of yours?”
“Well, yes, I was, I mean I did, but how on earth did you deduce all that?”
“Easy enough, sir. And please don’t mind me saying, but if clothes doth oft proclaim the man, then it’s highly unlikely you were ever in private practice. Tattersall-check brushed-cotton Viyella shirt, frayed at the cuffs; Harris Tweed jacket, leather patches at the elbows; cavalry twill trousers, well used; highly polished pair of tan brogues, recently reheeled and resoled; everything courtesy of Messrs. Aquascutum and Church’s, ergo Regent Street not Jermyn Street; all standard issue ‘home counties,’ not-so-well-off officers, for the use of. Then, of course, there’s the little matter of your regimental tie; alternate maroon and yellow, broad diagonal stripes against a dark blue field; not to mention your lapel pin featuring the RAMC’s rod and serpent cap badge, in miniature.”
I found myself fiddling unconsciously with my tie. I swallowed and endeavored to remain calm. One doesn’t come across such displays every day.
But the taxi driver hadn’t finished with me yet. “Then of course there’s what’s left of that suntan of yours, which incidentally is so engrained a child could see it never came from just ten days in Torremolinos. Add the sweat-stained NATO watchband on your rather, if I may say so, somewhat worse for wear Rolex Oyster Perpetual. Add to that the limp when you walk. And I’d say you got yourself banged about a bit, maybe as the result of coming into too close a proximity with an IED, and subsequently you had a couple of months’ hospital and physiotherapy, before finally being invalided out back into civvy street? That’s about it, though, given no more than a cursory look.”
“But that’s extraordinary,” I spluttered. “How on earth … how could you deduce so much from so little, the improvised explosive device and everything?”
“As I said, it’s just a little hobby of mine, sir, seeing as how I come into contact with so many strangers during my working day. And what with one thing and another, I’ve found it pays not just to look, but to try to really see.”
“You most definitely have a touch of the detective about you,” I said.
“Comes from being blessed with a ceaselessly inquisitive nature and an eye for the telling detail. Take that posh new Cancer Centre at Barts. I’ve heard rumour people there are embarking on stem cell research. Yet another attempt to further the brave new world that began some fifteen and more years ago when the very first mammal, Dolly the sheep, was cloned in a laboratory up near Edinburgh. Now, according to the BBC, over in Japan they’re going to try and get some poor elephant to give birth to a prehistoric giant woolly mammoth. You ask me, they’ll be cloning people next, the most dangerous bloody mammal of all. After which, there’ll be no telling who they’ll try bringing back to life. I tell you, there’s always been a lot more goes on than they’ll ever let on to the likes of you and me. So it wouldn’t surprise me if secret experiments had been going on for years and the scientists were just waiting for the right time to tell the public the truth of it: that they’ve already got real live human clones ready and raring to go.”
“What an outlandish thought,” I said, but there was little stopping him after that, as we’d obviously touched upon a hot button of some kind. It happens, of course; social barriers become lowered because of some unexpected shared experience, there’s a precipitous lessening of reserve, and for a time perfect strangers are suddenly conversing together like old friends. Even though it is true that, in our case, he did most of the talking while I did most of the listening.
After Barts, we fairly flew round to Aldersgate, the Stock Exchange, Liverpool Street Station, and Aldgate Underground station, with me exiting the cab at each stop so as to snap off some digital photographs. And we were on our way to the next point of interest on my list when the taxi driver asked me over the intercom whether I’d like some coffee when we reached the Tower of London. “Got a whole thermos flask full here, up front; black, no sugar, good-quality beans that I ground myself. Got a spare clean cup, too.”
“How very kind,” I said, and within minutes he’d pulled over close by the main entrance to the Tower and had poured the coffee and handed me a tiny cup through the equally tiny opening in the plexiglass partition and we sat there, very contentedly, for a good five minutes and more, he up front, me in back.
“Had them all at one time or another,” he said, sipping his coffee.
“I beg your pardon?” I said, desperately trying not to spill mine.
“Holmes and Watson—we’ve had almost all of them, over the years; by which I mean, me great-great-grandfather, me great-grandfather, me grandad, me dad, or me; we’ve had nearly all the actors in the cabs
at one time or another. Great-great-grandad had William Gillette, a real gent by all accounts. Great-grandad had Eille Norwood and that Yank with the famous profile, John Barrymore. Grandad had Clive Brook and Arthur Wontner and once even conveyed the inimitable Basil Rathbone around town.” There really seemed to be no stopping him and, all reserve now dispensed with, he continued to rattle off name after name, a veritable Who’s Who of the acting profession, from the dawn of the twentieth century through to the present day. “Then of course Dad went and did him one better by picking up Orson Welles, who did Holmes on the radio, over in America; huge, he was, almost filled the entire backseat.”
I thought it only polite to show interest so I took a chance and interrupted the flow and offered up my one and only Wellesian quote. “Orson Welles said of Sherlock Holmes, ‘that he was a gentleman who has never lived and yet who will never die,’ which was really rather clever of him, don’t you think?”
The taxi driver threw me a rather disdainful look. “An all too memorable utterance whose very theatricality only serves to misdirect, if not utterly confuse. If only he knew the half of it.” He paused to sip his coffee. “Who else, now? Carlton Hobbs. Douglas Wilmer. Oh, yes, Peter Cushing. He was a very good Holmes, who oddly enough also once played Conan Doyle himself. As for Watsons, we’ve had Robert Stephens and his Watson, Colin Blakely; Christopher Plummer and his Watson, James Mason; and Mr. Jeremy Brett, of course, God bless him, with his two dedicated Dr. Watsons, Messrs. Burke and Hardwicke. We thought Granada Television really nailed it, Brett especially. Tell the truth, we thought we’d nailed him, himself, he was that good. Who else? Well, Dad had Michael Caine and Ben Kingsley, but so have I since they’ve been knighted.” I nodded, encouragingly, so as not to distract him. “I’ve had that Yank, Robert Downey Jr., as a fare twice now; in town, for films one and two; mad sod, but pleasant with it; nothing like the real Holmes, of course, but great fun; lots of adrenaline and all that indefinable star power the tabloids are always going on about. That last time, he even had his Watson with him, our very own crumpet catcher, Jude Law. Girls chasing them both down the street, grown women, too, like they were a pop group or something, remarkable to watch, it was. My most recent Holmes was from the Beeb’s Sherlock, their modern take on it all, starring that bloke Benedict Cumberbatch. Odd bloody name for an actor, if you ask me, but it seems to stick in the mind, even if people can’t ever pronounce it properly. I also liked his Watson: Freeman, Martin Freeman; very believable and very down to earth, and a Hobbit now, so they tell me. Anyway, add it all up and there’ve been hundreds and hundreds of films. And dozens and dozens who’ve played Holmes on celluloid and TV, on radio and on the stage. And all over the world, too, even Russia and Japan. It fair boggles the mind, it does.”
A Study in Sherlock Page 3