'The sahib awaits you. Please come this way.'
Stumbling over stuffed crocodiles and the hoofs of sambhar floor rugs, we followed him through a corridor and into a long chamber lined and littered with botdes of various chemicals. Broad, low tables bristled with retorts, test-tubes, and littie Bunsen lamps, with their blue flickeringx flames. An overpowering smell of formaldehyde permeated the air. It did not seem to bother Symington, who sat behind a long marble-topped table sorting out what looked to me like dirty duckweed with the aid of a pair of tweezers. He was a small, untidy man with a bald shining head that was covered scantily on the sides and back with tufts of grey hair. Raising his head slightly he peered through his thick spectacles with weak watery eyes.
'Hello, is that you Mookerjee?'
'Yes, Mr Symington. How are you?'
'As well as can be expected. By the way, I never got the chance to thank you for that specimen of Primula glacialis.1 It's a real feather in my cap, you know. Even Hooker3 never got one.'
'Well, Sir, the true specimens only grow around twenty thousand feet. It is difficult for human life to manage at those heights.'
'But somehow you did, didn't you, you old devil,' he chuckled, pushing up a pair of spectacles that always had a tendency to slip down his nose. 'Now, who is your friend here?'
'Mr Sigerson is from Norway, Sir. He is a ... an ... ah ... explorer.'
'An explorer? How interesting. Very glad to meet you, Sir. How can I be of service to you?'
'If it is not too much trouble,' said Sherlock Holmes, 'I would like to consult whatever literature you may have on Hirudenia!
'Hirudenia? Ah. You have come to the right place. We have every standard work on the subject, including a few very special and important reports that I may presume to say are not to be found anywhere in Europe at present. Please follow me.'
He led us into a long narrow chamber lined on either side with tall mahogany bookcases. He opened the glass-framed doors of one and peered short-sightedly at the collection of books inside.
'Could I trouble you for that?' He turned around, pointing at a low step-ladder nearby. I carried it over to him.
'Thank you.' He climbed up the first three steps and, peering closely at the spines of the books on the top shelf, commenced a litany of the names of the authors, who were, I suppose, all experts on 'Hirudenia] whatever that was.
'Fowler.,. Merridew... Konrad... Hackett, humm... Hackett. Don't think he'd be any good to you; fellow deals with invertebrate phyla in general. Konrad and Merridew are best especially on the hirudenia of this country.' He pulled out two slim volumes and, blowing the dust off the top, handed them to Holmes. 'Hope you find what you need in here. Not too fond of them myself. Strictiy a flora man. Blood thirsty brutes killed half my pack animals on an expedition once. Well, I will leave you to your research.'
Holmes sat on the step-ladder and began reading. He flipped over the pages of the first book impatiently, and when he got to the end put it aside with a snort of disgust. He must have found what he was after in the second book for he suddenly stopped flipping the pages and gave a little cry of triumph.
'Ha! Ha! Capital!' he chuckled, twitching with excitement, poring carefully over the page, underlining each sentence with a nervous finger. He occasionally paused to scribble brief notes on his cuff. After a long time he turned to me, shaking his head with feigned sorrow. 'Ah, me! It's a wicked world; and when a clever man turns his brain to revenge, it is the worst of all. I think I have enough information now...'
'Mr Holmes! You have solved...'
'Exactly, Mr Mookerjee. Only that I arrived at my conclusions last night, aided in part by the invigorating fumes of a few ounces of native tobacco. This ...' he said, closing the book with a thump, '... is merely confirmation.'
'But I don't understand how...'
'Patience,' he replied. 'All will be revealed in good time, I assure you. I have my own peculiar way of working, which you must forgive me. And now for a little recreation. I would like to avail myself of the services you offered to me on our first meeting aboard the ship, and be introduced to the sights of this city'
We left the library and, going down to the laboratory, said goodbye to Symington. The old botanist shook Holmes by the hand and made a not very subtle bid to elicit information about Holmes's purported explorations.
'Well, Mr Sigerson, I wish you the best of luck in your venture. Mookerjee here knows the ropes and ought to be able to safely guide you to ... ahh ... where did you say you were going to pursue your explorations?'
'I did not,' said Mr Holmes, the merest hint of amusement colouring his voice. 'But your cooperation has been invaluable, and it would be ungrateful of me to be reticent. In all confidence, I am telling you that it is my intention to enter Thibet and visit the fabled city of Lhassa.'
As I had feared, Symington at once began to greedily enumerate a long list of plant specimens we were to obtain for him in the highlands of Thibet.
'... remember, I want the Blue Poppy and the Stelleria decumbens, root and all... and don't get discouraged by the spines ... the Gentiana depressa must be of the dwarf variety otherwise ...'
Offering tactful but non-committal replies, I managed to finally extricate Mr Holmes and myself from the company of Symington, who would have even walked with us down the street with his endless catalogue of botanical needs, if we hadn't luckily chanced upon a ticca-ghari at the gate of the bungalow. We hurriedly boarded the carriage and fled.
Sherlock Holmes leaned back on the cracked leather seat of the ghari and chuckled. 'The etymology of the word "enthusiasm" can be traced back to the Greek enthousia, meaning to be possessed by a god or demon. But it never occurred to me till today how true the word has remained to its origin.'
'I'm afraid I put you in a false position, Mr Holmes,' I apologised, 'by claiming that you were an explorer.'
'Nonsense, Huree. Your explanation, though spontaneous, was prescient. On the conclusion of this case I intend to undertake an exploration and make my small contribution to the furtherance of human frontiers.'
'But why Thibet, Mr Holmes?'
'Is it not obvious? It is one of the last of the secret places of the earth, defying the most adventurous of travellers to force open its closed doors.'
'You will never get there,' I thought to myself.'You, Mr Holmes, may be the world's greatest detective, but the priestly rulers of Thibet do not love foreigners, especially Europeans. No man ever gets even close to the Holy City without an official passport, and none are ever issued to white men. Even I only succeeded in reaching about halfway to Lhassa before the authorities discovered my true identity and nearly had my bally head cut off'
'Of late...' continued Sherlock Holmes, '... I have been tempted to look into the problems furnished by nature rather than the more superficial ones for which our artificial state of being is responsible. Of these the ultimate problem is the meaning of our existence. It is in the hope of some explanation that I must go to Thibet which, rightly or wrongly, has been reported to be the last living link that connects us with the civilisations of our distant past, and where is preserved the knowledge of the hidden forces of the human soul' He lit his pipe and puffed meditatively. 'There is nothing in which deduction is so necessary as in religion. It can be built up as an exact science by the reasoner.'4
The carriage trundled down Hornby Road towards the Mumba Devi Temple, and I performed my duty as a guide explaining to Mr Holmes the cult of the goddess Mumba (a fof m of Parvati, consort of Shiva) from whom the city had taken its name. Mr Holmes, like Strickland (thus unlike most other Englishmen) was a good listener, and his interest genuine and scientific. It was therefore a great pleasure for me to explain to him the sights of the city, frequently illuminating my discourse with jolly interesting and pertinent anecdotes. It is not generally known, for instance, not even to the citizens of this fair metropolis, that there was human occupation in the area even during the Stone Age. Very recently, Paleolithic stone impl
ements have been found at Kandivli in Greater Bombay by a scientific acquaintance of mine, a Mr Cunningham of the Royal Asiatic Society.
North of Greater Bombay are the Kanheri caves (which is a very jolly holiday spot) and the site of an ancient Buddhist University. More than a hundred caves have been discovered filled with gigantic Buddhist sculptures. The Portuguese who obtained the islands in 1534 presented them to Britain in 1661 as part of the dowry of Catherine of Braganza, sister of the king of Portugal, when she married Charles II. Ever since then, under the aegis of the Viceroy of India, Steward of our Most Gracious Majesty, the Queen Empress, this city has seen such tremendous progress, pro bono publico, in industry, building, education, and what not, that it is, without doubt, the foremost megapolis in the Empire — after London, of course, which I have not yet had the privilege of visiting.
Mr Holmes and I spent a most pleasant day touring the city and only during the late afternoon, after examining the delightfully didactic exhibits at the Victoria and Albert Museum, did Mr Holmes make reference to the murder case again.
'Well, I think we have refreshed our minds enough for the day,' he said, climbing into a carriage parked outside the Museum gates. 'Strickland will have set the stage by now for the final resolution of our problem. Kindly instruct the coachman to take us back to our hotel.'
Mr Holmes tossed a coin to an urchin begging for alms and leaning back on the carriage seat, smoked a cigarette. He then gave me certain instructions. 'Now, Huree, it is vital that you follow my directions to the letter. When we arrive at the hotel you will accompany me to the lobby where you will bid me goodnight and make a conspicuous departure. You will th »n make your way to the alley behind the hotel and, using the trade entrance, make your way to my room unnoticed. Knock softly, three times, at the door, and Strickland will let you in. From then on you are to follow his every instruction. As for myself, I will inform the manager or the desk clerk that I am somewhat exhausted by my excursions today, and that I wish to retire early, after having a quick supper in the dining room. That ought to give our friend, whoever he may be, enough time to make his own preparations.'
I was, of course, thrilled to the bone to know that the denouement of this affair was in the offing, and it consoled me somewhat for Mr Holmes's frightful uncommunicativeness about the case. We arrived at the hotel. Once within- the lobby I bade Mr Holmes goodnight and left through the front entrance, inevitably under the contemptuous gaze of the commissionaire. As my carriage moved across the driveway I had a fleetingglimpse of Mr Holmes addressing the Portuguese desk clerk, who was obsequiously poised in his usual half-bowing state.
1. Holmes expresses a similar thought at the conclusion of The Adventure of the Cardboard Box.
2. The only other reference I have uncovered on this unique plant is by Peter Goullart in Princes of the Black Boney John Murray, 1959. Goullart mentions: 'I was told by an eminent botanist that high up on the slope of Minya Konkka, shooting through the snow, grew a remarkable primrose, called Primula Glacialis, one of the rarest flowers in the world discovered by a Catholic priest. It rivalled the sky in the purity of its blue colour and delicacy of its contours.... Why did the most beautiful, most enchanting and delicate blossoms on the planet grow so high and under such impossibly hard conditions, braving frost, hail, landslides and cruel winds, out of reach of humanity?'
3. Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker travelled throughout India (1848-50) particularly the Sikkim Himalayas, to study the distribution and evolution of plants. He was one of the most eminent of nineteenth century scientists and a close confidant of Darwin.
4. Sherlock Holmes makes very similar statements in The Final Problem and the case preceding it, The Naval Treaty. It is interesting that the metaphysical strain in him should surface so conspicuously on these two occasions just before his finalencounter with Professor Moriarty — surely the most deadly, yet significant, moment in his life.
5
The Brass Elephant
Outside the gates of the hotel I paid off the carriage, but the blighter of a ghariwallah demanded double the usual fare as he had carried an English sahib besides myself. I gave him a flea in the ear for his impudence, and quickly made my way to the rear of the Taj Mahal Hotel. By now it was dark. I moved carefully, keeping close to the shadowy side of the alley. I waited for a moment behind a pile of empty boxes, while a couple of sweating coolies carried large slabs of ice through the rear entrance of the hotel. When they left, I crossed the alley and entered the building. I climbed up the dark stairs and hurried down the brightly-lit corridor. There was no one about. I knocked sharply, three times, on the door of Room 289. An irate Strickland opened the door and practically dragged me in.
'Do you have to make such an infernal racket? Come in quick, man. He ought to be here any minute now.'
We concealed ourselves behind a grilled marble screen between the room and the balcony window. I was curious to know why Mr Holmes had posted Strickland to guard his room, and the identity of the mysterious intruder who was expected; but if my years with the Department have taught me anything, they have taught me to hold my water when ill-temper rules the roost; if I may be permitted the expression.
We remained standing silently behind the screen. Through the grille of the screen I could now discern the shadowy outiines of the objects in the room. Strickland sniffed suspiciously.
'What a horrible smell,' he whispered irritably. 'You wouldn't by any chance be using some kind of perfume, would you, Huree?'
'Certainly not, Mr Strickland,' I whispered back crushingly. 'The aroma happens to emanate from a brand of hair-lotion of which I make daily applications on the scalp. It is a very superior and expensive medicant, retailed at one rupee and four annas a botde and manufactured by Armitage and Anstruthers at their modern plant in Liverpool. I highly recommend it, Mr Strickland, it would do wonders for your coiffure’.
He sighed. We resumed our vigil in dignified silence. Suddenly Strickland gripped me strongly by the arm. There was a slight rattle of a key opening a lock. The door opened noiselessly and for a moment a man's outline was clearly silhouetted by the gas lights in the corridor. The door closed quickly. The figure, furtively, made its way across the room to the bed. A match was struck. The glow revealed the fat nervous features of the Portuguese desk clerk. He lit a small candle and placed it on the dresser near the head of the bed, then quickly moved a table from the corner of the room (the very same table Mr Holmes had commented upon yesterday) to the side of the bed. Picking up the candle he climbed on the bed and then onto the table. He reached out for the brass elephant hanging over the bed and pulling it close to him he proceeded to perform a series of furtive operations whose exact nature we could not clearly discern from our coign of vantage.
The awkwardness of having to hold a candle in one hand, and arrest the swing of the elephant with the other, made his face shine with sweat and twitch with anxiety. He extracted an objectfrom his jacket pocket that looked like a small container, and transferred something fromit to the lamp. Finally he lit the lamp on the howdah of the brass elephant and let it swing gendy back over the bed.
Then he got off the table and, placing it back in its corner, proceeded to wipe his face with a large handkerchief. He then left the room furtively, locking it behind him. Strickland and I stayed behind the screen for another ten minutes till three sharp raps came from the door. Strickland opened it with a key that he drew from his pocket. Mr Holmes walked in and looked up at the lighted elephant lamp that now swayed only imperceptibly.
'Ha! I see we have had our visitor. Capital, capital,' he remarked, rubbing his hands together. 'Oblige me by turning up the gas. We may have to entertain again this evening, and this time it would not do for our friend to view the consequences of his deed only by the light of this remarkable lamp.'
Mr Holmes's cheeriness did not dispel my fears. The lamp was definitely not your usual objet d'art, and being in the same room as it made me a trifle nervous.
'I hope it is
not malignant in its operation,' said I, voicing my concern.
'Not at the moment, but we shall know very soon.' He turned away from the lamp and looked at Strickland. 'Now, Strickland, pray enlighten me as to the details.'
He stretched himself out on the sofa as Strickland informed him of all that had transpired in the room.
'I followed your instructions to the letter, Mr Holmes. At five o'clock, just before sunset, I entered the hotel unobserved, from the trade entrance, and picked up your keyfrom under the cocoanut matting in front of the room. Since then I have been waiting —and a good long wait it has been.'
'Ah, but one propitious of a very satisfactory conclusion,' laughed Sherlock Holmes, 'as the incident you observed a littie while ago will have augured. But we anticipate. Let us examine all our data before we proceed. What was the coroner's report?'
'Well, Mr Holmes, the coroner, Dr Patterson, was completely stumped. He says he's never had to deal with a case like this before. There are no indications of any kind of poison having been administered, nor are there any significant wounds to justify the tremendous bleeding — aside from a few superficial bruises that the deceased probably sustained falling down the staircase. In fact when the coroner had washed the body to examine it, there was practically no blood at all in his veins. I have never seen a paler native body in all my years in the force.'
'You are certain there were no wounds?' said Holmes insistently. 'No marks at all? Not even some insignificant puncture in the skin, around the back of the head or neck?'
'Mr Holmes, if you are thinking that the man died from a snake bite, I can assure you that it wasn't so. No reptile, however poisonous, could have . . .'
'Were there any puncture marks?' Holmes interrupted impatiently.
'Well, there were some slight scratches on the back of his neck, but nothing you could call punctures. I've seen all kinds of snake bites in this country and know the pattern they leave on the skin. These were lighter, mere nicks and . . .'
The Mandala of Sherlock Holmes Page 6