The Sherlock Holmes Megapack: 25 Modern Tales by Masters: 25 Modern Tales by Masters

by Michael Kurland

  “Then how do we find this Joshua Heinz? Where do we begin our search?” Mr Upshaw asked, reducing the heat in his demeanour to a simmer.

  “Your questions are valid, but they preclude an instantaneous answer,” Holmes advised. “My investigation is not yet complete.”

  “It could take days for you to reach a conclusion, and we must preserve our good name sooner,” Mr Upshaw stated anxiously.

  “Then I recommend you contact the reporters and invite them here for a conference,” Holmes suggested. “They will be more than happy to keep the mystery alive.”

  “And what of Joshua Heinz? Do you have a plan?” Mr Upshaw persisted.

  “Yes, but my stratagems are proprietary, though the results ordinarily become general knowledge,” Holmes told him to finish the conversation.

  We were off then to the Diogenes Club, where Holmes thought he would find his older brother Mycroft relaxing for the evening after leaving his desk in the British Home Secretary’s suite.

  “I shall impose on him to bring me closer to nabbing the elusive, crooked-nosed culprit,” Holmes postulated as we seated ourselves in a hansom and discussed the newest wrinkle in Holmes’s quest to determine the whereabouts of Joshua Heinz.

  * * * *

  “Sherlock! Dr Watson! What a pleasant surprise to see you both here!” Mycroft exclaimed when he saw us in the doorway of the lounge. “It is my guess that you have reached an impasse in the House of Lords investigation and need me to help untangle yourselves.”

  “You are always a step ahead of me, Mycroft, which is why our mother considered you the smarter of her two sons,” said the younger brother to the massive Mycroft. “In this case, it is not an impasse, however. It is only a logical step on which I embark, because it is your position in the prime minister’s administration that I hope to use, not your brilliance.”

  “But if it weren’t for my brilliance, I wouldn’t occupy the position,” Mycroft retorted. “Now how can I be of service, Sherlock?”

  Holmes explained to his sibling that Lord Pritchard, in an otherwise unproductive interview, admitted that he had met Joshua Heinz at a party in the French ambassador’s mansion.

  “I want to learn when the party occurred, who attended, who arranged it, what the occasion could have been, and, most importantly, who invited Joshua Heinz and how that person contacted the man—that’s all, for the time being, anyway,” Holmes proposed.

  “That’s a tall order, but I have some friends in the French embassy who likely have access to that information,” Mycroft said casually. “How soon do you need it?”

  “Tomorrow afternoon would be a superb time,” Holmes suggested.

  “There is some urgency to your request, then? In that case I shall make my inquiries first thing in the morning,” Mycroft told his brother. “Now join me for a brandy and you can tell me all about your adventure and how you got mixed up in this sordid affair. Your client must be someone very important.”

  “My client is indeed important! It is I,” Holmes announced, and he launched into a diatribe about the high cost of cinnamon.

  * * * *

  That night, he prowled about our sitting-room and dining area in his mouse-coloured dressing gown, initially fishing in the coal scuttle for a partially-smoked cigar, then pacing the floor with his old briar-root pipe and wringing his bony hands behind his back. Eventually, he withdrew to his bedroom, where the lamp burned until well past midnight, and I could picture him walking back-and-forth, slowly, then rapidly, then slowly again, as I drifted off to sleep across the hallway.

  In the morning, Holmes was nowhere in our apartment. Instead, I found a cryptic note next to the half-empty coffee pot, informing me that he had gone to examine the register of the St Pancras Hotel near the Palace of Westminster.

  When he returned at about noon, after I had brought my notes up to date, he was in a chipper mood. He briefly consulted his Index, a compendium of crime and criminals, among other topics, and made us sandwiches with some leftover ham and horseradish in the ice chest.

  “I didn’t see our quarry Joshua Heinz listed as a guest of the hotel on the days Lord Pritchard made his speeches,” Holmes apprised me while we ate, “but I did find a name of more significant interest. The establishment is luxurious, fitting the décor to which an international con artist is accustomed.” He said nothing further.

  * * * *

  About two hours later, the huge frame of Mycroft Holmes filled our doorway, and the boisterous brother proclaimed that the mission on which he had been sent was regarded by the French embassy staff as akin to a breach of national security.

  “It was like pulling a sore tooth to get any data at all about the party and the invitees,” Mycroft related. “My friends were so tight-lipped about the subject they made me promise not to share what I learned with anyone outside the Home Office. So, I am breaking my word by giving you this copy of the guest list, Sherlock. Protect it from disclosure to any living soul, other than Dr Watson, of course. You will note that Lord’s name appears on it, but it is bereft of the name Joshua Heinz,” said Mycroft Holmes, unfolding the sheet of paper and gingerly handing it to his brother.

  “I suspected as much, Mycroft,” said Sherlock Holmes, “although there is another name that I see here which intrigues me even more than that of Joshua Heinz: Baron François Maupertuis, the same name as the one in the register of the St Pancras Hotel.”

  “And who might he be?” Mycroft inquired.

  “Baron Maupertuis, according to my Index, is a convicted felon who operates in the spheres of politics and finance. He is the mastermind of fraudulent schemes that stretch across continents. I believe that Joshua Heinz is merely a new alias among a multitude of others he has employed to orchestrate an elaborate artifice.”

  “This is a real hornet’s nest you have disturbed, little brother,” Mycroft said in reaction. “Let’s just see how many of the nasty insects you can swat before this affair is settled.”

  “I am casting a wide net and will let the chips fall where they may,” Sherlock Holmes guaranteed. “Now what other details about the party did you come away with?”

  “The party took place on January the tenth,” Mycroft disclosed, “and was arranged with an order from the ambassador himself that the guest list be kept hush-hush. No reporters and no officials other than Lord Pritchard were on the guest list; only stalwarts of commerce, certain bank executives, and some wealthy investors. There were no invitations by post—the attendees were all contacted by special messenger. They were selected by the ambassador alone.”

  “Hmm. This case is piquant, and the more it evolves, the less likely that the sleaze ends at Lord Pritchard’s doorstep,” said the resolute younger brother.

  PART 2: A GRAND CRIME THAT POLICE IN THREE COUNTRIES FAIL TO SOLVE

  Chapter 1

  A SHOCKING DEVELOPMENT

  Sherlock Holmes wasted no time immersing himself in the data his brother Mycroft had delivered, spending the remainder of the afternoon among the London directories and reference books on the shelves in our sitting-room to further identify or locate the persons on the guest list of the party.

  Meanwhile, I put the final touches on a manuscript I was preparing to submit to a publisher concerning the case of Mrs Matilda Etherege, whose husband Holmes found living as a hermit in the Broads of Langmere when the police and his family had given him up for dead.

  “Watson, I have made sufficient progress in my research,” Holmes said proudly toward evening, “that I can afford a diversion until morning. There is little else I can accomplish until then, anyway, so what say you, my diligent biographer, to dinner at Roland’s Trattoria in Berkeley Square and then to a concert at Covent Garden. I have been eager to hear the soothing music of cello virtuoso Hans Josef Fabien ever since I read the reviews of his performance on opening night. Tonight is his last and I would feel deprived if we were to miss out on it.”

  I concurred wholeheartedly, knowing especially that Holmes needed rela
xation, and so, after freshening up, we gave our minds a respite to enjoy an evening out on the town. I should have known better than to think Holmes would permit our pleasure to interfere with business, however.

  Coincidentally, we were seated at Covent Garden about twenty rows behind the orchestra when Holmes looked above us at a box leased to the National Bank of England.

  “I see that the chairman of the board of directors, Sir Henry Grimm, didn’t want to miss out on the talented cellist’s last performance, either,” the ever-watchful investigator observed as intermission came. How he recognized the distinguished, elderly financier I had no idea, but the impulse to take advantage of an opportunity overcame him. “I think I shall engage Sir Henry in conversation about the party he attended at the ambassador’s mansion,” Holmes said excitedly as he started to make his way through the crowd in the lobby and ascend the stairs to the next level.

  I wandered over to the vestibule to purchase some refreshments while I waited for Holmes to return with new information. He was smiling broadly when we met again, and shook his head in a display of incredulity.

  “What is it that you have learned?” I quizzed.

  “Well, I don’t mind telling a story against myself once again,” he responded. “The old codger claimed to barely remember who went to the party, and he admonished me for meddling in the internal affairs of the bank and the machinery of our government. ‘Go on about your life without destroying the relationship between the pillars of this community and the leaders of this great Empire,’ he jabbered as his dentures click-clacked. I would hasten to say that my appeal to his sense of moral uprightness was an abysmal failure.”

  During the final half of the concert, my friend chuckled to himself over the encounter with Sir Henry, and on the way home Holmes leaned back in the cab with his tight-fitting cloth cap pulled down across the bridge of his long nose, mimicking their repartee, with an emphasis on the banker’s one-sentence lecture.

  “I would be amused even more,” Holmes gloated, “to know how much money the National Bank of England stands to lose if its esteemed chairman has been duped into a ploy concocted by the villain François Maupertuis. But enough hypothesis! It is facts that I need, Watson, and I intend to gather some useful intelligence in the morning.”

  * * * *

  Later, back in our apartment, Holmes stretched out on the sofa with his violin, recreating the melodious refrains we heard on the cello at Covent Garden. I scanned the pages of the evening Pall Mall in one of the armchairs and read aloud to Holmes a news account of Lord Ashton Pritchard’s release from jail on his own recognisance. Walking out of police headquarters, he was surrounded by reporters, to whom he vowed to vigorously defend against the trumped-up charge of malfeasance. He staunchly denied rumours that he was assisting the authorities in what was described as a continuing inquiry.

  “I wouldn’t doubt that Inspector Jones was the source of those rumours,” Holmes speculated, “to exert pressure on Lord Pritchard’s co-conspirator to do something that would bring him out in the open, to surface and fall into the long arms of the law.”

  “Such as what?” I asked.

  “Such as make contact with his lordship—surely he is under surveillance,” Holmes answered. “There is too much at stake for him not to be watched closely. That is what I will do for the rest of tonight and perhaps all day tomorrow, or at least until I am assured that Scotland Yard is doing an adequate job of it. Here is the address of Lord Pritchard that I acquired at police headquarters the day before yesterday, Watson. Come ’round in the afternoon and stroll past the front entrance with your walking stick as if you were out on a daily constitutional.”

  “What should I do after that?” I wanted to know.

  “A little birdie will whisper instructions in your ear,” said Holmes with a laugh, then he disappeared out the door at a fast clip.

  At about noon the following day, a steady spring rain pelted the city, so I donned my Mackintosh and broad-brimmed felt hat, took up my walking stick, and rode in a cab to St John’s Wood, where the stately, lichen-blotched stone dwelling of Lord Pritchard stood among a half-dozen other large houses of equal magnificence, all separated by elm trees, recently-planted flower gardens, and lush green lawns. I ordered the driver to stop about two furlongs beyond Lord Pritchard’s address and began my trek in the downpour. I passed his address and was a short distance up the cobblestone road when the sweet voice of a teen-age girl selling lilies from a cart under a wide bumbershoot wondered if I was Dr Watson.

  “Why, yes, I am, my dear,” I told her. “How on earth did you know?”

  “Mr Holmes and Inspector Jones, for whom I work, said you would be coming along and to keep an eye out for you,” she revealed. “I am part of the surveillance team. You can find the others in that carriage house across the road from Lord Pritchard’s home. The man who lives in the carriage house is a retired constable, Jeremy Higgenbottom. Inspector Jones arranged it so that the police could use Jeremy’s quarters as a vantage point and a staging area in the event Lord Pritchard goes on the move.”

  “This all seems intricately planned,” I mentioned.

  “Oh, it has been planned for a couple of days,” she added. “Mr Holmes and Inspector Jones cooked up the idea before Lord Pritchard was released. They want us to be on the lookout for a man with a crooked nose who might visit Lord Pritchard. If I see him enter his lordship’s home, I am supposed to blow my whistle and then go cover the rear exit in case he tries to escape through it.”

  “But what if he does, how would you stop him?” I inquired.

  “I am trained in karate, and, besides, I have this,” she disclosed, pulling back the front of her waistcoat and showing me a revolver butt hanging from a shoulder holster.

  “Oh, my!” I exclaimed. “You are not the one to tangle with!”

  “I should say not, but I am ready for him,” she concluded before I bid her good fortune and went toward the carriage house. I climbed the wooden steps and rapped on the door, which was opened by a stout, grey-haired gentleman with a high forehead, dark eyes, and a protruding jaw.

  “Hello, Dr Watson, come in, come in. I am Jeremy, your host,” he proclaimed.

  “Watson! You are soaking wet. Come sit by the stove to dry yourself,” said Sherlock Holmes, who was perched at a window in the cozy kitchen, looking out across the road at Lord Pritchard’s home.

  “Leave it to you, Holmes, to keep yourself snug and out of the rain when you are on duty,” I retorted. “I think I shall sit next to Inspector Jones at the table and take advantage of that warm cook stove.”

  “You are just in time for tea,” said the amiable occupant. “The little missus was about to serve some nice hot tea and fresh-baked muffins when you knocked.”

  “Lovely,” I said with enthusiasm, “for I skipped lunch to be here by mid-afternoon. Tell me, one of you, how goes the operation?”

  Inspector Jones volunteered that Lord Pritchard had had no visitors, so there was no sign of the man with the crooked nose.

  “The housekeeper and the butler arrived at about seven o’clock through the servants’ entrance, but other than the two of them, his lordship apparently has no well-wishers. All the rats have jumped ship. I expect the butler and the maid will be leaving for the day shortly.”

  The afternoon ended without the departure of the two domestics, and Holmes took on a worried look. Sunset came, then darkness, without a light in any window of the domicile across the road. “Something is amiss, and I fear the worst. We have been tricked,” Holmes deduced in an icy tone. “One of us should—”

  “Tricked? How?” Inspector Jones interjected.

  “The pair who arrived this morning were not what they pretended to be,” said Holmes glumly. “One of us should go to the front door and ring the bell to see if there is a response.”

  “Well, what if Lord Pritchard or the butler answers? It will give us away,” the inspector protested.

  “Not if we make it seem like
a final attempt to elicit his lordship’s cooperation,” Holmes proposed.

  “Then you handle it, Mr Holmes, because I already have exhausted my energies in that department while Lord Pritchard was in custody,” the inspector advised.

  Holmes agreed and scurried outside. The rain had subsided and, with the illumination from the street lamps, we watched Holmes’s thin silhouette glide to the front door and wait for someone to let him inside. He rang a second time and paused again for another few minutes.

  Getting no response, he went around the side of the building to the servants’ entrance and opened the unlocked door, stepping into the house. We saw a lamp flicker in one room, then another and another. Suddenly, Holmes’s slender figure burst out the main door and he waved frantically for us to move forward. He met us on the lawn and announced his findings:

  “Lord Pritchard has been murdered, shot six times as he lay in bed. The housekeeper and the butler are also both dead, gagged and bound with cord from the window blinds, callously executed with bullets in the backs of their heads while seated at the dining room table. But this is not the same couple who arrived early today. The deceased domestics are older, smaller, and dressed differently—and they are live-ins, as you will see when I show you their rooms. The two who committed these crimes came in disguise, suspecting that Lord Pritchard would be under surveillance, and made their escape through the rear exit.”

  The shocking news left us speechless for a time, until Inspector Jones broke the silence with a grunt and a curse. “So be it, then,” he said calmly, lifting his derby and scratching his scalp through a coarse shock of black hair. “Let’s go in and survey the damage. It puzzles me, though, why we didn’t detect the gunfire.”

  “The killers used pillows to muffle the noise, first doing away with Lord Pritchard after tying up the butler and the maid, then turning on them to eliminate any witnesses. I believe we are confronted with the trademarks of professional assassins,” Holmes stated. “Be cautious where you step—there might be footprints out here that I can examine in the morning when there is enough light, but the rain probably has washed that evidence away.”