“I thought perhaps that if you have access to a hansom cab or a growler or two,” Moriarty said, “and men who can be trusted to follow instructions with a modicum of intelligence to drive them, we could watch the house whilst remaining unobserved and contrive to follow anyone of interest who emerged.”
So the forces of order and the children of disorder gathered the next morning, Friday the third of October it was, in the streets a few blocks away from number 7 Randall Court. Three carriages were provided, with a driver and a passenger for each. A growler with a small rat-faced jarvey above and Police Sergeant Albert Cottswell seated below, uncomfortably rigged out in evening garb, down to a top hat and gold-handled ebon cane, waited in Upper Berkley Mews a block to the East of Randall Court. A hansom with a bow-legged ex-jockey atop and a pert-faced young lady with a golden pimpernel-bedecked bonnet seated in the cab loitered in Spottsworth Crescent to the south. A block over on Bixly Street a second hansom lurked, pulled by a burly-looking brown carriage horse with a large white star on its forehead, with Mr. Maws, Moriarty’s butler, as cabman in the driver’s seat and PC Bertrand Higgins, dressed in his closest approximation of a young man-about-town, as its passenger.
Four people whom Moriarty neglected to identify to the constabulary set about to, each in his own way, keep a close and careful watch on the house at number 7. Shortly before dawn Jimmy “the Squeek” Tomms had shimmied up the side of the four-story sandstone building at number 12, across the way, and settled in on the roof with a bag of pastries, a jug of sweet cider, and a collapsing telescope. His partner in various enterprises—a young man known as “the Beak”—had squirmed to the top of the residence on the next block, where he could watch for signals from Tomms and relay them to the growler driver waiting below. In case someone decided to venture forth through the mews that ran behind number 7, Red Sally had worked her magic with locks on the door of a conveniently vacant stable a way down the mews and was settled inside at the window, with just enough of the grime wiped off so she could see every which way through it. A string had been run to the back of the stable and through the wall, and a small red weight tied to the end outside. With a series of twitches on the string Sally could convey whatever needed to be told to Alphonse, her eight-year-old son, who had been schooled in the secret code of string twitches and was waiting outside, prepared to signal Mr. Maws a block away.
All was ready—but for hours their quarry, whoever that might turn out to be, stubbornly refused to emerge from the building. PC Higgins was beginning to take it personally. Here he was on special duty, and no telling what might come of that, engaged in an adventure that he could tell his grandchildren about—if he was ever to be allowed to speak of it.
“The lad is waving at us,” Maws said, interrupting Higgins’s thoughts.
Higgins stood up in the cab and shielded his eyes. The lad, Alphonse, was indeed waving a large once-white rag at them. One-two-three-four from side to side, a four-wheeler; one-two up and down, two passengers; one-two-three from side to side, headed east as it left the mews.
“We’re off, then,” said Maws. “Better sit yourself down.”
“Right, right,” Higgins agreed, quickly sitting and closing the little folding doors as Maws clucked the horse into motion.
Not too fast, didn’t want to appear to be following. Not too slow, didn’t want to lose the blighters. Mr. Maws, with his grimy topper and his wide mustache—assumed for the occasion—looked like the compleat cabman. Higgins contrived to look like the perfect upper-class silly ass that he felt himself to be in his sand-colored morning suit with the light red kerchief peeking out of the breast pocket and the brown bowler that was ever so slightly too small for his head. Nobody would give them a second look or for a second assume that they might be following anyone.
The carriage they were following, a maroon brougham with black wheels and a glossy finish, and with somebody-or-other’s coat of arms on the door—Higgins could only get glimpses of it as they rounded corners, and couldn’t have identified it anyway—proceeded east at an unhurried pace along Watney High Street for perhaps half a mile, then pulled over by a tobacconist’s, and one of the two passengers hopped out and darted into the store.
Mr. Maws drove the hansom past the brougham without stopping, and Higgins got a brief view of a sharp nose and the brim of a top hat through the brougham’s window. Maws made a right turn at the next corner—Pomfrey Street—and went halfway down the block before pulling to a stop and jumping down to lead the horse around in a tight U-turn. “We’ll just await the blighter here,” he said. “You might want to stick that mac over your suit to sort of change your appearance, in case they was looking behind them.” He pulled a rag from his coat pocket and, producing a small flask from another pocket, dampened the rag and proceeded to wipe the horse’s forehead with it, whereupon the white star miraculously disappeared.
Higgins pulled the stiff black coat up from the floor of the cab and drew it over his shoulders. “It smells,” he complained.
“So it do,” Maws agreed, climbing back up to the driver’s seat.
It was perhaps ten minutes later when Higgins saw the brougham passing the street corner ahead of them. Mr. Maws clicked his horse into motion, turned right at the corner, and once again began the slow-speed chase. After another twenty minutes or so it brought them finally to Totting Square, a small park with a fenced area in the center dominated by a larger-than-life-sized bronze statue of a stern-looking man in a doublet and jerkin, puffy pantaloons, and an onion-dome hat with a wide, flat brim. Mr. Maws slowed his horse down to a walk to allow the brougham to keep well ahead of them.
Higgins reached over his head and tapped on the driver’s panel, and Maws slid it open. “Do you suppose that’s Mr. Totting?” Higgins asked, indicating the statue.
“Or Sir Totting,” said Mr. Maws, leaning over to speak to the top of Higgins’s head, “or Lord, or General; but I’d say he’s some Totting or other.”
The brougham went three-quarters of the way around the square and pulled into a gated courtyard just big enough for a carriage to turn around. Which it promptly did, after depositing its two passengers at the door of the Georgian mansion that took up most of that side of the square.
“You jump out and watch them blokes,” Mr. Maws murmured down to Higgins. “Carefully now, without them twigging to you. I’ll be back directly as soon as I see where yon brougham finishes up.”
Higgins decabbed hurriedly, and Maws urged his horse into motion as the brougham pulled out of the courtyard and headed out of the square. A light drizzle had begun, and Higgins turned up the collar of his jacket and regretted having left the mac, smelly as it was, behind in the cab. The two men he was watching scurried into the house as soon as the door was opened, leaving Higgins to lurk in the doorway of the house across the square, where a steady trickle of water fell on his head as the drizzle turned into a shower.
Lights came at one of the first-floor windows, and Higgins could see someone moving about inside. He pulled out his pocket watch and peered down at it. It was seven after three in the afternoon, but the heavy overcast was doing a good job of obscuring the sun and most of its light. Higgins watched the figure in the window until it moved out of sight, and nothing further happened to hold his interest. He crossed over to the park and walked along the narrow brick path to the fence around the statue. Slowly he followed the fence, trying to find a plaque, or a sign, or some words chiseled into the side of the six-foot-high marble base.
“You are looking,” a voice from somewhere behind him said softly, “at the bronze statue of Captain Robert Percival Totting of Her Majesty’s Seventh Foot Regiment. The ‘Her Majesty’ in this case being, of course, Queen Elizabeth.”
Higgins spun around to see a slender, angular man in a brown check suit emerging from a low bush behind him, one where he would swear no man had been but moments before.
“What the—” Higgins began.
“My apologies,” the man said. “D
idn’t mean to startle you, but I thought I’d better speak up, as you were certain to see me when you turned around.”
“Where…?”
“I was sitting quietly next to—well, actually pretty much in—that yew bush. You would have seen me if you looked over as you passed.”
“Yes, but what on earth—”
“Am I doing hiding in these bushes? The same as you, I’d say,” the man said. “Watching that house, seeing who comes and who goes.” He brushed himself off with a quick gesture. “I’m Sherlock Holmes, by the way,” he said. “And you are?”
“Higgins,” said Higgins. “PC Higgins.”
“A pleasure.”
“I’ve met your brother,” Higgins volunteered. “How did you know—”
“I recognized your driver, Maws. Works for Professor Moriarty. Used to be a pugilist. It was an obvious deduction. How is Mycroft? Has he any new information on the workings of this plot?”
“What sort of information?” asked Higgins.
“Well, whatever, for example, brought you here?”
“We were following that brougham,” explained Higgins.
“Yes, I could see that,” said Holmes, “but why? How did it attract your attention?”
Higgins related what he knew, which was not much. “They don’t burden me with details,” he said. “They tell me, ‘Dress like a toff and sit in that there hansom, and Mr. Maws will tell you what to do.’”
“The life of a constable,” Holmes agreed. “Yours is not to reason why…”
The hansom cab with Maws atop rounded the corner and pulled back into the square. Holmes and Higgins walked over to meet it. Maws touched his whip to the brim of his topper. “Afternoon, Mr. Holmes,” he said.
“Good afternoon to you, Mr. Maws,” Holmes said. “You don’t seem surprised to see me.”
“Never surprised to see you, Mr. Holmes. You do turn up in the oddest places.”
Holmes gave a sharp laugh. “I think,” he said, “that I’d better speak with my brother and, I suppose, Professor Moriarty. You wouldn’t happen to be headed in their direction, would you?”
“Climb aboard, Mr. Holmes,” Maws offered. Then, leaning down to Higgins, he said, “There’s a mews around the block that holds a carriage house for that there establishment. But as we can’t cover both doors, and the hansom would be a mite conspicuous loitering about, I think you’d best stay and keep a watch on yon front door. Here, take my inverness, it’ll keep you a bit dryer; that old mac is not fit to wear. I’ll have someone come around to relieve you in a bit, and perhaps an extra pair of eyes for the mews.”
“They’ll find me by the gate under them stairs,” Higgins said, indicating the entrance to a nearby building, “if the owner doesn’t chase me away. There’s enough of an overhang to keep me a bit less wet. I fancy I can see right enough over the railing.”
“Hop to it, then,” said Maws, and Higgins trotted off while Maws, with a snap of the reins, headed the cab back down the street.
* * *
“I’ve always admired your study, Professor,” Holmes said, taking off his greatcoat and looking around the room before lowering himself into a chair. “It looks so erudite that it artfully conceals … what we both know you to be.”
Moriarty sighed. “Ah, Holmes,” he said. “You don’t know how I’ve missed you and your puerile accusations.”
Mycroft, who was settled in an oversized chair in a corner of the room, harumphed loudly. “Enough! Sherlock, Professor,” he said sharply. “We have no time for ancient animosities.” He turned to Sir Anthony Darryl, who was standing by the door. “Are the others coming?”
“I have sent messengers,” Sir Anthony told him.
“We will just have to fill them in when they arrive,” Mycroft said. “Well, Sherlock, what have you to tell us?”
“You, I presume, received my last cable?” Holmes asked.
“This morning,” Mycroft said, “if this was the last one.” He pulled a neatly folded form from his jacket, unfolded it, and read aloud:
RETURNING SOONEST STOP GAMES AFOOT STOP SH
“That’s it,” Holmes agreed.
“Elucidate,” said Mycroft.
Holmes took a silver cigarette case adorned with the arms of a member of the Austrian royal family from his waistcoat pocket. “There is an asylum called La Maison de Fous de Sainte-Anne la Belle,” he said, removing a cigarette from the case and tamping it down on the engraved wild-boar head on the crest, “located in the forest outside of Brunoy, a small town south of Paris.”
Mycroft nodded. “We know about that,” he said, “and the supposedly deceased Monsieur Bonfils d’Eny. I’m just trying to save time,” he added when his brother turned to stare at him.
“Of course,” Sherlock agreed. “To continue, Professor Moriarty’s assistant, Mummer Tolliver, and I visited la maison yesterday to inquire after Monsieur d’Eny, and were told of his death and shown the stone marking his grave. We appeared satisfied and went off. The mummer returned to Paris, I believe—”
“And thence to London,” Moriarty interrupted. “He arrived here less than an hour ago.”
“Ah!” said Holmes. “After the little man left, I remained in concealment on the road leading away from the maison. About twenty minutes later a man, one of the brothers, by his dress, left the maison and headed to Brunoy in a dogcart of the sort the French call dos-á-dos. I followed him.”
“Were you seen?” Mycroft interrupted.
Sherlock glared at him briefly.
“My apologies,” said Mycroft. “Of course not.”
There was a clattering at the front door, and the Duke of Shorham and the Earl of Scully stomped into the hall, divested themselves of their raincoats, and were shown into Moriarty’s study. In a few terse sentences Mycroft brought them up to date, then gestured to his brother to take up the tale.
Holmes paused to take a light for his cigarette from the lamp on Moriarty’s desk and then turned back to face the others. “The man I was following entered the telegraph office and sent a cable. I was able to obtain the telegraph form under the one on which he had composed his message, and thus recover the writing with the aid of a soft lead pencil.”
“What was the message?” asked Sir Anthony.
“It was addressed to Macbeth, at Westerleigh House, Totting Square, London,” Holmes said, taking out a slip of paper and passing it to him.
ANGLAIS ICI POSER DES QUESTIONS SUR HENRY VU LA TOMBE PARTI
“English here asking about Henry saw grave went away,” Sir Anthony translated.
“Henry?” The duke looked around the room. “Does this help? Who the bloody hell is Henry?”
“I would say that Henry is Bonfils d’Eny, who achieved a sort of local renown as the Belleville Slicer,” Moriarty said dryly.
“That is who we were asking questions about,” Holmes agreed.
“Ah!” said the duke.
“Of more immediate interest,” Moriarty suggested, “is who Macbeth is.”
“I,” said Mycroft, “concur.”
“I went from boat to train to cab and arrived at Westerleigh house in eighteen hours,” Holmes went on. “I stationed myself outside the house. The relevance of this address to our problem was confirmed when I saw PC Higgins and Mr. Maws arrive, as they must have had additional information from another source drawing them there.”
“Umm. Westerleigh House, Westerleigh House,” mused the duke. “Now where have I—” He snapped his fingers. “Of course!”
The others looked at him. “Of course?” asked the earl.
“That damned invitation! My wife wants to go, don’t you know, but I’ve told her that it’s impossible, just impossible. Parvenu scallywag!”
“To which particular parvenu, ah, scallywag are you referring, Your Grace?” asked Sir Anthony.
“That chap who’s calling himself the Earl of Messy, or some such. Trying to claim the title. Says his great-great-grandfather was the last earl. On top of which the
blighter claims to be the, as he puts it, ‘last of the Plantagenets.’” The duke shook his head. “What is it all coming to, these days? Anybody thinks they can do anything, claim to be anyone. Americans come over and expect to be accepted into society.”
“Only very rich Americans,” Sir Anthony said.
“That’s little excuse. Rich Americans bring their daughters over here and marry them to some impoverished peer, trading money for a title. Then the gals expect to be called duchess or countess or baroness or whatever.”
“I would say they’ve earned the title,” said the earl.
“And the nobleman has often earned the money,” Sir Anthony added.
“Bah!” said the duke.
“What about this Westerleigh House, Your Grace?” Mycroft asked. “What invitation?”
“That house—it’s where the supposed Earl of Messy … Mersy?—has moved himself and his entourage.”
“You said something about an invitation,” Mycroft reminded the duke.
“How’s that?” The duke looked puzzled for a moment; then his face cleared. “Oh, yes. The bally upstart is throwing a bally ball, and he had the bally nerve to invite my wife and me. Won’t go, of course. The duchess wants to go—get a look at him and that sort of thing. Something to gossip about, I imagine. But how would it look? I mean, really?”
“I heard about that chap,” said the earl. “Got an invitation myself. He’s invited half of London. Almost everyone of quality—any sort of quality whatever, it seems.”
“When is the ball?”
“Saturday night.”
“We’ll have to go, of course,” said Moriarty.
“So,” Holmes said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “You think that’s it then?”
“It would seem to all come together nicely if we assume that Saturday night is the witching hour,” Moriarty said.
“Indeed,” Mycroft agreed. “In front of dozens—hundreds—of people. No way it could be hushed up.”
“We’d better have our people there,” suggested Sir Anthony.
Who Thinks Evil: A Professor Moriarty Novel (Professor Moriarty Novels) Page 24