by Lyndsay Faye
“Who says I’m sane?” the fellow demanded. “Who says I’m a gentleman, either?”
“Well.” Holmes coughed politely. “I’ll admit that both sanity and gentility are nuanced questions, but I perceive you originally come from respectable stock in the neighborhood of Colchester—Lexden, to be precise—and never having met you before in my life . . .” Here my friend paused and with a look ascertained I understood we faced not an old enemy, but something more volatile still. “It is a habit of mine to give the benefit of the—”
“I said I’ll do it!” the visitor cried, raising the revolver and clapping its muzzle against his own head.
Horror contorted Holmes’s features as I gasped. An instant later, he had transformed himself into the snake charmer I have described elsewhere, the man who gives the distinct impression that he could walk into the middle of a frothing mob and calm its spirits with a quiet overture.
“Oh, but you can’t, you understand.” Holmes struck a lilting, conversational tone. “No, I won’t have it. See here, I think you came to Baker Street to tell me about yourself. Did you not? The only alternative explanation is that you came here so that I might witness your demise and vouch for it, which could suggest any of half a dozen motives that occur to me. But you see, I don’t know who you are, and supposing you fire that weapon . . .” He shrugged sadly. “Perhaps I never will. My friend here—just behind you, the hearty chap with the moustache—is a doctor. If something ails you, he will do all he can to help. As for myself, I am criminally curious, you know, and I cannot have gentlemen from Lexden charging into my rooms and intriguing me only to watch them expire.”
I had been confused, but though Holmes’s words were glib, they were equally gentle, and already taking effect. The man appeared more cognizant of the terrible situation in which we found ourselves after hearing my friend make light of it. His trembling did not cease, however, and his rich voice when it emerged was knotted thickly with despair.
“I thought perhaps that you, only you, could help me. Foolishness! No one believes me.”
“I might surprise you. I’ve been told I’m very unpredictable.”
“This truly is the guise madness takes, coming here in the middle of the night and waving a gun in front of decent people—it’s proof of everything they say! What I believe happened to me is impossible.”
“But you see, I happen to be the world’s foremost expert on what is possible versus what is impossible. So since you’re already here, it would be a shame not to tell me about it.” Holmes offered a tiny smile.
The poor fellow laughed and then collapsed to the floor as if someone had tossed a ragbag onto it, sobbing over and over, “God help me, God help me.” Quick as a thought, Holmes had descended to his knees, pocketed the gun, and taken him squarely by the shoulders.
“All right,” he said in a much more sober tone. “You’ve taken a spell, but whatever has happened to bring you here, nothing can harm you at the moment. You understand that all you must do is calm yourself, and my friend and I shall see to the rest? Very good. Some brandy I think might be in order, and I’ll move the rack before the hearth so we can dry your coat, and we shall see what we can do.”
“Brandy!” the fellow repeated after another anguished sound. “God have mercy. Some bread, thank you, and a cup of tea, and I’ll do what I can to recover myself. I cannot express my shame over—”
“Tut-tut! Not another word of that nature, provided you allow me to retain your weapon temporarily in lieu of an apology. Do you call that a fair trade? All right, then. If you can make your way into the sitting room just there, I’ll fetch the coatrack and some sandwiches. We must do for ourselves just now, as we’ve the most disloyal and frivolous landlady in Britain, who will insist on abandoning us whensoever one of her aunts is dying. It’s extremely tedious. I am Sherlock Holmes, by the way, and this is my friend, Dr. John Watson.”
When our guest perceived the hand proffered, he bent over it as if it were a lifeline. “Mr. Horatio Falconer, sir, and already a man forever in your debt.”
“Not at all. Off with you toward the fire, and we shall see to housekeeping and return in a trice.”
Mr. Falconer staggered to his feet and proceeded, still weeping hard, into the sitting room. On the instant he was gone, my friend fell back on his heels, looking thoroughly spent.
“Good heavens, Holmes, are you all right?” I demanded, approaching him. “That was an unprecedented performance. My dear fellow, can you stand?”
“Of course I can.”
When I had helped pull him to his feet, I saw in the low light of the hall that he was indeed hale enough, though far more shaken than usual following a violent altercation. I could scarce blame him, feeling identically myself.
“If we never see such a display as that again, I’ll give the universe top marks.”
“It was, as you suggest, unusual, and not in a fashion that bears repeating,” he conceded, seeming to shake the startlement from his limbs as he trotted downstairs.
“Holmes, I thought he was here to enact some terrible revenge on you.”
“Yes, that likewise occurred to me. I saw that you were as ready as ever to fling yourself into the fray, and I humbly thank you for it.”
“You’ve no need to thank me for anything, and you don’t do anything humbly.”
“Well, if that were the case, you’d have no notion of what it looks like, would you, and therefore cannot judge as to either the nature or the frequency of my humility,” he teased, seeming fully recovered as he shut the front door and locked it. “My dear Doctor, I am going to make sandwiches, a task at which I excel as I excel at so many others. I request that you carry the coatrack upstairs and fix me a headache tonic, if you would be so kind. I find myself in direst need of one.”
Some ten minutes later, Holmes and I sat in our respective chairs, listening to the coat drip as it dried, my friend’s tonic swiftly dispatched, watching as our guest upon the sofa consumed his simple repast of cold beef and cheese. The interval gave us ample opportunity to observe him. Mr. Falconer seemed somewhere between the ages of forty-five and fifty-five, but his appearance made his reason for refusing brandy eminently clear. He had already been drunk when he arrived, for his movements were slow and deliberate, his craggy face was emblazoned with red veins, and his skin beneath the enlarged vessels was a sickly yellow hue. A hooked nose, tangled black hair that fell to his shoulders unrestrained, and a suit equally as decrepit as his coat completed this picture of total dissolution. His eyes within the wreckage, however, were of a clear, pale blue, and so artistic and lively despite their glassiness that I heartily pitied the fellow for having driven himself into such perilous territory as regarded his health. When he had finished, he sipped his tea and heaved an overwrought sigh.
“Gentlemen, I hardly know how to thank you, but before I take advantage of any more hospitality, I must embarrass myself still further. I cannot pay your retainer in cash, Mr. Holmes, though I can visit a pawn shop should you be willing to wait until the morrow.”
So saying, he produced a small golden charm, obviously of enormous importance to him, considering it remained in his possession, and I passed it to Holmes. My friend had lit his pipe and sat smoking meditatively with his stork’s legs crossed. He turned the shining object over in his fingers and tossed it in an arc back to our client.
“Saint Cecilia. Thank you, Mr. Falconer, but when a client lacks the resources to meet my entire fee, I prefer to leave the subject of money forgotten. Consider your own case to fall under the latter category. Which opera company was it sacked you?”
Mr. Falconer’s jaw dropped. He rubbed at the short, wiry bristles on his cheeks. “How the devil did you know I was a singer?”
“How could I not know? You can’t open your mouth to speak without betraying your extensive vocal training to the expert. As you are sleeping rough of late—either
Hyde Park or St. James’s, which both feature the loamy light brown soil which has attached itself to your coat—it is clear you are no longer employed, but a man of your obvious talent could find work at any time were your general condition improved. The scene just enacted in my hall, forgive my mentioning it, would not have occurred to someone lacking in creative sensitivity. Add to this the detail that Cecilia is the patron saint of musicians, and the matter becomes indisputable.”
Our client winced at the reference to his earlier actions. “It was the Garrick Street Players, sir. I have played Morales, Guglielmo, Doctor Falke. . . . I had a permanent position in the company, but as you can see . . .” He gestured at himself. “Hyde Park is indeed my residence of late.”
“What happened?”
Mr. Falconer shook his unkempt head. “The oldest tale ever told, Mr. Holmes. A love lost, a terrible habit gained—the triteness is almost as painful as the shame.”
“But it is not this condition which drove you to such despair.”
“No indeed.”
“Consult me at your leisure, then.”
“Mr. Holmes, I have been kidnapped.”
“Indeed so?” Holmes puffed at his pipe. “And, having made a lucky escape, you wish to see your assailants brought to justice, I take it?”
“Mr. Holmes,” our client said softly, “I have been kidnapped and released back into the streets of London unharmed three times.”
As he frequently did when surprised, Holmes swept forward in his chair, grey eyes glowing like cinders. “Remarkable.”
“Yes, hardly credible.”
“The facts, if you please, from the beginning.”
“I shall do as best I can.” Mr. Falconer drew a still-unsteady finger around the rim of his saucer. “I am an only child orphaned at a young age and entirely alone in the world. You see me at my lowest tide, gentlemen, and have been subjected to an outrageous display to boot—no, no, I must speak of it, for the hopelessness I suffer has direct bearing on my case. After the first occasion on which I was abducted and set free, I half-thought it a grotesque joke and half a fevered nightmare, and when I told the story to my few mates at the only pub which offers me a rough bench any longer, The Fox’s Tooth, they laughed it off as a dream. After the second, which was identical to the first, I went to Scotland Yard. They would have none of me, and told me I had best look sharp or end up in jail myself for telling the police outrageous tales. The third instance ended this morning, after which I pawned my father’s watch—which had used to be decorated with my Saint Cecilia—exchanged it for a gun with which to protect myself or end myself, I hardly knew which; indulged in considerably more than I should have done, as per usual, for I cannot seem to stop; and then sought you out. If you fail to believe me, I shall run mad.”
“Pray master yourself, then, and deliver your story with clarity and confidence.”
“Can’t you see, sir, that I have no confidence left?” Mr. Falconer protested, but immediately thereafter he snarled in disgust. “Very well. I have nothing save my life left to lose, after all.
“As you say, Mr. Holmes, I come from Lexden, and for some twenty years earned my living by my voice. In my youth, I traveled with various touring companies, but as I approached forty, I began to tire of the lifestyle, for all that it was gay and convivial, and joined the Garrick Street Players as a permanent fixture of their season. The glamorous habits of a life led flitting from city to city did not leave me, however, as I now regret beyond my ability to tell you. Thus, when a woman with whom I had fallen abjectly in love treated me cruelly—indeed, had I been her bitterest foe, she could not have done a more thorough job—I fell from the tightrope upon which I’d been balancing for decades and landed as you see me: bereft, degraded, nigh-destroyed. I am embarrassed to say that I am not always in a state of awareness or remembrance, and it’s difficult therefore to blame anyone for not believing me when I can barely believe myself.
“About a month ago, I made a few shillings by street-singing near to Covent Garden, which is how I earn enough for food and drink, and afterward made my way to The Fox’s Tooth to drown my recollections in cheap gin. Unsurprisingly, the events of the night blurred after nine or ten o’clock, and I cannot tell you what time I left the pub, nor whether or not I made it to Hyde Park and the low line of shrubbery which has of late kept me reasonably dry and hidden from the constables. God, how little I’m sure of at this point! No doubt I am the worst client you’ve ever had the misfortune to address,” he added bitterly.
Holmes’s eyelids had drooped as he listened, and now he shut them completely. “Mr. Falconer, the worst clients want me to tell them whether their spouses have been unfaithful, or hope that I can locate lost railway luggage. Stop telling me what you don’t know, and start telling me what you do.”
“Quite right.” Mr. Falconer nodded more decisively. “I will waste no more of your time, gentlemen. Yes, upon the night I just described, I fell into a stupor, only to awaken in completely strange environs. My head felt wooden, my legs weak, my vision full of stars—it wasn’t like my usual symptoms at all, sir, and God knows they are plentiful. No, this was like emerging from an opium dream. The room in which I found myself spun, and I reeled from wall to wall in terror, not knowing who had put me there or why.”
“Describe the chamber to me.”
“The first time, I was so disoriented that I fear I didn’t learn as much as I should have—but on the second and third, although rattled and sick, I examined the place thoroughly, and it was the same each time. It was a bedroom, Mr. Holmes. An ordinary bedroom with pale stripes on the walls, a walnut desk with an empty drawer, olive-hued curtains, a comfortable bed with a green quilt, and very queer light.”
“How so?”
“Each time I have awoken there, the lamp has been off and the nocturnal atmosphere was bathed in blue. I should swear to it, though in my state I don’t like to swear to anything.”
“Well, well, let us assume you can swear to this or we shall have nothing to go on at all.”
“True enough, and possibly it was a symptom of the drug I believe I was given. In any case, on every occasion, I shouted for help at the top of my lungs to no avail. But when I had quieted, hoarse and sick, I could always hear muffled arguing. A woman’s voice, pleading, and a man’s denying her request, or so it seemed. The words were indistinct and I might not have recalled them in any case, so porous is my mind, but I am certain the tone was that of an altercation. At times, I could hear the woman weeping, Mr. Holmes.”
“Ominous.”
“Extremely so. The sound filled me with dread. Every time, the urgency and passion with which they fought have increased. I am certain of it as I’m certain of little else, since other than listening to these quarrels, and shouting to the speakers for help, there was nothing to occupy me.”
Holmes’s eyes opened with a shrewd edge to their stare. “But you must have interacted with someone when they went to restore your freedom.”
Mr. Falconer shuddered and carefully set down his teacup. “Yes.”
“Well, come to the point, then! What sort of individual was your jailer?”
“I never saw him when he took me, for he always came upon me in my cups and snatched me up unawares,” Mr. Falconer whispered. “But when he came to release me . . . He is a tall man, Mr. Holmes, nearly as tall as you, dressed all in black, wearing a hood like an executioner’s.”
My neck prickled with dread at the image.
“What was his eye color?” Holmes asked with clinical detachment.
“I am sorry, sir, but I could not say. He terrified me. Three times this man has overpowered me, though doing me no harm save to spirit me into a blue-lit bedroom. Once about a month ago, a fortnight after that, and finally last night. I flew at him when the door opened this time, but to no avail.”
“What was his voice like?”
“He never spoke to me. He only entered with a rag and pressed it over my face. It confirmed to my mind that—assuming any of this is even true—I was dosed with chloroform, which explained my feelings of delirium.”
“What did his hands look like?”
“I couldn’t possibly tell you.”
Holmes frowned in frustration. “Very well, leave the hooded man aside for now. What was across the street when you looked out the window? You must have done that much.”
“Tumbledown brick row houses, Mr. Holmes. I could have been anywhere.”
“It won’t do, Mr. Falconer. I really think we can make progress if we only set our minds to the task at hand. What color?”
“Oh—red brick, Mr. Holmes. With grey trim.”
“How many stories?”
“Three.”
“You say they were not well maintained?”
“They were poor and plain, and some of the windows were broken and stopped up with newspaper. But there are many such places in London. The only truly unnatural aspect of the landscape was the blue light. It quite unnerved me.”
“Where did you find yourself when you awoke?”
“At Covent Garden, sir.”
“Ah, that is highly suggestive.”
“How so?” I inquired.
“Mr. Falconer sings thereabouts for the odd coin. Likely the hooded man has heard him perform, and he associates the place with his victim, even if unconsciously. It seems natural to return him there. Have you encountered any strange audience members of late?”
“No one stands out to me.”
“I am not surprised, but it was worth asking. You can tell me nothing more, I take it?”
Heaving an overwrought sigh, our client shook his head.
“I will take your case pro bono, Mr. Falconer.” Holmes set aside his pipe and drummed his fingertips together. “It is remarkable, and therefore of its own intrinsic value to me. I must set one condition, however.”