The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories - Part IX

by Marcum, David;

  HOLMES:An excellent idea, Major Taylor... though I hope you’re not over-estimating our abilities.

  MUSIC:BRIDGE

  SOUND EFFECT:CLICK OF TABLEWARE

  WATSON:Magnificent curry! Nearly burnt my tongue off - but that’s the way I like it!

  TAYLOR:Good. You scarcely touched yours, Holmes.

  HOLMES:I’m afraid that curry has never been one of my favourite dishes, Taylor.

  WATSON:(EXPANSIVELY) I remember when I was stationed at Madras, my “bobberchi”, a fellow by the name of Saila, used to cook a wonderful fish curry. The secret of it, he told me, was sliced apples and raisins in with onions. Tied it myself once but can’t say I was very successful.

  HOLMES:And now might I suggest we consider the real purpose of our gathering - an analysis of this problem.

  GLENDINNING:An excellent idea Holmes.

  HOLMES:You see, I’m trying to find the pattern. The first death was a natural one, and when the five survivors were notified that the dead man’s insurance had been paid into the trust fund - It probably gave one of them the idea of killing the others.

  WATSON:Yes, Holmes, if there is any connection between the deaths, it must be concerned with the trust fund.

  TAYLOR:Only one of the club members could benefit, and all the survivors are here now.

  GLENDINNING:Therefore it must be one of the three of us. By the way Holmes, during dinner you mentioned that engineering knowledge must have played a part in Robinson’s murder. It might interest you to know that our host, Taylor, was in the Royal Engineers when he was in the army.

  TAYLOR:(BLANDLY) True, Glendinning, but though you yourself are a doctor - you’re also quite an amateur mechanic. It’s a very nice workshop you have in your house. You’ve probably got just the right tools for making a steel plug that would jam in a gun barrel - and other tools that would extract it afterwards.

  GLENDINNING:(DANGEROUSLY) Taylor... if you don’t take that back I’ll...

  HOLMES:Gentlemen, gentlemen. I had no idea that my simple remark would stir up a hornet’s nest.

  ALLEN:Yes, it’s ridiculous. If it comes to that, I wanted to be an engineer myself when I was young. But I’m a lawyer and I don’t see any evidence to justify our accusing each other.

  WATSON:Of course there isn’t. My friend was only theorizing, weren’t you, Holmes?

  HOLMES:Certainly. There were no personal implications.

  TAYLOR:I’m sorry, Glendinning. (FADING A LITTLE) Look, let’s have some smokes and talk this thing over dispassionately. (COMING BACK ON) Tobacco and cigars. I can strongly recommend the ’baccy. It’s a new blend I got in London today. Care for some, Mr. Holmes?

  HOLMES:Thank you, I think I’ll stick to my ship’s plug.

  TAYLOR:How about you, Watson?

  WATSON:I’ll have a cigar, thanks.

  ALLEN:I’ll try some of your baccy... Thanks.

  TAYLOR:How about you, Glendinning? Oh, I was forgetting. You ever touch anything but cigarettes, do you?

  GLENDINNING:Never. Don’t bother... I’ve got some in my case here.

  TAYLOR:I’ll stick to my pipe. Pass the tobacco, will you, Allen?

  ALLEN:Here you are.

  TAYLOR:Thanks. Help yourself to liquor, fellows. There on the sideboard. By the way, Holmes, before we go into this matter any further, it’s just occurred to me... Robinson left his raincoat in the back of my trap when I dropped him off at Glendinning’s yesterday. It’s possible there might still be some cartridges in the pockets.

  HOLMES:Where is that raincoat now?

  TAYLOR:I think it’s hanging in the hall. Want to come and look with me?

  HOLMES:(FADING) Very well.

  TAYLOR:(FADING) We’ll be back in a moment.

  SOUND EFFECT:DOOR OPEN AND CLOSE

  WATSON:While they’re out of the room, I’ve got a story I know you fellows’ll like. You’ve both been stationed in Agra, of course?

  GLENDINNING:Oh yes. Know it well.

  ALLEN:I’ve been there, too.

  WATSON:Well, you’ll love this. There was a charming little nurse over at the Chowrusta Hospital. Little red-headed thing... Elsie something-or-other. We started off one night to look at the Taj Mahal by moonlight, and we were spinning along in our rickshaw when one of the wheels broke. As we tipped over at an angle of... (SUDDENLY) Allen! What’s the matter, man?

  ALLEN:(GROANS, THEN SPEAKS THICKLY) I don’t feel... I don’t feel...

  GLENDINNING:Great Scott! He looks absolutely green in the face!

  ALLEN:(GROANS, THEN) You’re... both doctors... can’t you... (GASP OF AGONY)... do something for me...?

  SOUND EFFECT:ANOTHER GROAN, THEN THE THUD OF A FALLING BODY

  WATSON:(CALLING) Holmes! Holmes!! Come back here!

  GLENDINNING:He’s been poisoned! A hundred-to-one that curry was poisoned!

  WATSON:Yes, it was strong enough to disguise the flavour of anything.

  GLENDINNING:And yet you and I haven’t felt any ill effects.

  SOUND EFFECT:DOOR WRENCHED OPEN

  HOLMES:(FAST FADE IN) What’s wrong, Watson?

  WATSON:It’s Allen! He’s been poisoned!

  GLENDINNING:No wonder your curry was so hot tonight, Taylor.

  TAYLOR:You’re being ridiculous. I ate two helpings of it myself.

  HOLMES:Hand me that tobacco jar, Watson.

  WATSON:What’s tobacco got to do with it? Here you are.

  HOLMES:(SNIFFS DEEPLY) There’s your answer. Belladonna has been mixed with this tobacco.

  WATSON:Belladonna? There’s only one antidote for that - injections of pilocarpine. D’you have any, Glendinning?

  GLENDINNING:No, but I’ll drive over to my house and get some.

  TAYLOR:(EXCITEDLY) You mustn’t let him get away! He’s the killer! Who else but a doctor could have made the first death look like heart failure? And he’s the mechanical genius who fixed the trap that killed Robinson today.

  GLENDINNING:You’re mad, Taylor!

  TAYLOR:Am I? And you’re the one who never smokes a pipe - and yet knows that you can generate a deadly gas by burning belladonna.

  HOLMES:You seem to know that yourself, sir... and yet the fact isn’t common knowledge. And may I point out that you had just as many opportunities as the man you are accusing. You knew that Doctor Glendinning’s door was never locked. You knew about this workshop.

  WATSON:Yes... and his dispensary. You could easily have stolen some belladonna and mixed it with the tobacco.

  TAYLOR:But I feel ill myself. I was smoking a pipe, too, you know.

  WATSON:But you put your pipe down after a few puffs - I saw you!

  HOLMES:Exactly - and then found an excuse to take me out of the room. You were the man who suggested the curry dinner, which would have made it impossible for your victim - or victims - to detect the smell, or taste, of belladonna in the tobacco. Unfortunately for you - I don’t like curry! (SUDDENLY) Grab him Watson!

  SOUND EFFECT:SCUFFLE

  WATSON:No you don’t, Taylor!

  HOLMES:I’m going to take the liberty of searching you, Taylor.

  TAYLOR:You fools! You’ve got the wrong man!

  HOLMES:I think not... Ahh... How very stupid of you to have left the bottle of belladonna in your pocket. I was right!

  GLENDINNING:I’ll drive over as fast as I can (FADING) and get that pilocarpine.

  HOLMES:Splendid. And Doctor Watson and I will entertain our host until the police relieve us of the responsibility.

  MUSIC:BRIDGE

  HOLMES:What are you scribbling in that book, Watson?

  WATSON:Just making a few notes on “The Doomed Sextette”.

  HOLMES:
An unpleasant case - and it if hadn’t been for your timely injection of pilocarpine, Bob Allen might have died too.

  WATSON:Don’t underestimate Doctor Glendinning’s share in that. But there are one or two things I still don’t understand, Holmes.

  HOLMES:What, for instance, old chap?

  WATSON:How did Taylor expect to get away with such a train of crimes?

  HOLMES:He realised that a succession of deaths couldn’t be made to look natural - and so he selected a scapegoat.

  WATSON:You mean Doctor Glendinning?

  HOLMES:Exactly. He was going to make it appear as if Glendinning was responsible for everything. Then Glendinning would be tried and executed, and Taylor would be the last survivor and inherit the trust fund. But you see, someone had to suspect foul play.

  WATSON:And so he came to you for help?

  HOLMES:Yes. He was afraid that the local police might not be smart enough to find the clues he was deliberately leaving.

  WATSON:But supposing you had liked curry - and had taken a fill of his tobacco and been killed?

  HOLMES:Then he would still have accused Doctor Glendinning. He would have said that Glendinning was afraid I would detected him and so had poisoned me as well. And I’m afraid, old fellow, that he wouldn’t had had much difficulty convincing you. (LAUGHING) In fact, you’d have ended up as his best witness!

  WATSON:I don’t see anything funny about that.

  HOLMES:Don’t you? It rather appeals to my warped sense of humor. But one thing I beg of you, Watson.

  WATSON:And what’s that, Holmes?

  HOLMES:I deplore your rather overdeveloped sense of the melodramatic. If you should have occasion to make this little case a basis for one of your stories... promise me one thing.

  WATSON:What is it?

  HOLMES:Please don’t title it “The Strange Adventure of the Doomed Sextette”.

  MUSIC:UP STRONG TO CURTAIN

  FORMAN:Well, Doctor, I guess it was a bit of a shock to learn that an intelligent, respected man like Major Taylor was a killer.

  WATSON:Yes... I can’t understand it. Guess he just had a screw loose somewhere in his mental machinery. It was at times like that, I wished I’d never worked with Holmes.

  FOMAN:Yes, I know what you mean.

  WATSON:Mister Forman... don’t ever be a detective.

  FORMAN:Don’t worry... the only detecting I’ll ever do is to find out which one of the Petri Wines is my favourite... and believe me, twelve bottles of Petri Wine make a very interesting case.

  WATSON:Incidentally, which Petri wine is your favourite?

  FORMAN:Well, I like Petri California Sherry before dinner... and then with dinner I like Petri Burgundy or - well, I (LAUGHS) I guess I like ’em all! They’re all good because the Petri family sure knows how to turn luscious, hand-picked grapes into fragrant delicious wine. They ought to know how, they’ve had enough experience. Why, the Petri family has been making wine for generations... ever since they first started the Petri business back in the eighteen-hundreds. And, since the making of Petri Wine is a family affair - well, everything they’ve ever learned they’ve been able to hand on down from father to son, from father to son. So believe me, no matter what type of wine you prefer... for any occasion... you’ve got to go awful far to beat a Petri Wine... because Petri took time to bring you good wine. And now, Doctor Watson, what adventure d’you have in store for us next week?

  WATSON:Next week, Mr. Forman, I have a very weird and unusual story that takes place high on a cliff-top overlooking the English Channel. It concerns an actor, a dead politician, and a... haunted windmill!

  FORMAN:Thanks Doctor. And now I’d just like to say a word about the Red Cross. Did you know for instance, that right now the Red Cross is operating over seven-hundred clubs for our fighting men overseas. Each one of these clubs is a bit of America on foreign soil... a place where our boys can get a meal... can listen to music, or read the latest magazines or books. The Red Cross doesn’t forget the boys at isolated posts either. Clubmobiles... little clubs on wheels... go right up to the front with movies and coffee and doughnuts and the little things the boys miss so much. All this is just a part of the work of the Red Cross... work which can only continue if you help the Red Cross meet its 1945 War Fund. Two-hundred-million dollars must be raised... so give a day’s pay and help, won’t you? Your money does so much.

  MUSIC:“SCOTCH POEM”

  FORMAN:Tonight’s Sherlock Holmes adventure is written by Denis Green and Bruce Taylor and is based on an incident in the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle story “The Stockbroker’s Clerk”. Mr. Rathbone appears through the courtesy of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Nigel Bruce, who is usually heard as Doctor Watson, was unable to be on tonight’s program owing to illness. His place was taken by Mr. Joe Kearns. Mr. Bruce will be back on the program next Monday night.

  MUSIC:THEME UP AND DOWN UNDER

  FORMAN:(OUT) The Petri Wine Company of San Francisco, California invites you to tune in again next week, same time, same station.

  MUSIC:HIT JINGLE

  SINGERS:The Petri Family took the time

  To bring you such good wine

  So when you eat and when you cook

  Remember Petri Wine!

  FORMAN:To make good food taste better, remember –

  SINGERS:Pet - Pet - Petri Wine.

  FORMAN:This is Bill Forman saying goodnight for the Petri family. Sherlock Holmes comes to you from the Don Lee Studios in Hollywood. (CUE) THIS IS MUTUAL.

  The Adventure of the Old Boys’ Club

  by Shane Simmons

  “The Diogenes Club. Do you know it?”

  Word had come to me, as it often did, from one mouth on the street to the next. Smithy the Beggar, who worked one corner of Baker Street, told Jammer the Cripple, who held out his cup on another. Jammer passed word to Mick the Ratcatcher, who told Henrietta the Chicken-Plucker. And so on down the line, through a dozen different points of disinterest and twice as many working-class cast-offs that the greater London machine never looked at twice, until it arrived in my ear, the intended target. Sherlock Holmes wanted to see me at 221b immediately. The entire relay, from the moment his landlady had first passed on the summons to a neighbour, took less than ten minutes. I was standing at attention, hat in hand, in his rooms in twelve.

  “Wiggins,” he said, “you are precisely thirty seconds late.”

  “Sorry, Mr. Holmes,” I relied. “Perry was deep in a bottle last night and he’s having a slow morning.”

  “Inform Perry the Rugbeater that if he delays my communication network again, he’ll have to buy his whisky without the aid of my weekly stipend.”

  The breakdown in the relay was forgotten a moment later. That’s when Mr. Holmes brought up the Diogenes Club.

  “Know it?” I echoed. “Well, sir, I know of it. Can’t say I’m a member in good standing, or that I’ve ever crossed the threshold in my life.”

  “My brother, Mycroft, practically lives there,” said Mr. Holmes. “He’s slept in the reading-room armchairs more often than his own bed.”

  “I didn’t know you had a brother.”

  “I hardly know it myself, I see so little of him. That is how we prefer to maintain our familial ties. Nevertheless, our paths cross at certain junctures, and such a one has arrived today.”

  He finished writing a note at his desk and folded the sheet over on itself several times.

  “Give him this message,” he said, handing me the unsealed letter. “It is a call for his attention, most urgently required, on a matter of pressing importance.”

  I took it and stuffed it down my deepest pocket so as it wouldn’t get lost.

  “When he refuses - and he shall - give him this message,” added Mr. Holmes, and gave me a second folded note.

&
nbsp; I found another pocket to carry this vital backup plan.

  “We’ll see if that doesn’t compel him to crawl out of his cocoon of books and brandy and let the sun touch his flesh for the first time in weeks!”

  “Once I collect him, where will we find you?” I asked.

  “Mycroft will know. He will calculate it in an instant. To actually spell out the destination for him might be perceived as an insult, and an insulted Mycroft will not serve our cause well at all. Off you go!”

  As fast as my feet could carry me - and fast it was - I beat a path through the back alleys and side streets. Away from the bustle and traffic of the main roads, I was quicker than any cart or cab. A few walls that needed climbing, or cellars that could be cut through, shaved valuable minutes off my time. At last I found myself outside one of the least known and least talked about clubs in all of England. Even the members didn’t talk about it. Not to each other, not to anybody. All I’d ever heard about the place was that it was like some sort of monastery, with a bunch of old geezers not saying a word as they went about their drinking and smoking and reading. Mostly drinking.

  Unless you knew London like the back of your hand, there was no chance you’d pick out the right door on the right street in right block. The Diogenes Club was exclusive in a way that tried to exclude itself from the minds of even its closest neighbours. I only knew it existed because there’s hardly a nook or cranny in the whole city I haven’t made it my business to know about.

  With no one to greet me or stop me from poking my head in, I tugged at the heavy door and let myself into the towering lobby just inside. I didn’t get more than two steps in when I was beset by some gigantic bloke in in a spiffy uniform who didn’t even ask me my business.

  “No beggar-boys or wee bastards in here! Off with you before I give you a tanning!”

  I don’t claim to dress so fine, nor bathe so often, but it was a rude how-do-you-do, even by the low standards I’d come to expect. Common courtesy should have demanded he at least ask me what I was after, but no! He grabbed me by the ear like he meant to use it to drag me back outside and throw me into the gutter. A stomp on his foot and a fist to his bullocks made him think better of it, and he let me go in favour of cupping the royal jewels.