The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes--The Counterfeit Detective

by Stuart Douglas

  Rather than stand around watching Holmes, I made my way upstairs. The first floor mirrored that of the ground, with three doors on the left-hand side. I could hear Bullock in the nearest room, so I moved to the second door, which lay ajar. Inside was a small dressing room, with little space for furniture, excepting a large wardrobe with a mirror inset in its door that took up the entirety of the far wall. A chair and an ornate, if not actually gaudy, free-standing ashtray were the only other objects in the room. I sat and took note of the brands of cigarette in the ashtray, then carefully opened the wardrobe, with my hand gripping the revolver in my pocket, lest Rawlins’s killer should leap out like some pantomime villain. Needless to say, no such event transpired, and I was able to examine the interior at my leisure.

  In fact, there was not a great deal to examine. A collection of decent suits and reasonably expensive shirts hung on a rail. Directly beneath them two drawers contained a selection of ties and undergarments, respectively, tidily folded away. The drawers on the other side were almost empty, a single sock and a discarded cufflink their sole contents. I carefully searched the suits, and was disappointed in the first two, but I had better fortune with the third jacket. Crushed in the breast pocket was a much-folded piece of paper, which I fished out with some difficulty. I spread it out against the wall – and gave a small cry of horror as I realised I held a photograph of a corpse in my hand. From Hoffmann’s description, this was undoubtedly the final image he had been shown, with Rawlins gloating over the body of James Donaldson.

  Without delay, I hung the jacket back on the rail and was about to return to Holmes with the photograph when my eyes fell on a shoehorn hanging from the inside of the cupboard door. Where there is a shoehorn there are invariably shoes, and kneeling down I discovered a pair of brown brogues had been tucked neatly away.

  The shoes were of good quality and appeared almost new, with few scuff marks to be seen on the leather. I turned them over to check the bottoms for wear and, to my surprise, two heavy objects fell into my hand. The first was a watch with a black leather strap. Though I was no expert, it seemed of solid manufacture. On the back were scratched the initials “HP”. The second item was of equivalent quality – a gold money clip holding a bundle of hundred-dollar bills. I quickly pushed the shoes back in place and hurried downstairs to Holmes with my discoveries.

  Bullock had already returned, bearing treasure of his own. As I approached, he and Holmes had their heads bent over a selection of documents, which they spread across a table. I recognised one of these as a British passport sheet, much like the one I had locked away in the safe at our hotel, and the others were of the same type, though not from the same country. I recognised stamps and flags from half a dozen European countries, plus another handful that, though strange to me, were obviously official papers of some sort.

  “Most illuminating, Inspector,” Holmes was saying as I took my place beside him and bent over the documents for a closer look. “This certainly renders our mute friend more interesting than was previously the case. Watson, what do you make of this?”

  “Are they all passports?” I asked. “I know what a British passport looks like of course, and this one is the French equivalent, this one Dutch, but I cannot place many of the others.”

  “Yes, yes, Watson, that much at least is so obvious as to require no explanation, but there is another matter almost as plain which you have thus far wholly failed to identify.”

  Nettled by Holmes’s dismissive words, I picked up each of the documents in turn and examined it in minute detail. I took some over to the window, where I angled them in the light, hoping thereby to illuminate a hidden message or the light scratches made by a pencil pressing through from another sheet placed above this one. I ran my fingers over others, searching for an inconsistency in the paper or the mark of a carefully concealed repair. I even held each sheet to my nose and sniffed, in case a perfume still clung to them. In each case I was forced to conclude that this was simply a collection of passports. Interesting in itself but of no greater fascination than that. I said as much to Holmes.

  “At times, Watson, I wonder if perhaps you do not mock me when you look and look but do not see. Your observations contrive to miss the most vital fact to be drawn from even the most cursory of examinations.”

  He reached over and picked up the nearest sheet. “Height: six foot four. Hair: grey. Eyes: blue. Weight: one hundred and ninety-six pounds. Distinguishing marks: scar on left cheek.” Pulling two more sheets from the pile, he read, “Height: six foot four. Hair: grey/brown. Weight: two hundred pounds. Three-inch scar across left cheek. And this one – height and weight the same as the first, thin scar on left cheek. And so on.”

  Holmes dropped the papers back on the table and indicated the entirety with a wave of his hand. “Each of these passports has been issued to the same man, Watson! A different name on each one, I grant you, but there can be no doubt that they refer to the same person.”

  “And that person is not the man now lying before us, Doctor,” Bullock interjected. “At most he’s five foot ten and wouldn’t make two hundred pounds if he were soaking wet!”

  There was no denying the truth of Bullock’s statement. Nor could there be much doubt that the owner of the passports was the mute accomplice we had failed to apprehend in the Five Points. Holmes, however, was far ahead of me.

  “The passports belong to Hans Piennar, of course. The descriptions match our knowledge of the man, and to whom else could they conceivably belong?”

  “And then there’s this,” Bullock added, pointing to a small group of objects which I had failed to notice. A half-full ashtray, a fountain pen and some blank paper, and a well-used set of playing cards lay on the table, alongside a small notebook, which lay open at a pencil sketch of a man half-turned away, his face obscured. Although it was impossible to tell who the subject might be, I was struck by the oddest feeling that I knew the image itself, though I could not place it. I flipped through the book, which was full of such drawings, of the same figure in a variety of poses. On one page only did his face appear, and as soon as it did, I realised where else I had seen such sketches.

  “The Strand! These are some of the illustrations that the editor prints alongside my narratives of our adventures together!”

  “Exactly, Watson!” Holmes was triumphant. “Copies of The Strand illustrations of myself with, you will see, notes on some pages describing certain perceived characteristics of mine. I think we may safely assume that these were intended as aides memoire for the deceased. And done some time ago, at that.”

  Bullock was puzzled. “How can you be so sure of that, Mr Holmes?” he enquired.

  “That these sketches were created to help Rawlins perfect his role, or that they were done some time in the past?”

  “Both, if you’d be so kind.”

  “Watson has been omitted from those images that once contained us both, meaning there was no requirement for his impersonation. Why draw one of us when both were once included, if the intention is not to highlight the mannerisms and look of the sole remaining subject?”

  “And the timing?”

  “You will note that the book always falls open at the same page, indicating that it has remained in that position for some time. Additionally, the left-hand page is faded compared to the right, where it has suffered long exposure to the sun. Both indicate that the book has sat undisturbed for an extended period. Judging by the degree of fading and the length of time the window in question receives direct sunlight, I would suggest a period of six months at least has passed. The lack of actual copies of The Strand furthermore leads me to conclude that these sketches were prepared in advance and were discarded as soon as Rawlins had learned of me all he needed.”

  As we pondered Holmes’s words, I recalled the items I had discovered upstairs and showed them to my two companions.

  “Phew!” Bullock whistled as he fanned the hundred-dollar notes from the money clip. “There must be three thousand do
llars here!”

  I carried out a quick calculation in my head. “Six hundred pounds, give or take.”

  It was an impressive sum. Evidently, blackmail had proven a lucrative trade.

  Holmes, however, appeared already to have lost interest in both money clip and watch. He gave each a cursory glance, but his real attention was focused on the photograph I had come across.

  “You found this within a jacket, you say?” he asked as he held the photograph to the light.

  “Yes, in a wardrobe upstairs. Presumably, Rawlins – or even the mute – had extra copies that they kept handily on their person, should their use be required.”

  Holmes frowned and shook his head. “Which pocket did you find it in, precisely?”

  “The breast pocket.”

  “And already folded as we see it now? One long fold down the centre and several smaller ones, cutting across at angles?”

  “Yes. But I assume—”

  “Never assume, Watson. Especially when there is no need.” He laid the photograph out on the table before him. “The photograph is rectangular, and yet the longest fold bisects it along its short side and not, as would be more natural, across its centre lengthways. Notice too that it falls into that position without encouragement. It has been stored in such a fashion for some time, obviously. Like this.”

  So saying, he unbuttoned his jacket and slipped the folded photograph into the inside pocket.

  “Someone has carried it around like this for several days.”

  Put so plainly, it was difficult to disagree with Holmes. I did, however, raise one minor objection.

  “But what of the other folds? They are not so clear, perhaps, but still, they do require explanation.”

  Holmes shook his head sorrowfully. “Come now, Watson,” he said, “you hardly need that explained.”

  When I did not reply, he shrugged expansively and crossed the room to Bullock, with the photograph still held in his hand.

  “If you would allow me, Inspector,” he said, turning the man by the elbow so that they stood face to face. He gripped the photograph by one corner and placed his other hand on Bullock’s chest. “Now, pay close attention, Watson,” he said, and pushed the photograph with considerable force into the breast pocket of Bullock’s jacket. “This pocket is not the obvious place in which to store such an item, you would agree? It is too large, for one thing, and would be difficult to extract when the jacket is being worn. But it is the only pocket easily reached by another person standing in front of the wearer. It is a reasonable supposition, therefore, that someone returned it to Rawlins in such a manner, making new creases in the paper as he did so.”

  “But who?” I asked.

  “Impossible to say at the moment. Any one of his victims. Clearly he had forgotten about its presence or it would have been consigned to the fire long since.”

  As Holmes spoke his eyes strayed to the fireplace, and he strode over to it; with a soft exclamation he dropped to his knees and lifted a scrap of paper from the ashes. Further scraps followed, to be laid carefully at his side.

  “Another passport, Watson,” Holmes crowed, “or a section of one, at least. And something else…”

  He gestured for us to crouch down beside him, the better to examine the papers he had uncovered. The section of passport comprised only a thin, tapering slice of ragged paper, where a fold in the sheet had fortuitously kept a few lines from the flames. The familiar request for “assistance and protection” could just be made out, as well as the name of the holder, Noah Rawlins. Little else remained legible.

  The “something else” Holmes had mentioned was less simple to identify. I fancied that it was a telegram of some sort, though not an English one, nor American. In fact, I struggled to see how the tiny handful of fragments Holmes had rescued could help us at all. Only three scraps contained more than a single letter, for one thing.

  “‘MES’, ‘DON’ and ‘OAT’,” Bullock read aloud. “James Donaldson, presumably?”

  “It must be!” I exulted. “But what of the ‘OAT’?”

  “Oath, perhaps?” Bullock shrugged his shoulders expansively. “What do you think, Mr Holmes?”

  Holmes cast a distracted look in the inspector’s general direction. “Nothing occurs to me at the moment,” he said shortly, as he stirred the fragments with his finger, then dropped them into one of the small paper envelopes he habitually carried with him.

  Without another word, he scuttled around the room, completing his search. At one point he dropped to his knees and crawled beneath a dressing table where he scraped something into another envelope. A moment later he leapt up and, bending low over the table top, ran a finger down the back, behind the mirror. He sniffed at whatever he had collected, nodded and wiped his finger on his handkerchief. After another minute or so of seemingly random examinations, he seemed to have concluded his investigation and beckoned us over.

  “I believe time is of the essence, gentlemen, so if you will forgive me, we will move swiftly onto my analysis, leaving your own comments until after. The murder of Mr Rawlins was not an event I had foreseen and I fear that it presages a new and unknown player in this game. But let us not get ahead of ourselves. First, we must establish what we know for certain. To begin with, though Rawlins is dead, his mute compatriot remains at large – and was here very recently. Bullock informs me that there are two bedrooms upstairs, both recently slept in. The ashtray too contains two different brands of cigarette.”

  Inspector Bullock had been a policeman too long to allow this to pass unchallenged. “It is possible that Rawlins wasn’t choosy about his cigarette brand and simply smoked those that were cheapest at the time.”

  Holmes dismissed his concerns with a tut of disapproval. “The two brands were also each smoked in a distinct manner; one type was stubbed out half-smoked every time, the other smoked so low that they must have risked burning the holder’s fingers. No,” he went on, “I am sure that the mute was here recently, that he and Rawlins shared this accommodation, and that the former is now on the run.”

  “The clothes in the wardrobe!” I exclaimed. I quickly explained about the half rack of suits and the empty drawers. “It is as though the mute removed his own possessions and left Rawlins’s behind. Could he have killed him and fled?”

  Holmes was non-committal. “Perhaps. But why should he want to? They were colleagues in a lucrative enterprise in which Rawlins was a valuable, even unique, element. Can you really picture an excessively tall mute playing the part of Sherlock Holmes?”

  “He may have had no choice. Perhaps Rawlins attacked him, and the mute killed him in self-defence?”

  “By shooting him in the back and then administering a coup de grâce beneath the chin? Come now, Watson, do concentrate.” He picked up the revolver from the table and flipped open the cylinder. “Four bullets remain in the chambers. This was definitely the murder weapon.”

  “Why would the killer leave his weapon, though?” Bullock interjected.

  “Hmm?” Holmes was turning the gun over in his hands and seemed barely to hear the question. “The killer believed that it could not be traced back to him, of course.”

  “Aye, that’s believable enough, Mr Holmes. And when do you calculate Rawlins was killed, Dr Watson?” Bullock’s question was a pertinent one. Without the equipment needed for a proper autopsy, I could not be as precise as I might have liked, but there were certain indicators that allowed me to suggest a rough time.

  “The corpse is in full rigor, and liver mortis has covered almost the whole of his torso. If you will allow me a moment…” I squatted by the body and pressed down on the purple discolouration that marred the majority of visible skin. As I expected, only by leaning nearly my entire weight on Rawlins’s corpse was I able to make any difference to that colour. “Lack of blanching is consistent with a body dead for a minimum of eight hours and, I would hazard, a maximum of twelve.”

  “Indicating that death occurred in the early hours of this morn
ing?”

  “That would follow, yes.”

  “So, if the mute murdered his partner, why then did he leave all of his money behind? The watch has his initials on it, we may assume the clip was also his. A man who has a whole night in which to pack and make his escape would be a fool to leave three thousand dollars behind. Indeed, why leave any evidence of his presence at all? It is far more plausible that the mute, returning home in the early hours, discovered his colleague already dead and, in a panic, burned what incriminating evidence he could, threw his clothes in a suitcase and fled, with no thought to the money.”

  Holmes’s logic was sound. But if the mute had not murdered Rawlins, then who had? An unpleasant thought occurred to me.

  “There is another possibility. What if Rawlins was killed in the belief that he actually was Sherlock Holmes? Your own life could be in great danger.”

  “I did consider such a possibility,” Holmes replied calmly. “But while I have more than one enemy who would revel in my demise at home in England, I think it most unlikely that there are any such in New York. What we must ask ourselves is not why Rawlins was killed, but why he was killed at this moment, just as we close in on him. Once we know that, then we can proceed to the more specific matter of why he was killed at all.”

  “And do you have any answer to that question, Mr Holmes?” Bullock asked.

  “Not entirely, Inspector,” Holmes responded. “Or rather, none in which I have any conviction. But it does seem a great coincidence, does it not, that Rawlins should die the very day on which we discover his name from Pastor Hoffmann?”

  “You believe we were overheard, Holmes?” I recalled the strange man who had approached us outside Hoffmann’s house. “Followed, even?”