by Anna Elliott
From the envelope he extracted three letters, all addressed to a “Lord Harwell.” In the envelope there was also a thick wad of bank notes in varying currencies. Pounds, francs, and others. “Do you recognise it?”
“Yes, but I do not understand how it got there.”
“The initials ‘GH’ and your tailor’s name are embroidered into the lining of your coat. Do you not recognise them?”
I glanced at my inside coat pocket. “I do not.”
“Can you explain the letters?”
I looked over the letters. One from a grocer, one from a florist, and one from a haberdasher. All demanded payment for past due amounts. All addressed to Gerald, Lord Harwell, of Parkchester, Kent.
“If I can speak with Mr. Holmes,” I said, “all will be made clear. I expect he will come here directly, and that he will bring Police Commissioner Bradford with him. Both of those men know me by sight.”
The inspector’s eyes widened for a moment at the Commissioner’s name. “Very well.” He indicated the telephone box on the wall behind me, next to the outer door. “I shall afford you some privacy for your call.”
And with that, he left the room.
It was Becky who answered the telephone.
Unfortunately, she informed me, Holmes was not at home. Neither was Lucy. Still more unfortunately, just as I started to give Becky my instructions, the door to the outside opened.
A burly man in a dark blue constable’s uniform rushed in and shoved me away from the telephone. The receiver clattered against the wall. I recognised the man called Clegg, although he no longer wore a white laboratory coat. To match his dark blue uniform, he wore a constable’s helmet. He gave an evil smirk.
“Now I get a bit o’ me own back,” he said.
My frustration took over. I leaped forward, taking him by surprise, and drove the heel of my hand into his chin, knocking him against the wall. I hit him again, a solid left hook to the jaw. He went down.
The outside door was still open.
Looking back on my actions, I see that I was functioning on a level of low cunning, for when I saw Clegg unconscious on the floor of the Lavender Hill police station, I shelled him out of his constable’s jacket, put it on over the coat I was wearing, and donned the policeman’s helmet. Then, on an afterthought, I pocketed the envelope with the cash and walked outside, leaving the three tradesmen’s letters behind.
No one stopped me.
I had a moment’s exhilaration when I realised that I was free. Clad in my uniform, I might go where I liked. And I had plenty of money in my pocket. I flagged down the first hansom cab that presented itself. “Baker Street, cabbie,” I said.
The man nodded. “Right you are, Guv. You want the Chelsea Bridge? Or the Albert?”
“Quickest route,” I said, settling back into the seat of the hansom. I shut my eyes, suddenly exhausted. At Baker Street, I would tell Holmes. What would he want to know? Of course. The facts. I should be prepared with the facts.
But the moment I focused on one thing it flitted off to make way for another. I was tired, hungry, and still feeling the effects of whatever drugs remained in my system.
Again, I tried to focus.
Flashing lights.
A portrait with a spy-hole.
A fight with a burly man named Clegg.
I shook my head. What had happened to me?
Thugs had abducted me early Tuesday evening. From my surgery.
I had awakened from a drugged sleep this morning, on a table, in a building that I later learned was outside Clapham Common.
I had overheard Lord Sonnebourne make plans with a sleek-haired assassin, going over details. The man would receive his weapon and ammunition at the Pera Palace, in Constantinople. That sounded like a hotel of some sort. While there, he would kill a high official of the French government.
He would also kill Holmes. And that I could not allow.
Sonnebourne’s final words echoed in my mind:
“Before you leave Constantinople, shoot the Torrance woman as well. She will be somewhere near the Frenchman, possibly amongst his bodyguards. Likely she will be looking for you. She is working for Holmes.”
If only I had been able to deliver my message before Clegg had knocked me away!
But “if only” never served to help. What did I know that could be useful?
Well, I did know that Holmes and Lucy were not at Baker Street. So, perhaps Holmes had already left for Constantinople.
Whitehall, I thought. Mycroft Holmes would know. He would also know which French officials were now in Constantinople. He could send a message of warning to Holmes.
I could ask for Mycroft at the Diogenes Club. Ought I to tell the cab driver to go there?
The wheels of the cab clattered on the cobblestones. The summer air, already warm, was getting warmer. The street was getting crowded. I felt dizzy and uncomfortable. How long had it been since I had last eaten?
We had slowed for a crowd near Victoria Station.
Holmes is frequently chiding me for seeing without observing. Observation of the smallest details and understanding their importance requires a state of heightened awareness that comes naturally to Holmes but to me requires more effort. Yet today, with my mind in a drifting, hunger-deprived wobbly state, I saw something that changed my destination and indeed the course of the adventure.
7. LUCY
We were re-entering the environs of London, having passed by the Canary Wharf and the India Docks. Despite the hot summer weather, the grey, grim poverty of Whitechapel and the surrounding neighbourhoods was beginning to close in. No matter how perfect the weather, sunshine and fresh air never seemed to touch the crumbling tenement houses of the East End.
We were passing by a particularly vile-looking building where a pair of drunkards appeared to be trying to pummel each other to death on the stoop outside when a boy’s blond head appeared directly outside Mycroft’s window—the owner of the head having taken a running leap to perch on the carriage’s rear boot.
Mycroft, for once startled out of his usual sedate calm, jerked backwards with a half-uttered cry of surprise. But Holmes leaned forward, his expression instantly alert. “Ah, Flynn. You have news for us?”
Eleven years old, skinny, and invariably looking as though he had rolled head-first through a coal scuttle, Flynn was the leader of Holmes’s band of unofficial investigators known as the Irregulars. I knew that Holmes had him pounding the London pavements for any word about Watson—not that Flynn would have allowed himself to be occupied in any other way. He shied away from all expressions of sentiment as vigorously as he avoided soap and water, but he was fond of Watson. “Did you give him a crystal ball in order to keep track of our movements?” I asked Holmes. Probably I should just be happy that Becky hadn’t been trawling through the East End’s most crime-ridden neighbourhoods with him. The two of them were most often to be found in one another’s company, but today for a wonder, Flynn appeared to be alone.
At Mycroft’s direction, our carriage driver pulled towards the side of the road and drew to a halt.
“Nothing so esoteric, I can assure you,” Holmes said. “I merely alerted him as to the probable route we would take to and from Kent, and told him to keep watch for us in case there was news. Well, Flynn?” Holmes added, as Mycroft opened the door to the carriage, allowing Flynn’s entrance. “You have something for us?”
“I do.” Flynn bobbed his head, still fighting for breath after running to catch our carriage. “Not that you wouldn’t ’ave seen it for yourselves soon enough, but I figured as ’ow you’d want to know about it first thing. Special edition. Just came out this afternoon.”
He drew a folded sheet of newspaper from the grubby pocket of his trousers and passed it to Holmes, who spread it out on his knee, then sucked in a quick breath of air.
The sheet had been torn from the front page of a newspaper—the London Times, if I was recalling Holmes’s tutelage on the distinctive type setting of the vario
us papers correctly. But that was an unimportant side issue compared to the headline that screamed across the top of the page in letters half an inch high:
Fugitive Wanted for Double Murder.
Have You Seen This Man?
And below, in grainy newsprint reproduction but still instantly recognisable, was a photograph of Watson.
Shock was still drumming through me as I mounted the steps to 221B Baker Street. I was alone. Holmes had gone to the Lavender Hill police station in Clapham, from which Watson was supposed to have escaped, planning to obtain—although demand would likely be more accurate—information relating to Watson’s arrest.
Mycroft was pulling all the weight and influence he could manage with his contacts at the London Times in order to find out where they had gotten the photograph of Watson. For it was a recent photograph, taken in the last few days. None of us recognised it as one that had been taken of Watson before this, and besides, the photograph showed that his moustache had been shaved, and we could see a slight nick on Watson’s upper lip and a bruise on his cheekbone that must have come from the attack that had led to his kidnapping.
On the one hand, the photograph might prove that Watson was alive. On the other, our enemies had contrived to have him arrested and turned into the focus of a country-wide manhunt, which didn’t—
The door at the top of the stairs flew open, snapping off my train of thought, and Becky’s small form came barrelling through, blond braids flying out behind her.
“Lucy! Lucy, I’ve been waiting and waiting and waiting for you to come back!” She was breathless, her cheeks flushed and her blue eyes bright with impatience.
“I know, I’ve already seen the papers,” I began. “Flynn met us, and—”
“No, not that!” Becky interrupted. Her words were almost tumbling over one another. “I saw the afternoon papers, too, and Dr. Watson’s picture and everything, but, Lucy, that’s not what I need to tell you, listen!” She took a breath, then plunged onward. “Lucy, Dr. Watson telephoned here! This morning, just after you left. Mrs. Hudson was busy in the kitchen when the telephone rang, so I went to answer it, and I heard Dr. Watson’s voice!”
“Watson was able to telephone here? What did he say?”
“He scarcely had time to say anything.” Becky took another breath, her eyes brimming with sudden tears. “He just said, ‘Hello, is that Becky?’ and I said, Yes, it was, and I started to say how glad I was to hear that he was all right and that we’d all been looking for him, but he said, ‘I’m sorry, my dear, but I haven’t much time, and this is terribly urgent. Is Holmes there?’ I said no, that no one was here except for Mrs. Hudson and me. And Dr. Watson said, ‘It’s vitally important that Holmes know what I’ve learned about the Or—’ and then he stopped.” Becky gulped, swallowing. “I heard a hard thump—as though something had fallen, or maybe something had hit him? And then a kind of a shout. I don’t know whether it was Dr. Watson or not. I couldn’t recognise the voice. I said, ‘Doctor Watson? Doctor Watson, are you there?’ But there wasn’t any answer, and then someone on the other end of the line must have hung up the telephone.”
Becky stopped speaking and drew an uneven breath, her eyes still brimming. “Something must have happened to him to make him stop talking to me like that. Something bad.”
I was inclined to believe that Becky was right, but I didn’t want to say as much out loud. Instead, I put my arm around her. “Listen, Becky, whatever happened to interrupt Watson—whoever tried to attack him, if it was an attack—Watson must have escaped. He must have, otherwise they wouldn’t have bothered with releasing his photograph to the papers and starting everyone, police included, hunting for him. I don’t know exactly what their objective is, but by calling down a manhunt on him, they’re trying to slow him down or stop him from accomplishing … something. Maybe to do with whatever he learned about their organisation while he was taken captive? Maybe he somehow found out their plans and was trying to get word to Holmes so that he could thwart them.”
The telephone rang again in the hall below.
I took the stairs two at a time, with Becky clattering behind me, then snatched up the receiver.
“Hello?”
8. WATSON
The cab stopped for a few moments beneath the towering arched facade of Victoria Station, where a crowd of people had temporarily blocked our progress. Idly I watched them, getting in and out of carriages, calling for baggage-handlers, one person hardly distinguishable from the next.
But perhaps twenty yards away from where we stopped there stood a woman dressed in white. My gaze fastened onto her, as if magnetically attracted.
She wore a wide-brimmed white hat and her white dress shone brilliantly in the sun. She held a white parasol. Even from that distance I could see she was sharp-featured, dark-haired, and proud. She was not the only woman so dressed, for this was the summer, and white was fashionable, and so were parasols.
But my gaze picked her out from the crowd and would not let go.
Speak of the devil, I thought.
Probably because I had been thinking about her only moments before. I recognised her. And I drew in my breath.
Mrs. Torrance.
Sonnebourne’s words came back to me.
Before you leave Constantinople, shoot the Torrance woman as well. She is working for Holmes.
“Hold up, Cabbie,” I said. I got out. Took a five-pound note from my pocket. Turned my gaze back to see Mrs. Torrance.
A uniformed attendant was loading her luggage onto a cart. Clearly, she was preparing to board a train.
And if she was to be in Constantinople, where the assassin had been ordered to kill her, she would be taking the train to Dover.
And if she was working for Holmes …
And Holmes was not at Baker Street …
I tried to think clearly. But fatigue and lack of nourishment still addled me. The same questions circled through my mind.
Would Holmes also be going to Constantinople? He might very well be, if Mrs. Torrance was going there.
But if the alliance was a secret one, why would Holmes risk being seen with her?
“Sir?” came the voice of the cabbie. “Waiting will be extra.”
I made up my mind. My plans seemed to fall into place. I would write out two telegraph messages and send them to both Holmes at Baker Street and Mycroft at The Diogenes Club. Then I would look for Holmes in Victoria Station. If I found him, all would be resolved. If not, I would board the Dover train. If I only saw Mrs. Torrance, I would confront her. If I were satisfied that she really was working for Holmes, I would warn her.
And upon reaching Dover, I would find a place to sleep and take some proper nourishment.
I paid the cab driver. I found the telegraph office and sent my two messages. Then, in a secluded corner of the station, I left my borrowed policeman’s uniform coat and helmet. I boarded the Dover train just as it was pulling out, paid the conductor for my second-class ticket, and settled into my seat at the back of the carriage.
I shut my eyes. Only for a moment, I told myself.
9. LUCY
I had been praying that I would hear Watson’s voice on the line. Or Jack, telephoning to tell me that Watson was safe and unharmed. But instead, a man’s breathy, slightly adenoidal voice answered me.
“Is that 221B Baker Street?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Residence of Mr. Sherlock Holmes?” The speaker brought the words out with a slow deliberation.
“That’s right.”
“Well, now.” Having settled matters to his satisfaction, the speaker went on with the same ponderously slow manner. “This is Constable Oakes of the Dartford Police Station. A Mr. Mycroft Holmes left word with the Inspector here that Mr. Sherlock Holmes was to be kept informed, and so the Inspector asked me to telephone to you—”
“Informed of what?”
“There’s been a body found.”
My heart stopped for a moment, thinking of Wats
on, then restarted as the pieces belatedly clicked together in my mind. The village of Dartford was only about three miles away from the Harwell estate; I had seen it on the map this morning.
“A body? Do you mean Lord Harwell?”
“Well, it does look as though that’s the way of it.” I could imagine Constable Oakes on the other end of the line giving a slow, judicious nod, accompanied by his audibly drawn breath. “Turned up in an irrigation ditch, he did, and clear from the start it weren’t no tramp. Dressed in a rich man’s clothes and carrying a gold seal on his watch chain. That’s how we discovered it was Lord Harwell, because of the family crest on the seal.”
“So the body has been definitively identified, then?”
“Not for certain. That’s where the Inspector’s gone, to visit Harwell House and see whether he can bring Lord Harwell’s poor lady to the station so she can tell us for certain that it’s her husband.”
I felt another twinge of sympathy for Lady Harwell. Nothing about her life had likely prepared her for the harsh realities she was about to face.
“Do you know the cause of death?”
“Not as yet.” Constable Oakes breathed heavily again, then said, “Our police surgeon couldn’t be sure, not without an autopsy. Said it might be heart failure. Or a stroke.”
Heart failure didn’t fit at all with Mycroft’s suspicions of Lord Harwell’s having been killed for the sake of the state secrets he possessed. But then, if Lord Harwell had been poisoned, there wouldn’t be obvious signs of it.
“I see. Well, thank you for letting us know, and I’ll see that Mr. Holmes gets the message.”
Although Holmes, like me, would find himself hard-pressed to care about the details surrounding Lord Harwell’s death when our fears for Watson were so much more overwhelming.
Becky had been listening with wide eyes and barely-concealed impatience while I talked, and burst out as soon as I’d hung up the telephone, “Well? Is there any word about Doctor Watson? I could tell it wasn’t his voice on the line, but I couldn’t hear what the man was saying.”
