Sherlock Holmes and the Four Corners of Hell

by Seamas Duffy

Chapter 9

  ‘So, here is my stratagem for breaching the penetralia of the gallery, Watson. Wiggins has, as you know, reported a constant coming and going of mail and telegrams, so I had begun to think that there was an opening for us. I have arranged that Cartwright, in his role as District Messenger, will go to the gallery and ask to deliver a message into the proprietor’s own hand personally. It will contain nothing more than my request to become a member of the club under the name of Harris – the one I gave to the caretaker – with a false address. Once inside, Cartwright will pretend to be unwell, and will faint; it is to be hoped they will put him down somewhere to recover. He will snoop around the place if he gets a chance, and try to pick up the scent for what is going on there.’

  ‘Is that not rather dangerous, Holmes? What if they should see through the ruse?’

  ‘He can say that he has recovered and is well enough to leave. In any case, young men of Cartwright’s type thrive on danger, Watson; after all, he is hardly a child. His lack of height, his extremely youthful appearance and frail stature belie his real age.’

  ‘Yes, I seem to have some recollection … good heavens, Holmes; has it really been six years since I first came across him? How time flies.’

  ‘Yes, though his governor predated you by a few months. I have no doubt that Cartwright will be able to take care of himself, for the vicissitudes of his life have sharpened his wits, and I have seen him in the ring, too – he is no mean brawler. In any case, you and I shall be in the vicinity during the time he is inside. I shall loiter inconspicuously in the lane behind, and I have already made my acquaintance with the lock on the gate as well as the one on the rear door of the house. You can take the front of the building, and try to remain out of sight. I suggest the bow window of the Cumberland Arms would be a good place. Should he get himself into any trouble, he has only to give a blast on an old police whistle of Lestrade’s which I gave him, and we would be at his aid within minutes. He will be there at nine o’clock sharp.’

  Exactly on time, Cartwright cycled up the street, stopped outside number nineteen, propped his bicycle by the railings, and rattled the door. Presently, the man we had seen a few days earlier appeared and began to question Cartwright. The latter shook his head a couple of times and made a gesture with the envelope, which he held in his hand. Eventually the caretaker opened the door and admitted him to the house, and I settled down to wait. Five or ten minutes passed, by which time I had confess I had begun to have doubts about the wisdom of Holmes’s strategy. Then Cartwright appeared at the door and with great celerity, disappeared along the passage at the side of the house which led to the lane at the rear. I followed at once. By the time I had arrived there, Cartwright was breathlessly explaining something to an ashen-faced Holmes and was gesticulating wildly towards the house.

  ‘What the deuce is going on?’ I asked.

  ‘Something that we never dreamt of in our philosophy, Watson,’ said my friend, with a gesture to Cartwright.

  ‘I was telling Mr Holmes what happened,’ Cartwright gasped. ‘At first, the caretaker wouldn’t allow me to deliver the letter myself to Mr Newland, then he changed his mind and let me in. I was told to wait in the hall while Mr Newland was fetched. When he came back, I asked for a glass of water and put on a bit of a faint. He loosened my jacket and put me on a bed in a room. I waited a minute or two for him to go away and just as I was about to get up and have a poke around, in comes a very portly gentleman, a proper toff! I’ve seen his picture in the papers. He takes his jacket off and says to me, “A bit early aren’t you?” Then he says, “Hang on, you’re not the usual boy?” I said I didn’t know anything about any other boy, but that I had come to deliver a letter to Mr Newland. He laughed and said, “Yes, that’s what they all say.” Then he looked at me a bit funny and said, “Oh I see you do have a letter. Well, don’t mind what I said, young man; there seems to have been a complete misunderstanding,” and then he left the room. Soon as he was gone, I scarpered out the front door.’

  ‘Good Lord, Cartwright,’ I expostulated, ‘You don’t mean—’

  ‘Yes, Doctor, it’s what they call a molly house,’ he replied.

  ‘So, that’s their despicable game, is it?’ I thundered.

  ‘I’m afraid so, Watson. We have been rather dim.’

  ‘This is atrocious, Holmes!’

  ‘Indeed; but we have no authority to enter the premises.’

  ‘That has never held us back before!’

  ‘I am trying to reason this out. By now, Newland may have realized something is amiss. If we wait until Lestrade arrives with a warrant, they may have time to cover things up. On the other hand, they may simply think that Cartwright has recovered and left.’

  ‘We must do something, and immediately!’

  ‘You are armed?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then my mind is made up. Cartwright, your brave conduct will not go unremarked upon. Do you think you could do one more thing for us?’

  ‘Certainly, Sir. I am fine now, just got a bit of a shock when I realized. …’

  ‘Then take a cab, go straight to Inspector Lestrade and tell him exactly what has happened – here is some money. Let him know that I am here and will hold the field until he arrives.’

  In point of fact, Lestrade was on the scene within half an hour. But as I recall it, that time flashed by in an instant. We were through the rear door in no time and found ourselves in the hallway. The caretaker, no doubt alerted by our footsteps, appeared at once and uttered a cry of alarm. He fled along the hall and disappeared up the staircase bellowing a warning. We raced after him to the first-floor landing only to find a door slammed in our faces. We heard him turn the key in the lock. At the same time, the sound of someone stirring in a room at the end of the hall drew our attention. We heard two voices, then the sound of a window being opened.

  ‘They are trying to escape,’ said Holmes, ‘go after them and stop them while I attend to this door. You must go alone; I have no time to lose here.’

  I dashed toward the room and flung the door open to find a very corpulent, red-faced, well-dressed man attempting to leave by the open window. His companion had already reached safety: a few more seconds, it seemed, and he would be clear of my grasp; and if he should gain the passage into the lane, he would be gone for good. But with his heavy frame and ungainly limbs, he was patently finding it a great effort to locate footholds on the drain pipe. His breath came in short, throaty grunts as he panted heavily with exertion. Then, either his strength or his nerve had seemed to give out, his fingers lost their grip, and he plummeted down with a hoarse shriek. I dashed across to the window and looked. A dull groan arose from the gentleman, who was now lying semi-conscious in a dishevelled heap. Blood flowed freely from the back of his head and his left leg lay at a horrible angle. He was still breathing, however, for I could see the rise and fall of his chest. But none of these things I noticed at first: what struck me with the most incredible astonishment was that I was staring at the face of the Right Honourable Sir Gervaise Ffitch, former Cabinet Minister and Privy Councillor!

  Then I heard the crash of the door at which Holmes had been heaving. It had finally given way. I returned to find a small, sparsely-furnished room which was being used as an office. The caretaker was kneeling by the fireplace frenziedly stuffing paper torn from a ledger on the hearth into the fire. He looked round fearfully as Holmes bore down on him. Panic seized him and he made a grab for a pistol from the desk drawer, but Holmes was on top of him in an instant, and whilst they rolled on the floor, I knocked the gun out of the man’s hand. I dashed to the grate and saw that the fire had only recently been kindled, and so I was able to extinguish it quickly with the hearthrug and retrieve most of the contents of the grate.

  ‘Who the hell do you think you are?’ the man gasped as Holmes knelt upon his supine form.

  ‘I am Sherlock Holmes. Where is the proprietor of this nest of debauchery?’

  ‘Gone. Not so
smart after all, are you?’ the man replied.

  ‘I know where to find Mr Charles Newland,’ said Holmes.

  The caretaker answered this with a volley of foul oaths such as would shock a guardsman.

  ‘Take it from me, my man,’ Holmes continued, ‘that if anyone had harmed one hair of that boy’s head, they would not have walked out of this house alive. Nonetheless, this is a serious felony and not very long ago, you would have swung for this. All the same, you will be going down for a long spell.’

  ‘If I go down, there’s many a one will be coming along with me.’

  ‘I hope so. But for the moment, I am more interested in your part in the murders. What is your name?’

  ‘My name is George Hanby, and I will take whatever punishment is due to me for this,’ he said, ‘but I had nothing to do with any murders.’

  ‘Then you knew about them and said nothing, which makes you liable to a charge of being an accessory. One of the girls who was murdered discovered what was going on here, didn’t she? Either she threatened to tell the police or she tried to blackmail one of the members; perhaps your governor, too. Who was it – Jane Smart or Carden?’

  Hanby made no reply.

  ‘The police have been sent for and will arrive shortly,’ said my friend, clapping the gun to Hanby’s head, ‘but it would be most unfortunate if, when they arrived, they found I had shot you in self-defence after you had drawn that pistol on me.’

  ‘Carden used to work here,’ the man said. ‘She left after a row with the boss. Swore she would blow the gaff on what was happening unless someone paid her off.’

  ‘So I had thought. Who paid her?’

  The man merely shrugged.

  ‘Then she came back for more,’ said Holmes, ‘and someone decided to settle the matter once and for all?’

  ‘That was nothing to do with me.’

  ‘Well, you’ll get a few years’ hard for the rest.’

  ‘I’ll be well paid when I come out.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  Hanby leered at Holmes. ‘You got the book, haven’t you, or most of it. Look at the names. They’ll be only too happy to purchase my silence.’

  I had managed to retrieve some of the papers once the fire had cooled. There were lists with times and dates next to names which were obviously those of clients. I handed everything to Holmes.

  ‘Good Lord, Holmes,’ I said, ‘this will shock you to the core. It reads like a page from Debrett’s, supplemented by the Military Gazette and Crockford’s Directory. Look here!’ I pointed to one of names: a member of our reigning Monarch’s close family, admittedly one whose reputation for licentiousness had already been the subject of speculation in the foreign newspapers. There came the sound of a commotion at the front door, the pounding of footsteps on the staircase and Inspector Lestrade bounded in, followed by four uniformed constables. Holmes patiently explained the situation to the Inspector, and a pair of constables handcuffed Hanby and led him away.

  ‘There is another one in the yard,’ said Holmes, ‘he will need some medical attention, I’m afraid. He fell from the window when attempting to escape.’

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘Sir Gervaise Ffitch.’

  ‘The Privy Councillor?’

  ‘Yes, and there are even bigger fish in here.’ Holmes handed Lestrade the torn book and damaged sheaves. ‘I look to you to do your best to see that these people are brought to justice, for I need not appear in it. Find Newland and you will have the honour of arresting the vilest man in London, for not even Moriarty would have stooped to this. No doubt Newland is at present warning his clients that their cover has been blown, so I shouldn’t think he would be very far away.’

  Lestrade shook his head in disbelief.

  ‘Lord Fitzallan, the Duke of Hinton, General Sir Digby Probert, Justice Harding, the Very Reverend Thaddueus Elsworthy, dear me; and it goes on and on. I am not quite sure which surprises me most: the names in this book or how you got to know about this.’

  ‘One name you will not find there is that of Edmund Algernon Clermont. He is the owner of these premises, better known to you perhaps as the Earl of Titchfield.’

  ‘The Whitehall mandarin?’

  ‘Indeed he was. I cannot go into details here and now, and I must confess I am unable to prove anything at present. But I should lose no time in getting him under lock and key, for I believe he may also have played no small part in the murders which you have been investigating.’

  ‘It’s strange that you should mention his name in connection with that. We eventually found the owner of the coach with the stripes. You were right; there weren’t that many after all. We questioned the coachman and his master, but they both had unshakeable alibis. I had begun to wonder if Jacobs had been mistaken – it was dark after all, when he saw the coach. Truth to tell, Mr Holmes, we have had our eyes on the mail boys and telegraph boys for some time. You see, one of our beat constables noticed that some of the boys seemed to be spending money rather more freely than their meagre wages would allow. Naturally we suspected they were pilfering, but as we had had no complaint of money or goods going amiss, we were rather stumped. I couldn’t have imagined this!’

  ‘It is young Cartwright who deserves the praise,’ said my friend.

  ‘The messenger boy from the Devonshire case?’ asked Lestrade.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How did he manage to get himself mixed up in this?’

  ‘He was our Trojan horse. I shall explain his precise part later. You know, I have a feeling that he might make a rather good policeman.’

  ‘Perhaps he should come down to the Yard and have a word with me some time. There’s just one other thing, Mr Holmes. Now, don’t get me wrong. I am very grateful for what you have done here, of course. But am I to understand that both you and Doctor Watson simply barged your way in here?’

  ‘Yes, I see now that was rather impolite of us. In fact, the downright barefaced discourtesy of it makes me blush with shame!’ my friend smiled mischievously. ‘No doubt we should have waited meekly outside for you to arrive with your warrant, by which time, of course, Hanby would have burned the client list and cleaned out the grate, Ffitch could have walked straight out through the front door, and Newlands could have sat on his hands with nothing to worry about. He would have closed down the gallery here and re-opened another one in a fortnight.’

  The Inspector shook his head ruefully. ‘One of these days, Mr Holmes, you will go too far in taking the law into your own hands. The depravity of the culprits cannot condone—’

  ‘One can never, in my estimation, go too far in the interests of justice,’ interrupted Holmes. ‘In this case, the ends amply justify my means, however dubious.’

  ‘And I should have been only too happy,’ said I, ‘to defend my part in bringing this unspeakable wickedness to light.’

  ‘I’m sure no judge and jury would see it that way,’ Lestrade persisted.

  ‘In any case, there is no reason why the doctor or I should appear in it at all,’ Holmes continued diplomatically. ‘The sole credit for this lies with Scotland Yard, and the criminal classes of London must realize that they cannot hoodwink Inspector Lestrade for very long.’

  The events at Hampden Terrace on the Friday afternoon passed off peacefully as Holmes had expected. The following morning, Lestrade dropped in to see us. My friend assumed an attitude of complete ignorance as to the reason for his visit.

  ‘Why, you are up and about early today, Lestrade, has something happened?’ my friend said.

  ‘No; well, yes. I suppose I mean that something didn’t happen that we had expected to. It was all very hush-hush, and I’m afraid that is why I could say nothing to you about it beforehand.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Security of the realm, no less.’

  ‘As serious as that?’

  ‘Only seven people in the country knew about this, apparently. But it was a strange one altogether. You’ll remember the Jubile
e Plot; well, we received information that the dynamiters had set up a safe house and it was to be used in connection with an attempt on the Prime Minister’s life tonight at the Mansion House. Where do you think it was?’

  ‘Kilburn, or perhaps Wapping? There are a lot of Irish in those districts.’

  ‘Wrong! Only a few doors away from the Soho Picture Gallery – in Cleveland Street!’

  ‘What an incredible coincidence!’

  ‘The guv’nor is furious that we weren’t brought in until the very last minute. A law unto themselves, these Whitehall chaps!’

  ‘So I have heard.’

  Lestrade related to us the story of the raid on the house: how they had positioned themselves at three o’clock in the morning and waited; how no one had turned up; and how the police charged in at eight o’clock and discovered the messages in the first floor room and the boxes in the cellar.

  ‘You’ll never believe what was in those boxes which we thought had contained dynamite!’

  ‘I’m sure I wouldn’t.’

  ‘Harmless railway fog signals.’

  ‘That’s very odd.’

  ‘Yes. Two of the men whom the Whitehall chaps were watching, and whom they expected to turn up at the house, have disappeared too. The whole setup is puzzling: a safe house, coded messages, boxes arriving in handcarts in the middle of the night. Then it’s abandoned at the last moment and we find the dynamite isn’t dynamite anyway – no one knows why. I’m beginning to think there is an informer somewhere within our ranks, though perhaps the whole thing might have been a hoax.’

  ‘A hoax?’ said Holmes. ‘Are you sure you don’t mean a decoy?’

  ‘A decoy for what, Mr Holmes?’

  ‘It’s just a theory I had.’

  ‘A bit far-fetched, if you don’t mind my saying so; but then your knowledge of the circumstances is somewhat different from mine.’

  ‘Very different, indeed,’ Holmes agreed.

  ‘Now about the picture gallery affair. Hanby, of course, remains under lock and key. We eventually arrested Newland outside Fitzallan’s. He had, as you say, sounded the warning, and as we feared, Titchfield has fled – we suspect to France. Fitzallan and Hinton have been arrested. Probert was out of the country, as it happened, and I fear he will be in no hurry now to return. The Reverend Elsworthy has, I am grieved to say, committed suicide – or at least that is what it looks like at first hand. His body was found hanging in the vestry at Kempshott. We have also arrested Purcell from the Telegraph Office who helped procure some of the boys, and Sir Gervaise Ffitch is recovering in the prison hospital, though I suspect his reputation is now beyond recovery. We are making further inquiries into other names on the list – gross indecency will be the charge. As for our royal friend, rumour has it that his family has finally admitted that there is something seriously amiss with the fellow and have indicated that they intend to send him to Saxe-Coburg to be treated.’