Everything he said now was true. Ito had often been censured for his dalliances with geisha. Those who knew him best had nicknamed him “the broom,” in reference to the manner in which he swept women up and discarded them later.
“I readily admit to my own faults,” he finally relented, rattled. “And perhaps it was conceited to assume I could teach you anything of the martial arts. But there is one thing I beg you to take to heart. The Japanese are not, as you say, savages.”
Sherlock stubbornly refused to concede the point. “I remain unconvinced.”
Ito raised his voice, losing his patience again. “Then you believe we are barbaric by nature? That is what you mean to say?”
“I mean precisely what I said earlier.”
“What you said earlier? Oh, about the cunning savages, schooled in the fiendish methods of the Orient?”
This finally caused the other man to glance at Ito. There was a palpable shift in his grey eyes.
“Britain’s policy of colonization is not as just as the citizens of your country seem to believe,” Ito snapped. “It was Britain that began sale of opium in China to cover the trade deficit from the great volumes of tea you import. The Qing Dynasty were entirely correct to confiscate and dump those 23,000 crates. And yet Britain responded with force. It was Britain that exploited China’s weakness in order to force Japan to open its borders. To you the East may seem a nuisance, but to us the West are truly invaders!”
“You had better save your objections for the Honorable Mr. Gladstone,” the other man said, lowering his gaze to his pipe. “I am but a common detective.”
“You eschew any involvement. Your business in consulting with the public, however, is not exempt.”
“Your meaning?”
“I once believed the West to be a land of science, but your people seem prone to seeing the East as a repository of mystery and the occult. During my previous trip to London, we took port in Shanghai. There, there were great numbers of snake charmers from India who had set up trade. They made their money by hoodwinking Westerners, by pretending to control the snake with the playing of their flutes. But there is no snake that responds to the sound of a flute. The snake charmers simply kick the basket in secret, exciting the snake to show its head.”
Watson made an expression of surprise. “Is that how it is?” he asked Ito.
“No Easterner would be fooled by such a farce. There were similar spectacles in the Ryukyu Islands, but they quickly fell apart.”
“Ho there.” Watson smiled at Sherlock. “Did you hear that? If what this gentleman says is true, then there may be a fatal flaw in your earlier reasoning.”
Sherlock gazed out the window resentfully. “I’m very busy. It may seem to you as if I am doing nothing, but I am currently directing the entirety of my brain toward the analysis of yet unsolved cases.”
“But Sherlock…”
“Watson!” His back still turned, Sherlock waved a single hand, with a gesture akin to shooing away a dog.
The room fell silent. Watson sighed and turned toward Ito apologetically. “You will have to forgive us. Sherlock has just returned from a case, and I am afraid he is very tired.”
A twinge of regret began to steal over Ito. He had let his temper get the better of him. Such behavior was inexcusable in a politician.
“Not at all,” said Ito, bowing his head. “It is I who should apologize for intruding in this way. I beg your pardon. Mr. Holmes, I wish you good health. May your exceptional powers of deduction continue to bring comfort to those in need.”
Sherlock did not turn around. Ito could only feel disheartened by such a turn of events. Most of all he was disappointed in his own lack of forbearance. This painful interaction was not the reunion he had hoped for.
Watson accompanied Ito to the door. He told him he’d see him out.
They descended the stairs and stepped outside. Surrounded by the bustle of Baker Street, Watson turned toward Ito. “It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance, and most edifying as well. I am certain Sherlock will find cause now to make a closer study of the habits of snakes.”
A weak smile escaped Ito’s lips. He felt thoroughly dejected. “Thank you, but I’m afraid this exchange has only revealed my own immaturity. Please, give my regards to Mr. Holmes.”
He turned his back on Watson and walked away.
There was one thing that Sherlock had said, in particular, that Ito could not help but dwell upon. As a child I believed you to be a gentleman of distinction, but I know now that I was mistaken. His eyes had been sharp, accusatory, and tinged with a deep disappointment. No matter how Ito justified it, it was too much to expect Sherlock, or anyone, to dispassionately accept the burning of their own country’s legation. Add that to the misgivings he had formed regarding Ito’s character, and Ito ruefully felt his earlier treatment was perhaps only reasonable.
He waved down a carriage. “The British Library,” he told the coachman. A piercing sadness suddenly welled up in his breast. But what could he do but endure it? When all was said and done, Ito’s life had perhaps been too selfish to expect friendship in the ordinary manner of things. It was far too late now to change the past.
* * *
—
Sherlock Holmes stared deliberately at the fire poker—the one that had been bent out of shape by Grimesby Roylott. He resolved that Watson should find him in this exact posture when he returned to the room.
Had he turned to his books and papers immediately, it would have seemed as if Ito’s comment on the snakes had rattled him. On the other hand, were he to do nothing and simply continue smoking his pipe, Watson might assume he was brooding. Which certainly was not the case.
Footsteps echoed on the stairs. Watson entered the room.
“I was mistaken in my application of force,” Sherlock murmured, lifting up the poker. “Had I gripped it but three inches further to the left, I could have corrected the bend most precisely.”
“Mr. Ito was formerly your hero, I gather,” Watson responded lightly, as he began pouring the tea. “But however he might have disappointed you, surely there was no need for such abuse. Doubly so now, of course, if he regrets his former actions.”
Sherlock’s hand slipped, nearly dropping the poker. He quickly corrected himself, but not quickly enough to prevent Watson from snorting.
He did not care to think too deeply on the meaning of that snort. Tossing the poker aside, he retorted, “I spoke the truth when I said I am but a common detective. That does not alter the fact that I operate for the glory of Her Majesty and the great Empire of Britain.”
“Quite so,” said Watson, sipping at his cup, “but there is something to what the gentleman said. Might it not be true that the campaign in China was not waged for the sake of spreading civilization and order? Either mistaken notions have taken hold in the East, or Britain’s true motivation was profit. I wonder.”
Sherlock responded testily. “One might contest that the nation that has constructed a truly modern civilization is the one better equipped to make sound and objective judgments on such matters.”
“Yes, one might suppose.”
“What do you mean, Watson?”
Watson turned toward him with a somber expression. “I don’t mean anything in particular. But I am reminded of my time in Afghanistan. I cannot help but feel that I somewhat understand what the gentleman was driving at.”
It was true that Sherlock had no war experience. He fell silent.
Then he reached for the bottle on the corner of the mantelpiece, and removed a hypodermic needle from his Moroccan leather case. “Would you mind leaving me?” he muttered.
“Listen here now,” his friend took on a severe tone. “How many times have I warned you that the feeling of mental stimulation you get from cocaine is only illusory? I am a man of medicine. Must you do that in front of me?”
> “That is precisely why I asked you to leave me,” Sherlock said blithely, adjusting the needle. He rolled up the sleeve of his left arm and peered at the numerous marks already there, searching for a new location in which to inject the needle.
Watson dashed his teacup back down with a sharp clatter. “Next I suppose you will take up opium. Perhaps it will give you better insight into the mysteries and occult of the East.”
His footsteps grew distant. He slammed the door shut behind him as he left.
Sherlock closed his eyes with a sigh. How much easier it would be if he could abandon his own tedious pride. Unfortunately it was not in his purview to change his own nature. His deep-honed powers of observation and his unflinching deductive acumen were rooted in such mild eccentricities. His abilities were supported by this disparity: It was impossible to be both exceptional and ordinary.
6
March 10, 1891, midnight. Heavy rains showered over Western Italy. On the outskirts of the Port of Livorno, abutting the Mediterranean Sea, tall waves battered the wharf and extended to the carriageways, soaking the roads. The ocean’s surface churned in ridges and hollows, and the beam of a faraway light blinked in and out in the night. Flashes of lightning split the pitch-black sky, followed by rolling thunder.
Wrapped in a blanket to ward off the cold, Sherlock Holmes sat on a wooden crate in a small cabin. He’d already been soaked to the bone by the time he made his way inside. He would have liked a fire, but was forced to content himself instead with the single candle that burned before him.
There were footsteps at the door. He rose from the crate. A man entered the cabin, folding his umbrella. He was massive—so massive that he nearly burst from the seams of his Ulster coat. His hairline fell far back along his head. Though he was even taller than Sherlock, his face was not as large as his frame. It was a long face, or would be if not for his heavy-set, portly cheeks. Their parents would have it that the two brothers shared the same grey eyes and hawk-like nose, but Sherlock himself begged to differ. He could see no similarity between his brother’s features and his own.
Mycroft, now 44 years of age, carried a thick, bulging leather case in one hand. He cast a quick glance at the trunk next to Sherlock. “You are supposed to be dead. You should not have been wandering around the canals in the middle of the afternoon. It was too exposed.”
Sherlock knew it was highly unlikely he had been followed throughout the day, but was unsurprised to see that his brother knew of his movements. “Indeed. One would only be able to pick up a secondhand trunk at a decent price without being remembered from Serge’s store, capriciously open from the hours of 1:00 to 3:00 in the afternoon. Your shrewdness has never been in question, Mycroft. You ought to have become a detective.”
“What is in the trunk then, a change of clothes?”
“The trunk contains those articles minimally necessary to present myself as a gentleman. It would not do to seek an audience with the Dalai Lama while dressed in rags.”
“You’ll hardly be meeting the Dalai Lama.”
“Why’s that, now?”
“Tibet is under an isolation policy. It is closed to foreigners. The country is also under Qing Dynasty rule. As Britain’s influence has seeped into China since the Opium Wars, you cannot be sure you will be safe.”
“But surely the Qing Dynasty’s lack of assertiveness has caused the Tibetan people to lose faith in their rulers.”
“Tibet is a landlocked country. In order to reach it you would have to take port in China or India. Britain keeps close watch over the ports of China, as you can perhaps imagine. And of course, India, too, is British territory. Surely you are not ignorant of the fact that Her Majesty Queen Victoria is likewise empress of the Indian Empire.”
“Naturally I would sneak in. I obviously do not intend to enter as pleasure tourist, saluting my presence like a fool.”
“If you endeavor to deceive anyone by means of the false nose and chin putty that you’ve placed in your trunk, I beg you to develop more worldly opinions. Sherlock, you and I are but fish in a small pond.”
Sherlock began to grow annoyed. “You may spend your days at a desk, Mycroft, but my cases have taken me across the sea many times already.”
“By sea you only mean the Straits of Dover. Just because you received an official request from the French government once, don’t pretend that you have a broad understanding of the world. Think, now, do you truly propose that an unidentified 37-year-old Englishman can stroll in and request a meeting with the Dalai Lama? They have long been awaiting your arrival, I’m sure.”
“We cannot know unless I try.”
“Nor should you underestimate Britannia. The empire on which the sun never sets has colonies scattered across the globe, and its influence extends even farther than its territories. There is no place left on Earth where a man who is by all rights dead would find safe harbor. The moment you seek food or shelter of anywhere, you would be taken into local custody and a wire will be dispatched to England. It will take less than a month for Scotland Yard to ascertain your identity using anthropometry.”
“I will live away from human notice.”
“You had best forget about the Dalai Lama, then. Or the Caliph in Khartoum. How do you propose to respond when they ask who you are? Tell them, ‘It is I, the great Sherlock Holmes, and I have only faked my death’? In Islam, the very act of faking one’s death is punishable by execution. These travel plans of yours are completely bosh.”
“I was under the impression you were here to help me, Mycroft.”
His brother stared at him silently. He took a folded piece of paper from his breast pocket and handed it to Sherlock.
“I take this to mean you’ve finally deigned to procure a letter of introduction to a ship captain for me,” Sherlock observed.
“Though I am but a minor government worker responsible for auditing the books, some have recognized my talents and consult me now and then on a few trivial matters. I had to call on several favors to arrange for the ship. It is a smuggler’s ship, of course.”
“Dear Captain Leroy Cartlett,” Sherlock read at the top of the page. After the initial pleasantries, obligations and requests, Sherlock finally arrived at the final port of call at the bottom of the letter. A cry involuntarily escaped his lips. “Yokohama?!”
“The ship will dock at Calcutta and Shanghai along the way, but I advise you to stay fast within the hold. By no means are you to go ashore. The moment you are identified it would lead to an international incident—you would be sent to the dock, and I would certainly lose my post. Even your entrance into Italy was illegal. It is fortunate enough you were not arrested in Florence.”
“I don’t like it,” said Sherlock, staring at Mycroft. “Why must I go to Japan?”
“Tokyo is developing into a modernized city, with a capable police force. You can expect law and order when you arrive. Once you land, you must visit the residence of Lord Hirobumi Ito.”
“Ito…”
“Under no circumstances are you to approach the British legation. Remember, you are presumed dead.”
“Have you contacted him already?”
“No. Even a letter is out of the question. If it were to fall into the wrong hands, the British authorities would know immediately.”
“But why must it be Hirobumi Ito?”
“Are you a fool?” Mycroft’s voice rose in anger. “If you want to pass yourself off as a dead man and conceal your identity, you will need a patron with enough clout to avert the eyes of justice. Japan has implemented a constitution in recent years and has introduced a Diet. Lord Ito was their first Prime Minister. And he himself was once a stowaway. It was during that period we made his acquaintance. He will certainly sympathize.”
“Only a quarter century ago, Ito and his fellow countrymen were assaulting foreigners en masse in the name of joui. This so-called moder
nization may be superficial only.”
“Joui was a tragedy, but you must allow that it was the Japanese refusal to submit to Western rule that has permitted them to maintain their independence. Not even the British Empire can interfere directly in Japan’s laws and government. It is the only place where a dead man can find refuge from the British police.”
“Kindly remind me as to when I earned the enmity of the British police. If you recall, I risked my own life to depose of Professor Moriarty—a criminal of the highest order.”
“Lord Ito might say something similar. He and his fellows pursued joui for the future of their country.”
“The two are not the same. With Moriarty’s death, peace has been restored to the streets of London. If it came out that I were still alive, however, his network of criminals would burrow underground. By convincing the world of my death I have arranged for justice.”
“In your own mind, yes, but in the minds of the police you are a suspect in a murder investigation.”
The windowpane, battered by the rain, flashed with lightning. A slice of Mycroft’s face was illuminated in the stark light. A heavy rumble shook the glass.
Sherlock had already accepted his fate. He still could not stop himself from taking the truth hard. “I am a suspect?” he muttered, almost in disbelief.
“Naturally,” said Mycroft. “There were no witnesses, and Moriarty now rests at the bottom of the falls. You have no recourse by which to prove self-defense. There is also the matter of the letter you left behind, which suggests murderous intent.”
“I never wrote that I meant to kill him.”
“I am pleased to think that I shall be able to free society from any further effects of his presence. I believe those were your words. As the possibility remains that you struck first, the police are duty-bound to construct a case against the deceased. Their hands are tied.”
“But Moriarty was not alone. One of his confederates lay in ambush atop the cliffs.”
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