by Marvin Kaye
Grinning down at Kyla he began to unzip his white linen trousers, when Hannah said, “Domingo! She is—ella es sucio—unclean!”
“I told you not to question my actions!”
“But we…those chosen…are only worthy of you. She is not!”
Domingo’s grin faded as his head swiveled toward Hannah. “Question me once more and you’ll end up working the barrio’s streets like your sister…”
Kyla wanted to turn Hannah’s disquiet to her own advantage by attacking Domingo while he was distracted and chance convincing Hannah to rethink her loyalty to him. But she couldn’t summon enough strength to be effective. The helplessness that engulfed her as he turned back was somewhat ameliorated when she realized he hadn’t removed the Libra charm from around her neck. So she made the sign of the cross as he leaned over to fondle her breasts. That religious ritual brought a chuckle from him as he brushed her lips with his, then said, “Do you think Jesus is going to save you?”
Kyla’s answer was to bring her fingers from her forehead to her chest again instead of continuing the sacred gesture but she gripped the Libra charm and jerked it toward his face. She pressed the back of the medal while holding her own breath. Vapor hissed from the bottom of the charm and Domingo’s eyes widened in panic. He spun from her and stood gasping, then made gurgling sounds and tottered away from the bed to fall face down on the floor. Kyla’s eyes locked with Hannah’s. The young woman was still pointing the gun in her direction, but now tears marred her usual glaze, and anguish distorted her normally serene features. Kyla spoke softly, “Hannah, please...Give me the gun—”
“No!” Kyla flinched at Hannah’s half scream. “Is Domingo dead?”
“No, Hannah—”
“Is he dead?”
“He’s alive…unconscious…if you look…he’s breathing…”
Hannah’s aim never wavered from Kyla as she knelt by Domingo and started to sob. Rising she said, “He is alive…”
“I told y—”
“He swore nev—” Sobs convulsed her voice. “Never to touch any woman who wasn’t an initiate.”
“He lied to you, Hannah.” Kyla watched the gun tremble in the weeping woman’s two-handed grip and wondered if she could muster the strength to dive for the weapon, then decided verbal persuasion was a far safer gamble. “Hannah, please. Give me the gun.”
“No!”
Kyla froze as Hannah cocked the weapon, then swung it toward Domingo’s prostrate frame. The pistol coughed softly and Domingo’s body jerked. Blood welled up from a puncture in his back. Then the weapon spoke once more and blood burst from his head. A low wail escaped Hannah’s throat as the semi-automatic slid from her lowered hands and plunked against the floorboards. “Naomi…Oh God…what have I caused…”
Kyla stared through the high window of her brownstone and watched the first snow of winter dust the quiet Greenpoint Brooklyn side street. Then, raising a tumbler of Jameson’s to the photos on the mantle over her fireplace, she saluted the figures of the uniformed men who she so loved and sipped the iced drink. Larry introduced her to the Irish whiskey and she hoped he was returning the toast from the other side of the vale. She placed the glass between the pictures, stared at the gold Claddagh ring on her finger and reflected over the accomplishments of her mission. Domingo’s betrayal of his own false ideology shattered Hannah’s blind faith and saved Kyla’s life. Bringing the guilt-ridden woman back to America on the same chartered fishing boat that originally brought Kyla and her weaponry into Mexico turned out to be uneventful.
During various covert operations, Kyla made acquaintances both home and abroad with mind-control experts. So after convincing Hannah to agree to enroll in an emotional trauma curriculum, she gave her two thousand dollars for personal necessities, then placed the woman in the custody of a freelance cult deprogrammer who was often employed by the CIA and paid him in advance for his services. Hannah understood “Kay” was fading from her existence and tearfully expressed appreciation for her rescue and new chance in life.
Kyla mulled accepting a government assignment soon because her funds were drawing low. She felt her goals were worth the expense and trusted her American heroes Jefferson and Franklin would agree. She believed both these brilliant personages would applaud her methods and approve of her accomplishments. While Larry and Dennis would have probably been displeased about her leading their type of lifestyle, she was sure they would also have been positively impressed by her achievements. And if Franklin was correct in his assessment of rebellion to tyrants, then God should be pleased as well.
THE WOMAN, by Mackenzie Clarkes
To Mister Holmes,
The maiden Irene
Was London’s
Dame of crime
Her sapphire eyes
Did outshine
The fair ladies
Of London’s fame.
REFLECTION OF GUILT, by Laird Long
Ray Miller rushed up to the sheriff’s deputies as soon as they pulled into his empty driveway. The tall, lean pensioner jerked the rear door of the patrol car open and folded his long frame inside. “They just stole it!” he yelled. “Let’s—”
“Your car, Mr. Miller?” Deputy Sheriff Tina Jessup asked, turning around in the front seat to look at the flustered man.
“Right! The Ray Miller! My 1968 Dodge Polara.”
Deputy Sheriff Brendan Thomas grinned behind the wheel. “That cherry-red vintage car with ‘Ray Miller’ stenciled in big white letters on both sides?”
Everybody in town knew about Miller’s car, how much he loved it, and the fact he’d named it after himself.
“That’s right!” the man shouted. “Hurry up! Let’s go!”
“Go where?” Jessup asked. “Did you see who took your vehicle? Where they went?”
“No,” Miller admitted. “But I saw those two punks, Pete Tillis and Jerry Spruce, hanging around down the street, eyeing the Ray Miller while I was polishing him. And then when I went into the backyard for a couple of minutes and came back, the car and the punks were gone!”
“You think they took it?” Thomas said, looking at Miller in the rearview mirror.
“Yeah, Mutt and Jeff! Who else?”
Both deputies chuckled. The difference in height between the two young men was striking and humorous. Pete Tillis towered over the diminutive Jerry Spruce.
Deputy Thomas shifted the patrol car into reverse and backed out of the driveway. “Well, they shouldn’t be hard to find—driving that car in this town.”
“Exactly!” Miller agreed. “So step on it!”
They drove down the main drag, out onto the county highway. And sure enough, about half a mile up the road, the bright red paint job of Ray Miller’s vintage car was clearly visible in the afternoon sunshine. What wasn’t visible from that distance was who was driving the stolen vehicle.
Thomas tromped on the accelerator and Jessup switched on the lights and siren, giving chase.
The stolen car rounded a bend up ahead, hidden from view by the woods on either side of the highway. When the patrol car whipped around the same corner, the trio inside found the Ray Miller parked by the side of the road, empty.
“They can’t have gone far!” Deputy Jessup yelped, leaping out of the police vehicle. Her partner and the angry car owner followed at her heels.
Five minutes later, the two police officers and Ray Miller emerged from the woods, along with Pete Tillis and Jerry Spruce. The two young men were in handcuffs.
“Okay, who was driving?” Deputy Thomas asked the pair, when they’d all arrived back at the parked cars.
Pete Tillis looked over, and down, at Jerry Spruce. Jerry looked up at Pete. Neither one responded to the deputy’s question. They both knew the driver of the stolen vehicle would be facing the more serious charges.
“Punks!” Ray Miller growled. Then th
e elderly man hustled over to his car, pulled the passenger-side door open and slid inside on the front benchseat, happy to get his car back, but worried about any damage.
“Mr. Miller! Wait!” Deputy Jessup yelled.
Too late. Miller had slipped in under the large steering wheel, was running his hands caressingly over the wheel and the dashboard of his namesake, erasing any fingerprints. He completed the job by reaching out and adjusting the rearview mirror upwards until it suited him, then getting out of the car on the driver’s side and using the door handle to close that door.
“Well, there goes any chance of dusting for prints,” Deputy Thomas stated. “Unless one of these two confesses, or we can find a witness, we’ll never know who was driving the car.”
Deputy Jessup smiled, watching Ray Miller lovingly polish the hood of his car with a chamois. “I know who was at the wheel of the Ray Miller.”
“Who!?” Thomas and Miller both asked.
“Jerry Spruce,” Jessup answered, looking at the small man. “I observed tall Mr. Miller adjust the rearview mirror of his recovered vehicle upwards to see out of it properly, when he got into his car. Indicating that the most recent driver had adjusted the mirror downward to fit his shorter height. Pete Tillis isn’t short.”
Jerry Spruce hung his head, the joyride most definitely over.
`
THE ADVENTURE OF THE NINE HOLE LEAGUE, by John J. White
Baker Street, London
18 June, 1892
I cannot explain the severity of my shock when, for the first time since my acquaintance with my good friend Mr Sherlock Holmes, I observed him weeping.
It had been several days since Holmes solved the difficult, but not impossibly difficult, case of The Nine Hole League, which I will describe in detail from my diary, where I chronicle all of the adventures on which I accompany Holmes.
I rang the bell several times at 221B Baker Street, the address of the renowned sleuth and formerly my own residence as well, before my plunge into the happy arms of matrimony with the beloved Mrs Watson, née Morstan.
Knowing Mrs Hudson was visiting her nephew in Salisbury, leaving Holmes to his rather slovenly bachelor habits, I waited patiently for my companion to throw open his window and ejaculate, Come in, Doctor! Come in! But I am sorry to say that did not happen.
Instead, fearing my friend might have come to some harm owing to the influence of his rather disturbing habits, I let myself in and quickly ascended the seventeen steps to Holmes’s apartment. After a hard knocking on his study door, with no reply, I let my imaginings consume me and burst into the locked room, slightly harming my shoulder in the process.
Holmes sat slumped in an armchair by the unlit fireplace, his deerstalker hat pulled back and askew on his head, the unmistakably pungent odour of opium filling the dark room.
Tears streamed down his face as my usually stoic mentor sobbed uncontrollably. That damned opium. I thought he had rid himself of it, but I had misjudged. I grabbed his shoulders and tried to shake him to his senses.
“Holmes,” said I. “My dear sir, come out of it! What is the matter? What is the cause of this? Come out of it, I beg you!”
Holmes looked up at me through the smoky haze.
“Watson. Oh, that you should see me in such condition, my dear friend.”
I removed his cap and went to the cabinet to fetch some brandy. After he sipped it, he sat back in the chair and wiped his eyes.
“What is it, Holmes? I am your friend, you know that, sir. Discretion will be utmost, of course. What puts you in this state?”
Holmes sipped more brandy and then sighed.
“It is because of her, my friend.”
* * * *
Baker Street, London
Seven days earlier
11 June, 1892
I was summoned by messenger to my old bachelor residence, a matter of some urgency, according to the note from Holmes. After greeting Mrs Hudson at the door, she and I stepped lively up to Holmes’s study, where Holmes waved his hand for patience whilst continuing to puzzle over one of the chemical experiments that always demanded his keen attention.
“Well, sir,” said I. “The urgency of the matter seems to have abated, if I were to surmise.”
“Yes, yes, Watson. I am quite finished now and sincerely apologise for taking you from your patient. A rather large wound, I assume, from the strong odour of carbolic acid emanating from your jacket.”
I sat in an armchair across from my friend, who now did likewise.
“Your powers of observation are as sharp as ever. Now. The pressing matter?”
“Not quite so pressing, Watson, but instead, a need of your services and knowledge. You are still a golfer of note at London Scottish, I assume.”
I laughed. “Well, I wouldn’t say of note, Holmes, but when my duties to my practice and Mrs Watson are not so dear, I will slip away for a round now and then. You should join me sometime. Give you something to do with your time besides this morbid fascination with the criminal society. Yes, you must.”
“I know little of the game, which is exactly why I called for you. You have read, no doubt, of the unfortunate murder of Lord Douglas Fletcher.”
I had, indeed, read of it, and it was some point of interest in the clubhouse at London Scottish. “Killed with his own golf club, by his caddie,” said I. “A hard man, they say, this Fletcher. No one’s friend at my club. Said to cheat and bully, but hardly a reason to end a man’s life. There was talk his title was somewhat suspect, I hear.”
Holmes relit his pipe and blew smoke to the gilded ceiling before responding.
“Precisely, Watson. It seems in Scotland, now, anyone owning the slightest quantity of land finds himself honoured with the title of lord. The Yard is investigating the man’s past. But now—why we are involved.”
“Yes. I was wondering when you would get to the matter at hand. What have we to do with the Lord Fletcher murder?”
Holmes pointed to the stairwell. “There is a young lady, a Miss O’Reilly, from whom I have received a rather lengthy letter pleading for her fiancé, the infamous caddie charged with crushing the side of Lord Fletcher’s head with a—spoon, I believe you call it?”
“Yes, that is what it is called,” said I.
“Well, Miss O’Reilly proclaims her beau’s innocence and, in her desperation, has begged my services―and I, in turn, yours. And from the sound of the footsteps ascending, I believe that is her now.”
Holmes stood to greet Mrs Hudson and a ravishingly beautiful girl whose yellowish brown hair peeked from a large hat common to the working class. Were I to guess, I would put her in the employ of a family, perhaps as a governess, as the hem of her plain dress was somewhat tattered. I feared should Holmes accept this commission, he would likely not receive even his expenses from this poor thing.
Before Holmes could introduce either himself or me, the young miss threw her arms around Holmes and kissed him soundly on his cheek. Amidst Holmes’s scarlet blush, she continued to embrace him while she exclaimed in a strong Irish brogue, “Oh, Mr Holmes. When I received your telegram asking me to come, I knew absolutely that you would prove Charlie’s innocence. I am certain, knowing your reputation and good graces. Thank God for you, sir.” She backed away from Holmes, much to his obvious relief, and turned to me.
“I’m sorry, sir,” said she, her bright blue eyes dancing as she spoke. Whoever this Charlie was, I thought him a very lucky fellow.
Holmes gestured to me. “This, Miss O’Reilly, is Dr John Watson, my associate. You can feel quite comfortable speaking in his presence as he is quite discreet in all cases on which we collaborate.”
She jumped to embrace me as she had Holmes, placing a loud kiss on my cheek. I may have held her a bit longer than is proper, but the young miss had a very narrow waist as well as a full bosom which, I must say, fel
t quite comforting to a man of my age.
“Dr Watson!” she exclaimed. “I have read of you many times and it is so kind of you to help me in my time of need.”
She again pressed to embrace me, but I backed away for fear of losing my composure and embarrassing myself, perhaps even returning her kiss. Holmes came to my rescue this time; I am sure he saw my dilemma.
“Please, Miss O’Reilly, sit in this armchair. Tea?”
“Yes, please,” said she, straightening her pleats. Holmes raised his eyebrows to Mrs Hudson.
“Yes, sir. I’ll fetch a pot,” said Mrs Hudson, shaking her head at our guest and raising her brows to Holmes in return.
We talked pleasantries of weather and her journey from Eltham to Baker Street until Mrs Hudson had returned with the tea. No sooner had Mrs Hudson left when Miss O’Reilly broke down and leaned over to cry in Holmes’s lap.
Holmes looked like a young lad at his first dance and tried unsuccessfully to raise her from her embarrassing pose. I once again intervened, tapping the young lady on the shoulder. She finally sat back in her chair. I could not help but enjoy my friend’s discomfort.
“Now, now, Miss O’Reilly,” said Holmes. “Please sip some tea to calm yourself and tell your story to us, for the benefit of the good doctor to whom I have not yet read your letter.” Holmes patted the young girl’s rough hands. “There, there. Whenever you are ready.”
Miss O’Reilly placed her teacup in the saucer.
“Thank you, sir. As I wrote, me Charlie and―excuse me―my fiancé, Charles Daley, and I ate a bit of lunch in the clubhouse kitchen just before he were to caddy for the Lord Fletcher, himself, though Charlie had asked not to because of his brother, Frankie, and all.”
“Quite so,” said Holmes. “I believe you wrote Lord Fletcher had a great deal to do with the dismissal of your fiancé’s brother earlier in the week.”
“Yes, sir, he did, indeed, and that’s why Charlie didn’t want to caddy for the man, but the master said there were no one else around at the time and ordered him to do it, no matter. He agreed but was angry, as you can well imagine. Lord Fletcher accused little Frankie-boy of calling him a cheater and demanded the club release him immediately, you see. They did, of course, Lord Fletcher being a lord and a man of wealth and all.”
