He paused to text Watson I am here.
Watson emerged. His hair was mussed and dusty and he lifted his hands to demonstrate grubbiness and preclude the politeness of hand-shaking.
“Thanks for coming. I’m not sure what the police are going to do, but I wanted you to get in for a look early on.”
“At what, Watson?”
“We’ve found a body. In the wall.”
Holmes’ eyes widened. He thought back to the stories. Was there any rumour of missing wives? Children? Maidservants? It was unusual to find mummified remains in old homes, but it did happen. He wondered at the urgency, though.
And the smell...
“Is it one of his children? His wife, do you think?”
“This is not an old body. This is a brand new one. Recent.”
Not an old body.
HOLMES KNEW THE policeman, Peter Jones; he had been a year behind them at school. Quiet and intelligent. Both had tried out for the police force. Holmes had failed both the physical and the psychological tests. Jones looked five years younger, at least. A fit, healthy man.
“Holmes is the architect,” Watson said, fudging the truth only a little.
“I know Sherlock. Good to see you,” Jones said.
“Is it really a new body? My nose tells me so, and yet...” Jones said, “And yet no one has had access to the place in years.”
Watson and Holmes exchanged glances. Smiled, knowing how they used to get in. The policeman had been a loner at school and Holmes felt momentary pity.
“No access,” the policeman repeated. “Apart from monitored works.”
Holmes coughed. “Not exactly true. I see evidence of recent incursions throughout. There, a high heeled footprint I imagine doesn’t belong to any of the workers. On the wall by the staircase, a smiley face drawn into the filth with a clean finger and not yet covered with more filth. And, if I’m not mistaken, the remains of a recent pornographic magazine in the hallway.”
Watson blushed at that. “I’ve told the men,” he said, then whispered to Holmes, “The kids leave a lot more mess than we ever used to, but that one was the workers.”
Holmes entered the drawing room. The smell there was far stronger, and he understood where the concern came from.
It must once have been a glorious room. Thick brocade wallpaper from floor to ceiling, a lavish expense. The furniture was solid, beautifully made, laid out to encourage conversation. The wood fire appeared to contain remnants of the last evening spent there (not a recent visitation, given the state of the ashes and the wood) and Holmes romanticised the occasion for a moment.
The wall had been broken open. This was planned construction work, part of the development process. Inside was a body. Male. Looked to be mid-20s, but this was a damaged human, that was clear. Someone who had lived hard and rough. His hair was long and ragged. His clothing was caked in various substances and coated with dust, although that was most likely from inside the wall. He appeared to be tied tightly to a crossbar. He was gagged. One arm was free below the elbow, the hand clenching a lantern. Holmes touched it; cold.
He had not been dead long. One or two days, Holmes thought.
The pathologist finished her cursory investigation. “Alive for a while, at least. I can smell pepper, beyond the usual. We could be looking at an overdose.”
Holmes leaned in. Over the smell of the decaying corpse was the smell the pathologist described, and that of methylated spirits.
“Looks like a spirit lamp. I wonder how long it burned for?” Watson said. “Before he was left in the dark.”
The body was removed and the lamp left behind.
“Watson, look. Does that remind you of anything?” Holmes said when he’d lifted the lamp. There was a square mark in the dust.
Watson peered in, covering his nose.
“Don’t you remember? Our last night here? We found just such a mark.”
Watson nodded, although clearly that memory had faded.
On exploration, they found the same mark in three more places.
“Lanterns were placed here, Watson.”
“Old-fashioned.”
Holmes took out his penknife and walked it along the edge of the wallpaper. “It looks as if this has been recently replaced, the wall rebuilt. That explains why it feels out of proportion in here.”
Holmes loved symmetry. He felt disoriented in parts of this home, and had done from the start. He felt slightly ill. He was thesame as a teenager, but not in every room, he didn’t think.
“What is it, Watson? I feel the same way I do when I walk up uneven stairs. Dizzy. Ill.”
“There are many types of vertigo,” Watson said. He had never been sick a day in his life.
HOLMES WALKED THE perimeter, got a feel from the outside, although he’d walked it a number of times while working on the plans.
When a building is new, there are geographical problems. A mountain in the way. Uneven dirt. A waterway. Rocks. A gully. These things must be sorted before you begin, and the land must be solid, and even.
Holmes liked new buildings. Fresh spaces. All the spirit his own.
With old buildings, the problems were different. Do you gut the place? Knock it down? Change the nature of it?
These were the problems faced by Holmes. Every old building carried clues to its history. Its spirit. He did love that.
He looked under the bush. The hammer was there, rusted into the ground like a rock. Sad that the chain of information was lost. The teenagers must get in another way.
Leaving the police to do the footwork, Holmes headed back to his office.
On the way, his mouth was dry, and he wanted food. He stopped at the bakery below his office, where bare rafters held moody room lights and the walls bore damage of a long-ago fire.
In the bakery, people were decidedly cool towards him. There was anger in the town over the museum renovations. The school needed work, and other public buildings. The roads. Money should be spent on buildings in use, rather than one not in use at all.
However, the money was specifically left to the museum by a wealthy man who’d moved away and had come home to die. He’d had childhood memories of seeking out ghosts. “I don’t want to become a walltapper,” he’d said. “That’s why I came back.” Even the successful can be superstitions, Holmes thought. He opened a folder and worked while he ate. Anything to avoid conversation.
A GROUP OF teenagers came in, loud, full of life, and he let himself be absorbed by their talk, then headed up to his office. The smell of cakes was enough, most days; others he caved and walked downstairs to purchase a vanilla slice or a lamington. He always regretted it after a bite and threw the rest away.
WORK ON THE museum progressed. Peppertree Lodge was building well. The pink peppercorns lay thick on the ground, as he had hoped. There would need to be warnings posted, because some parts were poisonous. Anything that has the potential to poison has the potential for drug use; one man’s meat is another man’s poison.
Birds hated the peppertree, meaning a quiet living space. “Looking good!” Holmes heard. It was Peter Jones, the policeman. “There’s a sense of calm here. You don’t often get that these days.”
“That’s because of the symmetry. You’re not thrown off- balance. All is equal.”
They exchanged glances. “What is it about that place? Beyond the fact someone walled up a person there?” Jones said.
“It’s the walls. Not just in that room, but most of them. The rooms are out of proportion. Any news of that poor kid?”
“I came to let you know. No one’s reported him missing, so they still don’t know who he was. They say he died of positional asphyxiation. That he crawled in and got stuck.”
“Ridiculous. He didn’t crawl in there, he was walled in. How could he do that, let alone onehanded?”
“They sent an ambulance out there last night; different kid. Got blind drunk, thought he could fly, fell off the roof.” He reported this as fact.
“He’s okay?”
“They don’t know yet. His friends say he wasn’t drunk, but scared.”
“What’s fear but imagination, I say. All in the mind. I would like to visit that boy in hospital, though. I’m wondering if perhaps he knows more about the body in the wall than the others do. Certainly the reaction seems extreme.”
“It would be good to settle people; I’ve had citizens talking about closing work on the museum. Saying it isn’t safe. But I’m not sure you’d be welcome there. People are blaming you. Saying you didn’t keep your building safe.” He looked at his watch. “I’ve got another one missing, too. Drifter. Girl last seen on a street corner. She’s not one of ours. That’s keeping me busy.”
IN THE BAKERY, a group of teenagers sat with milkshakes and great piles of doughnuts. He overheard them talking, mostly gibberish they all understood; they had probably shared drugs before coming out. Then one said, “Bloody scary, that place. I’m not going back. I swear, I heard tapping. No wonder he was shitscared.”
Holmes bought another pile of doughnuts and took it to the table.
“Hi, guys,” he said. They eyed him suspiciously, as well they should. He disarmed them with some observations. Two were wearing footy shirts, so Holmes asked him how the team was going. Another was the only one with a heavy backpack. Holmes said, “You skip school today?”
“How did you know?”
“Observation, that’s all.”
“That’s kinda freaky.”
“Anyone can do it. You just have to pay attention. Are you talking about the museum site? The accident there? I heard he was pretty drunk.”
“He wasn’t that pissed. I’ve been heaps more off my face than that. He freaked out about the tapping. He reckoned it was the guy they found in the wall come back to haunt him ’cos of his dad.”
“His dad?”
They didn’t respond to that.
“We used to say it was all of the founder’s children. Dozens and dozens, murdered in the house, left to haunt it forever,” Holmes said.
“Creepy.”
“So this was a couple of nights ago?” he asked.
They nodded.
“Have you been there other nights?”
“Yeah, and we heard that tapping and like a creaking noise then, too.”
Holmes dismissed this. He could only deal in facts. “Have you seen your friend in hospital?”
“You should talk to him. No one believes what he saw.”
Holmes didn’t confess that he didn’t believe it, either.
“So, what is it you’re smoking? Some kinda weed? Must be good.”
“Caribbean,” one said. Another kicked him under the table.
“Is the Indica strain?”
“Whatever.”
“That’s pretty powerful stuff. Be careful. Can you keep an ear out for me? There’s a girl gone missing. The police don’t care. I think someone should.”
They agreed, even shook hands. Up close, Holmes smelled something familiar. It was the odd scent of the dead young man. That sharp, peppery smell.
Later, he said to Watson, “Is it possible for generations to share the same delusion?”
“I’m not a doctor.” But he almost had been; three years in medical school, until an unplanned pregnancy meant he had to go to work. “But I’d say no. I’d say all of us did in fact hear it.”
THAT NIGHT THE lantern men came to him. Bright light flashing in his eyes.
“My grandson tells me you’ve been asking him questions.”
“Have I?” Holmes thought back. One boy in the bakery had large ears, he remembered that.
“You know it’s always best just to be. That’s my philosophy. Should be yours, too. And keeping away from people less than half your age, that’s another one.”
The man’s knuckles were red and bruised. Bare-fisted fighting? It was possible.
“Keep away from our kids.” He drummed his fingers. A real sound.
The skinny one said, “That was my son, Sam, who fell off, and I blame you. You had no insurance.”
Holmes felt blinded by the light. Frozen in place. Still, he smelt the lamp fuel.
“It’s not too late. Give the nod. You give the okay. We’ll worry about the rest. We’ve got it sorted, but your blessing would be nice.”
He felt smothered. Choked. As if the walls were closing in. He shook his head, not trusting them, not knowing what they meant.
One said, “Sacrifices. People don’t make them anymore. We have to step in. We’ve been making sacrifices for a hundred years.”
The creak-creak of the lanterns as they swung.
“We’re builders going back generations. We’re descendants of the men who built this town. We understand what needs doing. We got the warnings. More to come. So we did the duty.”
“Who else has the courage, ay? The courage of the lantern men. To keep the good people safe. It’ll be on you. The next building collapse, or mine disaster, or bridge failure, it’ll be on you.”
“We’ve done it, anyway. Fuck you. All we wanted was your support. That’s all we ask. We do all the hard yakka.”
They picked up their lanterns, swinging them, the bases square and criss-crossed. The lanterns creaked as they swung.
HOLMES STOPPED AT the council offices to find copies of the original plans for the mansion. When he approached his office, he saw a skinny boy, leaning up against the bakery window, smoking. His leg was in plaster and he had crutches under his arms. He wore a t-shirt, too big, which read Peppertree Footy Team Go Dingoes. It wasn’t hard to guess who he was.
“They let you out, did they, Sam?”
The boy nodded.
“All your mates at school?”
He nodded again.
“Should we sit down, have a coffee? I can show you these plans. The old house. You can see where the body was. Might help to sort things out for you.”
Sam shuddered. “Yeah, no. I’ll wait for my mates. You can come have a smoke with us later, if you want. You seem to like that kind of thing.”
Holmes was impressed that the boy could make this assertion.
IT WAS LATE at night when the subject of lantern men came up. One of them had smoked too much, had slipped from pleasant numbness to paranoia.
“They’re at the window! See, the flashing light? Oh, god, I don’t want to die, I seriously don’t want to die.”
Holmes realised they had developed a mythology around the lantern men.
“If you get too fucked up they come for you. Swinging their lanterns. They’ll tell you you’re a fuck-up and what they’re gonna do to your family. Then they’ll slit your throat,” one said.
Another said, “No, they don’t. They pour the oil from their lanterns all over you and set you alight. You’ll burn down before anyone even knows you’re gone.”
Sam said, “No. they’ll wall you up in a place no one will find you.”
He’d watched them smoke this peppery drug, becoming more and more distant from reality. Holmes was ever and always mere moments from ‘the other life,’ the dark sinking into oblivion which obliterated all good he had done.
Sometimes a drive from address to address to look at his creations, his structures, helped.
Other times, the less dangerous descent into alcohol sufficed.
He had tried the addiction of gaming, but there was nothing but frustration, with the simple puzzles, the idiocies of plot, the infuriating game play.
“Will you come out to the museum with me tomorrow, show me where you heard the noise?”
They agreed.
HOLMES WALKED FROM room to room, tapping. For the first time, he really listened, hoping for a faint noise. The slightest hint and he would call the police.
It smelled different. Fresh paint covered the mustiness, and with the body removed, the air was clearer again.
Watson was there, supervising the builders.
“I feel queasy,” Holmes told. “Many of them are out of kilter.
Off balance.
I don’t think the drawing room is the only one with a wall extended.”
He tripped over a stair as he climbed, catching his fall with a hand against the stairway wall.
The wallpaper felt sticky, grimy, and he wiped his hands on his pants. They were destroyed, anyway.
“See, Watson?” Holmes held up the original plans he’d collected from the council. “This room is smaller by a metre at least.”
He took out his tape measure. “One metre, five centimetres.”
He tapped.
“This is where you heard tapping? When we were kids?”
“You said you never heard it, Holmes. Remember? I felt like an idiot and you didn’t help. You said you heard nothing.”
Holmes tapped on the wall. Cocked his head sideways. “Nothing.”
They heard the noise of construction start up below again. Lunch break was over.
“What room were you and your friends in last week?” Holmes asked Sam.
“The top bedroom. It’s like a little attic. One of the guys reckons a kid was starved to death. They reckon he was born without any arms or legs. And he was white and fat like a slug, and even though no one ever fed him, he lived for seventeen years. He snuck out at night to suck on the blood of anyone in the house.”
“Did he suck your blood?”
Sam’s hand rose to his neck. “No, not me.”
“But you did hear tapping.”
“It was that kid. The one they sacrificed in the walls. He’s gonna haunt me for life.”
They walked up the stairs to the attic room. “Shhh,” Holmes said. They listened; just the distant sound of construction.
Holmes rapped on the wall. “This room is smaller than it should be by ninety seven centimetres. Very strange.”
Holmes stood pressed up against the wall, his nostrils flared. His nose almost flattened.
“Oh, God,” he said. “Watson, can you smell it? Oh, Christ, I think there’s another in there.”
He looked around the room for a tool. “Let’s get it open. Now.”
There was no sound, but a sense of urgency took them.
Watson called downstairs to his men. “Don’t worry about being careful. Just get the wall down.”
The wall was new indeed.
Inside, with a lantern in her fist, was a young woman. She was gagged and bound, apart from the hand that carried the lantern.
Two Hundred and Twenty-One Baker Streets Page 9
