SHERLOCK
HOLMES
&
THE MASTER
ENGRAVER
Ross Husband
GLENROSS EDITIONS
Copyright © 2013 Ross Husband
First published 2013 in the
United Kingdom by GlenRoss Editions,
Norfolk, England IP21 4YG.
ISBN 978-1-84396-269-4
Also available in paperback
ISBN 978-1-48279-073-3
Kindle edition production
www.ebookversions.com
Ross Husband has asserted the
moral right to be identified as the
author of this work under the terms
of the 1988 Copyright & Patents Act.
This book is sold subject to the
condition that it shall not, by way of
trade or otherwise, be lent, resold,
hired out or otherwise circulated without
the copyright holder’s prior consent
in any form of binding or cover than that
in which it is published and without a similar
condition, including this condition, being
imposed on the subsequent purchaser. With
stated exceptions, the characters appearing
in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance
to real persons, living or dead, or any
descendants thereof is purely coincidental.
All rights are reserved to the author and
publisher. Reproduction in any form currently
known or yet to be invented, or the use of
any extract is only permitted with the written
approval of the author. Violation of these terms
may result in civil or criminal prosecution.
Use of the Sherlock Holmes characters created
by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle by permission of Conan
Doyle Estate Ltd
www.conandoyleestate.co.uk
(Authorised for distribution
in European Union countries by
Jonathan Clowes Ltd,
The Director of Copyrights EU)
Cover illustration
Self-portrait:
Hendrik Goltzius's Right Hand, 1588
Pen and brown ink
9 x 12 5/8 in (23 x 32.2 cm)
Teylers Museum, Haarlem
Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Philosopher John Gray,
on Sherlock Holmes:
“An exemplar of logic
who lives by guesswork, a man who
stands apart from other human
beings but who is moved by a sense
of human decency...”
“Holmes embodies the
modern romance of reason –
a myth we no longer believe in,
but find it hard to live without.”
(Kind permission of
English Philosopher John N Gray
BA, M.Phil, D.Phil)
“It is easy to accept that
a piece of paper that costs a few
pence to produce is worth five,
ten, twenty or fifty pounds...
“Gaining and maintaining
public confidence in the currency is
a key role of the Bank of England
and one which is essential to
the proper functioning of the economy”
The Bank of England
Museum – 2012
...is for my late father, H Robertson Husband, one of the wisest men I ever knew who, fifty years ago, first introduced me to the beautifully logical world of Sherlock Holmes. He also showed me how simple it is to make a tolerable low-powered microscope to facilitate my childhood attempts at forensic investigation. I have it still.
Contents
Title Page
Copyright & Credits
Epigraph 1
Epigraph 2
Dedication
Chapter One
The Master Engraver’s Dilemma
Chapter Two
‘Angraecum Sesquipedale’
Chapter Three
Mr Nathan Madgwick
Chapter Four
A Night in Bedlam
Chapter Five
A Den of Thieves
Chapter Six
The Game’s Afoot
Chapter Seven
The Mist Thins
Chapter Eight
The Chain is Broken
Chapter Nine
The First Proof
Chapter Ten
A New Alliance
Chapter Eleven
Asa Bormanstein
Chapter Twelve
The Chief Cashier’s Dilemma
Chapter Thirteen
The Smell of Money
Chapter Fourteen
Judas Silver
Chapter Fifteen
The Villains Are Taken
Chapter Sixteen
A Call to Arms
Chapter Seventeen
A Rat Trap in Belgravia
Chapter Eighteen
Justice is Served on a Plate
Preview – The Murders On The Square – Chapters One & Two
Author Note & Essay
Acknowledgements
About the Author
CHAPTER ONE
The Master Engraver’s Dilemma
It was an unseasonably mild, late November afternoon in 1889 when I concluded my final house-call of the day at a private patient’s house in Marylebone. The gleaming mahogany doors closed softly behind me and as I descended the imposing granite steps I reflected that having a wealthy hypochondriac patient or two was no bad thing for a retired army surgeon with a new wife to support, and setting up in a small but promising private practice.
It being only three in the afternoon, and with no other matter pressing, I chose on impulse to visit my old roommate, Sherlock Holmes in nearby Baker Street, having seen him but once or twice since my marriage.
To be candid, despite my blissfully happy new married estate, I still hankered for that dangerous frisson of excitement and cerebral stimulation that invariably ignited within me when in happy proximity to Holmes’ remarkable mind and its uncannily logical workings.
As I reached for the door-handle at 221B, I hesitated; momentarily it seemed to me for just the briefest of instants that all might be as before, just as it had been for several most lively years; that the door to my old room would yet be ajar, could still be open to me, and Holmes might hail his willing amanuensis from within a dense cloud of pungent tobacco smoke as he wrestled with whatever devilish puzzle or villainy he was in train of addressing; or was I merely indulging emotion in the absence of rationality?
Wishing to surprise my friend I ascended as silently as one may on a stair which I well know to creak loudly on five of the seventeen treads; I had long memorised their sequence and how to avoid them. Soundlessly I turned the doorknob and entered the silent parlour.
Frequently, our rooms at 221B Baker Street had been redolent of some aroma; most typically it would be strong shag tobacco, or perhaps cigar smoke; on occasion pungent chemicals might pervade the air – formaldehyde, spirits of alcohol and once even, the distinctive and heart-stopping lethal almond perfume of prussic acid. I had become accustomed to such miasmas.
Nonetheless it was with a degree of revulsion that I was assailed by the overwhelming, sweet coppery reek of decaying blood that afternoon. The source was evidently the open carboy, half-full of the stuff, upon his work-bench.
Holmes was seated at his desk in a great cloud of tobacco smok
e with his back toward me, head down, pipe in hand and all but inundated by a great litter of crumpled news-sheets and journals. The room remained still and quiet – he had not detected my stealthy arrival.
I paused, and was about to say something light-hearted as, for example “A caller to see you Mr Holmes” when he abruptly set down his pipe. Without turning he murmured “Do come in Watson and please, for heaven’s sake, stop tiptoeing round like a thief in the night!”
He spun round, and my bewilderment mixed with deep vexation must have shown, for my friend burst out laughing uproariously. “Oh Watson, to see your face; what a glorious study in frustration!”
“But how on earth could you have known it was I?” Disappointment seized me; “Oh, obviously, you merely observed me arrive, from the window.”
“I have been seated at my desk since noon.” “Then you simply heard the street-door close.”
“I overheard no such thing.”
“Then assuredly you did not hear the stair, for I avoided those steps which screech an alarm.”
“That is perfectly true. I see that matrimony and your practice have been keeping you rather more exercised than you had anticipated.” I was accustomed to these abrupt changes of subject as Holmes’ mercurial mind leapt ephemerally from one thread of thought to another. “As it happens Holmes, you are perfectly correct; how does that bear upon the matter?” My friend smiled.
“It is simply that for some weeks before you abandoned me and upped-sticks for Kensington, you had repeatedly vowed to send those favourite old ox-blood leather town shoes to be re-soled on account of the abominable squeak from the right.
“It has since abated somewhat, and no doubt the autumn dampness has further quieted it; however, the all-but inaudible, peculiarly high, still near-perfect A-flat, occasioned when you lift your right heel in climbing the stair is perfectly distinctive to a student of the violin, particularly one who explores the higher registers of which the instrument is capable. And thus you betrayed your arrival most individually and musically.
“I merely surmised, therefore, that you have not yet found the time among your other busy professional and private affairs to have them sent for repair. Other than that treacherous heel, your ascent might have been quite silent.
“But enough of this inconsequential nonsense; tediously, events have of late become somewhat slow and I find myself applying my brain to the most trivial of puzzles. Now how are you old friend? This is truly the most capital of surprises!” I sat in my old chair once again.
“As no doubt you detect, Holmes, life treats me very decently by and large; my patient-list grows almost weekly; indeed, I imagine that by the coming spring I shall likely have to refrain from accommodating further new patients – that or perhaps seek a junior partner.
“But all in all, I count myself a fortunate man, and providentially rather more in funds than when first we took these rooms all those years ago. And yet...”
I tailed off wistfully and paused. Holmes looked up from perusing his papers and fixed me keenly; “And yet what, Watson?”
“And yet this, Holmes; I recall how very alive I felt this summer past when we were up in the Highlands investigating the Ballantyne Castle murders. True, it was a grim and bloody business and, granted, I took another gunshot wound but truly, tell me this Holmes – what other London medical doctor of the ordinary has enjoyed the privilege of assisting Europe’s only consulting detective in his work?”
My companion chuckled. “Should you imagine that I have been continuously engaged in unravelling chilling mysteries, I regret you are in error! There is little currently to challenge me. See here...” and he rummaged impatiently through the more sensational pages of the news-sheets;
‘ENTIRE SIDE OF GREEN
BACON STOLEN UNDER MYSTERIOUS
CIRCUMSTANCES!’
“And here, look further ”– I read the item he had indicated with a rap of his pipe stem:
‘BAFFLED POLICE HUNT
FRAUDULENT SALESMAN’
“Was there ever any other variety of either species, Watson?
“Am I to scour the capital for a stolen ham, no doubt by now consumed and much enjoyed, or shall I perhaps turn my wits to hunting down some mendacious vendor of patent nostrums and quack remedies?”
I had, on occasion, observed my friend in this condition of irritable ennui before. I turned the pages of the newspaper he had passed me.
My eye settled upon a short news item; “Now what of this Holmes”? I read aloud:
‘SCOTLAND YARD SQUAD
MYSTIFIED BY NORTH LONDON
BURGLARIES’
Detectives are puzzling over two burglaries in a wealthy suburb of North London. On the same evening, a person or persons unknown appear expertly to have picked the locks of two substantial houses in the same area of Harrow and its environs, searched both residences thoroughly, owned respectively by a Mr Perkins and a Mr Bacon, but left with no theft occasioned, despite the presence of various valuable items openly displayed. Both unusual events were reported the following morning, in the absence of the occupiers, by a house-keeper and maid, respectively. The highly-reputed Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard commented: ‘The criminals were evidently disturbed in the course of their burglary and were forced to flee empty-handed. However, we have a good description of a man seen acting suspiciously in the area – medium or tall build, dark hair and possibly with a moustache. We are confident of an arrest in the near future.’
“Now surely that odd account might carry hidden promise? A burglar who troubles to break in, is confronted with numerous valuables, yet leaves quite without gain – not so much as a snatched snuff box – and twice on the same night?”
Holmes snorted. “Come, Watson; you are quite right to note it as an oddity, and I intend to look into it further; but you know well my methods – those were not burglaries as Lestrade believes; entry was effected not with a stout jemmy – the common burglar’s favoured and speediest tool – the locks were proficiently picked, valuable items were prominently displayed, yet none was taken.
“And if the ‘burglars’ were disturbed, then who disturbed them? It does not accord with the facts and I am afraid it will not serve.
“The account does not mention anyone reporting unusual sights or sounds; unsurprisingly, I suspect Lestrade is, as usual, on the wrong scent, for these were clearly searches, and whatever was being sought was not discovered.” After a short, thoughtful pause he said, “Nonetheless, it is an intriguing account that may promise something of the outré; I have already made a small enquiry of friend Lestrade. It will be diverting to discover the identities of the two house-owners, for assuredly they share something in common.
“But as to his over-weaning assertion: “...we have a good description of a man seen in the area – medium or tall build, dark hair and possibly with a moustache... We are confident of an arrest in the near future...’
“What arrant nonsense! Why, that perfectly describes you, old friend, along with ten thousand others! I wish him luck in his fruitless hunt!”
“But, hey-ho, no matter; I shall bide my time and without doubt some curiosity of at least moderate interest will come my way.”After this mildly entertaining interlude we spoke of other matters; I promised that I would attempt to locate an old research paper from my student days that might assist his malodorous investigations into the properties of haemoglobin. And so, on the comradeliest of terms, we parted, having agreed to meet again before the festive season. I left him moodily tuning his treasured Stradivarius, seated amid the wrecked remains of a week’s newspapers...
December passed briskly enough in a great surge of sufferers of common colds and influenza but by the start of the festive season my practice became quieter...
* * *
...It was a bitter Christmas Eve morning; I had set off to deliver the promised treatise on the life-cycle and properties of haemoglobin and move in for a few days with Sherlock Holmes at Baker Street.
My sweet wife, Mary, had made little objection as she planned to leave that day to spend several days visiting old friends in Cambridge. I was delighted by the unexpected opportunity to spend a little time in our old rooms, back in company with my clever and unusual friend.
Upon my arrival at Baker Street Mrs Hudson served soft-boiled eggs, tea and toast accompanied by her excellent quince jam, following which Holmes and I were companionably, but separately occupied; I reviewing the notes I had made throughout the Ballantyne Castle affair, and he engrossed in his obscure experiment at his work-bench which appeared to involve several vials of congealed blood, not a few vicious digs with a bodkin into his own fingers, and numerous gobbets of brown modelling clay which, temporarily affixed, precariously supported various components. There were many noxious-smelling chemicals which, from time to time, he introduced with pipettes into the labyrinth of chemical glassware; occasionally I heard a vesta being struck, and the soft pop of a Bunsen flame igniting.
Outside, the harbingers of Christmas had started swirling like dervishes, thick and white past our windows, while down in the street, breath plumed from horses and scurrying passers-by alike; a small gang of scruffy urchins bickered and jostled good-naturedly for the warmest places around the hot-chestnut seller’s glowing brazier.
Already the snow was settling sufficiently to induce that curious consequence of quieting everyday street sounds; the wheels of passing hansoms below made no more than a low gentle rumbling; horseshoes on snow-covered cobbles became soft thudding noises; human footfall on fresh snow was an all but inaudible chorus of soft creaking sounds.
Sherlock Holmes & The Master Engraver (Sherlock Holmes Revival) Page 1
