Sherlock Holmes & The Master Engraver (Sherlock Holmes Revival)

by Husband, Ross

  I could think of nothing uplifting to say – the atmosphere in the room seemed to be weighed down with the heavy burden of failure, and of Holmes’ close brush with death at the hand of the evil Bormanstein.

  My thoughts lightened when I recollected that this was the evening of Mary’s home-coming from Cambridge, and I turned my thoughts to some manner of celebration for her arrival. I was deciding between The Café Royal and Simpson’s in The Strand when Holmes turned towards me. Sombrely he said “I will, of course, have to account for the outcome of last night’s fracas Watson, to which end I have convoked Mr May, Mr Petch and Lestrade here in...” he looked over at the clock “...about thirty minutes – I have a lot to explain as you know. You may imagine it is likely to be a somewhat complicated meeting; accordingly I will perfectly well understand should you prefer not to be present.”

  I had observed Holmes, day and night, applying himself tirelessly to this intractable case – I was not going to abandon him in his hour of need. “I would prefer to remain if I may Holmes, if only to see fair play.” He smiled warmly but said nothing.

  “Anyway,” I continued “Bormanstein cannot elude you indefinitely – we know his identity, we have seen his face, his gang is taken – he is now a hunted man, alone and on the run, armed with nothing but a bag of money and a parcel of useless steel plates. He will surely make a slip, and we will be waiting to pounce!”

  “Watson my dear old chum, I do believe you are quite as durable as the engraved steel plates he carried away – and without doubt, infinitely more valuable than the money.”

  I was much affected by these words from a man whose opinion I so greatly valued. At precisely eleven o’clock I heard a hansom arrive below, followed a few moments later by a second. Holmes seated himself at the dining table with his back to the window, interlaced his fingers and waited in silence.

  The parlour door opened to admit Mr Frank May, chief cashier of The Bank of England, Mr Henry Petch, master engraver and partner of Perkins, Bacon & Petch, and a few seconds later, Inspector Lestrade of The Yard.

  “Please be seated gentlemen.” They joined Holmes at the table; I took the remaining chair. Frank May spoke first. “If I am correct Mr Holmes, last night the clock ran out on the criminals’ deadline. I believe you have called us here to report your progress; have you the Bank’s money?”

  Petch added “Have you recovered the plates Mr Holmes?”

  Lestrade joined in “And where is Asa Bormanstein?”

  Holmes held up his hands, palms out. “In order if you please gentlemen. No doubt, Mr May, you refer to a heavy Gladstone bag containing a quantity of Bank of England ten-pound notes provided by you; the last I saw of that, it was shackled to the wrist of a notorious criminal – also a murderer – fleeing into the night.” He turned to the old engraver:

  “Sadly, Mr Petch, even having been paid, Bormanstein still coveted the finely engraved steel, for he snatched the leather parcel before making good his escape.

  “As to your question, Inspector, I regret to say that at present I have no idea where he is – losing his trail is my greatest regret, but I will find him gentlemen; in time, I will see him taken – if he does not hunt me first.” A frosty silence descended on the meeting. Below on the street I heard a growler pull to the kerb.

  Coldly May said; “Then you have signally failed, Mr Holmes, and you have cost The Bank one hundred thousand pounds into the bargain. Your desperate last throw of the dice has come to nought.” Holmes looked intently down at the carpet.

  “And the plates are gone, probably forever” added Petch. Holmes studiously examined his fingernails.

  “I have researched diligently, and his name is not on any record of known criminals” Lestrade concluded the cheerless litany.

  Before Holmes could reply there came a soft knock upon the door. “Excuse me a moment gentlemen” – he strode across the room and opened the door. I heard a brief murmured conversation, a low chuckle and Holmes returned to the table bearing a sizeable cardboard box. He peered inside it and said irritably “Is it not annoying when other people’s goods are delivered in error to your address? This is surely not mine” and he opened the lid wide. Holmes’ face was sombre but I noted his eyes were alight with barely concealed excitement.

  “Ah, I see this is possibly your property, Mr May” and theatrically, like a prestidigitator revealing the vanished lady he set ten three-inch thick bundles of crisp new Bank of England ten-pound notes upon the table before The Chief Cashier.

  Again he peered within the box. “Aha! There is more – mayhap some belated Christmas cheer – perhaps this yours Mr Petch?” and he placed an evidently weighty, chamois leather parcel in the gnarled hands of the master engraver. Neither visitor spoke. Frank May fanned the corner of one stack of notes and nodded with deep satisfaction; Henry Petch slowly and incredulously unfolded the leather parcel whereupon a look of ineffable relief and joy flooded his careworn face. He looked up at Holmes; “And the Portal’s paper?”

  “That is safely under guard in the custody of, shall I say, a trusted... associate.” The room fell silent once again; the Hampson clock ticked softly in the corner.

  I beamed with delight – Sherlock Holmes had not failed; far from it, he had conjured a great triumph!

  But how he had contrived it was a mystery to me. Lestrade alone appeared somewhat vexed and deeply puzzled – he shook his head in bewilderment.

  “I’m sure I don’t know how the trick was done Mr Holmes, but it seems yet again you have pulled the rabbit out of the hat. I know I saw the bag –I saw it secured and locked on his wrist; I saw the plates on the desk – and I saw them taken!”

  “Come come Lestrade, it was you and I in concert who pulled the rabbit from the hat! I merely acted in, how shall I put it, an advisory capacity; this collar is fairly and squarely yours; you already hold the gang – you have retrieved the priceless plates, The Bank has its money intact – less £100 – I’m sure it will not be long before you apprehend their principal!”

  This statement was emblematic both of Holmes’ generosity of spirit, and his natural instinct to shun the public spotlight. His work was, for him, its own reward.

  “If you are amenable, Lestrade, I will call at the Yard tomorrow morning at, shall we say, eleven o’clock, and I shall tell you what I know of this business.” The detective looked at Holmes narrowly. “And exactly how much do you know Mr Holmes?”

  “I know all Lestrade, I know all.”

  The Inspector bade his farewells and departed in high good humour, evidently well pleased with his unexpected good fortune – perhaps promotion was yet within his grasp.

  Frank May studied Holmes shrewdly; “There is rather more to this affair than meets the eye Mr Holmes, and certainly considerably more than you are telling, of that I am convinced.” The merest suggestion of a smile flickered briefly across Holmes thin lips. “Ah Mr May, I’m afraid there you must allow me my little trade secrets.” The chief Cashier paused, then laughed drily. “Very well Mr Holmes; I suppose I shall just have to restrain my curiosity until Doctor Watson records the affair in one of his excellent accounts!” He glanced across at Henry Petch who appeared still to be dazed by the dramatic and unexpected return of his precious plates. He addressed me “Perhaps, Doctor, you might simply entitle it “Sherlock Holmes and The Master Engraver”, for that is where the whole affair started and finished!”

  I smiled. “Perhaps I will, Mr May, perhaps I will at that.”

  “I believe there is a final piece of business between us Mr Holmes” said The Cashier; “You have rendered a service of inestimable value to Perkins, Bacon & Petch, to The Bank of England, to the country and likely, to the Empire. I am authorised to settle your account immediately; no doubt you have incurred significant expenditure in the course of your enquiry, and there is the further matter of your professional fee – I shall not require an accounting. I trust this will be adequate to cover any expenses.” I watched in disbelief as May pushed acros
s one of the thick bundles of notes – ten thousand pounds “...and in view of the scale of the disaster you have averted, I feel this perhaps to be appropriate remuneration for your professional services” and he passed across a second bundle – a total of twenty thousand pounds! May slid across a receipt upon which Holmes scrawled his signature.

  My colleague gazed impassively at the fortune before him. “That is more than adequate Mr May – indeed it is a very great deal of money...” he laughed briefly “...but then I was playing against the man who tried to break The Bank of England, and his stake was considerably higher than mine!”

  “My renewed and most sincere thanks Mr Holmes, and you Doctor Watson; I shall now take my leave and return this to our vaults; it is possibly the largest, short-term cash advance, free of interest, we have ever made!”

  Holmes reached once more into the cardboard box. “Then you will perhaps find this useful” and he handed May an empty, brand-new Gladstone bag with its security chain and a key. “Oh, and these too.” He passed the Chief Cashier the three counterfeit notes we had acquired during the course of our investigation. “The man who delivered this parcel awaits you on his growler below; it is equipped with dark-blinds; he is entirely to be trusted – he nearly lost his life in the course of assisting me. You will note he is more than muscular enough to ensure your safe journey back to The Bank with such a precious cargo.”

  When the door had closed behind Frank May, Holmes turned to Henry Petch, who sat, gently smiling, both sinewy, age-spotted hands gripping the precious parcel tightly, as if at any moment it might again be snatched from his grasp. “I apologise for my, perhaps, theatrical revelation Mr Petch; my colleague has on occasion upbraided me for being unnecessarily dramatic.” Petch clutched his parcel even more fiercely and replied like a naughty schoolboy confessing to a minor crime “Think nothing of it Mr Holmes; truth to tell, I myself have been known somewhat mischievously to introduce a quite needless but flamboyant piece of scrollwork into my plates for the sheer exuberant devilment of it! But in more serious vein, I have a few questions to which I must have answers.”

  Holmes gestured for the elderly engraver to continue. “If the criminals employed keys, then whose did they use? As you well know, there are only four sets in the entire world. How did they enter our premises and violate the safe and the paper-store, and by what means did they contrive to remove such a large volume of material under the watchful eyes of Gunton and Shadwell? And how came these miscreants to know of the existence of the plates in the first instance?”

  Holmes sat for a moment, eyes closed in thought, organising his thoughts. “As I deduced from the start Mr Petch, they did, indeed use keys. But you are mistaken when you state that there are only four sets in existence; there were four – there are now six!” and he handed Petch his set of glittering zinc keys attached to a small steel ring. The engraver’s eyes opened wide.

  “Then whose are these?”

  “They are mine, but in a roundabout way, Mr Petch, they are yours!”

  Petch fumbled for his watch-chain; “There you are in error Mr Holmes; here are mine in their customary place. These are new – all our locks have been replaced.”

  Holmes nodded and continued “The fifth set used by the criminals was made in exactly the same manner as I contrived this sixth set. What one man can devise, another can discover? You will recall I took your keys to my work-bench yonder. I made perfect impressions in firm-grade modellers’ clay, in exactly the same way as did Bormanstein, but he used glazier’s putty, when spuriously repairing the orchid-house whose destruction he himself had organised the previous night. While you were away seeking a workman, and your wife was lured out on a wild-goose chase to Doctor Bentinck’s house, your maid Dulcie Hobbs – treacherously insinuated by Bormanstein using false references – removed your keys from your bureau and passed them to him, probably through the study window. The job took mere seconds. They were compelled to resort to this extraordinarily elaborate subterfuge, having previously searched your partners’ houses in Harrow for their keys, but to no avail as they were both away travelling and had their keys with them.

  “The impossible coincidence of your orchid-house being randomly vandalised one night, and two workmen appearing the very next morning in your predictable absence, with all necessary supplies and equipment, alerted me instantly.

  “As to how the villains entered your business premises, why, by the normal method; you and your partners hired them, then allowed them in. They rang the bell, were admitted by the watchman, a record was entered in the day-book, and the villains set about their criminal enterprise!"

  “Then you know their identity Mr Holmes? Surely the police can find the leader and seize him?”

  Holmes chuckled wryly; “You already know his identity Mr Petch – for you and your partners paid him for his services – Mr Orman of Orman’s Roofing Contractors, alias Mr Asa Bormanstein!

  “I have no doubt he offered a guarantee that he would best any other estimate you may have had for the works. By contracting with him, your hard-nosed partner in charge of purchasing unwittingly gave him free access to your premises, inside, outside, and on the roof, which is where he and his gang entered.

  “Once up high and out of view, it was a simple matter to remove the appropriate section of the roof, climb down directly into the paper-store and using the innocent gantry and block-and-tackle which hoisted their tar-vats up and down, haul the paper out of the store and thence down to their wagon, out of sight of the watchman, at the rear of the premises.

  “To steal the plates they simply unlocked the paper-vault from within, sauntered through to your private office, much as I did using those” he gestured towards the key ring “where they used their counterfeit key to unlock the safe. If you look carefully you will find I left my calling card within – Mr John Watson, Surveyor. Upon leaving, one of them, probably the wall-eyed Belton seized two of your burins, perhaps because they appealed as weapons; a colleague of ours was later stabbed with one of your engraving tools. He survived two such attacks and is well.”

  Petch appeared deeply upset by these revelations. “However, you have not yet told me Mr Holmes how these impious men gained their shockingly detailed intelligence.”

  For several moments my colleague sat deep in thought. “Here we touch upon a rather delicate matter, Mr Petch, and I cannot advise upon it, though I have my thoughts. You will recollect when first we met I asked you to describe your partners candidly. I recall one was a keen card-player at The Bagatelle Club, and also enjoyed – perhaps rather too much, a glass or mayhap even, several? It is well-known that ardent spirits and gambling go together ill; even worse when they occasion garrulous talk.

  “I visited the Bagatelle Club and learned from the steward that early in November your associate had lost a very large sum of money at the tables and was consoling himself in his customary way. It seems he fell into conversation with a tall, moustachioed player who plied him most generously with whisky; that man we now know as Asa Bormanstein. For a guinea, Barker, the head steward intimated to me that your colleague was volubly forthcoming on all matters, your business, your private addresses, your search for a contractor, Mrs Petch’s requirement for a new maid, your opening and closing days over Christmas – all were freely volunteered. Most damning of all, he displayed his keys and, it seems, indiscreetly boasted of the importance of each, and what they guarded.

  “But if, as I suspect, he is a valued colleague – perhaps a quiet word or two would suffice? In view of the calamitous consequences he occasioned, I doubt he will repeat the error.” Petch smiled ruefully to himself.

  “I believe perhaps we may take your advice Mr Holmes; after this dreadful business, I too doubt that such an indiscretion would occur again” and he offered his curiously evolved right hand.

  Holmes and I shook it warmly and thus it was that Mr Henry Petch, aesthete, lover of rare orchids, and the master engraver of Perkins, Bacon & Petch left 221B Baker Street, perf
ectly content and clutching his beloved plates tightly to his chest. With the parlour silent once more I resolved to quiz Holmes on those several matters still opaque to me. He was more than pleased to comply, for he knew that in me he had his most appreciative audience.

  “Let us relax with a pipe by the fire Watson and I shall briefly relate, if you wish, the entire sequence of events for you. And, infinitely more challenging to the critical faculties of observation and deduction, those small facts that the common man overlooks, but which damn a villain just as well as his confession.”

  And so, with that meticulous concision of narration I enjoyed so well, he proceeded to complete the puzzle for me...

  “A losing night at the card table, strong drink and black melancholy can play the very devil with some men’s discretion...” he began surprisingly. “But for that night’s random sequence of events, the theft – and a tragic and needless murder – almost certainly would not have occurred.

  “Consider, Watson: a man is brought low by a night’s heavy gambling losses; he is drowning his sorrows in a bottle when quite by chance he encounters a stranger. They fall into conversation, he feels diminished and seeks to restore his rank; through sheer hubris he attempts to prove his station in life by displaying his valuable keys, and the vast responsibility and authority with which they endow him. The stranger – Bormanstein as he claims to be – plies him with ever more refreshment and he becomes ever more indiscreet.

  “Like a willing lamb to the slaughter he unwittingly delivers every data necessary to commit the crime: the firm’s name and those of the other partners, their domiciles and pastimes, their holiday closure dates, the search for a roofing contractor, Petch’s hunt for a suitable maid and much more, no doubt.

  “In short, as Lestrade might say, Bormanstein has been gifted the means, the motive and the opportunity. “Now he must work swiftly; he conjures together a team of criminals and wins the contract at Perkins, Bacon & Petch simply by guaranteeing to beat the lowest price – it is immaterial to him whether he makes a profit or a loss – the prize is unfettered access to the premises for several days. But now he must also gain access to a set of keys; from his encounter at The Bagatelle Club he knows two of the partners are abroad in France and Ireland respectively, so he enters and searches their houses in Harrow but to no avail – Perkins and Bacon have their keys with them; hence the account we observed in the news-sheet concerning two burglaries in Harrow, but with no theft occasioned. He now has only one recourse – Henry Petch’s keys; for that he requires an accomplice within Mr Petch’s residence; also he needs Petch to be absent for a day; hence the magical arrival upon the scene of Dulcie Hobbs’ with her perfect but quite absurd letter of recommendation from the non-existent Baroness Amanti, resident in the untraceable French village of Obânes St-Amarin; shortly after, the orchid house is vandalised – it was a near-certainty that such a disaster in deepest winter would send Mr Petch scurrying in panic for a glazier.