Sherlock Holmes & The Master Engraver (Sherlock Holmes Revival)

by Husband, Ross

  “The utterly improbable appearance next morning of a competent glazier, Mr Nathan Madgwick and his ‘assistant’ Mr Asa Bormanstein, coincidentally equipped with all necessaries – including putty of course – miles from his yard in the Clerkenwell Road defied all belief and set me at the very highest alert. Then when I examined Petch’s keys and detected traces of putty, both by scent and by microscopic examination, it merely confirmed to me that impressions of the keys had been taken in Petch’s absence. Again, the price charged for the glazing work done was improbably low but immaterial – Bormanstein’s reward was five minutes alone with Petch’s keys and a large slab of firm putty – thanks to the treacherous services of the late Dulcie Hobbs.

  “The date is now the 19th of December, and Bormanstein has his impressions.

  “It was not until some days after – the evening of the 24th – when Henry Petch called upon us, that I made my own impressions with the modelling clay which I habitually use to secure equipment at my bench. Bormanstein has already made his keys and the robbery is long accomplished. The crime, you see, occurred three days prior on Saturday the 21st.”

  I calculated there was a lapse of some five days between Bormanstein gaining his impressions on the 19th and Petch reporting the robbery on the 24th.

  “How can you be certain the crime was committed precisely on the 21st, Holmes?”

  “Come Watson, there are three compelling facts which make the 21st of December the likely date. The first is the time needed to make the keys – you recall it required the highly skilled criminal-locksmith, Isaiah Pollitt, more than a full working day to complete the task over at the bench there; it could not have been achieved earlier. And second, on the Saturday, the criminals could be reasonably assured that there would be no-one on site except the watchman and themselves.”

  I pondered the irrefutable logic of this. “And the third fact?”

  “The organ-grinder, Watson! I doubt he earned much on a deserted Fleet Street on a bitter December 21st, for such it was as Gunton complained to us. And yet it seems this kind-hearted street musician played his machine for some considerable time, apparently for Gunton’s sole entertainment. Does that not strike you as odd?”

  “Perhaps he was finishing his work for the day and chose, in true festive spirit, to raise the spirits of a bored old soldier on his watch?”

  Holmes chortled. “...and to Gunton’s delight, obligingly played ‘The British Grenadiers’ at full volume for him every time he left the watchmen’s hut to make his round of the site?” Realisation dawned; “Good Lord Holmes, then the tune was a warning to Bormanstein and his accomplices to be alert – that Gunton was out on his round?” My colleague shrugged and spread his hands expansively in acknowledgement. “A simple alarm signal, but well-chosen to fool a sentimental old ex-military man.”

  “And now, Watson, events move apace. They set up their illicit press in remote Slater’s yard and start work. By that time I had Dulcie Hobbs under the closest observation; young Wiggins, who I set to watch her rooms, reported the number of the hansom that delivered Bormanstein and Belton in Chiswick on the night of her murder. The time of their arrival was confirmed by the landlady and by the time we know ashes to have been scattered upon the path; they can have been the only other people to enter her lodgings that night; their cinder-dusted footprints in her room and upon the table where they climbed to secure the hangman’s noose placed it beyond doubt. Hobbs’ shoes were free of cinders because she had arrived home before they were scattered.

  “I then summoned Solomon Warburg – you will recall his impressively insightful deduction as to the villains’ likely destination that dark fateful night. Imprudently he later ventured there alone, almost at the cost of his life and unfortunately in the process, drove the gang deeper into hiding; now we knew not where they were.”

  “That brings me to my next question Holmes – you appeared to be more taken up with the smell of the money, than its appearance? How did that bear upon matters, for it seemed to me, I cannot fathom how, that it somehow determined the circle of precisely three miles radius which you inscribed on the map, centred upon their hide-out in Cubitt Town. I recall you said to me something very like ‘within that circle is where I am convinced our wicked foes have gone to earth. It can, I am sure of it, be no further away.’ Then within hours you returned in the guise of a disreputable drunk, reeking of gin and decay, having spent the morning observing the villains on this SS Betania moored at Jacobs Island – precisely within your circle!”

  In that so-familiar pose, thin white fingers steepled beneath his angular chin, he responded “Do you recall, Watson, once I told you that I allow all my senses free rein; sight, sound, smell, touch, even taste; the results of their observation go into the crucible of deduction, and when the clinker of deception is cast away, there remains the lodestone of truth? You may also recall I invited your estimate of the distance a strong man in a state of agitation might walk in one hour?”

  Still I could make little sense of his explanation; I shrugged, bewildered.

  “Consider, Watson! We encountered Wall-eye and the dog-handler upon entering Cubitt Town shortly after one o’clock; after our lunch at the public house we walked to Slater’s yard where we discovered the blackmail demand and the second proof pinned to the wall sometime after three; Warburg swore on the Torah it was not there the night before; had it been, I’m sure even Lestrade would have noticed it. The yard was under continuous police watch from midnight; Constable Clarke assured us that he had left his station for no more than twenty minutes. The entire time elapsed was little more than two hours between our encounter with the heavies and the appearance of the ransom note. After we left them I surmised that one raced to warn Bormanstein at their new hideout, that strangers were asking strange questions; I would imagine the other – probably the dog-handler, remained to observe and follow us.

  “Bormanstein now wrote his demand and over-printed a bank-note with his Swiss account number as the serial – the heavy raced back with it. Fortuitously for them PC Clarke was absent for some minutes at The Cubitt Arms public house and that was when they placed their note, in full knowledge that we would shortly appear on the scene.

  “Hansoms are virtually unheard of in Cubitt Town; their horse and wagon was already gone, so I deduced that the alarm was raised by a man travelling on foot – one hour out and one hour back. A fit man can achieve, perhaps four miles in an hour-but Bormanstein had to prepare his demand – more time elapses – hence the radius of my circle – Wall-eye, or Sidney Belton as we now know him, could not have travelled further in the interval!”

  I sat entranced; how did this unusual man spin such fragile strands of deduction, then weave them into a deadly web as strong as steel? Holmes continued with his gripping and illuminating lecture.

  “The odour of an object may tell us as much as its appearance; consider, Watson, let us suppose you receive a letter from an unknown person; it smells of rose-water – your conclusion would be...?”

  “That it was likely sent by a woman.” He nodded. “Next you encounter a man who smells faintly of fish?” I started to see where my friend was leading me, “Why, that he is probably a fishmonger, or has lately handled fish.”

  “And a recently printed banknote that bears the smell of pitch?”

  “That it was created, or has been in a place – Slater’s Yard – thick with the stuff?”

  “And now a second, the ransom demand, which smells the same but with a faint hint of sulphurous decay, of rot? I refer of course to the note you kindly assayed blindfolded.” Now I was upon uncertain ground. “That it was printed at Slater’s Yard but has moved elsewhere and acquired this new scent?”

  “Exactly Watson! And the third proof, presented at Kauffmann Brothers in payment for thirty links of silver, then brought to us by The Chief Cashier, smelled most strongly of that same rotten-egg stench of decay.

  “There is only one type of establishment in the world that creates that d
istinctive, vile smell, Watson, and they invariably are located near water where they discharge the foul and pungent effluents of their industry; the simplest research indicated that there is only one such establishment within my deduced circle of hunting-ground – you will recall that the wall-eyed Sidney Belton, the same who foolishly stole the third bank-note to buy his sweetheart a keepsake, lodged at number 30 Jacob Street hard by Tan’s Yard in Bermondsey, at Jacob’s Island. His purchase – the Judas silver – confirmed my every suspicion because the note he used smelled powerfully of... a tannery!

  “The press the criminals employed requires to be driven by a steam engine, hence the reason why I concealed myself among the unsavoury ranks of the drunks and idlers of Jacob’s Island to watch the only source of steam power thereabouts – the newly renamed SS Betania, in lamentable condition – anchored motionless, adjacent to the stinking outlet gutter from the tannery, but curiously still making steam. There on her deck, I observed Bormanstein, Belton and the other heavies from time to time, and they were unquestionably set to repel all boarders! It was, as I have said Watson, a fortress defended by a fast-running moat of noxious effluents.”

  I now understood why Holmes had called his own ground for the final confrontation, but how in heavens did he entice Bormanstein to Belgravia? And why von Huntziger’s lavish Belgrave Square mansion, why von Huntziger’s involvement at all? I pressed my friend further.

  “Bormanstein attended, Watson, simply because he could not stay away! – I persuaded Mr Frank May to telegraph Herr Balz Balmer of The Bank Leu in Switzerland, requesting him to send a perfectly deceitful telegraph message from Switzerland, for collection by Bormanstein, stating that the ransom from The Bank of England had been deposited in his account! Herr Balmer complied to protect both the Bank Leu AG and The Bank of England. That telegraph, incidentally, was the shorter of the two messages that young Wiggins saw Bormanstein collect with such evident satisfaction.

  “The longer of the two messages was an instruction drafted by me, sent to Louis Lépine and then as I requested, duly forwarded by him to the Bermondsey telegraph office, again for collection by Bormanstein; but to Bormanstein it appeared to have been sent by Professor Moriarty from Fontainebleau. Had Bormanstein replied and queried the content, the vigilant Lépine would have intercepted his message and repeated the instruction more forcefully.”

  It appeared that Sherlock Holmes’ artful cunning knew no bounds.

  We were interrupted briefly by Mrs Hudson who set out a very civilized luncheon of boiled beef and carrots, mashed potatoes and cabbage of which I was mightily appreciative, having missed breakfast entirely.

  After a short interval I resumed my questioning; “Then what exactly was the content of the message purporting to be from Moriarty to Bormanstein? It must have been extraordinarily compelling.”

  “It was – it confirmed that Moriarty had made an agreement with von Huntziger to sell on the stolen materials for a further one hundred thousand pounds.”

  “And why did you issue the invitation to meet at von Huntziger’s Belgravia mansion of all places?”

  “For the simple reason that to be believable, Watson, Moriarty’s supposed instruction to sell on the plates and paper had to name as the buyer a known and wealthy criminal, with the means to pay the fabulous sum of one hundred thousand pounds. Count Otto-Dietmar von Huntziger is just such a man.

  “Bormanstein was aware of von Huntziger’s curriculum vitae, as was Moriarty, and concluded that the professor had contrived a means of further capitalising on the stolen goods. They were now becoming too dangerous to possess. And you will recall I warned Mr May that the simple payment of the ransom demand would not ensure the safe return of the plates.

  “The telegraph, apparently from Moriarty, simply assured Bormanstein that the ransom had been received from The Bank of England, that the game would soon be up, and that he had contrived a final and highly profitable throw of the dice which would increase their total gain by a further hundred thousand pounds to the enormous sum of three hundred and fifty thousand pounds – enough to fund a criminal empire for decades.

  “Hence Bormanstein dutifully appeared precisely at midnight at Eaton House, Belgrave Square, exactly as I bade him. I did tell you, Watson, I can be extremely persuasive!

  “Von Huntziger, for his part, was more than pleased to join in the plan, particularly when I suggested that his cooperation would almost certainly occasion an attack of amnesia on my part in connection with the stolen Hartz sapphires!” He chuckled. “It so happens that as unresolved cases go, my heart would not truly be in any further investigation, for I know the previous owner of the stones obtained them by a cruel deception amounting to extortion; at least von Huntziger obtained them through artistry and skill!

  “Then there remain just three unresolved puzzles for me, Holmes; how came it that I observed the Gladstone bag of money upon the desk, we saw Bormanstein riffle through a stack of notes, check the bag a second time, shackle it to his wrist and flee, yet today you have handed it back to The Bank?”

  “By the childishly simple expedient of a second identical bag beneath the desk – I purchased two; the Count first displayed the bag containing one hundred thousand pounds in genuine currency – it had to be genuine to stand up to the close examination to which Bormanstein would undoubtedly expose it. Von Huntziger removed it from the desk momentarily until he had examined the plates, then artfully re-presented the second bag which contained ten bundles of unprinted Portals paper, each topped-off with a genuine note, each bundle being secured with an official Bank of England paper band.

  “This second bag with its deceitful contents was delivered to von Huntziger earlier yesterday by Warburg, and was already concealed beneath the desk when I placed its twin, containing the genuine payment, alongside.

  “Had Bormanstein troubled to make more than a perfunctory examination of the second bag, he would have found that what he accepted was ten bundles of plain, unprinted Portal’s paper, and ten, ten-pound notes. But he saw what he expected to see. For all his pains he has earned exactly one hundred pounds! And amusingly, I noted he neglected to take the key which unlocks the bracelet, which will annoy him still further!”

  I smiled at the audacious simplicity of the means with which Holmes had tricked the criminal master-mind. “Then what of the plates, Holmes? What on earth was in the heavy leather parcel that Bormanstein snatched?”

  “Why, finely engraved plates of highly-polished steel of course! However I doubt that he will trouble to print from them.

  “They were fabricated to my order by Mr Julius Kauffman and his engraver – the same who inscribed the thirty-link silver bracelet purchased with the third, counterfeit note. I am sure they are not as accomplished as Mr Petch’s delicate work, but they were the correct size and weight, and wrapped in chamois leather, they served to deceive. I had all along anticipated that Bormanstein would attempt some form of double-deal, and thus defeated his last-minute change of heart.

  “I placed them in the humidor upon our arrival.

  “At this point we have the adroit Count von Huntziger – and his rare skill with legerdemain – to thank; he is most accomplished in the deft removal of valuable articles and their invisible substitution with others; I am certain it has served him in the course of his profession; you might have observed he spent an unusually long time in preparing and lighting his cigar!

  “In the process it was, for him, an effortless move to change the substitute plates for the real, re-wrap them in the leather outer and return them to the desk.” He paused, a mischievous smile on his face.

  “However, as I say, I somehow doubt that he will trouble to print any impressions from the plates he snatched. You see, Watson, from the very beginning Bormanstein has been taunting us, he has been parading his true identity at every opportunity, for he is of that arrogant breed that believes his intellect is superior, that he is beyond the reach of the police but more arrogantly still, that he is beyond the
reach of Sherlock Holmes!

  “He is undoubtedly a clever man, he is certainly a very dangerous man, but on this occasion with his effrontery he has quite overreached himself!”

  He turned to his desk and from his printers’ tray, selected a number of the lead type-slugs, which he trickled into my open hand. There were fourteen in all; I arranged them in order – there were three A’s, a single B, E, I and M, two N’s, an O, an R, two S’s and a T.

  I looked up quizzically at my friend. “What am to I do with these Holmes?” He handed me the slips of paper I had seen him printing earlier that morning. “Well, Watson, with those characters you could compose this...

  BARONESS AMANTI “...or this...

  OBANES ST AMARIN “...and this too...

  ASA BORMANSTEIN

  “...oh, and you can even re-order them to spell out his real name...