“It is simply a question of applying one’s mind to the timing of specific events. The heart was delivered to my rooms at 11:45a.m., which suggests to me that the time difference between entering and exiting this room is inconstant. Enter it — and we find ourselves transported twenty-four hours into our future. But exit it — and I am certain that we would find ourselves stepping back not into the dusk of the previous day, but into the morning light. And it is there where the Boulting brothers will be waiting.”
“You mean,” I said, speaking slowly despite the furious haste in which my mind was working, “that we were permitted to enter these premises unmolested because the brothers had already apprehended us earlier that self-same day, when we passed out of this room and back into the room of clocks? And that the aforesaid confrontation occurred despite the fact that several hours were still to elapse before our arrival here?”
“Precisely, Watson!” Holmes confirmed.
“I confess, Holmes, that my mind is reeling from the paradoxical nature of these events,” I told him.
“Then perhaps it is better simply to think in terms of your own journey through them,” said he, “and to view the deeds still to come not as a fait accompli, but as a premonition of a possible future — a future which I fervently believe remains subject to change.”
I endeavoured to grasp this concept — though the correct course of action to prevent Holmes’ gruesome demise from becoming an unalterable part of our already-glimpsed future remained clouded in my mind.
“Surely, Holmes,” I ventured, “simply knowing that the brothers are waiting for us on the other side of that door, affords us ample preparation to confront them?”
“One might imagine so,” Holmes concurred, “and yet a closer examination of the evidence would suggest otherwise.” He knelt beside his own corpse once again, and with barely a flicker of repugnance, carefully turned its head. “Observe, Watson, the bruising beneath the hair here, which I noticed earlier. Now hand me that poker, if you would be so kind.”
I handed Holmes my make-shift weapon, peering at the stripe of livid bruising visible beneath the close-shorn and somewhat thinning hair of the corpse. Carefully Holmes overlaid the bruising with the poker to illustrate that this, or something very like it, was the weapon which had inflicted the wound.
“So what are you suggesting, Holmes?” I asked. “Surely not that I delivered this blow?”
“Certainly not, Watson,” he replied, before adding with a twitch of his lips, “though it would not surprise me to learn that you have been tempted to strike me similarly upon occasion.”
He stood up, and instead of handing me back my weapon he crossed the room and replaced it in the companion set beside the still-glowing fire.
“From what is present here, and also from what is absent, I am able to form a reasonable hypothesis of what would occur were we to exit this room via that door. The fact that my revolver is nowhere to be found, and that your corpse is not lying beside mine, I believe to be significant. Most pertinently, it suggests to me that you are wrong in your assumption that the Boulting brothers are armed with nothing more than blades.”
“Indeed?” said I.
“Oh yes. I have almost no doubt of it. One of the brothers has a revolver, and he would shoot you dead the instant you stepped through that door. Reacting instinctively, I would then aim my own revolver at the fellow, whereupon the second brother, almost certainly in concealment close by, would rush forward, snatch up the poker recently released from your dead fingers, and strike me a hefty blow across the back of the head. This would render me unconscious, causing me to drop my gun. The brothers would then drag me into this room, and thus forward in time, where they would butcher me and cut out my heart, wrapping the bloody organ in a sheet of newspaper. They would then step back into the past, box up the heart and arrange to have it delivered to me in Baker Street. And thus the entire unending cycle would begin all over again.”
I cursed and said, “It is like a fiendishly tight knot, Holmes, one that is constricting around us. Yet even so, I believe the solution is simple. We must exit this room via an alternative route.”
So saying, I crossed to the door at the back of the room and reached out for the handle.
“It will be locked,” Holmes said quietly.
I tried the handle and turned it. But Holmes, whether by deduction or guesswork, was quite correct. The door rattled a little, but refused to open.
“The window, then!” I cried, not to be outdone. However, Holmes crossed the room to intercept me, laying a hand on my arm.
“Beware, Watson,” he said, “for there are traps everywhere. The Boulting brothers may be waiting for us beyond that door, but it is my belief that they are waiting for us outside that window also.”
My first instinct was to ask my friend how this could possibly be, but I was beginning to come to terms with this extraordinary situation by now, and within seconds my own mind had furnished me with the solution.
“You mean that when we do not emerge from this room, the brothers will realise that we have deduced the truth of the matter, and will position themselves outside the window in order to cut off our retreat?”
“Quite so. The brothers who woke up to this world yesterday morning are currently waiting outside that door for the two of us to emerge, whereas the brothers from thirty or more hours later, who have slowly been forced to accept that we are not going to emerge, will be maintaining vigil outside the window. Either way, Watson, we are surrounded, and whichever exit we choose, the outcome will be the same.”
“Well, this is a pretty pickle,” said I. “So what are we to do, Holmes?”
“There is a limit to the patience of these scoundrels, Watson,” Holmes replied, “and it is that which we must turn to our advantage. Eventually the pair outside the window will tire of their vigil, and will risk all on a direct assault. And when they do that, we must be ready for them.”
“How?” I asked.
Holmes outlined his plan and I listened attentively. When all was prepared, we snuffed out the candle and settled down to wait.
All was quiet, and in normal circumstances I might have found my eyes growing heavy-lidded with sleep. However the knowledge that there were two sets of brothers — albeit the same pair repeated twice over — waiting for us outside with murderous intent, not to mention the sobering presence of Holmes’ hideously mutilated corpse, served to sharpen my mind to a keen edge.
When the attack did finally come, as Holmes had predicted it would, it came without warning. The glass of the window shattered into a thousand pieces and a bullet struck the opposite wall with such force that a sizeable hole was created.
I sat tight in my armchair beside the fire, my heart racing in my chest. Now would come the acid test of Holmes’ predictive abilities, and although I trusted my friend implicitly, I confess to say I was in fear for my life as I waited for events to unfold.
Seconds later the Boulting brothers were through the window and inside the room, and I — as Holmes had informed me I must do — rose from my chair to greet them.
First through the window was the butcher, William Boulting, brandishing a cleaver. He was a barrel-chested ox of a man with a full beard of reddish hair. At his shoulder, revolver at the ready, was the clock-maker, Joe, smaller and considerably wirier than his brother, his hair and moustaches prematurely grey.
“Gentlemen!” I cried. “Pray, hold your fire a moment, and think on what you are doing!”
Joe Boulting’s face twisted into a sneer. “We have thought on it, doctor,” he said. “We have done nothing but think on it since our dear brother was so cruelly taken from us.”
“Your brother was a murderer,” said I with all the conviction I could muster, “and as such could expect nothing less than to be punished for his crime. Surely neither of you can dispute the fact?”
“Punishment takes many forms,” growled William Boulting. “When poor Charles killed the girl he was confused, sick
with brain fever. He should have been offered help, not hard labour.”
“He was fortunate he was not sent to the gallows,” I replied tersely. “It was only due to the intervention of Mr. Holmes here, informing the court as to your brother’s much-reduced state of mind, that he was spared that fate. You should therefore be thankful to Mr. Holmes, not plotting his downfall.”
Joe Boulting scowled at Holmes’ silent figure, sitting in shadow on the far side of the fireplace. “Can the man not speak for himself?” he asked.
“Unfortunately my friend has been grievously distressed by these events,” said I. “His heart is not as strong as it was.”
The butcher raised his cleaver meaningfully. “If it pains him so sorely, then perhaps we ought to relieve him of it.”
“Please, gentlemen!” I cried. “I implore you one last time. If you do not alter your intentions, you will surely suffer the same fate as your poor brother. What then will you have achieved, beyond the destruction of all here present?”
Joe Boulting, whom I had already ascertained was the more devious and intelligent of the two, appeared for several moments to consider my words. Then he raised his revolver and pointed it squarely at my heart.
“No, Dr.Watson,” he said. “An end to Mr. Sherlock Holmes is worth any price one might care to pay.”
It was not the first time I had been threatened with a firearm, though it is nevertheless a situation one hardly becomes used to. The instant Joe Boulting declared his final intentions, however, a voice rang out behind him.
“Not another movement, gentlemen, if you please!”
For one terrible moment I thought Holmes had miscalculated, and that Joe Boulting might pull the trigger out of spite, or perhaps sheer startlement. But then the barrel of the revolver swung away from me as he and William began to turn — just in time to see the ‘corpse’ of Sherlock Holmes spring nimbly to its feet.
“I would advise you to drop your weapons, gentlemen,” Holmes said, his own revolver trained steadfastly on the smaller of the two men.
For several seconds the sole movement in the room came from the glimmer of the firelight reflected in Holmes’ avid eyes. Then Joe Boulting released a sigh of defeat and his hand drooped to his side, as if the revolver he was clutching had all at once become too heavy for him to hold … only for him to raise it again swiftly a moment later and point it at Holmes’ heart!
A shot rang out. In my mind’s eye I saw Holmes fall dead to the ground — an instant before Joe Boulting gave a cry and staggered backwards, blood gushing from a bullet wound in his shoulder. I stepped aside as he fell against the fireplace and crashed down on the hearth before it, and then, before his brother could react, I bent and picked up the revolver which Joe had dropped.
Now there was just William, still clutching his cleaver, standing between Holmes and myself. He looked from one to the other of us — or rather, to the two guns which were now trained on him, front and back, his eyes dancing feverishly like those of a cornered sewer rat.
“Drop your weapon, if you please, Mr. Boulting,” said Holmes quietly. “I assure you that Dr.Watson and I mean you and your brother no harm. You have my solemn vow that the instant you comply with my request, the two of us will depart via the window and nothing more will be said of this matter.”
“But Holmes—” I protested.
Holmes held up a hand, but I was not to be silenced.
“Consider the body,” I reminded him.
“I believe we can rely on time itself to dispose of my mortal remains,” said Holmes. “Look behind you, Watson.”
I glanced over my shoulder, and released a gasp. A strange darkness, a cloud of billowing, dense smoke that was nevertheless peculiarly difficult to fully focus the eye upon, was enfolding the corpse on the chair, simultaneously obscuring and reducing it.
“What is happening?” I asked, my voice hoarse with disbelief.
“We have changed history, Watson,” Holmes informed me. “Time is covering our tracks.”
“Imposs—” I began — and at that moment, with a cry of rage, the recumbent Joe Boulting plucked a burning log from the fireplace and hurled it at my friend!
Holmes ducked easily, and the log sailed over his shoulder. However William Boulting, who had still to relinquish his weapon, perceived Holmes’ momentary distraction as an opportunity to attack. With a bellow, he raised his cleaver above his head and flew at my friend. Acting purely upon impulse, I pulled the trigger on Joe Boulting’s revolver three times, and saw three bloody bullet-holes appear in William Boulting’s broad back.
The butcher staggered, and then crashed to the ground at Holmes’ feet. He lay there, heaving and shuddering, his life-blood draining out of him.
“Thank you, Watson,” Holmes said simply.
“A regrettable, but inevitable outcome,” I muttered.
“Indeed,” Holmes said, and turned to observe the not inconsiderable fire which had generated from the burning log, and was now attacking the furnishings of the room closest to the internal door, crackling and leaping from one item to the next.
“It is time to beat a hasty retreat,” he said calmly, and made for the hearth, where Joe Boulting was still lying, clutching his bloodied shoulder and groaning with pain. “Help me carry this one outside, Watson.”
Holmes’ proximity seemed to revive the surviving brother. His eyes opened wide and he screeched, “No! Do not touch me! You have destroyed this family, Sherlock Holmes, and I will not allow you to lay your filthy hands upon me.”
“Oh, hush,” Holmes said dismissively, and bent forward to give aid.
I cried out a warning, but not quickly enough to enable Holmes to prevent Joe Boulting from plunging a hand into the fireplace and closing his grasping fingers around a fistful of red-hot embers. I rushed forward, fully expecting Boulting to dash the embers into Holmes’ face, but to my astonishment and horror, Boulting raised the glowing handful to his own livid face and crammed the embers into his mouth.
Holmes and I both recoiled as the man screamed and thrashed about, his hand and lips blistering hideously. Yet, despite what must have been indescribable agony, I saw Boulting’s throat jerk as he swallowed the embers, thus sealing his fate.
Holmes rose slowly, a sickened look on his face. “There is nothing more we can do here, Watson,” he said. “Let us take our leave of this tragic place.”
As the building burned behind us, destroying the time portal, hopefully for ever, we clambered out of the window and staggered away. Eventually we were able to hail a cab, which took us back to Baker Street. Although we had been absent for what seemed to us only a few hours, we were quickly to discover — via Mrs. Hudson’s disgruntled comment that she would appreciate it if Mr. Holmes were to inform her the next time he intended to miss dinner, breakfast and lunch — that more than a full day had elapsed in the real world!
Of the heart, which had been delivered the previous morning, there was now no sign. As with the corpse in the parlour of Joe Boulting’s clock shop, it appeared that time had found a way of dealing with it.
In fact, Holmes suggested with a wry smile, as we sat smoking earlier this evening, if — as is my habit — it was my intention to record the particulars of this case, then it would almost certainly be wisest to do so sooner rather than later. After all, he further pointed out, if the singular events we had not merely witnessed but been involved in were now becoming erased by time, did it not therefore follow that our memories of the incident would likely follow the same course?
And so here you find me, sitting up into the early hours while Holmes is long abed, committing the details of today’s extraordinary adventure to paper, while they are still fresh in my memory. What a peculiar thing it would be if I were to wake in the morning and regard these notes as a mere fiction. Although if time is to be perfectly thorough, then who will there be to say that I have written these words at all? Might it be more likely that I will enter this room after a good night’s sleep, only to find tha
t these scribbled-upon pages, which I now hold in my hands, are as fresh and unsullied as the new day?
The Hand-Delivered Letter
Simon Kurt Unsworth
Hello, old friend.
Are you surprised to hear from me? Shocked? If you recognised the handwriting on the envelope, did you wonder if this could be some elaborate fake, or had you realised that those turbulent waters had failed to hold me? Have you been awaiting my contact these long years? If I were to wager, I would say not. I have been careful not to show myself, been careful to keep myself hidden so that even the shadows had no knowledge of me, living the half-life of a mole until I was ready to emerge. I have kept myself buried, friend, and I have missed my life in these years. Still, no matter. What matters now is that I am here, renewing our acquaintance.
Have you prepared yourself a pipe? Are you seated? Good. Get comfortable, sir, and let me tell you my tale. It is, after all, the last one you shall ever hear. What’s that I hear you mutter? Typical bravado? No. Not this time. Perhaps, all those years ago before we took our fall, I might have been guilty of that, but no longer. Now, I have little time for anything but the task at hand and I have discovered the value in truth, no matter how harsh. Honesty seems the only way to behave, given the circumstances. Not, of course, that you deserve such treatment, you who lied and dissembled and made yourself seem so infallible. How many times did you allow your amanuensis to write about me? How many? Be honest now! Seven! Seven, in all those tales and despite all those times we crossed paths, despite my dogging your heels as you dogged mine for years. All those pallid fools reading about your adventures, reading about your victories, but what of mine? What of all those times you stood against me and found yourself wanting? Found yourself second best? Gone, excised from our history by your faithful companion, cored out like an apple!
And what of the good doctor? Have you seen him recently? No? Well, we shall return to him presently.
Gaslight Grotesque: Nightmare Tales of Sherlock Holmes Page 24
