The Empress of India

by Michael Kurland

  “Looking for gold bars?”

  “Why, yes, of course.”

  “But if they weren’t removed all at once last night, then there’s no reason to assume that the gold is still in the shape of bars,” Moriarty said. “Gold is gold, no matter how it’s stretched, pummeled, or deformed.”

  “I’m getting all mixed up, the way you’re telling it,” said Lestrade. “I have no doubt that you’re right: When Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty agree on something, there’s no point in arguing about it. But just what is it you’re right about? What happened to the gold, and how did it happen?”

  Holmes and Moriarty looked at each other. Moriarty gave a slight nod, and Holmes took a breath. “Any given detail might be wrong,” he said, “but on the whole, it had to go like this: When Captain Iskansen decided to take the gold, he enlisted the aid of Professor Demartineu and Mamarum Sutrow, who devised the plan. Or perhaps they came to him, it cannot—”

  “Yes, yes,” said Lestrade. “One came to the other. And then?” Holmes shrugged. “Iskansen supplied the key, Demartineu and Sutrow painted the false front, and the gold was removed.”

  “How?” asked the director of the Bank of England.

  “In the evening, when Captain Iskansen came to close the vault door, there was always a small group of people with him,” said Sherlock Holmes. “One of them presumably stayed behind in the vault overnight, and left with the group who opened the door the next morning.”

  “Like Mamarum the Great’s trick with Lady Priscilla,” Margaret suggested.

  “Much like that, yes,” Holmes agreed.

  “But the room was completely empty when they opened the door this morning,” Margaret said. “What happened to the trompe-l’oeil structure?”

  “The guards reported hearing a strange whooshing noise in the night,” Moriarty said. “Magicians use a material called flash paper that disappears in a whoosh of flame if a lit cigarette end is applied to it. The paper is put in an aqueous solution of nitric acid and then dried. It’s how they make those wonderful flashes when something appears or disappears.”

  “The false front was made of flash paper?”

  “Perhaps of something with a bit more structural integrity. Let us call it flash-cotton. And a short fuse was left burning so the structure would vanish with a flash in the middle of the night.”

  “And the gold?” asked Bergarot with single-minded interest. “What of the gold?”

  Holmes looked at Moriarty for help. His ratiocination had not taken him that far yet.

  “Melted down,” said Moriarty. “A small carbon arc furnace powered from the electrical circuit.”

  “And how can you possibly know that?” asked Lestrade.

  “It would explain the dimming of the lights,” explained Moriarty.

  “Melted into what shape?” pursued Bergarot.

  “Square, I believe,” Moriarty told him.

  “Square?”

  Moriarty nodded. “Sheets a little less than one foot square, and perhaps a quarter to a half inch thick.”

  Margaret gave a slight gasp. “The floor!” she said.

  “You are a very quick young lady,” Moriarty said approvingly.

  “What floor?” asked Bergarot.

  “The ballroom floor has been redone this trip,” Margaret told him.

  “In solid gold, is my guess,” said Moriarty, “with a surface of oak.”

  “The workmen would have to know,” Bergarot objected. “It would have to be a fairly large conspiracy.”

  “There’s a lot of gold,” said Moriarty.

  They headed out to the ballroom as a group and Moriarty made the experiment, prying up one of the parquet squares. “Suspiciously heavy,” he said. He turned it over.

  “I’ll be damned!” said Bergarot.

  “I’ll get Captain Iskansen,” Lestrade said, clapping his bowler firmly on his head. “And those two magicians!”

  “I doubt it,” said Moriarty. “They’re long gone, I fancy.”

  Holmes stood up. “Well, you have your gold,” he said to Director Bergarot. “I think I’ll go home now.”

  THIRTY

  THE RETURN

  Home is the sailor, home from the sea,

  And the hunter home from the hill.

  —Robert Louis Stevenson

  FROM THE UNPUBLISHED JOURNAL OF JOHN H. WATSON, M.D.

  Sherlock Holmes has returned!

  Sherlock Holmes is the most exasperating man on the face of the earth.

  I visited 221B yesterday, planning to look through some old case-books to refresh my memory concerning one of Holmes’s early cases—involving the king of a small East European country and a tin of poisoned sardines—and there was a light on in the study window. I dashed upstairs, not knowing what to expect, and there he was—sitting in his confounded armchair in his wretched old red dressing gown, smoking his blasted pipe, with the latest copy of The Strand Magazine turned down on the table next to him, gazing out the window. He did have the courtesy to look up as I entered the room.

  “Watson, old man,” he said. “I knew it was you by the sound of your boots on the stairs. It’s good to see you again!”

  My knees sagged, and I clutched the door frame for support. I’m sure I came as close to fainting as I have ever done. “Holmes,” I gasped, “is it really you?”

  He laughed. “Yes, my dear friend, no false identity, no disguise. It is me in the all-too-mortal flesh.”

  “Dear friend?” I expostulated. “Dear friend? And you don’t even have the courtesy—the kindness—to tell me you’ve returned?” I staggered over to a chair and sat down heavily.

  Holmes jumped up, concern in his eyes, and crossed over to me. “Watson, I am so sorry,” he said. “I did not realize the effect this might have on you. Here,” he continued, turning to the highboard where reposed the tantalus and gasogene. “Let me fix you a brandy and soda. You’ll feel much better after a brandy and soda.”

  He poured brandy and squirted soda water into two glasses and handed me one. “As to where I’ve been,” he said, returning to his seat, “I’m afraid that is one adventure that will have to remain untold. As to what I’ve done, I can say that I’ve eliminated one of the world’s greatest villains.”

  “Professor Moriarty,” I gasped. “You finally succeeded in—”

  “No, no.” Holmes shook his head ruefully. “I’m afraid Professor Moriarty is still with us.”

  “Then who?”

  “A man calling himself Dr. Pin Dok Low. Perhaps he was Chinese, perhaps not. He believed himself to be evil incarnate, and tried hard to make it so. I can honestly say that he will never be seen in this world again.”

  “Ah,” I said. “Then some good has come out of your absence.”

  “Yes,” he said, sighing. “Some good.”

  THIRTY-ONE

  THE OLD LADY OF

  THREADNEEDLE STREET

  It is a flaw

  In happiness, to see beyond our bourn,—

  It forces us in summer skies to mourn,

  It spoils the singing of the nightingale.

  —John Keats

  The ancient, well-marinated, oak-paneled office of the Honorable Eustace Bergarot, up on the third floor of the Bank of England, had just witnessed a rare ceremony: the Bank passing out money. The hoard of gold had been transferred to the vaults, and the directors had decided that, considering all the circumstances, it might be proper to reward some of those involved in preserving it.

  “Riches beyond the dreams of avarice,” Peter Collins said as he and Margaret left the room after the event. “Two hundred pounds.”

  “Truthfully, I did not expect any reward,” Margaret told him.

  “Nor did I,” Peter agreed. “The Old Lady of Threadneedle Street is not known for her munificence. I shall practice no more equine dentistry.” He put his hand on Margaret’s arm, and she paused and turned to him. “I have an idea,” he said lightly. “What do you say we combine our fortunes?”<
br />
  “Really? And just how do you propose we do that?” she asked.

  “Well, I thought, you know, ah—” He paused to gather his courage. “If you were to see your way clear to marry me, don’t you know, then we could, you know, that is . . .” His voice faded out.

  “Are you proposing to me?” Margaret asked, surprised to note that her own voice was quavering slightly.

  “I thought that’s what I was doing,” Peter told her. “But if you object or, you know, would rather not, why then I might very well have been speaking about something else. Fox hunting, perhaps. Although I must say I’ve never been overly fond of fox hunting; always seemed to see it from the fox’s point of view, don’t you know.”

  “You’re burbling,” Margaret said.

  “Well, d-dash it, will you marry me or not?”

  “For two hundred pounds?”

  “Well, you know, if we put our rewards together, it would be four hundred.”

  “So we’re to live on four hundred pounds and your income from the Indian police? Will we have to move back to India?”

  “Well, no,” Peter told her. “I’ve resigned my post. I think I’m going to be working for the Foreign Office, but I can’t say just when I’ll start, or what it will pay.”

  “Ah!” Margaret said. “Then are we to live on four hundred pounds?”

  “I rather thought we’d use it for our honeymoon,” Peter told her.

  Margaret sighed very deeply. “You’re not a very practical man,” she said. “I think I’ll have to keep the accounts when we’re married.”

  Peter broke into a wide smile. “You will? Marry me, I mean.”

  “I suppose I’d better,” she said. “I’ll have a little money to—”

  “Margaret, my dear,” Peter interrupted, looking shocked. “You don’t think I’d live off my wife’s money, do you?”

  “Men!” Margaret muttered.

  “My father would never approve,” he told her. “As I have an income of my own of twenty thousand a year, he would think it most unseemly were I to touch a penny of yours.”

  Margaret felt her eyebrows go up. “Twenty—”

  “That’s all, I’m afraid,” Peter said. “My older brother George Linley Thomas, Viscount Hagsboke, will come into most of the estate. We can stay at the hall if you like, I have a suite of rooms, but I rather think we’ll take a flat in town, don’t you?”

  Margaret looked at him sternly. “This isn’t more of your foolishness, is it?”

  Peter shook his head. “No, I’m afraid it’s mostly my great, great, great grandfather’s foolishness. He was an admiral under Pellew. King George made him an earl, and he married an heiress. His descendants have enlarged the holdings, but it isn’t really hard when you start with a large enough bundle.”

  Margaret stared at him for a long moment, and he looked embarrassed. “That doesn’t bother you, does it? I mean, it doesn’t make any difference, my having money?”

  She shook her head. “I told my father I’d marry you rich or poor, and I guess I meant it.”

  “Oh, good,” he said.

  It was ten o’clock of a cool September morning when Mr. Maws, with the measured, stately tread of the true aristocratic gentleman’s gentleman which he’d been practicing until it almost looked natural on his oversized frame, entered Professor Moriarty’s study, a silver tray held up by the tips of the outstretched fingers of his left hand. “He’s back,” he said, lowering the tray so Moriarty could remove the calling card.

  Moriarty took the card, looked at it, and snapped it between his fingers. “So he is,” he said. “Show him in.”

  “That I will, sir,” Mr. Maws said. “But don’t you go haring off to India or noplace again. You get yourself into enough trouble right here in England to last a righteous man a lifetime or two.”

  “I appreciate your concern,” Moriarty said. “But I fear no evil as long as I have your good right arm to protect me.”

  “But where was I when you was in mortal danger on that boat, I ask you? I can’t do you much good if I’m butling in this here big house whilst you’re off on a boat getting shot at, now, can I?” Mr. Maws flexed his broad shoulders. “I would have done them a bit of good if I’d been there, I tell you.”

  “And I missed you sorely,” Moriarty told him. “Show Colonel Moran in, and then finish packing for our trip to the Moor. I want to try that new clockwork mechanism in the ten-inch refractor.”

  Mr. Maws nodded, and retreated. A minute later he ushered Colonel Moran into the room, sniffed, and left.

  Moriarty waved Moran to a seat by his desk. “Back so soon?” he asked. “I didn’t expect you for a couple of months yet.”

  “Little Pook wanted me to stay around a bit longer,” Moran said. “He certainly did. But I had a hankering for Paris, so I left as soon as it wasn’t downright insulting for me to get out. I plan to get me a suite at the Plaza and stay in Paris until I tire of it. And no man of my acquaintance has ever been known to tire of Paris. Any man who’s tired of Paris is tired of life.”

  “If your interests are centered around gaming and the, ah, fair sex,” Moriarty agreed, “that’s certainly true.”

  “And the food,” said the colonel. “Don’t overlook the food. They don’t know how to eat here in England. They chew, and they swallow, but they don’t eat.”

  Moriarty laughed. “The cuisine won’t go through your money quite as quickly,” he said, “but I understand that enough rich food can ruin your liver.”

  “Perhaps, but what has my liver ever done for me?”

  “And gaming and women can ruin both you and your digestion, leaving you unable to enjoy any of the three.”

  Moran raised an eyebrow. “My dear professor,” he said. “Let me see if I understand this. You’re warning me about indulging in these three most pleasurable vices because, if I do, eventually I won’t be able to indulge in them any longer?”

  Moriarty laughed again. “I guess that was one way to interpret what I was saying,” he said. “Just ignore me and live your life as you please.”

  “Oh, I do—I will,” Moran replied. “But in the meantime, I have something for you.” He reached into his inner jacket pocket and tossed a large envelope across the desk to Moriarty.

  The professor opened the envelope and withdrew a stack of Bank of England currency.

  “Thousand-pound notes,” Moran said, carefully picking just the right cigar from his silver case and rolling it between his palms. “There’s twenty of them.”

  “Indeed?” asked Moriarty. “So the maharaja came through.”

  “Like a proper British gentleman,” Moran said.

  “I gathered that from your Parisian plans,” Moriarty said, sliding a glass ashtray across the desk to Moran. “But it’s nice to know I’m right.”

  “He said to me, ‘I trust you kept your part of the bargain, and the Lady of Lamapoor was obtained without violence.’ ” Moran lit his cigar and puffed on it with a pleased expression on his face. “I told him as how she was surrounded by violence at the time, but it was not of our doing and we rescued her from it. He said as how he trusted me and would not ask for further details.”

  “It must be nice to be so trusted,” Moriarty observed.

  “Damn it to hell,” said Moran. “If I’d known he wasn’t going to check up on me, I would have just busted a few heads open to get the blasted Lady and not bothered telling him about it.”

  “You’d lie? Colonel, I am astounded!” Moriarty said.

  “Yes, you are,” said Moran.

  “I, in turn, have something for you,” Moriarty said. He opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out an engraved, embossed, sealed, and countersigned document. “It’s an order on the Bank of England for five hundred pounds,” he said, tossing it across the desk. “A reward for aiding in the safeguarding of their gold. How the directors arrived at the figure, I do not know. They weren’t quite as munificent as Little Pook, but it will suffice.”

  “In
deed,” Moran agreed. “And a like amount for you?”

  “Twice that for me,” said Moriarty.

  Colonel Moran nodded. “That’s a like amount,” he agreed. “After all, you might say you saved the gold twice. Although, to tell you the truth, it did surprise me that you told the tale. Why not let Iskansen get away with his little scheme? It was no skin off our nose.”

  “It would have been,” said Moriarty. “They were going to examine the statuettes.”

  “Ah!” said Moran. He tapped the ash from his cigar into the tray. “Did they ever find Iskansen?”

  “He and the magicians have thoroughly disappeared. And not quite all the gold was recovered, so their larcenous striving was not entirely in vain.”

  “A well-planned endeavor deserves to be rewarded, I say,” said Colonel Sebastian Moran. “And we’ve done quite well out of it ourselves.”

  “The directors were actually in quite a giving mood, all things considered,” Moriarty said. “Holmes got a bonus on top of whatever he had been supposed to get for safeguarding the gold. Which, I suppose, in a backhanded way, he was doing even as Pin Dok Low. They awarded varying amounts to such of the Duke of Moncreith’s Own Highland Lancers as were involved in the engagement, along with a stipend for the widows of the men who were killed. They even saw fit to include the Artful Codger and Cooley the Pup in their largesse; as well as a few hundred for Peter Collins,” Moriarty said, “who will presumably be combining it with a similar amount given to the plucky Miss St. Yves. Collins and St. Yves are to be wed, I understand.”

  “A wonderful institution,” Moran said, standing up and stubbing his cigar out on the large glass tray. “For those as are fond of institutions. I wish them both the pleasure of it.”

  “Indeed,” said Professor James Moriarty.

  “I’ll be leaving for Paris almost immediately,” Moran told him. “I can be reached through Cook’s. If anything, ah, interesting crops up that’s in my line, let me know.”

  “I shall,” said Moriarty. “If you don’t mind being dragged away from the City of Earthly Delights.”