‘She was sleeping when I left her.’
There was a knock at the parlour door and Betsey came in with two photographs.
‘What’s this then?’ asked Lestrade.
‘I’ll go and see if Charlotte’s awake, and fit enough to see the pictures. Betsey, fetch the tray with the footprints on it,’ Mary said, and ran upstairs.
‘Photographs? Tray with footprints?’ mused Lestrade aloud.
Charlotte was indeed awake and a little brighter. Her temperature was lower and, hearing that the Green Dragon was being watched by Lestrade’s men, she said, ‘I believe Alexander is still alive, and I believe we’re on his trail. Let me see the photographs. Fetch my magnifying glass.’
This was done. The photographs showed the impression of the footprints in the flower bed, and the bottom of the ladder which had been put up to Alexander’s window.
Charlotte then studied the plaster of Paris footprints on the tray brought to her in the bedroom.
‘So,’ Charlotte said, ‘we have Lord Thursby’s body in the Houses of Parliament, a piece of opium in his pocket. Funny thing that, wouldn’t you say, Jules? And then a kidnapping and the impression of a Chinese shoe in the earth under the bedroom window. This is not dissimilar from the damp footprint I saw on the floor in the House of Commons after the murder. We know there was a dispute between Lee and Thursby over a matter of trade. And Sherlock, who went to find Lee, is missing. There are some odd connections here, Jules.’
‘I had the impression your brother knew Lee,’ Lestrade told her. ‘He was shocked when I said his name.’
‘Lee’, Charlotte told him, ‘is an importer of opium. No doubt he supplies the opium dens of Limehouse as part of his trade. He probably has somewhere a factory converting the substance to morphine. He is, I have to say, the supplier of my brother with morphine.’
Lestrade drew a deep breath. ‘I see,’ he said. ‘These Chinese are devils.’
‘You can hardly blame the Chinese for peddling opium,’ Charlotte said. ‘It was we who went to war with them to insist they use it.’
‘Politics isn’t my strong suit,’ Lestrade said. ‘All I know is every time we shut down one of these opium dens another one opens up.’
‘There’s no law against them, surely.’
‘No. No – but I’d dearly like to see one,’ Lestrade said. ‘My best course is to get men to Limehouse straight away and start asking questions among the Chinese.’
After he had left Betsey said, ‘I don’t like this. Policemen blundering about making enquiries might make things worse. These Chinese all know each other. They’ll clam up when the Inspector starts asking questions. Then one of them will warn Lee.’
Suddenly Mary was putting on her straw hat. ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘You’re from the East End. Will you come with me, Betsey, and help me?’
‘No, Mary,’ said Charlotte. ‘It’s too dangerous. You are expecting a child – ’
‘You can’t stop me,’ Mary told her. And Charlotte realised she could not.
‘Then I’ll come,’ declared Charlotte with a determination equalling Mary’s. ‘I feel better. I’ll sit in the carriage while you make enquiries in these insalubrious places. There’s safety in numbers even if one of the number is not very able.’
‘Charlotte – no!’ exclaimed Mary.
‘Alexander is my son,’ she said. ‘Do you think I will make a very good job of recovery as I lie here at home, knowing you are going to these dangerous places? We’re at a disadvantage, though. We do not know quite where to go.’
Betsey said, ‘In my opinion, neither of you should be involved at all. But I see there’s no stopping you. So we might as well find my brothers, Len and Thomas. They know some of the Chinese boys from Limehouse. They’re not meant to mingle with the Chinese, nor are the Chinese boys meant to fraternise with our lads, for the Chinese are very clannish. But I know they go gambling together. Len and Thomas go to play their gambling games down in Lime-house, though Ma would have a fit if she knew. Then the Chinks come up our way and play cards. Mum keeps telling the boys they’ll get killed down in Limehouse but nothing can stop them. They’ll have as good a notion about where to go and who to talk to as any of Lestrade’s policemen. Probably better.’
Before they left Mary sent a message to her servant, requesting her to come and help in Charlotte’s household. She also asked her to bring with her, without the knowledge of anyone else, a certain item from Battersea. Then Betsey and Mary wrapped Charlotte in a blanket and put her in a cab. Leaning back in her seat, Charlotte, though weak, said with satisfaction, ‘Good. This way we can get ahead of Lestrade’s men and perhaps avoid alarming Lee.’
In Upper Thames Street they turned left into Whitechapel and stopped outside a small house in a narrow, dirty street.
‘How the poor live, eh?’ said Betsey. ‘Not much, but it’s home. Let’s hope Len or Thomas is in. It depends how much work they’ve got at the foundry.’ She ran into the house, and out again soon after.
‘Whitechapel Road,’ she told the driver. To Mary and Charlotte she explained, ‘They were on half-time at the bell foundry before, but orders have picked up. We’ll find them there.’
At a large building in Whitechapel Road she put her hands over her ears and ran in to the clamour, coming out later with two short, lightly built young men, both very like her. A stocky man in a bowler hat with a black beard followed them. Betsy put her head in the cab window. ‘This is Mr Jameson, the foreman,’ she said. ‘Can you explain we need Len and Thomas badly?’
‘Can you spare them?’ Mary asked, leaning out. ‘We will gladly pay their wages for the day if you release them now. It’s to help the police,’ she added.
This did not reassure the bearded man, who looked suspicious and glanced warily at his two workers, making it plain he thought the only help either would ever give to the police would be his own confession to a crime.
‘Please, Mr Jameson,’ cried Betsey. ‘It’s only the once.’
Finally, he grudgingly agreed and Len and Thomas squeezed into the carriage, making themselves as small as possible, out of politeness.
‘You’ve got to get us to Limehouse, where the Chink opium shops are,’ Betsey said.
‘What?’ said one.
‘This lady’s baby’s been taken. They think it’s probably a Chinaman, called John Lee.’
Both young faces expressed alarm. ‘You don’t want to go messing about with John Lee,’ Len said. ‘He owns half Limehouse – he’s clever, and he’s got a lot of men behind him. Even the police are wary of Lee.’
There was a silence in the motionless carriage. ‘It’s just not safe,’ said the other brother Thomas. ‘If your boy’s gone, madam, I’m very sorry, but if Len and me start nosing about in John Lee’s business it could be very bad for us. And as for you ladies, and Betsey – ’
Len interrupted. ‘We’re off work now, Thomas. Let’s go and see Harold Chung.’
Thomas nodded. ‘Can’t do any harm.’
Mary and Charlotte exchanged glances. Charlotte, Mary saw, was very pale. ‘Tell the driver to go there,’ she said. They went through the crowded, poverty-stricken streets and as they drove Len explained, ‘Lee’s a very rich man but his great enemy is a fellow called Chung. Don’t ask me what it’s all about but the Lees and the Chungs have been enemies for generations. They come from the same place in China and it all goes back hundreds of years. Lees and Chungs – dog and cat – that’s it. The police don’t understand. All they see is a load of Chinese cutting each other up down by the waterfront. But me and Thomas have known Harry Chung since we were boys, and maybe he can help – or his father. Old Chung’d do anything to damage John Lee, if he thought he could get away with it.’
The carriage drew up in a narrow street not far from the river. Thomas and Len disappeared inside a house converted into a shop. There were stalls outside selling strange vegetables and unfamiliar china and pots and pans. Meanwhile, on the pavement, a crowd of
Chinese men, women and children had collected, to stare at the carriage. The men had their hair in pigtails, the women in knots on their heads. Betsey said, ‘I don’t like the looks of this. They carry knives, you know.’
An elderly Chinese man then came from the shop, with Len and Thomas, who introduced him as Mr Chung. Polite greetings were exchanged. Then Mr Chung and Len and Thomas went back in the shop again. The crowd, in the meanwhile, had dispersed.
‘What is going on?’ wondered Mary. ‘Have you any idea what’s happening, Charlotte?’
Charlotte, looking extremely ill, just shook her head.
‘I think we should give this up and go home,’ Mary said. ‘You are really too ill to be out. And let’s be frank, we don’t know why we’re here or – ’ But now Len and Thomas emerged from the shop, without Mr Chung this time, and got back into the carriage.
‘What’s the verdict?’ asked Betsey.
‘Chung doesn’t give much away,’ said Len. ‘I talked to him. He said John Lee was mixed up in something too big for him. He seemed pleased about it, but wouldn’t give details, even if he had them. But Thomas had a quiet word with his son Harry – what did he say, Thomas?’
‘Grimshaw’s Wharf,’ Thomas said promptly. ‘Lee’s warehouse is down there. And there’s been some unusual traffic in and out. The Chung family keeps an eye on it when they can. Mr Chung says to tell the police to raid it. That’s an unusual thing for a Chinese to say. They don’t trust the police. Even when they’re feuding they prefer to keep them out of their business.’
Len said, ‘I reckon he’s nearly sure there’s something there that will finish John Lee if it’s discovered.’
Charlotte opened her eyes. ‘If my son is there, what will happen to him if there’s a police raid? He might be killed.’
‘I don’t know what to do,’ Mary said.
As the driver of their carriage turned to ask where to go next, the shining head of a small Chinese girl on tiptoe appeared in the carriage window.
‘Miss Holmes?’ she pronounced clearly.
‘Yes – what do you want?’ asked Charlotte.
‘Please follow me,’ said the girl.
‘Why?’
‘Message from your brother, so please follow,’ commanded the girl. She began to run along the pavement, the carriage following.
‘Sherlock?’ said Charlotte. ‘What is this all about?’
Mary took her pulse, shook her head. ‘Whatever it is, you must go home soon.’
They went through narrow streets then into a wider one, then stopped outside a church surrounded by a large graveyard.
‘Here,’ said the little girl, and disappeared.
Charlotte got out of the carriage and stood on the pavement, leaning on Mary. An unshaven, poorly dressed, but very familiar figure came through the tombstones and out into the street.
‘Charlotte,’ Sherlock said, ‘I heard you were ill. I have had to go to ground. Disguise and disappearance seemed my only choice until I had worked out a problem. I have been living in a poor lodging house, hiding from John Lee.’
‘Alexander has been taken,’ Charlotte burst out.
‘Taken by Lee,’ he agreed. ‘That is the problem. I know how and why Lee killed Thursby. He knows I could get him tried and hanged. Now he has my nephew as a hostage and will kill him if I speak.’
‘Then – do not speak,’ said Charlotte. ‘Who cares who killed Thursby? The world is better off without him.’
‘I was tempted to think that,’ Sherlock answered. ‘But I cannot trust Lee’s word. He might anyway kill your child, Charlotte, then make his escape. I have been here for days now, evading Lee’s spies, trying to form a plan for getting Alexander back safely. But now,’ he said, almost cheerful, ‘the die is cast. Lee will know by now you’re here and will understand that to mean others are on his trail – we must do something immediately.’ As he spoke he scribbled something on paper. ‘Betsey – you go to Scotland Yard with this note. Get Lestrade to Grimshaw’s Wharf as soon as you can. Only Lestrade, mind. I trust no one else. Meanwhile, we’ll go to the wharf now and face out Lee. There’s no other choice.’
They had to leave the carriage at the end of a dark alley. They walked between rows of dark, soot-blackened warehouses, Charlotte supported by Sherlock on one side and Len on the other, while Thomas lent Mary his arm.
Before they got out of the carriage Sherlock had attempted to dismiss all of them. ‘You’re ill, Charlotte. Mary, this is no place for you. Len and Thomas – this is not your fight.’ But no one had wanted to retreat. Mary’d said, ‘We may not make up much of an army, but there are five of us, and a little boy probably lying terrified in one of these dark buildings.’
As they went up the cobbled alley the sky overhead seemed to grow darker. Although there were thumps and thuds from the wharves beyond the buildings, there seemed, where they were, to be no life at all.
‘We must be cautious,’ Sherlock muttered, with an anxious air. ‘These warehouses go straight out on to the river – we must be careful Lee does not escape by boat.’ Then he stopped and banged four times at a small door set in blackened brickwork. A trapdoor opened. He put his face towards it and said some words in Chinese. The trapdoor closed. Moments later, the door opened. An old woman stood there. ‘Come in,’ she said in English. ‘Mr Lee is waiting for you.’
They went down a short corridor and through a dark and dirty room. All around on bunks in alcoves or on mattresses on the bare floor lay the opium smokers, Chinese and European. One was a European woman in a soiled white silk dress, lying on the floor, face up to the ceiling, the opium pipe beside her white hand on the grimy floor. At a table lit by one candle an old Chinese woman was stuffing the opium pipes. Someone coughed. A door at the end of this room opened into a windowless dusty office and there behind an empty desk stood a handsome Chinese in a dark suit and a very white shirt. There was a leather suitcase beside the desk.
‘John Lee,’ said Sherlock, advancing with Charlotte into the room, ‘I am here to ask for the boy. The police are almost here. It will be better to give him up. I give you my word I will say nothing to anyone, ever, of Thursby’s death.’
‘Mr Lee, I implore you – he is my only son. He means nothing to you now,’ Charlotte pleaded.
‘My boat is ready on the river outside,’ Lee said. ‘I shall be taking the boy with me. If you inform the police, if they follow me, I will kill him.’
Then Charlotte gave a cry, and fainted into her brother’s arms.
Mary Watson took a step towards Lee. ‘Mr Lee, you are a very cruel man,’ she declared angrily. ‘Will you give that boy back?’
‘Ladies should stay at home,’ Lee said implacably.
‘Not when you gentlemen kidnap our children,’ said Mary. Charlotte meanwhile moaned, reviving slightly. Her eyes met Lee’s in fear.
It was then that Mary produced from her handbag Dr Watson’s revolver, the item she had asked her maid to bring over from Battersea – and shot Lee through the breast. The sound reverberated round the dusty room. The door was flung open and the old woman stood there, a long knife in her hand. ‘Get back!’ cried Mary, now pointing Dr Watson’s revolver at the woman.
‘My God!’ said Sherlock. ‘Mary – what have you done?’
Dazed, Charlotte murmured. ‘The female of the species …’
‘You’d better take us to the ship,’ Mary told the old woman. ‘We intend to get the boy back.’ She waved the gun at the woman.
Sherlock, still supporting Charlotte, flinched. Len and Thomas pressed themselves against a wall. Without a word the old woman opened a further door, leading into a vast, raftered room packed with bales. She almost ran across, Mary behind her, the others following, then unbolted and flung open a huge door. There in front of them was the wharf, and beyond that the wide expanse of the Thames. Moored against the dock was a small, trim craft. Two sailors stood on deck. Mary stepped on to the gangplank, still holding the gun and said, ‘Where’s the boy?’
Defiant looks vanished as the hooting of approaching boats began. ‘River Police,’ said one of the men, as two steam craft belonging to the River Police chugged towards them. Both sailors charged down the gangplank and on to the wharf to make their escape. Mary, Charlotte and Sherlock ran on deck, down a small ladder and, throwing open a cabin door, found Alexander sitting at a table with a Chinese woman. He flung himself into Charlotte’s arms.
Much later that night, in Chelsea, with Alexander tucked up safely in bed and Charlotte comfortably on the sofa beside Prince Rudolph, Sherlock and Dr Watson smoked their pipes by the open window. Mary sat quietly in her chair sewing.
John said, ‘Lestrade is managing matters so that John Lee’s death will be attributed to a policeman, who, it will be said, was obliged to shoot him for resisting arrest. He feels it would be better, and so do I.’
‘I’m sure that’s more suitable,’ murmured Charlotte.
‘I would much prefer it,’ Mary said, looking up from her sewing. ‘It was a terrible thing to do, but I could see no alternative.’
‘I am surprised you could shoot so straight, my dear,’ said John.
‘A complete fluke, I assure you,’ Mary told him. ‘It is surprising what one can do in an emergency. I shall never pull a trigger again – unless,’ she added grimly, ‘that awful parrot drives me mad.’
‘It’s a mercy Lee won’t have to be brought to trial,’ said Sherlock. ‘It’s as good as certain he killed Thursby for cheating him over a consignment of opium, but it might have been hard to prove in court. Charlotte found the wet prints of a Chinese shoe on the carpet by the Speaker’s chair, indicating that Lee had killed Thursby in Limehouse, then brought him to the House of Commons by boat. But dried-up footprints on a carpet hardly constitute evidence. Nor does a piece of opium in a pocket.’
‘Why should Lee kill Thursby for a commercial fraud, when he could have taken him to court in an ordinary way? And, having done so, why prop him up in the Speaker’s chair?’ asked John.
The Strange Adventures of Charlotte Holmes Page 26
