The Baker Street Boys - The Case of the Ranjipur Ruby

by Anthony Read

  Wiggins and Beaver looked at each other apprehensively.

  “That wouldn’t be the Raja of Ranjipur, would it?” Wiggins asked.

  “Good heavens, how do you know that?” asked Dr Watson, greatly surprised.

  “Well, that’s sort of why we’re here. That and the Thugs and Professor Moriarty.”

  “Moriarty! How on earth is he involved?”

  “Well,” said Wiggins, “it’s like this…” And he proceeded to tell the doctor all that had happened. Dr Watson listened with great interest. When Wiggins had finished, he scratched his head and sat thinking hard.

  “I wish Mr Holmes were here,” he said. “I’m sure he’d be able to make something of it, but I’m blessed if I can.”

  “Was you ever in India?” Wiggins asked.

  “Indeed I was. I have a couple of bullet scars to remind me of it. I served as an army surgeon in the Afghan war.”

  “And d’you know anything ’bout the Thugs?”

  “I’ve heard of them, of course. Who hasn’t? But all that was over and done with years ago.”

  He got up, crossed to the other side of the room, selected a large book from the shelves on the wall and began thumbing through it.

  “Ah, yes, here we are,” he said, and began reading aloud. “The Thugs were a well-organized secret society of professional assassins who travelled in various disguises throughout India. They were suppressed by the government in 1840 thanks to the efforts of a British official, William Sleeman … hmm, hmm … strangled their victim by throwing a handkerchief or noose around his neck … plundered then buried him … all done according to ancient religious rituals including the sacrifice of sugar to their goddess, Kali…”

  Wiggins dipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out the blue paper bag. “Look what I found in the alleyway!” he said.

  Dr Watson took the bag, opened it and nodded solemnly.

  “Sugar! If these fellows aren’t Thugs,” he said, “they’re giving a jolly good imitation. I’d say your friend Ravi is in grave danger.”

  THE BIGGEST BADMASH IN LONDON

  Inspector Lestrade regarded the paper bag with great suspicion. He sniffed at its contents, then licked one forefinger, dipped it into the bag and dabbed it carefully on his tongue.

  “Sugar,” he pronounced.

  “Exac’ly,” Wiggins agreed.

  “Common-or-garden sugar,” the inspector went on, leaning back in his office chair. “Nothing illegal in a bag of sugar. I’ve got several in my pantry at home.”

  “But yours ain’t a sacrifice to the goddess Kali, is it?”

  “No, it’s to sweeten my tea, and put on my porridge and in Mrs Lestrade’s puddings and pastries. That’s what sugar’s for.”

  “Not if you’re a Thug and you’re gonna murder somebody in the name of Kali,” Wiggins said.

  Beaver and Queenie, who had accompanied Wiggins and Dr Watson to Scotland Yard, nodded vigorously. Inspector Lestrade looked puzzled.

  “We’ve got plenty of thugs in London,” he said. “I lock some of them up every day. But they don’t go around with bags of sugar in their pockets – not unless they’ve stolen them.”

  “These ain’t that sort of thug,” Queenie said. “These are Indian Thugs.”

  “What is she on about?” Lestrade asked, irritated.

  “Thugs in India are, or were, ritual murderers. They were followers of a secret cult called Thuggee,” Dr Watson explained. “That’s where our word for a ruffian comes from.”

  “Does it, indeed? And you’re trying to tell me they’re starting up over here?”

  “Not exac’ly, no,” said Wiggins.

  “So what ‘exactly’ are you trying to tell me?”

  “That somebody’s trying to murder Ravi, and steal the Ranjipur Ruby.”

  “Who is?”

  “Professor Moriarty.”

  Lestrade let out a long sigh.

  “Oh, no,” he groaned. “Not him again. How do you know?”

  “We saw his carriage, in the Baker Street Bazaar,” said Beaver.

  “And?” Lestrade looked at him expectantly. “What was the phantom professor doing this time?”

  “Er … nothin’.”

  “He wasn’t there,” Queenie said.

  Lestrade sighed again. “He never is.”

  “No, but his carriage was,” said Wiggins.

  “Nothing illegal about parking a carriage in the Bazaar,” Lestrade said wearily.

  “But he’s up to something,” Wiggins said. “He’s gotta be. I know he is.”

  Lestrade got to his feet.

  “You don’t know, lad. You only think you do. Haven’t you learned anything from Mr Holmes? Now get off out of here and stop wasting my time.”

  “I say, steady on, Inspector,” Dr Watson intervened. “The Boys are only doing their duty as good citizens and reporting suspicious circumstances.”

  “Thank you, Doctor. But I’m a very busy man with lots of crimes to investigate. And all they’ve brought me is a bag of sugar, an empty carriage going nowhere, and some tale about an Indian lad being set upon in the street by two roughs – who were probably trying to rob him but got away with nothing, so no harm done.”

  “Well, if you put it like that, Inspector…”

  “I do. Now if you don’t mind, I have work to do. Good day to you.”

  The Boys were upset that Inspector Lestrade would not take them seriously. As they left Scotland Yard, Wiggins kicked the door frame in a temper.

  “Why won’t he listen to us?” he demanded.

  “He thinks we’re makin’ it all up!” said Queenie. “Ain’t that right, Doctor?”

  “Perhaps he does,” Dr Watson replied. “After all, we didn’t present him with any real evidence, did we?”

  “You don’t think that, do you, Doctor?” Wiggins asked.

  “No, no, of course not,” the doctor replied quickly. But he didn’t sound very convinced.

  “Tell you what,” Wiggins said. “Why don’t you come with us and we’ll show you Moriarty’s carriage?”

  The doctor hailed a cab and they all piled in for the journey back to Baker Street. As it stopped outside the Bazaar, Sarge hurried to open the door. He stepped back in amazement as Wiggins climbed out, followed by Queenie and Beaver.

  “What’s all this, then? Come into money, have you?” he asked, then raised his hand in a salute as Dr Watson emerged. “Oh, beg pardon, sir. I didn’t see they was with you.”

  Dr Watson nodded, then looked harder at the commissionaire. Sarge stared back at him, a smile of recognition spreading across his face.

  “Captain Watson?” Sarge asked. “Is it really you, sir?”

  “Well, I never,” said the doctor. “Sergeant Scroggs!”

  “Captain Watson?” said Queenie.

  “Do you know each other?” asked Wiggins.

  “I should say we do,” said the doctor. “This brave fellow saved my life when I got my first wound on the Khyber.”

  “And the captain saved mine when I was hit. Even if he did have to cut me arm off to do it.”

  “Yes, sorry about that,” said the doctor. “But there was no other way. Good to see you again, Sergeant. How are you keeping?”

  “Well enough, thank you, sir. May I ask what you’re doing with these young scamps?”

  “Dr Watson’s a friend of Mr Sherlock Holmes,” said Wiggins.

  “He helps him and all,” added Queenie.

  “Just like we does,” Beaver said. “We’ve just come from Scotland Yard.”

  Sarge looked suitably impressed.

  “Have you now?” he asked. “And what brings you back here?”

  “We got something to show the doctor. This way, guv’nor.”

  Wiggins led the way through the Bazaar to the parked carriages.

  “Just over here… Oh!”

  Moriarty’s carriage was no longer there. Where it had stood the night before there was now a smart coach, painted a shiny dark red. The B
oys stared at it in dismay.

  “It was right there! Honest,” said Wiggins.

  “Yeah, right there,” Beaver confirmed.

  They described the black carriage to Sarge. But he didn’t know anything about it, and couldn’t say how it had got out of the Bazaar since last night.

  “Don’t see how it could have left without me seeing it,” he said. “That’s if it was here at all.”

  “It was, it was!” Beaver protested.

  “We all seen it last night,” Wiggins said, shocked that their friend could doubt them.

  “In the dark, was it?” Sarge asked.

  “It was getting dark, yeah,” Wiggins answered. “But not so dark that we couldn’t see the letter ‘M’ painted on the door.”

  “That’s M for Moriarty,” Queenie explained.

  But Sarge knew nothing about Moriarty, which was not surprising – the master criminal always did everything in the deepest secrecy. In any case, Sarge explained, he hardly ever saw the owners of the carriages, only the coachmen who drove them.

  “We seem to have drawn a blank,” Dr Watson told the Boys. “I fear there is nothing more we can do for the moment, so I must leave you. I have patients to visit.”

  “Why won’t nobody believe us?” Beaver complained when they were back in HQ and telling the others what had happened. The four younger Boys had stayed behind while Wiggins, Queenie and Beaver had gone to Scotland Yard with Dr Watson.

  “If you’d took me with you, I’d’ve made old Lestrade and the doctor believe us,” Shiner grumbled. He was cross at missing out on a ride in a cab and a visit to Scotland Yard.

  “No you wouldn’t,” said Queenie. “You’d only have made it worse.”

  “Trouble is,” Wiggins said, ignoring them, “Lestrade was right – I was forgetting what Mr Holmes taught me. We don’t know nothing. We only think we know.”

  “We know what them Thugs tried to do to Ravi,” said Beaver.

  “That’s right,” Queenie agreed. “We seen ’em trying to murder him.”

  “No we didn’t,” Wiggins said. “We only think they was trying to murder him. They might have been trying to kidnap him.”

  “Why would they want to do that?” Sparrow asked.

  “To hold him for ransom!” Rosie cried.

  “Exac’ly,” said Wiggins. “Well done, Rosie.”

  “What’s ransom?” asked Gertie.

  “It’s when you take somebody prisoner, and say you’ll only let him go if his people give you a lot of money,” Queenie explained.

  “Or something very valuable…” said Wiggins.

  “Like the Ranjipur Ruby!” Sparrow exclaimed.

  “Exac’ly. If Professor Moriarty is after it, he could have sent them two Thugs to capture Ravi and hold him to ransom for it.”

  The rest of the Boys gazed at Wiggins in admiration. Once again, he had proved how clever he was.

  “Mind,” he cautioned them, “we don’t know that, neither. They could still have been trying to kill him. Out of revenge.”

  “What we gonna do, then?” Queenie asked.

  “I dunno,” Wiggins admitted. “But I’ll think of something. First of all, we gotta warn Ravi. You young ’uns stop here. Queenie and Beav, come with me.”

  “If the police don’t believe you, why should we?” Captain Nicholson asked.

  He was standing with his back to the fireplace in the drawing room of Lord Holdhurst’s house, one foot resting casually on the tiger’s head. A wisp of blue smoke curled round his face from the thin cigar between his fingers. He raised a quizzical eyebrow at the three Boys, who were standing in a row facing him, like schoolchildren who had been hauled up in front of the headmaster.

  “’Cos we’re tellin’ the truth,” blurted out Beaver. “Honest.”

  “They’ve already saved my life once,” Ravi spoke up. “So I shall listen to what they have to say.”

  He was sitting on a long sofa next to his Uncle Sanjay, whose enormous moustache bounced up and down on either side of his chubby face as he nodded his head.

  “I am being in complete agreement with Ravi,” he said.

  The dewan, who was sitting slightly apart from the others, gave a scornful snort.

  “As you wish,” he said. “Kindly proceed.”

  Wiggins took hold of the lapels of his ragged coat, as he had sometimes seen Mr Holmes do. “Like I say, we can’t prove nothing – leastwise, not yet. But if Moriarty’s about, you’d best watch out. ’Cos you can bet he’s up to no good.”

  “Who is this Moriarty?” the dewan asked. “Is he some kind of badmash?”

  “I dunno. What’s a badmash?”

  “A bad man,” said the captain. “What we’d call a villain, or a crook.”

  “Oh yeah,” said Wiggins. “He’s the biggest badmash in London.”

  “Mr Holmes calls him the Napoleon of Crime,” Beaver chipped in.

  “Says he’s got a finger in everythin’ wicked in this city,” Queenie added with relish.

  The dewan snorted again, even more scornfully. “Then why is he not in prison?” he demanded.

  “’Cos he’s slippery as a serpent,” said Wiggins. “And twice as cunning. He ain’t a professor for nothing.”

  “I take it you’ve had dealings with him before?” the captain asked.

  “Once or twice, guv’nor. One time he nearly did for Mr Holmes his self, not to mention Her Majesty Queen Victoria. And would have done, if it hadn’t been for us. Only we’re not allowed to talk about that, you understand.”

  “I see. It would seem that we’re lucky to have you on our side.”

  “It would seem to me,” the dewan sneered, “that you are having a very strong imagination, young man.”

  “Well, sir, if you means I can imagine what might happen if things go wrong, then p’raps I have. You need one if you’re a detective.”

  The captain’s mouth twitched in a small smile under his moustache. Ravi grinned openly. The dewan scowled, his face dark as thunderclouds.

  “And do you imagine that this Moriarty is a follower of Kali?” he asked derisively. “Practising the cult of Thuggee to murder Prince Ravi?”

  “I wouldn’t put nothing past him,” Wiggins replied. “I hope you’ve got that ruby somewhere safe.”

  “It is locked away. And only I have the key,” said the dewan. He reached under his shirt and pulled out a large key hanging on a cord around his neck. “You see? It is never leaving my person.”

  “Good show,” said the captain. “Can’t say better than that, eh?”

  Ravi grinned mischievously. “I’d say that having that round your neck would be jolly handy for anybody wanting to strangle you,” he teased.

  The dewan was not amused. In fact, he turned so pale that Wiggins thought he was going to faint. But Ravi had not noticed. “I say,” he chuckled, “I’ve had a rather jolly thought. If this geezer Moriarty wants to steal the ruby so badly, why don’t we let him? Then he’ll bring the curse down on himself, and that’ll be him done for.”

  The dewan’s face changed from pale to purple, and he looked as though he was about to burst. The captain stepped in quickly. “Ravi!” he snapped. “That is not funny. How can you joke about the curse at a time like this?”

  “Sorry, Ram Das,” Ravi apologized – although he did not look very contrite.

  “Listen,” said Wiggins. “Are you certain sure the ruby’s still there? When was the last time you seen it?”

  “There’s a point,” the captain said. “If this professor of crime is so dashed clever, who’s to say he hasn’t already nipped in here and taken it?”

  “Exac’ly,” said Wiggins.

  The dewan reluctantly agreed to show them the ruby. He led the way out of the drawing room and down a corridor to a room at the end, which proved to be a study. A leather-topped desk stood in the middle of the room, and the walls were lined with books from floor to ceiling, except for a space in which hung an oil painting of an imposing country man
sion. The Boys could see no sign of the ruby anywhere.

  To their surprise, the dewan walked over to the picture and swung it away from the wall, to which it was fastened by hinges on one side, like a door. Behind it, set into the wall, was a steel safe. While the others watched, he took the key from round his neck, unlocked the safe and lifted out an ornate golden casket. Carefully, he placed it on the desk and lifted the lid. There was a sigh of relief from everyone. Inside the casket, resting on a bed of dark-blue velvet, was the ruby. It was as big as a small hen’s egg, and seemed to glow with a deep red fire. Everyone stared at it in wonder, as though hypnotized.

  Uncle Sanjay broke the silence. “There,” he said. “The Ranjipur Ruby, all safe and sound.”

  “At least for now…” said Captain Nicholson.

  A PAIR OF WORN OUT BOOTS

  “That ruby’s the most beautiful thing in the world,” Beaver enthused. “You should’ve seen it.”

  “Yeah, we should’ve,” Shiner replied peevishly. “We young ’uns always get left out.”

  “No you don’t,” Queenie said. “Only when we can’t all go.”

  “Shiner’s right,” said Gertie. “It ain’t fair. You and Wiggins and Beaver get to have all the fun.”

  “Tell you what,” Wiggins said, “why don’t we all go to the Bazaar and get Madame Dupont’s new leaflets? Then we can hand ’em out together.”

  “That don’t sound like fun to me,” Sparrow grumbled. “Sounds more like hard work.”

  “It is,” said Wiggins. “We’ll be keeping a lookout for them two Thugs. Only nobody’ll know, because they’ll think we’re just handing out leaflets.”

  “Good idea,” agreed Queenie. “If they’re really after Ravi, like as not they’ll be hangin’ about somewhere, waitin’ for a second chance.”

  “Skulkin’,” said Beaver. “That’s what they’ll be doin’.”

  “What they got to sulk about?” Shiner asked.

  “No, not sulkin’ – skulkin’,” Queenie corrected him. “It’s like lurkin’, you know. Stayin’ out of sight in the shadows.”

  “Well, whatever they’re doing, they’ll be keeping their eyes open for Ravi,” said Wiggins. “Waiting to do him in.”