“William Francis Frobisher,” Holmes corrected.
“Why they got so many names? They frightened they might lose some?”
“It is a sign of social status,” my companion explained.
“A lot of hot air wasted if you ask me,” Wiggins said, accepting the glass of water from a disapproving Mrs. Hudson. He at least had the wherewithal to give her proper thanks this time. The urchin, it appeared, was not totally without manners.
“Unsurprisingly, no one asked you, Master Wiggins,” Holmes said. “Now, details, boy, where exactly did Frobisher go?”
“We thought he was just taking in the night air, but then we could tell he had a particular place in mind. He meandered a bit, like he thought he might be being followed, then with his head down hustled over to Covent Garden in maybe quarter of an hour. He went to Rose Street and stopped to watch the fights.”
“That’s not where a boy should be,” I began to say, but stopped short of rebuking Wiggins when I received a stern look from Holmes. The Lamb and Flag, London’s oldest pub by most accounts, had earned its nickname of the “Bucket of Blood” thanks to the bare-knuckle boxing bouts held there with great regularity. Word had it, the alley became the place to go to hire thugs, muggers, and killers.
“The skinny… that is, Mr. Frobisher, stood and watched for a few minutes, but Willy said he wasn’t really watching the fights as he was watchin’ the audience.”
“An astute young man,” Holmes said.
“When the loser was carried off, the skinny man walks over to a bunch of fellows and talks them up. We took turns gettin’ close enough to overhear best we could. He pulled out a wad with more pounds in one place than I ever seen, and peeled a few right off. I wanted to practise my tooling skills, you know,” said he, wiggling his fingers, demonstrating just how light they were. “But knew you’d be cross with me if I wound up gettin’ pinched.”
“More that you got caught than the fact you picked the man’s pocket,” Holmes assured him. Now it was my turn to give him a look.
“This huge fella, boxer’s nose and bald as you like, took the money and they shook hands.”
“Did you happen to hear who was being targeted for a beating?”
“Oh for sure I did. That’s why I’m here, see.”
“Go on,” said Holmes.
“Get this, Mr. Holmes, ’twas the other one, the fat man… Haldaine.”
My jaw dropped, but Holmes merely nodded as if he had expected as much.
“Interesting. Well done, Wiggins.” To me he said, “First one or both conspire to kill Chatterton-Smythe when his resolve weakened, and now that Haldaine is showing the same second thoughts about this affair, his partner is ready to help him see the error of his way and keep him in line.”
“Oh no, you’ve got that wrong, Mr. Holmes,” Wiggins interrupted.
“How so?”
“The skinny man, Frobisher, ain’t looking to keep Haldaine in line.”
“No?”
“He wasn’t paying for no beating, see. He wants the fat man killed, end of story.”
Fourteen
Locating the Mine
The rain poured down all that night and into the early morning, making a bad day even worse. But Holmes was adamant that we go to Parliament and obtain the vital records in search of the final pieces to connect the clues into a complete picture. Holmes had ordered Wiggins to continue with his surveillance of Frobisher and Haldaine; the attack on the latter could be thwarted now that we were aware it was imminent. I wasn’t happy. This was dangerous work for children, but Holmes continued to reassure me these boys were in their own way more dangerous than the fighters at the Bucket of Blood. I was, needless to say, sceptical.
Donning our coats and hats, we tried with little success to hail a cab. We had to walk several streets to a busier thoroughfare before managing to obtain one. I decided that this was the time to tell him about my interviews with Wynter’s comrades, the engineer Raskill and Lieutenant Dodge. I had not revealed these activities to my friend, thinking he would not understand my motivations.
“Holmes, I have spoken to men from the Dido and they raise some concerns that may or may not have a bearing on the case.”
“Why did you seek them out?”
“I wanted to understand Norbert Wynter, see the sort of chap he was, see if there might be a clue to his disappearance.”
“We have plenty of clues and are hunting them down,” he said.
“But this appears to be one avenue we never considered exploring.”
“What did you learn? What suspicions have been raised?” He displayed no interest in Wynter the man, just Wynter the case.
“As to his being a deserter, one told me he volunteered for the Naval Brigade that reinforced the 58th Regiment at Majuba Hill but neither man I spoke with saw what happened once he disembarked the Dido. But, both men did imply there was much not discussed after the battle. Secrets are being kept and not as well as the Admiralty may believe.”
“All very interesting, Watson, but without detail, it raises more questions and I daresay we likely do not have time for them until we exhaust our current line of inquiry.”
He fell silent, returning his gaze to the world beyond the carriage window and I was left to worry about what else was being kept from us.
It was only after we arrived at the Houses of Parliament that he expressed any interest in the machinations our investigation would demand. “Who shall we bother for this information, Watson?” I had wondered if he intended to do much the same as young Wiggins had last night and simply stand there banging on the door until someone came to answer, then barge his way into the House of Commons and declare his intent.
I offered an alternative course of action. “Based on my reading, I believe we should start with Mr. Leonard Courtney.”
“Who might he be?”
“The Undersecretary of State for the Colonies.”
“And why not his master, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, John Wodehouse, 1st Earl of Kimberley?” Holmes asked. I was impressed he actually had bothered to learn the man’s name but no doubt it came as a part of his investigation, needing to know who might be involved in an international affair such as this.
I explained how according to some of the articles I read yesterday, Wodehouse was already travelling. “Also, Courtney is on record as being quite concerned over expenditures in Africa and might be a willing ally in learning what has been happening over there, out of sight, but not out of mind.”
“Good work, Watson. Let us seek out Mr. Courtney.”
Holmes was not accustomed to the wheels of politics and did not fully grasp the difficulty of walking in to see such an important individual without an appointment or even letter of introduction. I had earlier suggested we bring Inspector Gregson with us to add some authority to our presence, but Holmes refused, stubbornly determined that this was still our investigation and a representative from Scotland Yard would only serve to prematurely connect our questions with Chatterton-Smythe’s murder, an eventuality we wanted to delay for as long as possible.
Gamely, we found our way to the outer office of the Undersecretary and were met by a young man in a dark suit that was beginning to fray slightly around the trouser cuffs. Holmes introduced himself and expressed a desire to meet with Mr. Courtney. At that, the man laughed out loud, irritating my companion considerably.
“I am Gilbert Harries, the Undersecretary’s private secretary. Do you know how many members of the House want some time with the Undersecretary? If I allowed them all, we’d never get any work done.”
“I know we do not have an appointment,” I interrupted, smoothly, looking to see off an altercation before Holmes’s ego could get the better of him and put an end to our hopes. “Our business, though, is of most vital and urgent importance.”
“What does it concern?” Harries asked, still clearly amused at our temerity.
“A matter that should not be discussed before publi
c ears,” Holmes said, enigmatically. He stared intently at the man who actually withered a little under his gaze.
“This is Whitehall,” the secretary declared as if we did not understand our whereabouts. “This may be as far from public as one could find.” He laughed at his own humour although I did not find it quite so amusing. After all, those toiling here were to serve the public.
Holmes merely glared at the man, clearly unhappy with having his time wasted.
“Mr. Courtney is not in his chamber at present,” Harries said, his smile finally fading.
“If you would be so kind as to intercede, I can explain what we need and perhaps you might be of some help?” Holmes said. He had dropped his voice to a low, deep tone, one I assumed he used to convey the importance of our presence.
“Well this could certainly be a diverting discussion,” Harries said, and I finally understood what Holmes did not. He was a bored functionary, rarely asked to step out of his role and he appreciated this distraction. “Come with me.”
Harries conducted us into the main office, a wood-panelled room that spoke of age and importance, the room itself imbued with the gravitas of the building. On the Undersecretary’s desk were maps and books, and a large world globe waited for study atop a pedestal. Once the door was closed behind us, he turned.
“Now we are more private, how may the Undersecretary’s office assist you?”
“We are seeking the current maps and records of ownership for the diamond mines in the Boer territory,” said Holmes. “It is our belief that something is happening in Africa that bodes ill for England.”
Harries stared at Holmes incredulously. “You cannot be serious? Surely?”
Holmes merely stared back at him.
“Holmes you said your name was?” Harries asked, clearly hesitating to commit himself to a course of action he felt to be ludicrous in nature.
“Sherlock Holmes. If you would like someone to vouch for my veracity, I suggest you contact Scotland Yard and ask for Inspector Gregson. I am a consulting detective and have done him a number of services recently. He will assure you my request is both legitimate and worthy of your attention.”
“Scotland Yard? Very well. I will need some time to verify your claim, of course, and even more time to obtain the Undersecretary’s approval for the release of the information you have requested and to actually gather the documents you need,” Harries said, making it obvious that we were in for a long wait.
“Since time is of the essence, may I suggest you assign these tasks to several underlings so all might be done at once?” Holmes said, the exasperation slowly creeping into his voice.
“You clearly have no understanding of how the government works, do you?”
“I have been acquainted with aspects which I find inefficient and distasteful, starting with the manner in which bureaucrats appear to delight in wasting people’s time,” Holmes said testily and I feared we would lose the man’s much-needed cooperation.
Sure enough, he looked upset, so to ameliorate the matter, I interjected once more.
“Sir, I assure you that my friend Holmes here has the Crown’s interests at heart,” I said. “If he claims every second is precious, believe me, every second is precious. The very least you could do is send others to verify his identity and see if the Undersecretary would be so kind as to let us look at what must surely be public records in the meantime?”
“And you are…?” he asked.
“Dr. John Watson, late of Her Majesty’s Army Medical Department, and now a doctor in civil practice and companion to Mr. Holmes,” I informed him. I hoped my military service would reassure him that we were not lunatics intent on interrupting government business.
“A doctor and a detective? Why—”
“If you’d be so kind,” I said. “We really are pressed for time and however Her Majesty’s servants may assist us in our efforts to protect the realm would truly be a blessing.”
Finally, the logic of our requests and the earnestness of our demeanour must have convinced Harries that our presence was serious and our business pressing. He asked us to be patient and we accompanied him back to his desk, where he wrote several notes.
“You know, gentlemen, being private secretary to the Undersecretary gives one certain privileges.” There was a sense of pride in his voice now that he had committed himself to our assistance. He gave out a sharp yell and an even younger man in a cheap suit arrived to take and distribute the notes.
Clearly, Holmes had expected access to the records to be immediate, but I knew better. In order to keep him occupied, I suggested he take a stroll through the building and let me wait with Harries until the documents we needed arrived. He nodded his agreement and swiftly strode off, no doubt in search of mischief.
As one might imagine, gathering all the approvals and documents was a Sisyphean task that took a good part of the day, but Harries finally managed to obtain our requested materials and was kind enough to set us up in the Lords Library so that we might peruse them. Before all the papers were stacked on a table, Holmes was already unrolling maps and was examining them with his magnifying glass.
“Watson, would you be so kind as to begin determining the relevant mine ownerships, cross-referencing against shareholder documentation, and providing us with a list of suspects? I would rule out, of course, anyone who has sold out to either the Barnato Diamond Mining Company or the factors controlling the Kimberley and the old De Beer mines, most notably Cecil Rhodes and his partner C.D. Rudd, but anticipate that not all have done so.”
His words made perfect sense but the detailed work he was asking for better suited the skills of a legal clerk than those I possessed as a doctor. It was very slow going, and I spent the remainder of the day sifting through dense reports, filings filled with most imprecise legal language, and ownership paperwork. Much of it was written in a variety of hasty hands as the paperwork made real the claims but they were a formality compared with the actual possession of the mines and division of their imagined wealth. I was aghast at how sloppy some of the documentation was, with missing or incomplete information that would have made pressing a claim difficult if not downright impossible in some cases. Clearly, no one had done an audit of these reports. I tried to imagine medical records—even on the front line—being allowed to be so disordered and how that might result in the difference between proper treatment and a patient’s death.
Holmes, for his part, was dogged in his reading of maps, poring over every inch of them, taking documents from me to match to the various locations. He was hasty with the papers, making so much mess that I was forced periodically to pause my own investigations to re-order them.
After we had been at it several hours, Harries appeared to let us know that the library would soon be closing for the evening, and informed us that we would have to surrender the maps and documents to his safe keeping within the next half hour. Holmes tried to argue, but I laid a hand on his forearm, reminding him we were here only because of Harries’s kindness, not duty, and he could easily rescind permission. We needed to maintain the private secretary’s good will in case we had to return in the morning.
Holmes did not press the point, instead he instructed, “Look at this, Watson.” He gestured with his magnifying glass at a map of Boer territories. With two fingers he traced the courses of the Buffels and Slang Rivers.
“The rivers form a junction at this formation of rock named Sorrow’s Crown.”
“What of it?” I peered closer, and saw an unfamiliar symbol next to the rock formation. “What is that?” I inquired.
“It appears on several other maps of the region, and denotes classified filings. Do you have anything for this area?”
I consulted my notes, realising that with haste and weariness, my handwriting had become almost indecipherable. I checked for any mention of Buffels, Slang, or Sorrow’s Crown but found nothing.
Holmes was about to toss the map aside when something captured his attention and he paused, a
long finger tracing one of the lines of longitude running across the map. He then slowly withdrew his notebook and thumbed back a few pages. With narrowing eyes, he studied something in his notebook and then the map. He snapped his notebook closed and replaced it in his pocket. Clearly he found something but would not voice it until we were alone.
“Ask Harries if we can access those files,” Holmes instructed. “I would wager the clues we seek are there.”
With more than a little trepidation, I approached Harries’s desk. He was clearly ready for me to surrender the loaned papers. A look of disapproval crept across his face as he saw that I was empty-handed.
“Something else, Doctor?”
“Yes, actually and believe me, I do hesitate to ask at such a late hour.”
“But you intend to ask anyway?”
I nodded. “On the maps there are symbols denoting classified files and Mr. Holmes asks if there is any possible way we could see those reports.”
He shook his head slowly from side to side.
“I am afraid not, Doctor. Classified means they are secrets of Her Majesty and not mine to share. I suppose if Mr. Holmes were to draft an official request, detailing his reason for asking, the Undersecretary might see his way clear to share some of the information contained within them if it is not considered a threat to national security to do so. But, the files themselves could not be released. Now, it is time for me to lock up for the night, so I must ask you to bring me everything.”
“Of course.”
I walked slowly back to the library and Holmes, who gave me a questioning look, but quickly surmised the answer from the look on my face. His shoulders slumped. We bundled everything together, took them to back to Harries and bade our farewells.
Once on the damp streets of Westminster, Holmes took a deep breath of the summer air. The rain had stopped, but it would be several hours before the muck solidified. “The secrets we seek are in those files, Watson. If the government is keeping these secrets, then we can deduce that the government is somehow involved. We simply must get our hands on them.” I shook my head. I couldn’t see how it could be done, but Holmes was like a terrier with his teeth sunk deep into a bone. “There must be someone we can turn to for assistance? Someone we haven’t thought of?”
Murder at Sorrow's Crown Page 20
