Chronicles of the Lost Years (The Sherlock Holmes Series)

by Cooper-Posey, Tracy

  I gave her a reassuring pat and followed him.

  The door to his rooms was a splintered skeleton. The lock was still sitting in the frame, the wood impaled by the nails of the key plate. He pushed the door open and it jammed, half-open, on an overturned sofa.

  Holmes stepped over the sofa with one long-legged stride and stood in the middle of the rug, staring at the destruction. He was not observing in his scientific manner, but merely acquainting himself with the unyielding fact of this very personal attack.

  His files and papers were spread over most of the room—the result of years of careful classification scattered in minutes. The old deal table his chemical equipment sat upon had been upturned, the glass, china and metal allowed to slide down the slope to shatter and puddle on the carpet. Some noxious chemical had begun to eat into the priceless Persian rug.

  As he turned a slow full circle, taking in the overturned furniture, the fragments of his eccentric collection of memorabilia from his travels and his carelessly scattered possessions, a draught from the smashed pane in the window by the fireplace lifted some of the papers and floated them over to land at his feet.

  I was appalled. A personal attack on Holmes himself would never have achieved the same deep impression that this carefully calculated destruction would. I could see each item of upheaval Holmes observe strike home with the effectiveness of a well-aimed bullet.

  Mrs. Hudson appeared by the door. Holmes looked at her. “No one else has been up here?”

  “No, sir. Mr. Mycroft insisted I let no one in.”

  “Not even the police?”

  “Not even them,” she replied stoutly. “Mr. Mycroft saw to that.”

  “That at least is one small mercy in my favor,” he said softly. He dropped his bag, shed his coat and jacket and rolled up his sleeves. Then he crouched down to examine the floor at his feet.

  •ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï•

  Mycroft arrived two hours later. By that time, Holmes had finished in the main sitting room and was examining the bedroom whilst Mrs. Hudson and I cleared the remains of the sitting room.

  I showed Mycroft into the bedroom and hovered curiously by the door.

  Mycroft pointed to the dressing chair. “You have studied the seat?”

  “Yes, yes,” Sherlock replied, his voice muffled by the bed base. He extracted himself and lifted the pillows, then looked at Mycroft. “All this damage…there must have been a remarkable amount of noise. Did no one come to investigate?”

  “Elizabeth apparently shattered the window in the sitting room herself in an attempt to call up some help, but there were men with guns at either end of the street, holding back witnesses.”

  Sherlock pulled the counterpane aside. “And the constabulary—what were they doing?”

  “They were rushing to the scene of an accident two blocks away—an accident that, it has now been discovered, was a hoax.”

  Sherlock threw the counterpane to the floor and tipped the mattress over. “So, they were well organized, had large numbers of people to use and were not afraid to make a lot of noise or create a lot of fear to achieve their ends.” He shot a glance at his brother. “The newspapers?”

  “I managed to suppress her name and any association with you. That’s all I could manage. The police were easier to contain, after I had a word with Tobias Gregson.”

  Sherlock strode into the sitting room and over to his scattered files, where he began to sort through them. “They’ve not made any contact since taking her?”

  “I rather imagine they were waiting for you to get back from Scotland,” Mycroft said, as we followed him out.

  “When did they take her?”

  “About seven o’clock last night.”

  “The train was barely out of London.” Sherlock sank suddenly onto the sofa, which now sat in its feet once more. “She could be half a world away.”

  Mycroft glanced toward me and I read the expression on his face clearly. He was surprised—not that this had hit his younger brother badly, but that it appeared to be affecting those abilities to think clearly and precisely that Holmes was famous for.

  “It is hardly likely, is it?” Mycroft said gently. “They’ll want her somewhere nearby so they can use her for the bargaining lever they need her for.” His voice was dry and there was an implied criticism.

  Holmes said softly, “Do not let your dislike of Elizabeth distort your perception, Mycroft.”

  Mycroft pushed at a file with the ferrule of his umbrella. “You persist in that silly misconception….”

  I confess I stared at the two brothers with dumb amazement. It was the first time I had ever suspected there was any dissension over Elizabeth. It occurred to me as I watched the pair that perhaps family dissension was inevitable. My friends’ lives had been bohemian and unfettered and Mycroft was very set in his ways.

  “I refuse to even consider Elizabeth may be implicated in this. I would trust her with my life—have trusted her.” Holmes rubbed his temple. His hand trembled only slightly, now he had absorbed the worst of the facts. “As you can see for yourself, they’ve gone to a lot of trouble to take her.”

  He stood and strode to the mantle where he stuffed a pipe full of tobacco. “At a conservative estimate it would have taken them ten minutes to chop down the door. Elizabeth barricaded the door, too. Once they had broken through the barricade, she besieged herself in the bedroom. Unfortunately that door did not prove so solid. A single heave, I would estimate and the lock snapped.” He started his pipe. “Elizabeth is not entirely helpless and the contest did not end there. I found this—” and he pulled Elizabeth’s long, gold-handled knife from his pocket and threw it to the floor between our feet. “It has blood on it. We know there were at least three guns involved, so it is safe to assume she probably had to contend with a gun, too.”

  I picked up the knife and shuddered. The picture Holmes drew was bleaker than the one my own imagination had painted, yet I knew his educated guess was more likely to be the correct one. That this might be Elizabeth’s blood on the blade appeared a distinct possibility.

  Mycroft sat in a chair. “For goodness sake, Sherlock, do you not believe I haven’t made it my business to know all about Elizabeth long ago? Her loyalty is not in question here.”

  Holmes took his pipe from his mouth. “You had Elizabeth investigated?”

  Mycroft had the grace to look uncomfortable. “You’re a public figure. Precautions like these must be taken.”

  Holmes merely stared at Mycroft, his face immobile. Then, softly: “Do you still have the report?”

  “I burnt it,” Mycroft replied. “I thought it prudent.”

  Holmes tapped his pipe out into the grate. “The question still remains—who are they?”

  Mycroft looked out the window. “I rather imagine we’re about to find out. Here comes Inspector Lestrade and at a fast clip.”

  Lestrade made his way up the stairs at a breathless pace. I could hear his boots rattling out a staccato on the wood of the stairs. He stopped abruptly in the doorway, the expressions on his face beginning with shock and giving way rapidly to puzzlement and then to unhappy resignation.

  “Then I am too late. He has already been here,” Lestrade said to Holmes.

  Holmes took two paces toward Lestrade. “Who has already been here?” he asked and by his tone, it was obvious that whatever shadows concealed the full shape of the puzzle in his mind, Lestrade’s answer would remove them.

  “Colonel Moran. He has escaped from Dartmoor. I just heard and came straight around to warn you.” Lestrade looked around and took a breath. “I am too late, I see.”

  Holmes’ face became expressionless as his mind raced to compute this new information and add it to the little he already knew. Finally he glanced at Mycroft.

  “Moran. The enemy reveals himself.”

  “The escape was obviously meticulously planned, along with all these arrangements,” Mycroft said, indicating the state of the room. />
  “Yes and all were executed within a twelve hour period…or perhaps less. To ensure I would not be warned.” Holmes looked at Lestrade. “He escaped yesterday afternoon, Inspector?”

  Lestrade nodded. “No one was hurt then?” he asked, looking about. His gaze fell on Mrs. Hudson’s face and her red-rimmed eyes. “My dear god,” he whispered. His face seemed to lose what little color remained after his exhausting race through the hot summer streets to warn Holmes. “The kidnapped woman in the Standard…it was Miss Elizabeth.”

  •ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï•

  I was wakened by a dim patter of footsteps—slow, measured steps—and for a moment I was returned to a decade earlier, when Holmes would tirelessly pace the midnight hearth rug, solving difficult conundrums.

  I looked at the clock beside the bed. It was just past midnight. I had only been asleep an hour. The evening had consisted of an exhausting interview with Lestrade and Gregson. The latter had arrived in response to Lestrade’s summons. Mycroft had also remained, sitting in the corner by the shattered window, silently absorbing the story as Holmes and I told of the woman who had paraded as the distraught Mrs. Thacker and the detailed, convincing story she had spun.

  Holmes was in the novel position of being the victim of a crime and suffered Gregson’s and Lestrade’s thorough examination with bad grace. Both those gentleman, however, were astute enough to realize that Holmes was merely venting his anger over his own gullibility and maintained their professional poise.

  Unfortunately, Holmes could also see that they were making allowances for this fact and the knowledge chafed.

  The pair of detectives eventually rose and bid us a good evening. After their departure Mycroft had begun his own series of questions. To my surprise, Holmes submitted to this second inquiry with better humor. My surprise abated when I realized that Mycroft had a different purpose in mind. He was not merely gathering information, but questioning Holmes in a manner that was prompting them both to consider every obscure corner of the affair, searching for any facts that their collaborative reasoning might infer.

  After a humble and very late supper hastily scratched together by Mrs. Hudson, I had gratefully fallen onto the bed Holmes offered me for the night and immediately slept.

  Sensing the unsettled mind behind the measured steps I was listening to now, I rose and drew on my borrowed dressing gown and made my way to the sitting-room.

  Most of the disarray had been re-organized and was stacked, packed, or otherwise pushed into related heaps for Holmes to sort out at his leisure, leaving most of the floor space clear, including his thinking circuit.

  Holmes was on the furthest point of his lap about the sofa and looked up at me.

  “Watson. I woke you. My apologies.”

  “No, do not apologize,” I told him. “I came out to see if there is something I can do for you.”

  “As a doctor or a friend?”

  “Both.”

  “I assume your Hippocratic Oath would not allow you to perform a quasi-lobotomy on various parts of my brain?” Holmes asked, with a touch of acid.

  “I was thinking of a sedative,” I replied, suppressing a smile at the request.

  “No.” Holmes pushed his hands into his pockets. “I need my wits fully functional, not asleep. So instead, as a friend, talk to me, Watson.” He paced the hearth rug. “Take my mind away from the pictures that are plaguing me.”

  I slid into Holmes’ vacant and cold chair. “Yes, I thought it was something like this that was goading you along.”

  Holmes’ step increased slightly. “It is the curse of a good imagination, Watson. The images are persistent.” He halted and glanced at me from under his lowered brow.

  “You’re a logical thinker,” I said smoothly. “Surely it is occurred to you that your concern is exciting your imagination and exaggerating the images.”

  “Yes, yes, I am aware of that,” Holmes said impatiently. “But truth and fear are too mixed now to separate and I cannot halt them. So I must persevere with them.”

  I studied him professionally. “At least you can reassure yourself she is alive. You know she has to be or Moran has lost any bargaining leverage.”

  “Oh, I know she is alive,” Holmes said quickly.

  “Well then, that’s one area where you can distinguish between truth and your fears,” I pointed out.

  Holmes paused at the fireplace and rested his slippered foot on the skirt guard, and his hand on the shelf. “Not even my fears have entertained that possibility. Elizabeth must be alive….” he began bleakly, but the thought was left unfinished. He glanced up at me. “I owe it to Elizabeth to find her. I owe it as an apology. She was right, not I.”

  “How was she right?” I asked.

  “If I had not been so anxious to leave for Scotland, I would have questioned, as Elizabeth did, the similarity of the case with that other I compared it to. Elizabeth told me the notes were missing.” He pointed to the sorry pile of documents by the hearth. “They must have been missing since Moriarty’s men ransacked these rooms twelve years ago. They were probably taken then. Moran retained them and used the details to dangle an authentic mystery before me. They knew I wouldn’t be able to resist the lure of successfully solving this case when I had failed so miserably the first time.” His voice was somewhat bitter. “If I hadn’t been quite so hasty, I would have seen it too and known without doubt who was dangling the bait.”

  I said slowly, “I do not believe she knew consciously that something was wrong. It was just a feeling of uneasiness.” I recalled the impression she had left with me of premonition. I had not imagined it, after all.

  I looked away from the atypically still figure in front of me and my gaze fell to the table beside Holmes’ chair. His watch chain sat in a small heap beside the whiskey glass and as I pushed at it with my forefinger a green glitter caught the firelight. The chain spread and revealed the small Chinese coin that was his fob and two small green gems mounted in gold along the length of chain. I had found Elizabeth’s two missing gems.

  Suddenly I recalled Holmes’ manner of tucking his hand into his fob pocket when away from Baker Street, and thinking deeply. Now the chain lay beside his chair, deliberately sought out and carried there.

  “Elizabeth is quite capable of looking after herself,” I said thoughtfully.

  Holmes looked up from the fire. I saw his gaze go to where my fingers were touching the chain. “You know their history, then,” he said. “But there are many ways of overcoming a solitary woman, no matter how skilled or prepared she may be. As this room bears witness, Watson, if you are determined enough and have the numbers, it can be done. It is that very force which may have been necessary that worries me.” He turned and began to pace again, one lap before arriving back at the hearth. “This is the very thing I took all precautions to avoid. My greatest fear was that my enemies would learn of Elizabeth’s importance to me and use that knowledge.” He kicked the cold grate. “So, now I am living my nightmare and my passage through it is no easier upon waking.”

  I pushed the watch chain back into a neat pile. “Holmes, you’re existing on an overdrawn account. You must get some sleep. This pacing is not achieving any results and will not while your mind is distracted so. Let me prepare a sleeping draught for you. I can at least guarantee you eight hours undisturbed by nightmares—either the waking or sleeping variety.”

  He refused, of course. But I am more deft at handling Holmes since I have had practical examples from Elizabeth. I covertly dropped the powder into his brandy and topped up the glass before going to bed myself.

  •ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï•

  I woke to find Holmes standing over my bed, wrapped in his dressing gown. His eyes were bloodshot, proof that my sleeping draft had worked. He ground the heel of a hand into the hollow of one eye as I watched. “We have a visitor, Watson,” he said and turned and walked back out into the sitting room.

  Alarmed, I scrambled
out of bed and hastily drew on my gown, before following him out.

  It was much later than I had first supposed, for the clock chimed the half hour after ten as I entered the sitting room. It looked little different from the previous night. Holmes would have had very little time to work before the sleeping draught had taken effect.

  Inspector Lestrade was standing by the table, identifying two rugged, useful-looking chaps to Holmes. I guessed they were policemen out of uniform, here to help protect Holmes from Moran’s revenge.

  “Right, you two,” Lestrade finished up. “One by the door and another across the street. Tell the others they’re relieved and they’re to go home and get some sleep. Try not to look like bobbies out of uniform, lads.”

  They nodded and left the room.

  “You had men patrolling last night?” Holmes asked Lestrade.

  “Yes.”

  Holmes picked up a box of broken china and dropped it onto the table with a crash. “There really is no need, Lestrade. I can manage this situation.”

  “Now, not another word, Mr. Holmes. This is my sort of business and it is nice to be able to help you out for a change, rather than come to you for help as I usually do.”

  “If that is the case, there are many other more appropriate ways—” Holmes began, picking up a shard of china that was all that remained of Elizabeth’s favorite teapot.

  But Lestrade cut him off with a quick wave of his hand and said firmly. “I insist, Mr. Holmes. Or else I will have to turn this into official police business.”

  Holmes looked at him with genuine astonishment. The threat was quite clear, for if Lestrade did turn the affair into official police business, it would be taken out of Holmes’ hand entirely and he would be forced to rely on Lestrade’s skills. To Holmes, that was unthinkable.

  Lestrade, for once sensitive to atmosphere, added awkwardly: “I like Miss Elizabeth, Holmes. I do not want to see any harm done to her through my own idleness.”

  Holmes dropped the shard of china back into the box. “I see,” he said blandly. “Well, you’d better sit down then, Inspector.”