I was roughly pushed down below decks and into a cabin that was quite large, and on a ship of that size an exorbitant waste of space. Moran’s tea chest sat in the corner, by the porthole. The cabin had been Sarawan’s until a short time ago. His compass , charts and navigation equipment lay scattered over the desk. The thick captain’s log rested as a paperweight on the last chart he had been using.
Moran turned to Sarawan. “Leave us. You see to the loading.”
Sarawan nodded, and hurried away, looking relieved.
The crewman was openly wielding the pistol, now we were in relative privacy. Moran waved him forward. “I am going to search his pockets. Keep it trained on him.”
Obediently, the crewman cocked the gun and pushed it up against my ear. The cold metal was sufficient to keep me totally immobile whilst Moran searched my clothing. He found, quite naturally, the gun. My other possessions were quite harmless, and he let them be. The gun he put in the desk drawer. He cleared the desk in one sweep of his arm, sending charts and the log across the floor.
“Put him in the chair,” Moran ordered, pulling the seat up close to the table.
I was pushed into the chair and the gun was brought to rest against my neck again. Moran crossed the cabin and delved into a locker. He extracted a flat black box, which he brought back to the desk. “Recognize it?” he asked me.
I did recognize its type. It was a first aid kit, a comprehensive all-encompassing kit that one would expect a responsible ocean-going captain to have available. Although the more esoteric items could vary from one to another, scalpels and blades were standard items.
Moran opened the lid and extracted the scalpel, then carefully fitted a new blade to it. His movements were slow and deliberate. “Please do tell me when to stop, doctor,” he told me.
“Why bother? You do not believe me.”
“I don’t believe the song you’re singing now. Let’s change your tune and see if I believe you then. Majah, his arm, please.”
The gun lifted from my skin and Majah grasped my right forearm and pinned it to the leather desk top. He put most of his body weight into the effort and I could no more shift my hand than I could fly.
Moran delicately separated my thumb and moved it away from my hand. I was powerless to slide it back. He looked at me with mock kindness. “Last chance, doctor. Do we operate?”
“Why bother, Moran? Doctor Watson has been telling you the simple truth.” It was Holmes’ voice.
Moran looked up, startled. “Well, well, so you were here all along, Mr. Holmes.” He nodded to Majah and the inexorable weight lifted from my arm. I gratefully slid my arm off the desk and swiveled around in the chair.
Majah had turned to point the gun at Holmes, who stood in the doorway dressed in his Indian costume, his dock worker’s gloves in one hand. Holmes pointed at Majah. “There’s no need for him. I have too much to lose by attempting anything foolish.”
Moran considered this. “All right. Majah, give me your gun and leave us.”
The crewman was obedient to the last. Without a murmur of protest he handed over the weapon and left the room, closing the door behind him.
The two opponents faced each other across the cabin.
“Your tan is dripping,” Moran remarked.
Holmes rubbed at the skin dye, which was washing away in the high summer heat. “It has served its purpose.” He pulled off the turban and wiped his face with it.
Moran rose and walked around the desk and sat down in the captain’s chair. “So, Mr. Holmes, despite my warning you have persisted in searching for me.”
“You took extraordinary measures to ensure I would not. That was your mistake. You should have left Elizabeth alone, Moran.”
“I think not. Look at you. I have both you and your companion under my control. I see no sign of reinforcements. You thought the police might foul your plans and now you are here, alone, and unmasked. I think it was a rather effective ploy, myself.”
“You are not out of England yet.”
“Mere details. Shall we negotiate face to face?”
“You have no room for negotiations, Moran. The police are on their way here, now. You do not think I would have foreseen this possibility and made arrangements against it? Even Watson had his own safety provisions. This ship has been watched from afar for as long as Watson was on the dock. As soon as you brought him aboard, the alarm went up. I give you mere minutes of freedom.”
Moran, with a chuckle, lined the revolver up on the tea-chest sitting innocently in the corner. He cocked it and aimed carefully, then looked toward Holmes as he pulled the trigger, watching for his reaction. The noise of the shot was loud in the enclosed room and I jumped despite myself. The shot drilled messily through the thin packing case.
Holmes appeared to remain completely unmoved, despite Moran instantly turning the revolver back upon him and re-cocking it with one quick, practiced motion of his thumb. If Moran had expected Holmes to show any appreciation for his marksmanship, he was disappointed. But I saw something that Moran would not notice beneath the faded remains of the stain: Holmes had turned quite pale. I saw him clench his hand to hide its tremor.
Moran smiled. “Another, Mr. Holmes? Or shall we make arrangements for my escape? I have one last shot at my disposal, for this is a dual firer. No?”
He turned with casual speed and fired into the tea-chest once again. This time, Holmes moved to launch himself at the man, but Moran instantly swung back around, lifting my own revolver from the desk drawer and leveling it at Holmes. Holmes halted, knowing as surely as I did that Moran needed very little excuse to fire upon Holmes himself.
“Surprise,” Moran said softly. “I have six more shots to use.”
“Then I suggest you use them, Moran, for that is the only way you will be able to leave this cabin alive.”
There was something in my friend’s tone that I could not fathom and I was quite at a loss to understand the definite note of doom I could sense in his words. An undercurrent was sweeping through the room and I was being left upon the shore. Moran understood, however. I could see it in his gloating face and triumphant smile.
It was then it happened. There was a loud explosion and the whole ship’s structure rose and fell in an uneven, terrifying heave and shudder beneath our feet. I recoiled violently and swung toward the port hole, hoping to see some evidence or explanation for the alarming explosion.
Moran, too, drew in a startled oath.
I turned my head back rapidly at the sound of his exclamation and was in time to see Holmes catapult himself at Moran, one hand pushing aside the arm holding the revolver, which had dropped away from Holmes’ direction as Moran had turned toward the port hole. My friend’s face was that of an implacable enemy bent on justified revenge.
Moran recovered swiftly from the distraction, but not quite swiftly enough to beat Holmes’ matchless speed and reflexes. The gun fell to the floor and they came together.
The competition was over very quickly. Moran was in poor condition after his restricted years in prison and Holmes, in addition to long years of experience and honed skills, was motivated by a powerful incentive.
As Moran’s fingers closed about his throat, Holmes brought from beneath his Indian’s costume a gold curved-bladed knife, which he plunged with one powerful stroke into Moran’s sternum, burying the blade to the hilt.
As soon as Moran crumpled to the deck, Holmes bent and placed a foot on the man’s chest beside the knife hilt and extracted it with one sharp tug. Then, with the bloody instrument poised to strike again if needed, he meticulously checked that all signs of life were gone, that Moran was indeed dead.
The callousness of the task painted for me the picture Elizabeth had once, in vain, tried to convey; the dangerous and ruthless savage that lay beneath their shell of civility, dormant until needed and called upon through threat of danger, or pain. Now I understood just how deep and fundamental that change had been.
Holmes moved rapidly across t
o the splintered tea-chest.
“Hurry Watson. Quickly now, all speed. We’ve got to get this lid off. Hurry man!”
He was applying the blade of the knife to the nail heads as he spoke and trying to prize off the lid. Bewildered, I hurried to obey. The lid had been loosely secured beneath four bent nails and between us we forced the nails aside and pried the lid up, splitting it into two in the process.
Holmes lifted the fragments and threw them across the decking. He looked down into the chest with a face that seemed feverish and for a moment I thought he might faint. He grasped the edge of the crate. “He’d already moved her!” he whispered hoarsely.
I stared down into the empty crate and studied the telltale blood stain on the coarse grain of the wood. The eddying undercurrents swirled back to pick me up and enlighten me. Holmes had thought Elizabeth was in the crate. The bloodstain told that she had indeed been a prisoner inside for a while, but no longer. Moran had moved her elsewhere.
Holmes had not known that.
I recalled his pallor when Moran had fired upon the chest and his remorseless words of doom that had followed the second shot. He had indeed suffered pain enough to awaken the savage.
The ship listed slightly. Holmes cross to the door and turned the key, locking it. There was a further, minor explosion out on the deck and the boat listed a little further, with a creak of strained beams. There were many cries and hoarse, panicked shouting, in foreign tongues.
“She could be somewhere in here,” Holmes said, looking about. He spotted the doors of a wardrobe and crossed to tug at the handles. He dug out his metal probes.
“Or anywhere else on the ship,” I pointed out.
“I have been watching this door since Moran came aboard. No one has left the cabin except him and the crewman who wheeled the chest in.” He began delicately picking the lock.
My attention was distracted by another insidious occurrence. My feet were wet. I looked down at them, alarmed.
“Holmes!”
He spared barely a glance at me.
“Holmes! There is water leaking in.”
“It is not leaking, Watson,” he replied.
“Not? Then what is this water doing here?”
He selected another probe. “Rising, I would assume. I suggest you stand on the other side of the cabin.”
I struggled up the tilting deck to the other side of the cabin, as he had suggested. “Holmes, it is getting higher.” It was across at least a quarter of the floor. “Where is it coming from, if the ship isn’t taking on water?”
Holmes lifted his head, his expression exasperated. “It is not leaking, Watson, because I did not make a mistake with those charges. The ship is sinking.” The ship gave another deep groan, adding its own emphasis to his forecast of doom.
I stared at him.
“You had better get out while you can, Watson,” he told me, turning back to the locks. “I will search the rest of the cabin.”
I was quite frozen to the spot. Nothing could have induced me to leave Holmes behind, even though I had no way of assisting. Nothing, that was, until Holmes spoke to me quietly;
“Go. There is no point in all of us dying together.”
•ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï•
The ship sank beneath the surface as I was making my way from the cabin and I was sucked down into the water with it. I am a confident swimmer, so I allowed myself to be pulled deeper until I was free to strike for the surface.
I came up and looked around. The now racing tide had pulled me well out into the river. My coat and boots were weighing me down, so I swam slowly through the flotsam toward the dock. There appeared to be a large number of men on the dock, some wet, some dry, and there were still a few in the water, being helped up by those already ashore. It appeared the majority of people who were on board had made it safely onto land.
The police had arrived. There were a handful of bobbies taking down details in their notebooks and as I hauled myself up the pier, Lestrade crossed the dock to kneel and lend me a hand.
“Was Holmes aboard when she blew?” Lestrade asked me, lifting his voice above the babble behind him.
“Yes. How did you guess?”
“I got a telephone call from him this morning. He gave me the details about Moran, the hostel and this ship.”
I turned and scanned the lapping wavelets. Nothing. My beating heart was rapidly counting seconds ticking away—each second an eternity. The water remained undisturbed by human presence.
“Where is he?” Lestrade hissed, vocalizing my own worry.
Flotsam had been rising to the surface continually but now no more new rubbish appeared. The water became still.
“Damn it, where is he?” Lestrade muttered again.
It was too long.
I stripped off that repulsive coat and bent to remove my boots.
“Watson?” Lestrade asked.
“I am going back down there. He could be in trouble.” I stopped, needing my breath to work on the water-swollen boots. They finally came off.
Lestrade had turned away and whistled piercingly. He waved his arms and five men, three of them uniformed bobbies, ran toward him. They were barely within hailing distance when he began to dispense crisp orders in a decisive manner not at all like his usual laconic self. Then he touched my shoulder.
“I have a man here who’s good at underwater stuff, Watson. He’ll go.”
“Not fast enough,” I said shortly, standing up and moving toward the edge of the jetty.
“Let him go. You’re too tired—”
“Out of my way, Lestrade.”
“There he is!” The cry went up from further down the shore, from one of the policemen there. He was pointing down the river and we gazed out toward the middle of the flow where the man was directing us to look.
The distance was blurring my vision and to my eyes I could see only a small dark figure.
There was a splash as the underwater man dived in and began swimming strongly out toward the drifting figure. He reached it and slowly they began the return trip back. As they came closer I could see two distinct figures. Holmes, swimming alone, and the policeman, trailing.
Many willing hands reached down to help them up onto the dock.
Holmes hauled himself upright, water draining from him in rivulets, and faced us. “Your timing, Lestrade, as always, is immaculate.”
•ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï•
Lestrade found us twenty minutes later, in a sun-warmed corner of the warehouse they had opened temporarily to shelter the cumbersome investigation of the sinking of the Andhra’s Pride and the illicit cargo of guns and ammunition.
“I have to ask just a few questions,” Lestrade said apologetically. “The details we can sort out later.”
“Of course,” I agreed. “What do you want to know?”
“Moran. He is dead?”
In my mind I recalled my picture of Moran, staggering and clutching the gold knife handle with its green gems. Staggering and falling. “Undoubtedly,” I answered.
“How did he die?” Lestrade asked.
I hesitated for a fractional moment, thinking my answer through. Holmes had killed Moran but with ample reason, so if I replied truthfully, it would not harm my friend. However, the legal complications that would ensue could tie Holmes up in official bureaucracy for many weeks.
I waved a hand toward the Thames and looked Lestrade in the eye. “The ship sank,” I replied levelly, carefully avoiding Holmes’ gaze. It was not really an answer at all, but was as close as I could stretch the truth toward an answer.
Lestrade nodded. “And why did the ship sink?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said instantly and quite truthfully. “There was an explosion, and the ship began to take on water. Actually, it simply fell apart.”
“An explosion? The ship was sunk deliberately? Who by?”
I looked at Holmes, troubled. “I do not know that it was delibera
te,” I said slowly. “If it had been deliberately sunk, then it must have been one of us, mustn’t it? Yet we were both in the cabin with Moran when the explosion occurred.” I didn’t voice the rest of my thoughts. I knew it was not I who had deliberately set charges to sink the ship and thereby kill several quite innocent men. Holmes had by far the strongest reasons for an act such as this. I recalled his statement about not making a mistake with the charges.
“The Andhra was carrying a heavy illicit load of munitions, including gunpowder and explosives,” Holmes said, burying his hands deep into the pockets of his borrowed overcoat. “They were using naked candles in the holds. It would only take a very small mistake for a tragedy of this sort to happen.”
Lestrade nodded again. I could see he was not entirely happy about the mystery, but he accepted Holmes’ hypothesis of what may have happened. He was called away, then.
“Holmes, what of Elizabeth?” I asked him.
•ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï• •ï¡÷¡ï•
“I looked in every corner or space in that cabin that could possibly hide a body. Elizabeth wasn’t there. Therefore I must infer that the tea chest came aboard empty. Moran was bluffing me and successfully, too.”
It was two days after the sinking of the Andhra. Those two days had been busy days, indeed. The police investigation had included a search of Sikmah’s hostel, which resulted in several arrests. Holmes and I both participated in these events.
Moran’s sister, Beatrice O’Connor, had been found and detained and I was witness to Holmes’ interview of her—an occasion I do not care to repeat. She had been abusive, hysterical and uncooperative.
Despite her circumlocutions, it became plain after weary hours of talk that hers had been the driving mind behind Moran’s revenge. Moran had, after ten years of continual persuasion, convinced his sister that she could be rid of him forever—relieved of her monthly duty visits and the disgrace to the family—if only she would help him escape and flee England.
Once her assistance was assured, he had given her the information necessary to revive the last remains of Moriarty’s network of criminals and Moran’s own circle of comrades, to call them in to help with her plans.
Chronicles of the Lost Years (The Sherlock Holmes Series) Page 22
