Thirty-Nine Steps from Baker Street

by J. R. Trtek

  “Yes, I’m a great reader of yours, sir,” said Grace with enthusiasm. “I observe, however,” he added with great effect, “that you are back in the army—”

  “The medical corps,” I confirmed, pushing my breakfast plate away and tugging at the Sam Browne belt of my uniform. “For the past three years.”

  “Of course,” replied the man. “That makes sense, with your experience and all. But may I ask you, sir: Is that Doyle fellow now taking over for you? I read the last story just the other month—and it was a long wait for it—the tale about Mr. Holmes here and that spy Bork, and it wasn’t like your others. Is Doyle going to be writing them now?”

  I sternly looked at Holmes, who glanced away.

  “Doyle may take over my responsibilities briefly while I am in service to our nation,” I said. “Or so I understand,” I added in an icy voice. “Rest assured, however, that once this war ends, I hope to resume full authorship of my friend’s adventures.”

  “Ah, that will be most welcome.”

  “Now then, Mr. Grace,” Holmes said with a pained smile, “Let us get to what prompts your visit.”

  “We ran into the gentleman at an establishment in Stepney,” said Frank Farrar.

  “Yes,” said Shinwell Johnson, smiling at the stranger. “He was hoisting a glass while bitterly complaining to anyone who might give a listen.”

  “And we listened very closely,” added Farrar. “We think you will find this man’s tale most interesting, Mr. Holmes.”

  “Well, I don’t know that it is interesting to me so much as very frustrating,” Grace declared as Shinwell Johnson and Frank Farrar took up positions to one side, standing near the sitting room wall.

  “Pray unburden yourself,” Holmes said to Mr. Grace. “Tell us the facts concerning your anguish.”

  “Well, as you correctly surmised, Mr. Holmes—I suppose from my coat here and perhaps my voice—I drove a hansom for many years, but we all know the trade is vanishing on account of those motors. Every bus you see these days is a motor—the horse-drawn ones have all gone away. It’ll be the same for the hansoms—sooner rather than later—and I quit the trade, having seen the handwriting on the stable walls.

  “I have tried my hand at a few other endeavours in the meanwhile—working first in a mews and then seeking employment in fields unrelated to horses, which I’m certain will become extinct within ten years.”

  Holmes nodded as he smiled.

  “Most recently, I thought I had found a sufficient livelihood from working as a watchman. It was in that capacity, however, that I experienced my present misfortune.”

  “And Mr. Farrar and Mr. Johnson heard you speak of it?” asked Holmes, reaching for his cherrywood pipe.

  “Yes, they did,” replied Grace. “They suggested I come to you for assistance, though I understood you to be retired.”

  My friend he stuffed his pipe. “From time to time, I have no objection to being challenged in my old age. I should enjoy having you tell me your story, Mr. Grace.”

  “Well, two months ago, I was approached by a fellow to keep a regular eye on a building the far side of Poplar, within smelling distance of a gasworks.”228

  Holmes paused in the act of filling his pipe and glanced at Farrar and Johnson. “Pray, continue,” said the detective.

  “The building is a warehouse of sorts, I suppose,” the man said, “though I never saw the insides, nor was I ever told exactly what was happening behind its walls.”

  “Where is the structure located?” Holmes asked.

  “Just off the high street,” said Grace. “I can give you precise directions, if you wish.”

  “I should like that very much. However, for the moment, you said your duties…as a watchman…extended only to the exterior of the warehouse?” enquired Holmes as he lit his pipe. “You never stepped within?”

  “Not once, except to enter a small, separate addition that housed personal facilities, which I used when necessary.”

  “Describe the man who hired you,” said the detective, shaking his vesta and tossing it onto the grate. “How did he initially contact you? What was his name? Whom did he represent, if someone other than himself?”

  “I had placed myself with an employment agency,” responded Mr. Grace. “It was through its auspices that the fellow learnt of me. He was a Swede—introduced himself as Mr. Borge, and he was a mite like you in appearance, Mr. Holmes, though a bit younger: prominent nose, if you don’t mind me saying so, penetrating eyes. And a florid face. A bit haughty, in my opinion—of course, in that way he was quite unlike you, I mean to say—but he was all business and did not waste his time or mine.”

  “Go on,” urged Holmes languidly.

  “Well, he told me he was a representative for something called Gussiter’s Deep-breathing System.”

  At the mention of Gussiter, the detective betrayed interest with his eyes alone. The name also caused me to straighten suddenly in my chair, the pain in my leg becoming quite irrelevant.

  “And what were your specific duties?” asked Holmes.

  “Well, they were mildly curious. You see, this Mr. Borge wished me to keep an eye on the building, yes, but that and nothing more: just watch it from the outside and not guard it as such, you see. Indeed, he told me that if I ever saw any suspicious or threatening activity, I was to do nothing to stop it, and on no account was I ever to call the police for assistance. He wished only to know if I had noticed something out of the ordinary.”

  “And did you ever observe suspicious activity outside the warehouse?”

  “None whatsoever,” replied William Grace. “Oh, there were lorries—drawn by horses, all of them—that regularly pulled up before the warehouse, and crates were unloaded from them and carried into the building, and other crates were removed from within and carted away.”

  He scratched his head.

  “Now that I think of it, during those last few days there were far more removals than deliveries. In any case, Mr. Borge told me to expect such activity—that parcels would arrive every day while others would be shipped out. And there were a few workmen who did go in and out of the building during the night—but though they were dressed the part, they did not have the air of simple labourers, if you know what I mean.”

  “I believe I do,” Holmes assured him. “Did you ever speak to any of those men?”

  “Oh no, for you see, that was another instruction given me by Mr. Borge: I was never to approach anyone going into or coming out of that building. I was to speak to someone only if they spoke to me first.”

  “Did you not consider that unusual?”

  “Of course I did, but the way I saw it, I was getting paid to follow directions, wasn’t I?”

  “True, you were,” admitted Holmes. “And beyond those instructions, rather singular in themselves, you say you did not observe any unusual activity outside the building?”

  “Besides the somewhat suspicious appearance of those coming and going, I never witnessed anything that was out of the ordinary, no.”

  “And what were your hours of observation?”

  “From nine o’clock in the evening through to the same hour of the morning: twelve hours straight. I had a key which allowed entry into that portion of the warehouse I previously mentioned, where there were private facilities in case I found myself in need during the night.”

  “I see,” said Holmes, now enveloped in a smoky miasma. “Well, your story thus far is of interest, to be sure. You said, however, that you had a particular complaint.”

  “Yes,” said Mr. Grace. “You see, though there was no written contract with Mr. Borge, I did enter into a verbal agreement with him. The man promised me a full year of work. For the first six weeks, I was paid regularly by a man who had been at Mr. Borge’s side when I signed on. It was to that individual that I made my daily reports.”

  “And from what you have told me, I assume he emerged from the building and accosted you each day?”

  “Yes, he came out very
briefly every morning to ask if I had seen anything unusual, and each time I told him I had not. He was the only such person from the place with whom I ever spoke. And every Friday, he would give me my week’s wages.”

  “Can you describe this individual?” asked Holmes.

  Mr. Grace shrugged. “Well, that brings up something a bit odd in itself, for you see, every time I saw him, he appeared just a bit different. Oh, he was tall and a tad on the thin side, but his style of clothes, the cut of his hair, the manner of the man’s walk—each time these and other aspects of him changed a bit. Some days, it was only by talking to him that I could be sure it was the same gent. Well, that and the two ugly moles on his face.”

  Holmes exhaled noticeably, and his eyes made a circuit round the room, catching in turn Farrar, Johnson, and me before returning to Grace.

  “Go on,” he said. “You said you were given wages every Friday.”

  “Right, but you see, this past Wednesday, when I came to the warehouse to take my nightly station, I thought it somehow seemed vacant.”

  Holmes stared at the man as if willing him to continue.

  “Well, I stayed for two hours nonetheless,” Grace said, “for in the past there had always been deliveries after such an interval, as well as those odd workmen coming and going. This evening, however, there was no activity at all. At length, despite my standing orders, I knocked upon the main entrance door, but to no effect. Then I happened to see, strolling by, two other men employed elsewhere in the area. They worked during the day, and I had often chatted idly with them as they were on their way home while I was about to begin my nightly vigil. I took them aside to ask about the warehouse.

  “‘Heard it was evacuated earlier today,’ one of them says. ‘I saw them take many crates out of it this afternoon,’ the other one tells me.”

  Holmes nodded.

  “I went to the building door again,” Grace said. “This time I pounded on it with force, but there was still no answer. Judging the warehouse was indeed vacant, I trudged home, reckoning there was no point in watching over an empty shell.

  “I returned the next day and found the place still quiet, except for a band of small boys who were poking about the back. I thought to chase them away, but then I decided that if Mr. Borge had abandoned me, I’d not lift a finger for his blasted warehouse. I went in search of a pint or two instead. Indeed, that has been my principal activity since.”

  “It was late yesterday that we saw Mr. Grace, glass in hand, declaiming for all to hear,” said Frank Farrar. “We spoke with him then and there, received his full story, and convinced him to tell his tale to you.”

  Holmes leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling for a moment, the arm holding his pipe extended out to the side, and then he brought down his chin and cast a neutral glance at Farrar and Johnson before saying, “It is a story that has more than one element of interest. Great interest, indeed.”

  “But there is more to tell, Mr. Holmes,” said Shinwell Johnson.

  “Yes,” agreed Grace. “For I’ve not yet fully stated my great discontent. You see, I was promised work and pay for a full year, and I received money for less than two months. I want my sovereign a week for the rest of those weeks I was guaranteed, I tell you!”

  Once more, Holmes’s expression became one of rapt interest. Cocking his head, the detective asked, “Did you say a sovereign per week?”

  “That’s right. He wasn’t paying in any of those paper Bradburys. Mr. Borge’s man gave me sovereigns, what you can depend on.”229

  Holmes looked with sparkling eyes at Johnson and Farrar, who nodded to him in unison. Holmes returned the gesture, and all three men smiled. There followed several more minutes of interrogation by Holmes, then instructions to his pair of agents, after which he promised to William Grace that he would investigate the matter thoroughly and attempt to gain justice for his new client.

  “Thank you for hearing me out,” said Grace as Farrar and Johnson prepared to escort him from the house. “However, what will be your fee, Mr. Holmes?”

  “I leave it to you, sir,” replied the detective, whereupon William Grace let out a hearty laugh.

  “Very well said,” chuckled the cabman. “Very well said, indeed.”230

  Grace turned to go, but then, glancing at me with a mixture of apology and hope, asked, “Do you think, Dr. Watson, that there is a bit of a chance that someday this might serve as the basis for one of your stories?”

  “We will see,” I replied in a soothing tone.

  As Grace left in the company of Farrar and Johnson, Holmes tended his pipe thoughtfully. I patiently waited for him to utter a comment, and at length, after the house door had closed, my friend said, “We have more than a few strands now, Watson—we have enough to twist into a hefty thread. I should like to see what pulling on the skein will yield.”

  “And will Farrar and Johnson do the tugging?”

  “I believe I will take a hand first,” Holmes replied. “Tomorrow, your leg willing, we will together examine that warehouse site.”

  “For evidence of Gussiter’s Deep-breathing System?”

  “For that and more. Meanwhile, the matter of Mr. Grace’s wage deserves a careful pull as well.”

  “The use of sovereigns is significant, I gather.”

  “Of course it is,” replied Holmes, standing up suddenly. He strode to the mantel and knocked out his pipe. “No one pays in sovereigns any more. I cannot remember the last time I saw one in common use.”

  “Why would anyone employ them?”

  “To avoid the risk of utilising a bank,” said Holmes. “If Mr. Grace has been unknowingly working for the Germans, their payments would of course be made in currency drawn from funds previously stockpiled for such use. Assuming that accumulation was made prior to the war, it would be composed of sovereigns rather than paper notes.”

  “Even if this is the tip of some Germany espionage activity, can you be certain that Von Bork is involved?” I asked.

  Holmes leaned upon the mantel and smiled. “I cannot be absolutely certain—yet—but to my mind, the name of Mr. Grace’s employer, Mr. Borge, is suggestive of ‘Von Bork,’ is it not?”

  “I get your point. And what is your plan?”

  “To get on with my own business,” Holmes said. “May I?” he asked, gesturing toward the pile of yellow foolscap that I kept at my writing desk in the corner of the sitting room.

  “Of course,” I replied.

  “The examination of bodies, the questioning of clients, it all slowly comes back to me after all these years,” said Holmes as he reached for one of my pens as well. “So too with placing notices in the newspapers.

  “Ah,” he said, putting pen and paper upon the table as if something had suddenly come to mind.

  “Only after I have secured your marmalade, Watson.”

  § § §

  The next morning—a rainy and glooming one, but also one that saw my physical condition much improved and my outlook on life brightened by the presence of marmalade—I accompanied Holmes down toward Poplar, where—using William Grace’s description of the warehouse he had watched—we found the aged brick structure in question.

  Grace had exaggerated somewhat about the building being near the gasworks, which in reality was perhaps three-quarters of a mile away, though in the distance, we could see smoke rising from its slag heaps, and from some locations the top of a great gasometer.231

  “It seems Dieter Baumann was somewhat loose in his description of his place of work as well,” Holmes noted. “Farrar and Johnson have been combing an area too far to the east. No wonder their searches came up dry.”

  “Still,” I replied, sniffing, “the gasworks seem close enough this morning.”

  “Yes,” my friend agreed. “We may blame that upon the direction of the wind.”

  In a state of mild discomfort from the noxious tinge wafting in from the facility, I was led by Holmes through a slow circumnavigation of the block upon which the wareh
ouse sat, during which we contemplated every angle of its design.

  “I wouldn’t go in there” came a sudden, high-pitched voice from behind.

  Turning, we saw three young boys staring at us. After a moment, one stepped forward and said, “I told you gents you better not go inside.”

  “And why do you say that?” asked Holmes.

  The small fellow looked at his companions and then replied cautiously, “It’s haunted,” he said, pointing at the warehouse. “It is, you know. Best not to go inside.”

  “Do you know someone who has taken that chance?” enquired my friend. “What fate did he suffer?”

  Again the boy glanced at his two friends before responding. “We got a pal what paid for the trespass,” he told us. “He got a nasty hurt.”

  “What kind of hurt? Did a ghost strike him?”

  The boy did not respond.

  “Was the building deserted then, as it is now?”

  “Yes,” said another of the lads. “It was empty, except for the spirits.”

  “What spirits do you keep speaking of?” asked Holmes. “What should we fear from going inside?”

  “Boils,” said the third boy. “Like what you get when you touch a ghost.”

  Holmes looked at me and then asked the first lad, “Is your wounded friend about? May we speak with him?”

  “He didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “Of course he didn’t. We would merely wish to—”

  Before Holmes could finish his statement, the three turned and ran down the street, vanishing round a corner.

  “Though my leg is better, I doubt I can follow in pursuit,” I said.

  “No matter,” said Holmes. “We could never overtake those streetwise tykes, even were we both in fine health and a good thirty years younger. And to give chase would only further alarm them.”

  He turned toward the vacant warehouse.

  “Perhaps their curiosity will draw them back within a short time. But come,” my friend said, beginning another circuit of the block. “I believe I espied a door in the back alley that will provide us discreet entry.”

  “You risk the wrath of ghosts and retribution at the hands of the law as well?” I asked humorously.