Embassy Row

by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

  “You mean the records of money transfers to the embassies?” She inquired. “How do you get your hands on these fascinating documents, and so quickly?”

  Holmes wagged a finger at her. “Miss Gatspy, you ought to know me well enough by now to realize that is a question I am not at liberty to answer.”

  I went into the hall and took my coat, muffler, and hat from the rack near the entry. Even in the dim light, the brass urns glowed, the Arabic script around the mouths of them seeming to have movement in their shape; I wondered if our writing looked as strange to Arabs as their writing did to me. I let myself out of the flat and descended to the street, pleased that my ankle did little more than ache as I went.

  An unfamiliar jarvey was driving the cab drawn by a piebald bay that pulled up for me, and I looked up in surprise, faltering.

  “Sid Hastings sent me,” said the jarvey. “He’s called away to tend. to his boy Matthew. Broke his wrist; the lad did, falling off a fence. Sid told me to pick you up.”

  “And how did you know me?” I asked, feeling suspicious.

  “Why, Sid pointed out the address and said as you was a cove with a bruise the size of a beef chop, just turning to green. You come down the stairs from the address I was told, and half your face looks like old Stilton. Who else would you be but Mister Guthrie?” He made an impatient gesture with his whip. “You getting in, then?”

  Reluctantly, I climbed into the cab and pulled the panel shut, all the while keeping a careful watch on passers-by. I chided myself for being too cautious as I gave him Lady Brackenheath’s direction.

  There were a number of carriages pulled up near the Brackenheaths’ town house, and as I got out of the cab, I told the jarvey to drive around the block to find a place to wait, for surely he could not do it here without impeding the flow of traffic in the street.

  “How long will you be?” asked Sid Hastings’s deputy.

  “No more than half an hour,” I said, confident that if I could not have a word with Lady Brackenheath in that time, I would not be able to secure a moment with her until tomorrow.

  Haggard admitted me, a hint of alarm in his impassive face as he recognized me. “Mister Guthrie.” He glanced over his shoulder to the stairs leading up to the first floor, and kept his voice low as he spoke to me, unwilling to announce my presence in any way. “If it is Lady Brackenheath you wish to see, it is not convenient just at present. She is receiving the condolences of Lord Brackenheath’s mourners.”

  “Not all of them,” I said, in what I hoped was sudden inspiration, “for I would conjecture he had companions you would not admit to this house.”

  “True enough,” he said, taking my meaning at once.

  “And not all of them ladybirds or roisterers,” I prompted, and fell silent, encouraging him to talk.

  “Not by half,” said Haggard, finally indicating the corridor to the servants’ quarters. He wore the look of a small boy apprehended with pockets full of sweet biscuits. “Best come with me, sir, if I take the purpose of your visit.”

  “And you think that might be—” I got no farther.

  “I think you suppose Lord Brackenheath was not wholly innocent in his own demise.” He favored me with a single, decisive nod. “And I have begun to think so, as well. He had recently taken up some dashed queer associates. Not his usual thing at all, not gamblers and rakes, but something more . . . more deliberate. These weren’t flash coves, bent on debauch, but men with that shine in the eyes, if you take my meaning? like they was following a vision.” He saw one of the chambermaids coming toward him, and discreetly held his tongue until the woman was past. “He had taken to attending meetings. He had been doing this for more than a month, though I thought at first he would tire of it quickly. On two separate occasions his Lordship brought men to this house such as I have never before opened the door to. I was very much shocked when I was informed that these men were his trusted companions, and to receive every courtesy.”

  I sensed that Haggard’s indignation was still fresh, and so I decided to take advantage of it. “Do you recall anything you can tell me about these men.”

  “They weren’t true gentlemen, and that’s a fact. I wouldn’t say they were rum, in the usual way. But not the sort you’d expect even a man of Lord Brackenheath’s questionable character to encourage.” He stared up at the ceiling as if the presence of these men lingered as an unrelenting insult to the household. “I was pleased that Lady Brackenheath never saw those men. She was away on a visit.”

  I had a fairly good notion who it was she saw, but I kept my thoughts to myself. “On both occasions?”

  “It was the same occasion,” said Haggard. “The men visited this house at a three-day interval, coming just after Lady Brackenheath left, and having their second visit shortly before she returned.” He coughed for punctuation. “I thought this was more than his usual disregard for Lady Brackenheath. It seemed to me that his Lordship did not wish Lady Brackenheath to discover what company he kept.”

  “And why was that? What was it about them that so troubles you?” It occurred to me I was listening to the gossip of servants again, but I could not make myself believe it was ignorant or idle.

  “They all had a very poor demeanor. I was much struck by it at the time of their first visit. Lord Brackenheath often kept company with break-of-day boys, but not with such commoners as these.” He frowned as he strove to find a way to make his reservations more comprehensible. “Two of them had the manners of clerks, with threadbare coats and greasy hair, and not too nice in their grooming. They were the more strident in their speaking. The other two were neater and quieter, in conservative coats of better cut, apparently because they were the leaders. They spoke with public school accents. They all had the same fixed look about them, as one sees in certain fanatics.” Again he thought about his answer. “They were forever muttering about the danger white men faced in the East.”

  Remembering the reprehensible conduct of Lord Brackenheath with the Japanese, and how Mister Minato had been loath to speak of it, I could not be entirely surprised. “These men all shared his views, I take it,” I said.

  “And more,” confirmed Haggard. “He—that is, Lord Brackenheath—had promised to support their interests, though I have never known him to support any but his own. It may be that he was as determined to put these men at a disadvantage as he was to bring Lady Brackenheath to shame.” He rubbed his jaw, his only outward sign of discomfort. “I am not like those who suppose the Orientals are so inferior that they cannot be thought quite human, as many do, for they have achieved a civilization all their own, and I have been told it is older than any we have had in England. I do not love them, either, but I have met a few of the Chinese merchants Mister Bell did business with, and I knew he had respect for them and held them in high regard as clever, industrious, and honest. And never did I hear him disparage the race as a lot of filthy opium eaters, as Lord Brackenheath has.” He stopped unsteadily.

  “I take it you are concerned that some of what these men wished Lord Brackenheath to do for them was disrupt the negotiations for the naval agreement. And that he was willing to undertake the task.” I did not have as much time as I wished to make it easier for Haggard to unburden himself.

  “That was a part of it. But he—Lord Brackenheath—spoke to a foreign gentleman after his second meeting with these men, and he took great satisfaction in boasting to this fellow that his patriotism would gain him the freedom he wanted.”

  “Was this the same foreign gentleman you mentioned to me on my previous visit?” How very like a good butler, I thought, to tell only as much as he supposed was necessary for the best interests of his employers.

  “No. But I had the impression they were part of the same whole. The man who came here may well have been an intermediary, sent to ascertain the situation, and then the other one, in the carriage, sealed their bargain, whatever it was.”

  “Why did you say nothing of this before, Haggard?” I asked, although I
guessed the answer. “Surely you were aware it might have a bearing on his death?”

  He looked away from me to an empty place on the far wall. “I didn’t think it was called for, Mister Guthrie.”

  A reprimand would be useless and inappropriate coming from me. I did my best to take this with good grace. “I might have thought so, too, in your position.”

  He accepted this with obvious relief “Thank you, sir. It was not my intention to mislead you in any particular. I realize now I should have imparted the whole to you earlier, but—” He held up his hand. “I may have something that will help.” With that he motioned me to remain where I was while he vanished into the rooms beyond, only to emerge a few minutes later clutching something in his hand. “The strange men I spoke of? The last night they were here, one of them dropped this pamphlet. I . . . removed it from the salon.” He held it out to me as a token offering of apology.

  I read the title of the work and the breath all but stopped in my throat. I took the pamphlet as if I thought it might burst into flame. It was about two dozen sheets poorly printed on bad paper and it boasted a lurid illustration of a man in Oriental robes bending over a swooning English lass in a posture that Edmund Sutton would probably describe as comedic. But for all the tawdry appearance of the thing, its intent could well have been wrought in iron.

  THE DANGER FROM THE EAST

  A warning to all true Englishmen of the menace from the East and the seduction of Orientalism by Jeremiah Hackett an Englishmen raised in China and Japan

  “I hope it will help, sir,” said Haggard.

  FROM THE JOURNAL OF PHILIP TYERS

  A messenger has just arrived from Mister Tschersky of the Russian embassy, and M H has taken it to his study to read privately. Miss Gatspy remains in the sitting room with the various banking records being reviewed.

  G is expected back directly, and then, according to M H the whole will be made clear, for he is convinced he will then be able to determine what purpose Lord Brackenheath’s death was meant to serve. How he can be so confident of this I cannot tell but in all the years I have known him, I have only once heard him make such an announcement and have it not turn out as he declared.

  Sutton has improved enough to want something to eat, which is most encouraging. I have, in accordance with Dr. W’s instructions, prepared a sirloin of beef and will give him a glass of port when he is done. W says that such a restoring regimen should have Sutton back on his feet in a week at most. Sutton is not as confident as the Doctor is. He complains of pain and weakness, but his voice is stronger and he no longer has the air of one who has looked upon the world for the last time, which is most satisfactory.

  “WHY DIDN’T HE give this to the police?” Holmes mused aloud as he flipped through the pages of the pamphlet.

  “Embarrassment, I suspect, and an inherent desire to control the extent of the scandal,” I said, having thought the matter over at some length on the way back to Holmes’ flat in the cab. “Not just for Lady Brackenheath, but for the whole establishment. He does his utmost to protect the whole.”

  “I take it you’ve read it?” said Holmes, slapping the pamphlet against the palm of his left hand.

  “A bit. Not the whole of it. I take it it is all on the same note.” What had impressed me the most was the odd assumption on Hackett’s part that the whole of the East existed only to make life miserable for the West, that the East had no goals of its own but to thwart ours. I imagined that Hackett’s youth in the Orient must have been ghastly for him.

  “Repulsive claptrap, isn’t it?” he asked of the air. “This part about the ritual flogging of samurai warriors: What on earth was he thinking of? He lived there, and he should have known—” He tossed the pamphlet aside. “So now we know where the rot is in our establishment. We must now discover precisely what it is that Hackett was supposed to do, or may have done, to harm the negotiations. Let us hope he is as proud of his actions as he is of his writing. And someone will have to explain to my satisfaction,” he went on with icy purpose, “how it happens that a man of such extreme public opinions has come to hold a post of high confidence in the government.”

  I felt a kind of pity for the functionary who had permitted Jeremiah Hackett to be employed in this work, for Mycroft Holmes’ wrath was formidable. Then I had a second, less compassionate thought—suppose the man who had hired Hackett had done it for the express purpose of putting forward the plan to end the negotiations, that it was not accidental lack of prudence but deliberate sabotage? That possibility was most disquieting. I made an involuntary gesture of repulsion, and was only mildly surprised when Holmes took my meaning and responded as if I had spoken aloud.

  “Yes, I concur. It is never welcome to think ill of those who are supposed to do our bidding, and share our interests. But history is filled with betrayals, with those who gnawed away from the heart of the state to bring it down.” Holmes came and sat down at the sitting room table. “This, with the intelligence provided by Yvgeny Tschersky, makes it possible to resolve the whole matter with dispatch and—”

  “You cannot have the whole of it,” I protested.

  He ducked his head, a sign of concession. “Not everything, no. I do not know precisely who killed Lord Brackenheath, but I am now certain why he was killed, and once I have determined what Lord Brackenheath’s plans were when he was killed, I am fairly certain the perpetrator will become obvious.” He pointed to an envelope bearing the double-headed eagle of Russia. “Yvgeny Tschersky has provided the most significant information.”

  “The Grodno Hussar,” I said, confident that was the matter to hand. “He has been identified.”

  “The Grodno Hussar,” he confirmed. “Who is not, as your Miss Gatspy told us from the first, either Russian or a Grodno Hussar.” He noticed the pained look on my face. “Yes, very well,” he interjected impatiently. “She is not your Miss Gatspy. But she was correct in her information from the first.”

  “She said the man is Hungarian,” I reminded him.

  “And so he is. According to the information Tschersky has provided, he is Lajos Pecs, a younger son in a minor noble house. He has gone out to make his way in the world, and, as you can see, he has achieved some success.” His heavy brows raised. “Well, would you not say he has done well?”

  “At what? At passing for a Russian? Evidently not,” I said, my bafflement coming out in the manner of a challenge, “for we have discovered his ruse in short order.”

  “Yes, we have. But only because we looked for him, and had been given a timely warning as to his true allegiance. The deception was a very clever one, as this whole affair has been.” Holmes was somber now, his profound grey eyes seeming to darken as he went on. “If we had not had Miss Gatspy to aid us, it might have been two or three days more before I sought out Yvgeny Tschersky, and then the damage would be done.” He lifted one hand to show his opinion of the peculiarities of the fate he did not believe in.

  “But we were spared that misfortune,” I said for him.

  “So we were. Your Miss Gatspy is a woman to reckon with.” Holmes smiled deliberately.

  “That she is,” I said, capitulating. He could not—or would not—stop tweaking me about Miss Gatspy, and my annoyance only served to egg him on.

  Holmes made an approving gesture. “Very wise, Guthrie,” he said, and reached for a sheet of notepaper, his inkwell, and a pen; he began at once to write a few lines. “And I regret to tell you that there is another errand you must run for me, and that quickly. Ambassador Tochigi cannot be left uninformed. He is currently at Prince Jiro’s London residence, in Standish Mews; you will find the number here on the envelope. The place is being guarded by the Swiss for the nonce. I want you to see he receives this. Give it to him personally.” He finished up his note, folded it, put it into an envelope which he sealed with wax and then handed to me.

  “Is there anything you wish me to tell him? Shall I wait for an answer?” I asked.

  “Ordinarily I would ask yo
u to wait, but on this occasion, I need you back here promptly. There is much more to do.” He took a deep breath. “Once Charles Shotley delivers the last of the material I have requested, we’ll have everything right and tight.” Then he lowered his voice. “When you return, look in on Edmund, will you? He is feeling well enough to feel neglected. You may tell him where you have gone today.”

  “He is still improving?” I asked.

  “Thank goodness, yes, he is,” said Holmes quietly. “He claims he wishes to continue in his impersonation of me. I am not certain that it is wise, but . . . I must have a double, or I cannot tend properly to my duties. And it took me four years of searching to find him.”

  “It would be dreadful to have to search another four years,” I said, striving to capture his tone of voice.

  “I wouldn’t make the attempt,” said Holmes. “I do not think I could be so fortunate twice in my life. And so I would become a prisoner of my own mythology, and I would have to live here all the time except for daily excursions across the street and the occasional bolt to Oxford or Cambridge, or whatever place the government—” He shook his head. “All this is true enough, but the most important thing to me is that my friend, who risked his life for my sake, will not have to die for me. I don’t think I could bear that.”

  “Amen,” I added to this with great feeling.

  Holmes favored me with a long stare. “Yes.” He changed his stance. “You may say this does not march with what I do—for men are sent to battle and death on my recommendation. I cannot deny it. I have been given the responsibility for aiding the direction of the ship of state, and part of that burden is the knowledge of requiring deaths.” The weight of this admission was in his eyes as I had never seen it before. “And that is why I strive to keep us from war, to arrange our treaties to best serve the purpose of a just peace, to resort to battle when nothing else is possible. All else is profligacy. I have no wish to be a despot, to measure my success by the number of bodies reckoned to my credit. If I thought I might do that, I would retire from public life and devote myself to horticulture.”