Encounters of Sherlock Holmes

by George Mann

Holmes flicked his fingers.

  “He is—or, rather, was, when in his prime—an explorer,” I said. “He more or less single-handedly opened central Africa, leading to the discovery of the source of the River Nile. He also examined the cultures of West Africa, was one of the first Englishmen to enter forbidden Mecca, and, I believe, was a secret agent for Sir Charles Napier in India.”

  “Oh, he’s much more than that,” Swinburne interjected. “Sir Richard is fluent in at least thirty languages. He’s counted as one of the best swordsmen in Europe. He’s a scholar, a disguise artist, an author, a poet, a mesmerist, and an anthropologist.”

  Much to my discomfort, a tear rolled down the poet’s cheek.

  “But I fear these are his twilight years,” he said. “My friend is not the man he used to be. He’s sixty-seven years old, and the hardships of Africa have caught up with him. But, by God, he’s determined not to go without making one last contribution to man’s knowledge! Two years ago, Mr Holmes, he translated and published an Arabian manuscript entitled The Perfumed Garden of the Cheikh Nefzaoui. It is a treatise concerning the art of physical love between a man and a woman.”

  I cleared my throat. “Is it—is it—decent, Mr Swinburne?”

  The poet snorted derisively. “Some idiots claim it to be naught but erotica.” He leaned forward. “But do you not agree, Mr Holmes, that through the detailed study of every aspect of human behaviour —every aspect—we can gain a better understanding not only of individual motivations, but also of the racial and cultural proclivities that inform those motivations?”

  Holmes opened his eyes and looked a little surprised. “That is a very astute observation, and I agree without reservation.”

  “Then you’ll understand the dissatisfaction Sir Richard has felt concerning that volume, for it was published incomplete.”

  “In what respect?”

  “He’d been unable to locate a version of the work in its original Arabic, and so was forced to translate from a French edition from which the notorious twenty-first chapter had been omitted. That chapter, by itself, is almost the same length as the entirety of the remaining material. It deals with what we English refer to as unnatural vices—that is to say, physical relations between men.”

  “Holmes,” I murmured, “I’m not sure we should involve ourselves with—”

  “Nonsense!” my friend snapped. “Continue, please, Mr Swinburne.”

  “Last year, Sir Richard discovered that an Algerian book dealer owned a copy of the work in its original language and with chapter twenty-one intact. He purchased it, and now intends to re-translate and annotate the entire volume, complete with the missing material. He regards it as his greatest project.”

  “And it is this manuscript that has been stolen?” Holmes asked.

  “Not the complete thing; just chapter twenty-one. You can see why the police can’t be informed. They couldn’t possibly understand the anthropological value of the document. To them, it would be classed as filth of the worst kind. Sir Richard would be arrested.”

  Holmes grunted. “From where, exactly, was the chapter taken?”

  “From a travelling trunk in his hotel bedroom.” The poet suddenly slapped a fist into the palm of his hand and cried out, “A curse on Avery, damn him! May the hound rot!”

  “You’re getting ahead of yourself,” Holmes said. “Avery?”

  Swinburne shook his fist and snarled, “Edward Avery. A bookseller. The Burtons had hardly arrived in London before they learned that the swine has been illegally publishing and selling the earlier edition of The Perfumed Garden. Sir Richard confronted the rogue who, knowing that there could be no legal redress, brazenly offered to publish chapter twenty-one as a supplement. This was refused, of course, and Avery responded by declaring that, one way or another, he would see the chapter in print to his own benefit.”

  The little man angrily swept the tears from his cheek. “I lost my good friend Tom Bendyshe tonight, Mr Holmes. I want vengeance. Bring Edward Avery to justice, and restore that chapter to Burton before I lose him as well.”

  The carriage came to a jolting halt and the driver shouted down to us, “St James Hotel, gents!”

  We disembarked.

  “Two and six, please.”

  “Again?” Swinburne yelled. “It’s a confounded conspiracy!”

  Holmes took the poet by the elbow, dragged him away, and called, “Pay and follow, Watson!”

  I fished in my pocket for change, passed the coins up to the cabbie, and chased after my companions.

  The St James Hotel, off Piccadilly and at the northeast end of Green Park, was familiar to Holmes and me, as was its manager, Joseph McGarrigle. A concierge ushered us up to the fourth floor and to suite 106, which we found guarded by two constables, both of whom recognised Holmes. They opened the door and we stepped through into a sitting room where Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard greeted us somewhat grudgingly. The pallid, rat-faced police detective was standing beside a chair occupied by a large, elderly woman who appeared to be in considerable distress. She was attired in an old-fashioned jacket and voluminous skirt, with a frilly bonnet pinned to her long, tightly wound hair. A large crucifix dangled from the end of her beaded necklace.

  I looked from her to the body of a slightly built man sprawled face down between the fireplace and the suite door. His head was turned to one side and a deep and bloody dent was visible between his eyebrows.

  Mr McGarrigle was seated at a table by the window.

  “Really, Holmes!” Lestrade exclaimed. “This is a very straightforward business. There’s nothing for you here.”

  “I shall be the judge of that, if you please, Lestrade,” Holmes replied. He bowed to the woman. “Lady Burton?”

  “Yes,” she responded huskily. “Thank you for coming, Mr Holmes. My husband has often expressed a desire to meet you. I wish it could have been under different circumstances.” Holding out a hand to Swinburne, who took it, she added, “Thank you, too, Algy.”

  “How is he?” the poet asked.

  “Terribly upset.” She sniffed and raised a handkerchief to her eyes.

  “Interrupted burglary,” Lestrade announced. “It’s as plain as a pikestaff. Thief came up the stairs outside, climbed in through the window, and was interrupted by Mr Bendyshe. Panicked, killed him, made off. Nothing stolen.”

  Sherlock Holmes stepped over to the body and squatted beside it. “How did he get in?”

  “I just said. Through the window.”

  “Not the burglar, Lestrade. Mr Bendyshe.”

  Lady Burton pointed across the chamber at a door opposite the fireplace. “Connecting rooms, Mr Holmes. Thomas was a dear friend. We had that door unlocked so he could come and go as he pleased.”

  Lestrade added, “He must have heard movement in here and came to investigate.”

  Holmes knelt and bent his head down close to the carpet. “I suppose you’ve been stamping around in your usual clumsy manner?”

  “I arrived little more than five minutes ago.”

  “Time enough to destroy evidence. I want to turn the body over. Do you object?”

  Lestrade hesitated then gave a curt nod of permission.

  Holmes indicated that I should draw closer. “Watson, come and help, but watch where you tread. Take the feet.”

  I joined him. We carefully rolled the corpse onto its back. I pointed to the head wound and noted, “Not much blood.” Holmes clicked his tongue and impatiently waved me away. He pulled a magnifying lens from inside his jacket and began a meticulous examination of the corpse, lingering over the watch that was hanging by its chain from Bendyshe’s waistcoat pocket. Without looking up, he said, “Tell me what occurred, please, Lady Burton.”

  Sir Richard’s wife gave her eyes a final dab with the handkerchief then folded it and pushed it into her sleeve. “I met Blanche—my sister—for dinner. When I came back, I found the room as you see it now, with poor Thomas on the floor. My husband and Algernon returned from their cl
ub almost immediately after I had alerted Mr McGarrigle. That is all.”

  The hotel manager interjected, “Mr Bendyshe arrived just a few minutes before Lady Burton. He asked if Dr Baker was here. I had been busy overseeing the change of staff to the night shift, and didn’t know whether he was or not. I suppose Mr Bendyshe came looking for him.”

  Algernon Swinburne said to Lady Burton, “May I go to Richard?”

  She nodded. “Take Dr Watson with you, Algy.” She turned to me. “I’d like your opinion of my husband’s condition, Doctor.”

  The poet gestured for me to follow, crossed to a door to the left of the chimneybreast, tapped on the portal, and entered.

  I glanced back at Holmes. He was now on his hands and knees, with his nose less than an inch from the carpet, snuffling around like a bloodhound between the dead man and the fireplace.

  I stepped into what proved to be the bedroom.

  A lean-faced man was sitting in a chair beside the bed. He stood and came forward.

  “Dr Watson? I’m Dr Grenfell Baker. I’m pleased to meet you.”

  “Um. The pleasure’s mine,” I responded, distractedly. My eyes were not on Baker but on his patient, who was sitting up in the bed.

  Sir Richard Francis Burton was glowering at me like the Devil incarnate. Though elderly, white haired, and plainly ill, he was as impressive an individual as I’d ever seen. His deep-set eyes cut me through just as Holmes’ always did, but they had none of the detective’s aloof coldness about them; instead, there was an angry sullenness that both warned and challenged, a look I had often observed in dangerous criminals but which was here supported by a very obvious and ferocious intellect. Burton was a man, I instantly perceived, who’d been tested at every turn, who’d battled his way through one obstacle after another, who had been hurt and defeated and insulted, but who absolutely refused to lie down and take it. That he bore emotional scars was plainly evident—one could see it in that terrible gaze—but he was marked by physical ones, too. A long, savage furrow scored his left cheek; a smaller one, on the opposite side, puckered the skin at the angle of his jaw; and there were pockmarks and old wounds visible all over his face and hands.

  Partly concealed by a moustache and short beard, his determined mouth was set hard, though it now twitched at the corners in what might have been an attempted smile.

  “Watson, hey?” His voice was deep and gruff. “I have read your accounts with great interest, sir.”

  He stretched out his hand to clasp mine. I stepped forward to take it, and, in doing so, suddenly saw through the famous explorer’s brutal appearance and recognised the frail old man beneath. Burton’s eyes were bulging unnaturally, his breathing was too fast and too shallow, his skin felt cold and clammy, and there was a blue tinge to his lips. I had seen the symptoms many times before. His heart was giving out. He was dying.

  “Sir Richard,” I said. “It is truly an honour to meet you. As your wife observed, it’s a shame it isn’t under different circumstances. Sherlock Holmes is looking for evidence in the other room and will be with you presently.”

  “No,” he growled. “I’ll not receive him as a blasted invalid. I want to watch him work.”

  He swung his legs over the side of the bed and pushed himself up.

  “For crying out loud!” Dr Baker exclaimed. “Why do you insist on disobeying my every order? Lie down at once!”

  “Squawk, squawk!” Burton grumbled. He reached for a robe that hung from the bedpost and shrugged into it. “You’re like a parakeet, Baker! Always making noise! Algy, offer me your shoulder, there’s a good chap.”

  Swinburne scuttled forward and gave Burton support.

  “Lead on, Dr Watson. You come too, Baker. Perhaps exposure to a scientific intellect will cure you of your quackery.”

  Baker and I fell in behind Burton and Swinburne as they slowly shuffled towards the door. Baker leaned close to me and whispered, “First I’m a parakeet, now I’m a duck. He is a perfectly impossible patient.”

  No sooner had we entered the lounge than Burton halted in front of us and uttered an oath in Arabic. “Bismillah!”

  Looking past him, I saw that Lestrade and McGarrigle were holding Sherlock Holmes by the ankles and dangling him out of the window.

  “What in blue blazes?” I cried out, rushing over. I leaned over the sill and saw that the detective was hanging upside down beside the metal staircase. He was holding a lighted match next to one of the points where the structure was bolted into the brickwork.

  “Give them a hand hauling me in, Watson!” he called.

  I reached down, dug my fingers into the top of his trousers, and helped Lestrade and McGarrigle drag him back to safety.

  Burton, who was being fussed over by his wife, steered her back into the chair she’d risen from, then turned to Holmes and said, “I never imagined I might meet you feet first, Mr Holmes. What in heaven’s name were you up to?”

  Holmes smiled. “As I am frequently forced to remind Inspector Lestrade, one does not collect evidence by treading on it.” He paced over to Burton and shook him by the hand. “I have read a great many of your accounts, Sir Richard. It is a rare pleasure to meet a man who knows not only how to look, but how to see.”

  I gritted my teeth at this. In the cab, Holmes had acted as if he knew little or nothing of the famous explorer when, in truth, he was almost certainly better informed than I. As he so often did, he’d encouraged me to display my knowledge not for information, but for its insufficiency, as if my inadequacies somehow aided him in the clarification of his own thoughts.

  “And what I see,” Burton said, “is that you have an unfortunate habit, Mr Holmes. Cocaine, is it? Forgive my bluntness, but you’re a bloody fool. If the damnable stuff doesn’t kill you, it will rob you—” to my utter astonishment, he lifted his hand and used his forefinger to tap Holmes sharply on the forehead “—of that exceptional mind of yours.”

  Sherlock Holmes appeared to be so taken aback by this that he was quite lost for words.

  “Dick,” Lady Burton objected. “Mr Holmes is here to help.”

  My friend recovered himself, bowed his head to her, and said, “It is perfectly all right, madam. Your husband is absolutely correct.” He turned back to Burton. “My eyes?”

  “Yes. Your pupils are slightly mismatched in size—the left being dilated—and your lower lids are too dark for your complexion. There are other indications. You are unnaturally gaunt. Your gums are slightly receded. No doubt, if you raised your sleeve, I would see needle marks. What is it, a ten per cent solution taken at regular intervals?”

  “Seven,” Holmes answered quietly “And irregular.”

  “Ah! So Dr Watson is weaning you off it, then?”

  “He is.”

  “Then you are blessed with a very good friend indeed.” Burton was still using Swinburne as a physical support. He looked down at the little poet and said, “As am I. Thank you, Algy. I can stand unassisted, I think.”

  Dr Baker protested, “You shouldn’t be standing at all.”

  “Indeed not!” Lady Burton added.

  Burton turned to the hotel manager. “Mr McGarrigle, would you take my wife and Dr Baker downstairs and provide them with a pot of tea? Algy, go with them, please.”

  Swinburne flapped his arms. “What? What? What?”

  “I would like to speak in private with Mr Holmes. Dr Watson is his trusted confidant, so must stay. Inspector Lestrade represents Scotland Yard and will refuse to go. The rest of you, let us give Mr Holmes some space to do his work. No doubt he is dismayed to have so many people milling around the scene of a crime.” He clapped his hands together. “Out with you! Out! Out! We shall talk later!”

  Burton walked unsteadily over to his wife, who had resumed her weeping, and tenderly brushed her cheek with his hand. He kissed her and said softly, “You are tired, darling. Go downstairs. Rest. Don’t worry. I shall be fine, and I won’t be long.”

  She clung to him for a moment then reluct
antly followed the others. As they were passing through the door, Holmes called, “One moment! Mr McGarrigle, can you tell me how often the exterior staircase is used?”

  “It’s not used at all, Mr Holmes,” the hotel manager responded, “and hasn’t been for years. It is unsafe. As I’m sure you saw, the bolts that hold it against the wall are loose.”

  When the group had departed, Sir Richard Francis Burton gazed sadly at Bendyshe’s body for a moment before then turning to face Lestrade. “My apologies, Inspector, I did not greet you. What is your opinion of this affair?”

  Lestrade hooked his thumbs into his waistcoat. “As I told Holmes, Sir Richard, it is a simple matter. A burglar risked those outside stairs, climbed in through the open window, but was confronted by Mr Bendyshe before he could make off with anything.”

  Burton glanced at Holmes, sharing, with that quick look, the secret of the stolen chapter.

  “The intruder attacked Bendyshe,” Lestrade went on, “and struck him a fatal blow to the head before escaping back the way he had come.”

  “I see. Do you agree with that assessment, Holmes?”

  “No, I do not.”

  “Good. Neither do I.”

  Lestrade emitted a groan, screwed up his eyes, massaged his temples, and whispered, “Oh, spare me! Now there are two of them!”

  Burton said, “And you, Dr Watson. Do you see where Lestrade’s theory stumbles and falls?”

  I looked at Holmes. He was regarding me with arms folded and an amused twinkle in his eyes. He murmured, “You know my methods, Watson.”

  I sighed and cast my eyes over the room.

  “The head wound,” I said.

  “Ah ha!” Burton responded.

  “Bravo!” Holmes added.

  “And the position of the body. If Bendyshe entered through the connecting door, why is he now closer to the suite’s entrance? One might suppose that he grappled with the burglar, was forced back across the room, and was murdered where we now see him lying. But there are no signs of a struggle and the wound is on the front of his skull. If he was struck there with enough force to kill him, why did he not fall backwards, as you’d expect? Why is he stretched out face down?”