by Hayes, Steve
Outside, the afternoon had turned distinctly colder and low grey clouds scudded overhead, propelled by a biting wind. Holmes, seemingly unaware of the inclement weather, suggested they walk the circumference of the Palace before calling it a day.
By this time Watson’s gammy leg was starting to play up – as it always did in damp weather – but Holmes seemed so energized by their surroundings that Watson didn’t have the heart to destroy the mood, and so agreed without demur.
For all his aches and pains, Watson couldn’t deny that it was wonderful to be back in Holmes’s company. And, though it had been hard to accept the truth about Irene Hastings, he appreciated that Holmes had not only saved him from being gypped out of his money, but had also managed to lift him out of the dark mood which had threatened to crush him.
‘I must confess,’ he remarked wearily as they continued their stroll around the palace grounds, ‘I never knew you had such an interest in architecture.’
‘It is something I have begun to cultivate in my twilight years,’ Holmes said, studying his surroundings with such intensity he seemed to be trying to commit them to memory.
As they walked on it began to sleet. Holmes showed no awareness of the foul conditions, or that Watson’s limp was increasing. Instead he became more and more withdrawn until Watson finally asked him if anything was wrong.
Holmes shook his head. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘You seem unusually preoccupied.’
‘Not a bit of it.’
‘Come now,’ Watsin said, exasperated. ‘You forget – I know you of old. There is something going on in that all-seeing, all-reasoning mind of yours. What is it?’
Holmes started to reply, then stopped as he noticed how difficult Watson was finding the going.
‘My dear fellow, forgive me,’ he said. ‘You are favouring your leg more than usual. And small wonder. It has been a long day and this wet weather certainly cannot do an old war wound much good.’
‘That’s all right,’ Watson said, trying to make light of it. ‘I’m fine.’
‘No – it was thoughtless of me to drag you along on this interminable circuit – and typical that you should acquiesce without complaint.’ Holmes stopped and clapped his companion on the arm. ‘Come along – we shall return to our hotel and seek to restore you with a pot of tea, a slice of Marmor Schnitte and a short rest.’
‘Well … if you insist.’
They returned to the Heldenplatz, where Holmes bought an evening newspaper and then flagged down what they still called in England a Forder cab. As they rode back to the Grand, he scanned the paper, found what he was looking for, then folded it and tucked it into his overcoat pocket.
‘It appears we shall have to wait another day before we can see Houdini at work,’ he announced. ‘The show has been cancelled for the second night running, and though the management is hopeful that the curtain will go up tomorrow night, they are by no means sure.’
‘What a dashed shame,’ said Watson.
Winter darkness stole across the city. By the time they reached their hotel the streetlamps had been lit and Vienna again resembled a scene from a Christmas card of old. As Watson climbed down from the cab, he stifled a yawn and wearily suggested that an early night was in order.
Holmes paid the cab driver and then turned to him. ‘I am sorry to hear that, Watson, for I regret to say that an early night will not be possible.’
‘No? Why?’
‘Because I suspect we are about to receive a visitor. And quite possibly the answer to a mystery.’
Watson stiffened. ‘What—?’
‘Have a care, old friend. No need to tip our hand.’ Grasping Watson’s arm, Holmes guided him toward the hotel’s revolving door. ‘Let us get in out of the cold.’
As they entered the lobby, Watson demanded to know what was going on.
‘As we alighted from the cab a moment ago,’ Holmes explained, ‘I spotted a familiar figure across the road attempting, somewhat unsuccessfully, to remain hidden in the shadows of the alleyway there. As soon as this person spotted us, they started forward, then hesitated. I can think of no other reason for such reticence besides a wish to avoid being seen with us on the street. But we shall see soon enough, for here comes our visitor now.’
The revolving doors began to turn. A moment later Frances Lane entered, a check motoring wrap buttoned about her throat and a small handbag clutched in her gloved hand. She hesitated when she noticed Holmes and Watson awaiting her arrival and stared at them.
Watson could not believe his eyes. The woman seemed to have aged noticeably since their last meeting.
‘Ah … Mr Holmes…!’ she began.
‘You have been awaiting our arrival, I presume?’
She blinked her distinctive green eyes in dismay. She looked so cold and desperate that Watson quickly moved to take her by one arm, saying gently, ‘Come, Miss Lane. You are frozen to the bone.’
She started to protest, but Watson would have none of it. He led her across the lobby toward a corner table that was shielded from the entrance by some artfully arranged potted palms, leaving Holmes to order tea from a passing waiter.
By the time Holmes had rejoined his companion, Watson had seated Miss Lane at a small round table and was studying her with concern. She was close to tears and until this moment had not seemed the crying type. ‘There, there,’ said Watson, patting one of her hands. ‘Don’t take on so. You are among friends now.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, drying her eyes. ‘I shouldn’t—’
‘My dear lady,’ said Holmes, sitting opposite her, ‘if you are, as I suspect, in some sort of difficulty, coming to us is precisely what you should have done. Now what, pray, is the nature of your problem?’
‘It’s not me,’ she said softly. ‘It’s Mr Houdini. But I fear he will be furious when he finds that I’ve enlisted your aid.’
‘And yet you have enlisted it nonetheless.’
She looked absolutely wretched. ‘Gentlemen, I can’t discuss Mr Houdini’s personal business. It’s just something I find impossible to do. When he first hired me it was upon the strictest understanding that I employ discretion at all times. I am privy to a great many of his secrets – not personal matters, you understand, but the means by which he is able to perform the feats he does. Many times I’ve been approached by rival acts, offering large sums of money to make me break that confidence. I would never do that, and Mr Houdini knows it. And that’s why I’m so upset to have betrayed him as I’ve done tonight. But he can’t resolve this matter alone, I know he can’t.’
‘Very well,’ Holmes said. ‘We will come and see him to discuss it, and if he is of a mind to do so, he may give us all the details himself.’
Relief flooded across her tear-stained face. ‘Oh, thank you, Mr Holmes—’ She broke off as their tea was delivered and didn’t speak again until the waiter had left. ‘We had better not go together,’ she then added.
‘In case we are seen by the press, you mean?’ Watson said, pouring tea.
‘Not just the press.’
‘You believe you are being watched?’ asked Holmes.
‘I’m convinced of it.’
‘And perhaps followed here?’
‘Possibly – though I made every effort to evade any follower.’
‘Whom do you suspect of following you?’
‘I’m not sure. I It could as easily have been a reporter after the real reason behind the show’s cancellation as … as someone else.’
Holmes studied her sharply. ‘This … difficulty … of Mr Houdini’s. Is it of a criminal nature?’
‘I would rather he explained it to you himself.’
‘Very well. Mr Houdini is staying at the Royal, I believe?’
She nodded. ‘On the Stephansplatz.’ Then, suspiciously, ‘How did you know that?’
‘It is in the paper,’ Holmes replied simply.
Her lashes fluttered. ‘Yes … yes, of course. Forgive me, gentlemen, my nerves hav
e got the better of me. The Royal. Room 414.’
‘Splendid,’ Holmes said. ‘Now, finish your tea and then make your way back there. Oh, and take this with you,’ he said, handing her the newspaper he had bought earlier. ‘It may not be the best disguise, but it will suggest to whoever you believe is watching you that you left your hotel in order to do nothing more daring that buy an evening newspaper.’
‘Y-Yes, all right.’
‘Watson and I will give you fifteen minutes and then set out for the Royal. I should be very surprised if a hotel which has been so recently refurbished has not installed at least one fire exit. When you reach your destination, locate the exit and wait there. When we knock, you may let us in, and in this manner we shall be able to enter the hotel and talk to Mr Houdini unobserved.’
She nodded again, too agitated to calm herself. ‘I understand.’
She got to her feet and they rose with her. Impulsively Watson squeezed her hand and said, ‘Take heart, Miss Lane. If there is anything Holmes and I can do to help you, rest assured it will be done.’
‘Thank you, gentlemen,’ she said tremulously. Then, turning, she walked out of the lobby without a backward glance.
Watching her go, Watson felt his pulses begin to race. ‘Good Lord,’ he breathed. ‘This … it’s just like the old days, Holmes! I wonder what Houdini’s problem is?’
Holmes reached for his hat. ‘We shall know that soon enough, my friend. That is, if you are up to it?’
‘I would not miss this for anything … whatever it is.’
‘Then let us go.’
‘But … but you said we would wait fifteen minutes.’
‘So I did. But I think it would pay us to keep a close eye on Miss Lane, to make sure that she really has eluded her pursuers … if indeed they were ever there.’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
… and a Flat Rejection
IT WAS NOW snowing lightly and the persistent wind was colder than ever. Shunning a cab, for the Royal was only a ten-minute walk from the Grand, Frances Lane hurried through Vienna’s wintry streets with her head down, the very picture of torment.
Holmes and Watson kept well back, but made sure to keep the attractive American in sight at all times. However, she appeared not to be being followed by anyone other than themselves.
‘Do you imagine she only thinks she was being followed, Holmes?’ asked Watson.
‘You know that I never guess,’ came the crisp reply.
Watson rolled his eyes. ‘Of course. Let me see now … Ah, yes. “It is a shocking habit, destructive to the logical faculty.”’
‘I am glad to see that you have not forgotten all my teachings.’
‘How could I? It was I who committed most of them to paper.’
Her pace quickening, Frances Lane followed the Burgring past the Academy of Fine Arts. To her left, the Volksgarten lay in eerie darkness; its world-famous rose beds, monuments and large imitation Theseus temple were quiet and still.
Presently she turned right, onto the Shottenring. The snow began to fall slightly harder, and the cold wind made it spiral and dance. It was now a little after 6.30. The roads were still reasonably busy, but pedestrian traffic was growing noticeably thinner.
As she turned right again onto Franz-Josefs-Kai, Watson could just discern the dark waters of the Danube rising and falling sluggishly on the far side of a small park. A trolley bus clanked past, seeming almost to glide along the tracks in the centre of the wide thoroughfare.
Frances Lane vanished around another corner into the Rotenturmstrasse it was here that Holmes led Watson across the narrow street, so that they might observe Miss Lane’s progress from the opposite pavement.
Another three-minute walk brought her out onto the bustling Stephansplatz. The Royal stood almost directly opposite St Stephen’s Cathedral, an impressive brown stone basilica built in the thirteenth century whose architecture still looked remarkable even in these snowy conditions.
As the Royal came into sight, Holmes quickly sidestepped into the recessed doorway of an otherwise faceless office building, giving Watson no choice but to follow him.
‘What is it?’
Craning his neck, Holmes peered cautiously along the street. ‘That man there, do you see?’ he replied. ‘Standing outside that closed cafe on the other side of the road, just a short distance up from the Royal, pretending he is waiting to meet someone.’
Watson squinted through the snow. ‘I see only one man foolish enough to be out in this weather – a tall, skinny-looking fellow, just visible under the awning. He’s wearing a dark-grey alpaca topcoat and what looks like a linen sporting cap. Got his hands in his pockets.’
‘He’s the one.’
‘What about him?’
‘He reacted when Miss Lane came into sight … the almost imperceptible stiffening of his shoulders and the involutary twitch of his torso betraying both recognition of who she was and surprise at her return.’
‘Perhaps he is waiting for someone. Perhaps he thought she was the person he was waiting for.’
‘Then why seek to disguise his mistake so quickly behind a show of supreme nonchalance? See – he now appears to be studying the contents of that café window with a level of interest that cannot possibly be warranted. All the time, however, he is really watching Miss Lane’s reflection as she enters the hotel.’
Watson felt a sudden chill that had nothing to do with the weather. ‘She was right, then! She and or Houdini are being watched!’
‘Perhaps. Almost certainly he is the fellow who attempted to follow her, and whom she subsequently lost before she reached the Grand. But does that make him a villain? He could, as Miss Lane herself suggested, just as easily be a reporter looking for a story that may or may not exiSt Still, I think we shall avoid him for the time being, and retrace our steps. We can approach the Royal from the direction of the Hoher Markt – it is only a short distance back the way we have come and from there I expect we will find a way to enter the hotel from the rear.’
The Hoher Markt was a wide, cobbled area given over to shops and offices. It was largely deserted now and as they hurried through the whirling snow the glow from the hissing streetlamps sent their shadows jogging out ahead of them.
At length the rear elevation of the Royal appeared at the end of a darkened alley, looking tall, indistinct and shadowy in the churning blizzard. Holmes at once crossed the deserted, ill-lit street and went in search of a fire exit. It transpired that there were several.
Starting at one corner of the building, they began to work their way along, rapping at each one in turn. At the third fire exit they received a response. The sound of a handle being depressed mingled with the moan of the wind. Then the door opened and Frances Lane, looking thoroughly chilled, allowed them into a dingy stairwell.
There was no need for conversation. With an upward tilt of his head Holmes merely motioned for her to lead the way. A moment later the stairwell was filled with the rustling of her muslin and cotton ankle-length dress, mixed with Watson’s laboured breathing as they climbed toward the fourth floor.
At last they reached a door that opened onto a well-lit, carpeted hallway with ornate doors at regular intervals on both left and right. Halfway along the hallway Miss Lane stopped opposite number 402; only then did she hesitate and give Holmes and Watson a fearful look.
‘He isn’t going to like this,’ she whispered. ‘But he can’t deal with … with what has happened by himself.’
Gathering her courage, she knocked on the door and called, ‘Harry … it’s me, Frances.’
The door was wrenched open almost immediately. Harry Houdini, in rolled-up shirtsleeves and an unbuttoned waistcoat, with his curly, centre-parted hair thoroughly tousled, said, ‘Frankie! For God’s sake, where have you—?’
Then the showman’s pleasant blue eyes saw Holmes and Watson, and his whole manner changed. ‘What the—?’
Frances Lane brushed past him, unbuttoning her checkered wrap as she said, ‘Gen
tlemen, come in. Hurry, before anyone sees you.’
The suite itself was luxuriously appointed. The main area was furnished as a combination sitting room and office, with a bedroom and en-suite bathroom located behind a closed door in the left-hand wall. Houdini, however, looked terrible. Dark circles ringed his eyes and his collarless shirt and trousers were rumpled, almost as if slept in.
As Holmes and Watson entered and Houdini closed the door after them, he exclaimed angrily, ‘What the devil’s going on here, Frankie?’ Before his assistant could reply, he added to Holmes and Watson, ‘Listen, I don’t mean any disrespect, but this isn’t a good time for me.’
‘So I believe,’ said Holmes.
Houdini’s frown deepened. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘I’ve asked Mr Holmes to lend us a hand,’ said Frances.
It went absolutely quiet in the softly lit room. Then: ‘You’ve what? Frankie, how dare you go against my wishes! I told you we were going to—’
‘Harry,’ she said wretchedly, ‘Harry, we’ve got to do something
‘That’s right,’ he agreed with an emphatic nod. ‘And I am doing something. I’m playing this straight down the line!’ He turned away from her and, trying to calm himself, said to Holmes, ‘Look, whatever Frankie’s told you … I can only ask you to forget it. All right?’
Before Holmes could reply, Watson stepped forward, determined to defend the young woman. ‘Miss Lane has been careful to tell us nothing of your business,’ he said sternly. ‘Aside from the fact that you are in some sort of trouble and need help, she has been the very soul of discretion.’
‘However,’ Holmes added, ‘we do know some things, Mr Houdini. That you are dealing with a number of people who are playing a high-stakes game, for instance. And that in some way it involves your wife.’
