“Well done, Tobias, well done indeed! You are coming along very well, I must say. I fear you may be right. Now then, Mycroft, I’m sure those damned doctors say you need exercise. They’re always saying you need something you haven’t got or don’t want. A quick stroll up the pier? Morning greetings to the seagulls and the fishermen? What do you say?”
“I’m afraid Tobias normally takes me out to the balcony in my chair at this time. I fear the pier would be too much for me.”
“Very well,” said Sherlock Holmes, darting to the wheel chair and pushing it out to the furthest end of the balcony. “But you must walk this far, Mycroft, it will do you good. Tobias, will you be so kind as to accompany me to the far limit of the West Pier beyond the bandstand? Maybe I shall meet a fortune teller. I have always placed high hopes in that profession. Far more reliable than the bishops, in my opinion.”
Mycroft Holmes picked up his walking stick and made his way slowly out to his wheelchair on the balcony. It was a beautiful spring morning. The sky was blue, flecked with groups of brilliant white clouds. The sea was a darker blue with a couple of coastal steamers far out in the channel, puffing tiny dots of smoke into the air. Closer in a couple of fishing boats were clawing their way along the coast towards Rottingdean. But Mycroft felt the same colour as his suit. His cloth was grey, his mood was grey, his heart was grey. He thought he would go on feeling grey till the end of his days.
He spotted his two companions striding out along the pier. He would have known his brother’s walk anywhere. Tobias seemed quite small and insignificant beside him. But if Mycroft had been looking through a pair of field glasses or a telescope, he would have noticed something rather surprising. The person doing most of the talking, gesticulating fiercely from time to time with his left hand, was not the great consulting detective, but his own assistant, young Tobias.
“Sea air, sea air, how refreshing it is!” cried Sherlock Holmes on his return. “I must get back. Hundreds, if not thousands, of my bees will have perished while I have been away. I am sad to see you laid so low, brother. I fear your chances of regaining the Baker Street Cup must have gone for ever.”
The Baker Street Cup was a real silver cup given to the winner of the annual series of Test Matches at chess the brothers played every year. Some were played in the conventional manner, others as chess without boards. The title had gone the previous year to Sherlock by four matches to three, with the decider played at a long lunch with no board at Simpsons in the Strand. Now the younger brother was claiming the title in perpetuity.
“I don’t mind, Sherlock,” said Mycroft sadly, “I don’t really care about chess any more.”
“How I hate illness,” said Sherlock Holmes as he and Tobias walked down the grand staircase to say goodbye, “how I hate seeing people who are ill. Let me know how it goes, won’t you? The Alcester case might revive him, you never know.”
With that he shook Tobias by the hand just outside the front door and turned left along King’s Road en route to West Street and Queen’s Road where the railway waited to take him back to his bees.
Inspector Lestrade arrived shortly after lunch wearing a fine new suit, slightly marred by a stain upon the lapel and devalued altogether by a brand new boater, purchased, Tobias surmised, at Victoria Station in honour of the trip to the seaside. In his wake came Inspector Bramble of the Brighton constabulary, a barrel shaped man with a large moustache and a diffident manner. In deference to his high regard for all Holmes brothers, irrespective of health, Lestrade insisted that all conferences be held in Mycroft’s rooms with Mycroft and Tobias in attendance. Also present was hotel manager Valentine Delaney, clad in a light grey suit purchased in Rome with a red rose in his buttonhole. Tobias wondered if he doubled as the hotel gigolo in his spare time.
“I hope you are making good progress here, Mr Holmes, in these splendid rooms,” Lestrade began. “Carrie, the wife, swears by Brighton as a place of recuperation after it cured her grandfather of the gout many years ago. Do you have any questions for the moment?”
Mycroft shook his head sadly. Tobias had watched him picking at an excellent chicken salad at lunchtime. Even a strawberry trifle, a speciality of one of the junior chefs, had been totally neglected.
“I’m sure you will have some wisdom for us later on,” said Lestrade cheerfully, “if I could begin with you, Mr Delaney, there are a number of points of interest about your hotel I should like to ask you about. Perhaps you could just give us the general background?”
Delaney purred slightly, as if he were a very expensive motor car preparing to move off. “Of course, Inspector, of course. Founded in the eighteen sixties. Still owned by the same family, who also own Browns Hotel in London and the Meurice in Paris.”
Even the mention of one of the gastronomic capitals of Europe failed to make an impact on the invalid. Tobias made a private bet with himself that his employer would be fast asleep by three o’clock.
“The Majestic,” Delaney carried on, “has been upgraded and improved with the passing years. It still has two hundred and one rooms with five suites available. There are six major reception rooms looking out over the sea and a billiards room. We were the first hotel in the county to install electric light and the first to install a lift. We have higher rates of re-occupancy, people coming back to us year after year, than any other hotel in England.”
“Mycroft raised this with me the other day,” said Tobias politely, “he wondered if it had to do with the staff recruitment policy. Everybody visible, he said, waiters, chambermaids and so on, seems to be aged between sixteen and twenty five and very physically attractive. Mycroft thought it must be deliberate.”
Valentine Delaney laughed. “What it is to have the brain of a Holmes in our midst,” he cried, with just a hint of annoyance. “Mycroft is right, of course. I myself and a much younger man from the accounts department interview all the young ladies, and our housekeeper and one of the chambermaids interview all the young men. You will see, if you look closely,” Delaney coughed a little at this point, “that we have a lot of middle aged bachelors and aging widowers among our guests. The same is true on the distaff side. We have not, of course, asked them why they return over and over again, but people have been known to confirm that Albert with the blond hair is still waiting at table, that sort of thing. I may say that two of our young people employed in front of house have made very advantageous marriages in recent years. We offer them a special discount rate for the wedding and reception, of course. Happy families by the sea.”
“Was the Duchess of Alcester a regular visitor?” Lestrade cut in.
“She was, as a matter of fact. This was her fourth year in succession.”
“And was there a particular young man on display who caught her fancy? A Lothario of the Lanes you have here in Brighton? The seducer on the seafront?”
“I do not know,” Delaney shook his head. But some of his own putative gigolo connection must have returned. “But which of us can tell the secrets of a lady’s heart?”
“Quite so, Delaney, quite so,” said Lestrade testily. “Did she always stay at the same time of year?”
“It was always in April or May, I believe. After her stay here she usually went to take the waters in Marienbad or some other Continental spa.”
“In other words,” Inspector Bramble had a very deep voice like a basso profundo, “any thief with half a brain could have worked when she would be here with her jewellery collection and made their plans accordingly?”
“That would certainly appear to be the case,” Valentine Delaney was crossing one elegant trouser leg over the other, “but the reality is slightly different. Every time the Duchess comes I plead with her to put the valuables in our safe, or entrust them to the police. She has always refused. Theft of such valuables from a hotel of quality like ours is not good for the reputation on which we depend for our clients and our custom. We have contingency plans. The Duchess was encouraged to eat in the seclusion of the Fitzherbert Suite r
ather than in the main body of our dining room so that if she were to be robbed, at least it would not be in front of a couple of hundred people. We have rehearsals in the event of a theft as you saw with two of my people going to guard the doors once the lights went out. We have a direct line to the nearest police station, which is why so many officers arrived so quickly. Unfortunately, our efforts have not been successful. The necklace is still missing.”
“And what about the black-out?” Lestrade was back in the hunt. Tobias remembered Dr Watson telling him that Lestrade’s nickname among the criminal fraternity was The Holloway Ferret and he certainly had a remarkable similarity to one of those small animals as he pursued the hotel owner back to his lair.
“I wondered when you were going to come to that. There have been two black outs like that since Easter. The hotel engineers can find nothing wrong with the various mechanisms. They insist the incidents are man made. After the last one I had them establish a connection with the Bristol next door which would cut in almost immediately if our own supply went down. I believe this thwarted the thieves in their plans and prevented their getaway.”
“But it means,” boomed Inspector Bramble, “don’t you see, it means that there is yet another criminal, apart from the one or two in the Fitzherbert Suite? We could be dealing with a gang of three or even four, rather than two.”
A low moaning sound began to spread across the room from the deep sofa where Mycroft Holmes had been listening, or not, to the proceedings. The Government Auditor had fallen asleep. It was a quarter to three. Tobias hid a grin behind a mild fit of coughing.
“Damn,” said Lestrade, “there were one or two questions I wished to raise with him, even in his weakened state. Talking of gangs, by the way, gentlemen, I checked with the records department of Scotland Yard before I came down here. There are three known jewel thieves they believe could have carried out this job. Nobby ‘The Safe’ Symonds from Bethnal Green, Light fingered Lionel from Lewisham and Diamond Jack from up Arsenal way. I took the liberty of taking a look in your visitor’s book while I waited for the good Inspector here and a John Joseph Smith, one of the favourite noms de plume of Diamond Jack, stayed here for four days at the beginning of this month. Brought his wife too, cheeky blighter.”
Inspector Bramble whistled. Mycroft began to snore rather loudly. Tobias shook his head in despair.
“Gentlemen,” said Delaney, shaking out his trousers as he rose to his feet, “I feel we should leave. Perhaps we could meet here again at six o’clock this evening when our friend will be rested and may be able to give us some assistance.”
A messenger boy came in with a letter as the others were leaving. It was addressed to Herr Mycroft Holmes in a Gothic Germanic script. Tobias was deeply suspicious of this missive but felt he should wait until Mycroft was awake. Tobias was to tell Lestrade later that if his master had known what was inside he would have stayed asleep.
The message was quite short, as Tobias read it out later at Mycroft’s instructions. There was no address at the top, only the legend The Fatherland in large capitals. It came from one of Mycroft’s most fearsome opponents, the criminal mastermind from Germany usually referred just as the Count.
‘Dear Holmes,’ it said, ‘please allow me to tell you how very pleased I am to hear that you are ill. And my informants tell me even better news, which is that you may not be polluting this earth for very much longer. I cannot say how delighted I am. You have only been a tiny pinprick to my activities over the years, but now all Europe lies open for me without any opposition at all.
‘Let me conclude with the hope that your last days and hours will be as painful as possible.
Deutschland uber Alles.
Graf von Stoltenburg
“Ridiculous man,” said Mycroft wearily. “What a tiresome race they are. I fear the Count may cause us more trouble yet. No reply, Tobias. Let me just put it in my pocket book for my records.”
Mrs Hudson knocked loudly at the door and flowed into the room, her arms laden with parcels of various sorts.
“Now then, Mr Holmes,” she began, depositing packages at the side of the bed as she spoke, “I brought you a couple of new shirts from Savile Row. They’re quite light so they should be good by the sea side. The librarian at the Diogenes Club said he thought you would like these books in this parcel here. He told me out on the street where he could talk that he was sure you would like them. Your colleagues at the Treasury have sent you this illustrated history of chess by some American with an unpronounceable name and beautiful drawings. And, most important, I have made you a fruit cake, light but very tasty, some plain scones in this little box, and” – Mrs Hudson looked around furtively as if Dr Moore Agar might be hiding in a cupboard or lurking on the balcony –“ and, in this bag, some of those little cream éclairs you like so much. I know he went on about your diet, Mr Holmes, that doctor person, but a little pleasure will do you good.”
“Thank you so much, Mrs Hudson. I shall try the éclairs a little later this afternoon.”
“Now listen you to me for once, Mr Holmes,” Mrs Hudson had parked herself in the red armchair nearest the bed and was looking sternly at Mycroft as if he were a soufflé that refused to rise, or a sponge that stayed flat in her oven.
“You must get better, Mr Holmes. I know it’s easy to say it, but we all want you to get back to your normal self. Why, if you didn’t, I should have to sell Pall Mall and 221b Baker Street and go and live in the country. And that cooker and the oven in Pall Mall are so locked into the wall that I’d have to leave them behind. I couldn’t bear it, Mr Holmes. You must get well. You must start today.”
Inspector Lestrade swept into the room without knocking, twirling his boater in his hands. “I’m so sorry, Mrs Hudson,” he said, “I had no idea you were here.”
“Don’t mind me, Inspector. I’ve got to go back to London in a minute. Tobias, would you accompany me down that pier out there? I’d like a nice blow before I go back.”
Mycroft rose slowly to his feet and ushered Lestrade to a couple of chairs next to the balcony. “You may think I have not been paying attention, Lestrade. Some things I have missed, I grant you. There is one matter of overwhelming importance I would draw to your attention.”
Lestrade thought of the dozens of policemen still guarding the hotel, the staff of the Grand all confined to quarters without exception, the watch at the railway station now extended to all the ports in southern England which might take a man to France, the inquiries at Europe’s leading jewellers, the guarantee from no less a craftsman than Carl Faberge himself that all his customers had been asked to keep their eyes open, the promises of gold to members of London’s underworld for information that might lead to an arrest and the recovery of the pearls. He was never confident in the presence of the Holmes brothers, Lestrade. He would have been the first to admit that their powers were so much greater than his. What might he have forgotten?
“And what would that be, Mr Holmes?”
“Why, it seems to me to be of the utmost importance that the Fitzherbert Suite is kept locked and guarded twenty four hours a day. I believe an attempt will be made in the next few days to force entry. Vigilance may solve the mystery. That is all I have to say.”
In vain did Lestrade ask if Mycroft had secret sources of information, if he knew who the thieves were. Shortly after half past four the Government Auditor began yawning. Tobias had hoped for a moment that the recovery might be beginning, but he saw that it was yet another false dawn.
“It was the younger Pitt, I believe,” said Mycroft, “whose last words were reported to have been: ‘I could just eat one of Bellamy’s meat pies.’ Well, I could just eat one of Mrs Hudson’s cream éclairs. I’m afraid there aren’t enough to offer one to either of you.”
Lestrade strode out to the balcony and glared at the holidaymakers on the pavements and the carriages driving along the seafront. As his gaze travelled to the distant horizon where sea and sky met in a clash of blues he felt his
eyes fill with tears.
“Mr Holmes, Mr Holmes,” he cried, rushing back inside to find Mycroft wiping a dollop of cream from his waistcoat, “you must come back to us. You can’t just go away like this.”
“My doctors won’t allow me to go anywhere just at the moment, Lestrade.”
“That’s not what I meant, Mr Holmes,” Lestrade was leaning forward now, “what I mean to say is, knowing you and your brother has been the high point of my professional career. It’s been more important to me than the murders I’ve been lucky enough to solve. You know, I said to the wife before I came down here, ‘Carrie, I said, it’ll break my heart if Mr Holmes doesn’t get better, so it will and no mistake.’ Now it looks as though you’re not getting better and your powers are passing away like the tide going out beyond your balcony here. I said to your brother once, Mr Holmes, that if he should come down to the station there wouldn’t be an officer there who wouldn’t take his helmet off and cheer him to the rafters. It’s the same for you, Mr Holmes, it’s the same for you. I can’t bear it if your powers have gone, I really can’t.”
A low grumble was coming from the opposite chair now. Sated by Mrs Hudson’s éclairs and Lestrade’s uncharacteristic eloquence the Auditor of all Government Departments had gone back to sleep. The snoring grew louder. Tobias put his head in his hands and thought about his future. Inspector Lestrade walked very slowly out to the balcony and pulled out his handkerchief.
The notepaper was the finest London’s stationers could provide. In the centre at the top was a crest of a starry sky at night with the words per silentium ad astra inscribed in a semi circle, silence is the way to heaven. This was the motto of the Diogenes Club and the letter was a typewritten plea from its Chairman to its most distinguished member.
‘Dear Holmes,” Tobias began, with Mycroft cleaning his glasses by the balcony, shortly before seven o’clock, as the sea front was growing quiet and the holidaymakers were going home for the night, ‘forgive me for writing at this difficult time. The Diogenes Club is in crisis. Without your support it will be declared bankrupt in the next few weeks and closed down for good.
Mycroft Holmes: The Case of the Romanov Pearls (The Mycroft Holmes Adventure series Book 6) Page 2
