by Mrs Hudson
If any place had become the centre of that night’s bacchanals, it was the great square around Nelson’s Column. That huge space was teeming with merry-makers so that the foot of the column was entirely obscured and the lions that guard it seemed to float on the shoulders of a dancing crowd. Even as we approached, the press grew greater and I found myself carried forward and thrown against Dr Watson.
‘Flotsam?’ he shouted above the hubbub. ‘Are you here? Excellent! Don’t let him out of your sight. It should be any minute now that we need to grab the fellow!’
Then the eddying tide of people drew me away from Dr Watson and threw me into the arms of Rupert Spencer, who grinned warmly and pushed me forward in the direction of Nelson himself.
In the very centre of the square, the scene was one of utter bedlam. As well as the throng of people drinking from flasks or bottles of beer, and shaking hands with everyone, there seemed also to be taking place a pageant of strange and wonderful figures that looked as if they had arrived directly from a medieval carnival. A beautiful princess in a pointy hat and silver robes danced with a boy in a jerkin who, I realised when I was thrown closer to him, wasn’t a boy at all but a fine-looking girl with close cropped hair. Around them, three men dressed as autumn leaves capered in circles, a man in a full suit of armour blundered in circles and attempted to pour brown ale through his visor, and, above them all, on the lip of the fountain, a pantomime horse kicked and whinnied like a thoroughbred.
‘It’s the pantomime troupe!’ Dr Watson yelled when we were thrown together again. ‘They’ve been performing here tonight. Watch out! There he goes!’
I peered through the tumult and saw the dark figure of the magician moving away from the centre of the square, towards a lamp-post where another small boy was leaning, apparently waiting.
‘My word! Here we go!’ Watson roared, and pressed forward keenly. ‘As soon as that note is out of his hand, let’s get him!’
As we pushed and shoved to get clear of the crowd, I saw the Great Salmanazar close on the boy. No word was spoken but the envelope was passed from one to another and the boy took off like an arrow from a bow. For half a second the illusionist watched him go, but then a great cry went up not ten yards behind him and I saw the wiry figure of Mr Holmes bursting from the shadows and hurling himself forward. While the smaller man was still looking up, Holmes dived forward and launched himself horizontally at his prey.
Had Mr Holmes been a yard closer when he leapt, the force of his tackle must surely have crashed the magician to the cobbles and our work that evening would have been done. But that single yard gave the Great Salmanazar a chance to react, and although his movement was instinctive rather than planned, it was enough for the main force of Mr Holmes’ dive to glance off his hip. The force of the collision staggered him, but he rode the challenge with a stoutness and sureness of footing astounding in a man so slight, and, while Mr Holmes’ momentum carried him five yards past, the magician clutched at a passer-by, regained his balance, and took flight.
Now it was a chase in earnest. Disguise was abandoned and all stealth was gone. The Great Salmanazar had a ten yard start over Dr Watson and was running for all he was worth. I followed behind as rapidly as I could, but was quickly passed by a recovered Sherlock Holmes, gaunt and tense and sprinting like an athlete. In open country our prey would have been quickly gathered in, and sensing this the illusionist tried to turn back to the centre of the square, where the thronging crowds promised shelter. This change of direction saved him, for Rupert Spencer had made ground to head him off, and five yards more would have taken the magician straight into his arms. But the sudden swerve changed everything, wrong-footing the younger man and allowing the older to double back and narrowly escape Dr Watson’s clutching fingers.
Seeing this, Mr Holmes was quick to adjust, and he and Dr Watson were able once again to close on the fleeing figure. The Great Salmanazar must surely have been grasped there and then had it not been for the unfortunate intervention of Baron Bounder, the pantomime villain, who chose that moment to lunge drunkenly after a pretty young girl dressed as a daffodil. This lunge took him straight into the path of the detective and his companion, and brought all three crashing down into a heap. Mr Spencer, in swerving to avoid the melee, found himself pitched straight into the arms of the daffodil, who took advantage of this astonishing good fortune by holding onto him tightly and kissing him as many times as she could before he was able to escape.
While this catastrophe untangled itself, the Great Salmanazar had broken clear of the pursuing pack and I saw him pause and look around. But at this point it seemed that his luck had changed, for his momentum had carried him almost exactly to the spot where Miss Peters had halted to remove her beautiful and totally impractical shoes, one of which appeared to have shed its heel. On looking up and finding herself face to face with the object of our pursuit, she squealed excitedly and, with great presence of mind, threw her fur stole over his head and kicked him in the shins.
This unexpected assault clearly disconcerted the little magician, and it took him a few moments to extricate himself, first from the fur, then from Miss Peters. Finally shaking himself free, and realising that his pursuers had begun to pick themselves up and re-group, he looked around and seemed to make a decision. His haphazard progress had now taken him to the part of Trafalgar Square that faced the Admiralty Arch. Perhaps the sight of the Mall beyond offered him respite from the chaos of the square, or perhaps his eye was caught by the pink and yellow costume of the pantomime horse, which had abandoned its place by the fountains and was now dancing for a small group of admirers under the Arch itself. Whatever his reasons, the Great Salmanazar set off in that direction, still with a lead of twenty yards over the pursing pack, which now, rather to my surprise, had me at its head.
Had the fugitive kept to his course and taken the chase onto the Mall, he must surely have escaped, for the various mishaps behind him had taken their toll, and none of the men giving chase were moving as freely as they had before. However, at that precise moment, the pantomime horse finished its dance and for no obvious reason jogged off placidly into a little alley that ran away to the left. The Great Salmanazar, perhaps hoping for narrow streets to hide in, paused and looked behind him, hesitated, and then darted after the horse and into the alley.
‘Yes!’ Mr Holmes cried. ‘We have him! I know that street. It’s a dead end!’ He and I came to a halt at the alley’s entrance and waited for the rest of our allies to catch up. ‘In there!’ Mr Holmes signalled. ‘See where the alley turns to the right? He’s gone round that corner. But the road runs only another fifteen yards before it comes to an end. We have him trapped!’
As if to support Mr Holmes’ grasp of London’s topography, the pantomime horse chose that moment to reappear, shooting rapidly out from around the corner as if startled to find that the Great Salmanazar had followed it there. Finding itself in front of a reception committee, the horse gave a nervous tap-dance and then, sighting the reassuring figure of Widow Wellbeloved drinking gin straight from the bottle, gave a little bow and scurried off.
‘Now,’ said Mr Holmes, ‘let us form a line and advance together. I think between us we will be more than a match for the fellow.’
And so we edged forward together and turned the corner five abreast. It was clear from the very first glance that Mr Holmes’ description of the little back street was an accurate one. The blank walls of high buildings enclosed all three sides of it. No one could possibly escape from it without coming past us.
But the first glance told us something else too. Something had gone wrong. Some trick of magic had been performed. For where we expected to see the great magician, hunted and cowering and ready to surrender, there was no one but a young lad perched jauntily on a dustbin and smoking a cigarette.
‘Scraggs?’ I gasped in bewilderment as the five of us stopped short.
‘Oh, hello, Flot,’ he chirped. ‘And Mr Holmes, and Dr Watson too. How jolly!’ He clam
bered off the bin, putting out his cigarette as he did so. ‘It’s a funny place, this. I was sitting here having a quiet smoke when two blokes in a comedy horse costume came round the corner. As soon as they saw me, they ran off again, then you arrived. A bit strange, eh?’
‘But Scraggs, what about the man who came in here just after the horse?’
Scraggs stared back at us blankly.
‘A man, Flot? Just now?’ He shook his head. ‘Sorry, there’s been no one. Just those two blokes in the horse outfit. I’ve been here ten minutes and I can tell you there’s been no one.’
At that moment, with slow, portentous certainty, the chimes of Big Ben began to fill the night around us, and we listened in silence as the great bell sounded twelve times.
‘Midnight,’ observed Scraggs. ‘And since we’re all gathered together so handy, like, perhaps I can be the first to wish you all a very happy New Year.’
Chapter XIX
An Unexpected Boy
It was quite some time before Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson could bring themselves to accept that the Great Salmanazar had truly disappeared. Every dustbin had to be searched, every drainpipe tested to see if it might have offered a means of escape. A single metal door was discovered sunk into one of the blind brick walls, presumably a rear entrance to one of the grand buildings around us. But the door was rusted fast and had clearly not been opened for years. Finally we searched the cobbled floor of the alley for drain covers that might lead to the sewers. To Mr Holmes’ delight, one was found near the corner around which the Great Salmanazar had disappeared. However it took the combined efforts of Mr Spencer and Dr Watson to lift it, and when the latter was prevailed upon to peer inside he reported that there was nothing to be seen but darkness and nothing to be heard but dripping water and perhaps the scurrying footsteps of a rat.
‘Damned smart piece of work if he made it down there,’ Watson grunted. ‘And ruby or no ruby, I’m dashed if I’m going down there after him.’
‘Very well, my friend.’ Mr Holmes’ face was a ghastly white in the gaslight. ‘I daresay that the solution to the conundrum will present itself to me presently. But first there is a great deal to be done. We must alert Lestrade to this fellow’s escape. We’ll soon have every policeman in the city looking for him. I’m sure he can’t get far. And we must get to Sir John’s house as quickly as we can, for the magician managed to send his message and we can expect his accomplice to make an attempt on the ruby at any time. We must be there to welcome him.’
‘Of course, Holmes.’ Dr Watson brightened. ‘We can still save our skins, can’t we? After all, if we can lay hold of this chap Phillimore, and if we can persuade Mrs Hudson to hand over the Malabar Rose, then I daresay the Home Secretary will be pleased enough, eh? Do you fancy coming with us, Mr Spencer? We could do with a strong chap like you.’
Mr Spencer looked at Miss Peters and raised an eyebrow.
‘I’d be delighted to join you, Dr Watson, but first I think I should take Miss Peters home.’ Miss Peters spluttered at this, but Mr Spencer carried on regardless. ‘I’m sure Hetty would agree that a young lady whose dress is torn quite so much as hers would be likely to attract the wrong sort of attention during a secret vigil.’
With these words he looked rather pointedly at her ankles. Miss Peters looked down, gasped, and stepped smartly behind me so that my skirts shielded her from his gaze.
With Hetty apparently rendered speechless, Mr Spencer grinned at me and Scraggs. ‘What about you two? Are you joining the vigil at Sir John’s?’
‘Not me,’ said Scraggs hastily. ‘I’ve got a job to do for Mrs Hudson. In fact, I should be off now. Don’t know what I’m doing lazing around here. Come with me, Flot?’
It was tempting to say yes, but I was remembering Mrs Hudson’s last words to me. I had promised that if things went awry, I would return to Baker Street and lock myself in. And now, with the Great Salmanazar having vanished into the night, it seemed prudent to live up to my promise.
*
For all the crowds that spilled on to the streets, for all the revelry and ribaldry in the air that night, my journey home felt a long and lonely one. The more desperate I became to reach my destination, the slower my progress seemed to become. As I left the crowded streets near the Haymarket and Piccadilly Circus, I began to quicken my pace, and in the emptier streets around Savile Row, I was on the brink of breaking into a run. The ruby was unguarded, I reasoned, the Great Salmanazar had escaped, and Mrs Hudson’s plans were in disarray. It was up to me to guard the rooms in Baker Street, up to me to see that the Malabar Rose, whatever its hiding place, remained safe until morning. As my heart raced at the thought, the first snow of the New Year began to drift gently to my feet.
The further I travelled from Trafalgar Square, the sparser the crowds became, until, as I entered Baker Street, the only traffic passing me was the occasional hansom cab, and the pavements ahead of me were empty but for one or two well-wrapped revellers hurrying to their beds. The snow must have started earlier here, for already a layer as thin and crisp as white crepe paper had settled over the cobbles. With no one around to observe me, I ran the last hundred yards as fast as I could, still struggling to contain the anxiety that was welling up inside me.
My first sight of home calmed me, however, and leaning against the rails I took a moment to regain my composure and recover my breath. I could see from the unbroken snow that nobody had set foot upon the stone steps up to the front door, nor the iron steps down to the basement area, since the snow had started to fall. How long ago was that? Twenty minutes? Half an hour? The knowledge reassured me, and when I took out my latch key and descended the area stairs, I had even began to laugh at myself for worrying so much and with so little provocation.
But it was laughter that soon died on my lips, for on descending the iron staircase I found the kitchen door not quite shut, the latch not flush in place. Surely Mrs Hudson would not have left it ajar in that way? She had been anxious that the place should be properly guarded… I wished then that I’d made less noise on the stairs, that I’d jangled my key chain less carelessly, for if any intruder had been waiting in the shadowy kitchen, they must surely now be aware of my arrival.
For a tiny part of a moment I was tempted to step away, to turn back into town to seek out Scraggs or Rupert Spencer and ask them to accompany me. But I had promised Mrs Hudson I would stand guard, and that was what I intended to do. So I steadied myself against the iron stairs, then with my key between my fingers and my heart in my mouth, I swung open the kitchen door and peered into the darkness.
Apart from the streetlight behind me, the only light in the room came from the dying embers of the kitchen fire. Shadows lurked in each corner, but they were familiar shadows, friendly companions in a place I knew so well. I listened for any sound of movement but there was nothing – nothing strange or unusual, nothing to make me nervous or on edge. And when I stepped forward and lit the oil lamps, everything seemed as it should be: as neat and as pristine as Mrs Hudson always left it. Even so, I had already learned that appearances could be deceptive, and armed with a lamp I proceeded to search every corner of the room. When that failed to show me any sign of intrusion, I moved onto the pantry, the cold room, then Mrs Hudson’s bedroom and finally my own. Emboldened by the unsullied sense of order that prevailed around me, I moved on to the rooms upstairs. My nervousness was now replaced with ruthless efficiency and I determined to make sure that I was alone in the house and that our defences remained unbreached.
Only when every room had been scoured for signs of disturbance did I allow myself to relax. I made sure to check that all the doors were firmly bolted and then I built up the fire and made myself a cup of hot milk, the drinking of which was accompanied by a warm sense of satisfaction. I was properly on duty and everything was in order. The bolts were drawn and I was impregnable. Let anyone try to carry off the ruby now! Then, putting all thoughts of the Great Salmanazar out of my head, I settled down to wait for M
rs Hudson.
But I waited and waited. In truth I think I had expected her return to follow shortly after mine, so I wasn’t really prepared for so long a vigil. The clock outside struck two, but still she had not appeared. Nor was there any sign of Dr Watson or Mr Holmes, and I realised that any noise from the street outside had long since ceased. With the celebrating crowds dispersed, the roads around Baker Street seemed quieter than usual. I began to realise how tired I was, and when the clock struck the next quarter it roused me from the edge of sleep and made me blink. From then on I struggled grimly to stay awake, while my body betrayed me by slumping comfortably in front of the fire, and my thoughts began to drift into slumber. I let my head fall back onto a cushion and I noticed dully that the oil lamp on the kitchen table was burning low. I knew I must refill it, but the lamp was a long way away and in a moment I would move and see to it, but for now the fire threw a softer light than the lamp and I would rest a moment and watch the shapes in the embers for a few minutes more…
When I next stirred, the kitchen lay in darkness. The oil lamp was out and the fire had burned so low that the only light was a smudge of orange in front of me. It would be wrong to say that I awoke, for my body remained asleep, so heavy in its slumber that to move anything but one sleepy eye would have been impossible. But something in my consciousness had flickered into waking and one small part of my brain told me that the shadows had changed. Something had moved.
