Thirteen Authors With New Takes on Sherlock Holmes

by Michael A. Ventrella

  “It is not my hot-headed brain that will be decapitated in the name of Vienna,” Sherlock said. “Observe.” Sherlock walked to the podium and picked up Beethoven’s baton. Sherlock could feel the angry stares of the orchestra and chorus behind him. “Tell me, Ludwig van Beethoven, have you recently created a duplicate of your baton?” Beethoven, having carefully read Sherlock’s lips, shook his head. “Throughout rehearsals, you chew at the tip of your baton. Surely this one would be worn down by now, but it is not. Can you explain the cleanliness of this?”

  “Looks new to me,” Beethoven said. “I presume it is a gift?”

  “A deadly one. Now observe evidence number two: An empty vial, which formerly contained arsenic, imprinted with the sigil of your beloved king, found in the East Orderly shop the night before the potential murder. Explain this, King Leopold Hobrecht of Berlin.”

  The king opened his mouth as if to speak but found himself stuttering instead. There were a few grumbles from behind.

  “That is correct,” Sherlock continued. “King Leopold cannot deny this, because he was attempting to assassinate Beethoven by dipping his baton into a vial of arsenic, this very baton, commissioned by his very own rat, Marcos Pierre, in conjunction with East Orderly. Stand up, Marcos, and stand up, Leopold. Let the audience applaud your effort.”

  Marcos remained seated, hatred flickering through his eyes.

  Sherlock turned to Beethoven. “King Leopold was not here to listen to your newest symphony. He planned his regal attendance to witness your murder with his own eyes. Anything to say, King?”

  “Take him away.” King Leopold snapped his fingers, and his guards stood in perfect synchronization. They pushed through the crowd and charged for the stage, their bayonets pointed straight at Sherlock.

  The orchestra wouldn’t allow it; they rushed from their chairs and stood as a wall shoulder-to-shoulder around Beethoven, their instruments standing in as their swords and shields.

  “Tell us the truth,” Watson said, hands trembling, “or I smash my violin into your skull.”

  “So what if it is true.” The king stood in front of the audience as if he were reciting a monologue. “I could not allow Vienna to be the home of the most wonderful music in the world any longer. Once you refused to hold the premiere of this symphony in Berlin, that is when we lost it. You wanted to, and yet the people of Vienna have tainted your loyalty. You are a traitor, nothing more. Do you even remember where you grew up?

  “Yes, you have discovered our plans, you mere instrumentalists,” the king continued. “I admit—we have hired your own first-chair cellist, Marcos, to help in the plan. He is splendid, really, just splendid, and he has done well in convincing Vienna’s very own baton craftsman to flee the country.” King Leopold motioned for Marcos to stand. “Applaud, everyone. Applaud.”

  Fabian glanced at Sherlock with an I-told-you-so smirk. Sherlock smiled an embarrassed apology.

  “But, Beethoven, there is still time to redeem yourself to your original king, the only true king of the world. We can forget this has ever happened and erase this from our memories. However, if you perform here any longer, you will disgrace your fathers and their forefathers before them, erasing your existence from the greatest country of the universe: Berlin.”

  “Never speak of my father. I hated him.” Beethoven held up the baton with a trembling hand and pointed at King Leopold. “You will be exposed.”

  “Well, then, since I have the power to rewrite history, even to rewrite this very moment, I sentence you all to death for defying the greatest king who has ever lived.”

  The king’s guards rushed the stage. Before they could attack, a cellist swung his instrument at the tip of a guard’s bayonet. The bayonet clashed to the floor with a metallic thunk, and a bullet went speeding through the roof, spraying rubble over the crowd. Someone yelled from behind, and suddenly the entire orchestra and chorus were harmonizing in terrifying war cries, charging the guards.

  The guards had no chance of firing any additional bullets; the musicians knocked the rifles out of their hands before another shot could be fired. A guard reached for his fallen bayonet, arms outstretched nearly out of their sockets, grasping for his only defense; he was stopped instantaneously as a flutist smashed him on the side of the head with the sweetest instrument an orchestra could have. As the guard fell, he blew a sharp exhalation into the flute’s mouthpiece, producing an ethereal resonance that, given the circumstances, was both exhilarating and terrifying.

  Sherlock struggled to maintain his balance as he sacrificed an invaluable Stradivarius violin to the cause by holding it up as a shield; a guard’s bayonet had pierced the violin, and Sherlock used his new shield as support to push the guard back. By the time the guard realized his weapon was now useless, Sherlock punched him in the jaw, catapulting him to the floor, stumbling over broken bows and dented woodwinds.

  The guards retreated. They were clearly outnumbered, nearly ten to two hundred.

  The battlefront was clear. Sherlock and Watson rushed to the front row, but King Leopold had vanished.

  “Over there,” Watson said, pointing to the entrance.

  King Leopold stood as a silhouette in the doorway, the Vienna sunset radiating a bright violet and blood red behind him. Sherlock met the king’s eyes, and King Leopold mockingly bowed.

  Just as King Leopold was about to end his bow, Beethoven ran from behind, tackling him to the ground. The king thrashed about, tugging at Beethoven’s hair, attempting to claw out his eyes, but it was no use; Beethoven’s fury was too great.

  Beethoven pulled out the poisoned baton. As Beethoven raised his arm in the air to slash the king’s throat, Sherlock ran up from behind and grabbed it. Watson held the king down, and Sherlock knocked the baton out of Beethoven’s hand.

  “He must confess his crimes to the royal courts,” Sherlock said, “or nobody will believe us.”

  “But my symphony! It was supposed to be joyous. The ode dedicated to joy.”

  “It will be,” Sherlock said.

  “The memories of today will haunt the melodies,” Beethoven said. “The blood of the slain will seep into the harmonies. The king will terrorize the chords forevermore.”

  “That is true,” King Leopold said. “Your song will belong to me, always.”

  Beethoven’s eyes grew wild with rage. His hands began shaking uncontrollably, then balled up into tight fists. He turned to Sherlock and Watson, narrowed his eyes, and bashed his head into King Leopold’s temple.

  King Leopold’s skull hit the ground with such incredible force that the sound could have replaced the strike of the symphony’s last bass-drum hit. The king was knocked unconscious, blood seeping through his scalp. He might not even remember what had happened.

  Sherlock tied the king’s hands with frayed bowstrings. That would have to do, Sherlock conceded, until the public execution.

  “Joyous.” Beethoven stood, rubbed his forehead, and brushed dirt from his sleeves. “I said joyous.”

  • • •

  The guillotine’s blades glimmered in the summer sunlight. The orchestra had set up outside in a half arc around the public execution, and it was so bright out that Sherlock nearly had to squint to watch his conductor’s nonlethal baton bounce to the beat of the music.

  King Leopold walked gravely to the guillotine, bare feet dragging across the floor. The Viennese government had spared no time in providing King Leopold a last supper before the beheading.

  “Let me confess one more thing,” King Leopold yelled. Beethoven added an extra rest in his symphony to let the man speak. “At least I will die with the most pleasant sounds on Earth encompassing my earbuds. It was never personal, Ludwig.”

  This made Beethoven smile, which was a rare sight as of late. He nodded to Fabian, who had resumed his position as first-chair cellist, and cued the orchestra to continue playing.

  Watson played his violin and spoke to Sherlock between notes. “My friend, thanks to you, our eccentric con
ductor will be able to create more music, and Vienna will remain triumphant.”

  “No, it is not I who should be thanked,” Sherlock said. “I am but a mere melody in this symphony we call life, and I cannot experience true harmony without our brotherhood. For what is life without harmony?”

  King Leopold rested his head on the welcoming planks of the guillotine. As the orchestra crescendoed to the very last phrase, the blade fell, slashing through the wind, the sound of the joyous symphony matching the tempo of a falling head.

  Badump. Badump. Badump.

  The Adventure of the Melted Saint

  BY

  Gail Z. Martin

  “Don’t take this the wrong way Alistair, but if you’re here, it means trouble.”

  Alistair McKinnon, Curator of the Lowcountry Museum of Charleston, jokingly preened. “Why, Cassidy! At my age, that’s one of the nicest things anyone has said to me in a while. Do I look suitably dangerous?”

  Alistair stooped, though the doorway was still an inch above his thinning brown hair. Today he wore a blue seersucker suit with a red bow tie, the natural apparel of the sartorially inclined old-school Charlestonian blue blood. He held a cardboard box, and despite our banter, his brow furrowed with worry.

  “You don’t usually bring me your mail for show and tell. What’s up?”

  “For starters,” Alistair replied, “I think this package arrived with its own ghost.”

  I figured that something supernatural lay behind his visit. That’s normal for me. I’m Cassidy Kincaide, owner of Trifles and Folly, an antique and curios store in historic, haunted Charleston, South Carolina, and I’ve got a couple of big secrets. First, I’m a psychometric, which means I can read the history—or magic—of objects by touching them. That comes in handy with my second secret, which is that Teag, my assistant store manager, has his own magical ability to weave spells into fabric—or weave data and hack computers with supernatural ease.

  And those two secrets roll up to our biggest one: Trifles and Folly really exists to get dangerous magical items off the market and out of the wrong hands. We’re part of a covert alliance of mortals and immortals dedicated to shutting down dangerous supernatural threats with extreme prejudice, and have been since our founding over three hundred years ago. When we do our job right, no one notices. When we screw up, the death and destruction usually gets chalked up to a natural disaster.

  “Maggie can cover the front of the store for a while,” I said. Maggie gave me a nod. She knows a little bit about what we do, though not quite everything, for her own safety. Alistair knows about my magic, but not about Teag’s abilities and the Alliance. It’s complicated.

  Teag and I showed Alistair into the small break room kitchen, and Alistair put the box on the table. He declined Teag’s offer of tea or coffee. Teag went ahead and poured a big glass of sweet tea for me, figuring I’d need it to recover after I read whatever objects were giving Alistair fits.

  “We received this box in the mail last week, from the Adirondack Museum in New York State,” Alistair said. “Apparently, it had been in their basement for nearly a hundred years. They sent it here because they felt the people connected to these objects had a stronger history with Charleston than they did with upstate New York.” He shrugged. “I’d agree with them on that part. But they didn’t mention that a ghost came along for the ride.”

  I eyed the box without touching it. If an object had really strong magic, I could often get an impression before I made physical contact. That was helpful, because then I could brace myself for what was coming. “I’m not getting any really bad vibes,” I said, letting my hand hover a few inches above the box. “What kind of problems has it been causing you?”

  “The poor woman who works in shipping and receiving broke down sobbing when she handled the box. She was so distraught we had to send her home. No idea why—except the box was in her office all day,” Alistair said. “Everyone who comes in contact with it mentions feeling down or sad, having a sudden change of mood. It’s wreaking havoc with the museum staff.”

  Alistair’s gaze slid away, embarrassed. “I have to tell you, I had a terrible time on the way over struggling with an overwhelming sadness that just came on me out of nowhere, for no good reason,” he admitted. “I’m really hoping you can help. We can’t put this on display. We’d have to offer free counseling with every admission ticket.”

  Now that Alistair mentioned it, I felt a strong downward tug on my mood, which had been pretty good until he showed up. Teag nodded, letting me know he was feeling it, too. I closed my eyes and tried to get a bead on what I was feeling. Sadness. Regret. Those were strong. There was something else…a sense of something hidden, something secret.

  “I’m not picking up anything dangerous.” I opened my eyes. “But there are some strong emotions attached. Why don’t you lay out the contents and I’ll see what I can find out for you.” I gave Alistair an encouraging smile. “Once we know what we’re dealing with, we can figure out better how to neutralize the supernatural heebie-jeebies.”

  Teag opened the box and set the items out on the table. The contents were an interesting jumble: an old journal, a stack of yellowed envelopes tied with twine, a man’s ring, and a melted gold coin. There was part of a burned piece of stationery as well.

  “What do you know about the previous owner or owners of the pieces?” I asked, still not ready to commit myself by touching anything.

  “Not much,” Alistair said with a sigh. “They came from the estate of a Mr. Jacob Whitley, of the New York Whitleys,” he added. If that was supposed to mean something to me, I didn’t get the reference. I raised an eyebrow quizzically and he continued. “A very prominent and wealthy family around the turn of the last century. Made their money in a line of retail stores.

  “The journal belonged to Marie deBrise Chastain,” he went on. “You recognize those names?”

  “The deBrise family and the Chastain family have been Charlestonian movers and shakers since the Huguenot days.”

  “The letters are between Rebecca Dumont and Mr. Whitley,” Alistair continued. “Everything dates to around 1920.”

  I moved my hand closer to the objects, and caught a flash of sorrow, a glimpse of flames, and the shadowy figure of a man. “There’s some kind of tragedy involved,” I said.

  Alistair nodded. “Marie Chastain was killed in a fire in 1920. Jacob Whitley, a suitor, escaped with his life but was badly scarred. Rebecca Dumont was a friend of Marie.”

  “How did all of these pieces end up in the mountains of New York?” Teag asked.

  “I have no idea,” Alistair replied. “We hadn’t started to research the pieces yet. I did put a call in to the Chastain family for information, but no one has called back.”

  “All right.” I mustered my courage. “Let’s see what I can find out.”

  I sat down at the table and reached for the diary. Teag could read the journal entries later, but for now, I wanted to pick up on the resonance of strong emotions left behind. The image of a woman’s face came to mind. Not conventionally pretty, but with regular features.

  “It’s not magical,” I said. “Mostly…not quite sad, but wistful? I’m guessing Marie might have had a lot of dreams she didn’t get the chance to fulfill.” I parsed through the images that came to mind. A shadow flickered in my inner sight. Not dangerous, but furtive. A man’s silhouette, there and gone. Odd.

  Next, I picked up the letters. The handwriting on the top envelope was faded, in the type of ink that told me it had been written with a fountain pen. The old-style script was a woman’s writing, neat and compact. This time, I got a mental image of two people. One was a petite woman who wore her red hair in a bob. She must have been Rebecca. The other was of a dark-haired man whose face I couldn’t quite make out, who I guessed was Jacob. Was he the shadow I glimpsed before? I wondered. I picked up a sense of uneasiness, of something being out of place, and a hint of something secretive.

  “You haven’t read the lett
ers?”

  Alistair shook his head. “We really haven’t had the box long enough to do more than catalog the contents.”

  “Interesting,” I said, wondering what the letters and journal would reveal when Teag read them.

  The sheet of stationery was partly burned. It looked like someone had snatched it out of the flames. After all this time, it radiated anger and disapproval. “You have pushed my patience to the breaking point,” I read aloud. “There will be consequences.” The man’s handwriting was strong and sweeping. The note was unsigned.

  “Any idea who wrote this?” I asked.

  Alistair shook his head. “None. Sounds rather ominous, doesn’t it?”

  “Did they ever figure out what caused the fire?” Teag questioned. “Was it an accident?”

  “From what I could find, it was blamed on a gas leak,” Alistair replied. “Of course, forensics back then weren’t what they are today.”

  I knew the coin and the man’s ring would be the worst of the items, which is why I saved them for last. The ring gave me a jolt when I touched it. I sensed Jacob’s energy, and Marie’s as well. Was the ring a gift from her? The energy was off—discordant, jumbled. I couldn’t get a clear read on it, but it made me jumpy.

  “Had the three of them been in any kind of trouble?” I asked. “It might even have been a scandal rather than something illegal. I think the three of them had a secret, but they aren’t giving it up easily.”

  “Nothing comes to mind, other than the fire that claimed Marie’s life,” Alistair said. “I can have a look through the archives when I go back to the museum.”

  “I’ll do some digging online,” Teag added. “And Mrs. Morrissey from the Archive might know something, too.”

  “When we hear back from the Chastain family, I’ll make some discreet inquiries,” Alistair added. Alistair was the soul of discretion, a necessity for fundraising and keeping well-heeled donors happy. History could be messy, and a city like Charleston not only had ghosts in every old house but plenty of skeletons in closets as well.