The Infernal Device & Others: A Professor Moriarty Omnibus

by Michael Kurland

  Dr. Papoli shrugged. "When I was called he had been dead for several hours. Rigor was pronounced. His face was flushed, which suggested to me the apoplexy; but I was overruled by the superior knowledge of your British doctors. If you would know more, you had best ask them."

  "I see," Moriarty said. "Thank you, doctor."

  Papoli bowed and backed out of the room.

  Moriarty crossed to the bedroom and gazed at the rumpled bedclothes. "Picture it, Barnett," he said. "The dead earl staring up at the ceiling, his face unnaturally red and bearing a horrified expression, his arms raised against an unseen foe. And the strange puncture marks on the body, don't leave those out of your picture." He turned to me. "What does that image convey to you?"

  "Something frightful must have happened in this room," I said, "but what the nature of that happening was, I have no idea."

  Moriarty shook his head. "Nothing frightful happened in this room," he said. "Understanding that will give you the key to the mystery." He took one last look around the room and then went out into the hall. For the next half hour he walked up and down the hallway on that floor and the ones above and below, peering and measuring. Finally he returned to where I awaited him on the second floor landing. "Come," he said.

  "Where?"

  "Back to Russell Square."

  We left the club and flagged down a hansom. Moriarty was taciturn and seemed distracted on the ride home. When we entered the house, Moriarty put a small blue lantern in the window, the sign to any passing members of the Mendicants' Guild that they were wanted. Moriarty has a long-standing relationship with the Mendicants' Guild and Twist, their leader. They are his eyes all over London, and he supplies them with technical advice of a sort they cannot get from more usual sources. About half an hour later a leering hunchback with a grotesquely flattened nose knocked on the door. "My moniker's Handsome Bob," he told Moriarty when he was brought into the office, "Twist sent me."

  "Here's your job," Moriarty told the beggar. "The Paradol Club is at the intersection of Montague and Charles. It has three entrances. Most people use the main entrance on Montague Street. I want a watch kept on the club, and I want the men to give me the best description they can of anyone who enters the club through either of the other two entrances. But without drawing any attention to themselves. Send someone to report to me every half-hour, but keep the place covered at all times."

  "Yessir, Professor Moriarty," Handsome Bob said, touching his hand to his cap. "Four of the boys should be enough. We'll get right on it."

  Moriarty reached into the apothecary jar on the mantle and took out a handful of coins. "Have them return here by cab if there's anything interesting to report," he said, handing the coins to him. "This is for current expenses. I'll settle with you at the usual rates after."

  "Yessir, Professor Moriarty," Handsome Bob repeated, and he turned and sidled out the door.

  Moriarty turned to me. "Now we wait," he said. "What are we waiting for?"

  "For the villain to engage in his employment," Moriarty said. He leaned back and settled down to read the latest copy of the quarterly Journal of the British Geological Society. I left the room and took a long walk, stopping for sustenance at a local pub, which I find soothes my mind.

  -

  I returned at about six in the evening, and stretched out on the sitting room couch to take a nap. It was just after eleven when Moriarty shook me by the shoulder. Standing behind him was an emaciated-looking man on crutches, a crippled beggar I remembered seeing at Twist's headquarters in a Godolphin Street warehouse. "Quick, Barnett," Moriarty cried, "our drama has taken a critical turn. Get your revolver while I hail a cab!" He grabbed his hat, stick, and overcoat and was out the door in an instant.

  I ran upstairs to my bedroom and pulled my revolver from its drawer, made sure it was loaded, and then grabbed my overcoat and ran downstairs. Moriarty had stopped two cabs, and was just finishing scribbling a note on the back of an envelope. He handed the note to the beggar. "Give this to Inspector Lestrade, and no one else," he said. "He will be waiting for you."

  Moriarty put the cripple in the first cab and looked up at the driver. "Take this man to Scotland Yard, and wait for him," he said. "And hurry!"

  We climbed into the second cab together and set off at a good pace for the Paradol Club. Moriarty leaned forward impatiently in his seat. "This is devilish," he said. "I never anticipated this."

  "What, Moriarty, for God's sake?"

  "Two people of interest have entered the back door of the club in the past hour," he said. "One was a young girl of no particular status who was taken in by two burly men and looked frightened to the watcher. The other was the duke of Claremore."

  "Moriarty!" I said. "But he's—"

  "Yes," Moriarty agreed. "And we must put an end to this quickly, quietly, and with great care. If it were ever to become known that a royal duke was involved—"

  "Put an end to what?" I asked. "Just what is going on in the Paradol Club?"

  Moriarty turned to looked at me. "The Greeks called it hubris," he said.

  We arrived at the club and jumped from the cab. "Wait around the corner!" Moriarty yelled at the driver as we raced up the front steps. The door was closed but the porter, a thick-set man with the look of a retired sergeant of marines, answered our knock after a few seconds, pulling his jacket on as he opened the door. Moriarty grabbed him by the collar. "Listen, man," he said. "Several detectives from Scotland Yard will arrive here any minute. Stay out front and wait for them. When they arrive, direct them to Dr. Papoli's consulting room on the second floor. Tell them that I said to be very quiet and not to disturb any of the other guests."

  "And who are you?" the porter asked.

  "Professor James Moriarty." And Moriarty left the porter in the doorway and raced up the stairs, with me close behind.

  The second floor corridor was dark, and we moved along it by feel, running our hands along the wall as we went. "Here," Moriarty said. "This should be the doctor's door." He put his ear to the door, and then tried the handle. "Damn—it's locked."

  A match flared, and the light steadied, and I saw that Moriarty had lighted a plumber's candle that he took from his pocket. "Hold this for me, will you?" he asked.

  Moriarty handed me the candle and took a small, curved implement from his pocket. He inserted it into the lock and, after a few seconds fiddling, the door opened. We entered a large room which was dark and deserted. I held up the candle, and we could see a desk and couch, and a row of cabinets along one wall.

  "There should be a staircase in here somewhere," Moriarty said, running his hand along the molding on the far wall.

  "A staircase?" I asked.

  "Yes. I measured the space when we were here earlier, and an area just below this room has been closed off, with no access from that floor. Also water has recently been laid on in this corner of the building and a drain put in. You can see the pipes hugging the wall from outside. Logic says that—aha!"

  There was a soft click and a section of the wall swung open on silent hinges, revealing a narrow stairs going down. A brilliant shaft of light from below illuminated the staircase.

  Moriarty, his revolver drawn, crept down the staircase, and I was but a step behind him. The sight that greeted my eyes as the room below came into view was one that will stay with me forever. It was as though I was witness to a scene from one of Le Grand Guignol's dramas of horror, but the chamber below me was not a stage setting, and the people were not actors.

  The room was an unrelieved white, from the painted walls to the tile floor, and a pair of calcium lights mounted on the ceiling eliminated all shadow and cast an unnatural brightness over the scene. Two metal tables of the sort used in operating theatres stood several feet apart in the middle of the room. Surrounding them was a madman's latticework of tubing, piping, and glassware, emanating from a machine that squatted between the two tables, the purpose of which I could not even begin to guess.

  On the table to my right
, partially covered by a sheet, lay an elderly man; on the other table a young girl similarly covered had been tied down by leather straps. Both were unconscious, with ether cones covering their nose and mouth. Between them stood Dr. Papoli, his black frock coat replaced by a white surgical apron, absorbed in his task of inserting a thin cannula into the girl's thigh. His assistant, also in white, was swabbing an area on the man's thigh with something that left a brown stain.

  "All right, Doctor," Moriarty said, starting toward the tables. "I think it would be best if you stopped right now!"

  Papoli looked up, an expression of annoyance on his face. "You mustn't interrupt!" he said. "You will ruin the experiment."

  "Your experiments have already ruined too many people," Moriarty said, raising his revolver. "Get away from the girl! The police will be here any second."

  Papoli cursed in some foreign language and, grabbing a brown bottle, threw it violently against the wall. It shattered and, in an instant, a sickly-sweet smell filled the room, a smell I recognized from some dental surgery I'd had the year before.

  "Don't shoot, Professor!" I yelled. "It's ether! One shot could blow us all into the billiard room!"

  "Quick!" Moriarty said, "we must get the duke and the girl out of here."

  Papoli and his assistant were already halfway up the stair. Doing my best to hold my breath, I staggered over to the tables. Moriarty lifted the duke onto his shoulders, and I unstrapped the girl and grabbed her, I'm not sure how, and headed for the stairs.

  While we were on the staircase two shots rang out from the room above, and I heard the sound of a scuffle. We entered the room to find Lestrade glaring at the doctor and his assistant, who were being firmly held by two large policemen. "He shot at me, Moriarty, can you believe that?" Lestrade said, sounding thoroughly annoyed. "Now, what have we here?"

  We lay our burdens gently on the floor, and I staunched the wound on the girl's thigh with my cravat.

  Moriarty indicated the unconscious man on the floor. "This is the duke of Claremore," he said. "It would be best to get him out of here before his presence becomes known. Dr. Papoli can safely be charged with murder, and his accomplice, I suppose, with being an accomplice. We'll see that the girl is cared for. Come to Russell Square tomorrow at noon, and I'll explain all over lunch."

  "But Moriarty—"

  "Not now, Lestrade. Tomorrow."

  "Oh, very well," Lestrade said. He turned to a policeman by the door. "Get a chair to seat his lordship in, and we'll carry him downstairs," he instructed.

  We took the waiting cab to Abelard Court, and Beatrice Atterleigh herself opened the door to our knock. She did not seem surprised to find us standing at her door supporting a barely conscious girl at one in the morning.

  "Will you take care of this girl for a few days?" Moriarty asked. "She has been mistreated. I have no idea what language she speaks."

  "Of course," Mrs. Atterleigh said.

  The next morning at quarter to twelve our client arrived at Rus-sell Square in response to a telegram. Lestrade arrived at noon sharp, thereby demonstrating the punctuality of the detective police.

  We sat down to duckling a l'orange and an '82 Piesporter, and Moriarty regaled us with a discourse on wines through the main course. It was not until the serving girl put the trifle on the table and Moriarty had poured us each a small glass of the Imperial Tokay— from a case presented to Moriarty by Franz Joseph himself upon the successful conclusion of a problem involving the chief of the Kundschafts Stelle and a ballerina—that he was willing to talk about the death of Lord Vincent Tams.

  "It was obvious from the start," Moriarty began, "that Lord Tams did not die where he was found. Which raised the questions why was he moved, and from where?"

  "Obvious to you, perhaps," Lestrade said.

  "Come now," Moriarty said. "His hands were raised and his face was flushed. But corpses do not lie with their hands raised, nor with their faces flushed."

  "This one did," Lestrade said. "I saw it."

  "You saw it full in the grip of rigor mortis," Moriarty said, "which makes the body rigid in whatever position it has assumed. But how did it assume that position? The face gives it away. The head was lower than the body after death."

  "Of course!" I said. "Lividity. I should have known."

  "Lividity?" Lord Tams asked.

  "After death the blood pools at the body's lowest point," I told him, "which makes the skin in that area appear red. I've seen it many times as a reporter on the New York police beat. I'm just not used to hearing of it on faces."

  "Your brother was at the Paradol Club to avail himself of the services of Dr. Papoli," Moriarty said, turning in his chair to face Lord Tams. "The doctor claimed to have a method to rejuvenate a man's lost vitality. He transfused his patients with youthful blood. Thus they regained youthful vigor. It is a not uncommon desire of men, as they get older, to recapture their youth. Papoli was preying on men who could afford to attempt it. Occasionally one of his patients died, because for some reason as yet unknown, some people's blood will cause a fatal reaction when injected into another. Papoli claimed that he had devised a machine that would solve that problem—the strange apparatus that was between the two beds. But he was obviously mistaken."

  "How do you know that?" Lestrade asked.

  "I went to talk to your prisoner this morning," Moriarty said. "He is extremely indignant that he is in jail. He considers himself a savior of man. He is quite mad."

  "So other men died besides my brother?" Lord Tams asked.

  "Yes, several. But they were elderly men, and their natural vanity had kept them from telling anyone about the operation, so his secret remained safe. Occasionally one of his donors died, but they came from the poorest classes of the city and they were not missed."

  "But my brother was not that old."

  "True. It was his obsession with sexual vitality that made him seek the operation. It failed. Papoli and his assistant thought your brother had died on the table. They left him there, not wanting to carry a body through the hallway early in the evening. Later, when they came back to take him to his room, they found that he had briefly regained consciousness and partially removed his restraining straps. The upper half of his body fell off the table in his dying convulsions, and he was left hanging from a strap around his legs. That explains his hands, which had fallen toward the floor. When they lifted him, rigor had set in and his arms looked as though they were raised."

  Lord Tams sighed. "Poor Vincent." He stood up. "Well, Professor Moriarty, you have saved my marriage, and possibly my life. I had the impression that Inspector Lestrade was preparing to clap me in irons at any second."

  "That's as it may be," Lestrade said. "No hard feelings, I trust?"

  "None, Inspector. I invite you—all of you—to my wedding. I must be off now to see Miss Whitsome and tell her the happy news. Professor Moriarty, you will send me a bill, whatever you think is right, and I will pay it promptly, I assure you."

  Moriarty nodded, and Lord Tams clapped his bowler on his head and was out the door. A minute later Lestrade followed.

  "Moriarty," I said, refilling my coffee cup, "two last questions."

  Moriarty held out his own cup for a refill. "What?" he asked.

  "Do you think the new Lord Tams will keep his brother's rooms at the Paradol?"

  "I never speculate," Moriarty said, "it is bad for the deductive process." He leaned back. "But if I were a betting man, I'd put a tenner on it. What else?"

  "Miss Lestrelle told us that Vincent had made some reference to Shelley, and you said that that told all. Were you serious? I looked through my copy of Shelley this morning, and I could find nothing that applies."

  Moriarty smiled. "I fancy you were looking up the wrong Shelley," he said.

  "The wrong—"

  Moriarty reached over to the bookshelf and tossed a book across to me. "Try this one."

  I looked down at the book. On the cover, in an ornate Gothic type, was the title:
Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley.

  -

  Moriarty was out all this morning, and he came back with a painting by Lenore Lestrelle. It is all green and brown and blue blotches and seems to be some sort of pastoral scene. I am afraid that he intends to hang it in the dining room.

  DEATH BY GASLIGHT

  Now entertain conjecture of a time

  When creeping murmur and the poring dark

  Fills the wide vessel of the Universe.

  From camp to camp, through the foul womb of night ...

  —William Shakespeare

  PROLOGUE

  When I consider life, 'tis all a cheat.