Moriarty (14 page)

“You'll have an extra one to give them then, won't you, Dropsy? An extra threepence in your pocket.”

“She really don't look herself.” Ember was still chauntering on about Sal's body, and at that moment Lee Chow brought his hand down on the deceased's forehead with a loud slap that made George Gittins wince. “You got rice and bugs ever'where,” Chow turned and addressed Dropsy. “You eve' do anything ‘bout the bugs, Dlopsy? They o'ganizing own army here.” Lee Chow dramatically scratched under his arm. “The rice got legements o' their own. The Bug and Rice B'igade.”

“You saying my house is not clean?” Dropsy asked belligerently.

“Hampstead donkeys everywhere,” Ember said. A Hampstead donkey was a body louse.

“Yes, we are saying that, and you'd better look to it, Mr. Carmichael, because our gaffer knows people who'd close you down quick as a fuck on a train, and don't open your mouth to me”—Carmichael had already done so—“because I'm likely to close it for a few months, if not forever. Where's that bloody undertaker? The stench in here's
enough to cut my phlegm.” Glittering George had a foam of spittle round his lips.

“Fart-e-bellies,” Lee Chow said plainly.

“Ar, and there'd be plenty of them here, an' all.” Gittins had reached the point where he wanted to hit somebody—preferably Dropsy Carmichael—but there was a call from someone on the stairs. The undertaker had arrived.

“I hear that someone has departed from this house,” old Cadvenor said in the trembly, parsonical voice he used regularly for the bereaved.

“Up here, Michael,” called George Gittins, so loudly that Streeter flinched.

“She really doesn't look herself,” Ember said for the umpteenth time.

“I'll need the name and other details,” Cadvenor said, entering the room, a portly, fastidious-looking kind of man, the sort that would fuss over his appearance and be adamant that everything be done “by the book,” as they say.

“You won't need those details, Mr. Cadvenor.” George Gittins turned so that what light there was caught his face. “You'll be doing this on behalf of the Professor.”

“Oh!” The undertaker seemed to be pulled up short. “Oh, yes. Of course. You're Mr. Gittins, are you not? Yes, I had heard the Professor was back in London.”

“Then you'll expedite this matter with haste, and receive payment in the usual way.”

“Certainly, Mr. Gittins. I'll get my lads up and we'll remove the corpse forthwith.”

“Good. Quick as you can, then.”

George looked at the body. The head was screwed to one side at an unnatural angle and the flesh had the flabby grey-white look of uncooked
pastry, the lips lacking blood, the nostrils flared, and the eyes filmed over with all spark gone. Not being a squeamish man, George leaned over and closed the eyes with the thumb and forefinger of his right hand, for which Cadvenor thanked him as his two assistants came into the room carrying a litter between them.

Gittins gave a peremptory order and they all began to descend the stairs, leaving the undertaker to his work.

At the door to the street, Gittins turned to Dropsy Carmichael. “I shouldn't go noising this abroad, Dropsy. Not if you've got any sense.”

“I'm not a fool, Mr. Gittins.”

“I wouldn't have known,” and George was away from the house as though he couldn't move quick enough, telling the others to get into the growler fast as foxes; pausing to tell Josiah Osterley to “take us back by the river, I need some air after that place.” “By God,” he said to Ember, “what a place to take poor Sal Hodges!”

“What a place indeed,” Ember agreed. “But she did not look herself, did she, George?”

“Anyone in a rush?” Gittins asked. “Any of you got appointments tonight? No? Good, we shall meander back,” and he put a foot on the box and whispered in Josh Osterley's ear; and so they wandered off with, it seemed, no particular destination in mind until, some two hours later, when the streets were lit by the electric lighting and the odd window was illuminated by candles, the growler finally took them west of the London Docks, down Nightingale Lane into Wapping, turning east again, then off to the right down a pitch-black cul-de-sac lane to the riverside itself, where George Gittins climbed down, saying, “I must strain me taters,” and proceeded to relieve himself into the river.

“Sidney?” he called, patting Valentine's muzzle as he returned to the growler. “Sid, get down here, up on the box with you, next to Josh Osterley. He'll need two pairs of eyes to get back up this lane.” Indeed
the lane was dark; there was not a glimmer of light for two hundred yards or so back up to the road.

So Streeter climbed up and settled himself on Osterley's left as Glittering George Gittins went back to the coach, passing beside the driver, opening the door, then swinging himself up, one foot in the coach, left hand on the roof as his right hand went down inside his jacket and pulled out the Smith & Wesson hammerless revolver. Lifting himself up he blew Streeter's brains out with a single shot from behind, startling the horses and shouting, “Josh Osterley, get rid of him!”

As he turned the coach around, so Osterley nudged Streeter's body into the river and Gittins swung inside the coach.

It was almost half past seven and, back in the real world, Albert Spear was about to call on Professor Moriarty with the news of Sal Hodges's murder.

LONDON: JANUARY 17, 1900

N
OW THAT
T
ERREMANT
was spending much of the time away from the house, Moriarty called in Daniel Carbonardo to watch him there, both on the premises and when he went abroad into the streets. He also had Wally Taplin, the freckle-faced boy with the smooth, neat, copper-coloured hair, living in as his errand boy. During Wednesday morning he had sent the boy over to the nearby stables where his cab driver, Ben Harkness, lived in rooms above the big shed where the Professor's hansom was stored, next to the stable he rented for Archie.

In the late morning they drove out, Daniel sitting in the hansom with the Professor, vigilant, armed, and ready to move should anyone attempt to harm his gaffer.

They drove to the General Post Office in St. Martin's le Grand, where Moriarty sent a telegraph to a Karl Franz von Hertzendorf at an address in the fashionable Stephansdom quarter of Vienna. The message read:

The message cost the standard rate of 3d a word for foreign telegrams, the entire cable being charged at seven shillings and nine pence.
*
They then returned to the house without incident, the entire outing taking roughly one hour. Moriarty found himself so impressed by Daniel Carbonardo's behaviour—the way he held himself, his alertness and general demeanour—that he seriously considered him for a place in his aptly named Praetorian Guard.

Once home, the Professor repaired to his room and poured himself a generous glass of a dry sherry, of which he was fond, while young Wally, good boy that he was, went and fetched him a rabbit pie from Mrs. Belcher at The Duke of York public house on the corner. The pie
came hot, and the boy carried it upstairs with a cloth over the two plates—one turned on top of the other—so that it would still be warm and fresh for the Professor, who, by the time the boy arrived, had laid a place for himself at table and sat there ready to eat, a pristine white napkin tucked into his collar and a bottle of Hospices de Beaune decanted and breathing beside his right hand.

Ada Belcher's rabbit pie was alright, not great but certainly edible, though the pastry lacked something, possibly the way a good rabbit pie's pastry should absorb the juices of the gravy and, so enriched, melt in the mouth. The actual rabbit was done to his liking with the tender meat peppered with cloves, and an onion spiked in the same way; carrots and diced potato were also provided, and there was plenty of gravy, delicious and full of flavour, to which he needed to add only a trifle of salt and a little English mustard for the meat. The mustard he made for himself, once a week, with Mr. Coleman's powder, sometimes, in the summer, after the French manner, mixing it with a white wine vinegar.

As a cook, Ada Belcher was almost good, though not quite great. Ada, he considered, narrowly missed the mark of perfection. The people he really wanted were those from the old days, particularly Fanny Jones; but Fanny had married Pip Paget so was Fanny Paget now, and would be to the end of Paget's days.

James Moriarty's fork, carrying rabbit flesh and pastry, replete with the succulent gravy, to his mouth, paused halfway up as he thought the unthinkable, drops of gravy falling back to the plate.

But was it unthinkable? Paget had denied him, and got away with it free and gratis. Though if the secrets of all hearts were laid bare, as they would be on the Day of Judgement, Paget doubtless expected to pay for his sin at some time, and it would not be difficult to make him cough and pay the final price. Oh, the idea of tasting Fanny's pastry again sent an almost sexual shiver through James Moriarty's body!

He sat back, relishing the flavour and thinking how much better it would be had Fanny Jones prepared and cooked the pie. At this moment he would gladly give a king's ransom for one of Fanny's meat or game pies, and possibly her speciality, baked apple, to follow, the centre of the apple stuffed full of demerara sugar, studded with sultanas, and laced with a pinch of ginger. In his head Moriarty was singing:

A remnant of his childhood.

He drank three glasses of the burgundy with his meal, and in the postprandial glow, the Professor leaned back in his favourite chair and thought again of the final days and hours when he took over his elder brother's life.

First, he recalled how he had worked hard in taking on his brother's outward appearance; once he had perfected this skilful method of disguising himself as the professor of mathematics, young Moriarty set the final moves into play. From the years they had spent growing up together, the youngest brother knew the darkest secrets of the true professor's soul. Certainly he was aware of the professor's besetting weakness: For all his command of mathematics, James Moriarty was hopeless with money, forever living beyond his means. It was quickly clear to the young Moriarty that the professor had formed an attachment to a pair of his wealthiest students, and in this he may have met his nemesis.

The young men—Arthur Bowers and the Honourable Norman de Frayse—were in their late teens, both already bearing the marks of
early degeneracy: the languid good looks, limp hands, weak mouths, bloodshot eyes following days of overindulgence, and a style of conversation that affected a quick, if cheap, wit.

Young Moriarty had both the young men marked. Bowers's father was squire of a small village in Gloucestershire, while de Frayse's father, the baronet Sir Richard de Frayse, was not beyond playing at the high-and-fast London life himself. The boys seemed already set in their ways, spending the bulk of their time with the professor of mathematics, sometimes staying out until the following morning and having little aptitude for the kind of studies that should have consumed their professor.

Through carefully cultivated friends, young Moriarty, judging when the time was ripe, spread the word that both Bowers and de Frayse were being corrupted by the older academic, and the whispers quickly reached the ears of their families—young Moriarty saw to that.

It was Sir Richard who reacted first, obviously concerned lest his beloved son be lured into the web of destructive pleasure and libidinous ways that were so obviously dragging himself toward eternal damnation. Sir Richard descended on the university and, after spending an uncomfortable hour or so with his son, arrived, wrathful and spleen-choked, at the Vice-Chancellor's lodgings.

The situation could not have been bettered, for the older man had acted true to form, even stretching himself further into trouble than his younger brother had estimated.

In all, the professor had funded his nights of eating, drinking, gambling, and, presumably, debauchery by borrowing heavily from the two young men. When all was made known, the mathematician owed some three thousand pounds to de Frayse and a further fifteen hundred to Bowers. The Vice-Chancellor's anger was horrible to see.
Moriarty's name was blackened in the groves of academe and he was asked to leave the university forthwith.

Naturally, rumours abounded: The professor had been discovered
in flagrante delicto
with a college servant; he had stolen money; he had abused and struck the Vice-Chancellor; he had used his mathematical skill to cheat at cards; he was a dope fiend; he was a Satanist; he was involved with a gang of criminals. The only truth that was un-decorated was that Professor Moriarty had resigned.

The younger Moriarty chose his moment with care, arriving innocent and unexpected at the professor's rooms late one afternoon, feigning surprise at the boxes and trunks open and the packing in progress.

His elder brother was a broken and beaten man, the stoop more pronounced, his eyes sunk even deeper into his head, his gait slow and stumbling, and his hands unsteady. Slowly, and not without emotion, Professor James Moriarty unfolded the sad story to his youngest brother.

“I feel you might have understanding at my plight, Jim,” he said, once the terrible truth was out. “I doubt if Jamie ever will.”

“No, but Jamie's in India, so there is no great or immediate trouble there.”

“But what will be said, Jim? Though nothing will be publicly revealed, for the sake of the university, there are already stories. The world will know that I leave here under some great cloud. It is my ruin and the destruction of all my work. My mind is in such a whirl, I do not know where to turn.”