The Sherlock Holmes Megapack: 25 Modern Tales by Masters: 25 Modern Tales by Masters (59 page)

“I see that the chairman of the board of directors, Sir Henry Grimm, didn’t want to miss out on the talented cellist’s last performance, either,” the ever-watchful investigator observed as intermission came. How he recognized the distinguished, elderly financier I had no idea, but the impulse to take advantage of an opportunity overcame him. “I think I shall engage Sir Henry in conversation about the party he attended at the ambassador’s mansion,” Holmes said excitedly as he started to make his way through the crowd in the lobby and ascend the stairs to the next level.

I wandered over to the vestibule to purchase some refreshments while I waited for Holmes to return with new information. He was smiling broadly when we met again, and shook his head in a display of incredulity.

“What is it that you have learned?” I quizzed.

“Well, I don’t mind telling a story against myself once again,” he responded. “The old codger claimed to barely remember who went to the party, and he admonished me for meddling in the internal affairs of the bank and the machinery of our government. ‘Go on about your life without destroying the relationship between the pillars of this community and the leaders of this great Empire,’ he jabbered as his dentures click-clacked. I would hasten to say that my appeal to his sense of moral uprightness was an abysmal failure.”

During the final half of the concert, my friend chuckled to himself over the encounter with Sir Henry, and on the way home Holmes leaned back in the cab with his tight-fitting cloth cap pulled down across the bridge of his long nose, mimicking their repartee, with an emphasis on the banker’s one-sentence lecture.

“I would be amused even more,” Holmes gloated, “to know how much money the National Bank of England stands to lose if its esteemed chairman has been duped into a ploy concocted by the villain François Maupertuis. But enough hypothesis! It is facts that I need, Watson, and I intend to gather some useful intelligence in the morning.”

* * * *

Later, back in our apartment, Holmes stretched out on the sofa with his violin, recreating the melodious refrains we heard on the cello at Covent Garden. I scanned the pages of the evening
Pall Mall
in one of the armchairs and read aloud to Holmes a news account of Lord Ashton Pritchard’s release from jail on his own recognisance. Walking out of police headquarters, he was surrounded by reporters, to whom he vowed to vigorously defend against the trumped-up charge of malfeasance. He staunchly denied rumours that he was assisting the authorities in what was described as a continuing inquiry.

“I wouldn’t doubt that Inspector Jones was the source of those rumours,” Holmes speculated, “to exert pressure on Lord Pritchard’s co-conspirator to do something that would bring him out in the open, to surface and fall into the long arms of the law.”

“Such as what?” I asked.

“Such as make contact with his lordship—surely he is under surveillance,” Holmes answered. “There is too much at stake for him not to be watched closely. That is what I will do for the rest of tonight and perhaps all day tomorrow, or at least until I am assured that Scotland Yard is doing an adequate job of it. Here is the address of Lord Pritchard that I acquired at police headquarters the day before yesterday, Watson. Come ’round in the afternoon and stroll past the front entrance with your walking stick as if you were out on a daily constitutional.”

“What should I do after that?” I wanted to know.

“A little birdie will whisper instructions in your ear,” said Holmes with a laugh, then he disappeared out the door at a fast clip.

At about noon the following day, a steady spring rain pelted the city, so I donned my Mackintosh and broad-brimmed felt hat, took up my walking stick, and rode in a cab to St John’s Wood, where the stately, lichen-blotched stone dwelling of Lord Pritchard stood among a half-dozen other large houses of equal magnificence, all separated by elm trees, recently-planted flower gardens, and lush green lawns. I ordered the driver to stop about two furlongs beyond Lord Pritchard’s address and began my trek in the downpour. I passed his address and was a short distance up the cobblestone road when the sweet voice of a teen-age girl selling lilies from a cart under a wide bumbershoot wondered if I was Dr Watson.

“Why, yes, I am, my dear,” I told her. “How on earth did you know?”

“Mr Holmes and Inspector Jones, for whom I work, said you would be coming along and to keep an eye out for you,” she revealed. “I am part of the surveillance team. You can find the others in that carriage house across the road from Lord Pritchard’s home. The man who lives in the carriage house is a retired constable, Jeremy Higgenbottom. Inspector Jones arranged it so that the police could use Jeremy’s quarters as a vantage point and a staging area in the event Lord Pritchard goes on the move.”

“This all seems intricately planned,” I mentioned.

“Oh, it has been planned for a couple of days,” she added. “Mr Holmes and Inspector Jones cooked up the idea before Lord Pritchard was released. They want us to be on the lookout for a man with a crooked nose who might visit Lord Pritchard. If I see him enter his lordship’s home, I am supposed to blow my whistle and then go cover the rear exit in case he tries to escape through it.”

“But what if he does, how would you stop him?” I inquired.

“I am trained in karate, and, besides, I have this,” she disclosed, pulling back the front of her waistcoat and showing me a revolver butt hanging from a shoulder holster.

“Oh, my!” I exclaimed. “You are not the one to tangle with!”

“I should say not, but I am ready for him,” she concluded before I bid her good fortune and went toward the carriage house. I climbed the wooden steps and rapped on the door, which was opened by a stout, grey-haired gentleman with a high forehead, dark eyes, and a protruding jaw.

“Hello, Dr Watson, come in, come in. I am Jeremy, your host,” he proclaimed.

“Watson! You are soaking wet. Come sit by the stove to dry yourself,” said Sherlock Holmes, who was perched at a window in the cozy kitchen, looking out across the road at Lord Pritchard’s home.

“Leave it to you, Holmes, to keep yourself snug and out of the rain when you are on duty,” I retorted. “I think I shall sit next to Inspector Jones at the table and take advantage of that warm cook stove.”

“You are just in time for tea,” said the amiable occupant. “The little missus was about to serve some nice hot tea and fresh-baked muffins when you knocked.”

“Lovely,” I said with enthusiasm, “for I skipped lunch to be here by mid-afternoon. Tell me, one of you, how goes the operation?”

Inspector Jones volunteered that Lord Pritchard had had no visitors, so there was no sign of the man with the crooked nose.

“The housekeeper and the butler arrived at about seven o’clock through the servants’ entrance, but other than the two of them, his lordship apparently has no well-wishers. All the rats have jumped ship. I expect the butler and the maid will be leaving for the day shortly.”

The afternoon ended without the departure of the two domestics, and Holmes took on a worried look. Sunset came, then darkness, without a light in any window of the domicile across the road. “Something is amiss, and I fear the worst. We have been tricked,” Holmes deduced in an icy tone. “One of us should—”

“Tricked? How?” Inspector Jones interjected.

“The pair who arrived this morning were not what they pretended to be,” said Holmes glumly. “One of us should go to the front door and ring the bell to see if there is a response.”

“Well, what if Lord Pritchard or the butler answers? It will give us away,” the inspector protested.

“Not if we make it seem like a final attempt to elicit his lordship’s cooperation,” Holmes proposed.

“Then you handle it, Mr Holmes, because I already have exhausted my energies in that department while Lord Pritchard was in custody,” the inspector advised.

Holmes agreed and scurried outside. The rain had subsided and, with the illumination from the street lamps, we watched Holmes’s thin silhouette glide to the front door and wait for someone to let him inside. He rang a second time and paused again for another few minutes.

Getting no response, he went around the side of the building to the servants’ entrance and opened the unlocked door, stepping into the house. We saw a lamp flicker in one room, then another and another. Suddenly, Holmes’s slender figure burst out the main door and he waved frantically for us to move forward. He met us on the lawn and announced his findings:

“Lord Pritchard has been murdered, shot six times as he lay in bed. The housekeeper and the butler are also both dead, gagged and bound with cord from the window blinds, callously executed with bullets in the backs of their heads while seated at the dining room table. But this is not the same couple who arrived early today. The deceased domestics are older, smaller, and dressed differently—and they are live-ins, as you will see when I show you their rooms. The two who committed these crimes came in disguise, suspecting that Lord Pritchard would be under surveillance, and made their escape through the rear exit.”

The shocking news left us speechless for a time, until Inspector Jones broke the silence with a grunt and a curse. “So be it, then,” he said calmly, lifting his derby and scratching his scalp through a coarse shock of black hair. “Let’s go in and survey the damage. It puzzles me, though, why we didn’t detect the gunfire.”

“The killers used pillows to muffle the noise, first doing away with Lord Pritchard after tying up the butler and the maid, then turning on them to eliminate any witnesses. I believe we are confronted with the trademarks of professional assassins,” Holmes stated. “Be cautious where you step—there might be footprints out here that I can examine in the morning when there is enough light, but the rain probably has washed that evidence away.”

Holmes guided us into the gruesome crime scene, again warning us to be alert not to tread on footprints on the tile floor of the kitchen, which was adjacent to the quarters of the couple who had served as housekeeper and butler. We moved into the dining room, where the two lifeless bodies sat with their heads bent backwards.

I estimated the victims had been dead for nearly twelve hours, judging from the stiffness of the cadavers and the condition of the coagulated blood, of which there was surprisingly little.

Holmes pointed out the pillows on the oval rug and focused our attention on the pattern of the gunpowder residue. “The muzzles of the weapons were two different diameters,” he conjectured. “It appears from the wounds on Lord Pritchard that he was killed with one calibre, and the servants with the other.”

In the master bedroom, Holmes turned the corpse of Lord Pritchard onto its side and shouted, “Halloa! What have we here? Two of the rounds passed through him and are imbedded in the mattress.” He took out his pocket knife to cut away some of the material, and fished with his hand into the cavity, pulling out a lead slug the size of the knuckle on the second joint of his little finger.

“It is a .45-calibre,” Inspector Jones remarked.

Holmes, taking his magnifying glass out of his jacket, examined the bullet scrupulously and noted that the lands and grooves etched by the barrel of the revolver twisted to the left.

“As Inspector Jones already knows from experience, Watson, only a handgun manufactured by Colt in America twists to the left, so I would venture to say at least one of the murderous intruders has spent time in the United States.”

“I suppose one of them is a female, or was dressed as a woman,” Inspector Jones commented.

“That is an enigma,” Holmes added, “because we probably are dealing with experts who can change their appearance to suit the situation.”

After conferring further, they agreed that for the time being they would concentrate their efforts on spy networks and the underworld to learn the identities of killers for hire, male and female alike, in Europe as well as on other continents. The problem they faced was a global one, and that was not the end of it. Once they found the assassins, they concurred, they would then have to snare whoever employed the pair.

“That is a tall order, to be sure, but we can start our search locally and expand from there,” Inspector Jones continued. “Right now, however, I must make arrangements for the victims to be removed and taken to hospital for autopsies. I shall place guards around the house to keep the press and the curious at bay, and we can rummage through Lord Pritchard’s personal effects after we have had some sleep.”

“If it’s all the same to you, Inspector, I shall stay here to do just that and forego the slumber,” said Holmes ruefully.

“Very well, suit yourself, only let me know as soon as you discover anything worthwhile,” the official conceded.

After Inspector Jones left, I attempted in vain to persuade Holmes to join me back at Baker Street for the night, but he insisted on remaining to look for clues, so I went home alone, thinking along the way about his daunting task.

* * * *

In the morning, I found him dozing in the basket-chair in the clothes he wore the day before. I quietly made coffee and heard Mrs Hudson’s footsteps on the stairs, so I opened the door before she got there and put my index finger to my lips.

“Shhh,” I sounded, and in a low voice I told her Holmes was asleep finally. She brought in a hearty breakfast for the two of us on tiptoes, placed the tray on the table, and scooted out without the slightest disturbance. I made certain I made no noise while I ate until I accidentally dropped my butter knife on the wooden floor.

Holmes awakened with a start and sprang to his feet. “How long have I been asleep?” he demanded.

“I don’t know when you arrived home, so I can’t give you an answer,” I said.

“What time is it now?” he asked, raising his voice.

I glanced at my pocket watch. “It is a few minutes after eight.”

“Good grief! There is barely enough time for me to be there promptly at nine,” he complained, and flew across the threshold.

Chapter 2

THE FRAUD BEGINS TO UNFOLD

Remaining idle while waiting for Holmes to return was an unproductive enterprise; therefore, I decided to journey to St Bart’s and observe the autopsies so I could interpret the results with first-hand knowledge. It was fortunate that I did go, because the orderly assisting Dr Uttley grew ill and left the cadaver room. I was enlisted to take his place.