The Sherlock Holmes Megapack: 25 Modern Tales by Masters: 25 Modern Tales by Masters (60 page)

Inspector Jones was in attendance, and he collected the two bullets when they were extracted from inside the skulls of the housekeeper and butler. “Mangled as they are, it appears each is a .476 calibre, with a hollow point for expansion,” he said adroitly, owing to his expertise in firearms and ammunition.

* * * *

The procedures completed, I travelled by cab to the tobacconist in the West End and purchased a fresh supply of my Arcadia mixture and twelve grams of Holmes’s favourite shag blend, for I had noticed he was running low on his stash in the Persian slipper on the mantle and had no spare time for a shopping trip.

When I reached home, Mrs Hudson advised me there was no sign of Holmes, so she scooped out two ladles of chicken noodle soup into a large bowl and put it on a tray for my lunch with several slices of fresh-baked Vienna bread, one of her specialities.

“I’m worried about him, away day and night without the proper rest and nourishment,” she said with a frown. Just as she did, Holmes appeared on the stoop and joined us in the kitchen.

“Ah, here you are,” Mrs Hudson spoke out, “in time for lunch for a change.”

Holmes greeted her warmly and complimented her on the aroma. She placed his bowl of soup on the tray with more bread and told us she would carry it all upstairs. “You’ll spill half of it going up the steps if I don’t keep it from you,” she said with complaint.

While we ate, Holmes brought me up to date on his investigation.

“Any footprints at Lord Pritchard’s home were obliterated by the rain, but I did find some interesting data when I went through his personal effects. His desk in the library had been rifled, but the killers, in their haste, neglected the safe in the wall between the shelves of the bookcase. I had some difficulty with the combination at first, but on my third try, the safe opened with ease. Inside were wads of hundred pound notes, along with a stock certificate for a hundred shares of the Netherland-Sumatra Company. The certificate was dated on the day the House of Lords adopted the unreasonable tariffs on spices imported from the Dutch East Indies, and the document was signed by the owner of the company, Baron François Maupertuis.”

“That would suggest a link between the certificate and Lord Pritchard’s campaign for the higher tariffs,” I postulated, then notified Holmes that I also had news. “I learned at the autopsies that the butler and maid were done in with .476-calibre bullets.”

“And that would suggest the weapon was a gate-loaded Enfield revolver, recently retired by the British military, or the new Webley-Green, the preferred choice of Army officers,” Holmes added. “We might be looking for two former soldiers, one from England and the other from America, since the .45-calibre Colt single action revolver is standard issue for cavalry troops in the western United States. Of course, it is possible, too, that the killer with the Colt .45 was a civilian, perhaps a gunslinger, or an outlaw, on the frontier. Time will tell.”

“Did you learn anything at your nine o’clock appointment after you rushed out?” I asked.

“I met with Mr Bynem, the spice trader, when the commodity exchange opened for business. I braced him with the stock certificate for the Netherland-Sumatra Company—a name he recognized as a new firm with a vast supply of spices not yet on the market. He said a representative of the owner was circulating contracts among all the spice traders on the exchange, trying to peddle the goods on the basis that they could bring huge profits, due to the fact that they reached our shore before royal assent to the new tariffs.

“However, Mr Bynem declined to buy, because the salesman wouldn’t allow Mr Bynem’s agents to inspect the cargo on the steamship
Zenith
, which is docked at Pier 32 in the Port of London. I asked Mr Bynem to describe this salesman, and he told me the man was dapper, dressed in a tweed suit, was about fifty years old, clean-shaven and tall, with a gregarious personality and a crooked nose. Mr Bynem recalled his name as Barnabas Huckabee, apparently another alias of Baron Maupertuis.”

“I suppose
you
plan to inspect the cargo, though, eh, Holmes?” I said hesitantly.

“You suppose correctly, Watson, as soon as we finish eating,” Holmes proclaimed. “Your participation would be greatly appreciated. It could be a risky activity, so come prepared for trouble.”

“What about Inspector Jones—shouldn’t he be invited as well?” I begged to know.

“He would be invited ordinarily, but we might have to bend the law, trespass, or do something else he wouldn’t approve. No, it’s best we leave him out of this,” Holmes countered.

We returned Mrs Hudson’s glassware and utensils to the kitchen and travelled on foot to the Underground, but first Holmes changed into his seafarer’s garb so he would blend in with the environment on the waterfront. We stopped at the telegraph office on St James’s Square, where Holmes sent wires to his contacts in Paris, Rome, Barcelona, and Amsterdam.

We then rode the Underground to Woolwich Station, which was approximately two kilometers along the Thames from Pier 32, so we hailed a hansom that took us the remainder of the way. Throughout the entire trip, Holmes and I discussed his plan to board the ship and slip into the cargo hold, while I was to stand guard on deck at the top of the stairs, pretending to be a passenger—which was why Holmes had instructed me to bring along my physician’s bag and a hold-all filled with clothing.

At Pier 32, Holmes sprang from the hansom and scampered part way up the gangplank of the steamship
Zenith
before I touched the ground, for he did not want anyone to see us working together. On his way up the ramp, Holmes passed two stevedores lugging a heavy oak barrel on their way to one of a dozen empty freight wagons, drawn by four horses, all positioned near the bottom of the gangplank.

I took my bags to the top in time to see Holmes in an animated discussion with a young, curly-haired man dressed in a business suit and carrying a valise. As I drew closer, I overheard the perplexed fellow tell Holmes that it was too late to inspect the remaining barrels in the cargo hold because the entire lot already had been purchased by his company, which traded in spices.

Holmes asked permission to remove the lid from the barrel on its way to the first freight wagon. The young man said his superior at the company would likely disapprove and refused. Holmes warned him that his decision could result in disaster for his employer, but the young man was steadfast.

“I am here to ensure that one hundred and fifty barrels are delivered to our distributors, not to learn what is in them,” he ejaculated. “Besides, they are all labelled—ginger, vanilla, cloves, pepper, et cetera, et cetera.”

“Your distributors will hear harsh words from the grocers once these barrels reach their stores,” Holmes cautioned. “What is the name of your superior?”

“Stanley Altmire,” the young man replied sharply.

“I shall take up the matter with him, then,” Holmes retorted, and walked toward me. “Come, Watson, we have another errand to run before this frustrating day is over. Let’s find out if this impertinent lad’s higher-up is equally recalcitrant.”

We boarded the Underground to the City of London and located the fourth-floor offices of Compton Trading Partners, Ltd, which had purchased the cargo, and waited in the reception area for Stanley Altmire to complete his transactions on the trading floor below.

Altmire, too, wore a tweed suit, and his round belly protruded from under the last button on his matching waistcoat.

“How do you know there is a problem with the shipment?” he asked Holmes after hearing the detective explain that the owner of the Netherland-Sumatra Company was a convicted confidence trickster.

“It was a straightforward deal,” Altmire continued. “We bought the goods at a bargain and can sell them for twice, maybe three times what we paid.”

“It was a simple matter of deduction, that is how I know there is a problem,” Holmes offered. “I can spare you considerable embarrassment if you allow me to inspect the contents of the barrels.”

“It is too late for inspections,” Altmire contended. “We have tendered payment and the goods are on their way to market.”

“Do you mind telling me,” Holmes inquired, “how much you paid for a hundred and fifty barrels of ocean sand?”

“F-f-for what?” Altmire stammered.

“For beautiful, white, beach sand,” Holmes declared.

“How can you be sure?” Altmire moaned, to which Holmes responded thusly:

“Because the first barrel that was carried out of the cargo hold of the steamship
Zenith
had been damaged on its side in transport. It leaked, leaving a trail of ocean sand all along the gangplank, across the deck, and down the stairs to the cargo hold. I deduced that if one barrel contained sand, not nutmeg as it was marked, all the rest were suspect. But to be certain that you have been swindled, I must conduct my inspection.”

“I shall write the addresses of our distributors’ warehouses with a letter authorizing you to open the barrels,” Altmire stated apologetically. “We paid twenty thousand pounds for that shipment. I need to know the results of your inquiries as quickly as possible so that we can notify the bank to cancel the draft—if the money hasn’t already been withdrawn by Barnabas Huckabee.”

“The dapper, cheery chap with the crooked nose?” Holmes queried.

“Yes, he’s the one,” Altmire answered, then excused himself to go to his desk.

Sherlock Holmes expended the next day-and-a-half exploring the warehouses on Stanley Altmire’s list, reporting the findings of ocean sand everywhere to the distraught trader, who failed in his attempt to cancel the bank draft before it was negotiated. The cash was gone.

“Our company can hardly afford the loss,” Altmire told Holmes sorrowfully. “I’ll be sacked.”

“When my case is complete, perhaps the courts will order the funds returned,” Holmes said to ease his pain.

“That means getting the lawyers involved, an additional expense that might come to nothing in the end,” Altmire cried out. “By then I shall be without an income, and I have a family to support.”

“Tragic as that sounds, learn a hard lesson from it,” Holmes directed. “In business, as in life, trust only those who have earned it. I once gave this same advice to an old Russian woman, who nearly was slaughtered because she placed her trust in a scoundrel without first testing his loyalty to her noble pursuits.”

Chapter 3

INSPECTOR JONES MAKES A DREADFUL ERROR

“There is more to this scheme than meets the eye, Watson,” Holmes surmised while he read a reply to one of his wires. “What I have discovered so far is a simple bait-and-switch fraud, far beneath the shady capabilities of Baron Maupertuis.” The dispatch came from a private detective in Amsterdam with whom Holmes had collabourated in the case of the reigning family of Holland, a matter too delicate for publication.

Holmes quoted from the telegram: “My former colleague, Jan Akers, tells me the Netherland-Sumatra Company has amassed a fortune in bank loans and investment capital from across Europe, and its inventory of spices occupies an enormous storage facility in a shipyard on the North Sea Canal.”

“What if all the barrels in that conglomeration contain sand?” I proposed.

“That would be more consistent with the grandiose character of a Maupertuis plot,” Holmes guessed, “especially if he borrowed immense sums to finance a bogus supply of spices, using the same spurious collateral over and over. It has always amazed me how businessmen, bankers and investors are so quick to believe a charming swindler, never doubting his word when a windfall of profit is dangled in front of them.”

Holmes wrote back to Akers to express gratitude for the information and to impose on him further, asking if he could make discreet inquiries as to the whereabouts of Baron Maupertuis, in particular if he maintained a residence in the Netherlands.

“We can go by the telegraph office on our way to Scotland Yard,” Holmes said to me as he replaced the cap on the inkwell. He had no sooner spoken than we heard Mrs Hudson coming up the stairs, then stopping in the open doorway, where she announced that Inspector Peter Jones was waiting in her parlour to discuss an urgent problem.

“By all means, send him up, Mrs Hudson,” Holmes instructed her.

Our visitor’s slow, heavy footfall on the steps foretold of bad news, for he was usually agile and fast-paced.

“Oh, Mr Holmes, I’m afraid I have bungled the job,” he began as he entered our rooms.

“Come, take up one of the armchairs and fill me in,” Holmes implored, seeing that the man was in distress.

Inspector Jones slumped into the seat and covered his pale face with his pudgy hands. “The situation couldn’t be worse,” he howled. “I killed a man, an innocent human being, thinking he was one of our prime suspects in Lord Pritchard’s murder, but it turned out he only resembled the one posing as the butler.”

“How did this happen?” Holmes broke in.

“I was engaged in talk with an informant on Cold Harbour Lane in South London,” Inspector Jones explained, “when the man in question walked past me. He looked so much like the imposter butler that I left the informant in mid-sentence and accosted the gentleman. I told him I was investigating the murder of Lord Pritchard and wanted to take him to headquarters for interrogation. ‘You’ll not pin that crime on me!’ he shouted, and turned to run.

“I snatched the back of his jacket and spun him around. He grappled with me and was getting the better of it, so I drew my revolver and clobbered him on the forehead as hard as I could. He collapsed in a heap—I had no idea he was a bleeder, and the force of my blow caused his brain to haemorrhage. He died on the spot, almost instantly.

“Now I have been suspended from duty, pending the outcome of an internal investigation, because the deceased was a harmless doorman at the Excelsior Club, dressed for work, and he had a clean record—never so much as a brush with the law.”

“Your first mistake was the confrontation—you should have followed him,” Holmes chastised angrily. “But the damage is already done, so there is little to be gained from dwelling on it. I’m almost certain there will be disciplinary measures, although perhaps not an end to your career, since you acted in good faith in the performance of your duties.”