Young Sherlock Holmes: Knife Edge (3 page)

Mycroft stared at Sherlock for a few moments without speaking, and then said: ‘Well done. I see your mental faculties have not withered to compensate for the obvious over-development of
your body. Yes, I have known for a while now that there was . . . let us say an
event
. . . in this area that I would be obliged to attend at this
time. I had been tracking the course of
the
Gloria Scott
homeward by means of various agents I have in ports around the world, and predicted that you would arrive in England at roughly the same time that I had to be in Ireland.
I cabled one of my agents and told him to meet with the
Gloria Scott
when it broke its journey in Cadiz and talk with Captain Tollaway. He offered the Captain . . .
well, let us say a
small but not insignificant amount of money to change his plans slightly, to dock here, in Galway, and to try to arrange things so as to arrive here at a particular time.’ He raised an
eyebrow at Sherlock’s expression. ‘You are angry, I perceive.’

‘Yes, I’m angry.’ Sherlock tore his gaze away from his brother and stared out of the window. ‘I thought for a little while
that you had made the effort to come all this
way on my behalf, because you had missed me, not because I could be moved around like a pawn on a chessboard because it suited you.’

‘I confess,’ Mycroft said heavily, ‘that I did not take your feelings into account when I made my plans. That was a mistake. I am sorry. Please accept the fact that I am more
than happy to see you, and that, had
it always been a part of the Captain’s plan to stop at Galway before continuing on to Southampton, I would have done my best to have been here to meet you
regardless of any other plans that I had. It merely made things more . . . convenient . . . for me to combine separate events into one.’

‘I’m glad that I could help,’ Sherlock murmured bitterly.

The carriage pulled up in front of an
ornate hotel. A doorman moved to help Mycroft and Sherlock get out.

‘I have been staying here for a few days,’ Mycroft said as he levered himself out of his seat. The carriage tilted alarmingly as he moved. ‘Fortunately we will be relocating to
Cloon Ard Castle, out along the coast road in an area known as Salthill, this afternoon.’

‘For your
job
.’

‘Yes, for my job.’

‘And am
I entitled to know what this job is, or should I just wait patiently until you have completed your work and we can go back to England?’

‘I will tell you everything over lunch.’ Mycroft stepped to the pavement and the carriage rocked back on its springs. ‘I promise.’ He glanced up at the carriage driver.
‘I will not be needing you for a few hours, but please pick us up at four o’clock this
afternoon, on the dot. I will have luggage. A lot of luggage.’ He glanced at Sherlock.
‘We will need to get you several sets of clothes, a decent pair of shoes, a carpet bag and some toiletries this afternoon. We cannot have you looking like an itinerant sailor for the rest of
your life. I have taken the liberty of contacting a local tailor. He will attend us this afternoon with a range of suits
in various sizes. I had considered bringing some of the clothes that you had
left behind at Holmes Manor, in Farnham, but I worried that you would have grown out of them.’ He stared at Sherlock as Sherlock descended from the carriage. ‘I see that I was
right.’

A table had been set aside for Mycroft in the restaurant area of the hotel, and the
maître d’hotel
escorted them across the nearly
empty room. When they were seated Mycroft
said: ‘The lobster for me, I think. Sherlock, I can recommend the turbot.’ When Sherlock nodded he added, ‘And a bottle of Montrachet.’ The
maître d’
made an apologetic motion with his hands. ‘Sancerre?’ Another shrug. ‘Bordeaux?’

‘I’ll have a pint of whatever local beer you stock,’ Sherlock said, surprising himself.

‘And I suppose that I will
have the same,’ Mycroft murmured unhappily. As the
maître d’
moved away, he added, ‘I wish that the climate of Ireland was more
conducive to the cultivation of grapes. As it stands, the constant dampness favours only the growing of hops, potatoes and mushrooms. I understand that the enterprising locals have found a way to
make a strong spirit from potatoes. It is called “
potcheen
”, and I am
informed that it is as much use as a fuel for lamps and a means of removing varnish from furniture as it
is as a drink. So far they have failed to produce an alcoholic beverage from mushrooms, but they are an inventive people. Give them enough time and they will succeed.’ He sighed heavily.
‘I have often thought that the measure of a good drink is how well it lends itself to being used in cookery.
Just think of beef in red wine, chicken sautéed in brandy or champagne
trifle. I fear that if you tried to marinate a chicken breast in
potcheen
it would dissolve in moments.’ He glanced at Sherlock. ‘Beer, eh? You
are
growing up, and not
in a direction of which I necessarily approve. I suppose we can blame the company you have kept for the past year.’

Sherlock took a moment to look around
the restaurant. ‘Sailors are rough folk,’ he said eventually, ‘but at least they are honest in their dealings. They say what they mean and
they mean what they say.’

‘Unlike me?’ Mycroft inquired. ‘I suppose I deserve that rebuke. So, while we wait for the wonders of the kitchen to appear, tell me all about your voyage. I am agog to hear
the details.’

‘Didn’t your agents give you a
full account? I’m not sure there is anything I can add to their reports.’

‘Don’t get snippy, Sherlock. You have been through a life-changing experience. I want to know all about it.’ He paused momentarily. ‘Actually, my agents did mention
something about a murderously feral child and a plot to blow up an American naval vessel, but I would rather hear the details from you. It seemed so fantastical.’

Sherlock spent lunch telling Mycroft everything that had happened to him on the
Gloria Scott
, in Shanghai and in the other ports that the ship had visited. Mycroft sat and listened,
interrupting every now and then with a pertinent and focused question. As Sherlock recounted the story of his life-or-death struggle with Mr Arrhenius he could see that his brother was getting
increasingly tense.

‘Storms I had expected,’ he murmured as Sherlock finished his story. ‘Scurvy, perhaps. But this . . . this I had no idea about. You are fortunate to have survived.’

‘Now it’s your turn,’ Sherlock prompted. ‘What are you doing here, and what is it that we are expected to see when we arrive at the castle? Some kind of diplomatic
meeting?’

Mycroft shook his massive head. ‘What do you
know about spiritualism?’ he asked.

Sherlock marshalled his thoughts. ‘It’s the belief that when people die their spirits – their souls, if you like – live on in some immaterial form, and can be contacted
by someone appropriately sensitive here on earth. I believe that these sensitive people are called “mediums”. The spirits of the dead supposedly live in a place that’s not exactly
heaven,
but is more like another plane of existence that we can’t see and that they can’t describe. I know there have been mediums who have claimed to contact famous dead people like
Shakespeare or Mozart, and given new plays, or new musical compositions, by them at meetings called “séances”. There’s a lot of table tapping and the use of wooden boards
with letters around the edge which the spirits
can supposedly use to spell out messages.’

‘You sound sceptical,’ Mycroft said. ‘I approve.’

‘It’s difficult not to be. As far as I am aware there is no absolute proof that these mediums actually can contact the dead, and the kind of messages that come back from the other
side are quite generic – the dead are apparently pretty happy, most of the time, and a bit vague about what they
do when they’re not making contact with the mediums. And, of course, the
mediums take money from the people who attend the séances, which means that the entire process is vulnerable to fraud. It’s a particularly unpleasant form of fraud as well –
trading on the grief of the recently bereaved in order to make money.’

‘Do you believe that spirits live on after death?’ Mycroft asked as their
main courses arrived.

‘I know that I don’t believe in
ghosts
,’ he said finally. ‘I had to think about that quite seriously in Edinburgh, over a year ago, when Gahan Macfarlane was
using theatrical make-up to get people to think that reanimated corpses were committing crimes on his behalf. He wanted to frighten the locals so they would let him get on with things. I remember
speaking to
Matty about it.’

‘I would think that young Matty believes in ghosts. I find that either the poorer or the richer a person is, the more likely it is that they will believe in the unexplained. Those of us
who are fortunate to have an adequate but not excessive amount of money tend to be more sceptical. Or perhaps either excessive bad luck or excessive good luck in life means that people seek
explanations that lie outside the ordinary.’

‘Matty told me that he has seen some things in his life that he hasn’t been able to explain in any other way than by resorting to the idea of ghosts. As for me – I worry about
the simple things, like the fact that they are supposed to be able to walk through walls but they don’t fall through floors or stairs, and the way all ghosts seem to lose
their minds after
death. They might be great conversationalists in life, but as soon as they are dead they seem to resort to groaning and moaning and clanking chains to get their point across. Why only come out at
night – why not walk about in daylight? It doesn’t make any rational sense. And,’ he added, ‘from a personal point of view, when I die the last thing I want to happen is
that I’m
forced to hang around the place
where
I died with no aim other than to scare people. If anything of my character or personality lasts after death then I want to be able to
move around, travel a bit, and visit some places I haven’t seen before.’

‘Like the centre of the earth?’

Sherlock gazed quizzically at his brother.

‘If, as you logically point out, a ghost that can walk through
walls as if they weren’t there should fall through the floor, then it seems logical to conclude that all ghosts will
end up at the centre of the earth. If, of course, they are bound by gravity. Perhaps that’s why the Church teaches that hell is beneath us, and heaven above.’

Sherlock nodded decisively. ‘The whole thing is based on a series of premises that make no sense.’

‘So that disposes
of ghosts. Very well. What about the concept that something of a person – call it their spirit or their soul – survives after the death of the body? That is,
you will admit, a slightly different prospect.’

‘Didn’t someone once say that energy can be neither created nor destroyed, although energy can change forms, and energy can flow from one place to another? I think I read that
somewhere.’

‘A German physicist and physician – Hermann von Helmholtz. Very precise and methodical, the Germans. That is why they make such superb engineers. Lord help us if they ever decide to
take over the world – their single-mindedness and determination would virtually guarantee their success.’

‘So, if a person’s consciousness is defined as a form of energy within the brain, then it makes sense
that the energy isn’t destroyed when the brain is destroyed. It either
flows to another place or is transformed into a different type of energy.’

‘An excellent point,’ Mycroft conceded.

‘Why so much interest in souls and the persistence of character and memory after death?’ Sherlock asked, intrigued. ‘And what on earth does it have to do with the reason you
are here in Galway?’

‘You will be aware that my job in the British Government involves collecting information from a number of agents located around the world. I trawl this information in, as a fisherman might
trawl mackerel, and then I sort through it all, seeking fish hidden in the catch that are considerably rarer than mackerel, or perhaps looking for two or three mackerel whose markings by themselves
appear random
but which can be put together to form a bigger picture.’ He frowned. ‘I believe I will abandon the fishing metaphor. It isn’t helping me make my point. Anyway, my
job is frustrated by three things – communication, perception and death.’

‘You are going to need to explain that a little more, if you don’t mind. Without recourse to fishing.’

‘Of course.
Communication
is a problem because
it takes weeks or sometimes months for my agents to get information to me, and by the time it arrives on my desk it is often out of
date, superseded by events. The man who invents a means of communication that enables someone to speak to another person on the other side of the world as though they were in the next room will, I
guarantee, become a millionaire.
Perception
is a problem because
I expect my agents to look at each scrap of information that comes into their possession as though they were me, but they
aren’t. I have a feeling that they often throw away scraps of information that they believe are unimportant but which, if I saw them, would lead me to come to important conclusions.
Death
is important because a significant number of my agents have a habit of ceasing to
exist before they can give their reports to me.’ Sherlock glanced at Mycroft, shocked, and his
brother continued: ‘I do not wish to sound callous. I know they have loved ones, and families who will miss them. The problem is that the nature of this business means that many of them work
in dangerous, out-of-the-way places where accidents often happen to people or where they catch strange foreign
diseases. Others have a habit of getting caught while infiltrating government
buildings in various capital cities around the world and being killed either while trying to escape or, shortly afterwards, by hanging or by firing squad. It is, regrettably, a risk that the job
entails. They all know that it might happen.’