Moriarty Returns a Letter (5 page)

“Please,” said the woman. “Do not try to tell me that the marks I saw on my husband were from a train.”

The inspector wanted to just drop his head into his hands and hide. For lack of anything better, he fell back on official protocol.

“Please accept my sincere condolences. If there is anything the Yard can do—”

“Anything the Yard can do?” she said, repeating his words in an amazed tone.

He could say nothing in response.

“Well then,” she continued. “I have already received the very sound advice that perhaps I should leave London and return to America just as soon as possible, and I have also received my paid ticket for doing just that. Second-class, I see,” she added, taking the ticket out of her purse. “I suppose I am indeed grateful it isn’t steerage.”

The inspector stood, thrilled for there to be any aspect of this at all for which he could still make amends.

“I’ll get that fixed straightaway,” he said, with perhaps too much enthusiasm.

“Inspector Standifer, sit down!” said the woman, and it was a command.

He sat.

She stared across at the inspector for a long moment, and then she said:

“I shall not leave London—nor indeed shall I even leave your office—until you explain to me how my husband died with half the skin of his back flayed to the bone.”

The woman sat back in her chair, her chin tilted up, and her eyes, just slightly damp, fixed in a direct stare on the inspector, who shifted ever so slightly in his chair.

“I … I am not at liberty to say.”

“Then I am not at liberty to leave.”

“It will not ease your pain to know this.”

“Nothing will ease my pain, but I will know what happened, regardless of the inconvenience it will cause you to tell me.”

The inspector might have been able to hold the line if she had not added that last part. She had shifted the topic from her own situation to his in an instant, and his situation was indefensible. He wondered if she was born with that negotiating skill or had acquired it.

He looked back at her direct stare and decided that she was born with it.

“How much,” said the inspector, with a long sigh, “did your husband already tell you?”

“That he was working undercover and that he was working for you. And that he was very proud of what he was doing.”

The inspector nodded.

“With reason,” he said. “I will tell you what I know.”

He was breaking protocol by doing so, but he knew that she would not be deterred. And perhaps by telling her, he would make her understand the danger she was in and she would become the more willing to leave London at once.

“Your husband infiltrated one of the most dangerous counterfeiting gangs in London,” said the inspector. “He made them believe that through the resources he could provide to them—resources that were in fact coming from Scotland Yard, though of course he did not dare let them discover that—they would be able to expand their operations beyond their most insanely criminal fantasies, exporting their counterfeit currency and contraband goods not just to the Continent, but to the United States as well.

“He convinced them that they could exchange their counterfeit fifty thousand pounds for a cargo of premium whiskey, in the hold of the
Queen’s Gambit,
which is docked at this moment at St. Katherine’s, in preparation for a departure to New York City this evening. He signed a document executing the contract for that—for which they obtained a bill of lading from him—and all that remains for them to do, they believe, is for them to show up at that dock with the counterfeit money, present that bill of lading, and set sail for America with fifty thousand quid worth of whiskey—and that’s wholesale value.

“But the gang became suspicious. We pushed this operation too far. They suspected your husband was not what he seemed, and that’s why they—why they did what they did to him. I am so very sorry.”

The lady’s eyes were looking glassy now, as though she were somewhere far away, perhaps in that cargo hold herself, in place of her husband.

Then she focused.

“So they tortured him to get him to confess that he was working for Scotland Yard.”

“Yes.”

“But he did not confess.”

“No. And in a last-ditch attempt to distract them, I believe he tried to convince them that the reason for all the failed plots was a character of fiction described in this magazine.”

He showed her the copy of
The Strand
. She picked it up, glanced at it, and then put it down dismissively.

“But they didn’t believe
that,
of course,” she said.

“Well—in fact they did. I believe at some point he had them convinced—that all the clever criminal schemes he had devised for them were being foiled by the consulting detective known as Sherlock Holmes. That Sherlock Holmes is real, that Dr. Watson is his biographer, and that Arthur Conan Doyle is merely Watson’s literary agent for getting the bloody stories published. And finally, your husband let them believe that he himself—keep in mind, he never told them his real name—was in fact the Professor Moriarty described in this latest story. He went so far as to use that name in signing the bill of lading. And it all might have worked. I believe it was working.”

“Why didn’t it?”

The inspector picked up the magazine, gripping it as though he could find something in it that would change what had happened, and then he just dropped it on the desk.

“These scum are extremely dangerous even when they do believe you. But it probably didn’t help that this monthly issue only came out last week. I’m sure your husband was winging it and just didn’t know.”

“Know what?”

“That at the end of the story, both Sherlock Holmes and Moriarty are killed.”

He picked up the magazine and tried to turn to the appropriate page.

“They fall into a watery chasm in a place called Reichenbach Falls. It’s right here, someplace near the end—”

“Please,” said the woman, placing a hand on the magazine to stop him. “You needn’t show me. You’re saying that this story got my husband killed?”

“No, no. It very nearly saved his life. And in fact it made it possible for him to preserve his cover. But in the end, they … I’m very sorry, but they intended to kill him whether they believed him or not. We received this letter from them.”

He handed her the letter that the man named Redgil had sent to Sherlock Holmes.

She took a long moment to read the letter. Then she folded it and placed it on the desk in front of her. She looked up at the inspector.

“How will justice be done to these men?” said the woman.

“Dear lady,” said the inspector. “It is being done as we speak. And when it is all complete, I promise to send to you a full accounting.”

“Send to me?”

“To your address in the States.”

The woman took a moment to absorb that. She didn’t seem as though she was going to object to the idea, and it certainly made no sense for her to stay. But clearly something was on her mind.

Now she leaned forward, looking directly at the inspector, the muscles in her face set so hard to keep herself from trembling that it seemed she would simply shatter at any moment, and without any trace of the bravado she had shown a moment before she said:

“Inspector, how are I and my child to live?”

This gave the inspector pause. Then he said:

“Surely the New York City Police Department has provisions—”

“There is a life insurance policy that my husband was able to purchase, and there is the New York City Police Department’s Widows and Orphans Fund.”

“Ahh,” said the inspector, hoping that meant everything would be taken care of, though in his heart he knew better.

“Inspector,” said the woman again, “how are we to live?”

There was a long moment of silence. The inspector had no answer.

Then there was a knock on the door.

“Not now,” said the inspector. He was too much a gentleman to use the interruption as an excuse to extract himself from an uncomfortable conversation. He considered it, but didn’t.

But the knock was repeated, and then the sergeant on the other side of the door, sounding quite urgent, said, “Turner here, sir.”

This was different. The inspector knew what this would be about.

“Come in,” said the inspector, and Turner did so.

Turner seemed a bit excited, slightly out of breath, but he stopped himself from speaking when he saw the woman sitting there.

“Sergeant Turner,” said the inspector, “this is Mrs.—” The inspector stopped himself before speaking her actual name. “Mrs. Moriarty.”

The sergeant’s face grew somber; he nodded toward her. “I’m deeply sorry for your loss, ma’am.”

“Thank you, Sergeant.”

Turner looked at the inspector to see if he should continue.

“It’s all right, Turner,” said the inspector. “You can report. The lady asked how there will be justice; she will be interested in what you have to say, and I want her to hear it. I’m rather anxious to hear it myself.”

Turner gave the inspector a doubtful look.

“Proceed, Sergeant,” said the inspector.

“Very well, sir,” said Turner. “We assembled at the
Queen’s Gambit
before dawn, just as planned. I put Jenkins in the cargo hold, Dawson in concealment at the stern, and Wilkins behind the crate stacks near the bow. I went on board to take the captain’s place. We waited for Redgil to arrive, and he did, with both his men, just past dawn as we expected.”

Turner paused now for a breath, and the inspector showed just the lightest trace of a grim smile. He was going to relish this next part, and he wanted the widow to hear just how thoroughly the Yard had expedited the justice she so rightfully demanded.

“Go on,” said the inspector.

“Redgil ordered his first confederate to bring two canvas bags on board. The confederate did so, opened the bags, and I ascertained that they were indeed full of packages of five-, ten-, and twenty-pound notes—enough to total close to fifty thousand pounds in all—and all of them counterfeit, though of course I didn’t let on that I knew that.”

Turner took a breath.

“And?” said the inspector.

“I informed Mr. Redgil, on behalf of Scotland Yard and Her Majesty’s Special Branch, that he was under arrest for counterfeiting and murder. At that same moment, Wilkins likewise informed the confederate who was stationed at the bow. Unfortunately, that confederate resisted, and Wilkins was obliged to strike that confederate several times on the head with a truncheon. That confederate has since expired. At that same moment, Dawson came forward with his own truncheon from the stern to place the second confederate under arrest, who we anticipated would resist as well, but unfortunately Dawson slipped on the slick surface of the deck—he’s never been on a ship before, he has told me since; I know I should have inquired about that beforehand—whereupon the second confederate pulled a six-round revolver from his inside coat pocket, and fired off two rounds, in my direction, before Jenkins came up from the cargo hold and struck that suspect several times on the head. With a truncheon. That confederate has since expired.”

Turner paused and looked at the inspector, apparently expecting some specific follow-up question at this point. The inspector just looked back expectantly.

“And?” said the inspector, finally.

“Both shots at me missed, sir.”

The inspector nodded impatiently as though that were a given, and said:

“And Redgil?”

Turner straightened his stance, as if on parade inspection.

“Sir, during all that, Redgil jumped overboard. I heard the splash, and we kept close surveillance on all points where he could likely surface—but we did not find him.”

“Bloody hell!” The inspector leaped up and slammed his hands on the desk.

Turner stood straight as a telegraph pole. “He may have drowned, sir. It is possible.”

“And I may someday become prime minister, but I don’t advise that you bet your pay on it!”

Turner held his position as the inspector circled him.

Then the inspector paused, looked at the widow sitting by his desk, and, with Turner still standing there, he said to her:

“I am sorry.”

The woman looked up at the inspector as if to ask what for. Then she looked at Turner, who dared do nothing but just stand ramrod still and look straight ahead at the wall.

Then she looked back at the inspector again.

“Oh,” she said. “You were hoping that the sergeant would manage to kill Redgil, and in so doing make up for the loss of my husband, as if they were chess pieces on a board, and things could be evened out by the exchange of one for another. I see.”

Now the inspector, deeply embarrassed that he had indeed been thinking that, turned almost as red and sweaty as Turner.

“Inspector,” said the woman, overstepping her bounds with no apparent hesitation whatsoever. “Perhaps the sergeant can be excused now?”

The inspector quickly nodded and told Sergeant Turner that he was dismissed.

Turner opened the door, but before he could exit, the woman spoke again.

“Sergeant—” she said.

“Yes, ma’am?” said Turner, snapping to attention again.

“Thank you very much for your efforts,” she said, with all sincerity.

“Yes, ma’am, thank you for saying so.” And then he exited.

The inspector went back to his desk and sat behind it, avoiding eye contact for a moment with the widow sitting in front. Letting her hear directly of the justice being done to the man who had tortured and murdered her husband was the best card the inspector had to play, and it hadn’t played nearly as well as he had hoped.

And now the woman was still in London, and also still sitting at his desk and racking him with guilt.

He tried to think of another approach.

“I think,” he said after a moment, “that with this Redgil still on the loose, it is all the more reason for you to leave London as quickly as possible. He doesn’t know your real name, and that’s the name under which you are booked to America; so far as he knows your husband was named Moriarty, and even if he goes to the trouble of checking the official death certificate, it will confirm that; I made sure of it. Passport, death certificate, bill of lading—everything regarding your husband now shows the name Moriarty. So if you leave the city now under your real name, you can do so safely; Redgil will never be able to find you, even if he tries. But if you stay here—well, there is no telling what a criminal might try to do, or what he might somehow have learned that could lead him to you.”