The Infernal Device & Others: A Professor Moriarty Omnibus (88 page)

             
"He knows that I know, and I'm sure he knows that I know he knows. But for all of that, can I assume that he knows I know he knows I know he knows?"

             
"I don't follow that," the baroness replied. "And I wish you'd stop; you're giving me quite a headache!"

— d'Arcy St. Michel

             
At ten o'clock the next morning, Sherlock Holmes was at the front door of 64 Russell Square, yanking on the bellpull. "Tell your master I wish to see him," he announced when the butler opened the door.

             
"Yes, sir," Mr. Maws replied, bowing and stepping aside in a parody of butlerian stiffness. "Alone today, are you, sir? Please follow me into the study. The professor is expecting you. I shall inform him that you're here, and he will be down directly."

             
"Expecting me, is he?" Holmes asked, stalking into the study and glaring around at the furnishings.

             
"Yes, sir," Mr. Maws said. "So he told me, sir."

             
Ten minutes later, when Moriarty came downstairs and entered the study, he found Holmes crouching in front of the desk, unabashedly going through the third drawer down. "Looking for something?" Moriarty demanded, reaching around his desk and slamming the drawer.

             
Holmes jerked his hand aside. "Always, Professor," he said. "And someday I'll find it." He retreated to the black leather armchair on the other side of the desk. "I have this insatiable curiosity about you, Professor Moriarty. Every little thing you do is of interest to me. Every little scrap of paper in this room helps, in some small way, round out my picture of you and your activities."

             
"Would you care to go through the bottom drawer?" Moriarty asked. "I assume you've already been through the upper two."

             
"Very kind of you," Holmes said. "Some other time, perhaps."

             
Moriarty settled into the chair behind his desk and regarded Holmes unblinkingly. "You have lost all shame, Holmes," he said. "It was but a few weeks ago that you and a squad of cloddish policemen went through this house from attic to sub-basement, examining the contents of every drawer, scratching furniture, bending lampshades, ripping curtains, breaking porcelain, and no doubt stealing the silver. After that farce it will be a long time before you get any judge to issue you another warrant against any of my property. And yet here you are again, going through my desk."

             
"Your butler had me wait in here," Holmes said mildly. "I was merely amusing myself while I waited."

             
"I admit I should have locked the drawers and cabinets before you arrived," Moriarty said. "But I keep forgetting, Holmes, that you are capable of such appalling manners."

             
Holmes chuckled. "Perhaps you are right," he admitted. "But only in my dealings with you, Moriarty. I assure you that when it comes to the rest of humanity, I am considered urbane and civil, and my manners are irreproachable. There is something about our relationship that brings out my worst qualities. I think it is, perhaps, the fact that every time I see you sitting there in your sack coat and your striped trousers and your impeccably knotted cravat, with a painting worth ten thousand pounds hanging on your wall and library filled with rare books and a winecellar filled with rare vintages, I cannot help reflecting that were there any justice in this world, you would be wearing gray cloth and occupying your time by walking the treadmill at Dartmoor."

             
"Justice, Holmes? Were there any justice, you would be forced by the state, whose rules you admire so greatly, to spend your time in some profession more fitting to your talents, such as giving diverting lectures in music halls, and identifying the occupations of ten random ticket holders. Instead you spend your days following me about and annoying me at every opportunity."

             
"Your butler said you expected me," Holmes said.

             
"And so I did," Moriarty replied.

             
"Why? I had no appointment with you."

             
"There was a major crime yesterday, was there not?" Moriarty inquired. "An 'impossible' crime, one of the newspapers called it. Surely it was not a wide leap of logic to assume that you would be called in. And even more surely, you would immediately scurry around to see me. Hoping, no doubt, to find a great pile of stolen artifacts on the rug."

             
"Indeed," Holmes agreed complacently. "Almost startled not to. You don't object, I suppose, if I look
under
the rug?"

             
Moriarty sighed. "Understand, Holmes, that I am somewhat honored that you suspect me of committing every crime in London that you can't solve. However, it does get to be wearing after a time."

             
"Not the crimes I can't solve, Professor," Holmes said, smiling tightly. "In several instances I have solved them to my satisfaction, I have just been unable to provide enough proof to bring the case before a jury. That is where you have shown yourself so infernally clever, my dear Professor Moriarty. I know you for the rogue you are, but I can't prove it. However, you and I know that I shall not stop trying; and one of these times, I shall succeed. And then you will
exchange your black sack coat for prison gray. But enough of this cheery conversation; I wish to speak to you of trains and treasures."

             
"Curiously enough, Holmes, I also wish to speak to you, although on another subject. Shall we discuss the fate of the Lord East Collection first, and then get on to more consequential matters?"

             
There was a knock at the door. "That would be Mr. Barnett," Moriarty said. "I have asked him to sit in on our little
t
ê
te-
à
-t
ê
te,
if you don't mind?" Then, without waiting for Holmes's response, he called for Barnett to come in.

             
"Good morning, Professor," Barnett said, coming through the door with a cup of coffee in his hand. He looked tested. "Good morning, Mr. Holmes." He sat down on the leather couch and sipped his coffee.

             
"It has all the markings of a Moriarty crime," Holmes said, ignoring Barnett. "I can sense your hand in this undertaking just as an art connoisseur can recognize a work of Goya or of Vernet, whether or not the canvas is signed. And then when I learned that you were actually present at the loading of the goods wagons, how could I doubt further? Moriarty was present; a fortune was stolen:
Quid hoc sibi vult?"

             
"I was there," Moriarty said. "I make no apologies for my presence. It was mere vulgar curiosity. And as a matter of fact, it was not gratified. We did not get to see the treasure, as I'm sure you know."

             
"That's true," Barnett commented. "I mentioned it at the time.

             
Loudly. How were we to know it was even in those boxes? Why wouldn't Lord East open them? What was he hiding? It is my duty as a journalist to ask these questions."

             
Holmes turned and favored Barnett with a scowl, then he returned his gaze to Moriarty. "I have indications of the method already," he said. "I believe the floor of the goods wagon has been tampered with. I have discovered that the train stopped twice on the way to London—both times briefly, both times accidentally. It is, perhaps, a flaw in my nature that I distrust such accidents."

             
"So?" Moriarty demanded. "Would you like to drag me off to prison now, or wait until you get some sort of proof that I was actually involved?"

             
"Don't ask me what I'd like to do, Professor," Holmes said, his long fingers tapping restlessly on the arm of his chair. "You know very well what I'd like to do."

             
"Pshaw!" Moriarty said. "Let us turn from the fanciful to the pertinent, Mr. Holmes." He reached down and, opening the bottom drawer of his desk, pulled out a thick handful of file folders. "I would like to discuss with you the seven murders which have taken place since the twenty-second of February."

             
Holmes stood up and pointed at the folders. "Those," he said, with a slight quaver in his voice, "are the official files!"

             
"Not quite," Moriarty said. "They are merely accurate transcripts of the official files. Certified duplicates of all the material contained in the files."

             
"Where did you obtain them?" Holmes demanded.

             
"From Giles Lestrade," Moriarty said. "There's no secret about it. I am, after all, working on the case."

             
"You're what?"

             
"I have offered my services to Scotland Yard, and have been accepted. Without a fee, of course. I have a private client, but there is no conflict of interest since my client's only concern is to have the murderer apprehended."

             
Holmes stared at Moriarty with fascination. "I don't believe it," he murmured.

             
"Why not?" Moriarty asked. "I am, after all, a consultant."

             
"Let us not discuss what you are, for the moment," Holmes said. "What I'm trying to figure out is what you'll be getting out of this."

             
"Paid," Moriarty said. "I will be collecting a fee from my private client."

             
"There is that, of course," Holmes said. "Frankly, Professor, I had just about concluded that you were not involved in the killings when I heard about the robbery. Then I was sure. Since you are so clearly involved in the robbery, you wouldn't really have had time to take part in the slaughter of the upper class."

             
Moriarty tapped the pile of folders in front of him. "I've been reading these reports, Holmes," he said. "And I would like to see how your conclusions compare with mine."

             
Holmes leaned back in his chair and laced his fingers together. He stared thoughtfully at Moriarty over his cupped hands for a minute. "Go ahead," he said.

             
"We'll start with basics," Moriarty said. "One murderer."

             
"Agreed."

             
"Male."

             
"Agreed."

             
"Early forties."

             
"Most likely."

             
"Average to slightly above in height."

             
"That's all in my report!" Holmes said. "All you're doing is reading my own report back to me."

             
"What report?" Moriarty asked. "There is no such report in these files."

             
"Ah!" Holmes said. "I gave that report directly to Lord Arundale. I suppose he never bothered returning it to the Scotland Yard files."

             
"I have noticed this regrettable tendency myself," Moriarty said. "It would seem that the aristocracy has little regard for record keeping. Except tables of genealogy, of course. Tell me, what other observations about the murderer have you detailed on this absent report?"

             
Barnett, watching this exchange with interest, could see how speaking civilly to Moriarty, how volunteering information to this friend and mentor that he had turned into an enemy, caused the muscles in Holmes's jaw to tighten, forming his lips into an involuntary grimace. But Holmes, with an effort of will, conquered his feelings. "I believe he is a foreigner," the detective said. "Probably Eastern European."