The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes (18 page)

Clearly taken aback by Holmes’s abruptness, Mrs Mullins hesitated for a moment before slowly rising and leading us back to the front hall. ‘A moment please while I get us an oil lamp to light the way.’

‘Most suggestive, would you not say?’ Holmes whispered suddenly once Mrs Mullins had moved away. ‘Especially when you consider that the duty roster Lestrade kindly enclosed with the list, clearly shows that Parkes has only been on day duty this past week!’

‘I will admit this new information confirms your
conjecture
that Parkes’s disappearance is unconnected to Daxer and his confederates. Officially he was last on night duty before Daxer was even in the country! Though I am at a loss as to what it all means.’ I replied, in the certain
knowledge
that my friend’s grasp of the situation was more astute than my own. At that, our hostess reappeared with the necessary illumination and began leading us up quite the narrowest and most precarious staircase I had ever encountered. I admit to feeling much relieved at having safely negotiated it. We were then led down a dark corridor towards the back of the house, and the solitary door at its end.

The single gas light within, gave out barely sufficient light for Holmes’s purposes, so he placed the oil lamp strategically on the bedside table, and was then able to begin his research of the room.

The small, uncomfortable looking bed had been neatly made, and not slept in, Mrs Mullins assured us, for many nights. Save the oil lamp, the table at its side was totally bare, and the room’s only chair revealed nothing besides its upholstery, through badly worn patches in its cover.

Holmes grunted irritably at the empty drawers in the
tall-boy, and was equally disappointed at the meagre contents of the clothes cupboard, a plain, shabby brown suit. He searched thoroughly in each pocket of this, and finally slammed the cupboard door shut, impatiently.

‘Were you not aware that your lodger had removed all his chattels?!’ Holmes asked, glaring at Mrs Mullins.

‘No indeed, sir.’ She replied. ‘I had no idea. Mind you, sir, I do not think he had that much with him to begin with.’

‘More than a single suit I am sure, though.’ Then with a finger to his lips, Holmes motioned us both to silence. With his hands on his hips and a single finger from each hand protruding into the top pockets of his waistcoat, Holmes bent his neck, and began surveying the floor, his last recourse for a clue.

He stood in this fashion for a few moments, his intense eyes almost protruding from their sockets, as he continued his search. Suddenly his eyes sparkled briefly, a triumphant smile flashed momentarily, and was then gone. I tried to follow the direction of his gaze, but could see nothing save an old, moth-eaten Chinese rug, surrounded by badly scarred floorboards. A barely audible cry, in fact no more than a brief exhalation of air, announced Holmes’s pleasure, and, in an instant, he was laying on his stomach, prostrate on the floor.

Only when his right hand went towards it, did I become aware of a small pile of dust particles, which would surely have been ignored by a lesser mortal. He gathered a small sample of the dust in his left hand, while his right
forefinger
sifted through it carefully. Returning the dust to the floor Holmes bent his head upwards to Mrs Mullins.

‘Were you aware of your lodger’s penchant for expensive cigars? This is the remains of one from the Dutch East
Indies, and is not so easy to obtain.’ The tone of this
question
indicated that any answer would be an irrelevance. Mrs Mullins, obviously surprised at the question, replied nonetheless.

‘No, sir. On the rare occasion I saw him smoking, it was usually a cheap cigarette.’

Ignoring the answer, Holmes began getting up once more from the floor when something, even more invisible to me than his previous discovery, apparently caught his eye.

Shuffling across the floor, like some dexterous lizard, he reached his find, and after a brief examination of this, placed it in a small envelope he brought out from his inside breast pocket. He was on his feet again in an instant, passing no comment as to the nature of his discovery and dusted himself down. Hurrying towards the door, he paused briefly to address Mrs Mullins.

‘Mrs Mullins, my advice to you would be to advertise a vacancy in your house with immediate effect, for I am now in no doubt that your previous lodger will not be returning. Come, Watson!’

I quietly apologised for my friend’s brusqueness and thanked Mrs Mullins for her indulgence, for by now Holmes was already in the street.

‘Watson, if Shinwell Johnson proves as reliable tonight as he has been in the past, I think I can look forward to encountering a most singular and brilliant criminal mind before the night is out,’ Holmes cheerfully announced once we had rejoined our cab. However, he proved most reticent on the subject for the remainder of our homeward journey, and I felt as shut out from the innermost workings of his mind as ever.

For an hour upon our return, Holmes entertained us with a most delightful rendition of Beethoven’s violin concerto, and he seemed able to shut out all thoughts of Parkes’s mysterious disappearance, and the anticipated message from Shinwell Johnson. However as the evening wore on, he became increasingly fretful at Shinwell’s lack of communication. He lit cigarette after cigarette, and seemed almost to chew them up as he ceaselessly prowled about our rooms.

‘I feel so close to success, and yet, if Johnson fails to locate this fence, Morrison, all my other work, and
deductions
will become worthless and futile!’ Holmes bemoaned.

‘I am sure he will not disappoint you. Johnson seems well able to take care of himself, so I am certain no
misfortune
has overtaken him. If the information is to be had, I am sure he will provide you with it.’ My inept attempts at consolation seemed to fall on deaf ears. It was now ten o’clock and there was not much conviction in my voice.

‘Yes, but when?!’ Holmes exclaimed. He lit another
cigarette
, and turned to the window from which he gazed intently. He then returned to his chair, crestfallen and apparently exhausted from the expenditure of so much nervous energy. However, within a few minutes he was back on his feet again, rubbing his hands together
gleefully
. A soft, almost inaudible knock on the front door, had alerted him to the presence of a visitor, before I could even distinguish it. Mrs Hudson having already retired for the night, I was despatched with a wave of the hand to attend the door, while Holmes waited in happy
anticipation
.

I opened the door to a filthy, dishevelled remnant of a man, unshaven, and reeking of stale beer. An almost lost, and buried instinct within him stirred him to doff his patchwork cap to me, and he attempted a toothless grin as he handed me a small, crumpled piece of paper.

‘From Porky.’ He croaked.

I slipped the creature a half-crown, and with the
treasured
piece of paper safely in my hand, I was glad to close the door on so sad a manifestation.

‘Quickly, Watson! There is not a moment to be lost.’ Holmes called down to me, before I had even glanced at the message myself. I took the stairs two at a stride, and Holmes had snatched the note from my hand before I reached the landing. Bearing the valued note, Holmes disappeared into his room at once, slamming his door shut with a shudder that shook the entire house. So intense was my curiosity that I called out to Holmes through the closed door.

‘For reasons best known to yourself, you seem to attach great importance to Johnson’s message, yet I fail to see why you must go out at so forsaken an hour. Surely the morning would be time enough.’

Suddenly Holmes’s door re-opened, but by only the merest chink, revealing nothing more than the tips of my friend’s sharp features.

‘Watson, Johnson has risked much in getting this
information
to me. If I betray him now, and, indeed the citizens of our great city, by shirking my responsibilities due to the lateness of the hour, it would be most reprehensible. Rest assured, all will be explained to you upon my return.’

‘You mean I am not to accompany you?!’ I cried, aghast at having my services dismissed in such a fashion.

Holmes’s answer was the hurried re-closing of his door. When he opened it again, a few moments later, the
transformation
Holmes had undertaken was the most startling he had yet achieved, even, perhaps, surpassing the gnarled, old book peddler he had used to disguise his dramatic return from death in my narrative of The Empty House.

When I beheld him it was hard to believe that my friend still existed beneath the heavy disguise. As with the book peddler, he had taken two or three inches off his height, by means of a subtle bend of his back, and limbs. Clever use of theatrical make-up provided him with three day facial stubble, and a broken nose. An ugly knife scar on his left cheek, and a set of huge black eyebrows made him appear all the more sinister. His attire, a well worn tweed suit with a gaudy coloured waistcoat, a dusty brown bowler worn askance, and a thin, unlit cigarette protruding from a corner of his mouth, completed the effect. He was, every inch, the vicious criminal down on his luck.

‘Gimme’ a light mister.’ Holmes growled in a broad, gravelly cockney accent.

‘Wonderful, my dear Holmes, just wonderful!’ I exclaimed, ‘For all the world, you will certainly not let Johnson down tonight, if, indeed he can recognise you at all,’ Then, remembering his callous dismissal of my
services
, for the coming night’s work, I added: ‘however, I would have thought my presence tonight might have been of some worth.’

‘My dear fellow, of course it would.’ Holmes replied, reverting to his gentler tones. ‘However, with the best will in the world, you find it somewhat harder than me to blend into the dark and forbidding surroundings I am about to
descend into. Shinwell Johnson will be in as much jeopardy as myself, and I should not like to compromise him still further. Besides, should I find myself in difficulties, I am sure Johnson will prove himself a most stalwart ally. I do hope you will still lend me your army revolver?’ He asked, with a consolatory pat on my left shoulder.

‘Of course I will,’ I replied, ‘but do take care.’

‘Ha! Still the ever watchful Watson. I do not expect to return much before breakfast, so you had best retire. Good night!’ That strange, menacing creation of his shot from the room, and I could hear the street door close behind him an instant later.

I had every intention of taking Holmes’s most excellent advice, but decided upon one last pipe, and a further chapter of a most rousing account of the American Civil War. I soon realized that any attempt at sleep would surely be futile. This, indeed, proved to be the case, and before long the exploits of General Grant, had paled beside my fears for Holmes, and the outcome of his treacherous night’s work.

Five anxious hours later sheer exhaustion slowly dragged my eyelids together, and I was on the verge of losing consciousness when a long, dark shadow standing over me brought me back. Long sinewy fingers were embedded in my left shoulder, prodding it gently, and a familiar voice was speaking to me.

‘Come along, Watson, you will do yourself no favours by sleeping here. You really must take to your bed.’

Slowly I raised my head, and Sherlock Holmes was looking down on me, his smile unmistakable even from beneath his most extraordinary disguise. The potential adventures, and dangers of the previous five hours
suddenly cleared the clouds from my mind, and I was on my feet in an instant.

‘Good heavens, Holmes, is it really you!?’ I exclaimed. ‘Your rendezvous with Shinwell Johnson, did it go well? Please tell me, you are unharmed?’

‘All went very well,’ Holmes answered calmly. ‘Indeed, things went better than my greatest expectations might have allowed. I have concluded a most gratifying night’s work. Now, however it is five o’clock in the morning, and my body craves for sleep. Do not worry yourself, I will furnish you with sufficient details for your notes and curiosity later in the day. Besides, you appear to be pretty much done in yourself.’

‘Be reasonable Holmes,’ I protested. ‘The sight of you, standing there in your attire, has dispelled all thoughts of desire for sleep, and I would much rather hear now. My curiosity would render sleep an impossibility, in any event.’

Holmes considered me in silence for a moment, while he began removing his disguise.

‘Very well,’ he said sharply. ‘I suppose your patience, and your concern alone, merit some reward.’ Then he added with a short burst of laughter. ‘I would have enjoyed having Lestrade here though, while I dispelled his half-baked theories of international espionage. I assume, however, he will hear soon enough.’

Holmes then dashed into his room, and when he finally returned he was dressed in his customary purple
dressing-gown
, all traces of the unsavoury villain now removed. He lit a cigarette and stood gazing at the dark street below, from our window. The shadow of him, cast by a single gaslight, accentuated the sharpness of his features upon the drapes.

‘Watson, as you may have already surmised, I discounted Lestrade’s espionage theories quite early on in our
investigations
.’ He began, seating himself cross legged, upon his chair. ‘Although this may have been premature of me, being ignorant, at that time, of so many facts, happily those earlier misgivings have now been dramatically confirmed.

‘As you know, the word coincidence has no meaning to me, especially in relation to my work. Therefore, Parkes’s disappearance, following the completion of so many
identical
case investigations, indicated some dark connections.

‘Although, until tonight, even I had underestimated the complexity of the matter. Obviously the odious fence, Silas Morrison was the connection, and he, above all others, would have welcomed the removal of Detective Constable Parkes. Thus so far, no doubt, you follow my reasoning, and the necessity for tonight’s rendezvous with the
underworld
.’