The Scroll of the Dead (3 page)

‘Another diversionary tactic, I have no doubt,’ snapped Holmes,
leaping from his seat. ‘Let us throw some light on the matter, shall we? I noticed the electric switch earlier...’ With a deft movement, he flooded the room with bright light. The rest of us were too stunned to move as he swept past the table and pulled back the drapes to reveal the negro manservant cowering there, clasping the brass horn we had earlier seen floating in the air. Behind him the French windows were open. Holmes closed them quickly to prevent the servant’s escape.

My friend turned to face us, a grin of triumph on his lips. ‘I am sure you all felt the chill at the start of the séance. A window left open is the simple explanation. As for the whispering, the self-operated gramophone, and the floating horn, our friend here simply stepped through the curtains and made the noises, set the machine in motion, while with his black gloves he held the horn where it might be seen and he would not. Isn’t that correct?’

The negro, with downcast head, mumbled his agreement.

As for the rest, a facility for mimicry and ventriloquism are Mr Hawkshaw’s only talents. You will admit, Sir Robert, that the voice you heard did not sound very like your son.’

The knight, whose face was drawn and haggard in the bright light, appeared to be in state of shock. ‘I suppose... I wanted it to sound like Nigel.’

‘Indeed. Wish-fulfilment is the greatest ally of these charlatans.’

‘How dare you!’ screamed Mrs Hawkshaw, stroking her husband’s head. ‘See how you’ve affected him with your slander.’

‘I am sure he will make a full recovery,’ snapped Holmes, grabbing the collar of Hawkshaw’s jacket, jerking him off the table, and slapping him heartily on the back. As he did so, a small metallic object flew from the medium’s mouth. ‘He’s just swallowed one bird too many.’

I picked it up and examined it.

A cunning device: it’s a bird warbler – hence the aviary sounds we experienced earlier.’

‘You’ve been damned clever, sir,’ observed Sebastian Melmoth smoothly, lighting up a little black cigar. ‘You’ve performed a great service for us all.’

Holmes gave a little bow and then turned to the medium and his wife who, struggling to come to terms with their exposure, were hugging each other in miserable desperation. ‘Now, I suggest you return any monies you have received from these gentlemen, and then it is time to shut up your fake show for good. If I hear of you practising your despicable charades again, it will become a police matter. Is that understood?’

Almost in unison the Hawkshaws nodded dumbly.

Melmoth chuckled merrily. ‘You put on a fine show yourself, Mr Trelawney Bravo.’

Holmes smiled coldly. ‘In this instance, the deceivers have been deceived. I am not Mr Trelawney. I am Sherlock Holmes.’

It was a week later when a strange coda to this episode was played out in our Baker Street rooms. It was late, about the time when a man thinks of retiring to bed with a good book. Holmes had spent the evening making a series of notes for a monograph on the uses of photography in the detection of crime and was in a mellow mood. A thin smile had softened his gaunt features during his preoccupations. I was about to bid him goodnight, when our doorbell rang downstairs.

‘Too late for a social visit. It must be a client,’ said Holmes, verbalising my own thoughts.

Within moments there was a discreet knock at our door and our visitor entered.

It was Sebastian Melmoth.

He was dressed very much in the manner in which we had seen him last and he was clutching a magnum of champagne. Holmes bade him take a seat.

‘I am sorry to visit at so late an hour, but it has been my intention for
some days to call upon you, Mr Holmes, and this has been my first opportunity.’

My friend slid down in his seat and placed his steepled fingers to his lips. ‘I am intrigued,’ he said lazily.

Melmoth, almost ignoring my presence, raised the magnum as though it were a trophy. ‘A little gift for you, Mr Holmes, in gratitude.’ He placed it at my friend’s feet.

Holmes raised a questioning eyebrow.

‘For exposing that scoundrel, Hawkshaw. I had heard so many good accounts of the fellow that I really believed that I had found the genuine article at last.’

‘Your thanks are misplaced, Mr Melmoth. You are neither poor nor bereaved, and therefore any benefits that you received from my little performance at Frontier Lodge are purely coincidental.’

Melmoth’s icy cold blue eyes flashed enigmatically and he leaned forward, the young, plump face demonic in the shadow-light. ‘Money means little to me, Mr Holmes; and you are quite correct. I am not – at present – bereaved. However, I am most serious in my research, and you have successfully sealed up one avenue of investigation for me.’

I could retain my curiosity no longer. ‘May I ask exactly what kind of research you pursue?’ I enquired.

Melmoth turned to me as though he had only just become aware of my presence. ‘Research into death,’ he said softly. ‘The life beyond living.’

My puzzled expression prompted him to expand on his reply.

‘I am of the new age in scientific thinking, Doctor Watson. Death is a medieval mystery, a mystery that can be solved –
must
be solved. I do not believe that we scrape and scrabble our way along the weary road of life merely to fade into oblivion upon reaching the end. There is more. There
must
be more. Like Oliver Lodge and those of his persuasion, I believe that life, as we know it, is just the beginning – the starting point. I talk
not of Heaven as prescribed by the scriptures, that fairyland in the sky but of a door through which we pass into immortality.’

Warming to his exposition, with flushed cheeks and tense jawline, he rose and threw his arms wide. ‘Take a walk into the East End of this city gentlemen. See the poverty there, the suffering, the open degradation. Human beings living and behaving like animals in the filth and squalor. Is that Life? Come, gentlemen, there has to be more. There is a key. Somewhere there is a key to unlock the secret of it all. You, Mr Holmes, deal with the ills of society; you, Doctor, minister to the ailments of the body. So be it; but I search beyond those petty concerns.’

‘You believe that you can alter the natural course of events?’ said Holmes.

Melmoth shook his head. ‘What you talk of as being natural is only regarded as such out of ignorance. Death is natural, I grant you, but the end of living is not. That the state of being ceases with the arrival of the burial casket is accepted by the naive, because it has never been challenged. No illness known to man would have been cured if someone had not challenged it. We would still be living in caves had there not been those who challenged the accepted beliefs and pushed the boundaries forward. I do not believe death is the end. Its power can and will be conquered.’ Suddenly he stopped in mid-flow, as though he realised that perhaps he had said too much. His face broke into a wide, unpleasant smile and his voice dropped to a sibilant whisper like a hissing snake. I assure you, gentlemen, I am correct.’

With this parting remark, he bowed low in a theatrical manner and swept from the room.

‘The fellow is mad,’ I said, as I heard him clatter down our stairs.

Holmes stared at the burning embers in the grate. ‘If only it were as simple as that, Watson.’

I
t has often been said – indeed, I have been one of those who have said it – that Sherlock Holmes, the famous consulting detective, was
the
champion of law and order of his age. However, on reflection, I can state that this is only partly true. Crime did indeed fascinate Holmes, but when it came to the solving of it, he was very selective. I have been present when he has rejected numerous pleas and entreaties to tackle a particular mystery solely on the basis that it was simply not interesting enough. The misdemeanours that intrigued my capricious friend had to bear the hallmark of the
recherché
before he would contemplate involving himself in providing a solution. He loved detective work for its own sake, but the detective work had to pose an unusual conundrum or it presented no challenge.

So it was in the spring of 1896 when, after a very fallow period, he devoured news of criminal activity reported in the daily press in the hope of spotting some intriguing puzzle to satisfy his needs. I would aid him every morning in this pursuit by pointing out what I regarded to be crimes of intellectual interest.

‘What you may consider stimulating to the deductive brain, Watson, falls far short of my ideal,’ he would comment disparagingly. “Music Hall Artiste Strangled In Dressing Room” poses no cerebral challenge whatsoever. A case of jealousy and intoxication. No doubt even the Scotland Yarders could cope with that one in a day!’

‘Have you seen the report in
The Chronicle
of the murder of Sir George Faversham, the noted archaeologist?’

Holmes took his pipe from his mouth and paused. ‘Items stolen from the family home?’

‘Nothing of real value taken.’

Ah,’ he scoffed. ‘Common burglary with homicidal consequences.’

I threw down the paper. ‘I give up,’ I cried. ‘There is obviously nothing that will satisfy you.’

Holmes gave me a weak grin. ‘Well, at least we are agreed on that point.’ His eye wandered to the drawer in his bureau where I knew he still kept the neat Morocco case containing the hypodermic syringe.

And that is not the answer either,’ I snapped.

For a moment Holmes looked surprised, and then a dreamy smile touched his countenance. He realised that I was playing him at his own game by reading his thoughts. The idea amused him so much that he burst out with a roar of laughter. His hilarity was so contagious that soon I was laughing along with him. So enwrapped were we in our own amusement that we failed to take notice of the insistent knock at our sitting room door. Moments later, it opened hesitantly and Inspector Hardcastle of the Yard stood on our threshold. Holmes had worked with Hardcastle on a couple of investigations in the past, notably the ‘Disappearing Chinese Laundry Affair‘. He was a dour Yorkshireman who was methodical and thorough, rather than inspired, in his police work. He appeared most discomfited by our abandoned behaviour.

‘If I have called at an inconvenient moment, gentlemen...’ he said,
bristling somewhat, unsure whether he was the cause of our amusement.

‘Not at all, Hardcastle,’ cried my friend, still chortling. ‘It is always a pleasure to receive a visit from one of my friends in the official force.’ He waved the Scotland Yarder to a chair. ‘Sit down, my dear fellow, and don’t look so disheartened. Weeks of inactivity have lightened my brain. You are indeed a sight for sore eyes, especially if you have a case for us.’

The inspector, uncertainty still clouding his features, did as he was bidden. He was a tall, beefy man whose great oval face was beset with large, grey, mournful eyes and a broken nose. His black hair, plastered with cream, looked as though it had just been dropped on his head. Clutching his bowler tightly in his large hands, he sat awkwardly in the chair opposite us.

‘You
do
have a case for us?’ enquired Holmes languidly, his mood changing rapidly.

‘Something I thought might interest you,’ said Hardcastle, his equilibrium still not restored.

‘I hope it’s not something already reported in the papers,’ observed Holmes, relighting his pipe with a glowing cinder from the fire. ‘It’s not the strangled magician at Henty’s Music Hall?’

‘It most certainly is not,’ snapped Hardcastle indignantly. Young Kingsley is on that case. I put my money on Roland Reilly the “Irish Vagabond with a Voice of Gold”.’

‘I am sure you are right. I have heard that when in drink he has a towering rage. In the confined world of the music hall artiste, the smallest slights and petty jealousies become magnified beyond all reason. I wonder that there isn’t a blood bath every night.’

Hardcastle looked curiously at my friend, striving to ascertain whether Holmes was being serious or still gently teasing him.

‘Come, come,’ said Holmes, spinning his hand as a conductor might to increase the speed of the music, ‘let us hear about your case, Hardcastle.’

‘There’s been a break-in at the British Museum.’

‘Is that all?’ groaned Holmes, slumping back in the chair.

‘There’s more to it than that.’

‘There had better be. What was stolen: some medieval pottery, or some gewgaws belonging to Henry VIII, perhaps?’

‘I’ll come to that in a moment. It was a very professional job. A two man operation.’

‘How do you know?’

The Inspector’s face lit up. ‘Because they were foolish enough to leave clues behind, Mr Holmes. We found two sets of muddy footprints near the scene of the crime and, before you ask, they could not have been anyone else’s because the floor is mopped clean after closing time.’

Holmes held his hands up in mock surrender. ‘Two men it is then, Hardcastle.’

‘The crib-cracker and the expert, I should guess.’

‘Expert?’ I asked.

‘Yes, Doctor Watson. Whoever it was knew exactly what he wanted. He had the whole ruddy museum to go at and just the one thing was taken.’