Who Thinks Evil: A Professor Moriarty Novel (Professor Moriarty Novels) (6 page)

“Ameliorate?”

“Yes. It means—”

“I know what it means.”

“Yes. Of course you do. Sorry.”

“What sort of amelioration do you offer, and what must I do in return?”

“I can arrange for the crown to accept a plea to a lesser offense, say”—he waved an arm vaguely in the air—“accessory of one sort or another. A sentence of no more than three to five years, I would imagine.”

“In return for this?”

His Lordship sat down again. “Ah! That is more complex. A … ah … person has disappeared. He must be found.”

“You wish me to search for someone.” Moriarty raised his manacled hands. “How do you propose I accomplish this?”

His Lordship shook his head. “I can certainly arrange to have the shackles removed,” he said. “We wish you to use your connections in the … I believe it is referred to as ‘the underworld’ … to locate the person in question.”

“From a prison cell?”

“If possible.”

“Dubious,” Moriarty said.

“You could arrange for various of your minions to visit you, could you not, and give them the necessary instructions? Effectively direct the search from here?”

Moriarty smiled grimly. “Despite what you may have heard, I have no minions, no mob, no gang, no nefarious members of some secret society ready to my bidding. I have a few associates, and I admit my range of acquaintances within the criminal classes is wide. Even so, few felons would recognize me on sight, and even fewer, I fear, would venture to visit me here—and of those, none who would be useful for your purpose.”

“A pity,” His Lordship said. “We had supposed—”

“Surely you must have some better way to achieve your purpose,” Moriarty said. “Is this some devious malefactor you want me to unearth? What has he done to warrant such attention?” Moriarty closed his eyes for a second and considered. “No—it wouldn’t be that. Scotland Yard, for all of its deficiencies, should be able to accomplish that. Or, at least, you would have no reason so quickly to doubt its reach. For some reason you can’t involve the Yard; you need utmost secrecy.” He opened his eyes. “Why not call upon my friend Sherlock Holmes? He’s dependable and can be trusted, and I can testify to his tenacity and bullheadedness, if you consider that a virtue. Some do. Certainly if you’re prepared to trust me—”

“He is unavailable,” His Lordship said. “Performing some service for the king of Sweden, I’ve been told.”

“Ah!”

“It was his brother, Mycroft, who suggested that we come to you. He says, oddly enough considering the circumstances, that you also are dependable and can be trusted.”

“Good of him, considering,” Moriarty said. “Still, there’s little I can do for you from the confines of this fetid dungeon.”

His Lordship considered. “Mycroft Holmes is of the opinion that you are almost certainly innocent of the crime with which you are charged,” he said.

Moriarty raised an eyebrow. “He thinks me incapable of murder?”

“He thinks you incapable of being caught so easily, of devising such an amateurish plan.”

“I must thank him,” Moriarty said.

The Earl of Scully considered for a long moment. “The task we require of you is delicate and sensitive, and demands the utmost secrecy,” he said. “It is also vitally important that it succeed. It would be no exaggeration to say that the fate of the nation might depend on its success. Other avenues are being explored, but the necessity for keeping it secret restricts the number of people we dare inform, and in any case there are few we can use for something like this—and we have no one with suitable entrée into the underworld. It is there that the answer may lie.”

Moriarty shook his head. “I can be of little use to you from this cell,” he said. “I will gladly give you whatever little suggestions I can, but that must, unfortunately, be the limit of my assistance.”

“I am sorry we cannot come to an agreement,” His Lordship said.

Moriarty raised his manacled hands. “Don’t misunderstand, I’d be delighted to assist you,” he said. “Once I’m unshackled and free to move about, I might be able to accomplish something. But as things stand…”

The earl rose. “Then we are at an impasse,” he said, “as I have not the authority to order your release.”

“That is indeed unfortunate,” Moriarty said gently. “Send an urgent message to Holmes. He can never resist an appeal from a peer. He’s something of a snob, but if he can be led away from his fixation on me, he’s often very good.”

“We have been in touch with the Swedish government,” His Lordship said. “They claim not to have any idea where he is.”

“He’s probably wandering around Stockholm dressed as a defrocked Zoroastrian mobed, or some such.”

“Yes, well—” The Earl of Scully banged on the cell door. “I will go now,” he said. “I must look in other quarters.”

“And I—I must remain here,” Moriarty told him, sitting back on the cot.

[CHAPTER FIVE]

ONE NIGHT’S PLAY OF FOX AND HARE

An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered.

—GILBERT KEITH CHESTERTON

SOMETIME, PROBABLY IN THE LATE SEVENTH CENTURY,
a Saxon tribe that called themselves the Wetten built a bridge over the River Belisama, some sixty-plus miles northwest of the market town of Londinium. Over the next thousand years Londinium stretched and twisted and burst through its walls and shortened its name. The Belisama, for reasons of its own, became the Ribble, and the town that grew up around Wetten’s bridge increased a wee bit in size and became Wedsbridge.

On the old Roman road on the west side of the town, cleverly situated between the train station and the river, crouched a U-shaped inn that called itself the Fox and Hare, the name a gradual shrinking and corruption of a phrase that had nothing to do with either the vulpine or lepus genus but had originally meant “Strong Place with Stone Walls of the Wetten Clan.” The present building had been there for at least three hundred years, if you discount the fact that it had burned down and been rebuilt twice in that time.

So much Barnett had discovered at the British Museum, following Professor Moriarty’s dictum, “An hour’s research and an hour’s planning saves two weeks’ marching about.” How much marching about would be saved by Barnett’s new knowledge of the Wetten clan and their legendary leader Ogthar the Uxorious remained to be seen.

The instructions in Professor Moriarty’s smuggled note were clear but left much to the intelligence and planning of Barnett:

Who is Esterman? Where from? Whence comes he to own the Fox and Hare? Why did he lie? He licks his lips when alcoholic beverages are mentioned. Ply him with intoxicants. Mention Hoxbary and see how he responds.

After the requisite hour’s planning and yet another two hours’ preparation, Barnett and the mummer packed up their bags and hailed a hansom cab. “Euston Station,” Barnett called up to the cabbie, “and drive at a leisurely pace, if you please.”

The cabbie stuck his heavily mustached face down into the trap. “Mollie and me, we been at this hoccupation for seventeen years,” he said, “Mollie being but a two-year-old when she took up the ’arness. And we hain’t never got a hinstruction like that, we hain’t. You wants me to take my time?”

“Why not?” Barnett asked.

“To Euston Station?”

“Correct.”

The cabbie shook his head. “You’re an original, you are!”

“I don’t want to overly excite the port,” Barnett explained.

The cabbie having no response to that; they rode the rest of the way to the station in dignified silence and boarded the 10:23
A.M.
Western Local, which got them into Wedsbridge in time for a late lunch.

The publican of the Fox and Hare, Archibald Esterman by name, was behind the bar polishing glasses when Barnett, two small suitcases under his arm, pushed through the door. “Good day to you, publican,” Barnett called. “Are we too late for a bit of lunch? And have you rooms for my companion and myself?”

Esterman looked Barnett over suspiciously as he approached the bar, taking in the shiny derby, the bespoke brown tweed suit, and the dusty but well-polished shoes. He came to an opinion. “Good day to you, sir,” he said, “but if you’re another of them reporter fellows, and I fancy you are, then you can just turn around and go back out the door.”

“You mistake me, sir,” Barnett said, holding the door open for the mummer as the little man staggered past him lugging two large black cases. “We are traveling men. Although why you would have an animus against newspaper reporters—surely an inoffensive breed—is beyond me.”

Esterman sniffed and looked doubtful. “And what, if I may ask, do you travel in?”

“Spirits,” Barnett said.

“Come off it now,” said Esterman, giving forth with a brief guffaw. “Gents what sell spiritous beverages don’t dress like toffs, and toffs don’t come around trying to sell me no spirits.”

“Well said, sir, and I’m sure you’re correct,” Barnett told him, “but you misunderstand me.” He took one of the cases from the mummer and heaved it up onto the nearest table. “My man and I travel in fortified spirits and
vins au pays,
as it were, and none of your common plonk neither. Inns and public houses are not our clientele of choice. At least not in the hinterlands, although we have some trade clients in the city. And, of course, the better gentlemen’s clubs.” He sprang the catch, and the case divided in two and opened like a black canvas butterfly spreading its wings. “Few public houses have a patronage who could appreciate, or would be willing to spring for, our merchandise,” he continued.

Within the case, neatly embedded in wire frame and cotton batting, were eight wine bottles, four to a side, their labels facing forward for inspection.

“Here we have,” Barnett began, running his forefinger over the first bottle with an air of learned professionalism, “the Royal Muscat, or Muscat Frontignan as she is properly called in La Belle France, grown in Beaumes-de-Venise within sight of the Rhone and bottled, of course, by Montiverde et Cie.”

“Of course,” the publican said, his left eye twitching an involuntary twitch as he licked his lips.

“This one, as you can plainly see by the label,” Barnett went on, moving his finger to the next bottle, “is a Quinto do Alexandro Crusting Port. The amber liquid was poured into this bottle in the fall of 1815, shortly after Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo. Which would explain the
‘Vive le roi’
overstamp at the bottom of the label. My agency has discovered forty cases that were forgotten in the cellar of a lodge in Vila Nova de Gaia, and paid a handsome price for them. These are probably the last bottles anywhere in the world of this justly renowned product.”

“Justly,” Esterman agreed. His eyes blinked rapidly as he peered at the bottle. His tongue ran along his upper lip as though seeking confirmation that it was still there.

“Four guineas the pop,” Barnett said, swinging the case closed, “but I don’t want to bore you.”

“Four guineas the case is a bit—” Esterman began.

“The bottle,” Barnett gently corrected him.

“The—” The publican’s chin thrust out and his eyelids twitched as he fixed his gaze on Barnett’s mustache. “Say, what do you take me for? Four—”

“As I said,” Barnett told him, settling down on a bar stool, “the average publican could not be expected to stock such exotica, splendid a quaff as it may be.” He cast a critical eye around the room, managing to raise one eyebrow in silent assessment of the ancient well-knocked and pitted tables and chairs. “I imagine your patrons are more likely to be downing porter than port. Beer at tuppence the pint is a far cry from quality port at five shillings the glass.”

“True,” Esterman granted, “but—”

“But not as satisfying, you’re going to say,” Barnett interrupted, raising a forefinger of emphasis, “and you can’t say truer than that.”

The mummer leaped with surprising grace onto the next bar stool. “P’raps we could let His Honor here try a tuppit of the old and mellow, gov. What d’you say?”

“Well…” Barnett considered, rubbing his forefinger along the side of his nose. “We have some errands to do in the vicinity,” he told Esterman. “So if you’ll give us a couple of rooms to throw our luggage in, we’ll be off. We have people to see. Upon our return, this evening, after the last draft of lager is pumped, we’ll settle down and sample our stock. Perhaps in trade for a cut off the joint and a boiled potato or two, eh?”

Esterman paused to think, flicking his tongue in and out of his mouth like a viper as he did the calculation. A shilling’s worth of supper against a glass or two—three glasses?—of a three-guinea-the-bottle crusting port laid down in 1815. “Could be managed,” he allowed. “Could be done.”

“Done and done!” declared Barnett, sticking out his hand. “My name’s Barnett, and this is my companion and adviser, Mummer Tolliver, otherwise known as Mummer the Short. And you are?”

“Esterman’s the name. Archibald Esterman.” He took Barnett’s hand and moved it solemnly up and down twice. “Proprietor of the Fox and Hare, which I purchased these ten years ago from the Wigham clan, what has owned it, father and son, for these past four hundred years.”

“Four hundred years?” Barnett marveled.

“Or more. Or even more.”

“Here now,” the mummer said, hopping off his chair. “We’d best be on our way, nest-see-paz? We’ve got a barrel full o’ gentry to see afore we settles in to that joint you’re cutting.”

“That’s so, that’s so,” Barnett agreed. “Landlord, if you could show us to out rooms we’ll move our luggage in, and then we must be off to visit”—here he took a scrap of paper from his waistcoat pocket and peered down at it—“Lord Thornton-Hoxbary, or, as it may be, his steward or butler.”

Esterman pushed himself suddenly to his feet and looked down at Barnett with foxy eyes. “And just why is that?” he demanded. “What do you want with His Lordship?”

The mummer hopped up on his chair and thrust his chin out pugnaciously. “His Lordship, is it?” he demanded. “Friend of yours, is he?”

“I had the honor to be in His Lordship’s service at one time,” Esterman said, pulling his face back from the mummer’s sharp, inquisitive nose, “and I don’t hold with people going over to annoy His Lordship, who was very good to me and mine.”