The Travels of Sherlock Holmes, page 3
‘There was a danger in it, though?’ I said. ‘Had he not known –’
Holmes waved a hand impatiently. ‘I was quite convinced that he did know. And I was right. Because he knew so many of the details, he thought he might be able to save the entire organization – his plans, remember, were always on the grand scale – but for once he had overestimated his own abilities. When the crash came, when it was finally and inescapably clear that he would be taken if he remained, then he fled precipitately.’
‘Another point bothers me,’ I said. ‘I can understand Moriarty’s wanting to kill you, after what you had done to him, but I cannot really see why he was so careless of his own life. If it is the case that the prosecution would fail without you – as did in fact happen with Moran, as you say – then why did Moriarty not think that he might safely return, stand his trial, and brazen it out, after he had killed you, assuming that he had succeeded in doing so?’
‘I am sure that the possibility of doing so had occurred to him,’ said Holmes. ‘But remember that the smaller fry, those who made up the greater bulk of the gang, would be taken, and, more to the point convicted, for they worked more or less openly, they had not their master’s genius, or opportunities, for concealment. And then, even if the case against Moriarty did fail without me – and, although probable, that was not by any means a cast-iron certainty, he might well have been convicted even without me, had there been a competent prosecuting attorney – still the police would mark him, and mark him well. Patterson and Lestrade knew almost as much about the gang as I did myself, though, since only I had carried out much of the investigation, the finer points as to the presentation of the evidence were beyond them. Scotland Yard would watch Moriarty so closely that he would never have the chance to build up new connections, to revive his evil empire. Let him but commit the most homely of nuisances under the railway arches at three in the morning, in the midst of a November fog, and there would be an inspector of detectives there to feel his collar.’
I laughed. ‘Lestrade is tenacious enough, certainly. I am sure you are right.’
Holmes nodded. ‘And they would make any charge stick, however trivial it may have been. Indeed, I am not at all sure that they would wait for him to offend before they charged him.’
‘What, you don’t mean they might falsify the evidence?’
‘Aye, Watson, I mean just that. Reprehensible enough, to be sure, but I have often seen an odd light in Lestrade’s eyes, a light betraying not merely anger but a desire for revenge at all costs, as the investigation was turned aside yet again for lack of any proofs, and months of work were frustrated. My own respect for the law is second to none, but I cannot swear that I would entirely blame Lestrade if he chose to interpret that law in favour of those innocents whom Moriarty fed upon. And even had he refrained from doing so, I had other friends in London, who would not have taken kindly to Moriarty’s eliminating me. For instance, there was a certain Dr John Watson, who might have –’
‘Indeed,’ said I. ‘Had the fellow shown his face here, I’d have –’
‘To be sure you would. His life, in short, would have been intolerable.’
‘And so Moriarty decided it was better to die, rather than live a hunted, haunted life of forced respectability, looking over his shoulder all the time. He was undoubtedly evil, but it is still rather sad, that, Holmes.’
Holmes laughed silently. ‘Not at all, Watson. I assure you that nothing could have been further from his mind. He planned to kill me, and then resume his career, but not in England.’
‘Indeed? That is more like sense. Perfectly understandable. In France, perhaps? If, as you say, his web extended there, he would surely –’
Holmes waved a hand. ‘It is certainly tempting to think so. But the French police, though deficient in many respects, have as much tenacity as Lestrade or Gregson when they have cause for suspicion. I had friends there, too, Dubuque and le Villard and the others, and a word from Scotland Yard to Paris would make France too hot for the professor. No, he had taken that into account, you may be sure. Moreover, his plans were, as ever, on a grand scale, as you will learn. Now, one thing that you must know at the outset is that before I called upon you that fateful day in 1891, I had been at Mycroft’s rooms for the whole afternoon.’
‘I believe I had recorded that fact in my published account.’
Holmes nodded. ‘What you did not record, for the simple reason that I had not told you, is that I had a long talk with Mycroft before I called upon you.’
I raised an eyebrow. ‘On a Friday afternoon? I thought our diligent government servants would be at their desks until early evening?’
Holmes laughed. ‘Do not let Mycroft – Sir Mycroft, indeed, now – hear you say as much. No, in the ordinary way of things, Mycroft would be the last to leave the office, but he had much on his mind that day, and needed to think in peace. Hence the early return home, for even the Diogenes Club would not have given him the necessary quietness.’
‘Oh?’ said I, recollecting the sepulchral atmosphere of that strange establishment. ‘It must have been a deep matter indeed on which he sought inspiration.’
‘Oh, it was, I assure you. For some time, Mycroft had been receiving reports from his agents in India, concerning activity on the northern borders.’
‘Russian activity?’
‘Just so.’
‘Nothing new in that, surely?’ I said. ‘Russia has sought to extend her influence into India since – since I don’t know when.’
‘Since 1807, to be precise,’ said Holmes. ‘It was in that year that Napoleon suggested to Tsar Alexander that France and Russia should join forces to invade India and dis-possess Britain, whose influence had gradually extended over the sub-continent in the century since the death of Aurangzeb, last of the Mogul emperors.’
‘There you are, then. I may not have the exact dates on the tip of my tongue, but I do know that Russia was forever sniffing at the northern borders of India when I was out there.’
Holmes nodded. ‘True enough, and Mycroft would not normally have bothered too much about it. But there had been disturbing reports, unusual activity, and my brother could not see what significance, if any, might attach to that. Mycroft was eager to discuss the matter, to see what answers I might have for him, but I fear I had other, more pressing, things on my mind, so that I paid little attention to Mycroft’s worries. He saw how things were with me, and went so far as to shelve his own questions for the time being, so that we might make those plans with which you are already familiar.’
‘Arranging for the cab in which Mycroft drove me to the station, and the like?’ said I.
‘Exactly.’
‘By the by, Holmes, I never asked you at the time, but how came it that Mycroft had such skill as a cabby?’
He waved a hand impatiently. ‘In his youth, he was a four-in-hand driver of some note. Indeed, his record on the London to Brighton road remained unchallenged for a considerable time. But the question now is this concern of Mycroft’s as to India.’
‘Ah, yes, I interrupted your account of the talk with Mycroft.’
Holmes looked a trifle disconcerted. ‘I had finished,’ said he, with a touch of petulance, ‘apart from telling you to note the circumstance, for it will be quite pertinent later.’
‘I duly note it, Holmes.’
‘When we left for France, then, I had no real aim in view, other than to stay out of harm’s way until such time as I was called to give evidence against Moriarty and the others. But when I heard that Moriarty had escaped the net, things changed. At the outset, I honestly believed that he would simply try to kill me at all costs, even if it meant his own life – I, too, had slightly underestimated him. You know the result, our own wanderings through Switzerland, until we came to the Falls of the Reichenbach. It is there that the account that I originally gave you begins to differ somewhat from the truth.’ He leaned back in his chair and stretched out his legs before the fire, then recommenced his narrative.
Chapter Three - A Reichenbach Retrospective
Sherlock Holmes lay back in his chair, gazed at the ceiling – which, just as in the old days, was exceedingly dusty – in that introspective way of his, and commenced the following narrative.
*
When the young Swiss messenger arrived at the Reichenbach Falls with a note for you, my dear Watson (said he) I knew well enough from the very outset that there was no mysterious Englishwoman lying at death’s door.
Ever since I had received the telegram from Patterson, who was, you may recall, the inspector in charge of the official police action against the Moriarty gang, telling me that the professor had escaped the net, I had been expecting some devilry, though I could not predict in what form it would occur. Still, I had been on the lookout for something – anything – out of the ordinary, and here it was.
You will ask, Watson, why I did not return with you, and thereby avoid the danger which I fully expected to arise as soon as you were out of sight.
Well, for one thing it was just possible that I might have been wrong, that there could indeed have been an unfortunate English lady whose last moments would be eased by your presence. If that were so, then of course nothing would be lost by letting you return alone.
If, as I suspected, rightly in the event, the note was a ruse to get me on my own, then it was safer – for you, I mean – to let you go, and for me to face the danger alone, lest Moriarty, growing weary of trying to distract you from my side, should decide to eliminate us both. Yes, old fellow, I know that you would not have thought twice about that, but I had to – if not for your sake, then for the sake of your wife.
No, it was safer to say nothing, to let you return, and to wait there myself until the professor should appear.
He did so, as soon as you were out of sight. Not alone, as I suggested when I saw you after that gap of three years, but in company with two of his criminal associates, both very large, and both of an extremely unpleasant appearance.
Moriarty himself was pointing a large and wicked-looking revolver at me. The other two men were unarmed, but still looked dangerous enough in all conscience.
‘I had not expected so large a welcoming committee,’ I said.
Moriarty inclined his head in a little bow of acknowledgement. ‘I fear that changed circumstances – which I deplore as much as you do – make it impossible for me to accord you all those courtesies, those personal attentions, shall we say, which I would have wished,’ said he. ‘This foolishness has gone on quite long enough, as I’m sure you will agree. There must be no room for mistakes this time, Holmes, hence the presence of my two colleagues.’
‘May I at least leave a note for Watson?’ I asked. ‘He will be concerned enough about me as it is, without the added distress of not knowing exactly what may have occurred.’
Moriarty shook his head. ‘I regret that it will not –’ he broke off, and looked beyond me, towards the Falls, his eyes darting here and there, until they settled on the damp and slippery track that led to the edge and a curious light came into them – ‘on second thoughts, perhaps I might permit it, but you will please be prudent as to what you write, for I fear that I must insist upon reading the finished product.’
‘I had expected nothing else,’ said I, and proceeded to write the note which you, Watson, later found and later still made public. I deliberately kept it non-committal in tone, for I knew that Moriarty had some scheme in mind. Reading your account later, I was struck by the fact that he had let me refer to the files of evidence against the gang, but then I realized that he intended to sacrifice his old friends – or at any rate to leave them to sink or swim as they could – the better to cover his own disappearance.
When I had finished, and Moriarty had read and approved my note, I placed it by the side of the path, weighted down with my cigarette case. ‘My thanks for that civility,’ I told Moriarty. ‘I trust it will make Watson’s mind somewhat easier.’
‘Let us hope so. And now,’ said he, looking at one of his henchmen, ‘I think it is time to say farewell to Mr Holmes, if you would be so kind.’
The fellow looked at the slippery path, and the rushing torrent, with no great enthusiasm. ‘Be quick,’ urged the professor.
‘I had thought, Professor, that perhaps you and I –?’ I suggested.
‘Dear me, Mr Holmes! Dear me, as I have had occasion to remark to you before.’ He stared at me, an evil glint in his eye, like some sort of venomous reptile.
‘Ah, yes,’ said I. ‘The little affair at Birlstone, as I recall.’
‘I fooled you completely there, Holmes,’ said Moriarty with a good deal of malicious satisfaction apparent in his voice. ‘I had been commissioned to advise as to the elim-ination of Mr Douglas, only to see the job hopelessly bungled by a self-proclaimed expert assassin.’ His head oscillated violently with emotion. ‘Heaven preserve us from these amateurs of crime, whether American or home-grown! When he had made an absolute hash of a perfectly simple task, it was then, of course, quite necessary for me to flush Douglas out of hiding and so enable my own agents to complete the job, and who better to undertake that mundane, yet essential, task than the renowned Sherlock Holmes?’
‘Hence the curious message, with the vital words written clearly, and only the trivial statements in cipher?’
‘Quite so. I knew it could not fail to arouse your curiosity.’
‘I was aware there was something odd about a cipher message of which the essential elements, the very elements which should have been secret, were not in cipher and thus no secret, but I confess I did not suspect that,’ said I. ‘But as to this present difference of opinion, I had expected that it would be man to man, if the phrase is not entirely inapplicable in the circumstances.’
Moriarty’s eyes glittered angrily at the insult. ‘You are, what, thirty-five years old? I am nearer sixty than fifty, and not in the best of condition, having led a somewhat sedentary, though reasonably exciting, life. Besides,’ he added, a curious note of exaltation in his voice, ‘I must conserve my strength. For the mountains, you understand, Holmes. Yes, the mountains.’ There was a strange gleam in his eye as he spoke, and that along with his tone made me think rapidly.
I glanced up at the peaks around us. ‘It is a little early in the season for comfort.’
Moriarty laughed heartily. ‘These anthills? Merely practice, I assure you. But useful practice, nonetheless. And now, enough of this tomfoolery.’ He gestured towards the Falls with the muzzle of the revolver. ‘Let us get it over and done with.’
The man whom he had indicated as my executioner seemed disposed to dispute matters. ‘Why couldn’t you shoot him and have done?’ he asked, a reasonable enough question, I thought, seen from his viewpoint.
‘Fool!’ hissed Moriarty. ‘It must look like an accident, and how could it do that if he had a bullet in him? Finish the job now, and be quick, before that obstinate clown of a doctor returns.’
The fellow stepped forward, motioning me to go ahead of him along the path to the edge of the Falls. I walked slowly, ostensibly because the wet earth made it dangerous to hasten, but in reality that I might have a chance to speak to the man who edged his way gingerly along behind me.
‘You are aware that Moriarty will not let you return?’ said I. ‘He could, as you say, have shot me with impunity, for a body going over the Falls is unlikely ever to be recovered for a close examination as to the presence or absence of bullet holes.’
‘What on earth are you talking about?’ said he – or words to that general effect, for he was a coarse fellow.
‘It is not in the least a matter of making my death look accidental,’ I went on, ‘but rather of making it look as if Moriarty had perished along with me. In that way, nobody will think to look for him among those mountains of which he spoke just now. It is surely patently obvious that such a plan can only succeed if there are two lines of footprints going to the very edge of the Falls – and, by the way, we have reached that edge now – but none going back?’
My companion, who was practically clinging to the wall of rock, hesitated, and looked back at the tracks we had left.
‘You take my point?’ I said.
He gazed back along the path at Moriarty, as if seeking inspiration from his master. Moriarty called out something, but it was lost in the crashing of the Falls. As if to reinforce his instructions, the professor raised his revolver, and fired a single shot, which took a chip out of the rock a yard above our heads.
‘He wants the job finished,’ said my companion, evidently a man of few words and little imagination, but capable of grasping one central theme, if it were made clear to him.
‘That is true enough, but –’ before I could reason further with him, he had made up his mind, and made a hesitant sort of charge at me.
I have said that he was a big man. And yet he was cautious, his charge when he made it was hesitant, for he was afraid for his life. The path was narrow and damp, unsafe even for men not engaged in a hand-to-hand struggle. Moreover, he believed, where I did not, that the professor would permit him to return in safety.
On the other hand, I had nothing to lose, for I knew that the professor would not, could not, allow either me or my assailant to leave there alive, whatever might be the outcome of the little contest at the end of the path.
I met the reluctant attack confidently, then, with a grip which I had seen demonstrated some years previously by a member of the Japanese Legation, a nobleman who was an adept in the secret art of baritsu, a wrestling technique so secret that few of the Japanese themselves are aware of its existence.
I managed to catch my assailant off balance, and turn his charge. He twisted round on the slippery path, overbalanced, and groped frantically at the air for what seemed an eternity. Then he let out a hideous scream, and went over the edge.
