The Travels of Sherlock Holmes, page 9
Scattered over the hillside were the bodies of a score of men, their limbs sprawled out just as they had fallen. I do not think that any of those in our little party could honestly have been described as sensitive, certainly we had all seen death, both peaceful and violent, before. But in those hills, it was such an unexpected sight that it brought us to an involuntary halt, and we stood there a long minute before Sigerson said briskly, ‘Let us see what has happened here,’ and led the way down the slope.
It was, indeed, fairly obvious what had happened. All the men – poorly dressed, and rough-looking men – had been shot, and simply left where they fell. Sigerson moved from one pathetic corpse to the next; I assumed he was checking to see if any of them were still alive, though it seemed clear enough that it was a forlorn hope.
Sigerson straightened up. ‘How would you read this?’ he asked.
I shrugged. ‘They have been shot. What more is there to say?’
‘From the general disposition of the bodies, is it not clear that they were all moving down this slope when they were shot? Furthermore, the absence of any powder marks indicates that they were shot from some distance away.’ He picked up one of the rifles that lay scattered all around, and held it to his nose. ‘Some of these have not been fired, certainly not recently. That fellow said they were bandits, and – no disrespect to the dead – they certainly look a most villainous bunch, which might suggest that they had been in hiding, possibly higher up in the mist, or behind the rocks scattered about so conveniently for such a purpose, and that they had intended to ambush some group moving along the track which I see at the bottom of the slope here, but in the event they got more than they bargained for.’
‘They weren’t tailored, either,’ said Fenton, who had also been examining the bodies. ‘Most of them have no more than one or two bullets in them, well aimed. Whoever shot these men knew how to make their shots count.’
‘Professional soldiers?’ said Sigerson, and Fenton nodded agreement.
Norbu said a few words to our informant, whom Dass had now brought to the scene, and listened intently to the gabbled reply.
‘He says it was soldiers,’ said Norbu. ‘Not Tibetans or Chinese, but foreigners. Big men, with beards, and dressed in furs.’
‘Cossacks!’ said Fenton at once.
‘It sounds very much like it,’ agreed Sigerson. ‘Russians, at any rate, if not the best known specimens of their armed forces. Evidently we have almost come upon the men we seek. Norbu, will you ask how many soldiers this man saw?’
‘A hundred, perhaps two hundred,’ came the reply. Norbu added on his own initiative, ‘but I think that fear may have caused him to exaggerate.’
‘Even so, it was a large enough party to cause this slaughter,’ said Sigerson. ‘And this did not happen very long ago, I would judge. Where did the soldiers go?’
Norbu put the question to our informant, and the reply was immediate, ‘Towards the place from which we have come, the home of the Dalai Lama’s family, just as we thought.’
‘Impossible!’ said Fenton. ‘The way to the village is the way we have just travelled ourselves. We could not fail to pass them, and we saw nothing.’
Norbu spoke again to our informant, and got a lengthy reply. ‘He says there is another way,’ Norbu translated. ‘A long way round, but the path avoids the second village, the one we saw earlier today.’
‘That explains it,’ said Sigerson. ‘They are avoiding any settlements, as far as may be, until they are compelled to show themselves.’
Our informant was speaking again, and Norbu, looking elated, said, ‘It looks as if we may be able to take a short cut, and head them off without too much difficulty. He says that the way they are taking to avoid the village is a cir-cuitous one, but we can go on foot over the hills.’
Fenton stared at Sigerson. ‘Well, do we head them off?’
‘It is certainly worth trying, if only to get a look at our enemy, and we may possibly be able to slow them down somewhat, allow our friends more time, even though we may not be able to stop the professor altogether. Norbu, tell our friend here to lead the way.’
Our informant set off across the angle of the slope to our left, and Norbu and Sigerson went after him. But I had noticed that one of the bandits – who had mostly been armed with the sort of home-made weapons that are called ‘jezails’ in India – had an old but very large and well-cared-for army pattern revolver by his side, and I stooped and picked it up. If we are to tangle with Cossacks, I thought, it might be as well to take some elementary precautions. Evidently Fenton had had the same idea, for I noticed that he too was collecting an armful of weapons from some of the poor fellows who now had no use for them. He saw me looking at him, and gave me a smile, as if we were two naughty schoolboys scrumping for apples, then we set off after the others.
The Tibetan who had told us of the massacre was evidently now fully recovered from the initial jolt of witnessing it, for he set a cracking pace across the slope and then climbed up an almost vertical wall of rock. Only Norbu, who was, presumably, used to this clambering about like a chamois, could keep up with him, the rest of us struggled and gasped some way behind.
Once we had climbed the rock wall, we had a fairly level walk of it, so the going was better, though there was nothing in the way of a track, or even a path, and certainly neither horse nor even mule could have gone that way.
Our guide led us along what seemed to be the top of a high wall of rock, and I was glad that the mist and cloud prevented our seeing exactly how far down it was to the floor of the valley on either side. On we went, now scrambling up more steep slopes, now going down fairly gentle ones, for something approaching two hours.
We were progressing along a narrow path that ran between walls of rock, twelve feet high, on either side. At a bend in the path, our guide halted, waved at us to wait, then moved ahead cautiously. He disappeared from sight for a moment, then returned with a look of excitement on his face, and whispered to Norbu.
‘There is a river valley below us,’ said Norbu, ‘with a little bridge, and we have evidently beaten them to it, for they have not yet arrived at the bridge, but are heading towards it.’
We rounded the bend, and found ourselves on the top of a cliff, which commanded a steep and narrow valley. Just as Norbu had said, there was a little river rushing and tumbling along far below, spanned by one of the makeshift bridges which you see in those parts. There was a track of sorts on either side of the river, and on our side, but still half a mile off, a file of mounted men were riding towards both us and the little bridge. There were certainly not a hundred riders, but it was a large group, a couple of dozen men, and they all looked competent and well-armed.
‘Cossacks, or I’m a Dutchman,’ muttered Fenton.
Sigerson had gone ahead, and was examining the edge of the cliff, a look of vexation clouding his brow. ‘The rock is rotten just along here,’ said he. ‘With a half pound of powder we might have brought the whole lot down, prevented their crossing the river here, and given ourselves an extra day.’ The annoyance he felt was written plainly upon his face.
Fenton gave a little cough, as if deprecating his foresight. ‘I took the liberty of helping myself,’ he said, holding up the equipment he had collected earlier. ‘Those poor chaps didn’t look as if they’d be needing it, but I thought that we might find it useful if we had to face the Imperial Russian Army. There is plenty of powder here.’
‘Well done,’ said Sigerson. ‘Now, if we work quickly, for I would not wish to harm them if it might be avoided –’
He and Fenton packed a large quantity of the black powder into cracks in the cliff edge. It took some time to do it properly, and the leading riders were all but at the bridge as they finished.
Fenton gazed down, and frowned. ‘We have left it a bit late.’
‘No matter,’ said Sigerson firmly. ‘They are soldiers, and know the risks they take. Light the fuses!’
Fenton did as he was bid, and we set off hastily back the way we had come, rounding the bend in the track as there was an explosion, which deafened us for a moment, amplified as it was by the surrounding walls of rock.
‘That should do it,’ said Sigerson with some satisfaction.
Fenton, who had been in the rear, said, ‘I think the leading riders were caught in the fall, and had no time to pull back.’
‘Ah, that’s a pity,’ said Sigerson with no sign of emotion. ‘I wish it might have been avoided, but there it is. Well, Captain Fenton, I think you have achieved what you were ordered to do, to assess the situation and prevent the enemy from doing any harm to our interests. Our best course now seems to be to return to Lhasa, to determine whether we can make any diplomatic progress. The leaders were lost, you think?’
‘I’m certain of it. So that means that the professor – if he was with them, which is still not proven – can be no further danger to us.’
‘It would indeed be comforting to think so,’ said Sigerson with a smile as enigmatic as that of the Mona Lisa.
Chapter Ten - ‘A most interesting man’
For two days we went back the way we had come. It is safe to say that each one of us felt pretty well satisfied with ourselves, and each showed it in his own way.
Fenton and I were content that we had halted the enemy’s march in so soldierly a fashion. Dass was, I think, still fascinated by the explosion, which had, I must admit, been quite spectacular, and expressed his satisfaction that the job had been done cleanly and with some concrete result, ‘For,’ said he, ‘in this line of work there are sometimes a good many loose ends.’ Norbu sympathized with the riders who had perished, but recognized that it had been necessary in order to help his countrymen. Sigerson too was pleased enough when I asked him, though he still gave some pretty broad hints that we had not heard the last of our enemy, a proposition which Fenton took leave to doubt – to me, and in private, at any rate.
After two days, we passed through the last village before Lhasa, and came to another deep valley, through which rushed a fairly broad river – I think it was the same branch of the Tsangpo which borders Lhasa, but it may have been merely a tributary stream, for there are many little rivers in the mountains.
The narrow track led steeply downwards to a ramshackle bridge, not so very different from the one at which we had blocked the enemy’s advance, and we set off down it. We had got about halfway down the side of the cliff face, when suddenly a shot rang out from the wall of rock high above us.
Instinctively we threw ourselves down at full length, sought what little shelter there was, and cowered there.
Scarcely had we done this, when there was a second shot, and by this time I had recovered my composure sufficiently that I could make out that it was someone higher up on the track along which we had just walked who was doing the shooting. It must, therefore, have been someone who had followed us, waiting to get to a position of vantage. He had succeeded, for we were as helpless as fish in a barrel where we were. We lay there in silence, waiting for yet another shot, but none came.
Five minutes, long minutes, passed, then ten.
‘Dyce, can you see anyone up there?’ asked Fenton, at my side.
I looked cautiously up, but could see nothing. ‘All clear as far as I can make out.’
‘If there were anyone up there, why should he wait, when we are so completely at his mercy?’ wondered Fenton. ‘Have you your pistol?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then be ready if he shows himself.’
Before I could speak, Fenton had left his hiding place. He edged his way back the way we had come, and the rest of us watched, fully expecting the worst. I still had the ancient revolver and a dozen cartridges, and I had more or less marked the spot where our assailant had been, so I hoped that if he tried again I might be able to get off one or two shots that would count, but everything was quiet.
Fenton reached the top of the cliff, and he carefully raised his head, and looked back the way we had come, before shouting down to us, ‘There’s nobody here now.’
He scrambled down to rejoin us. ‘Evidently we did not succeed in disposing of them completely,’ he remarked drily.
‘I had expected something of the sort,’ said Sigerson. He glanced around. ‘But what ails Norbu?’
We looked where he pointed. Norbu, who had been at the head of our little procession, still lay where he had thrown himself. Sigerson hastened over to him, then stepped back with an oath.
‘The second shot did not miss,’ said he.
The rest of us hurried over, but there was now nothing anyone could do. The second shot had gone through Norbu’s heart.
There was no point stopping to mourn him here. We improvised a kind of stretcher with our cloaks and blankets, and started off once more, intending to take Norbu’s body to his cousin in Lhasa.
‘I blame myself for this,’ said Sigerson bitterly as we went.
‘You should not,’ Dass told him. ‘Norbu was every bit as much a soldier as those unfortunate Russians, and he knew the risks just as well as they did.’
‘No,’ said Sigerson with a curt shake of his head. ‘Were it that and nothing more, I should think the same as you. But poor Norbu was in the lead when he was shot, and he was of much the same size and appearance as I am. They intended to kill me, not him, and that is what I mean when I say I am responsible.’
We crossed the bridge, and set off up the path on the opposite side, the path that would lead us to Lhasa.
As we reached the top, our way was blocked by a very tall man, wrapped in furs. He did not venture any sort of greeting, nor did he move aside as we neared him, and I wondered what on earth he thought he was doing, for he could see that we had a heavy burden. It was impossible for us to pass him on the steep and narrow track, struggling as we were with poor Norbu’s body, and it was a long way down to the valley below us.
Sigerson turned round, and motioned to us to set Norbu down by the path side, then he walked up to the man who stood there.
‘Good evening, Professor. I had expected you.’
‘Good evening, H——,’ said the man in English. The blank does not signify an oath that I wish to conceal in some prissy Jane Austen fashion, but a name, and the name was not “Sigerson”. It was unknown to me – then, at least, though it has become somewhat more familiar to me since, for its owner is famous the world over.
‘My name is “Sigerson” in these parts, a shift which I am sure you will respect. Well, Professor, I take it that you have come to finish the business we left half done at Reichenbach?’
‘Just so – Sigerson.’ He gazed about him, with a curious oscillating motion of his head. ‘The surroundings are uncannily similar, are they not?’
‘Indeed. But this time I have the companions.’
‘Come, come, Sigerson!’ said the professor with a laugh. ‘You would not stand upon ceremony, I feel sure. I am, by the way, very sorry that your friend should have come to such a sad end,’ he waved at Norbu’s body. ‘I told Igorov that you were not so easy to kill, but he quite insisted.’
‘He is not with you, then, this – Igorov?’
‘We parted company, I fear. He is a brilliant man in his own way, but somewhat headstrong. He would insist upon trying to dispose of you once and for all, after you spoiled his plans in that precipitate manner – I assume that the explosion and landslide was your work, of course? Yes? I had thought as much. And now he has set off for home, I have no doubt, probably in some dudgeon after the failure of his main mission, but with the quite illusory compensation of having encompassed your death. I, on the other hand, wished to make absolutely sure. So I am alone, and at your disposal. I am also unarmed,’ he added, staring at the revolver in my hand, ‘so you will please tell your friends, who look young enough to be quite impetuous, not to interfere.’
‘You will do as the professor says,’ Sigerson told us. He walked forward a little way towards the professor, who was removing his travelling coat.
‘But surely, gentlemen’ protested Fenton, ‘you do not propose to brawl like a couple of navvies on pay day? Apart from the obvious dangers of doing so in so wild a spot, it seems impious with poor Norbu lying here. You, Mr Sigerson, I have grown to know and respect you – and you, professor! Why, I was one of your pupils, ten years or so ago. Do you not recognize me?’
The professor stared at him. ‘One impudent puppy is much like another,’ he said in an offhand way.
Fenton, looking abashed, and more than a little offended, relapsed into silence.
Sigerson was now standing on the very edge of the path, with a sheer drop at the side of him. ‘Mind, now,’ he told us, ‘you are not to interfere in any way. If by some chance I should not be here at the end of our little contest to advise you, then I leave it to you to decide what is to be done with the professor here.’
The professor bowed to him in an ironic fashion, then – before I had worked out what they proposed to do – he made a clumsy rush towards Sigerson, for all the world as if he intended that they should both go over the edge of the path and plunge into the river far below.
Although they were much of a size, Sigerson was in the prime of his life, and was in good training – he had, for example, frequently set the pace for the rest of us on the route to Lhasa. By contrast this professor was about sixty, as near as I could judge, and his leanness was not that of an athlete, but that of some old, dried-out, leathery don, fit only for shuffling round his library.
Sigerson met his shambling onslaught, and they wrestled for a short moment, before the professor stumbled on the edge of the path, let out a hideous scream, and clutched frantically – and hopelessly – at the air, as he toppled slowly but surely backwards, looking like the figures one sees in a nightmare, where the most ordinary action seems to take years.
Sigerson, a look of horror on his face such as I have never seen before or since, leapt desperately towards him, his arms outstretched as if he would catch him, but it was too late. The scream did not end until the professor hit the water far below.
