The Mammoth Book of New Sherlock Holmes Adventures

The Adventure of the Amateur Mendicant Society – John Gregory Betancourt

1887 was one of Holmes's busiest years. We know for certain of at least thirteen cases that year, and indications of several others. Watson refers to some of these at the start of 'The Five Orange Pips' although, in his usual devious way, the case of 'The Five Orange Pips' itself did not happen in that year but in 1889.

The year began with Holmes facing one of his most formidable opponents, the King of Blackmailers, Charles Augustus Milverton. It was followed by the case of 'The Paradol Chamber', which I am still piecing together and hope to bring to you at a future date. After that Holmes was plunged into the major problems of the Netherland-Sumatra Company, which also resulted in the case enticingly referred to as 'The Giant Rat of Sumatra', for which the world is not yet ready, and the daring schemes of Baron Maupertuis. It is of some significance, I believe, that all record of these cases has been extinguished and my researches and those of my colleagues have revealed nothing. I have no doubt that Watson was, in any case, concealing identities here, but I also have no doubt that these were amongst some of Holmes's most daring and important cases. His exertions upon them damaged his health to the extent that Watson ordered Holmes to join him on a few days vacation in Surrey to recuperate, whereupon Holmes promptly threw himself into the local case of 'The Reigate Squires'. The case acted like therapy and within days Holmes was reinvigorated and back in London.

One of the next cases that Holmes took on was 'The Adventure of the Amateur Mendicant Society' which Watson delayed from writing down for several years. That delay meant that some of his earlier jottings about the case did not end up in his final papers stored in the despatch box and instead surfaced amongst some other papers found by bookdealer Robert Weinberg, whose own researches I shall return to later. Weinberg sold these papers to John Betancourt who has helped piece the case together.

As I have written previously, my first years sharing lodgings with Mr Sherlock Holmes were among the most interesting of my life. Of all his cases – both public and private – which took place during this period, there remains one in particular of which I have hesitated to write until this time. Despite an ingenious resolution – and to my mind a wholeheartedly satisfactory one contrived by my friend, the bizarre nature of this affair has made me reluctant to place it before a general readership. However, I feel the time has come to lay forth the facts concerning Mr Oliver Pendleton-Smythe and the most unusual organization to which he belonged.

My notebook places our first meeting with Mr Pendleton-Smythe, if meeting it can be called, at Tuesday 24 April, 1887. We had just concluded a rather sensitive investigation (of which I am still not at liberty to write), and Holmes's great mind had begun to turn inexorably inward. I feared he might once more take up experimentation with opiates to satiate his need for constant mental stimulation.

So it was that I felt great relief when Mrs Hudson announced that a man – a very insistent man who refused to give his name – was at the door to see Mr Holmes.

'Dark overcoat, hat pulled low across his forehead, and carrying a black walking stick?' Holmes asked without looking up from his chair.

'Why, yes!' exclaimed Mrs Hudson. 'How ever did you know?'

Holmes made a deprecating gesture. 'He has been standing across the street staring up at our windows for more than an hour. Of course I noticed when I went to light my pipe, and I marked him again when I stood to get a book just a moment ago.'

'What else do you know about him?' I asked, lowering my copy of the Morning Post.

'Merely that he is an army colonel recently retired from service in Africa. He is a man of no small means, although without formal title or estates.'

'His stance,' I mused, 'would surely tell you that he a military man, and the wood of his walking stick might well indicate that he has seen service in Africa, as well might his clothes. But how could you deduce his rank when he's not in uniform?'

'The same way I know his name is Colonel Oliver Pendleton-Smythe,' Holmes said.

I threw down the Morning Post with a snort of disgust. 'Dash it all, you know the fellow!'

'Not true.' Holmes nodded toward the newspaper. 'You should pay more attention to the matters before you.'

I glanced down at the Morning Post, which had fallen open to reveal a line drawing of a man in uniform. missing: colonel oliver pendleton-smythe, said the headline. I stared at the picture, then up at Holmes's face.

'Will you see him, sir?' asked Mrs Hudson.

'Not tonight,' said Holmes. 'Tell Colonel Pendleton-Smythe – and do use his full name, although he will doubtlessly bluster and deny it – that I will see him at nine o'clock sharp tomorrow morning. Not one second sooner and not one second later. If he asks, tell him I am concluding another important case and cannot be disturbed.' He returned his gaze to his book.

'Very good, sir,' she said, and shaking her head she closed the door.

The second the latch clicked, Holmes leaped to his feet. Gathering up his coat and hat, he motioned for me to do likewise. 'Make haste, Watson,' he said. 'We must follow the colonel back to his den!'

'Den?' I demanded. I threw on my own coat and accompanied him down the back stairs at breakneck pace. 'What do you mean by 'den'?'

'Please!' Holmes put up one hand for silence and eased open the door. Pendleton-Smythe was striding briskly up Baker Street, swinging his walking stick angrily, as though it were a machete. We both slipped out and Holmes closed the door behind us. Then together we crossed the street and proceeded surreptitiously after the colonel. He seemed to be heading toward the river.

'What is this affair about?' I asked as I hurried after Holmes.

'Mr Pendleton-Smythe, had you bothered to read that article in the Morning Post, disappeared two days ago. Foul play was suspected. In the fireplace of his London home police inspectors found several scraps of paper, but little could be made out except one phrase: 'Amateur Mendicant Society.' What do you make of it?'

'A mendicant is a beggar, I believe.'

'True!'

'But a whole society of amateur beggars? And for a retired army colonel to be involved in them! It boggles the mind.'

'I suspect,' said Holmes, 'that modern views of beggary have colored your thoughts on this matter. Mendicants have been, at various times and in various cultures, both revered and despised. I suspect this is another name for the Secret Mendicant Society, a network of spies which is – or was, at any rate – quite real and much older than you realize. Its roots stretch back to the Roman Empire and as far abroad as Russia, India, and Egypt.'

'You think it still exists, then?' I asked.

'I thought it had died out a generation ago in Europe, but it seems to have surfaced once more. I have heard hints in the last few years, Watson, that lead me to suspect it has become an instrument of evil.'

'And Pendleton-Smythe…'

'Another Professor Moriarty, pulling the strings of this society for his own personal gain? Fortunately, no. He is, I believe, a pawn in a much larger game, although only a few squares on the board are yet visible to me. More than that I cannot say until I have questioned Pendleton-Smythe.'

'What do these 'amateur mendicants' do? Are they beggars or not?'

'Quickly!' Holmes said, pulling me behind a stopped Hansom cab. 'He's turning!'

Pendleton-Smythe had stopped before a small rooming house. As we peered out at him, he paused on the steps to look left then right, but did not see us. He entered the building and shut the door behind himself.

'Interesting,' Holmes said. 'But it confirms my theory.' 'That he's a beggar?' I asked, feeling a little annoyed for all the rushing about. 'If so, he is surely a well-lodged one.'

'Pendleton-Smythe has gone into hiding out of fear for his life. Why else would a man who owns a house choose to rent a room in such shabby surroundings as these?'