page.
“I was very careful not to mention any Irish connection in the story,” I said defensively.
“It is where you pay tribute to my mental and physical faculties for the year ‘95 that the error occurs,” Holmes replied in annoyance.
“I don’t understand,” I said, examining the page.
He took back the magazine from me and read with careful diction: “In this memorable year ‘95, a curious and congruous succession of cases had engaged his attention, ranging from his famous investigation of the sudden death of Cardinal Tosca-an inquiry which was carried out by him at the express desire of His Holiness the Pope….”
He paused and looked questioningly at me.
“But the case was famous,” I protested. “It was also publicly acknowledged that the pope asked specifically for your help. I kept some of the articles that appeared in the public press….”
“Then I suggest you go to your archive of tittle-tattle, Watson,” he interrupted sharply. “Look up the article.”
I moved to the shelves where I maintained a few scrapbooks in which I occasionally pasted such articles of interest connected with the life and career of my friend. It took me a little while to find the six column inches that had been devoted to the case by the Morning Post.
“There you are,” I said triumphantly. “The case of Cardinal Tosca was recorded.”
His stare was icy. “And have you noticed the date of the article?”
“Of course. It is here, for the month of November 1891….”
“Eighteen ninety-one?” he repeated with studied deliberation.
I suddenly realized the point that he was making.
I had set the date down as 1895.1 had been four years out in my record.
“It is a long time ago,” I tried to justify myself. “It is easy to forget.”
“Not for me,” Holmes replied grimly. “The case featured an old adversary of mine whose role I did not discover until after that man’s own death while in police custody in early 1894. That was why I knew that the date that you had ascribed to the case was wrong.”
I was frowning, trying to make the connection. “An old adversary? Who could that be?”
Holmes rose abruptly and went to his little Chubb Safe, bent to it, and twiddled with the locking mechanism before extracting a wad of paper.
“This,” he said, turning to me and tapping the paper with the stem of his pipe, “was what I found in my adversary’s apartment when I went to search it after his death. It is a draft of a letter. Whether he sent it or not, I am not sure. Perhaps it does not matter. I believe that it was fortuitous that I found it before the police, who would doubtless have made it public or, worse, it might have fallen into other hands so that the truth might never have been known to me. It is a record of my shortcomings, Watson. I will allow you to see it but no other eyes will do so during my lifetime. You may place it in that bank box of yours with your other scribbling. Perhaps after some suitable time has passed following my death, it can be opened to public scrutiny. That I shall leave to posterity.”
I took the document from him and observed the spidery handwriting that filled its pages.
I regarded Holmes in bewilderment. “What is it?”
“It is the true story of how Cardinal Tosca came by his death. You have had the goodness to claim the case as one of my successes. This will show you how I was totally outwitted. The man responsible wrote it.”
My jaw dropped foolishly. “But I was with you at the time. You solved the case to the satisfaction of Scotland Yard. Who-?”
“Colonel Sebastian Moran, the man who I once told you was the second most dangerous man in London. He was my adversary, and I did not know it. Read it, Watson. Read it and learn how fallible I can be.”
The Conduit Street Club, London W1
May 21, 1891
My dear “Wolf Shield”:
So he is dead! The news is emblazoned on the newspaper billboards at every street corner. His friend, Watson, has apparently given an interview to reporters in Meiringen, Switzerland, giving the bare details. Holmes and Moriarty have plunged to their deaths together over the Reichenbach Falls. Sherlock Holmes is dead, and in that news I can find no grief for Moriarty, who has dispatched him to the devil! Moriarty, at his age, was no street brawler and should have sent his hirelings to do the physical Work. So Moriarty’s untimely end was his own fault. But that he took that sanctimonious and egocentric meddler to his death is a joy to me.
Holmes was always an irritant to me. I remember our first clash in the Kildare Street Club in Dublin, back in ‘73. He was but a young student then, just gone up to Oxford. He and his brother, Mycroft, who, at the time, was an official at Dublin Castle, were lunching in the club. It chanced that Moriarty and I were also lunching there. It was some paltry misunderstanding over a ridiculous toilet case with that old idiot, the Duke of Cloncurry and Straff an, that Holmes’s meddling caused me to he thrown out of the Club and banned from membership.
It was not the last time that little pipsqueak irritated me and thwarted my plans. But there is one case where he was not successful in his dealings with me. Now my own ego must lay claim to having got the better of that Dublin jackeen. I proved the better man but, alas, he went to his death without knowing it. I would have given anything that he had plunged to his death knowing that Sebastian Moran of Derrynacleigh had outwitted him while he claimed to be the greatest detective in Europe! But, my dear “Wolf Shield,” let me tell you the full story, although I appreciate that you know the greater part of it. You are the only one that I can tell it to for, of course, you were ultimately responsible for the outcome.
In November of i8go His Eminence Cardinal Giacomo Tosca, nuncio of Pope Leo XIII, was found dead in bed in the home of a certain member of the British Cabinet in Gay fere Street not far from the Palace of Westminster. The facts, as you doubtless recall, created a furor. You will remember that Lord Salisbury headed a Conservative government that was not well disposed to papal connections at the time. The main reason was the government’s stand against Irish Home Rule summed up in their slogan — “Home Rule is Rome Rule.” That very month Parnell had been reelected leader of the Irish Party in spite of attempts to discredit him.
The Irish Party controlled four-fifths of all Irish parliamentary seats in Westminster. They were considered a formidable opposition.
A doctor named Thomson, called in to examine the body of the papal nuncio, caused further speculation by refusing to sign a death certificate, as he told the police that the circumstances of the death were indistinct and suspicious. The doctor was supported in this attitude by the local coroner.
The alarums that followed this announcement were extraordinary. The popular press demanded to know whether this meant the papal nuncio was murdered. More important, both Tory and Liberal newspapers were demanding a statement from government on whether the nuncio had been an intermediary in some political deal being negotiated with Ireland’s Catholics.
What was Cardinal Tosca doing in the house of the Conservative government Minister Sir Gibson Glassford? More speculation was thrown on the fire of rumor and scandal when it was revealed that Glassford was a cousin, albeit distant, of the Earl of Zetland, the Viceroy in Dublin. Moreover, Glassford was known to represent the moderate wing of the Tories and not unsympathetic to the cause of Irish Home Rule.
Was there some Tory plot to give the Irish self-government in spite of all their assurances of support for the Unionists? All the Tory leaders, Lord Salisbury, Arthur Balfour, Lord Hartington, and Joseph Chamberlain among them, had sworn themselves to the Union and made many visits to Ireland declaring that Union would never be severed. Yet here was a cardinal found dead in the house of a Tory minister known to have connections with Ireland. It came as a tremendous shock to the political world.
Catholic bishops in England denied any knowledge of Cardinal Tosca being in the country. The Vatican responded by telegraph also denying that they knew that Cardinal Tosca was in England. Such denials merely fueled more speculation of clandestine negotiations.
