When Dunlevy had finished, he tore out the page and passed it to my friend. “Is this of any use to you?”
After glancing at it, Holmes balled it up and threw it in the fire. “It is conclusive. If you will excuse me, I must see what can be done.”
“But Mr. Holmes—”
“I’ve a task for you and Miss Monk, if you would be so kind. Go at once to George Lusk’s residence in Mile End. Tell him to meet with his men. They are already arranged into beats, and equipped with police whistles and truncheons, but convey my assertion that they must be flawlessly organized and on the most stringent alert. Afterwards, Miss Monk, do please stay indoors.”
Once outside, Holmes made for Whitechapel Road. I touched my friend on the shoulder predicting resistance, but he paused at once and regarded me expectantly.
“You anticipate another murder.”
“I am in hopes of preventing it. It will require an extraordinary effort. I need Lestrade’s assistance, but…I must think of a way. Perhaps my brother can—I do not know. Perhaps it is impossible.”
I stared at Holmes in astonishment, for never had I seen him look so completely cowed by his own knowledge.
“You feared it could be Dunlevy.”
“He was one possibility. We are left with the other.”
“Then you do know who the killer is.”
“I do. It is perfectly clear now. But pray God that I am wrong.”
“But why?”
As he passed a hand over his eyes, I recalled that he could not have slept more than twenty hours in the last seven days. For the first time since I had known him, Sherlock Holmes appeared to be exhausted by work rather than by inaction.
“Because if I am right,” he murmured, “I haven’t the first idea what to do.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN The Killer
I have always been struck by my friend Sherlock Holmes’s temerity in the face of adversity. In all our long years of association, I have never once known his courage to fail him, and his actions later that night, or rather early the next morning, reflected the dauntless tenacity I had come to expect of him. It is a brave man who awakens Mycroft Holmes at four o’clock in the morning.
We stopped at Baker Street for a wash and a change of clothes, but Holmes, on the instant he emerged from his bedroom, announced his intention of going out again.
“You will hardly find it a reflection on you, friend Watson, when I suggest that the fewer individuals storming my dear brother’s rooms at this hour, the better for Queen and country. In any event, I trust he will know better than I what steps should be taken.”
“Can I do anything in your absence?”
“Read all my correspondence the instant it arrives; I shall stop by the post office when it opens to redirect my mail. And get some rest, my dear fellow. You’ll need it, if I have not completely lost my mind.”
The notion of resting initially struck me as ludicrous, yet a hot bath and the reflection that I would be as good as useless that night without some respite soon convinced me to follow Holmes’s advice. I awoke near nine o’clock that morning and rang for breakfast, little expecting Mrs. Hudson to appear in my doorway in a far more severe fit of temper than I would ever have given the kindly woman credit for. I was told that the mysterious disappearance of two lodgers, during a time when they are known to be in danger, is unspeakably vexing to an affectionate landlady. I soon forged the appropriate truces.
Knowing Holmes’s obsession with presenting a complete case, I was not in the least surprised that I remained in the dark. It was as unlike him to explain a problem before its conclusion as it was for him to leave unfinished threads at the end of one. Something of the detachment of my days in combat entered my bones; there was a war on, and Holmes was the general leading the assault. Even if I could not propose a strategy, now that my friend had returned, I could at least follow orders.
The first telegram for Holmes arrived at half past one in the afternoon and stated, “The officers in question patrol an area bordering Whitechapel and Spitalfields north of Wentworth Street and south of Spital Square. Map follows by post. Abberline.”* The second was from Mr. Vandervent of the News Agency, demanding an immediate interview at his offices, with me alone if Holmes still could not be found.
Vandervent’s caveat proved unnecessary, as my friend arrived home at slightly after three in the afternoon in an exceedingly bad temper.
“I believe it is the sole business of government to invent elaborate impediments to swift action,” he snapped, flinging his hat on the settee emphatically.
“Your brother has been taking you round, I see.”
“To hell and back. It is no wonder they depend upon him so. He at once set about notifying the proper channels, which I need hardly tell you took three hours longer than it ought to have done. Mr. Matthews was not without a certain grasp of the problem, however.”
“The Home Secretary!” I exclaimed. “Is it truly as bad as that?”
“I am afraid so. Are there any messages?”
Holmes read his telegrams gravely, then jotted down another. I caught a glimpse of George Lusk’s address on the form.
“Holmes, you really must eat something.”
“No doubt I must. But we must also find a cab, for you do not wish to entertain the notion of inciting Mr. Vandervent’s wrath. I have seen it before.”
“I should like to know what good you think you’ll be to anyone lying helpless in hospital.”
He ignored me. “Come along now, my dear Watson, for in light of the notes you discovered, we’ve every reason to believe Vandervent’s news is no trifling affair.”
The Central News Agency’s offices were located in New Bridge Street in the City, and though I had never seen them, I had been prepared by the air of barely harnessed chaos in the offices of the
“I say, Mr. Holmes—” one began, but he was interrupted by the advent of a whirling dervish wielding a crutch as if it were a pikestaff.
“If you so much as form the thought that this is an opportunity to pose questions to Mr. Sherlock Holmes, I shall explore the potential of the typewriter as a deadly weapon,” Mr. Vandervent declared. With a jerk of his white-crowned head, he led us to a private office and elbowed the door shut.
“Thank heaven you’ve returned, Mr. Holmes,” he remarked, relocating stacks of news clippings from the chairs to the floor. “I had determined to meet with Dr. Watson, but it is far better that you both are here. Sit down, gentlemen.”
“Mr. Vandervent, I am afraid we haven’t much time. There have been some recent developments—”
“I wish to inform you of a development, as you call them, which has not yet come to pass. And despite my best efforts to smash it, including the employment of favours, pleas, threats, and my own considerable personal charm, it will nevertheless come to pass early tomorrow morning.”
Mr. Vandervent located what appeared to be the final draft of an article. Seating himself on the edge of his desk with a deft hop, he read it to us.
In a most distressing turn of events, it has become clear that, directly after suspicions lobbied against him by the official police came to light through this publication, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, the aberrant private detective, has fled from his Baker Street dwelling. He had been observed to be spending a great deal of time in the East-end just
