number — one that corresponded with the arrangement of locks on the safe.
Kneeling down in the centre of the beam, he slipped in the first key. It turned smoothly, with a decided click. So did the second. And the third. But the fourth refused to budge. Badger cast a worried glance at his confederate, but neither man spoke. Badger withdrew the key and tried again, with the same result. A thin sheen of sweat materialised on his brow. What the hell was wrong here? This certainly wasn’t in the plan. The first three keys had been fine. He couldn’t believe the Man had made a mistake. It was unheard of.
“Try the fifth key,” whispered Arthur, who was equally perplexed and worried.
In the desperate need to take action of some kind, Badger obeyed. Remarkably, the fifth key slipped in easily and turned smoothly, with the same definite click as the first three. A flicker of hope rallied Badger’s dampened spirits and he turned the handle of the safe. Nothing happened. It would not budge. He swore and sat back on his haunches. “What the hell now?”
“Try the fourth key again,” came his partner’s voice from the darkness.
Badger did as he was told and held his breath. The key fitted the aperture without problem. Now his hands were shaking and he paused, fearful of failure again.
“Come on, Badger.”
He turned the key. At first there was some resistance, and then... it moved. It revolved. It clicked.
“The bastards,” exclaimed Arthur Sims in a harsh whisper. “They’ve altered the arrangement of the locks so they can’t be opened in order. His nibs ain’t sussed that out.”
Badger was now on his feet and tugging at the large safe door. “Blimey, it’s a weight,” he muttered, as the ponderous portal began to move. “It’s bigger than my old woman,” he observed, his spirits lightening again. The door creaked open with magisterial slowness. It took Badger almost a minute of effort before the safe door was wide open.
At last, Arthur Sims was able to direct the beam of the lantern to illuminate the interior of the safe. When he had done so, his jaw dropped and he let out a strangled gasp.
“What is it?” puffed Badger, sweat now streaming down his face.
“Take a look for yourself,” came the reply.
As Badger pulled himself forward and peered round the corner of the massive safe door, a second lantern beam joined theirs. “The cupboard is bare, I am afraid.”
The voice, clear, brittle and authoritative, came from behind them, and both felons turned in unison to gaze at the speaker.
The bull’s-eye spotlit a tall young man standing in the doorway, a sardonic smile touching his thin lips. It was Harry Jordan. Or was it? He was certainly dressed in the shabby checked suit that Jordan wore — but where was the bulbous nose and large moustache?
“I am afraid the game is no longer afoot, gentlemen. I think the phrase is, ‘You’ve been caught red-handed.’ Now, please do not make any rash attempts to escape. The police are outside the building, awaiting my signal.”
Arthur Sims and Badger Johnson stared in dumbfounded amazement as the young man took a silver whistle from his jacket pocket and blew on it three times. The shrill sound reverberated in their ears.
Inspector Giles Lestrade of Scotland Yard cradled a tin mug of hot, sweet tea in his hands and smiled contentedly. “I reckon that was a pretty good night’s work.”
It was an hour later, after the arrest of Badger Johnson and Arthur Sims, and the inspector was ensconced in his cramped office back at the Yard.
The young man sitting opposite him, wearing a disreputable checked suit which had seen better days, did not respond. His silence took the smile from Lestrade’s face and replaced it with a furrowed brow.
“You don’t agree, Mr Holmes?”
The young man pursed his lips for a moment before replying. “In a manner of speaking, it has been a successful venture. You have two of the niftiest felons under lock and key, and saved the firm of Meredith and Co. the loss of a considerable amount of cash.”
“Exactly.” The smile returned.
“But there are still questions left unanswered.”
“Such as?”
“How did our two friends come into the possession of the key to the building, to the office where the safe was housed — and the five all-important keys to the safe itself?”
“Does that really matter?”
“Indeed it does. It is vital that these questions are answered in order to clear up this matter fully. There was obviously an accomplice involved who obtained the keys and was responsible for drugging the night-watchman. Badger Johnson intimated as much when he engaged my services as lookout, but when I pressed him for further information, he clammed up like a zealous oyster.”
Lestrade took a drink of the tea. “Now, you don’t bother your head about such inconsequentialities. If there was another bloke involved, he certainly made himself scarce this evening and so it would be nigh on impossible to pin anything on him. No, we are very happy to have caught two of the sharpest petermen in London, thanks to your help, Mr Holmes. From now on, however, it is a job for the professionals.”
The young man gave a gracious nod of the head as though in some vague acquiescence to the wisdom of the Scotland Yarder. In reality he thought that, while Lestrade was not quite a fool, he was blinkered to the ramifications of the attempted robbery, and too easily pleased at landing a couple of medium-size fish in his net, while the really big catch swam free. Crime was never quite as cut and dried as Lestrade and his fellow professionals seemed to think. That was why this young man knew that he could never work within the constraints of the organised force as a detective. While at present he was reasonably content to be a help to the police, his ambitions lay elsewhere.
For his own part, Lestrade was unsure what to make of this lean youth with piercing grey eyes and gaunt, hawk-like features that revealed little of what he was thinking. There was something cold and impenetrable about his personality that made the inspector feel uncomfortable. In the last six months, Holmes had brought several cases to the attention of the Yard which he or his fellow officer, Inspector Gregson, had followed up, and a number of arrests had resulted. What Sherlock Holmes achieved from his activities, apart from the satisfaction every good citizen would feel at either preventing or solving a crime, Lestrade could not fathom. Holmes never spoke of personal matters, and the inspector was never tempted to ask.
At the same time as this conversation was taking place in Scotland Yard, in another part of the city the Professor was being informed of the failure of that night’s operation at Meredith and Co. by his number two, Colonel Sebastian Moran.
The Professor rose from his chaise-longue, cast aside the mathematical tome he had been studying and walked to the window. Pulling back the curtains, he gazed out on the river below him, its murky surface reflecting the silver of the moon.
“In itself, the matter is of little consequence,” he said, in a dark, even voice. “Merely a flea-bite on the body of our organisation. But there have been rather too many of these flea-bites of late. They are now beginning to irritate me.” He turned sharply, his eyes flashing with anger. “Where lies the incompetence?”
Moran was initially taken aback by so sudden a change in the Professor’s demeanour. “I am not entirely sure,” he stuttered.
The Professor’s cruelly handsome face darkened with rage. “Well, you should be, Moran. You should be sure. It is your job to know. That is what you are paid for.”
“Well... it seems that someone is tipping the police off in advance.”
The Professor gave a derisory laugh. “Brilliant deduction, Moran. Your public-school education has stood you in good stead. Unfortunately, it does not take a genius to arrive at that rather obvious conclusion. I had a visit from Scoular earlier this evening, thank goodness there is
At the mention of Scoular’s name, Moran blanched. Scoular was cunning, very sharp and very ambitious. This upstart was gradually worming his way into the Professor’s confidence, assuming the role of court favourite; consequently, Moran felt his own position in jeopardy. He knew there was no demotion in the organisation. If you lost favour, you lost your life also.
“What did he want?”
