The House of Silk: The New Sherlock Holmes Novel Part 17

There was a door at the very back of the house. It was open and led into a garden. One of Lestrade's men was lying in front of it, blood pumping out of a bullet wound in his chest. Lestrade was already attending to him but seeing Holmes he looked up, his face flushed with anger. 'It was Harriman!' he exclaimed. 'He fired as he came down the stairs.'

'Where is he?'

'Gone!' Lestrade pointed at the open door.

Without another word, Holmes plunged after Harriman. I followed, partly because my place was always at his side but also because I wanted to be there when scores were finally settled. Harriman might only be a servant of the House of Silk, but he had made this business personal, falsely imprisoning Holmes and conniving in his murder. I would gladly have shot him. I was still sorry I had missed.

Out into the darkness and the swirling snow. We followed a path round the side of the house. The night had become a maelstrom of black and white and it was hard even to make out the buildings on the other side of the lane. But then we heard the crack of a whip and the whinny of a horse, and one of the carriages shot forward, racing towards the gate. There could be no doubt who was behind the reins. With a heavy heart and a bitter taste in my mouth, I realised that Harriman had got away, that we would have to wait in the hope that he would be found and apprehended in the days that followed.

But Holmes was having none of it. Harriman had taken a curricle, a four-wheeler drawn by two horses. Without stopping to choose from the vehicles that were left, he leapt into the nearest one, a flimsy dog cart with but one horse and not the healthiest specimen at that. Somehow I managed to clamber into the back and then we were off in pursuit, ignoring the cries of the driver who had been smoking a cigarette nearby and hadn't noticed us until it was too late. We burst through the gates, then swept round into the lane. With Holmes whipping it on, the horse proved to have more spirit than we might have expected and the little dog cart simply flew over the snow-covered surface. We might have one horse less than Harriman, but our vehicle was lighter and more agile. Perched high up, I could only cling on for dear life, thinking that if I fell off I would surely break my neck.

This was no night for a chase. The snow was sweeping at us horizontally, punching at us in a series of continuous bursts. I could not begin to understand how Holmes could see, for every time I tried to peer into the darkness I was instantly blinded and my cheeks were already numb with cold. But there was Harriman, no more than fifty yards ahead of us. I heard him cry out with vexation, heard the lash of his whip. Holmes was sitting in front of me, crouched forward, holding the reins with both hands, keeping his balance only with his feet. Every pothole threatened to throw him out. The slightest curve caused us to skid madly across the icy surface of the road. I wondered if the splinter bars could possibly hold, and in my mind's eye I saw imminent catastrophe as our steed, excited by the chase, ended up das.h.i.+ng us to pieces. The hill was steep and it was as if we were plunging into a chasm with the snow swirling all around us and the wind sucking us down.

Forty yards, thirty ... somehow we were managing to close the gap between us. The hooves of the other horses were thundering down, the wheels of the curricle madly spinning, the entire structure rattling and shaking as if it would tear itself apart at any time. Harriman was aware of us now. I saw him glance back, his white hair a mad halo around his head. He reached for something. Too late did I see what it was. There was a tiny flash of red, a gunshot that was almost lost in the cacophony of the chase. I heard the bullet strike wood. It had missed Holmes by inches and me by even less. The closer we were, the easier a target we became. And yet still we hurtled down.

Now there were lights in the distance, a village or a suburb. Harriman fired a second time. Our horse screamed and stumbled. The entire dog cart flew into the air, then came cras.h.i.+ng down, jarring my spine and setting my shoulder ablaze. But fortunately the animal had been wounded and not killed and, if anything, the near calamity only made it all the more determined. Holmes cried out wordlessly. Thirty yards, twenty. In a few seconds we would overtake.

But then Holmes was dragging on the reins and I saw a sharp bend ahead the lane veered round to the left, and if we tried to take it at this speed we would be killed for sure. The dog cart sluiced across the surface, ice and mud spitting out from beneath the wheels. I must surely be thrown off. I tightened my grip, the wind battering me, the whole world barely more than a blur. There was a sharp crack ahead of me not a third bullet, but the sound of splintering wood. I opened my eyes to see that the curricle had taken the corner too quickly. It was on one wheel and that had placed an unimaginable strain on the wooden frame which broke apart even as I watched. Harriman was jerked out of his seat and into the air, the reins pulling him forward. For a brief second he was suspended there. Then the whole thing toppled on to its side, with Harriman disappearing from sight. The horses kept running, but they had become separated from the carriage and took off into the darkness. The curricle slithered and span, finally coming to a halt right in front of us, and for a moment I thought we would crash into it. But Holmes still had the reins. He guided our horse around the obstacle, drawing it into a halt.

Our horse stood there, panting. There was a b.l.o.o.d.y streak along its flank and I felt as if my every bone had become dislocated. I had no coat and I was s.h.i.+vering with cold.

'Well, Watson,' Holmes rasped, breathing heavily. 'Do you think I have a future as a cab driver?'

'You might have one indeed,' I replied. 'But don't expect too many tips.'

'Let us see what we can do for Harriman.'

We climbed down but one glance told us that the pursuit was over in every sense. Harriman was covered in blood. His neck was so badly broken that, although he lay sprawled out with his palms down on the surface of the lane, his sightless eyes stared up at the sky and his entire face was contorted by a hideous grimace of pain. Holmes took one look at him, then nodded. 'This was no more than he deserved,' he said.

'He was a wicked man, Holmes. These are all evil people.'

'You put it quite succinctly, Watson. Can you bear to return to Chorley Grange?'

'Those children, Holmes. Those poor children.'

'I know. But Lestrade should by now have taken charge of the situation. Let us see what can be done.'

Our horse was full of fire and resentment, its nostrils steaming in the night. With difficulty we managed to turn it round and drove slowly back up the hill. I was surprised how far we had come. The journey down had been a matter of a few minutes. It took us more than half an hour to return. But the snow seemed to be gentler and the wind had dropped. I was glad to have time to collect myself, to be alone with my friend.

'Holmes,' I said. 'When did you first know?'

'About the House of Silk? I suspected that something was amiss the first time we came to Chorley Grange. Fitzsimmons and his wife were consummate actors but you will recall how angry he became when the child that we questioned a fair-haired boy by the name of Daniel mentioned that Ross had a sister who worked at The Bag of Nails. He covered it well and tried to make us believe that he was annoyed that this information had not come to us sooner. But in fact he was furious that anything had been told to us at all. I was also puzzled by the nature of the building opposite the school. I could see at a glance that the wheel tracks belonged to a number of different carriages, including a brougham and a landau. Why should the owners of such expensive vehicles be coming to a musical recital by a group of anonymous, deprived boys? It made no sense.'

'But you did not realise ...'

'Not then. It is a lesson that I have learned, Watson, and one that I shall remember for the future. In the pursuit of a crime, a detective must occasionally be guided by his worst imaginings which is to say that he must put himself in the mind of the criminal. But there are limits beyond which any civilised man will not allow himself to stoop. Such was the case here. I did not imagine what Fitzsimmons and his cohorts might be involved in for the simple reason that I did not wish to. Like it or not, in future I must learn to be less fastidious. It was only when we discovered the body of poor Ross that I began to see that we had entered an arena different to anything we had formerly experienced. It was not just the cruelty of his injuries. It was the white ribbon tied around his wrist. Anyone who could have done such a thing to a dead child must have a mind that was utterly, completely corrupt. To such a man, anything would be possible.'

'The white ribbon ...'

'As you saw, it was the token by which these men recognised each other and which would allow them entrance to the House of Silk. But it had a second purpose. By looping it around the child's wrist, they made an example of him. They knew that it would be reported in the papers and would therefore act as a warning, that this is what would happen to anyone who dared cross their path.'

'And the name, Holmes. Is that why they called it the House of Silk?'

'It was not the only reason, Watson. I fear the answer has been in front of us all the time, although perhaps it only became obvious in retrospect. You will recall the name of the charity which Fitzsimmons told us supported his work? The Society for the Improvement of London's Children. I rather think we have been pursuing the House of SILC and not Silk. That must surely have been its origin at any rate. The charity could have been constructed precisely for these people. It gave them the mechanism to find the children and the mask behind which they could exploit them.'

We had reached the school. Holmes handed the dog cart back to its driver with an apology. Lestrade was waiting for us at the door. 'Harriman?' he asked.

'He is dead. His cart overturned.'

'I can't say I'm sorry.'

'How is your officer, the man who was shot?'

'Badly hurt, Mr Holmes. But he'll live.'

Unwilling though I was to enter the building a second time, we followed Lestrade back inside. Some blankets had been brought down and used to cover the police officer who had been shot by Harriman and the piano, of course, was silent. But apart from that the House of Silk was much as it had been when we had first entered it. It made me shudder to return, but I was aware that we still had unfinished business.

'I have sent for more men,' Lestrade told us. 'It's a nasty business we have here, Mr Holmes, and it's going to take someone a lot more senior than me to sort it out. Let me tell you that the children have been sent back to the school on the other side of the lane and I have two officers keeping an eye on them, for all the teachers in this horrible place are implicated in what's been going on and I have them all under arrest. Two of them Weeks and Vosper I think you met.'

'What of Fitzsimmons and his wife?' I asked.

'They're in the drawing room and we'll see them shortly, although there's something I want to show you first, if you can stomach it.' I could hardly believe that the House of Silk could hold any further secrets but we followed Lestrade back upstairs, he talking all the while. 'There were another nine men here. What am I to call them? Clients? Customers? They include Lord Ravenshaw and another man who will be well known to you, a certain doctor by the name of Ackland. Now I can see why he was so keen to perjure himself against you.'

'And what of Lord Horace Blackwater?' asked Holmes.

'He was not present here tonight, Mr Holmes, although I'm sure we'll find that he was a frequent visitor. But come this way. I'll show you what we've found and see if you can make sense of it.'

We walked along the corridor where we had encountered Harriman. The doors were now open, revealing bedrooms, all of which were luxuriously appointed. I had no wish to enter any of them my very skin recoiled but I went in after Holmes and Lestrade and found myself in a room draped in blue silk with a cast-iron bed, a low sofa and a door leading into a bathroom with piped water. The opposite wall was taken up by a low cabinet on which stood a gla.s.s tank containing a number of rocks and dried flowers arranged in what amounted to a miniature landscape, the possession of a naturalist, perhaps, or a collector.

'This room was not in use when we entered it,' Lestrade explained. 'My men continued along the corridor to the next room, which is nothing more than a storage cupboard, and they only opened it quite by chance. Now, look over here. This is what we found.'

He drew our attention to the tank and at first I could not see why we were examining it. But then I realised that there was a small aperture cut into the wall behind it, perfectly concealed by the gla.s.s so that it was virtually invisible.

'A window!' I exclaimed. And then I grasped its significance. 'Anything that happened in this room could be observed.'

'Not just observed,' Lestrade muttered, grimly.

He took us back out into the corridor, then threw open the door of the cupboard. It was empty inside but for a table on which stood a mahogany box. At first, I was not sure what I was seeing but then Lestrade unfastened the box which opened like a concertina and I realised that it was in fact a camera and that its lens, at the end of a sliding tube, was pressed against the other side of the window that we had just seen.

'A quarter plate Le Merveilleux, manufactured by J. Lancaster and Son of Birmingham, if I am not mistaken,' Holmes remarked.

'Is this part of their depravity?' Lestrade demanded. 'That they had to keep a record of what took place?'

'I think not,' Holmes replied. 'But I now understand why my brother, Mycroft, was given such a hostile reception when he began his enquiries and why he was unable to come to my aid. You say you have Fitzsimmons downstairs?'

'And his wife.'

'Then I think it is time we had our reckoning.'

The fire was still burning in the drawing room and the room was warm and close. The Reverend Charles Fitzsimmons was sitting on the sofa with his wife and I was glad to see that he had exchanged his clerical garb for a black tie and dinner jacket. I do not think I could have borne any more of his pretence that he was part of the church. Mrs Fitzsimmons sat rigid and withdrawn and refused to meet our eyes. She did not utter a word throughout the interview that followed. Holmes sat down. I stood with my back to the fire. Lestrade remained by the door.

'Mr Holmes!' Fitzsimmons sounded pleasantly surprised to see him. 'I suppose I must congratulate you, sir. You certainly have proven yourself to be every bit as formidable as I was led to believe. You managed to escape from the first trap that we set you. Your disappearance from Holloway was extraordinary. And as neither Henderson nor Bratby have returned to this establishment, I will a.s.sume that you got the better of them at Jackdaw Lane and they are both under arrest?'

'They are dead,' Holmes said.

'They would have ended up being hanged anyway, so I suppose it makes no great difference.'

'Are you prepared to answer my questions?'

'Of course. I see absolutely no reason why not. I am not ashamed of what we have been doing here at Chorley Grange. Some of the policemen have treated us very roughly and ...' Here he called out to Lestrade at the door. '... I can a.s.sure you I will be making an official complaint. But the truth is that we have only been providing what certain men have been requesting for centuries. I am sure you have studied the ancient civilisations of the Greeks, the Romans and the Persians? The cult of Ganymede was an honourable one, sir. Are you repulsed by the work of Michelangelo or even by the sonnets of William Shakespeare? Well, I'm sure you have no wish to discuss the semantics of the matter. You have the upper hand, Mr Holmes. What do you wish to know?'

'Was the House of Silk your idea?'

'It was entirely mine. I can a.s.sure you that the Society for the Improvement of London's Children and the family of our benefactor, Sir Crispin Ogilvy who, as I told you, paid for the purchase of Chorley Grange, have no knowledge of what we have been doing and would, I am sure, be as dismayed as you. I have no need to protect them. I am merely telling you the truth.'

'It was you who ordered the killing of Ross?'

'I will confess to it, yes. I am not proud of it, Mr Holmes, but it was necessary to ensure my own safety and the continuation of this enterprise. I am not confessing to the murder itself, you understand. That was carried out by Henderson and Bratby. And it might be as well to add that you would be deluding yourself if you thought of Ross as some innocent, a little angel who fell into bad ways. Mrs Fitzsimmons was right. He was a nasty piece of work and brought his end entirely upon himself.'

'I believe you have been keeping a photographic record of some of your clients.'

'You have been into the blue room?'

'Yes.'

'It has been necessary from time to time.'

'I a.s.sume your purpose was blackmail.'

'Blackmail, occasionally, and only when absolutely necessary, for it will not surprise you to learn that I have made a considerable amount of money from the House of Silk and had no particular need for any other form of revenue. No, no, no, it was more to do with self-protection, Mr Holmes. How do you think I was able to persuade Dr Ackland and Lord Horace Blackwater to appear in a public court? It was an act of self-preservation on their part. And it is for this very same reason that I can tell you now that my wife and I will never stand trial in this country. We know too many secrets about too many people, some of whom are in the very highest positions, and we have the evidence carefully tucked away. The gentlemen whom you found here tonight were but a small selection of my grateful clients. We have ministers and judges, lawyers and lords. More than that, I could name one member of the n.o.blest family in the country who has been a frequent visitor here, but of course he relies on my discretion, just as I can rely on his protection should the need arise. You take my point, Mr Holmes? They will never allow you to bring this matter to light. Six months from now my wife and I will be free and, quietly, we will begin again. Perhaps it will be necessary to look to the continent. I have always had a certain penchant for the south of France. But wherever and whenever, the House of Silk will re-emerge. You have my word on it.'

Holmes said nothing. He stood up and together he and I left the room. He did not mention Fitzsimmons again that night and nor did he have anything further to say on the subject the following morning. But by then, we were busy again, for the entire adventure had of course begun at Wimbledon and it was to there that we now returned.

TWENTY.

Keelan O'Donaghue The snowfall of the night before had tranformed Ridgeway Hall in a way that was quite startling, accentuating its symmetry and rendering it somehow timeless. I had thought it handsome on both occasions that I had visited, but as I approached it for the last time, in the company of Sherlock Holmes, I thought it as perfect as the miniature houses one might see behind the window of a toy shop and it almost felt like an act of vandalism to scour the white driveway with our carriage wheels.

It was early in the afternoon of the following day and I must confess that, had I been given a chance, I would have postponed this visit at least for another twenty-four hours, for I was exhausted from the night before and my arm, where I had been struck, was aching to the extent that I could barely close the fingers of my left hand. I had pa.s.sed a wretched night, desperate to fall asleep in order to put out of my mind everything I had seen at Chorley Grange, yet unable to do so precisely because it was still so fresh in my memory. I had come to the breakfast table and had been irked to see Holmes, quite fresh, restored in every way to his old self, greeting me in that clipped, precise way of his as if nothing untoward had occurred. It was he who had insisted on this visit, having already sent a wire to Edmund Carstairs before I had risen. I remembered our meeting at The Bag of Nails when I had described what had befallen the family, and Eliza Carstairs in particular. He was as concerned now as he had been then and clearly placed great significance on her sudden illness. He insisted on seeing her for himself, although quite how he might be able to help her when I and so many other doctors had failed was beyond my comprehension.

We knocked on the door. It was opened by Patrick, the Irish scullery boy whom I had met in the kitchen. He looked blankly at Holmes, then at me. 'Oh, it's you,' he scowled. 'I wasn't expecting to see you back here again.'

Never had I been greeted on a doorstep with quite such insolence but Holmes seemed amused. 'Is your master in?' he asked.

'Who shall I say is calling?'

'My name is Sherlock Holmes. We are expected. And who are you?'

'I'm Patrick.'

'That's a Dublin accent if I'm not mistaken.'

'What's it to you?'

'Patrick? Who is it? Why is Kirby not here?' Edmund Carstairs had appeared in the hallway and came forward, clearly agitated. 'You must forgive me, Mr Holmes. Kirby must still be upstairs with my sister. I did not expect the door to be opened by the kitchen boy. You can go now, Patrick. Go back to your place.'

Carstairs was as immaculately attired as he had been on every occasion that I had seen him, but the lines that days of anxiety had drawn were clearly visible on his face and, like me, I suspected that he had not been sleeping well.

'You received my wire,' Holmes said.

'I did. But you evidently did not receive mine. For I clearly stated, as I had already intimated to Dr Watson, that I had no further need of your services. I am sorry to say it, but you have not been helpful to my family, Mr Holmes. And I must add that I understood that you had been arrested and were in serious trouble with the law.'

'Those matters have been resolved. As to your wire, Mr Carstairs, I did indeed receive it, and read what you had to say with interest.'

'And you came anyway?'

'You first came to me because you were being terrorised by a man in a flat cap, a man you believed to be Keelan O'Donoghue from Boston. I can tell you that I am now in command of the facts of the matter which I am happy to share with you. I can also tell you who killed the man that we found at Mrs Oldmore's Private Hotel. You may try to persuade yourself that these things are no longer important, and if that is the case, let me put it very simply. If you wish your sister to die, you will send me away. If not, you will invite me in and hear what I have to say.'

Carstairs hesitated and I could see that he was fighting with himself, that in some strange way he seemed almost afraid of us, but in the end his better sense prevailed. 'Please,' he said. 'Let me take your coats. I don't know what Kirby is doing. It sometimes seems to me that this entire household is in disarray.' We removed our outer garments and he gestured towards the drawing room where we had been received on our first visit.

'If you will permit me, I would like to see your sister before we sit down,' Holmes remarked.

'My sister is no longer able to see anyone. Her sight has failed her. She can barely speak.'

'No speech will be necessary. I wish merely to see her room. Is she still refusing to eat?'

'It is no longer a question of refusal. She is unable to consume solid food. It is the best I can do to make her take a little warm soup from time to time.'

'She still believes she is being poisoned.'

'In my view, it is this irrational belief that has become the main cause of her illness, Mr Holmes. As I told your colleague, I have tasted every single morsel that has pa.s.sed her lips with no ill-effect at all. I do not understand the curse that has come upon me. Before I met you, I was a happy man.'

'And hope to be again, I am sure.'

We climbed back up to the attic room that I had been in before. As we arrived at the doorway, the manservant, Kirby, appeared with a tray of soup, the plate untouched. He glanced at his master and shook his head, indicating that once again the patient had refused to eat. We went in. I was at once dismayed by the sight of Eliza Carstairs. How long had it been since I had last seen her? Hardly more than a week and yet in that time she had visibly deteriorated to the extent that she put me in mind of the living skeleton that I had seen advertised at Dr Silkin's House of Wonders. Her skin was stretched in that horrible way that attends upon patients only when they are close to the end, her lips drawn back to expose her gums and teeth. The shape of the body beneath the covers was tiny and pathetic. Her eyes stared at us but saw nothing. Her hands, folded across her chest, were those of a woman thirty years older than Eliza Carstairs.

Holmes examined her briefly. 'Her bathroom is next door?' he asked.

'Yes. But she is too weak to walk there. Mrs Kirby and my wife bathe her where she lies ...'

Holmes had already left the room. He entered the bathroom, leaving Carstairs and myself in an uneasy silence with the staring woman. At last he reappeared. 'We can return downstairs,' he said. Carstairs and I followed him out, both of us bemused, for the entire visit had lasted less than thirty seconds.