The Devil's Due Page 21

  I must have been staring for Holmes caught my eye, beckoning me with a crooked finger and a wink. Reluctantly, I made my way over to him.

  ‘This handsome fellow is my friend and colleague, and … also my doctor … Dr Hamish MacAllister,’ Holmes said to the group as I arrived. They turned and surrounded me in an instant, hemming me in. Holmes saluted me with a touch to his forehead and vanished. His mocking smile infuriated me. Oh, we would have words later!

  The group pressed in close. ‘Oh, Doctor, Doctor!’ said a man in a lavender evening coat and matching cravat. ‘What kind of a doctor are you?’

  ‘An army surgeon,’ said I in my gruffest voice.

  This, strangely, caused a ripple of laughter.

  ‘A medical doctor, then!’ said another ‘Because …’

  ‘Let me guess. You have a toe …’ I said.

  A beat as they took this in, followed by a roar of laughter.

  Why? I wondered.

  ‘Oh, I have a toe!’ said one.

  ‘Me, too,’ cried another.

  I looked around for Holmes. He was nowhere to be seen. I endeavoured to disengage but was cornered.

  ‘Pierre said you were a writer.’

  ‘Are you a poet?’

  ‘Poet?’ I laughed. ‘Not me!’

  I shall admit here that I have privately dabbled in verse and was a secret admirer of Sir Walter Scott’s heroic poems. But even Holmes did not know that. Although who was I fooling? Holmes seemed to know everything about me.

  ‘Doctor, you need a flower!’ said a short young man with a Scottish accent. He grabbed me by the arm, pulling me away from the group.

  It was a relief to be out of that knot of men, and yet this was another mocking stranger under the wrong impression, or so I thought.

  ‘I do not need a flower,’ I said, irritated.

  But he had already plucked an orange rose from a bouquet on a side table and proceeded to snap off most of the stem. He leaned in to insert the bloom into my buttonhole.

  ‘Do not mind them,’ he said, sotto voce. ‘They so rarely get to tease. This flower is not a label, it is a reminder.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Of man’s highest aspirations. You see, nature cannot be bested. No painting, no poem, no sculpture, no symphony – no work of man is more beautiful than this simple creation. Though we may aspire.’ He smiled. ‘Charles Rennie Mackintosh taught me that.’

  At my puzzlement, he added, ‘He and his wife, both great artists, are my friends. I am Dr James Duncan from Glasgow. Yes, a medical doctor, like you. Do not judge us, Dr MacAllister.’

  ‘I … yes … I mean, no …’

  He smiled and vanished into the crowd. I was chagrined at my reaction a moment earlier. I could certainly manage a little teasing without losing my temper.

  I was then distracted as a squealing group of entirely naked children ran through the party. When I looked up from them, I found myself staring into the eyes of a roughly clad French workman with two days growth of beard, small steel glasses and greasy, messed hair. The man leaned in, took me by the arm, and propelled me away from Oliver Flynn and his group. ‘Come with me!’ he whispered in a French accent.

  ‘Let go of my—’ I started, but then realized who it was! ‘Vidocq! What are you doing here?’

  ‘Shh!’

  He did not let go of my arm until we were outside on a balcony overlooking the Apothecary Garden. Beyond that, the Thames glittered in the moonlight. The river was lovelier when it was not about to engulf one, I thought.

  Behind us, through two doors, and in two salons, the party bubbled along.

  ‘Watson,’ he growled. ‘Do not say my name. Here I am Jean DeGuiche.’

  ‘And I am Hamish MacAllister. You were warned to leave town.’

  ‘Eh?’ He shrugged in that Gallic manner. ‘I have the, how you say, unfinished business.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘A young anarchiste, name of Vadim, he arrive from Paris yesterday. He is very, how you say, enthusiaste, but also a bit stupid. He makes the bombs. I am tip off, and follow him here to intercede.’

  ‘Intercept, you mean?’

  ‘He have a bomb with him tonight.’

  ‘Here, at the party? Why? Oliver Flynn is on their side, is he not?’

  ‘In theory. Monsieur Flynn work with Louise Michel, some of the anarchistes, to help the poor. Build schools. Orphanages. But he does not realize where some of this money actually goes.’

  With a nod, he indicated the second salon opening onto this balcony. There Oliver Flynn now held sway with a different group: serious men and women of the ardent intellectual type. There were one or two workmen who looked like they had come to the party directly from their jobs in construction, others of a more scholarly bent, sporting dark clothes, faces that never saw daylight, and serious frowns. Pamphlets, marches and unison chants came to mind.

  ‘See the man in the yellow shirt?’ He nodded towards Flynn’s coterie. ‘Vadim. Look what he carries.’

  At the far side of this group stood a handsome fellow of perhaps nineteen or twenty, wearing a bright yellow shirt. A canvas bag with something heavy inside hung from his shoulder. Mycroft’s warning at the Diogenes floated back to haunt me – ‘inexperienced young men … one will blow himself up accidentally’.

  ‘Does he plan to detonate this bomb here, at this party?’

  ‘I do not think so.’

  Clinging to Vadim’s arm was the only woman in the group. She was blocked from my view, but I caught a glimpse of long, dark hair.

  ‘Why bring a bomb here?’ I asked.

  Vidocq continued. ‘He do this to show off to friends. And to impress some girl he meet only yesterday,’ he sighed. ‘It is always the girls.’

  Ah, these Frenchmen. Thank goodness such immaturity was behind me. The group shifted and I had a clear view of the girl. She turned to beam at Vadim, confident, teasing. My, she was a beauty!

  Upon second glance, there was something familiar about her. It was then I noticed the dark mole on her cheek. It was the young woman from Hyde Park! The one who had handed me the Tarot card.

  ‘It’s her!’ I cried. ‘She’s … she is working with … she’s going to set off the bomb! Tonight! Here!’

  Whoever this girl was, whatever her connection, I knew only that she must be working with the person carrying out the Alphabet Killings. She would kill Oliver Flynn, next on the list, and any number of his friends and family. I had to find Holmes. I looked wildly about for him.

  He was nowhere in sight. I turned back to Vidocq, but he had left me and was elbowing his way through the crowd towards Vadim and the others. Where was Holmes?

  There was no time to lose. I followed Vidocq but became entangled in the crowd. As I pushed through, I found him exchanging harsh words in French, one hand gripping the startled young man in the yellow shirt.

  I saw at once that Vadim’s lovely female companion was missing. And so was his canvas bag. The bomb!

  I caught a flash of dark hair as the girl made her escape through a far door in this second salon. I tried to follow, but again was hampered by the crowd.

  I emerged in a long hallway, doors all along it. Coming towards me were two drunken partygoers, an artistic dandy arm-in-arm with a serious female anarchist. They stopped to steal a kiss which lurched into a passionate embrace as they completely blocked the narrow hallway. ‘Excuse me!’ I shouted, pushing them aside.

  ‘Barbarian!’ cried the woman.

  I checked one door after another. Nothing. Then I spotted the canvas bag discarded on the floor at the end of the hall. It was flattened. Empty!

  I opened the door nearest to it and dashed in, stumbling over a stack of books placed in my path. I recovered, only to find a dagger pressed to my chest, just under the breastbone. A quick upward thrust and it would be over. I did not move.

  The beautiful young woman from Hyde Park glared up at me, the dagger held firmly in her right hand, a crude bomb with a timer in h
er left. She smiled. ‘Hello, Dr Watson,’ she said, savouring the moment. ‘That disguise is no disguise at all.’

  ‘You are here to kill Oliver Flynn!’ I said. ‘The “F” on the list!’

  She looked surprised, then laughed.

  ‘But why kill all these other innocents?’

  ‘Why not?’ said the girl. ‘The bomb goes here, or the bomb goes there. A lot of people either way. A party or a market place. This will receive more attention.’

  ‘And is it attention that you want?’

  ‘Not me,’ she said. ‘My employer. And now – goodbye.’

  ‘Goodbye … Judith?’

  She paused, raising an eyebrow and smiled at me. I looked past her and gasped in relief.

  ‘Holmes!’ I cried.

  My ruse worked. She turned to look, and I grabbed her knife hand and twisted it. The knife nicked me but tumbled to the ground. She screamed and kicked me, hard, and we both dived for the weapon. She flung the bomb away and I followed it with my eyes, fearing that we and the entire house would go up then and there. She got to the knife first and slashed at me, cutting the back of my hand badly. I cried out but managed to grab and twist her wrist. She dropped the knife. As I lunged for it, she seized the bomb, kicked me hard in the ribs, and escaped through the window.

  I righted myself and grasped my bleeding hand. But before I could pursue her, Holmes and Vidocq burst into the room.

  ‘The bomb?’ Holmes cried.

  ‘She has it!’ I nodded at the window and Vidocq took off after the girl.

  ‘Your hand!’ said Holmes. The cut had nicked the dorsal vein and it was bleeding profusely. I ripped off my tie and Holmes bent down to help me. With one hand apiece, we managed to bind the wound.

  ‘We must get everyone out of the house,’ he said. ‘Vidocq told me you recognized the girl from the park. She’s here to kill Flynn.’

  Holmes managed at last to convince Oliver Flynn of the danger, and in a few tense minutes, with the help of the persuasive Dr Duncan, we had the entire party – guests, children, servants, everyone – moved across the street to the Apothecary Gardens. The police had been summoned and a bomb specialist was en route. Several of the woman, led by the kindly and beautiful Mrs Oliver Flynn, were in the process of putting the children to bed in a neighbour’s house down the street.

  As we stood regarding Flynn’s house, Holmes said, ‘I should have followed up more aggressively on the girl after you got that card, Watson. I dismissed her as a hired messenger and focused elsewhere.’

  ‘Holmes, you are only one person. There have been so many paths in this case. And you have been blocked from getting much police help.’

  ‘For what little use that has been recently,’ he said bitterly.

  We heard a shout from the roof. There stood Vidocq, waving at us. ‘She is gone. The bomb is here!’ he called down to us, pointing to a place behind him on the roof.

  ‘Save yourself, Vidocq! The house is emptied!’ shouted Holmes.

  ‘I am dismantle!’ returned the Frenchman. He gave us a jaunty salute and disappeared from view.

  Not five seconds later, the bomb detonated with a roar and the roof of Oliver Flynn’s house caved in. I stared at it in shock.

  ‘Vidocq,’ I whispered. ‘My God! He had no time to escape!’ Holmes stared at the smoking ruin. He shook his head sadly. ‘It does not appear so.’

  I watched smoke and a few flickers of flame arise from the ruined top floor of the house. I had never liked the man. But I would never wish him such an end.

  ‘He died a hero,’ I said. ‘But what about Flynn and his guests?’

  I needn’t have worried. ‘The Langham! The party moves to the Langham.’ Oliver Flynn’s voice carried over the noise of the crowd. ‘How can I thank you, Mr Holmes?’ he called out to us as he approached..

  I looked at Holmes in puzzlement. ‘Not Pierre Vernet?’

  Holmes shrugged. ‘I had to reveal myself, Watson. He would not heed the warning from Pierre Vernet.’ He turned to Flynn as the flamboyant Irishman arrived to face us. ‘You are not going to the Langham, are you? As I told you, the murderer will soon learn he has not succeeded in killing you and your family.’

  ‘I have sent my man to Victoria. He is securing tickets for us to go to Paris on the dawn train. We shall hide with a friend until that time, and in Paris you may contact me at Le Meurice. I do not want to run like this, but I am listening, Mr Holmes. We will be safe until you or your brother send word.’

  CHAPTER 28

  Conflagration

  Our carriage rattled north to Baker Street through the empty streets. A deep exhaustion and sadness settled over me. Holmes, however, was still at work.

  ‘We are barely keeping apace, Watson. This Alphabet Killer is now in a hurry, but the “F” is safe for the moment.’ He removed his moustache and glasses, and the rose from his jacket. He took out a comb and returned his hair to its normal style. I removed the rose from my own lapel and he handed me his. I stared for a moment at the two flowers, then looked at him.

  ‘Holmes. You …?’

  ‘No.’ A moment. ‘Surely you know me by now, Watson.’

  I smiled. No, I would never know him completely. It felt wasteful to toss the flowers out the window. I laid them on the seat for the next passengers to find.

  ‘Are you sure Flynn was the “F”?’ I wondered.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What, then, was his secret crime? I asked.

  ‘What does it matter?’

  ‘You have wanted to confirm each of the others!’

  ‘Flynn has funded several anarchist groups, one of which is responsible for fourteen deaths in a bombing in Dublin.’

  ‘Funded? But did he know how the money would be used? That is not so direct, is it Holmes? Not like the others.’

  ‘I do not know. In any case, we are on to “G” now.’

  ‘But if G is Gainsborough, then that one is already dead.’ I said. ‘But if the G is Goodwin—?’

  ‘They are in Nice. They were less inclined than dear Mr Flynn to ignore my suggestion to take temporary refuge.’

  ‘Then you have eliminated them as suspects?’

  ‘Not entirely, Watson. But they are at least safe if they are on the list. And if they are involved, they are disconnected from events here. Either way, it serves my investigation. I am rather surprised they complied. It suggests their innocence, in fact.’

  ‘But does not confirm it?’

  ‘No. Which brings us to the girl tonight. She was introduced at the party as Judith.’

  ‘I was right, then! As I confronted her, Holmes, I had a sudden intuition. I called her Judith!’

  ‘And?’

  ‘She … she seemed amused.’

  Holmes shook his head. ‘I thought the Hyde Park girl was merely a messenger, but she appears to be a principal in this case. Her connection to Lady Gainsborough bears re-examination. We know from Heffie that Judith is duplicitous, entrepreneurial and intelligent. But there must be someone behind her, Watson, there must! To what degree has this young woman been involved, and at whose behest?’

  ‘Lady Gainsborough?’

  ‘Or the late Lord Gainsborough. Or another?’

  ‘And her motive?’

  Holmes shrugged. ‘Depends on her history – love, money, revenge? Money, most likely. Consider this. The writer of the Lucifer letter was a literate person. It took at least two people to manage these killings – and to drag Anson to the shore and bind him there, to force Mrs Benjamin to join her hanging husband, to drag Clammory’s partner, wounded, up onto the barber’s chair. A highly intelligent, articulate, and very strong individual is involved. There is not a single killer but two or more – a group. We are close, Watson, so very close!’

  The carriage rattled on and we passed Hyde Park. Speakers’ Corner at this hour was deserted except a for a lone woman, standing on a box, exhorting in the darkness to no one. A brisk wind had come up. The nearby trees were now flutteri
ng wildly and her skirts blew around her.

  ‘I must look into Fardwinkle when I can. Although the style, the flavour, the nuance … Fardwinkle feels wrong. I shall set Heffie on Judith’s trail tonight.’

  ‘Holmes,’ I said. You say the killer has sped up his agenda. If your theory that A and G were Anson and Gainsborough … G is already done and that brings us now to the letter H. Might that be “Holmes”? Your brother is on the list.’

  ‘Mycroft can look after himself,’ said Holmes.

  He waved off the thought. Our carriage pulled up at 221B. Billy, who had been awaiting us outside in the cold, ran up to us.

  ‘Sir! Sir!’ he cried. ‘Heffie!’

  ‘What about her?’ asked Holmes.

  ‘A note from her,’ Billy said, handing a slip of paper up through the window.

  He read it and blanched. ‘When did this come?’

  ‘Just now, sir!’

  Holmes turned to me, his face white. ‘My brother’s house is on fire!’

  There was no traffic at that hour and our cab thundered south towards St James and Holmes’s brother’s flat. As we rounded the corner, we became aware of a great fire burning just down the street on the ground floor of a stately residential building opposite the Diogenes.

  Holmes gasped. ‘Mycroft!’

  We pulled up between several police and fire vehicles. The firemen were wrestling with a large hose and, through the large front windows, I could see bright orange flames flickering behind heavy drapery. Even as I watched, one of the drapes caught fire.

  We dismounted the vehicle and saw a young fireman seated on the kerb, his face blackened. He was being tended to by another for a burnt arm.

  ‘Anyone in there?’ cried Holmes.

  The wounded fireman, partially in shock, looked up at Holmes and nodded. ‘A man’s body. The girl. I couldn’t …’

  I turned to Holmes, but he was gone. To my horror, I spotted his thin frame, black coat flapping behind him, racing towards the burning building. He paused on the landing in front of the door.