Part 10 (1/2)
”How did you know?” the girl gasped, still clearly in the grip of utmost dread.
”Mademoiselle, there is no time for that! Where is he?”
Holmes did not wait for her reply, but reached for the feebly burning gas jet protruding from the wall, and turned the handle sharply for a brighter flame. In the increased illumination, he immediately saw a moth-eaten couch in a corner of the room, and on it a form wrapped in a blanket.
Hurrying over to the couch, he kneeled beside it, drawing back the frayed fabric. The sleeping face he saw was unmistakably that in the photograph in Irene Adler's room. The stillness of that face, and the slow breathing, registered on his mind. He rose to face Nicole Romaine with a grimly accusing expression.
”He's drugged!”
The girl shrank back from his blazing stare. ”Only-only a few grains of laudanum, that's all, monsieur, and only when I must go out. I would not harm the boy!”
”You have a.s.suredly harmed his mother! What brought you-his friend!-to take part in this outrage?”
The dancer sank into a rickety wooden chair and stared hopelessly at the worn carpeting. ”I had no choice. A man came to me three days ago . . . Charles Nickers, a tumbler with the Twickenham Toffs.”
”Ah,” said Holmes. ”Yes, I had the distinct pleasure of arresting his brother, Bill, in London about two weeks ago. The Twickenham Toffs have long been part of Professor Moriarty's organization-but that's no matter to you, Miss Romaine. Now, what did this tumbler want of you?”
”He said . . . unless I did as I was bidden, my brother, Anatole, in Paris would be murdered!”
”I see. And what were your orders-in addition to persuading Scott Adler to take part in a prank directed at his governess?”
”To bring him here and engage a room facing the street. Originally, my room was in the rear. I was to say to the opera that I was ill. Then . . . twice a day I must inform Mr. Nickers that the boy is here and that no one had inquired after him.”
”Inform him? By what means?”
”Each day, at eleven and again at six, he watches across the street. I open the curtain and nod. That is all.”
Sherlock Holmes looked at his watch.
”Then it's almost time for him to be at his post,” he murmured. He turned to the girl. ”Mademoiselle, you have received Moriarty's instructions. Now you shall hear mine! When your Charles Nickers arrives, you will give the proper signal, just as you've been told to do. And you will continue to give that signal twice a day until I relieve you of the responsibility. Do as I say, and you will emerge from this dismal matter unharmed, as will your brother. Fail me in any respect, Miss Nicole Romaine, and you will be held accountable for the death of Scott Adler!”
The girl shrank back appalled.
”Mon dieu!” she cried.
”Yes, I should have said exactly the same thing in your place, if I were French.” Holmes nodded toward the window. ”Is he out there?”
Nicole Romaine went to the window, drew the curtain, and looked into the street.
”If so,” said Holmes, ”give the signal.”
The girl gave a simple slow inclination of her head, looked intently outwards for a moment, then stepped back and closed the curtain once again.
”He has gone.”
”Good!” said Holmes. ”Now . . .”
He eased the door to the room open and peered into the hallway, then pulled his own room key from his jacket pocket and handed it to the girl.
”I am in room thirty-two. Take the key. It is three doors along from you, on the opposite side of the corridor. Go and unlock the door. When the way is clear, signal to me. Now!”
Holmes opened the door wide enough for the girl to leave, and she slipped through it and hurried down the corridor. He kept watch on her as she came to the door of room 32, quickly opened it, and stepped inside. In a moment she emerged again, glanced in both directions, and gave him an urgent wave.
Sherlock Holmes turned to the sleeping boy on the couch, swept him up in his arms, and ran from the ballet dancer's room, covering the few yards' distance down the corridor in no more than two seconds.
Inside his own room, still holding the blanket-wrapped form of Scott Adler, Holmes faced Nicole Romaine and spoke urgently.
”Back to your room, mademoiselle, and remember, to do exactly as I say. This boy's life depends upon that!”
The girl clasped her hands in front of her and spoke fervently. ”Yes, yes! I will obey you utterly!”
”Do so!”
Sherlock Holmes gently kicked the door shut behind her and then laid the sleeping boy down on the bed. The large trunk which had accompanied ”Bandini” to the hotel stood in the center of the floor, and Holmes knelt by it and opened it. Inside was a network of intertwined ropes attached to the sides and ends of the trunk, forming a hammock, on which rested some folded blankets and leather straps. On it Holmes now placed Scott Adler, cus.h.i.+oning him with the blankets and securing him in place with the straps. Taking out his pocket-knife, he opened the awl blade it contained, and tested the cl.u.s.ters of small holes un.o.btrusively bored near the handles of the trunk. Satisfied that the supply of air would be sufficient, he closed the trunk.
”You'll have a bruise or two to show for your adventure, lad,” he said softly, ”but they'll soon disappear under your mother's kisses.”
He snapped shut the two bra.s.s locks that secured the trunk, and turned a key in both. Straightening up, he inspected himself in the tarnished mirror that hung over the battered chest-of-drawers, and made small adjustments to his wig and clothing. Next, he took a deep breath, flung the door open, and strode into the corridor and down it to the open stairwell.
Leaning over the railing, he bellowed down to the lobby two flights below, ”Signore!”
In a moment, he could see the foreshortened figure of the proprietor beneath him, staring up in surprise.
”This is not an albergo for actors, it is a pen-a for pigs! Send-a up for my luggage and-a prepare my bill!”
Along the corridor in which he now stood, and on the floors above and below him, Holmes could hear the sound of doors being cautiously opened, and was aware of heads poking curiously out behind him. Good: the proprietor would be all the more concerned to be rid of the Great Bandini with no more fuss than was already being made, and would have no time to perceive the fact that Bandini's trunk was noticeably heavier than when it had been brought in.
He raised his voice to an enraged howl.
”I will not-a spend five-a more minutes in this-a place!”
It was no more, in fact, than four minutes before Holmes, the trunk carefully set on the seat facing him, was in a cab, his hotel bill paid to the white-faced proprietor, and on his way to the Algonquin Hotel.
Chapter Eleven.
Sherlock Holmes had made it clear that no results could be expected from his efforts during the daylight hours, and had laid no injunction upon myself or Irene Adler save that we be at her residence from six o'clock onwards.
The lady herself, the outward sh.e.l.l of Holmes with which she had gulled our watchers now being restored to the wardrobe at the hotel, expressed no wish but to return home.
”I am in no mood for diversion, or even company, Dr. Watson,” said she. ”I have often been alone and have grown accustomed to it, but am rarely lonely. This will be a long day, and I shall wish for nothing so much as the setting of the sun, whatever it may bring, but I do not require or wish companions.h.i.+p. Cast yourself loose in this great city, and discover what you may of what it has to offer; I, on my part, may be cheered to think of the experiences you will have, and shall look forward to hearing your account of them.”
I thought that a most handsome dismissal, and confess I was relieved to have it made so clear that my company was not wanted. Miss Adler is a fine figure of a woman, no doubt of that, but more intense and high-powered than I find comfortable for any extended period.
Having seen her into a cab, then, I found myself with the better part of a spring day in New York to spend as I would, it then being only ten o'clock.
I am afraid that, in the event, I did not make the best use of it. In vain to ask me of the treasures of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the wonders of the Natural History Museum, the magnificent view of the city to be obtained from the torch of the Statue of Liberty-even the more worldly delights of Koster & Bial's ”improper Vaudeville” and certain ”joints” in Thirty-third and Fifty-seventh Streets where opium may be freely smoked, about which not a few loudly dressed individuals I encountered in my wanderings seemed anxious to inform me. I did, indeed, in a trip up Fifth Avenue in an electric omnibus, the open back of which afforded an incomparable view of a mile or more of millionaires' palatial residences, glimpse the famed art museum, but did not enter it. I did have a moment of disorientation when observing what appeared to be Cleopatra's Needle, so familiar to me in London, poking out of the trees behind the museum, but was informed that it was that obelisk's twin, presented to New York by the Khedive of Egypt some twenty-five years past.