Part 1 (2/2)
I nodded ”Is it required, Mr Swinburne?”
”Itit with you”
I left the room and entered my bedcha When I returned to the consulting room, Holmes was ready to depart Swinburne hustled us down the stairs and out into the swirling fog of Baker Street, where he eham! Blast that driver! I knew he couldn't be trusted! He tried to charge me two and six!”
”That is the approximate fare from the St James Hotel,” Hol!” Swinburne protested ”The distance is ihtly disorientated by the poet's eccentricity The detective, by contrast, appeared to be rather amused by it
Despite the hour and the aeather, ere able to hail a four-wheeler and were soon rattling southward towards Green Park
”It is a short journey, Mr Swinburne,” Hol and be concise What has happened?”
”Murder! Theft!” The poet twitched and jerked spasmodically It was plainly apparent to enital excess of electric vitality, but hehimself under control, took a deep breath, let it out slowly, and continued, ”Sir Richard, his wife Isabel, and their personal physician, Dr Grenfell Baker, arrived in London three days ago, having travelled from their home in Trieste, where Burton is consul”
”Physician?” Holmes asked ”Are the Burtons unwell?”
”Yes Sir Richard's heart is giving out He suffered an attack a feeeks ago and remains frail But he pushes himself so He absolutely refuses to rest”
”And Lady Burton?”
”She's generally strong but suffers the e” Swinburne shook his head and murmured: ”Time turns the old days to derision, Our loves into corpses or wives; And e and death and division Make barren our lives”
Hol more No embellishments required”
The little ed at his beard, then went on ”It so happens that ourup at the St James, too, so the Burtons took a rooht, Isabel went to meet with her sister-”
”Where?” Holmes cut in
”At Bartolini's Restaurant in Leicester Square Dr Baker, ton, while Sir Richard, Toether at the Athenaeu have you known the Burtons?”
”Nigh on thirty years,” Swinburne replied
Hollared at hiue's attention holly focused upon the poet, who said, ”At about nine o'clock, Toht palpitations and left us Sir Richard and I stayed on at the club until half past eleven I then accompanied him to the hotel, where he intended to show me a manuscript, of which I shall sayfor us in the lobby He rushed us up to the Burtons' suite Apparently, Isabel had returned shortly before us and found To dead inside it The afore It appears a thief had entered through the hich had been left open, was interrupted in his work by To the scene”
”On which floor is the Burtons' room?” Holmes asked
”The fourth Theis accessible via an exterior metal staircase that runs up to the roof at the rear of the hotel”
”I see Why is this not a police matter, Mr Swinburne? Why consult me?”
Swinburne threw his hands into the air ”No! No! Police? I them but we asked him to delay until I could fetch you The problem, Mr Holmes, is that we cannot admit the existence of the manuscript to the police”
”Why not?”
Swinburne levelled his bright green eyes at the detective ”What do you know of Burton, sir?”
Holmes looked at me, said, ”Watson?” then sat back and closed his eyes
”I can speak now?” I asked in an indignant tone
Holers
”He is-or, rather, hen in his prile-handedly opened central Africa, leading to the discovery of the source of the River Nile He also exalishent for Sir Charles Napier in India”
”Oh, he's much more than that,” Swinburne interjected ”Sir Richard is fluent in at least thirty languages He's counted as one of the best swordsuise artist, an author, a poet, a ist”
Much to my discomfort, a tear rolled down the poet's cheek
”But I fear these are his twilight years,” he said ”My friend is not the man he used to be He's sixty-seven years old, and the hardshi+ps of Africa have caught up with hi one last contribution to o, Mr Holmes, he translated and published an Arabian manuscript entitled The Perfu the art of physical love between a man and a woman”
I cleared my throat ”Is it-is it-decent, Mr Swinburne?”
The poet snorted derisively ”Soht but erotica” He leaned forward ”But do you not agree, Mr Holh the detailed study of every aspect of hu not only of individual motivations, but also of the racial and cultural proclivities that inform those motivations?”
Holmes opened his eyes and looked a little surprised ”That is a very astute observation, and I agree without reservation”
”Then you'll understand the dissatisfaction Sir Richard has felt concerning that volume, for it was published incomplete”
”In what respect?”
”He'd been unable to locate a version of the work in its original Arabic, and so was forced to translate from a French edition from which the notorious twenty-first chapter had been oth as the entirety of the relish refer to as unnatural vices-that is to say, physical relations between men”
”Holmes,” I murmured, ”I'm not sure we should involve ourselves with-”
”Nonsense!” my friend snapped ”Continue, please, Mr Swinburne”
”Last year, Sir Richard discovered that an Algerian book dealer owned a copy of the work in its original language and with chapter twenty-one intact He purchased it, and now intends to re-translate and annotate the entire volureatest project”
”And it is this manuscript that has been stolen?” Holmes asked