Anthony Horowitz - The House of Silk

‘So, what now?’ Holmes asked me.

‘I really have no idea,’ I replied.

‘Do you still believe this to be the House of Silk?’

‘It seems unlikely, I agree.’ I suddenly realised the import of what he had just said. ‘Are you telling me that you do not think it is?’

‘I knew from the outset that there was no possibility of it so being.’

For once, I could not hide my irritation ‘I have to say, Holmes, that there are times when you try my patience to the limit. If you knew from the start that this was not the House of Silk then perhaps you can tell me — why are we here?’

‘Because we are supposed to be. We were invited.’

‘The advertisement…?’

‘It was meant to be discovered, Watson. And you were meant to give it to me.’

I could only shake my head at these enigmatic answers and decided that, following his ordeal in Holloway prison, Holmes had returned entirely to his old self — secretive, over-confident and thoroughly annoying. And still I was determined to prove him wrong. Surely it could not be a coincidence, the name of Dr Silkin on the advertisements, the fact that one had been found concealed beneath Ross’s bed. If it was meant to be discovered, why place it there? I looked around me, searching for anything that might be worth my attention, but in the whirl of activity, with the flames of the torches flickering and dancing, it was almost impossible to settle on anything that might be relevant. The jugglers were throwing swords at each other now. There was another rifle shot and one of the bottles exploded, showering glass over the shelf. The magician reached into the air and produced a bouquet of silk flowers. The crowd, standing around him, applauded.

‘Well, we might as well…’ I began.

But then, at that very moment, I saw something and my breath caught in my throat. It could, of course, be a coincidence. It might mean nothing at all. Perhaps I was trying to read some significance into a tiny detail simply to justify our presence here. But it was the fortune-teller. She was sitting on a sort of raised platform in front of her caravan behind a table on which were spread out the tools of her trade: a deck of tarot cards, a crystal ball, a silver pyramid and a few sheets of paper with strange runes and diagrams. She had been gazing in my direction and, as I caught her eye, it seemed to me that she raised a hand in salutation, and there it was, tied around her wrist: a length of white, silk ribbon.

My immediate thought was to alert Sherlock Holmes but almost at once I decided against it. I felt I had been ridiculed enough for one evening. And so, without explanation, I left his side, wandering forward as if drawn by idle curiosity and then climbed the few steps to the platform. The gypsy woman surveyed me as if she had not just expected me to come but had foreseen it. She was a large, masculine woman with a heavy jaw and mournful, grey eyes.

‘I would like to have my fortune told,’ I said.

‘Sit down,’ she replied. She had a foreign accent and a manner of speech that was surly and unwelcoming. There was a footstool opposite her in the cramped space and I lowered myself onto it.

‘Can you see the future?’ I asked.

‘It will cost you a penny.’

I paid her the money and she took my hand, spreading it in her own so that the white ribbon was right before me. Then she stretched out a withered finger and began to trace the lines on my palm as if she could smooth them out with her touch. ‘A doctor?’ she asked.

‘Yes.’

‘And married. Happily. No children.’

‘You are quite correct on all three counts.’

‘You have recently known the pain of a separation.’ Was she referring to my wife’s sojourn in Camberwell or to the brief imprisonment of Holmes? And how could she possibly know of either? I am now, and was then, a sceptic. How could I fail to be? In my time with Holmes I found myself investigating a family curse, a giant rat and a vampire — and all three turned out to have perfectly rational explanations. I therefore waited for the gypsy to reveal to me the source of her trickery.

‘Have you come here alone?’ she asked.

‘No. I am with a friend.’

‘Then I have a message for you. You will have seen a shooting range contained in the building behind us.’

‘Yes.’

‘You will discover all the answers that you seek in the rooms above it. But tread carefully, doctor. The building is condemned and the floor is lousy. You have a long lifeline. You see it here? But it has weaknesses. These creases… They are like arrows being fired towards you and there are still many more to come. You should beware lest one of them should hit…’

‘Thank you.’ I took my hand back as if snatching it from the flames. As sure as I was that the woman was a fake, there was something about her performance that had unnerved me. Perhaps it was the night, the scarlet shadows writhing all about me, or it could have been the constant cacophony, the music and the crowds, that were overwhelming my senses. But I had a sudden instinct that this was an evil place and that we should never have come. I climbed back down to Holmes and told him what had just transpired.

‘So are we now to be guided by fortune-tellers?’ was his brusque response. ‘Well, Watson, there are no other obvious alternatives. We must see this through to the end.’

We made our way past a man with a monkey that had climbed onto his shoulder and another, naked to the waist, exposing a myriad of lurid tattoos which he animated by flexing his various muscles. The shooting gallery was before us, with a staircase twisting unevenly above. There was a volley of rifle shots. A group of apprentices were trying their luck at the bottles, but they had been drinking and their bullets disappeared harmlessly into the darkness. With Holmes leading the way, we climbed up, treading carefully, for the wooden steps gave every impression of being on the edge of collapse. Ahead of us, an irregular gap in the wall — it might once have been a door — loomed open, with only darkness beyond. I looked back and saw the gypsy woman sitting in her caravan, watching us with an evil eye. The white ribbon still dangled from her wrist. Before I reached the top I knew that I had been deceived, that we should not have come here.

We entered the upper floor which must once have been used for the storage of coffee for the smell of it was still apparent in the grimy air. But now it was empty. The walls were mouldering. The dust was thick on every surface. The floorboards creaked beneath our feet. The music from the barrel organ seemed distant now and cut off and the murmur of the crowd had disappeared altogether. There was still enough light reflecting from the torches which blazed all around the fair to illuminate the room but it was uneven, constantly moving in such a way as to cast distorted shadows all around us, and the further we went in, the darker it would become.

‘Watson…’ Holmes muttered, and the tone of his voice was enough to tell me what he desired. I produced my gun and found comfort in its weight, in the touch of cold metal against my palm.

‘Holmes,’ I said. ‘We are wasting our time. There is nothing here.’

‘And yet a child has been here before us,’ replied he.

I looked beyond him and saw, lying on the floor in the far corner, two toys that had been abandoned there. One was a spindle top, the other a lead soldier standing stiffly to attention with most of its paint worn away. There was something infinitely pathetic about them. Had they once belonged to Ross? Had this been a place of refuge for him before he was killed and these the only souvenirs of a childhood he had never really had? I found myself drawn towards them, walking away from the entrance, just as had been intended, for too late did I see the man step out from behind an alcove, nor could I avoid the cudgel that came sweeping through the air towards me. I was struck on the arm below the elbow and felt my fingers jerk open in a blaze of white pain. The gun cluttered the ground. I lunged for it, but was struck a second time, a blow that sent me sprawling. At the same time, a second voice came out of the darkness.