Mike Ashley - The Mammoth Book of New Sherlock Holmes Adventures

Scarcely a fortnight later, a telegram bearing a familiar return address in the Sussex Downs was delivered to my rooms. The message consisted of only three words: "Come at once" and the signature "Holmes". No further text was necessary.

I made haste to Victoria station and purchased a first-class return for the down train to Brighton. After an unusually long wait for my train's arrival, the railway journey passed quickly enough. At the Brighton cab-rank, a coachman conveyed me to the gateposts of my destination.

The house of Mr Sherlock Holmes was outwardly like any bachelor's domicile, but the gardens surrounding it provoked astonishment. The house was flanked and garrisoned on all sides by long thin wooden cabinets which – upon closer inspection – were in fact bee-hives, oozing the pale beeswax and darker secretions of their insect inhabitants. The constant buzzing was a thousandfold Babel. As I strode up the front path amid an escort of inquisitive bees, I glimpsed the face of my friend and summoner at a nearby window. Before I even had time to make use of the boot-scraper beside the doorstep, I was ushered within.The bees, fortunately, elected to remain outside. A moment later I was cross-legged on a haircord settee, in the parlour of my good friend Sherlock Holmes.

"Delighted you came, Watson." He passed forth his cigar-case, and I accepted a black perfecto. Whilst I cut this and lit it, Holmes resumed: "You must pardon my bees. One of the hives has just today produced a new queen, and she has been kept busy murdering all of the dormant queens."

"I had not known that bees could be persuaded to live in wooden cabinets," I said.

Holmes selected a Havana panatela, and lit his cigar without cutting it. "The bees live in a nearby hollow oak. Those cabinets are my own creation, inspired by the devices of an American beekeeper, the Reverend Langstroth. Each honeycomb occupies its own cabinet, and may be removed without disturbing the other combs." Without warning, my friend changed the subject abruptly: "Watson, I regret that you were obliged to wait so long for your train at Victoria station."

"You were aware of the delay, then?" I asked him.

"Not at all," said Sherlock Holmes. "As soon as you entered my house, I observed that your train was delayed."

I smiled indulgently. "You must have memorized Bradshaw's Railway Guide, and you inferred the tardiness of my train from the hour of my arrival."

"I never memorize idle data,Watson. My mind is a workroom, not a storage room." Holmes pointed his long fore-finger towards my feet. "Your shoes, I observe, are freshly polished. Owing to the urgency of my telegram, you would not have chosen to delay your departure from London by devoting time to such trifles. You must have been unwillingly detained at the railway terminus, and – during the enforced wait – you availed yourself of the bootblacks who ply their trade along the Belgrave wall of Victoria station."

"Remarkable, Holmes! What you say is the truth."

"Furthermore," my friend continued, "there is one particular bootblack in the Belgrave Road whose brown boot-cream is of

a distinctive russet colour, not available commercially. I believe that he makes up the mixture himself, from an original receipt. Your footgear, Watson, bears the mark of that tradesman."

Once again I was astonished. "But surely, Holmes, you did not summon me here to discuss bootblacks," I ventured.

"Indeed not." Holmes went to the fireplace, and retrieved a folded document from the mantelshelf. "You are doubtless aware of the recent holocaust in San Francisco."

I nodded sadly. "Yes, the earthquake and the subsequent fires. A dreadful accident."

"Accident is hardly the word, Watson. Precisely one day after the San Francisco earthquake, my good friend Pierre Curie the distinguished French scientist – was struck and killed by a horse-cart in Paris. That misfortune was an accident. This San Francisco affair is something rather worse: our planet Earth has burst open at the seams."

I nodded once more. "In spite of scientific progress, men are still at the mercy of Nature."

There was a dark look in his eyes as Sherlock Holmes spoke: "It is not Nature which preys upon men, Watson. The predator who threatens humanity is man himself." Holmes sat down and unfolded the document in his hands. "I have received a despatch from two American gentlemen: Mr Henry Evans, the president of the Continental Insurance Company; and Mr James D. Phelan, a former mayor of San Francisco. These men have pledged themselves to the cause of resurrecting their dead city, and of seeing San Francisco rise from the ashes."

"Strange that a former mayor, rather than the current office holder, should undertake such a mission," I remarked.

"The current mayor is part of the problem, Watson." Sherlock Holmes glanced at the document before him. "Mr Phelan informs me that, during his own term as mayor of San Francisco, municipal funds were allocated for the wages and training of police officers and firemen, as well as funds for the purchase and maintenance of fire-engines and pump-waggons, and for horses to convey them."

"A prudent investment, surely," I said.

"Perhaps not," Holmes's frown deepened. "Mayor Phelan's letter goes on to state that the present mayor of San Francisco one Eugene Schmitz by name – is the agent of a ring of thieves and grafters who have systematically looted the city's coffers and enriched themselves by several millions of stolen dollars. Due to the absence of funds, the police force and fire department of San Francisco are mere skeleton crews: ill-trained, and obliged to fulfil their duties with defective equipment. In consequence, when the earthquake struck, the death-toll was far higher than it might have been. Doctor, it may interest you to know that the recent San Francisco earthquake, and the ensuing conflagrations, have claimed seven hundred human lives."

"Good heavens!" I exclaimed.

"Indeed. But if Mr Phelan is to be believed – and I believe him, Watson – more than 300 of those deaths, as well as 20 million dollars' worth of property damage, are the direct result of Mayor Schmitz's embezzlements. Had the city's funds been allocated to their rightful needs, those people never would have died."

"A tragedy, surely. But what has this to do with you, Holmes?"

My friend refolded Mr Phelan's epistle and pocketed it. "The Continental Insurance Company, and several other assurance firms as well, are now threatened with bankruptcy as a result of the torrent of policy claims emanating from San Francisco. Mr Evans and his colleagues intend to make good on all claims, but they are resentful at bearing the costs for this tragedy whilst the thieves who caused it go free. Mayor Schmitz and his corrupt associates are to blame, yet no evidence of their guilt can be established."

We smoked in silence for a moment, and then Holmes spoke again: "Evidently my reputation has travelled all the way to California, Watson. This letter is the result. Mr Phelan and Mr Evans, joined by a syndicate of insurance brokers, have offered me carte blanche if I will but journey to San Francisco and place myself at their disposal. These men wish to engage my services in a matter of deduction and investigation. They desire me to find solid proof, such as will stand up in any American court, of the malfeasances of Schmitz and his henchmen."

"And do you intend to accept this commission, Holmes?" I asked him.

"My dear Watson, I already have. American politics are a dark labyrinth which I have never entered before, and the challenge intrigues me." Holmes arose and stretched himself.

"One more thing, Watson. The hospitals and emergency wards of San Francisco are filled to bursting with the injured and the dying; there are not enough doctors in that broken city to attend to them all. Your medical talents would be welcome in this crisis. And I may have need of your assistance during my own investigations. Shall I notify Continental Insurance to advance me the funds for two steamship tickets to America?"