Martin Greenberg - Sherlock Holmes In America

These were deep waters indeed, and I needed to tread carefully. “Who is this woman,” I asked, glancing at the writing on the envelope, “this Miss McParland?”

“She is a native of Chicago, Illinois, living in what the inhabitants there refer to as the South Side. That is all, for the moment, you need know.” He consulted his pocket watch, then replaced it in the folds of his waistcoat. “You are booked on the Oceanic tomorrow at this time. I trust your journey will be speedy, safe, and pleasant.”

I ushered him out of my study. “Won’t you stay for tea, Mr. Holmes?” asked the faithful Mrs. Hudson, bearing two steaming cups on a silver tray.

“My thanks to you, madam,” he replied graciously, “but duty calls.”

I saw him to the door. The Channel lay beyond the downs, shimmering in the grey light. But Mycroft’s gaze was toward the east, toward the German Ocean. “Sherlock,” he said quietly. “There is someone who would like a word with you.” We stepped outside.

His motorcar was waiting, its engine running. There was a man sitting in the back seat, whom I immediately recognized as Mr. Asquith from his distinctive profile. As I moved to greet him, he rolled his window down and said, “You must fully understand, Holmes, that His Majesty cannot and will not acknowledge your presence in America. Should anything go awry, or should you meet with some misfortune, you are not to communicate with your brother or anyone else connected with this government. I cannot emphasize this point enough, and I trust I make myself clear.”

“Perfectly, Prime Minister,” I replied.

“Very well,” said Mr. Asquith, rolling up his window. Our brief interview was over.

I turned back to Mycroft, puzzlement writ large upon my features. Instead of edifying me, however, my brother did something remarkable: he took my hand in his and held it for a moment before shaking it. It was not until his hand had been withdrawn that I realized he had pressed a small piece of paper into it.

“You have been through many rough adventures in which you have risked life and limb, Sherlock. I think at once of Dr. Roylott, and of the loathsome Milverton, and even of poor Jefferson Hope. I pray that this will not be another of them. And yet… ” His voice trailed off.

“Many were the men, Moriarty’s men, who have wished me dead, and I still live,” I told him.

“Yes,” he said after some thought. “Your strength has never failed you, nor your iron will, nor your keen mind. But it is a new world upon whose precipice we stand, and one that is not so readily accommodating to men such as we… such as we once were.”

He clambered into the rear seat of the Daimler, and lowered the window as the driver made ready to engage the gears. “From now on, and until further notice, your name is James McKenna, laborer and former amateur boxer, of Liverpool. Good luck, brother,” he said.

As they drove away, I looked at the piece of paper, which contained a single address: 3154 S. Normal Avenue.

“Mr. McKenna,” squawked a voice in my ear. That would be Mrs. Murphy. Like other women of her race, she had a pinched, befreckled face, bony fingers that bespoke the miser and watery, pale blue eyes. “You haven’t touched your chowder.”

I had been a boarder at her establishment for several days, on the theory that if I was to pass for James McKenna, then what better place to pick up the plumage of this strange bird, the Irish-American, than in his native habitat?

I looked at the steaming bowl before me. “My appetite fails me today, Mrs. Murphy,” I said, upon which voiced sentiment she whisked the vessel away and promptly set it down before another of the lodgers. “Then Mr. Callahan will have it, and that’s the end of it. He’ll no want of strength on the morrow, for the butcher’s work ain’t ne’er done but begins anew fresh each day.”

Foregoing the chowder with gusto (as the Americans, with their unhealthy reliance upon Spanish words, say), I rose, took my leave, and set off in the direction my landlady had pointed me. I glanced once more at the piece of paper into which Mycroft had impressed my hand, though I had long since committed it to memory, perhaps as a kind of talisman.

I shall not trouble the reader with an account of the squalor and filth I encountered along the way. Suffice it say that half an hour’s walk was never undertaken so briskly, with greater purpose, or more relief when at last my destination was reached: the intersection of W. 31 stStreet and S. Normal Avenue in a part of the city they called Bridgeport. I turned into Normal Avenue and walked south to number 3154.

The residence I sought was typical for the location or, in local parlance, the “neighbourhood.” It was a small, two-storey building, what the locals call a “prairie bungalow,” or perhaps more descriptively, a “shotgun shack.” Miss Maddie McParland resided on the first-American, second-floor, and so a short trudge to the top of the stairs soon brought me face to face with her door knocker.

I knocked, then knocked again. At last, I could hear a voice on the other side of the transom: “Who is it, please?” The Irish lilt in her voice was unmistakable, even if her accent was wholly American.

“Mr. James McKenna, come all the way from London with an urgent message for you,” I replied. “May I come in, please?”

The door opened. As Watson has told you, I am impervious to the charms of a well-turned ankle, but at this moment I wished I had his powers of description, so comely was the lass who now stood before me. “A message for me? There must be some mistake, good sir. But, please, come in and take some refreshment,” she said.

The flat was rather more well-appointed that one might have suspected by its humble exterior. My own Mrs. Hudson could not have kept it neater or cleaner; there were books on the shelves and the satisfying smell of tea brewing in the kitchen.

I accepted her offer with gratitude and sat down in a comfortable chair near the fireplace while she sat opposite on a kind of divan. “I can’t tell you who gave this letter to me, or why,” I began, “but I can assure you this is no joke. Indeed, it is deadly serious.”

“But how can something in London possibly concern me, Mr. McKenna? I’m an American.”

Instead of a reply, I handed her the letter. At that point, my work was done and I should have taken my leave and set out on the long journey home. But, as I had no way of knowing whether it required a reply, I sat, waiting. At last, she took the hint and opened the envelope.

I cannot describe the look on her face as she read. Her eyes widened, her face flushed, though with embarrassment or anger I could not tell: I could swear a tear or two came to her eyes. But whatever awful news the epistle conveyed she otherwise bore with equanimity and strength.

She read the letter twice and then tucked it safely into the folds of her sleeve. For a long moment, she seemed to be struggling with herself, occasionally casting a glance my way, as if making up her mind about something. Then, wordlessly, she rose and motioned for me to follow her.

My nostrils flared with excitement as Miss McParland guided me down dark streets, little more than pig alleys. The beastly heat had brought out all manner of street life, with toughs lounging in every third doorway, while up on the roofs, women stood a constant watch. As we came around one corner, and into the filthiest street yet, one of the crones set off an unearthly howl. Others soon followed her example, banging pots and screeching. Soon, every eye was upon us.

And then the pelting began. Paving stones, flower pots, rotten fruit, and offal rained down upon us, most of which, I thought, was unmistakably directed at me. “Why are they doing this?” I shouted.