Kim Newman - Professor Moriarty The Hound of the D'Urbervilles

‘The woman?’

Moriarty’s shoulders lifted and dropped.

‘The old goat probably hopes she’ll give him a tumble to get her snaps back,’ I suggested. ‘I’ll wager he pulls the pics out of the safe every night and gives ’em a proper looking over.’

‘If that were the case, she wouldn’t have engaged us. Miss Adler does not strike me as a lady who likes to share. Yet she has willed over half the earnings of a profitable enterprise to us.’

‘No choice, Moriarty. Who else could get her what she wants?’

The Professor tapped his teeth. ‘No one but us, Moran. Evidently.’

Moriarty’s fingers went to his watch pocket. In my years of association with the Professor, I never saw him pull out the timepiece I presume anchored the chain across his flat middle. Once an associate understood the import of timekeeping, everything went to schedule. Otherwise, there might have been consequences.

He had barely stroked his chain when Filthy Fanny dashed from the crowd and began kicking the police guard.

Fanny had been successfully presenting herself as a ten-year-old waif for a full two decades without anyone being the wiser. It was down to the proper application of dirt, which she arranged on her face with the skill other tarts devote to the use of paints and powder.

Now, Filth wore the sooty skirts of a Zenda Cannon Girl. And heavy shin-kicking clogs.

She harangued in backslang (‘Reggub the Esclop!’) that sounded mighty like Ruritanian, or whatever heathen tongue they use. [16] Ruritania is a German-speaking country, though Rudolf II tried to make French the court language.

After some painful toe-to-shin business, the plod got his truncheon out.

With a command of the dramatic that would put a Drury Lane tragedienne to shame, Filth tumbled down the Embassy steps, squirting tomato juice from a sponge clapped over her eye.

Moriarty handed me a cobblestone and pointed.

I threw the stone at the gawking copper, and fetched off his helmet. I’d once brought down a Bengal tiger with a cricket ball in exactly the same manner.

Then, the mob rose and rushed the Embassy. Moriarty hooked me with an umbrella handle and we milled in with the crowd.

The front doors caved, and the first rush of intruders slid about on the polished marble foyer floor like drunken skaters. Three guards tried to unscabbard sabres, but the Comanche set about stripping them — and the environs — of anything redeemable. Pawn-shop windows would soon display cuirasses, plumed helms and other items stamped with the Elphberg Seal.

Sapt poked his head out of his door. Moriarty signalled. A couple of bruisers laid hands on the Secret Police Chief.

The Professor sidled next to the anarchist with the biggest beard and suggested he draw up a list of demands, phrasing it so the fellow would think the whole thing was his idea.

Sapt looked about furiously, moustache twitching. Dirty hands held him fast.

A bunch of keys rattled on Sapt’s belt. Moriarty pointed them out, and an urchin brushed past, deftly relieving Sapt of the keys.

‘Give him a taste of what the Cannon Girls get,’ I shouted.

We left the mob happily shoving the Police Chief feet-first up the nearest chimney. The anarchist had posted lookouts at the doors, and was waving an ancient revolver at the still-surprised constables.

‘You can’t rush us,’ Comrade Beard said. ‘This Ruritanian territory is claimed by the Free Citizens’ Committee of Strelsauer Altstadt. Any action against us will be interpreted as a British invasion.’

The average London crusher [17] Crusher: Police constable. isn’t qualified to cope with an argument like that. So they bullied someone into making them tea, and told the anarchist to hang fire until someone from the Foreign Office turned up. In return, Beard promised not to garrotte any hostages just yet.

Sapt, it appeared, had got stuck.

With all this going on, it was a simple matter to slip into Sapt’s private office, take down the portrait and open the safe. It contained a thick, sealed packet — and, disappointingly, no cash box or surplus crown jewels. Moriarty handed me the goods, and looked about, brows knit in mild puzzlement.

‘What? Too easy?’

‘No, Moran. It’s just as I foresaw.’

He locked the safe again.

There was a clatter of carriages and boots outside. Boscobel Place was full of eager fellows in uniform.

‘They’ve called out the troops.’

‘Time to leave,’ the Professor said.

Back in the foyer, Moriarty gave the nod. Our Comanche confederates left off pilfering and detached themselves from those still intent on making a political point.

Sapt had fallen head first out of the chimney, sooty as a sweep. The Professor arranged the surreptitious return of his keys.

We left the building as we came, through the front door.

The Comanche melted into another crowd.

I came smack face to face with a junior guards officer, who was about to set diplomacy aside and invade. I stiffened my neck and snapped off a salute, which was smartly returned. Once you’ve worn the colours, they never wear off.

‘Carry on, Lieutenant,’ I said.

‘Yes, sir,’ he responded.

As often, Moriarty had contrived not to be noticed. Like those lizards who can blend into greenery, he had the knack of seeming like a forgettable old stick, someone who has got off the omnibus two stops early and wandered into a bloodbath which was none of his doing.

We strolled away from the battle. Shouts, shots, thumps, crashes and bells sounded. Nothing to do with us.

A cab waited on the corner.

III

Moriarty was in a black thinking mood. He chewed little violet pastilles of his own concoction — a substitute for the cigarettes which had yellowed his fingers and teeth but were now abandoned because he’d taken it into his head to deem tobacco a threat to human health — and paced his room, hands knotted in the small of his back, brow set in a crinkled frown.

I was still full of the thrill of jizzwhackery, and minded to pop downstairs to call on Flossie or Pussie or whatever the tiny blonde with the lazy eye said she was called. After the hunting grounds, the boudoir. I’d learned that in India, along with how to keep an eye on your wallet in the back of your trousers while they’re draped over a chair. Fifi. Her name was Fifi. She really was French. And she had a friend. Véronique.

But the Professor was preoccupied.

The evening papers were in, along with tear-sheets of fuller reports that would be in tomorrow’s editions. Sapt was claiming that dangerous Ruritanian revolutionary movements needed to be exterminated. He called upon Great Britain, Ruritania’s ancient ally, to join the crusade against insurrection, alleging that the assault upon the Embassy (and his person) had been equally an insult to Victoria and Rudolf. Typical foreign sod, wanting us to fight his battles for him.

Back in Streslau, there had been street skirmishes between Michaelists and Rudolfites. Many arrests had been made and Sapt was expected to return to his country with information which would lead to a complete sweep of the organised troublemakers.

The packet of photographs lay on our bureau. It seemed that reclaiming this property of a lady had interesting side effects. Moriarty’s imaginary revolution had genuinely to be put down.

‘I hope the blasted country don’t go up in flames before Irene can cash these chips, Moriarty. She’ll get no blackmail boodle out of ’em if they’re hanging from lamp posts in the public gardens.’

Moriarty growled. He left the room, and closeted himself in the dark, buzzing space where he raised his wasps and plotted the courses of heavenly bodies.