Michael Kurland: Professor Moriarty Omnibus

Moriarty threw open the door to the nearest room, and found it empty; but there were a pair of posts fastened to the floor in the center of the room, with leather thongs running through eyebolts in the posts. Barnett did not like to contemplate what such an apparatus might be used for.

In the next room they tried there was a girl, clad only in a white shift, who shrank away from them in horror as they opened the door. The shift was in tatters, and they could see the strips across her back and thighs where she had been beaten. It was not Cecily Perrine.

"It's all right, miss," Sherlock Holmes said, advancing into the room. "We've come to get you out of here. It's all right, really it is. We won't hurt you." He continued talking to the girl and walking slowly toward her, as she, eyes wide, speechless with fear, retreated into the farthest corner of the room.

"See here, Holmes, there's no time for this," Moriarty said. He turned to the girl. "Any minute now there's going to be an awful row. Those people who have done this to you are going to try to stop us from freeing you and the others. You'd best come with us now, and help with the other girls as we release them. We'll see if we can find a room where you can bolt the door from the inside. When it's all over, I shall see that you and any other ladies up here are removed from this place and taken care of. Properly. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir," the girl said, but her voice was heavy with doubt and fear.

Moriarty reached around inside his jacket, behind his back, and, after fumbling for a second, pulled out a long, flat leather truncheon. "Come here, girl," he said. "Take this. If anyone approaches you while we are otherwise occupied, hit them in the face with it. Aim for the nose. That will discourage them."

The girl came forward hesitantly and took the proffered instrument. "I shall," she said, slapping it tentatively against the palm of her hand. She winced, finding the device surprisingly painful. "I shall," she repeated, staring directly into Moriarty's eyes. Her voice gained strength. "I shall! Oh, indeed, I shall."

"Very good," Moriarty said. "Now, stay close behind us."

They returned to the hallway. "I doubt if we have much time," Moriarty said. "Each of you take a room. Dispose of any resident masked men in it as you see fit — as rapidly as you can. I suggest we open all these doors immediately, and release any more captive young ladies."

"I — think — so," Holmes said, staring back at the strange, dreadful equipment in the room they had just left. "How horrible. It is difficult to believe that these men are Englishmen."

"I occasionally find it difficult to believe that our Parliamentary representatives are Englishmen," Moriarty remarked dryly. "Let us proceed; I think I hear pounding from below. If either of you happen to notice a window facing the front of the house — which would be that side, there — kindly heave some article of furniture through it."

Holmes looked speculatively at Moriarty. "Some of your minions downstairs?" he asked. "Well, I shall be glad to see them. I fancy all the windows are boarded up; there seems to be a false wall across that side of all the rooms."

In the third room that Barnett entered he found himself staring at a scene that he would never forget. The floor was bare and covered with sawdust, and at its center was a six-foot oaken X which dominated the room. Cecily Perrine, clad only in a long white shift, had just been unchained from an eyelet bolted to the wall and, her hands bound with thick cord, was being dragged across the floor by a short, thickset, hooded man.

The man giggled inanely as he pulled Cecily toward the oaken torture device. He brandished a short, many-stranded whip which he flicked occasionally into the empty air as though to get in practice for the delights that would follow.

"My God!" Barnett screamed.

Cecily turned and stared impassively at this second hooded man who now stood in the doorway.

The man with the whip pushed Cecily aside and whirled around. "What are you doing in here?" he demanded petulantly. "Get out! Get out! This is my room. Mine! She is mine! Get out! You know better than this!" He bounced up and down with excitement and anger, and waved his whip at Barnett. "Leave!"

Barnett snatched at the whip, pulling it out of the man's grasp. "You bastard!" he yelled, scarcely aware of what he was saying. "You slime! What are you doing with this woman?"

"She's mine," the thickset man insisted in a shrill voice. "I paid for her, didn't I? Now you just get out of here, or I'll report you to the Master Incarnate. Get your own female!"

Barnett could feel the blood rising to his face, and the mantle of reason lifted itself from the primitive emotions beneath. Like a distant observer, cool and detached, he watched himself lift the short whip and bring its weighted handle down again and again on the head of the thickset man. The man fell to the floor, and Barnett stopped — not through compassion, but because the target of his rage was now out of reach.

Slowly the haze cleared from before his eyes and he looked at Cecily. Then he quickly looked away. He did not want to see her like this, he did not want ever to think of her like this, bound and helpless, and subject to the whims of evil men.

He crossed to where she lay and quickly, tenderly, untied her hands. "Cecily," he said, "what have they done to you?" To his surprise, he found that he was crying.

"Benjamin?" she whispered. "Is it you?"

He took his mask off — he had forgotten it was still on — and held her to him for a long moment. There was a robe in the corner which he used to cover her. "Can you walk?" he asked. "We must hurry."

"Yes," she said. "Get me away from here."

There were a total of seven women in the various rooms of this upper floor, and, at that moment, five men. Moriarty immobilized the men by tying their thumbs together behind their backs with short pieces of wire, which he produced from one of his innumerable pockets. By this time they could hear a steady pounding noise coming up from the door below.

"There is no other way out," Holmes said. "I have tried all the doors. Presumably we could find our way to the roof, but what then? It's a long way to the ground."

"I suggest we remove the false wall from one of the rooms facing the front of the house," Moriarty said. "If I can get to a window, I can get assistance."

"What good could your men do us now?" Holmes demanded. "They're down there and we're up here."

"A group of determined men assaulting the front door." Moriarty pointed out, "would at least provide a much-needed diversion. It would most probably complete the job of panicking the rank and file."

"Perhaps I can be of some assistance," a deep, well-modulated voice said from behind them.

They all turned. A tall man in elegant evening dress bowed to them politely before removing the mask that covered his face. "Allow me to introduce myself," he said, with just the slightest hint of a Middle European accent coloring his flawless English. "My name is Adolphus Chardino."

"Ah!" Moriarty said.

"Who are you?" Holmes demanded, shielding the seven young ladies behind him.

"That is of no moment at the present," Chardino said.

What is meaningful is that I can assist you in your efforts to leave." He removed a large pocket watch from his vest and glanced at it. "And I would earnestly suggest that you hurry; it would be wise to be gone within the next fourteen minutes."

"Why?" asked Holmes suspiciously.

"Well, you see, in fourteen minutes it will be midnight," Chardino told him earnestly. "And tomorrow — is another day."

"How do we get out?" Moriarty demanded.

"Follow me," Chardino said. He led them down the hallway to a small door.