Maxim Jakubowski - The Mammoth Book of the Adventures of Professor Moriarty

‘Must be a toff,’ I then joked, as he had referred to a public house near to Eaton Square.

He spluttered with mirth. ‘Him? His servant more like.’

Whose servant? I wondered, but could take it no further, for my link belatedly realised that loose tongues led to voices silenced for ever.

The information both heartened and depressed me. Eaton Square was a neighbourhood where the Spider might himself dwell and his servants might indeed spend time in the local taverns. What depressed me, however, was that by the time I had clad myself appropriately and found what I thought to be the right tavern, the day was advancing fast and tomorrow was 21 June. The chances of finding Spider, learning his plans, and foiling them were very remote, even if his servant were here.

The barmaid was eyeing me curiously. ‘New round here?’ she asked.

‘Work for tomorrow evening. Up at one of them big houses in the Square.’

The Queen would be holding a splendid luncheon and dinner at Buckingham Palace after the procession and service at Westminster Abbey. She was related to so many of the crowned heads of Europe that they alone would dine at the Palace, which meant that the British aristocracy were planning to hold similar splendid gatherings in their own grand homes. My story passed muster with those around me.

‘Sooner it’s over the better,’ said my neighbour, a morose-looking man, albeit smartly dressed, in his thirties. ‘Dress uniform his nibs wants laid out tonight. And he’s only off to his club.’

Uniform? That sounded interesting. ‘Must be meeting Jubilee visitors,’ I said wisely.

He snorted. ‘Only a dinner with one other chap. Important, he says. Everything has to be important for him.’

‘I’m thinking of joining a club myself,’ I joked, knowing my workman’s gear hardly put me in that class.

‘You wouldn’t get past the Albion door,’ he said, grinning.

One of the famous clubs in Pall Mall. There was a slim chance that his employer might be the Spider, but I hesitated to arouse suspicion by asking more. I was in luck again, as my neighbour decided to continue the joke. ‘Give it a try,’ he urged me. ‘Turn up there, ask for Colonel Sebastian Moran and say you’re dining with him.’

‘I’ll do that,’ I assured him.

He roared with laughter, the barmaid joined in and I followed suit. When he’d wiped the tears of mirth from his eyes, he clapped me on the back. ‘I likes a man who likes a good joke.’

Anticipation filled the air that evening, crowds already gathering on the streets, talking of the great event on the morrow and of those dignitaries who were known to have arrived. The glorious weather was holding and much beer was drunk that night in the Queen’s honour; many the working men who staggered home even more bung-eyed than usual.

I was not among them. I was sitting on a stool at the roadside near the foot of the Albion Club steps in Pall Mall and practising my newly acquired trade of shoeblacker. My companion, the regular shoeblacker, had been easy enough to square, once he had been informed that I was a detective from Scotland Yard, one of the many guarding the Queen’s peace that evening; there was, I told him, an expectation of trouble with so many important people in the city. My shoeblacker friend was especially pleased to help on receipt of a whole shilling.

‘Between you and me,’ I told him in confidential tones, ‘I’m looking out for a Colonel Sebastian Moran. Know him?’

‘Not ’arf,’ he told me eagerly. ‘That’s one geezer everyone steers clear of. You don’t cross him. Yessir, nossir, that’s what he wants and if he don’t get it you’re in trouble.’

‘Tip me the wink when he comes,’ I said.

‘Right-ho, sir.’

I waited about an hour, filling in my time learning to buff an evening boot and, I admit, enjoying the task. Nevertheless, I was conscious that the hours were ebbing away like sand through an egg timer and I might be pinning my hopes on the wrong man.

‘That’s him now, sir,’ my companion whispered. I looked up from my improvement of an evening pump shoe to see the most chilling face I had ever had the misfortune to encounter. Huge white drooping moustache, glaring eyes and a sharp jaw that would quell the fiercest of warriors all combined to convince me that this was my man. The Spider, resplendent in his army uniform, was before me.

‘Indian Army,’ my confidant said in awe. ‘That’s what he said once. The First Bangalore Pioneers.’

I rejoiced: Jesse Bracken too had been in the Indian Army – perhaps a coincidence or perhaps he had been chosen for his role at Tilbury for that reason.

Then I sobered. What came next? Even though I knew who the Spider was, how could I tell his plans? And, if I did not, how could I avenge poor Elsie’s death by scotching them? With whom, I wondered, was he dining? Would that give me some clue?

‘Does his companion for this evening dine regularly with him?’ I asked.

‘Once a week,’ he replied. ‘Some geezer he knows, a professor or something. He’s a good ’un, that one. Give me a tanner over what he owed for his boots once.’

My hopes fell. A regular guest was less likely to be here for final details of a master plan. And yet the Colonel had told his valet that it was an important occasion. My hopes rose again.

‘Here’s that chap now,’ my informant told me ten minutes later.

The evening seemed suddenly chilly, as a figure descended from the hansom, paid the driver, then paid him the unusual courtesy of lifting his top hat to him.

‘Thank you, cabbie,’ he said.

I heard the voice quite clearly. It was like none other I could remember, with its peculiar mix of softness and steel. He paid no attention to us, as he climbed the steps, and I heard the doorman greet him: ‘Good evening, Mr Moriarty.’

‘ Professo r Moriarty,’ he gently reminded him. Then he turned round before entering the building. I could not tell what made him do so. All I know is that I felt the presence of evil so powerfully that I had to look away. Imagination, I told myself, but I knew it was not. He must be the Spider’s chief of staff, as tainted as the Spider himself.

I sat at my post in despair. What had I learned? Nothing for sure, save evidence that I was surely right about the Spider’s diabolical plans for the morrow.

Two hours later, the Professor returned alone. He stood at the top of the steps looking out towards the roadway – or perhaps he looked at me. Certainly a shiver ran through me. Then Colonel Moran joined him and they walked down the steps together, pausing not far from me for a whispered conversation. The Colonel was laughing, a sound so alien that I trembled. There was no mirth in it, just a maniacal triumph.

‘Every crowned head of Europe will be with the Queen,’ I heard him say. ‘They and those who guard her.’

‘Certainly,’ the Professor agreed. ‘Her Majesty will be served well by her Indian guards.’ The politeness of his voice made his words more sinister than the Colonel’s.

They were bidding each other farewell and I hastily concentrated on my current employment, a pair of button boots for which the owner waited expectantly. Yet I sensed the Professor was looking at me. I felt his eyes boring into me, as though they seared through to my very soul. If the Devil had sent his messenger then this was he.

With a great effort of will, I did not glance up at him, as my fellow shoeblacker took my customer’s payment.

What did he want of me, this Professor? Had he understood my purpose for being here, seen my true unimportant self? Panic filled me, and I was on the point of running for my very life, when he spoke to me: ‘My shoes, if you please.’