Tony Richards - The Astonishing Adventures of Sherlock Holmes in the Twenty-First Century

He finally sank into a fitful doze, only to be woken with a savage jolt an hour later by a curious sound. At first, he was quite certain that it was the murmur of a massive swarm of bees approaching. But that turned out to be only the product of his slumber-addled brain. A downpour had begun outside the lodge. The noise that he could hear was merely heavy raindrops on the roof.

He emerged next morning reasonably refreshed, to that smell of wholesome cleanliness that always comes after a prolonged rainfall. Birds were screeching in the trees, and he could hear the raucous chattering of a troop of monkeys some way off.

Masterton was back on the veranda, cooking breakfast on a wood-fuelled griddle. Helping him was a tall African fellow who Holmes had not met until this point.

Masterton looked up at him as he emerged, and grinned.

“Slept well, Mr Holmes?”

“Reasonably so.”

“You haven’t met our Jomo yet, now have you? Jomo Lewu. He’s the best tracker we have here, and I’m putting him with you.”

Jomo stepped forwards, extending a hand. He was a handsome Kenyan in what looked like his late twenties, and had the air of being measured and polite in everything he undertook.

“I’m delighted to make your acquaintance, Mr Holmes.”

By his way of speaking and his accent – which was slightly British – Holmes deduced this was an educated man. Yet he was dressed in a threadbare short-sleeved shirt, a pair of ragged cut-off denim shorts, and sandals, and looked like no more than an ordinary local. Holmes shook his offered hand, and was surprised by the strength of the returning grasp.

“You’re from around here?”

Jomo nodded. “From a village about ten miles to the north. But what else can you tell about me, Mr Holmes? I would, frankly, be quite fascinated to hear your deductions.”

Sherlock realised that he was being challenged in a mild and slightly teasing fashion, and rose to the bait.

“You are unmarried – that much is plain. But my guess is that you won’t be for much longer. You’re not afraid of hard physical labour – I felt a few small calluses when we shook hands. And you might well have been born here, but you’ve done a bit of travelling since. My best guess would be, a sojourn at some university in one of your larger cities first.”

“Yes – Nairobi.”

“And then, by your manner of inflection … another few years spent studying in England?”

“Oxford,” Jomo grinned. “I don’t like blowing my own trumpet, but … a Masters in Ecology.”

“This is just a stop-gap job for you, then?”

“No, sir. Even Oxford was too big a city for me, and I couldn’t wait to get back here. I feel that I can breathe here, in a way that I can nowhere else.”

“He’s taking over management of the lodge when I retire,” Masterton added, rather happily. “Got some interesting ideas for the place, all of them too new-fangled for the likes of me.”

They settled down to eat their breakfast: bacon, eggs, fried bread and mango juice. Flies buzzed about them and the temperature began to soar. Jomo stared at Holmes worriedly while the great detective re-explained the peculiar conclusion he had come to.

“I’ve thought that myself a few times. But, Mr Holmes, how could it possibly be?”

The detective swallowed the last portion of an egg, then wiped the corners of his mouth with a cloth napkin before replying.

“That is what I’m being paid to find out, I’d suppose. And I’m relying on your help.”

The younger man looked not in the least bit intimidated by those words. No, quite the opposite, in fact.

Within another half an hour, they were bouncing out across the bush in a brand-new, open-backed Land Rover. Holmes had borrowed a pith helmet which had been on display in the sitting room, since they were only at the top edge of the rainy season, and the sunlight beating down upon the landscape was intense. The African wilderness was far less full of life during the day than it had been last night. Except that – Holmes supposed – the life was still around, but it was largely sheltering from the heat.

The tyres of their vehicle threw up clouds of dust. They were following a narrow, rutted track, going past low scrub and tall grasses at first. But then a tree line came in sight.

“Look!” Jomo exclaimed.

He let the Land Rover idle to a halt, although he was careful not to switch the engine off. Holmes followed the young man’s gaze, and saw what he was looking at. Halfway off towards the trees, a white rhinoceros was grazing. And presumably a female, since it had a calf nearby.

“Good Lord,” he murmured. “It looks like a cross between a dinosaur and a Chieftain tank.”

But he was still quite amazed by the spectacle, and wished he’d brought along a camera.

Jomo appeared to read his mind. The fellow reached into the glove compartment, and pulled out a plastic disposable one.

“I always have a couple with me, since somebody nearly always forgets to bring along his own,” he told the great detective. “With the compliments of the house.”

Holmes was supposed to be at work here and not on vacation. But he couldn’t resist taking a dozen snaps of the great beast. And another eight snaps when a trio of tall giraffes wandered by.

“Is there any specific place where these bees struck?” he asked Jomo carefully, once he was done.

His companion’s head went nodding off in the direction of the trees. “Over there.”

“Well, we’d better go there, then.”

Could he hear the humming of the swarm again? No, it was merely a low, almost subliminal purr being put out by their vehicle’s engine. Holmes could feel his throat tightening as they approached the tree line, nonetheless. His sinews tightened and the inside of his mouth went dry. He might be immortal, but was not immune to pain. He had been stung by bees and wasps several times during the course of his long life. And the thought of a great multiplicity of those sensations …

But he did the best he could to put that right out of his mind. He’d already been told, hadn’t he? The swarm only attacked huntsmen.

The woodland that they were approaching was a quarter of a mile in width. It was impossible from this vantage point to tell how deep it ran. It stood on the savannah like some dark green boat adrift upon a yellow-brownish ocean. And as their truck drew up to its edge, Holmes could see how dense the foliage was.

“We can’t go any further in the truck,” Jomo told him.

He was already climbing down, and Holmes followed his example, waiting while the fellow strapped a pistol round his belt.

“Only for shooting into the air,” Jomo explained. “The worst I’m going to do with this is scare a leopard.”

“Then I take it that you don’t approve of killing animals?” Holmes enquired as he started following him into the relatively cooler shade of the trees.

Jomo shrugged. “We all do that thing. Who knows what we squashed on the way here? We all have to eat, and by the way that you took breakfast I am sure you are no vegetarian. It’s the natural way of things.”

“But killing just for sport?” Holmes pressed him.

The shrug he got this time was smaller, lighter.

“Harris is something of a creature of habit, and he’s hunted all his life. His clients come here almost every year – at least, they used to – and are friends of his.”

“He was with them when these attacks occurred?”

“Except for one occasion.” Jomo shuddered slightly as a memory took hold. “I was with the sheik.”

“And … were you or your employer stung at all?”

“Not once.”

Which flabbergasted Holmes. It seemed to him not merely remarkable but entirely unbelievable. How could any swarm of bees attack only one man, and ignore another who – presumably – was standing nearby? It went contrary to everything he knew of both nature and logic.