Frank Thomas - Sherlock Holmes and the Sacred Sword

Of course, I was dumbfounded. "Holmes, you jest. Chu San Fu in his intellectual dotage may have fallen prey to a Caesar complex, but he is not stupid."

"True, Watson. You are too old a hand to make the error of underestimating an opponent, and so am I."

"You reinforce my thoughts," I cried. "You are a marked man. The Chinaman knows that only you have the imagination and the ability to anticipate his moves and divert them. I would think, nay, I know, that right now his first thought is to stop Sherlock Holmes."

"Let us hope so, ol' chap. Dinner?"

From experience I knew that I had to bite back my remonstrances. Holmes had allowed the orchestra of his voice to play the overture, but I was going to have to wait for the first act of the opera of his composition.

What we had for dinner I cannot tell you. I was so consumed with worry that I ate without noticing the fare, certainly not according to my fashion. But one must admit that I had cause for concern. Holmes's tone when he discussed Chu San Fu and his second coming, as 'twere, had an ominous quality. That he would risk himself to stop the master criminal from instigating an uprising, I was sure. Therefore, it behooved me to stick to him like the proverbial plaster and to provide whatever assistance my trusty Webley and I could. Holmes was not impetuous or rash. He seldom made a move that was not well considered in advance, but I could not anticipate what scheme he had in mind to bring the Oriental to heel. For all I knew his meticulous mind had evolved a foolproof plan, but I could scarcely picture one that would not involve personal risk, and I promised myself that the danger would involve the both of us.

As for myself, the world would hardly recoil in horror if mischance befell one John H. Watson, M.D. The picture of Her Royal Majesty being overcome with shock and grief did not come to my mind, nor did tremors spreading through the Empire. But all of these things I could envision should Holmes fall before a miscarriage of chance, and I vowed that if the bullet engraved with his name was fired and I was able to step between it and my friend, I would do so gladly. Because of him, I had lived a richer life to this moment than most are blessed with at their final hour. Surely I could say farewell to my existence with the heartening thought that it had all been worthwhile. Indeed, had I the ability to relive it, I would have it no other way than what chance, fate, or a divine blueprint had plotted for me.

Such thoughts, though grim in nature, did produce a heartening effect and lent starch to my manner and rigidity to my backbone. When Holmes and I strolled out on the veranda of the hotel, savoring our after-dinner cigars, I was a bit lightheaded and imbued with an air of fatalism and a spirit of being ready, come what may. My current of energy was somewhat short-circuited when I realized that I had felt much the same way on that well-remembered night when we waited in darkness and silence in Oberstein's house at 13 Caulfield Gardens to spring the trap on Colonel Valentine Walter. What was it Holmes had said prior to the conclusion of that case, certainly of vast importance to the Empire? Oh yes: "Martyrs on the altar of our country."

Suddenly I felt quite deflated as I recalled that on the evening in question Holmes had been wrong. Colonel Walter had not been the bird he planned to snare. Good heavens, suppose my friend had made a miscalculation regarding this matter?

"I say, ol' chap, you were standing rather like this when you saw the lawyer, Loo Chan, hastening down Sharia Kamel, were you not?"

"Quite, Holmes," I responded.

"In the direction of the Ezbekiyeh Gardens, I believe you said."

"Right. Do you suppose that he set himself up like a stalking horse to draw me into the net?"

"Doubtful," replied Holmes. "Rather fancy that he found you dogging his footsteps and decided to gather you in as a hostage. But your quick thinking regarding that matter turned the tables, did it not?"

"Come now, Holmes, that decision was forced on me. Would never have had the chance but for that flowerpot or whatever it was that struck down the Manchurian who had grabbed me."

"I've given that a bit of thought, Watson. You do seem to operate under a lucky star, for which I am grateful. Let us try and retrace your steps when you were shadowing the lawyer. Possibly, the area of his hiding place may be revealing."

"Loo Chan is well on his way to Macao by now," I said, and then realized this was an inane remark.

"But Chu San Fu remains, and he may have gone to earth in the same area. The native quarter certainly seems like the section he would choose."

I fell in with Holmes's scheme, having little choice really. But I was not fooled. This was no spur-of-the-moment thought of his since he had mentioned such a trip prior to dinner. Had I planned on an investigation of the old town in search of the criminal hideout, I would have had a detachment of the local police with me, something that Holmes had the authority to do with the carte blanche conferred upon him by the foreign office. But then I recalled that, for reasons of his own, he had decided to go it alone without the benefit of the local establishment.

My nighttime excursion into the byways of Cairo was of recent vintage and I had little trouble following my previous path. Again, in a remarkably short time, the lights and sounds of the small European quarter were behind us and we were into the ancient city, much of it as it had been when it was called "Babylon-in-Egypt," and just as crowded, huddled, and secret as when first erected by Chaldean workmen. I recounted to my friend my actions when following the Oriental lawyer, though I did not mention my thoughts regarding what I hoped to do or my considerable doubts as to my ability to do anything. Holmes's keen eyes were darting everywhere, and that peculiar sixth sense of his regarding directions was, I sensed, associating our progress with whatever knowledge he had of the local geography.

Finally we arrived at the alley-mouth down which Loo Chan had disappeared and into which I had ventured from a different direction. Holmes surveyed the scene, his aquiline nose held in such a manner that had its shape been different, I would have sworn he was sniffing the breeze to scent the spoor of his dedicated enemy.

"Come, ol' chap," he said suddenly, "we shall backtrack. The next street over, if I read the signs right, would eventually lead us to the vicinity of the Mosque of al-Ashar, which is our one clue in this muddled mess. Chu San Fu intends to go there if I am correct as to his plan. So let us reconnoiter in that direction."

We reversed ourselves and went back another block before making a right-angle turn on a fairly sizable side street. The squat and squallid dwellings were reproductions of each other for a block and then, for half of another. Then Holmes drew me to a stop in the shadow of a one-story building, indicating the other side of the street.

"Really, the only edifice of any size that we've seen for some time, Watson."

It was that. Contrary to its neighbors, it was set back from the street and rose four stories. The ground floor was not visible, being shielded by an imposing wall, the top of which was armed with shards of glass set in cement. There was no gleam of light from its windows, and the whole structure had an abandoned and dilapidated appearance.

"Surely not a residence, Holmes, in this or former times."

"I suspect it served, during part of its history, as what our American cousins would call a 'pokey.' Are those not bars on some of the upper windows?"

There was moonlight to aid our investigation but I could not make out the ironwork that Holmes referred to. Small wonder, since his night vision was of the keenest whilst mine did not exist. The aged edifice had certainly caught Holmes's attention, and after a half-minute or so during which he subjected it to the closest scrutiny, he motioned to me and we continued our way down the dingy street but paused again after a dozen or so steps.