Frank Thomas - Sherlock Holmes and the Golden Bird

"Holmes, 'tis said that men, Selkirk probably among them, are absolutely dotty over such gems. I'm dashed if I blame them. It is something, is it not?"

"Cold to the touch with a fire that will not burn but a dazzling brilliance that can sear the soul."

I did not know if Holmes was merely musing or quoting.

"Yes, Watson," he continued, "it is, indeed, something."

With a visible effort, Holmes broke the mood of the moment and his long, flexible fingers extracted the diamond from the casket. He handed it to me.

"Ol' chap, your pocket handkerchief will protect the beauty."

As I carefully swathed the gem in linen and placed it in my breast pocket, my friend scooped up the casket, which he replaced in the hiding place over the mantle. Closing the small hidden panel, he regarded me for a long moment, his eyes dreamy with thought.

"You know, I have espoused a pragmatic philosophy throughout our long association. But at this moment, it is hard for me to conceive that such a majestic and quite unique creation of nature is not guided by an inevitable destiny. Can it not be that this ageless and invulnerable thing, which has seen empires fall and generations vanish, is simply passing from hand to hand down a preordained path to its fate."

I had certainly never heard Holmes speak in such a manner. As we departed from the castle of Basil Selkirk and returned to Baker Street, ours was a silent journey with my friend and myself buried in our thoughts.

21

The Resolution

227

It was late in the afternoon that our expected visitor from Berlin arrived. On our return from St. Aubrey, Holmes did not divest himself of his suit clothes as was his habit, but instead had extracted the small salon piece, which he fancied as a weapon, from a drawer of the desk. Alerted by this precautionary move, I had secured my revolver as well. Questions pounded at my brain, but I quieted their siren call and applied myself to the answers that had already come my way during the events that had crossed the sky of our lives like scud clouds in a high wind. The silence in our chambers was unusual and complete. Finally, with my thoughts collected, I regarded Holmes. His tall and whipcord frame stood by a window gazing with unseeing eyes at the passing scene.

"I say, Holmes, am I interrupting a chain of thought?"

"Not really," he said, without turning. "I was likening the gem in your pocket to a creation of that Oscar Wilde fellow. If you recall, Dorian Gray remained ever young, unsullied by the passage of time. In similar fashion the Pigott Diamond has burned with an everlasting flame for years on end."

"Possibly fueled by its effect on so many lives," I said, almost without thought, and was surprised when Holmes turned toward me with a look of interest. "I was just thinking that our pursuit of the statue and the gem has been a tortuous one, with a variety of incidents, but it has resolved itself to where the unknown elements are few."

"My dear Watson, ofttimes you amaze me. Please don't let your thoughts dangle in thin air, but elucidate."

If there was a twinkle in his eye, I chose to ignore it.

"Once you divined that the Golden Bird was nesting on a crystal egg, the motives became clear. As a dedicated collector, Basil Selkirk was schooled in the history of diamonds and, given the clue of the year of Ali Pasha's death, figured out that the Pigott Diamond still existed. Naturally, he wanted it and was quite willing to give up the Golden Bird as a means of removing himself from the scene."

"Pray continue," said Holmes, with approval.

"Chu San Fu's motive is certainly clear. Where could he get a comparable stone to adorn his daughter? Both Doctor Bauer and Streeter referred to similar diamonds, but they would be hard come by being owned by ruling houses or titled men of wealth. How he learned that the Pigott existed is not clear."

"Nor to me," admitted my friend. "Relative to Chu San Fu, let me interject some heartening news. You will recall that when his lawyer, Loo Chang, left here, I had arranged for Slippery Styles to be on his trail. That investment of effort produced rich dividends. Styles stuck with the Oriental and located his secret office. On my orders, Slim Gilligan burglarized said premises securing the lawyers files on the illegal activities of his client. Even now the Limehouse Squad is gloating over a veritable blueprint of Chu San Fu's illicit operations. In short order all of his opium dens, houses of prostitution, and similar noisome ventures will be shut down. I said I'd smash Chu San Fu, Watson, and we have."

As was so often the case, I regarded Holmes with a slack jaw. He had crushed a kingpin of crime who had laughed at the law for years and now revealed the fact as a mere afterthought.

In Holmes's mind, the matter being a fait accompli Chu San Fu now commanded little attention. This was evidenced by his next words.

"Back to the matter of the fabulous gem, Watson How the Oriental crime tzar or Jonathan Wild, master criminal of the past century, became privy to its existence is a matter of speculation."

"Our client, Vasil D'Anglas, must know more about the stone and its hiding place than anyone else," I stammered.

"True," agreed Holmes," and it would seem that the very man you mention, who can resolve the entire matter, has just alighted from a hansom at our door."

But a short time later, I heard a heavy and labored tread on our stairs. The ascent was interrupted by frequent stops but, finally, Vasil D'Anglas, breathing heavily, made his way into our rooms.

When Holmes and I had visited D'Anglas in Berlin, the man had not presented an attractive picture. Now. though the passage of time had been short, his appearance had worsened. His forehead seemed more craggy and overhung dull and deep-set eyes. His skin was shocking. Coarse and wrinkled with a dry, scaly look, the man reminded me of an elephant. While a surface examination seldom proved accurate, I had diagnosed his trouble in Berlin as acromegaly, a rare condition produced by the malfunction of the pituitary. It was with difficulty that I suppressed a desire to question our visitor regarding his problem. He had to know that his condition was critical and worsening, and certainly had placed himself in the hands of Berlin doctors. I recalled, from a series of articles in "The Lancet," that the Germans had involved themselves in more research into the mysterious pituitary gland than had our medical people. Just as well for our client that Holmes secured the Golden Bird when he did, for D'Anglas's sands were certainly running low, I thought.

Then my mind flashed back to our interview with Lindquist who had died the next day. Selkirk had just fallen before the grim reaper. Had someone, at that moment, offered me the golden roc as a gift, I would have refused it with enthusiasm. My mind directed a similar distaste toward the great diamond still resting in my breast pocket and I vowed to remove the fatal object from my person as soon as possible. Of a sudden, I felt that it radiated decay and death and that I would be contaminated by exposure to the priceless Pigott. A stimulated imagination can prompt weird fantasies.

D'Anglas, having greeted us both, had lowered himself ponderously into the chair adjacent to our desk. I secured his top hat from the man, placing it on the end table, but he clung to the thick, oaken cane, which aided his stumbling steps. The head of the stick was a heavy piece of bronze in the shape of a hammer. It seemed of Arabic design and I felt would have been of interest to a curator of antiques.

"Mr. Holmes, your cable filled me with joy. The despondency, which had weighed my soul ever since the news from Constantinople that the Bird had been stolen from Hassim's shop, was lifted."

His face shifted briefly in my direction and then returned to Holmes. "There cannot be another disappointment. Tell me that you have the statue."