Death in the Air (27 page)

Sherlock rises in a flash, bends over at the waist, plants his legs, and drives forward with all the power he has, sending the hard edge of his boney shoulder into the back of Brim’s knees. The boy buckles and falls face-first down the steps, smashing his teeth into the stones. As he groans and releases the knife, Sherlock enacts the next part of his plan.

Sutton is directly in front of Brim. He glances back for an instant and sees the boy with the hawk-like nose leaning over his young comrade, then reaching for an
overcoat pocket and seizing the hunting crop. Almost immediately, Sutton feels the business part of that horsewhip laid across the back of his calves, not only removing a line of flesh from them and shooting searing pain up his legs, but also snaking around to the front of his knees, gripping them and, with a pull from his enemy, sending him reeling to the ground.

Sherlock Holmes is indeed a natural with Sigerson Bell’s favorite weapon.

Just as he hoped, the other armed constables arrive at the staircase at that instant.

“Point your revolver at this one’s head!” he shouts at the first Bobbie, indicating the wounded Sutton, now on his knees on the ground. “And seize that boy!” he cries to the other.

The gun is leveled at the leader’s temple, inches away, poised to end his life. The other arriving policeman pins Brim to the ground.

But Sherlock Holmes doesn’t want just these two thieves – he wants them all – every last member of the Brixton Gang. He wants to wipe them from the face of London’s crime world and remove their evil blight from its midst. It’s the only way to get his money.

He begins the final part of his plan.

“You three!” he cries at the top of his lungs, calling to the escaping criminals. They keep running without glancing back, racing over the muddy bank and leaping into the steam launch. But as they turn to seize the boat’s ropes from the
little wharf they realize that two of their lot are missing. In the light of the huge, crackling fire from the warehouse, growing in flickering reflections in the dark water, Sherlock can see the falling face of Charon, the other gang leader. That reaction is what the boy hoped for – Malefactor has told him many times that the phrase
as thick as thieves
has a great deal of truth in it. Crooks stick by one another … they have their code. That brutal man standing in the steam launch has a touch of good in him mixed with all his evil. He will be hard pressed to desert his accomplice, especially if it means condemning him to death.

“Lift him up!” Sherlock barks at the Peelers.

They raise Sutton to his feet, the gun still cocked and held tightly to his head.

The crowds are beginning to gather. At first there had been just a few street people, then drunks from the nearby taverns, but now many working-class folks are arriving, some in barely more than underclothes, drawn by this magnificent, deadly show. On the water, boats are drawn to the billowing flames too, as the fire adds heat to the already hot night. The sounds of the bells of the Southwark fire brigade and of their charging horses grow louder.

And suddenly, out of the nearly collapsing building, comes Lestrade and his six policemen, coughing and staggering about, one gripping a frightened and quivering reporter by the collar. The Metropolitan Police’s senior detective sees Sherlock and four of his men down by the river. They appear to have two of the gang members in
custody. But why is a revolver being thrust into the temple of one of them? Lestrade stumbles forward.

“If you try to escape,” shouts Sherlock at the boat, his anger rising, “we shall put a bullet into the brain of your friend here!”

“No!”

It isn’t the other gang leader responding. Charon simply stands stock still, his mouth wide open. It’s Inspector Lestrade.

“This is highly irregular!” he cries, staggering toward Sherlock.

The boy speaks without looking at him. “Precisely! Irregularity is now in demand!”

“The Force does not condone this!”

“The Force is about to lose three-quarters of the Brixton Gang!”

The crowd lets out a roar of approval.

Standing on the boat, the evil Charon gives the order to start the steam launch’s engine. A deadly contest is afoot.

Sherlock must make a decision. The boat is fewer than twenty yards away – all the players in this dramatic game of chicken can see the expressions on each others’ faces – they can all estimate one another’s resolution.

Charon smiles.

Sherlock hesitates … then decides.

“Kill him!” he screams at the Bobbie holding Sutton.

“Put the gun down!” warns Lestrade.

“Kill him!!” repeats Sherlock.

The policeman lowers his weapon.

The men on the boat are about to push off, grins on their faces.

Sherlock grabs the revolver out of the nervous Bobbie’s hand and jams it into the Sutton’s head again, grinding it into his temple.

“Observe!” he screams at Charon.

The leader on the steam launch turns and sees who now holds the weapon. He looks into the wild boy’s face and doesn’t see what he hopes for: the gray eyes are like steel, there is anger and retribution in them … absolute conviction … and a sort of greed. This lad will kill his friend right before his eyes.

“The brain is like tomato aspic!” shouts the incensed youth at the fiend. “Should I unload this piece of steel into it at the velocity my weapon can summon … it shall rip his precious jelly apart!”

“And I shall have you hanged for murder!” growls Lestrade.

But Sherlock doesn’t even look at the senior detective, doesn’t care. He thinks of his dead mother, killed by a crook, of the victim of the Whitechapel murder, of Irene nearly crippled by another fiend, of Monsieur Mercure, of all the people these devils and others like them have hurt, indeed killed. He thinks of all the evil that is perpetrated by such villains every day, ravaged upon so many decent people by the few. He thinks of his reward.

He cocks the revolver, digs it into the man’s ear, and addresses the boat.

“This will be my pleasure!”

But the bang doesn’t sound.

“Hold it!” shouts the gang leader on the steam launch. His shoulders sag. He turns to the others and signals for them to return to shore. Soon they are all disembarking, hands held high.

In the cobblestone lane, gathered in a huge semi-circle around the inferno and the unfolding drama near the water, a massive crowd of London’s citizens bursts into applause, whistles, and foot stomping. On the water, the night explodes with fog horns and exclamations of admiration.

Sherlock Holmes looks around. For the first time in his memory, he feels a sense of pure happiness seep through him. It seems to almost reach his soul.

WHERE CREDIT IS ALWAYS DUE

S
herlock remains mute all the way back to Scotland Yard. It isn’t because others are insisting he stay silent. Indeed, Lestrade questions him aggressively as aggressively as he dares given the glowing admiration for this anonymous boy that was evident in the huge Rotherhithe crowd. What the senior detective really wants to do is grab the lad by the throat and throttle him, not only for his reckless, uncalled-for actions that may have made the Force look too violent in the eyes of some of the spectators, but also in order to shake the entire story of this mystifying robbery and murder out of him. Inspector Lestrade still has no idea how it transpired. All he knows is that the two crimes are apparently connected, that the entire Brixton Gang is suddenly in custody … that young Sherlock Holmes is about to get every ounce of the credit … and a five-hundred-pound reward.

“I shall withdraw the offer of money … if you do not come clean!”

But the boy knows that is hogwash. It isn’t time to speak yet. He is holding back his story and his emotions with an enormous effort of will.

They move slowly on horseback to Scotland Yard, the reporter on a horse nearby, his presence a large factor in keeping the Inspector from thrashing the boy. Lestrade fumes as they trot onward.

At the office, Sherlock sits down to explain, making sure the journalist is poised behind Lestrade’s desk with his ink bottle and pen at the ready. The detective and his son have their ears cocked, and the door tightly closed.

Holmes commences to explain, starting from the very beginning, with his observation of the doctored trapeze bar, moving on to what he learned from and about The Swallow and the other two acrobats, how he eliminated them from suspicion, how he noticed that the inside of the vault could be viewed only from Mercure’s position, how he uncovered that the Brixton Gang knew The Swallow, met the guard, and then put a potion into his drink, how the whole thing was a devilishly clever crime of misdirection, secretly perpetrated by ruthless professionals while the attention of everyone in the Crystal Palace was directed elsewhere, a chaos created by their own handiwork.

He does all this without once mentioning Malefactor. Their differences are between the two of them.

Sherlock is almost done when a Bobbie knocks on the door. Lestrade motions to Holmes to keep quiet. He opens the door and the Peeler hands him a note. As he reads, a resplendent smile spreads across his face. It worries Sherlock.

When the detective lifts his eyes from the page, he is glaring at the boy.

“You,” Lestrade says gruffly, pointing a finger directly at him, “leave.”

“But I haven’t finished the –”

“Leave!”

“With all due respect sir,” argues the reporter, pulling his glasses from his face to focus on the Inspector, “he must finish his narrative.”

Lestrade steps toward him, the smile back on his lips. In fact, he is trying to contain it so he won’t burst into a laugh. He leans over the journalist and whispers into his ear. An expression of wonder comes over the bespectacled man’s face.

“Say nothing,” says Lestrade, “or I shan’t take you with me.”

In seconds Lestrade, the reporter, and two Bobbies are briskly leaving the police station and Sherlock Holmes is being shoved through the door. Outside, he is thrown onto the cobblestones. The London sky has begun to spit rain.

“My reward!” he cries.

The senior detective and the others climb into a police coach that has been brought up from the nearby stables, but the younger Lestrade hesitates to get in, standing near the fallen boy. He has a look of indecision on his face and moves to offer a hand and help Sherlock up.

“Son!” shouts his father, leaning out the window, looking irritated. “Are you coming with us or not?”

“But, Master Holmes helped us so much. He deserves –”

“This!” says Lestrade, pulling a banknote from his pocket and tossing it out the coach window. It lands on the
fallen boy. “Are you coming with us?” the Inspector demands once more, glaring at his son. “We shan’t wait.”

The young man hesitates and turns back to his father. In the coach he looks out the window at Sherlock Holmes, who is still on the cobblestones, now in a sitting position, looking stunned. A dirty five-pound note lies in his lap.

What happened?

AWAKENING

S
herlock sleeps on the streets that night. He doesn’t want to go back to Sigerson Bell until he gets the whole reward.
But when will that be?
His brain is usually able to understand or at least grapple with any problem with which it is presented, but he can’t unravel this one – Lestrade’s actions are a mystery.

In the morning he makes his way to Montague Street. It isn’t where he wants to be. He’d rather confront the police again at Scotland Yard, or even track down
The Times
reporter.

But at this moment, he just wants comfort. His mother is gone, so affection must come from Irene Doyle. He wishes he didn’t need her, wishes he was tougher, but on this morning, he simply isn’t. He feels as if he were that hot-air balloon that
The Flying Man
used a few years ago to sail high above the Cremorne Gardens, only to have it suddenly deflate and drop him to the earth like a stone … where he died, spit upon a church steeple, of all things.

He wants to see Irene’s wonderful face again, hear her strong and caring voice, and tell her that he is sorry, that he needs her friendship.