Death in the Air (7 page)

They had eventually appeared: a little bandit army stretched out inconspicuously through the thick Leicester Square throngs, looking for targets, Grimsby and Crew in the lead, Malefactor in the shadows.

Irene had been watching too, sitting on one of the square’s park benches, brought here by cab, situated close enough to others so that it would appear she wasn’t alone. Today she wears a plain, brown cotton dress – no crinoline to make the skirt billow out – a gray shawl, and dark bonnet, almost disguised as a working-class girl.

“Facts?” responds Malefactor, put out by Sherlock’s demand.

“That is the only way to proceed with any investigation. It is what a scientist does. Gather facts first –”

“and then eliminate all the things that aren’t possible, and find the plausible,” says Irene, finishing his sentence. She has heard him say this before, in the days when they were much happier with each other.

“Precisely,” he says.

“And what facts are you after now?” asks Malefactor, turning his back and sitting down on the cobblestones, pretending indifference. Sherlock’s questions about planned “accidents” in the entertainment world during their previous encounter had revealed that the boy was interested in the Mercure incident. But that’s all he knows.

“Intimate details about dangerous performances and their practitioners.”

Malefactor is uncomfortable. “I have told you what I know of circus performers.” He lowers his voice. “This is one of the very few things about which I am not encyclopedic.” His eyes shift toward Irene to see her reaction.

“But
El Niño
is.”

“El Niño?” says Malefactor, turning to Sherlock.

“The same; star of the Royal Alhambra stage. He must know the Mercures, and all about their world.”

“Wouldn’t a lesser star do?”

“I need to contact someone of the Mercures’ stature. In fact, someone even more celebrated. Someone to whom I can be sure The Swallow has spoken.”

“But how might
you
get so close as to actually speak with El Niño?” sneers the crime boss.

“Just get me in and I’ll do the rest. Steal me a ticket. In the pit will do fine.”

Malefactor pauses. A dismissive expression passes over his face, but then he remembers Irene, standing by his side. He knows Sherlock is using the situation. Can Malefactor
produce what is needed, or will he be forced to admit defeat in front of Irene? A plan to first impress her, and then convert her, has been growing in Malefactor’s mind. It is a long and complicated one, and there can’t be any hitches along the way. But Sherlock Holmes has him for now. He has made a clever chess move. Malefactor appreciates it. In fact, he admires it.

“I shall get you in, Jew-boy” he says, smiling.

As eight o’clock approaches, Sherlock emerges into Leicester Square clothed in dazzling evening dress: a black tailcoat and trousers with silk tie, a stovepipe hat … and a mustache. His outfit is courtesy of the Trafalgar Square Irregulars, a prized selection from their vast store of stolen goods, taken some months before during a daring raid on a drunken gentleman, walking alone after a night on the town. They had left him staggering about on the roadway in his underclothing. The mustache is a concoction of horsehair and glue. Thank goodness the boy is tall.

Stealing the ticket was no great task for Malefactor’s light-fingered lads. The boss dispatched Grimsby and Crew while Sherlock was being dressed and they returned before he was done.

It’s a pass for the pit stalls: one bob and sixpence.

Sherlock makes his way onto the north-west corner of the square. Along this side are rows of big, four-storey stone buildings jammed together with canopies overhanging the wide footpaths and advertisements plastered on exteriors. Most of these places were white or at least brown when they were built, but they are now streaked with black from the coal soot in the air. The south and west sides of the square have similar-sized buildings though no two insides are the same. Leicester Square is a mix of London: a cornucopia of its delights and seamier side. There are museums showing human and animal oddities, hotels with foreign names, soup kitchens, and little exhibition halls for every kind of entertainment known to man. Tall elm trees shade the central park, which is encircled by a short black-iron fence that sprouts gas lamps on poles. They have just been kindled by the lamplighters and a moist, foggy glow sits over the square. People are here looking to be entertained: dandies with white silk scarves, and scores of women (most of a less-than-genteel sort), wearing loud dresses with necks and ankles exposed; many are in makeup, apparently unmoved by the queen’s belief that it cheapens the fairer sex. There is a buzz in the air. An organ-grinder plays while his monkey dances, hawkers invite customers into their dens, and newly acquainted couples sit on the benches, conversing in soft tones.

Over everything, on the east side of the square, looms the stunning Royal Alhambra. Sherlock stares up at it as if it were the Moorish palace in Spain that it is modeled upon. He can barely believe that he is about to enter: Wilber and Rose Holmes could never have afforded it, nor would they
have condoned it. It was here that Leotard had virtually invented the flying trapeze and enthralled every woman who watched his straining muscular form, where Blondin had walked the high wire after he returned from Niagara Falls, where Ethardo ascended his dangerous, winding, spiral path on a ball to the ceiling. The cream-colored stone structure ascends in six magnificent storeys, two minaret towers reaching to the sky on either side of the roof, and a regal dome at the center. Arched windows look down on customers alighting from lines of cabs and a mass of revelers entering the doors. Signs announce the attractions in big, bright letters:
THE FLYING FARINIS!
and
FARINI AND SON IN MARVELOUS FLIGHTS!
and
EL NIñO THE BULLET BOY!
The Alhambra can hold nearly five thousand people.

As Sherlock hands over his round, tin ticket and passes into the lobby, he feels like he is walking on air, rather like the man who once strolled upside down on the ceiling of the Alhambra’s dome. Though he enjoys the atmosphere of anticipation in this exterior room, he rushes through it, past the pack of patrons, a thin bark floating in a sea of gaudy clothes, intent on entering the infamous inner auditorium for the first time.

He is not disappointed. In fact, it nearly makes him faint.

It seems like there’s a whole world under the gigantic dome: pink and red and gold, everything sparkling in the gaslight jets. Balconies rise up in three curved tiers to the hundred-foot ceiling. At the far end is a proscenium arch and stage with a shimmering black curtain, awaiting
show time. Long rows of tables, with bottles of wine and champagne on white tablecloths, run along the floor toward the stage, garishly dressed people already seated there, anxious for the spectacles to begin.

Sherlock staggers to the rowdy pit near the front, finding an inconspicuous place among the many standing spectators. These people aren’t dressed quite as well, and some of the men have painted women on their arms whom the boy is sure are not their wives or even fiancées.

Before long there is a roar from the crowd and a sixty-piece orchestra begins to play Sherlock is taken aback by the power of all the instruments sounding together. He has never been so close to such a band. He listens for the violins but their sweet sounds are drowned in the swirling, up-tempo waltz that fills the mighty room and echoes in the dome.

Every night there is a parade of entertainment here and Sherlock is transfixed by this one. First, there is a famous singer named Alfred Vance who belts out hilarious songs, then beautiful dancers wearing skimpy dresses raise their legs very high to smashing drum beats and shouts from the crowd, the Fakir of Oolu suspends a lady in midair, Oscar Slater twirls six hats on sticks at once, and then comes a “ballet” unlike any Sherlock has ever heard of: no one wears elegant dresses, no one dances on their toes, and the music is far from refined. Instead, it is a cast of hundreds in a tale of perilous adventure, a loud and riveting display.

Sherlock is exhausted by it all. He feels hotter and sweatier under his evening suit than he has felt all week.

Many emotions course through him as he is carried along by the sights and sounds that fill the music hall.

But he knows that something even better is yet to come. The Farinis will close the show. They will fly directly above the heads of the audience. Sherlock can hardly wait.

When it begins, it exceeds his expectations.

The gaslights dim. A drumroll sounds. A trapeze apparatus lowers magically until it hangs halfway between the ceiling and the floor, and a long narrow net falls into place about thirty feet above the tables. Silence descends.

Suddenly, El Niño is in the air. He sails noiselessly on a single swinging trapeze in a blood-red costume. His curly blond locks flow behind him. His grace and strength are incredible as he builds momentum, almost reaching the ceiling of the dome, eliciting gasps from below. But then the drums begin again, loud and sinister this time, and suddenly Signor Farini is seen across the auditorium on another trapeze.

“There he is!” someone cries.

Farini’s black goatee and mustache contrast perfectly with his scarlet costume, the big muscles in his legs bulge in his silk leotards, his bare arms are thick and sinewy. Sherlock tries to shout but the sound catches in his throat. He has seen this famous man once before on Fleet Street near London Bridge, strutting along with his protégé like a
dark-eyed stallion, confidence exuding from him. Sherlock had been entranced. Now … here is
The Great Farini
in the air above him! This is the athlete who challenged Blondin on a high rope above Niagara Falls, perhaps the most fearless, inventive acrobat on earth, and the creator of El Niño, the boy who can fly.

Farini swings toward the ceiling too, and because of his size and power, it seems as though he will sail from his trapeze and ascend through the roof. The orchestra is playing “The Farini Waltz” and El Niño and his mentor are synchronizing their movements. But then the master makes a sudden move into a sitting position and … his bar breaks! He starts to fall and Sherlock’s cry is smothered by the screams of many others. But Farini isn’t really falling – the bar hasn’t broken. He is executing a sudden drop of a few feet, and grabs the bar with the backs of his knees to hang upside down. Then he starts swinging, his eyes cast across the auditorium toward El Niño. There, the “Bullet Boy” makes a mighty swing and crosses to a trapeze bar directly over the center of the hall, catching it with one hand and winking at the audience. Then he takes another swing, two, three … and lets go!

He flies like a falcon, somersaults … and catches his father’s hands. Farini gives him three swings and flings him into the air again, back toward his own bar, which he catches. Once more they try the trick, but this time with two somersaults, and finally … three.

Sherlock is ecstatic. He watches in wonder as the Farinis perform more extraordinary feats, in a stunning
display of strength and speed: El Niño taps on a drum with both hands, holding on to the trapeze by the nape of his neck while he plays; Signor Farini lies down between two bars and projects the boy straight into the air with his remarkable stomach muscles.