Nicholas Meyer (22 page)

We pulled into the drive of 76 Wallenstein Strasse, our horses streaming with foam, to find the Viennese Constabulary aimlessly patrolling the grounds. Dr. Schultz's telephone call had alerted them and they had arrived by motor launch. A tall, straight sergeant, with white-blond hair and alert blue eyes, was in command. He strolled quickly over as we debarked and addressed my friend with a rigid salute.

"Herr Holmes? We have just arrived, but the house is closed and no one appears within." His English was studied but serviceable.

"As I surmised," the detective responded with a disconsolate sigh. "We are too late." He glanced about moodily.

"This is not a reflection on us, I hope," the sergeant said anxiously. "We got here so soon as we were notified."

"No, no, the fault is none of yours, though your men have made a fine mess of the ground. It could not be worse if a troop of Uhlan had passed over it. Still, we may as well have a look." So saying, he started up the slope towards the house, the eager sergeant at his elbow.

"Herr Holmes, your reputation is well-known to us and the prefect has ordered me to place my men at your disposal."

"Really?" Holmes stopped, impressed. "It's a pity they don't share your prefect's views at the Yard," he added, and began walking again, his eyes fixed on the muddied lawn before him. I heard him mutter something about how it was hard that no prophet was ever regarded as such in his own land.

Freud made as if to follow, but I laid a restraining hand upon his arm and explained in low tones that at such times we should only be in Holmes's way. He nodded and remained where he stood.

Holmes's survey of the house was confined to a hasty examination of the area by the
porte cochère
, during which he trotted back and forth, sometimes in circles, uttering little yelps and whines of satisfaction, curiosity, or displeasure. At such moments his resemblance to a hound was most

remarkable; his keen features, particularly the aquiline nose, the slung-forward posture of his body, and the shambling gait, all tended to suggest some dog intent on picking up the scent of its prey. But for the magnifying glass which he now whipped out and used to examine the earth, he would have reminded me very much of Toby, casting anxiously about for a lead.

Dr. Freud, the sergeant, and the police watched this performance with differing expressions of incredulity upon their faces; Freud with the absorption in all facets of Holmes that was characteristic of him thus far; the sergeant with dubious professional interest, as one who seeks to learn from a master but who cannot quite bring himself to believe that such bizarre behaviour is meant to do anything but impress observers; his subordinates with open smiles of scepticism. If they knew of Holmes, they knew by hearsay only, and this demonstration meant nothing to them whatever. They suspected it was mere affectation. I could have told them otherwise; that Holmes was capable of extremely affected behaviour on occasion, but that this was assuredly not one of those occasions.

Suddenly he halted, his body quivering over some detail in the ground. He threw himself down upon his face and remained there for some moments, then rose to his full height and rapidly descended the knoll.

"There is every indication they have placed the woman inside a large steamer trunk and are carrying her with them out of the country."

The sergeant was too dumb-founded to speak, so astonished was he by Holmes's methods, but I, who was more familiar with their reputation for accuracy, did not question them.

"But Holmes, where he is taking her?"

"Where?" He thought for a moment, then snapped his fingers. "Why to Bavaria, of course! Once he crosses the border he will be as safe as the Emperor in Schönbrunn. Blast!" This was in reference to the spent horses belonging to our cab.

"Come on, Watson!" he called, running down the drive. "We must find other transportation to the nearest terminus!"

Freud, the sergeant, and I—followed at the heels by the confused constables—raced out past the front gate in Holmes's wake and into the placid street.

We almost collided with him around the corner beyond the gate, for he had skidded to a stop, his Inverness flapping wildly about him. At the far end of the street, entering it at an appropriate pace, was an ornate funeral procession—the hearse, the horses, the carriages, and many pedestrian mourners all dressed in obsequious black. Obviously, the demise of some peer or merchant prince had occasioned this awful display of solemnity, but Holmes's eye gleamed as he beheld the lugubrious sight and he sprang forward.

"Holmes!"

He paid us no heed. With the constables, Dr. Freud, and me behind, he sprinted towards a huge dark carriage travelling immediately after the hearse. No doubt it contained the corpse's devastated kinsmen, dukes and marquesses all, but Holmes did not hesitate: he threw himself into the box and seized the reins from the astonished coachman, turning the vehicle out of its place in the procession and cracking the whip.

"Watson!"

The carriage thundered towards us and Holmes waved me aboard. As the vehicle raced by, Freud and the stalwart sergeant and I all managed to find something to cling to, and we hauled ourselves up.

It is not possible to do justice to the expressions of surprise and alarm upon the faces of the occupants within. There were four of them, all dressed in consistent and elegant black: a corpulent gentleman with ruddy complexion and white side-whiskers, whose great size dated from an earlier fashion, was spluttering helplessly; a young girl of sixteen or so, her features partially concealed by a veil, stared at us with wide-eyed wonder behind it; an elderly lady, similarly attired and also corpulent, was so engrossed by her grief that I do not think she noticed our presence at all, but continued to sob copious tears into a tiny black cambric handkerchief. Next to her, attempting both to console the woman and to fathom our presence in the carriage, was a young man I put down as a nephew or a son. Torn between filial duty and perplexity, I judged his effectiveness as opponent or as comforter was problematical at best.

I saw all this in a fraction of the time it takes to relate it. I was busy holding onto and opening the door, and handing up my service revolver to Holmes, that he might prevent the coachman's attempting any mischief.

The sergeant had jumped in on the other side and held his own pistol at the ready, though none of the passengers seemed disposed to interfere, nor did they react when he tried—in his most official tones—

to assure them that this was an emergency and that there was no cause for alarm. No doubt the statement struck them as contradictory.

There being no more room in the coach, Dr. Freud was obliged to stand on the running-board and cling to the window frame for support, his hair flying in the wind.

The rest of the police and mourners were left behind, utterly.

"Which way is the nearest station?" Holmes called down to the sergeant through the trap.

"The Munich train only goes from—"

"Devil take the Munich train! The nearest station, man!"

The sergeant bawled out directions that would get us to the Heiligenstadt
Bahnhof
, and I could hear Holmes cracking the whip once more above me as we hurtled off in search of it.

Except for the noise of the horses and the creaking of tackle and the sobbing of the elderly lady, no one spoke. The sergeant, whose eyes were roving about the interior of the coach, nudged me and jerked his head in the direction he wished me to look. On the inside panel of the door was an elaborate coat-of-arms.

"I hope Herr Holmes knows what he is doing," he remarked under his breath.

"So do I," was Freud's only comment. His head was in the window and the crest on the opposite panel had also engaged his attention.

"Don't worry," I replied, but the suggestion struck me as idiotic under the circumstances and I regretted having uttered it.

After re-crossing the canal, the coach screeched around a sharp right-hand turn, almost—it seemed to me—lifting two of its wheels off the ground in the process. On the left side, as the carriage regained its equilibrium, I could see massive railway yards, and I assumed we were headed for their terminus at the farther end.

This indeed proved to be the case. Some minutes later the coach jerked to a halt and, before we had dismounted, Holmes was on the ground and running towards the building. As we tumbled after him the sergeant again apologized to the surprised party in the coach for our ghastly intrusion on their occasion of grief, and even offered them a crisp salute, in deference to their exalted rank.

We caught up with Holmes, who was already in excited conversation with the stationmaster, having ascertained that Baron Von Leinsdorf had commissioned a special some three hours before.

"We will also commission a special," Holmes informed him, but the man explained that it required some hours' notice to clear the tracks ahead by telegraph and put together such a train. The Baron had evidently ordered his the moment we had left his house at mid-day.

Holmes listened with half an ear while the good man detailed the difficulties involved, his eyes roaming about the platforms until at last they lighted on an engine and a tender with steam already up and one car behind.

"So you see,
mein Herr
—"

"I'm afraid I haven't time to argue," Holmes interrupted, fetching forth my revolver and showing it to him. "We'll have that one right there, if you don't mind." He jerked the weapon in the direction of the engine.

The man was too amazed to react, but the sergeant, gasping for breath, seemed to feel that things had gone too far.

"Now see here—" he began, but my friend was in no mood for conversation.

"Telegraph the frontier," he ordered. "Tell them to stop that train at all costs. Have them use whatever pretext is necessary and search the trunks. The trunks! Hurry, man, every instant is precious. A woman's life and the course of history may depend on your speed!"

The sergeant's training had not equipped him to resist commands so briskly uttered, and he dashed off to execute them without further remonstrance.

"You will be kind enough to accompany us," Holmes informed the stationmaster, and that unhappy individual shrugged and did as he was bid. The engineer was adjusting valves when we approached, but the situation was soon made clear to him. He raised his eyebrows when the stationmaster informed him that his small train was now a special, but prepared to back out of the station.

"Where are we going?" he demanded, seeing that the stationmaster made no move to leave the train.

"Munich," Holmes told him, displaying the revolver. "Doctor," he turned to Freud before the engineer could make reply, "there is no need for you to go with us. Would you sooner depart?"

Sigmund Freud smiled ruefully and shook his head. "I have seen too much of this affair to lose sight of it now," he answered, like the stout-hearted fellow he was, "and I have my own score to settle with the Baron. Besides, that woman is my patient."

"Excellent. Now—"

"But we haven't enough fuel for Munich!" the engineer protested, after a delayed response to the revolver and our destination, "and the points—the points are all wrong!"

"We will cross the first obstacle when necessity compels us to," I replied. "And as for the second, we will switch the points as we go."

"I never get your limits, Watson." Holmes smiled thinly. "Off we go then—full speed, mind."

The engineer and stationmaster regarded one another helplessly. The stationmaster nodded with resignation, the engineer heaved a pessimistic sigh and swung round a wheel, and we were off.

*15*—Pursuit!

Of course it was not possible to proceed at full speed—not getting out of Vienna, at any rate. There were too many points to be switched over, and the track, which ran around the outskirts of the city to the northwest, was not designed for rapid traffic. The first half-hour was quite maddening, therefore, as Dr. Freud and I were constantly obliged to leap from the cab and rush over to change an interminable series of points at the direction of the engineer, whilst Holmes, holding my revolver, saw to it that neither the engineer nor the stationmaster attempted to interfere with our plans.

Night was falling rapidly, which made our task the more difficult. The points were hard to distinguish, and, what was more, we were obliged for safety's sake to change them back again after the train had passed, that no accidents might transpire in our wake.

It would be ironic, indeed, as Holmes pointed out, should our efforts to rescue one woman result in the death of hundreds.

In addition, the points themselves were stiff and it required the strength of two men—on some of them

—to change them over. I was grateful that Freud had elected to accompany us. Without his presence our situation would have proved intolerable.

We worked our way past the Hermalser Park, which, by this time, I was unable to see, and headed south, where we joined the main line leading west from the large terminus where Holmes and I had first arrived in the city what seemed an eon ago. There were endless points to be thrown back and then forth again, and Freud and I were perspiring freely by the time the last one had been accomplished and we were well and truly gaining momentum as we charged into the night.

By this time Holmes had explained the situation to the engineer and the stationmaster, and their attitude underwent a marked change. Instead of working under the threat of a revolver—which Holmes

nevertheless retained in his pocket, lest their sentiments change again—they offered to cooperate to the limit of their capabilities.

The night air was chilly as we sped along, but there was work to be done that helped us to stay warm.

Those who have never engaged in it cannot fully grasp the exhausting nature of coal shovelling. Yet if we were to maintain the speed essential to overtake the Baron's train it was necessary to pack that engine's furnace with fuel.

And pack it we did! As towns and fields flitted by in the blackness, Freud and I shovelled coal as though our lives depended on it. I was the first to give out. The wound in my leg had grown