“‘Come, Holmes,’ my friend was speaking again and I could hear the voice of Moriarty, ‘surely you are enough of a gentleman to administer the coup de grâce?’ I raised your revolver — the revolver I have so often bidden you carry — and fired — twice. But I freely confess I could not bring myself to fire at him. Then, as if on cue, Big Ben began to toll midnight. He stood there for a moment longer and then he said quietly, almost sadly — ‘The question is which is to be master — that’s all. Humpty Dumpty, Holmes — Humpty Dumpty.’ Then he seemed to let himself fall. By the time I reached the spot there was no sign of him.”
“Humpty Dumpty had a great fall …”
It was our young friend speaking the words that were in all our minds. Alicia looked down into the dark swirling waters carried in on the evening tide. “And I doubt whether all the King’s horses and all the King’s men could put him together again.”
I looked at the four of us, as bedraggled a bunch as one could hope to see this side of Limehouse. We had survived so much these past few hours and now, when we had so much in which to rejoice, we stood there with a distinct air of anti-climax in the air.
“Well, Holmes,” I said with an air of forced jolity, “you’ve settled the oldest score of all.” My friend looked at me sombrely.
“So I have, old fellow, so I have.”
Then, like a host at a party suddenly remembering his manners, he turned to our young friend, who looked as though he were ready to embark on the whole affair all over again, and said quietly — “And you, sir, we are greatly in your debt. If ever you are in need, Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson will be at your service.”
“Indeed, indeed,” I added heartily. “But my dear fellow, we don’t even know your name?”
The young man pushed back an errant strand of fair hair and boyishly stood to attention.
“Churchill, sir. Winston Churchill. And I promise you, you will hear from me.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“You will forgive my saying so, Holmes, but your demeanour these past few days has hardly been that of a man who has pulled off the biggest coup of his career.”
My friend and I were strolling along the Embankment, having spent the past several hours at Scotland Yard. The day was bright and clear as London went about its daily business, quite unaware — and not for the first time — of the debt it owed to the man at my side.
“You might fool all the people most of the time, as I believe one of those American Presidents was fond of saying,” I continued, “but I know you too well.”
“Good old Watson,” Holmes gave me a brief smile, which was soon replaced by a frown.
“No, I must confess that like Hamlet — since we seem to be exchanging quotations — in my heart there was a kind of fighting that would not let me sleep. I have always felt Moriarty as an elemental force and the vibrations should have stopped, but they singularly fail to do so. How do you explain that, good Doctor?”
“But for heaven’s sake, Holmes,” I riposted, “we’ve just seen the man’s body.”
“We’ve just seen a cadaver that has been formally identified as Moriarty’s body. Conveniently washed up at high tide, wearing clothing of the kind he was wearing, to be sure. Inconveniently so damaged about the head that the face was unrecognisable.”
“Probably bumped against the pilings or perhaps a passing boat?” I suggested. “A few days in the water does nothing for a fellow’s complexion. I’ve seen enough of them in my time to know that.”
“Possibly, Watson, possibly. And yet …”
“And yet — what?”
“I feel we have been thrown a bone, old fellow. Our techniques are still so crude. Some day a pathologist will be able to identify a body without possibility of error by something as small as a single fingerprint, a drop of blood — even its teeth. In some ways we are still groping through the Middle Ages.”
As he spoke I had the image of the second gruesome sight we had seen that morning. Steel’s corpse had been washed up a day or so earlier much further down river and that contorted face, frozen in a smile of eternal fear, was one I should recall to the end of my days. The denizens of the water had already begun their grim work. Holmes, I noticed, had give the body only a cursory glance. For him Steel was a footnote to history — a fact to be filed in his commonplace book. I wondered which of us had his priorities right.
Then I realised that he was still talking about Moriarty’s remains. “But did you not spot the one thing that should give us pause?”
“And what was that, pray?”
“The bullet wound in the shoulder.”
“Well, there you are, Holmes, my point precisely. You saw me hit him in that accursed passage way and this morning you saw the medico remove a bullet of exactly the same gauge from the wound. QED.”
“Quod non erat demonstrandum, I’m afraid. I have never doubted that an Eley’s No. 2 was an excellent argument, but the bullet we saw just now was fired from a point considerably nearer than yours. The burn marks on the flesh tell that much. But, more to the point, it was fired after death.”
Before I could argue, he continued: “You may remember my telling you that in my student days I gained a certain notoriety for conducting experiments which some of my colleagues considered somewhat macabre. They consisted of ascertaining the degree of bruising one could inflict on the corpse. I can assure you the answer is — very little. No, old fellow, this bullet was fired into the arm of a dead man and I very much doubt that his name was Moriarty.”
“But why didn’t you say something, if you’re so sure?”
The cold grey eyes left mine and appeared to be searching for something just over the horizon. Whatever it was he sought, I had the clear impression that he saw nothing in between. “This game, whatever it is, is Moriarty’s and mine and must be played out as the pieces chance to fall. You are the one person, Watson, I can expect to understand that.”
“We have gained the world a breathing space, no more. The forces of unrest that Moriarty sought to tap will not vanish on the breeze. They will find their voice and it will be a harsh voice, I fear — one that will seem to shout down reason for a time. I fear our world has taken its values too much for granted and there are those all too ready to put them to the test. If our way of life prevails — which I hope and pray it shall — it will be stronger and purer for having gone through the flame.”
Then, as so often, his mood changed abruptly.
“However, we have achieved something for our efforts, old fellow. We have taken this hand, at least, and Moriarty must think again. The Clarion is muted — for good, I suspect Did you notice the newspaper stand we passed a few minutes ago? Every paper but our friend’s seditious medium.”
“I should think so, too.” I interjected, remembering the scandal of a day or two earlier, when the police had impounded the Clarion’s entire morning edition for November 5th with the headline: ‘PARLIAMENT RISES! HUNDREDS OF MP’S DIE IN NEW GUY FAWKES BLAST! CHAOS GRIPS CAPITAL!’ “Tower of London’s the place for those fellers.”
“Yes, I’m afraid our friend did o’erleap himself a little there.”
We walked a little further in companionable silence, then Holmes said — “I suppose it must be admitted that the case was not without its points of interest or, indeed, amusement. The sight of Lestrade tucked away in the cleaning cupboard with a ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign around his neck will occur to me now every time I see him. At least he retrieved his hat unscathed. That is his one great consolation. And I suppose the fact that, once again, I have allowed the world to believe he solved the case. And I have a feeling that you found at least one other, did you not, Watson?” In someone else his covert glance would have amounted to teasing.