“A fraud,” I cried indignantly, “a damned fraud! And yet tomorrow he’s going to tell the world the monster exists and he’ll have witnesses to back up his story. It’s incredible!”
“I’m afraid that’s the one thing it won’t be, Watson. Moxton’s theory of the nature of truth is becoming all too credible. You read about a thing — therefore it is. Especially if there’s a large picture to go with it. And I think we may safely deduce that tomorrow’s Clarion will carry precisely such a photograph. In fact, I’d be prepared to wager that front page was already set and waiting some time before we were witness to his little charade. If he sincerely believes that a word can mean what he chooses it to mean and if Confucius is correct in his assumption that a picture is worth a thousand words … I leave the mathematics to you.”
“You mean that the perception is as good as the truth?”
“Better, Watson, better. Particularly if people are given the perception they would like to see. No, I’m afraid that in the future people like our friend — with the aid of sufficient funds and the available technology — will be able to provide the so-called ‘people’ with a version of the world they would prefer to live in. And if the uncomfortable reality should occasionally leak through, well … twenty-four hours and another headline will conveniently cover it up again.”
“But Holmes, if you’re even remotely right, this is insupportable. We must do something — but what?”
“I’m very much afraid, old friend, that we must revisit Reichenbach and finish the job I had foolishly assumed was over seven years ago.”
I must have looked rather like one of the fish I had been singularly unsuccessful in catching earlier but Holmes was kind enough to make no mention of my open mouthed stare. Instead, as he swung himself up into the driver’s seat and helped me up beside him, he merely added in a conversational tone.
“I had assumed you realised that Moxton is our friend Moriarty? Now, I believe I promised you a decent dinner?”
CHAPTER THREE
“Moriarty?”
“Yes, Watson — Moriarty. If you repeat his name one more time in that tone of voice it will make a round twenty times of asking.”
“But the world knows that Moriarty died at the Reichenbach Falls …”
“Just as the world knew I died at the Reichenbach Falls — except that now it knows that I didn’t And if you’re not going to eat that last piece of Stilton, you might edge it this way. The fresh air seems to have given me quite an appetite.” Abstractedly I did as he asked. “But how did you spot him, Holmes?” Now my friend grew serious at last. “I admit, Watson, I have had the advantage of you. I sensed his presence, just as I did all those years ago. Lots of little things began to add up again — a case of arson here, a murder or an industrial dispute there … all the individual threads admittedly tenuous but slowly coming together to weave a pattern, a web of disruption and evil. At first I could not believe it — perhaps because I did not want to — but then I was forced to face the fact that I had seen such a pattern before and only one man was capable of weaving it. One Napoleon of Crime is perhaps inevitable in a lifetime — but two?”
“Then increasingly, the face of the spider in the middle of the web began to clear. The name of John Moxton began to crop up too often for either comfort or coincidence. Moxton or one of his associates. You noticed ‘Professor James’ this afternoon?”
“Fellow with the box of tricks? Certainly. Why?”
“‘Professor James’ is no more a professor than you are, Watson. He used to go by the name of Kurt Krober. At least he did when he was one of Moriarty’s henchmen. And if those wires were connected to anything, I’ll eat Lestrade’s bowler hat.”
“Which reminds me.” He took out a folded paper from an inside pocket. “This cable came from Lestrade while we were out enjoying ourselves. I asked him to contact my old friend, Wilson Hargreave of the New York Police Bureau to find out all that is known about the mysterious Mr. Moxton. Let’s see what he has to say …”
He unfolded the several sheets and scanned them quickly. “Ah, most interesting. Let me see … John Moxton, born New York City, June 1839 … etc … etc … entered family publishing business … takes over in 1887 … quite a modest little enterprise by the look of it and Moxton appears to do little to change its fortunes … ah, here we are, Watson. 1893 Moxton apparently suffers a complete breakdown quite unanticipated by his colleagues and friends. The man is a widower with only one sister living …”
“Alicia’s mother?”
“Quite so, Watson,” Holmes shot me a thoughtful glance. “Miss Creighton’s mother and herself a widow. Mother and daughter had not seen Moxton for many years, since they lived in Europe. Moxton, therefore, had, in effect, no close family. He was apparently whisked away to a sanatorium and kept in total seclusion under the care of his personal physician, Julius Minton …”
Holmes turned the page. “A year later he returns to New York fully recovered. His co-workers are impressed by the new energy he now brings to his work. Many of them describe him as ‘a new man’. From that point the business takes off dramatically. Moxton apparently turns into a veritable tycoon, arranging financial deals that transform this rather sleepy little publishing house into a force to be reckoned with …” He skimmed the rest of the report. “And the rest, as our American friends are fond of saying, is history. Exit John Moxton. Enter the new John Moxton …”
“But what makes you so sure he’s Moriarty, Holmes? Admittedly I only caught a glimpse of him at Reichenbach but I was left with an impression of a tall thin man, almost cadaverous …”
“Much easier for a thin man to become a fat one, Watson, than for a naturally heavy man to lose weight — as I think you will agree?”
I hastened to change the subject Mrs. Hudson’s good plain cooking was taking its toll on my waist line and I suddenly realised that when I had met Miss Creighton earlier I was conscious of holding in my stomach. Such is male vanity! Fortunately Holmes was in no mood to be diverted from the trail. “And, of course, a clever tailor can add immeasurably to the desired effect.”
“But the face? The man looks nothing like Moriarty.”
“Yes, indeed, the face …”
Holmes pondered the question as he took out one of his favourite pipes and filled it with some foul-smelling concoction. Not to be outdone, I produced my own pipe and soon my Arcadia mixture was at least providing a protective cloud. “There are only two men in the world who presently have the skill to reconstruct a face with that degree of subtlety. Soon, I have no doubt, such cosmetic surgery will become a veritable industry and we shall all be able to change our appearance as often as we change our clothes. But today …?
“I would have said Duchamps of Utrecht … particularly skilled with the eyes. You remember we ran across him a couple of years ago in the case of the politician, the lighthouse and the trained cormorant — and by the way, old fellow, when are you going to get around to writing that one up? It was not without its points of interest. Where was I? Ah, yes, Duchamps … I believe we can rule him out. I hear he is serving the pleasure of the Belgian authorities … which leaves us with Zuckerman of Boston … Yes, the nose has all the hallmarks of Zuckerman’s work and, unless I miss my guess, we shall find that Moxton just happened to be taken to Zuckerman’s clinic after his ‘breakdown.’”
“So Moriarty becomes Moxton?”
“Moriarty becomes Moxton and brings all his considerable financial resources to bear using the real Moxton’s publishing company as a base of operations. Let us not forget, Watson, that when his empire was supposedly broken up and scattered to the four winds, no one really knew precisely where he had secreted his ill-gotten gains. There were twenty known bank accounts apart from the Crédit Lyonnais and it is reasonable to believe these were only the tip of the iceberg. It would be a simple matter to channel them deviously back to the new centre of the web.”