9
The fire had, as it seemed to me, destroyed many of the answers to the mystery which led to the “Siege of Sidney Street.” The most intriguing, if the press were to be believed, was what had become of the sinister and cold-blooded figure of “Peter the Painter.” Had he died in the fire or was he safely back in Paris, or Berlin, or Moscow? He was certainly real enough. He had a history of subversion and assassination in the police dossiers of the world. He also had a future in the revolutionary government of the Soviet Union, though Sherlock Holmes was one of the very few who predicted that. No one could agree as to who commanded him or who obeyed him, let alone in what disguise he might be found. In England, it seemed that he had come and gone, died perhaps, in the few weeks following the Houndsditch murders.
Because I had seen him, I was pestered a little by the press but I could tell them nothing they did not know already. I thought he was one more paragon of evil who had set out to destroy Sherlock Holmes-and had failed.
So I sat down to compose our narrative of the Anarchist uprising. Holmes was out and it was a fine February afternoon with the rime of the frost still clinging to the grass of the Regent’s Park. Being a Saturday, our landlady Mrs Hudson had gone to visit her sister in Dulwich. Even Mary Jane, the maid-of-all-work, had gone walking with her “young man.” The house was quiet, the traffic subdued, and I had begun.
On a morning in early December, three years before the Great War, Mrs Hedges brought us the unusual story of a yellow canary…
I had written a page or two more when there was a ring at the front door. I cursed to myself but it is a “rule of business,” as Holmes says, to leave no summons unanswered. I put down my pen, descended the stairs, and opened the front door.
“Mr Hoolmes! Mr Share-lock Hoolmes!”
I froze with terror-and it was no cliché-or should I say my heart leapt to my throat. There was no mistaking who he was. He had not died in the fires of Sidney Street, whatever the authorities might hope. I thought helplessly that my Army revolver was locked in the desk upstairs and that I was alone in the house. Perhaps if I could make him believe that the landlady or the maid was within earshot he would not dare to murder me…
“You are alone, I think. But whoever you are, you are not Mr Share-lock Hoolmes. Perhaps when I tell you my name, Piatkoff, you will comprendre.”
It was the same coat with astrakhan collar, the same broad-brimmed hat. But now the voice was quiet and a fine scorn animated his features with his dark neat-cut hair, the aristocratic profile and beaked nose.
Had I known of his visit in advance, I could have prepared myself. For the moment the shock was so great that the power of speech was beyond me. He stood up a little taller, his head went back a little and he seemed about to utter a laugh of diabolical triumph.
Then, as if in my unconscious mind the entire mystery of the past few weeks was revealed, I exclaimed,
“Holmes!”
He laughed, drew breath, and then laughed again. It was not the satanic cackle of Piatkoff but the ebullient chuckle of my friend.
“Holmes, what the devil…”
“My dear Watson-I could not resis…” Laughter stifled him on the doorstep for a moment. “I could not resist one more little impersonation. I could not forgo the sight of your face when… Surely, my dear old fellow, you noticed that when Piatkoff materialised before you on previous occasions, I was always conveniently elsewhere? Truly, truly, you see but you do not observe! ”
I was so shaken that I simply stood back and watched him go up the stairs. He shrugged off the astrakhan-trimmed coat and sent the hat skimming on to the rack. The greasepaint that had subtly flushed his complexion was wiped off. The wads that had heightened those cheeks were pulled from above the gums, he disappeared into his room and disposed of the gum arabic and gutta percha which had made the alteration of his nose possible, and he peeled away the fine set of whiskers.
By the time that he returned I had almost finished the glass of whisky which the occasion demanded. Wiping his hands on one of Mrs Hudson’s clean towels, he remarked,
“You must save some of the blame for Brother Mycroft, Watson, for it was his apartment that I used as my dressing room. ”
“Your brother knows the truth of this charade?”
“Indeed.”
“And Lestrade?”
“The truth is not something that one always tells to a susceptible fellow like Lestrade.”
“But to what purpose?”
He sighed and sat down.
“No one in the Anarchist movement here is certain of Piatkoff. Nor of his appearance, for he has so many. Nor of his voice or manner, for it changes in a moment. Nor of his whereabouts. There are so many spies, so many Anarchist movements spying on one another, that he does not advertise when or where he comes and goes. He is like the elusive Scarlet Pimpernel, though far less amiable.”
“But he cannot be so secret.”
Holmes reached for his pipe.
“Secrecy is all to these people. The names of the few are not known to the many, much less their disguises. They cannot betray, even if they wished to. Piatkoff is still in Paris but most of the Anarchist group in London -and the Metropolitan Police-believe him to be in England, dead or alive.”
“But to what end?”
“Mycroft and I devised a plan which we divulged to no other person. It hinged upon making the press, the police, and even you, my dear fellow, believe that Piatkoff was in London and that I in my impersonation was he. We were careful to deal only with those who had never met him. Sidney Street was the arsenal of those who sought European revolution and whose first weapon was assassination.”
“Assassination of whom?”
He pulled a face.
“I was told more of assassination than I expected. The list includes the King, the Prime Minister, and Winston Churchill as Home Secretary, who therefore commands the nation’s police force. Among many other names, my own appears. I confess I should have been disappointed had it not been so. You, for some reason, are omitted. My performance as Piatkoff in the street below us and the notoriety which the press gave me for that were of great assistance. The search which you and your two policeman undertook through the streets of Stepney was invaluable. I promise you, it was essential that you should all have believed in my masquerade. There are spies everywhere. Imagine trying to get Lestrade to act a part. He would not last five minutes.”
“You bought firearms from E. M. Reilly & Co in New Oxford Street and had them delivered to a contact at the Anarchist Club?”
“Indeed, several very efficient rifles of a kind which the trade of assassination thrives upon. You saw them in action at Sidney Street. One of them I managed to rescue during my visit to the burning house. The comrades come by hand-guns quite easily but they are remarkably short of rifles. I do not believe they possessed one until my gifts to them. Rifles, they believe quite correctly, are ‘the weapons of assassination.”’
“But this is madness!” I said.
He shook his head.
“No, Watson, this is cold and absolute sanity. Mycroft and I agreed that I should become their quartermaster. They would look to me for their supplies and they could not do that without telling me of their needs. By knowing of their needs, I should learn their plans and the objects of their campaign of assassination. I should become not their servant but their master.”
“And Lestrade?”
“Lestrade knows nothing of this and never will. As it proves, the charade is over.”
I tried to compose myself.
“Let me have this straight. You supplied these men with live ammunition and rifles, which as it turns out were used in an attempt to assassinate the Home Secretary in Sidney Street?”
“They were supplied for that purpose but we had no idea that Sidney Street would be the occasion. Mr Churchill, of course, was bound to be the target in the circumstances.”