‘His broad black hat, his baggy trousers, his white tie, his sympathetic smile, and general look of peering and benevolent curiosity... It was not merely that Holmes changed his costume. His expression, his manner, his very soul seemed to vary...’
When I hurried across Victoria station towards our carriage with my bundles and the day’s Globe, Pall Mall, and St. James’s I came across the identical apparition of the Nonconformist preacher with the identical sympathetic smile and general look of peering and benevolent curiosity.
I recalled Holmes saying ‘It is the first quality of a criminal investigator that he should see through a disguise’.
I determined to unmask my friend there and then, only to find myself obliged to pay a loitering street Arab sixpence to retrieve a genuine prelate’s hat and stick from the railway track to which had I dispatched them, yelling out ‘You can’t fool me thrice, sir!’.
On the dot of 11 o’clock, and much to my relief, the engine driver pulled the air whistle. Doors slammed. Steam was applied to the reciprocating pistons, giving life to the 4-4-0 wheels. With a deafening noise the monster began to hurl itself forward. A helpful Mr. Paul Smith at Thomas Cook’s had told us the journey would last one hundred and four hours. Our first meal would be aboard the Dover-Boulogne ferry. Beyond lay Paris and Madrid. Then Algeciras and the steamer to Gibraltar.
I leaned towards Holmes, mischievously intending to enquire whether he’d remembered to bring his Legion of Honour Grand Croix to impress the Sultan, but was met with one of Holmes’s most remarkable characteristics, the power to throw his brain out of action. With the unusual remark ‘Watson, I’ve had quite enough of Petrarch for one day’, my old friend snatched a pair of black night-spectacles from a pocket sewed inside his cavernous coat and popped them on his nose. He stretched out his long, thin legs, loosened his cravat, and lay as dead.
The train gathered speed, clacking its way across the Thames. Victoria Station fell back. I turned my attention to the outside world. St. Paul’s Cathedral came into view, 365 feet high. A cloud-burst earlier that morning had washed the smoke and dust out of the air so that even at a distance the gilt cross sparkled in the sunshine. Spires, dwarfed by the dome, stood out with unnatural clarity.
I surrounded myself with a cloud of newspapers until at last, saturated with the events of the day, I tossed them to one side and stared at my sleeping friend. Next to Holmes lay a long cherry-wood pipe and his favourite clay pipe, a box of vestas, and a pouch with Grosvenor tobacco mixture (at eightpence an ounce). He had opted for a rare Poshteen Long Coat. He had worn it last in our encounter with the ruthless Empire Loyalists of the Kipling League and their President, David Siviter, in The Case of the Dead Boer at Scotney Castle some two years earlier. No-one would accuse Holmes of foppishness. The bulky piece with its many flaps and pockets was accompanied by a regrettable common-or-garden ear-flapped travelling cap showing signs of savage attack by moths, no respecters of ancient relics.
Beside me was a heavily-sealed document ‘for the attention of Commander Hewitt’ delivered to the train and passed to me by Holmes with the words ‘Do oblige me when you have time’. The succinct address ‘Bankside’ indicated it had been written by Mycroft Holmes in the privacy of the Diogenes Club.
I lit a lunkah and began to read.
‘Dear Sherlock, by now you will be boarding the express train to Dover, engaged in a task as important as any you have undertaken. Your destination Constantinople - often referred to as ‘Stamboul’ - has been called empress of the world, a city of beauty and tragedy, where a man’s ancestry is proclaimed by the colour of his trousers - Turks red, Greeks black, Jews blue, Armenians violet. Turkey is more an Asiatic power than a European one.
‘First, a cautionary word on wearing naval officers’ uniforms. The Civil Service is in the throes of drawing up a new Convention regarding the status of wartime spies. Ch.11, Article 29 will state a person is considered a spy who acts clandestinely or on false pretences, infiltrates enemy lines with the intention of acquiring intelligence and communicating it to the belligerent during times of war. You should, therefore, be aware that if war breaks out during your stay in Turkey, and the Ottomans are on the other side, you will be executed. Now you know of this risk no-one will hold it against you or Dr. Watson if you spend a pleasant hour or two at Dover Castle followed by a six-course dinner courtesy of His Majesty on the next train back to Victoria. Otherwise read on.
‘The Sultan is a bottomless pit of falsehood and fraud who will fulfil nothing except under force or the proximate use of force. The East is, and ever was from times immemorial, the land of the most striking contradictions. Venice in its darkest days was light and freedom compared to the cesspool of vice, decay and blood which is the Stamboul of today. Across the Ottoman Empire provinces which were once rich and fertile have returned to nearly the desolation of the desert, in parts a howling wilderness.
‘Europe waits with bated breath for Ottoman rule to collapse. St. Petersburg and Vienna bide their time like crows on a fence post. Berlin maintains a ship anchored for months at a time in the harbour at Stamboul full of political and commercial spies masquerading as archaeologists and engineering geographers. We have good reason to believe the Kaiser signed a secret military convention with the Sultan when Abd-ul-Hamid hosted him in Constantinople eight years ago. If war breaks out between Germany and England, we will find the Turk on the other side. Why should this be of concern to London? Because when the Sick Man does collapse England must have her share of the spoils. Our power extends to the boundaries of even the farthest ocean. In Kipling’s words, England holds Dominion over palm and pine. Our world-empire is an octopus with gigantic feelers stretching out over the habitable globe. Many economies including China and Siam are under our control.’
The letter went on,
‘The Foreign Secretary is not the most sensitive barometer by which to read tendencies in foreign policy. His attention is fixed too hard on France, a corrupt and traditional enemy which to my mind remains of interest but no longer consequence. England herself is in urgent need of a Metternich, a Talleyrand, a blood-and-iron Bismarck, which Sir Edward is not. History may show the King’s recent Entente with Paris was England’s first blundering step to war with Germany. There is not enough dissimulation in Grey for a politician. Rather, he is an unpretending Englishman of country tastes, simple in word and thought, good at fishing and learned in sparrows. Perhaps I’m being unfair - there is in great affairs so much less in the minds of the chief actors than in the minds of the event. In emergencies we discover we are the puppets of the past which, of a sudden, pulls the unseen wires and determines the action.’
I resented Mycroft’s mild contempt for Sir Edward’s ‘country tastes’. The Foreign Secretary was a man after my own heart.
A chilling analysis unfolded.
‘When the next crisis comes we shall find the war-chariots’ reins not in Whitehall but Wilhelmstraße. There is a good deal of gunpowder lying about in Berlin waiting for a spark, its ruler keen to settle differences sword in hand. The mischief-makers’ time is coming, ohne Hast, aber ohne Rast - without haste, but without rest. The gifts of patience, forbearance and tact may be invaluable for the conduct of delicate negotiations but Germany is not a wilting lily. She is a walnut which it will require a hammer to crack. Grey will be powerless to prevent the shipwreck which is now inevitable It only takes one to make a quarrel; it needs two to preserve the peace.’