The Infernal Device & Others: A Professor Moriarty Omnibus (102 page)

             
"Why?" Holmes demanded.

             
"There is no time," Moriarty said, closing the watch and putting it away. "Get down!" he ordered. "All of us.
Now!
I just hope we're far enough away." He dropped flat to the pavement, and the others followed. Barnett did his best to shield Cecily from whatever was to happen.

             
The Mummer came running over. "What's happening, Professor?" he demanded, staring down at the group.

             
Moriarty's hand came up, grabbed Tolliver by the lapel, and pulled him down to the pavement. A second later the earth lifted and heaved, and a sound that was beyond sound filled the air. It seemed to go on and on, and then, abruptly, it stopped. For a few seconds longer there was a new sound, coming from all about them—the splattering, smacking noises of large objects hitting other large objects, or hitting the ground. And then that too died out.

             
Barnett lifted his head. Where the house had been there were now several fires. But—and this his mind did not grasp for a moment—there was no longer a house.

             
"Midnight," Moriarty said. "The start of a new day, and the end of the old. Let us go home."

             
So she went into the garden to cut a cabbage leaf to make an apple pie; and at the same time a great she-bear, coming up the street, pops its head into the shop. "What! no soap?" So he died, and she very imprudently married the barber; and there were present the Picninnies, and the Joblillies, and the Garyulies, and the Grand Panjandrum himself with the little round button at top, and they all fell to playing the game
of
catch as catch can, till the gunpowder ran out at the heels
of
their boots.

—Samuel Foote

             
Barnett spent the better part of a day composing the letter. It was as short as possible, considering all he had to put into it. He rewrote it fourteen times, and each time was convinced that he sounded just as much like a stuff-shirted prig as the last time. Whenever he tried to lighten the tone, it sounded frivolous to him; and he would not sound frivolous.

             
Marry me, Cecily, the letter said. And then it went on to tell why. It spoke of love and understanding and mutual aid and trust. It touched on a woman's right to have a career, and how he understood, and was willing to honor that.
(Prig!)
It skirted the issue of complete independence for women by pointing out that although he
most
assuredly believed in it himself, that would change neither the laws nor the customs of Great Britain.

             
It was six pages long in his small script.

             
In the late afternoon he went over to Cecily Perrine's house. It was a week since the clubhouse had exploded, and Cecily had been
confined to her bed for that time, tended by her father. The first three days of bed rest were for her health and recuperation. The last four were more for her father. The old man seemed to feel that her ordeal was somehow his fault, so Cecily stayed in for a few extra days to allow him to fuss over her.

             
Barnett came over every day, clutching some small idiotic present to his chest as he entered her room. This day he brought a potted plant, which he placed on the window ledge. Then he chatted politely with Cecily for two hours—afterward, he could not remember what they had talked about. As he got up to leave, he handed her the envelope.

             
"Read this at your leisure," he told her, "after I leave. It tells you how I feel. Somehow I'm afraid that if I try to do it in person, we will get sidetracked and have an argument, which is the last thing I want. Answer me when you are ready."

             
Then he shook her hand and left. The words that he had intended to add remained stillborn on his lips. He had practiced them, but he could not say them. He had planned to say that he, with this letter, was once more proposing marriage to her, and that if she turned him down this time he would have to stop coming by. Seeing her would become too painful.

             
That was what he had intended to tell her. But at the last moment he had lost his courage. Supposing she said no—she would probably say no—she had said no once before. Would he actually have the courage to walk away and no longer see the woman he loved? It was probably the wisest thing, but it sounded so final. Perhaps if he stayed around, someday he would ask her a third time, and that time she would say yes.

             
He shook his head as he walked away from the house. Never would he have believed that he could behave this way. Love, he thought, is an unstable, unkind, thoroughly demoralizing emotion.

-

             
Back at Russell Square, Moriarty was entertaining a guest. Barnett recognized the visitor as the Indian gentleman who had called himself Singh. "This house," the guest was saying as Barnett entered the study, "the explosion demolished it completely?"

             
"Utterly," Moriarty said. "My calculations indicate that there must have been at least two hundred pounds of gunpowder packed into the cellar. There was one fireplace standing complete from cellar to chimneypot, like an angry brick finger pointing at the sky, but all else was gone. Bits and pieces of the Hellfire Club were found a quarter mile away."

             
"How many bodies? The newspaper accounts varied."

             
"Twenty-six that they could be sure of."

             
Singh nodded. "Professor. Chardino believed in a vengeful God. A fascinating case, indeed."

             
Barnett looked curiously at the slender, dapper Indian gentleman, who turned and extended his hand to him as Moriarty introduced them. "Mr. Singh," Moriarty explained, "has come to arrange for the transportation of the treasure. It is being returned to those from whom it was stolen—spiritually, if not actually."

             
"Ah, Mr. Barnett," Singh said, taking his hand and shaking it briskly, "it is a pleasure to meet you. Allow me to commend you on how well you perform under stress."

             
"Thank you," Barnett said. "I am grateful for any compliment, but to what occasion are you referring?"

             
"The incident of the loading of the treasure train," Singh explained. "Your little bit of misdirection was masterfully done!"

             
"Well, thank you again," Barnett said, smiling. "Were you there?"

             
"Ah, yes," Singh said. "You would not recognize me, of course, clad, as I was, in a
dhoti
and busily loading treasure chests. I was but scenery—a donkey laborer."

             
Barnett pointed a finger at him. "You—"

             
"Indeed," the Indian agreed. "Such is life."

             
Mr. Maws appeared at the study door. "Mr. Sherlock Holmes is here, and would speak with you," he informed the professor.

             
"Ah, yes, Holmes. He is expected," Moriarty said. "Send him in."

             
Holmes stalked through the door and up to Moriarty's desk without acknowledging the presence of anyone else in the room. "I have you now, Professor Moriarty!" he exclaimed. "Professor of thieves!"

             
Moriarty smiled. "Mr. Holmes," he said. "Allow me to introduce—"

             
"Your friends?" Holmes chuckled. "I shall shortly introduce
you
to a judge—and a good British jury. You have gone too far!"

             
"Of what do we speak?" Moriarty inquired mildly. "Have you a purpose behind this tirade, or is it merely something you've eaten that disagrees with you?"

             
"That statuette," Holmes said. "That bauble. A bronze statuette of the goddess Uma, one of Shiva's consorts. Worth thousands, according to Lord East. It is one of two identical pieces, over a thousand years old." Holmes consulted a scrap of paper he carried. "One belonged to Lord East, and the other to the Maharaja of Rajasthan." He looked up and glared at Moriarty. "And just how did one of these priceless pieces come into your hands?" He smiled and folded his arms across his chest.

             
"Allow me to introduce you," Moriarty said, indicating Singh, "to the Maharaja of Rajasthan. Your Highness, Mr. Sherlock Holmes. A bit impolite, but a good solid investigator. When his reach does not exceed his grasp."

             
The Indian extended his hand. "My pleasure, Mr. Holmes," he said. "I have, of course, heard of you."

             
Holmes glared at the Maharaja, and then back at Moriarty. He sighed, and a look of resignation crossed his face. "You have, I'm sure, some means of identifying yourself?" he asked the Maharaja.

             
"But of course," the Maharaja agreed, pulling out a passport. "If there is any doubt, I am known to Lord Pindhurst, her majesty's Minister of Imperial Affairs, as well as to her majesty, Queen Victoria. Indeed, I had lunch with her today."

             
"I am sure you did," Holmes said, handing the document back to the Maharaja. "And I am sure that you gave the statuette to Professor Moriarty. I won't even ask you what service the
professor performed in return, your highness. It is a pleasure to meet you, despite the, ah, circumstances." He turned back to Moriarty. "There is a certain inevitability about this moment, Professor. I should have expected it, but I am ever the optimist."

             
"I am sorry to disappoint you," Moriarty murmured.

             
"I have not had a chance to properly thank you for coming to my assistance in that hellhouse," Holmes said. "It was very sporting of you."

             
"Think nothing of it," Moriarty said. "Whatever were you doing there, Holmes? It was an unexpected pleasure."

             
"You don't suppose you're the only one who reads the agony columns, do you?" Holmes asked. "I—borrowed—one of those pretty medals from someone who would not need it for a while, left him lying peacefully in a bush, and entered. By the by, Professor— that fellow Chardino; he was the killer, was he not?"

             
"He was," Moriarty agreed.

             
"I see." Holmes looked thoughtful for a moment. "One cannot justify murder under any circumstances, but there are some that come closer than others. Is there anything we should do—about his demise, I mean?"

             
"I am having a headstone erected for him next to his daughter's grave," Moriarty said. "You may contribute."

             
"What will it say?" Holmes asked.

             
"I think, 'A Loving Father,' " Moriarty answered.

             
"I will subscribe," Holmes said. "He certainly was that."

             
"A bit of news that you might want to pass on to your friends at the Yard," Moriarty said. "One of those Hellfire devils escaped the blast."

             
"Oh?" Holmes said.

             
"Yes. Colonel Moran saw him picking his way out of the rubble and recognized him, but he escaped in the confusion.
"

             
"
Who was it?"

             
"Lord Crecy Darby. Colonel Moran knew him years ago in India."