My Sherlock Holmes Part 9

"We know more," I said.

"So it would seem, and so much to the good," said Mr. Holmes.

"If I were to pick a culprit on the basis of these inquiries," I said, "it would be Collingwood."

"Interesting," said Holmes.

"It would seem that Collingwood had the most to gain from possession of the four diaries," I said. "He clearly wants to build a career on the shoulders of his uncle-establish himself as conservator of the legend and heir to the literary throne. Owning those diaries would enable him to write convincingly and knowledgeably of the intimate thoughts of his uncle during what some would call Dodgson's most creative period. And if he cared to slip a little dagger into his uncle's reputation as a revenge for Dodgson's unkind judgments of Collingwood's abilities, well, he'd have the means."

"What about Dean Liddell?" asked Mr. Holmes. "The two have been at odds for the longest of times."

"True," I said, "and he'd love nothing better but the sudden and complete departure of Charles Dodgson from Christ Church. The diaries would no doubt give him means to fulfill this petty dream. He's certainly autocratic enough to confront Dodgson with the diaries and demand his immediate departure but it hasn't happened. I conclude that poor Dean Liddell does not have the books in hand."

"Then," asked Mr. Holmes, "shall we call upon Mr. Collingwood?"

"No," I said. "I do not believe he is our thief. He doesn't have the spine or the imagination."

"Excellent," said Mr. Holmes. "And therefore?"

I let the question dangle in the air for a moment and then replied, "I have a theory both as to whom, why, and how."

Mr. Holmes beamed with a smile so broad, it would have cut a path through the densest of London fogs. "To whom do we then turn?"

"I have a theory," I replied, "but I wish to test it. Let us arrange a meeting with Mr. Dodgson."

"Capital," said Mr. Holmes. "Now, tell me, young man, isn't this fun?"

I nodded and he beamed.

Three days later we were back in Dodgson's study. Instead of tea we were drinking ginger beer. After a proper review of our steps, Holmes gestured to me and bade me to speak.

"I have a theory, professor," I began, "and a hope. Your facility with the photographic arts is well known and revered. Do you, by any chance, have any photographs of this room."

"Yes," he replied. "It has been my practice to photograph this and other chambers here on a regular basis and to make appropriate notations including the date, the time of day, quality of light coming though the window and atmospheric conditions. I have approximately twenty-five such studies of this room-Actually that would be forty-two images, if you count photographs taken by students and presented to me. "You see," he added,"I stopped playing with photography in 1880 when they changed the materials. It just diminished the quality of the pictures. However some students needed help and encouragement, and so called on Dodgson."

"Would it be too much trouble to see the pictures?"

"Not at all," said Dodgson, "and as you may surmise, my archives are sufficiently organized. But you'll have to excuse me. I keep them all in my studio."

As he was leaving the room, I asked for the use of a magnifying gla.s.s."

After his exit, Mr. Holmes cast a smug glance at me and said, "A magnifier! How fascinating. Next you'll be smoking a pipe and wearing a hunting cap."

"I am dubious about the pipe," I said. "But let me tell you about my theory. If we look at the photographs, we may be able to observe a variation in the appearance of the bookcase. And according to the data Dodgson compiled, we might be able to determine when the diaries were taken, and see who Mr. Dodgson's visitors were in that period."

"An interesting hypothesis," said Mr. Holmes, "but a little too inelegant to be truly scientific."

Dodgson returned some twenty minutes later with the gla.s.s and a bulky envelope containing a sheaf of pictures. I set my eyeball to the gla.s.s and scrutinized each photograph, taking special care to concentrate on the bookcase. While I devoted myself to this tedious study Mr. Holmes and Mr. Dodgson entertained themselves with the creation of a cryptographic system that would need the services of two separate individuals, each knowing only a part of the code, to decipher it. Mr. Dodgson held that a necessary component was the elimination of vowels.

And then I found it.

"Mr. Holmes," I said, "would you please come over and have a look."

I showed him two photographs.

"I see," he said, pointing at the second photo. "These books are moved to the right. And they have new shelf companions to their left. And look here. This pile of books on the windowsill is slightly lower."

"Exactly," I said, and turned the second photo over to examine the date scrawled on the back and cross-checked against the now well-worn list of visitors.

"Mr. Dodgson," I said, "I believe I know who has your diaries. If I returned them to you without revealing the thief's name, would you be content?"

"No," he said. "I would not be content. Knowing that someone came here in the guise of friendship and took those valuable properties would forever bring me sorrow and fear that it might happen again."

He shrugged.

"But if that is the price of having them back," he said. "So be it."

"Then they shall be returned," I said.

I then turned to Mr. Holmes and said, "Let us go, Mr. Holmes There is work to be done."

The next day when the Dean's maidservant brought me into the sitting room, Mrs. Liddell did not seem surprised to see me.

"The Dean is not here," she said.

"I was told," I replied. "But if I may, it is you with whom I wish to speak."

"Yes?"

"I have a confession and I need your help."

She gestured toward the same sofa on which I had sat the previous week. She looked at her husband's imposing chair and then decided to sit on the far end of the sofa, with a discreet s.p.a.ce between us."

"Yes?" she asked again.

"First of all," I said, "I'm not a journalist."

"Yes," she said, once more.

"But let me tell you about my background."

I told her that I was indeed enrolled in Christ Church. But I described the strange journey to the school. I told about the Baker Street Irregulars and my early encounters with Sherlock Holmes. I told her what life was like on the stones, and what I did to survive. She was shocked to learn that a sneezer could bring a few bob to an enterprising lad. I told her how Mr. Holmes had changed my life and I hoped to make something of myself.

"I have told you all this," I said, "to give you power over me. Any time you wish to, you can turn to Mr. Liddell and tell him all that I have related to you. And that will be the end of me here and in life."

I then told her about Mr. Dodgson's diaries and how I promised him that he would have them hack and that I needed her help to keep his promise.

She began to sob softly.

"I want you to know," I said, "that I know what it's like to have secrets. I know what it's like to live in fear that someone will find out the truth about you."

She nodded her head.

"We were so innocent," she said, "an accidental touch on the shoulder, an exchanged glance and that was all. But it tortured each of us and we dare not speak of it."

"And," I said, "when he went to his studio that bitter day in 1876 to retrieve the photographs of poor Edith, you went to his bookcase to pa.s.s the time and you happened to pick up one of the diaries and you read an entry in which he mentioned your name in the most endearing of terms."

"I was distraught over the death of my daughter. I didn't want to lose my marriage and my family. Charles is so unworldly. I was afraid his diaries would somehow get into the wrong hands. Without thinking I took the ones covering those sweet but strange years."

"Mr. Dodgson loved not Alice, but you."

"And I loved him," she replied. "n.o.body ever knew of these feelings. We never even confessed them to each other but we both knew. But how did you come to this conclusion?"

"When we were talking last week about his announcement that he wanted to marry Alice," I said, "you explained that she was too young for him. You did not say that he was too old for her."

"The difference being?" asked Mrs. Liddell, who by this point had recovered her composure.

"At that moment, and with regard to that subject, your thoughts were for him and not for her."

"I've been a good wife," she said.

"I know," I replied.

She stepped out of the room briefly and returned with a pillowcase containing the four diaries.

"Husbands," she said, "are not known to explore armoires where wives keep their undergarments, let alone kitchens or laundries."

"I shall remember that," I said.

And that is how I solved my first and last case. I did not become a mathematician as Dodgson had hoped I might. Nor did I ever pursue the bright promise of consulting detective that Mr. Holmes envisioned for me. I do like my life as a journalist. Pursuing other people's secrets is much more desirable than revealing my own.

But on that very topic of secrets, I have devoted some considerable thought.

Isn't it odd that by protecting what you have, you lose some or all of who you are? I am in no position to know or say whether Mr. Dodgson and Mrs. Liddell should have expressed their feelings to each other and forged their private thoughts into a reality. Some have done so and have escaped or disregarded penalty. Others have been, shall we say, less fortunate. I do believe that each of these star crossed never to be-lovers was separately torn apart by the exact same turmoil. It wasn't so much the knowledge that they loved someone they should not, a knowledge I am sure that sustained them and even elicited a curious smile in the darkest of nights and dreariest of days. It was that they could not tell another living soul about this feeling that was so much a part of their beings.

I understand this. I was aggrieved and still am over my efforts to keep certain parts of my life a secret from all. The cold logic from which Mr. Holmes advised silence on these matters has prevailed. I have no intention of risking what I have earned. And yet the example of those two sinful innocents is not lost on me. I am writing these words in the expectation that they will be published after I am gone, which I trust will be in the far, far future. I hope that in that age people will have a more complex picture of who I am and what I have done, and that they may know of Mr. Holmes in his role as philanthropist. Perhaps they may also have a fuller and more understanding view of Mrs. Liddell, Mr. Dodgson, and all others who keep secrets to themselves. And when at last I pa.s.s, I pray that Mr. Holmes will be my champion at the Pearly Gates as he has been on this isle.

As to why Romeo had to be Romeo, I am still trying to answer that question.

MYCROFT HOLMES.

"Art in the blood is liable to take the strangest forms."

"But how do you know that it is hereditary?"

"Because my brother Mycroft possesses it in a larger degree than I do ... . When I say ... that Mycroft has better powers of observation than I, you may take it that I am speaking the exact and literal truth."

"Is he your junior?"

"Seven years my senior."

"How comes it that he is unknown?"

"Oh, he is very well known in his own circle."

"Where, then?"

"Well, in the Diogenese Club, for example."

-"The Greek Interpreter"

by GARY LOVISI.

Mycroft's Great Game.

I enter this account, for which I have been silent all these years, to set the record straight for posterity. I have instructed my solicitors to deliver it to my heirs and descendants 100 years after my death at a time when all princ.i.p.als involved will have long been deceased and unaffected by the facts herein.

It really was quite unfair, you know. My little brother Sherlock always getting all the credit. He had become quite the publicity hound lately, with Watson and Doyle positively fawning at his every word. Why, sometimes it was absolutely unbearable.

Oh, I know what you are thinking. I am Mycroft Holmes, solid, stodgy, overweight minion of the eccentric Diogenes Club, renowned recluse of Pall Mall, blah, blah, blah. Utter balderdash, I tell you!

While I had carefully fostered a veil of anonymity over my affairs and personage, there was much more to my work than anyone would have ever guessed. And while the official dispatches and the popular press positively fell over themselves to laud brother Sherlock's little accomplishments in his consulting detective "hobby," I performed my work in a totally obscure capacity, completely avoiding discovery by any outsider. My great powers and directives were not even imagined by our politicians and the Fleet Street press, as I managed this vast worldwide enterprise of ours-the British Empire!

Now don't misunderstand, I dearly love my little brother, and it was hardly a matter at all for me to put up with his silly eccentricities and inconsistencies now and then, as I am sure he had so patiently put up with my own. It happens to the best of us, for we were true brothers, blood being thicker than water and all that sort of thing. Nevertheless, since our teen years we had gone our separate ways, and each in his own way, had achieved a measure of success.

I remember fondly when our guardian, Great Aunt Julia Vernet, had told young Sherlock and me on that summer day in the gazebo, "I am sure that both my wonderful Holmes boys will go far in this world and make your marks, if you do not allow your great intellects to get the better of you. Promise me you will always remember to use your powers for only good purposes."

We promised. We dearly loved Great Aunt Julia. She died not soon thereafter, leaving us alone. It was a blow to Sherlock and me that we have never forgotten.

Ah, but that fond memory was from such a long time ago. From a much simpler world that was very far away from the present cold orb we are forced to inhabit today.

Today, it is 1891! We approach the dawn of a new century, an exciting modern age and a treacherous era of changing technology, international intrigue and dangerous nationalistic expansionism.

Now I must play the "Great Game," doing my duty for the Empire I love. The Empire Great Aunt Julia so loved. Unlike brother Sherlock, I adhere to my great aunt's values. My brother feigns the vaulted Bohemian, but in reality, it was the very structures of Empire that allowed him to so indulge his activities in the criminal investigatory arena.

Rather, it is I who bore the weight of Atlas upon my shoulders. It was the life I had chosen. I had no regrets. I had little choice then, for I was in too deep. It was, however, the one career I was eminently suited for. I must say that I have been very successful at my chosen tasks, but it has forced me to cut myself off from everyone and everything that might interfere with the performance of my duty. No one, not even my dear brother--especially he-has ever been allowed more than the most cursory knowledge of my work. It was best for Sherlock, best for myself, and best for the Empire I serve. Safer that way all around. For I was engaged in the most dangerous of games. Sherlock has had some nebulous suspicion that I occasionally was involved in some kind of "work"-for lack of a better word-for what we'll call "the government." He may have even suspected my influence reached to some at the highest levels. That was certainly true, but what of it?

Could Sherlock ever fancy in his wildest dreams that I was the government? Of course I steadfastly denied everything. He had given that impression to Watson, and the good doctor had dutifully recorded such suppositions in his fictionalized accounts of my brother's cases. I knew Sherlock well, and I thought this was nothing but a vain little conceit of his. He was too logical, far too observant, and I had made my plans too well in this venture. My overweight and sedentary life, the Diogenes Club, the "recluse of Pall Mall" dodge, were all but elements of a clever ruse I incor porated into my overall persona. I knew, in truth, that Sherlock had no evidence of my business. Nothing. He may have said certain things for effect, and to Watson, but he surely did not believe them. I intended to keep it that way.

The absolute truth was hidden behind a lie I had woven so well that logical Sherlock would never believe it. It was, that aside from the public figureheads of our beloved Queen and n.o.ble PM-I was not merely some occasional influence in the government, but I was in fact, the Controlling Director behind the entire British Empire. There was a need for such a person. The monarchy gave me their trust; politicians at the highest levels were able to effect a compromise. I was the natural choice as I had no ambition for myself or any political group. Actually, the "Directorship" merely broadened my existing powers and responsibilities. Thus was born the unofficial and very secret office of Controlling Director. From hidden vaults and rooms beneath the Diogenes Club, with a small group of dedicated specialists, I managed all that was the British Empire.

Certainly it was best that Sherlock did not know much of these matters. I hid it well; the facts of my activities have always eluded him. I was sure Sherlock's delicate sensibilities would cause us to be at loggerheads had he full knowledge of the import of my work and duties. I know he would have been upset by certain of my dealings. So I shielded Sherlock as best I could, even as I indulged him as he went his merry way on his criminal problems, as long as they did not conflict with my own plans. It was not always easy being Sherlock's smarter brother.

It is an axiom that in order for our government and Empire to succeed, certain of what I call "prerequisites" must be realized and met. It is a sorry constant that occurs when one is involved in power politics-the Great Game, as it is called. However, I found myself constantly having to wander further afield to achieve objectives, often into hitherto unexplored and sometimes unsavory areas to ensure success in my numerous ventures for the Empire. I am the first to admit that at times I found it troubling. Such as this recent Moriarty affair.

The basis of this problem began some years ago. In my position as Controlling Director of the Empire, it was I who allowed Moriarty and his minions to exist, and to some degree, even prosper. I knew it would be useful to the needs of the government and the Empire I served if my influence also extended into criminal society. So I made inroads into that sorry element. I discovered a most enterprising individual and realized that under the proper control, a criminal element could be most useful. I further realized that by having crime "organized," it would better enable me to control it, thus being even more useful to my purposes. The criminal element contributes agents who readily perform the most unsavory deeds that the regular military and most members of legitimate agencies would never attempt. So you see, in this cynical and dangerous game we play, they do have their uses.

And yet, I began to feel I had made an error in this chessboard of intrigue that I play upon our worldwide stage. Not all factors can always be considered, not all results so carefully manipulated. It began to disturb me to see Sherlock's obsession with Moriarty. While it was certainly well founded, it had been steadily growing. Now it threatened certain "delicate situations" should Sherlock act too adroitly in this area, or if he found out too much information that was not within his purview to know and decided to act upon it.