The Holmes-Dracula File, Fred Saberhagen [pride and prejudice read .TXT] 📗

I shall be all right.” And then her military walk came spattering the last rain’s shallow mirrors in his direction, shivering the stray gleams of electric lights ranked somewhere on the Thames’ far bank. Matthews meanwhile had stayed in the boat, and was now rowing it out toward midstream, inadvertently putting between himself and the old man such a stretch of running water that the latter in his weakened state perceived it as an effective barrier.

   The woman’s jaunty footfalls came on toward him through the night, behind tall piles of crates. All that old man needed to do was stand there in the shadow of a disused boatshed, waiting.

   She came in sight again, now close enough for her to see him also. He waited almost storklike on his long bare legs below that ridiculous shirt in which she had helped to dress him. His face that she had pillowed only minutes earlier was in the shadow now, but still she could scarcely have mistaken his figure in her path for that of any other man. Her stride faltered, and the hard dominance of her own face cracked like a clay mask.

   But…not one of your fragile ladies, as she had herself remarked. She could not avoid him, and after faltering once she marched on, pulling out a pistol. It barked like a toy dog from its abbreviated barrel, and sharp pain, ineffectual metallic pain, lanced the old man through the chest and flew on past him, even as his long arms reached out…

* * * * * * *

   At last his combined hunger and thirst were satisfied—he had not known how strong the craving was till he began to gratify it—and he lifted his head, licking a lip thoughtfully, looking and listening. The pier he stood on, and its adjoining piers, were quite deserted. Somewhere down the long water-corridor of shipping that twisted toward the sea, foghorns were beginning conversation.

   He held the body out at arm’s length. Hard boots and limp hands hung straight toward their ruffled images in muddy, moving water. In that mirror the woman’s body was suspended completely without support, its draperies of clothing tucked up by invisible force at knees and shoulders.

   It pleased him to bestow, in his own mind, an epitaph: Not one of your fragile ladies. With that he let the drained thing splash.

   In the brief struggle the hospital gown has been torn almost completely loose, and now with complete unconcern for either modesty or warmth he lets it fall. He sees the body drift and sink, and float again, but already his thoughts are elsewhere.

   That he will now turn upon his remaining persecutors and endeavor to hunt them down is beyond question. But should he, can he, begin that necessary task before he has his own identity in hand?

   With food his strength is waxing, but he is still in mortal need of rest, and still he cannot remember. Why has he known no fear, through all these perils? He is not immortal, no, far from it, but…

   Why does the water not give him his reflection back? And, how came he flowing like fog out of the water, neither the tide nor steel bonds able to hold him? Why had that heavy, leaden bullet done no worse than kiss him with a sharp sting as it passed through his body?

   There are a hundred questions more. One above all: Who is he?

CHAPTER FOUR

   Following Miss Sarah Tarlton’s first visit to Baker Street, Sherlock Holmes spent the remainder of the day in concluding his work upon one or two routine matters that he had been investigating at the request of the police. On the following morning he went out alone, quite early, and was gone for several hours.

   “I have just set in motion several inquiries concerning the mysterious Dr. John Scott,” he said upon returning. “If you are free after lunch, Watson, I hope you will accompany me to the warehouse where he was supposedly identified. Your medical knowledge may well prove useful in any discussion of the equipment that was removed.”

   I of course agreed, and before two o’clock we were in a cab, on our way to the London Docks at Shadwell. The warehouse was one of a number of long, low, shed-like buildings set close by the waterfront. After passing the desks of several clerks, we were admitted to the office of the superintendent.

   Superintendent Marlowe was a man of sixty or thereabouts, powerfully built and energetic in appearance. It was his habit to rise, at the least pretext, from behind his desk, as if the confinement of the small space there were too much for his nature to bear.

   He pressed our hands in greeting, as if we had come at his own invitation. “Very pleased to meet you, Dr. Watson. Mr. Holmes, this is a real honor. I suppose it’s this business of the medical materials that you’ve come about? Yes, as I thought. Well, you may be sure we don’t release goods to people who have no right to take them.”

   “I am reassured to hear it, Superintendent,” Holmes responded. “How did you come to guess the nature of our business?”

   “Well, sir, when young Miss Tarlton was here, with the gentleman who was helping her, she spoke of an investigation. With which, says I, I shall be only too glad to comply, provided that it be conducted legally and in good form. And for which I am now ready, having the papers in question right here.” Unlocking a drawer in his desk, the superintendent brought out a sheaf of documents. “Take my word for it, gentlemen, these are all in good order.”

   “May I?” My companion eagerly reached out a long arm. In his other hand, Holmes held two of the letters written by John Scott to his fiancée, and now he brought all together to the window, the better to compare handwriting. When