33. THE CASE OF THE CHANNEL FERRY

Back at the turn of the 20th century the channel ferry was small and smoky...

“Did you know, Watson,” said Holmes out of the blue and apropos of nothing in particular as far as I could tell, “did you know that there were boats crossing the English Channel over three thousand years ago?”

“No, I didn’t Holmes,” I replied, a sinking feeling warning me that I might be in for an unwanted adventure involving the high seas and foreign lands, “I’ve never needed to know that sort of thing and unnecessary knowledge can clutter up the brain, don’t you think?”

“Well, there is evidence that they did, and I can’t help thinking that it’s a marvel of modern science that such discoveries can be made about a time that is so lost to us that there isn’t even a trace of it in the longest memory on Earth,” he murmured.

“”I should think not! Nobody’s that old!” I ejaculated.

“Which brings me to the very reason I introduced the notion of crossing the channel into our erudite conversation,” he said with a sudden smile. “Because I feel we both need a breath of fresh air in our lungs. We’ve been in this apartment for far too long, and we should be going out. And the sea air, Watson, the sea air is better than any ten bottles of the tonics you prescribe for your ailing patients.”

“What are you getting at, Holmes?” I asked, knowing his abstruse techniques when it comes to broaching a subject I may not necessarily want to hear about.

“The Lady Gwendoline Haversham is off to the south of France for the season and has been warned that if her Tudor Diamond goes with her it is certain that Professor Moriarty will have his eyes on it.”

“Then she should leave it in a safe, in her bank,” I said shortly, “rather than waste the efforts of the best detective in England keeping his eye on it.”

“Be that as it may, the plan is simple, and you know as well as I do that simple plans are always the best. She is determined that she shall be seen with the Tudor Diamond in the sun of the south of France, and the risky part of her journey is the channel crossing. Beyond that the French authorities are quite capable of keeping their eyes open for the master criminal who we fear will be planning his campaign. The Lady Gwendoline is to travel across the channel, a journey of not too many miles, with her gemstone supposedly in a small leather case and under guard.”

“You say supposedly Holmes,” I said, knowing him and his wiles only too well by then.

“Precisely. For there will be a paste replica in that case, and the guard will be an ex-army sergeant with muscles the like of which one rarely sees these days. He will, of course, be unaware that he is guarding a cheap imitation.”

“And the real stone, Holmes?” I asked.

He thrust his hand into his trouser pocket, and with his uniquely patronising smile withdrew a silk pouch.

“Is here,” he murmured. “Now, Watson, drop everything and come! We catch the Dover train in less than an hour!”

“I’m not happy about this,” I complained. “The English Channel can play havoc with a fellow’s digestive system! I’ve emptied my digestive tract more than once during my army days on that stretch of water.”

“It’s not much more than twenty miles,” Holmes told me, and I guessed that twenty miles of seasickness had little effect on him. “And our task will be over as soon as we reach Calais! A couple of hours, maybe three, not much longer than that, and our task will be over. That’s good money for very little inconvenience, Watson, and our rent needs to be paid on time.”

The ferry, a paddle steamer and recognisably the technological triumph of the age, left Dover on time.

There was a fairly large and very diverse set of passengers on board, ranging from the affluent majority whose accents and attitudes put them firmly into the English middle classes, to dour Frenchmen with their ladies draped on their arms, returning to the home of their birth, and to the servant class whose faces displayed the fear they felt as the steamer slowly made its way from Dover and into the open seas. It’s funnel belched black smoke that streamed behind us like a stinking banner, trailing back to a tall sailing ship that might almost have been tailing us.

“Stay with me, Watson,” hissed Holmes, “see over there, leaning over the rail as if he was about to deposit his very heart into the foaming briny, in the shiny chequered suit...”

“Moriarty,” I breathed.

“The same arch criminal,” muttered Holmes grimly, “and it is a constant source of amazement to me that one with his powers of thought and mental deduction needs to find a career in crime when there are many peaceful and honourably honest paths through life that he could pursue.”

“It is thought that there is a definite criminal type, predetermined before birth,” I told Holmes, “and there are some who claim to be able to differentiate between a good man and a rogue by feeling his skull.”

“It is a science,” agreed Holmes. “Now see over there, where Moriarty is looking...”

“The Lady Gwendoline Haversham,” I nodded. I had never seen her before, but this lady was richly dressed and was unmistakably a member of the aristocracy, what with her loud overbearing voice, her entourage of paid lackeys all trying to look at least one cut above themselves and the way other passengers couldn’t help staring at her, envy or contempt, who could tell?

“See the ex-sergeant,” whispered Holmes.

I had already noticed the man. The kindest thing to say about him is that he was obviously the sort of man one would not wish to cross on a dark night, with or without a cause to quarrel with him. But that wasn’t everything. He was carrying, by a handle that seemed to be somehow chained to his wrist, a small leather case.

“Is that the…?” I asked Holmes, almost silently lest anyone hear me.

He nodded.

The steamer ploughed on across the sea, black smuts from its funnel drifting down and some of them landing on us, smudging our clothes and skin.

“Filthy things,” I muttered, meaning the paddle steamer.

Holmes nodded, and wafted his hand in front of his face in order to swipe away a particularly offensive smut.

“Now be ready, Watson,” he whispered suddenly.

I looked around me. Moriarty seemed to have vanished, probably into the crowds where he could pass unnoticed. The Lady Gwendoline was still holding offensively noisy court at the other end of the deck, her sergeant by her side.

Then there was a scuffle behind us and I felt something sticking into my back.

“Sherlock Holmes,” hissed a voice behind us, “just you keep still, or you’ll know the folly of movement, and hand over that little precious in its silk purse, and do it before I count to ten!”

“Moriarty!” exclaimed Holmes, “are you foolish, man? The Tudor Diamond isn’t worth you risking your neck for! What will you do with it? Nobody will want it because even the criminal class like to show their wealth off from time to time, and there’s no showing off such a magnificent stone without risking arrest for owning it!”

“Just to own it is reward enough,” growled the master criminal, “and I happen to know that it’s in your pocket, burning a hole in it no doubt as we speak. And it’s eight, nine, t...”

Then Holmes surprised me. He pulled the silk purse from his pocket and held it to Professor Moriarty rather than defend it with his life.

“If it’s that important to you, take it,” he said, “but remember … you’ll have to spend the rest of your life wondering when Sherlock Holmes will take it back!”

“Never!” hissed the thief, and he grabbed the purse and then did the most unlikely thing. He climbed onto the balustrade of the steamer and without so much as another word he leapt overboard, into the sea. I raced to see what was going to happen next, expecting to see him floundering, his chequered suit heavy with water, but saw nothing of the kind.

Moriarty was there all right, and even as I watched was drifting further behind the ferry as he climbed aboard a small rowing boat that seemed to have appeared from nowhere. Once aboard he and another man took two pairs of oars between them and rowed away furiously, making for the larger boat with tall sails that seemed to have trailed us since we’d departed from Dover.

“That’s that, then,” smiled Holmes, “and not a scratch on either of us!”

“But the diamond…?” I asked, confused.

“You must understand the word substitution,” he grinned, “come let’s tell Lady Gwendoline that all is well and that Moriarty has made off with a worthless chunk of glass...”

“But what…?” I blathered.

“It’s quite simple, Watson,” said Holmes, “I let it be known that I was using a double bluff and that the real gem might be in the leather case after all. Though it wasn’t, of course. That would have tempted providence. No, the real diamond, worth countless thousands...”

“Yes, Holmes?” I asked.

“Has been in your pocket all along! Now come! Let’s restore it to its rightful owner before we reach Calais!”

I couldn’t help it. I thrust one hand into my jacket pocket and there it was, hard and noble as any precious stone anywhere, tucked into a corner where the sun can’t shine…

© Peter Rogerson 23.08.17