Who Thinks Evil: A Professor Moriarty Novel (Professor Moriarty Novels) Read online

  The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you for your personal use only. You may not make this e-book publicly available in any way. Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe the copy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’s copyright, please notify the publisher at: us.macmillanusa.com/piracy.

  This book is for Sam and Archie, boon companions who are sorely missed.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to thank Ms. Linda Robertson for her unerring eye, and for always telling me what I needed to hear.

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Epigraph

  Author’s Note

  Prologue

  Chapter One: In the Dock

  Chapter Two: Mollie’s

  Chapter Three: Indecision

  Chapter Four: Durance Vile

  Chapter Five: One Night’s Play of Fox and Hare

  Chapter Six: The Spanish House

  Chapter Seven: Release

  Chapter Eight: Problem Child

  Chapter Nine: The Missing Prince

  Chapter Ten: Rose’s Room

  Chapter Eleven: Pamela’s Story

  Chapter Twelve: The Mummer Creeps

  Chapter Thirteen: The Professor Explains

  Chapter Fourteen: Giles Paternoster

  Chapter Fifteen: The Whichness of What

  Chapter Sixteen: An Outrage at Covent Garden

  Chapter Seventeen: Castle Holyrudd

  Chapter Eighteen: The French Connection

  Chapter Nineteen: The Mendicants Guild

  Chapter Twenty: The Belleville Slicer

  Chapter Twenty-one: This Day’s Madness

  Chapter Twenty-two: Who Thinks Evil

  Chapter Twenty-three: Westerleigh House

  Chapter Twenty-four: Frenchies

  Chapter Twenty-five: Come Follow, Follow, Follow

  Chapter Twenty-six: Do I Hear a Waltz?

  Chapter Twenty-seven: The Prince and the Giggler

  Chapter Twenty-eight: Feet, Feet

  Chapter Twenty-nine: A Midnight Dreary

  Chapter Thirty: On the Moor

  Also by Michael Kurland

  About the Author

  Copyright

  honi soit qui mal y pense

  [shame to him who thinks evil]

  —MOTTO OF THE MOST NOBLE ORDER OF THE GARTER

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  In some small ways my relating of this history of various events occurring during the later Victorian era may differ from that found in contemporary chronologies, journals, reports, and such. In all such areas of conflict my version is, of course, the correct one. However, all persons appearing in this book shall be regarded as fictional regardless of their resemblance to important historical personages or your Great-Aunt Harriet.

  [PROLOGUE]

  * * *

  LONDON PROFESSOR DETAINED IN CONNECTION WITH RECENT WIDDERSIGN OUTRAGE

  SPECIAL TO THE STANDARD

  Friday 11 July 1890

  ACTING on information received, detectives of the Criminal Investigation Division of the Metropolitan Police have detained Professor James Moriarty of 64 Russell Square, Camden. Professor Moriarty is being questioned in regard to the attempted robbery on Saturday last at Widdersign-on-Ribble, the country estate of His Lordship Baron Thornton-Hoxbary, located just outside the town of Wedsbridge in Nottinghamshire.

  In what has become known as the Widdersign Outrage, six masked men armed with revolvers forced their way into the manor house at or about midnight, after first assaulting and tying up the gatekeeper, two grooms, and the senior coachman. Once inside, they assembled the occupants of the house in the dining room, where one of the villains guarded them while three smashed their way into the small museum where His Lordship keeps a priceless collection of Greek artifacts acquired at the beginning of the century by His Lordship’s grandfather. The other men ransacked bedrooms on the upper floor, gathering up jewelry and other valuables of His Lordship and Lady Hoxbary and their sixteen houseguests.

  James Mercer, the chief butler, who had been tied up in the lower pantry along with the cook, an upstairs maid, and a serving girl, as well as a maid and two valets in the service of several of the houseguests, managed to free himself by the expedient of breaking a glass and sawing at his bonds with a sharp shard. Mercer immediately released the two valets, whereupon the three of them repaired to the gun room on the ground floor. Arming himself and the others with three rifles, a shotgun, and a Webley .445 service revolver, Mercer led the way up the servants’ staircase to the upper floor, where he and the other two intrepid servants accosted the robbers.

  In the ensuing gun battle two of the robbers were killed and one shot in the leg. The others escaped into the forest, and it is believed that at least one of them was wounded. One of the valets, Andrew Lamphier by name, received a bullet in the shoulder and is now recuperating in Queen Anne’s Hospital and Infirmary in Nottingham.

  The robbers fled without any of the items they had attempted to steal, although a small Mycenaean vase dating from the fourth century B.C. was found shattered in the grass. The Nottinghamshire police believe that the remaining culprits will shortly be apprehended.

  Baron Thornton-Hoxbary declined to release the names of his houseguests, stating he did not wish to add notoriety to injury, but it is believed that among the guests were the Duke and Duchess of Pennaugh and Sir Arthur Sullivan, the noted composer. It is not known in what way, if any, this outrage is related to the series of robberies of great homes that have plagued the countryside around the East Midlands for the past year. Readers of The Standard will remember our account of the daring robbery at Cramden Pimms, the Nottinghamshire estate of Lord Chaut, in March of this year, when thieves broke in through a window in the middle of the night and made off with several important jewels including the so-called Bain of Thorncroft, a twenty-carat imperial topaz, believed to be the world’s largest, owned by the Marchioness of Cleves, who was a houseguest of His Lordship at the time.

  Professor Moriarty, quondam holder of the Thales Chair of Mathematics at Midlothian University, is well regarded in mathematical and astronomical circles for his monograph The Dynamics of an Asteroid. What information he is expected to supply the police in regard to this unfortunate affair is unknown.

  * * *

  * * *

  UNIDENTIFIED BODY FOUND IN THAMES

  Special to The Standard

  Friday 11 July 1890

  On Thursday evening at about 8:30 P.M. an unclad and severely mutilated body was found floating in the Thames River below Blackfriars Bridge. Dr. Phipps, the police surgeon, who was called out to examine the body, declared it to be that of a woman of between 18 and 25 years, who had been in the water for at least three days before she was found. Neither the woman’s identity nor the cause of her death has yet been established.

  * * *

  [CHAPTER ONE]

  IN THE DOCK

  “If the law supposes that,”

  said Mr. Bumble…,

  “the law is a ass—a idiot.”

  —CHARLES DICKENS

  IT SEEMED STIFLING HOT TO BENJAMIN BARNETT, sitting in the rear of the courtroom, but Mr. Justice Hedge did not seem inclined to have any of the four oversized windows opened. In all the trials he had covered at the Old Bailey, Barnett did not remember ever seeing them opened. Barnett, owner and managing editor of the American News Service, sat in the back pew of the visitors’ gallery wi
th his notebook open on his lap and a carefully sharpened Tiffman’s No. 2 lead pencil in his hand. Professor James Moriarty had just been brought up from the cells and taken his place in the dock. A tall man with a hawklike face and piercing eyes, the professor stood passively, his shoulders slightly hunched in his black frock coat, giving the impression that he was the only adult in a world—or at least a courtroom—of children. His trial as an accessory in the Widdersign murders had gone on for four days before it was given to the jury, and those good gentlemen had now been out for three. Now, at four thirty in the afternoon of the third day of deliberations, the judge had reconvened the court. The bewigged barristers had returned from wherever barristers go while awaiting a verdict, the judge had donned his red robes and assumed the seat of the Queen’s Justice, and the jury was filing in.

  Mr. Justice Hedge waited until the last juror had taken his seat and then leaned forward on his elbows and tilted his head, the better to peer over his wire-rim eyeglasses. His gaze focused on the foreman. He frowned. “I received your note,” he said. “It’s been three days.”

  The foreman rose. “We know, milord. Three days.”

  “Are you absolutely sure?”

  “We are, milord. Absolutely.”

  “You can come to no agreement?”

  There was a stir in the small audience, which was quelled by a stern glance from the judge. The foreman, a thin, small, nervous greengrocer with a large, red-veined nose that gave character to his otherwise pinched and undistinguished face, nodded vigorously. “Yes, milord. That’s so, milord.” He clenched his hands into fists and thrust them behind his back to keep from fidgeting. “As you say, we’ve been at it for three days, milord, and we don’t seem to be getting nowheres at all.”

  “I suppose, then, that giving you a few more hours to consider would be of no help?”

  “No, milord.”

  “Or another”—his lordship grimaced—“day or two?”

  “No, milord.”

  “You understand the charge?”

  “Yes, milord.”

  “You all, singly and collectively, understand and agree,” His Lordship began, pushing his glasses farther up on his nose, “that if the defendant, James Moriarty, has, as charged, been responsible for planning the robbery at Lord Hoxbary’s country manor house known as Widdersign, he is perforce therefore as guilty as any of the felons who were actually present at the scene of the crime?”

  “We does, milord.”

  “And that, as the robbery resulted in the taking of human life, the defendant would be as guilty of the crime of murder as the one who fired the shot, even though he was not actually present at the time the crime was committed?”

  “Yes, milord.”

  “And even though the victims happened to be two of the criminals?”

  “Yes, milord, your lordship has gone over that quite thoroughly. At first some of us had trouble seeing the justice in that, but your argument was quite persuasive. We has no longer any problem with that.”

  “You’re quite sure?”

  “Yes, milord.”

  “Perhaps if I had some of the testimony read back to you?”

  The foreman looked horrified and responded quickly, “We don’t have no dispute over the testimony, milord, nor any questions pertaining to it.”

  “I see.” Mr. Justice Hedge paused to adjust his wig, which had recently adopted the annoying habit of inching its way forward until his forehead completely disappeared. “Well then,” he said, peering down at the foreman as though the poor man were a hedge flower of some unexpected and particularly undesirable color. “What does seem to be the problem?”

  “Well, milord, we can’t agree as to whether or not he did that he is charged with, based on the evidence as we’ve heard it, is what it comes down to, milord. He may have done, but there’s some as thinks he may not have done.”

  “By ‘he’ I assume you mean the prisoner at the bar,” the judge specified, glancing down at the court stenographer.

  “Yes, milord. The defendant, Professor Moriarty, that’s who we mean.”

  Mr. Justice Hedge pushed his glasses back into place with a forefinger and glared at Moriarty. “It would seem I have no choice but to declare a mistrial. Three days and no verdict. Unheard of.”

  Barnett scribbled “unheard of” on his pad and underlined it. He would have to arrange to visit Moriarty, who had been a friend and mentor to him in the not-too-distant past, and see if there was any assistance he could offer. Anything, he thought wryly, short of arranging a prison break. That, Barnett was sure, the professor could manage on his own.

  The Honorable Eppsworth, QC, appearing for the prosecution, rose and fingered the lapel of his judicial gown. “I would like to move, milord, that a mistrial be declared.”

  “It would seem I have little choice,” said his lordship.

  Sir Humphrey Lowenbog, appearing for the defense, rose and bowed gravely, if briefly, toward the judge. “If it please your lordship,” he said, “my client Professor Moriarty and I would be quite willing to spare the crown the expense and trouble of a new trial. A directed verdict would suffice, I would say.”

  “A directed verdict?”

  “Yes, milord. Of not guilty, milord.”

  Mr. Justice Hedge leaned back in his judicial chair and glowered down at the bewigged barrister. “I’m glad to see, Sir Humphrey, that you have not lost your sense of humor during these proceedings,”

  Professor Moriarty turned in the dock to look up at the gallery. He took a pair of pince-nez glasses from the breast pocket of his jacket and polished the lenses with a piece of flannel while he studied the faces of those who had been studying his back.

  “I would like to suggest,” said the Honorable Eppsworth, “that a new trial date be set for as soon as practicable.”

  “I would think so,” said Mr. Justice Hedge. “I doubt whether we could possibly get a second jury so blind to the obvious.” He slammed his gavel down on the bench before him. “This case is closed, a mistrial is declared, this jury”—he paused to glare at the jury—“is discharged. Their names will be stricken from the rolls. The clerk will set a new court date.”

  Moriarty put the pince-nez back in his pocket as his eyes met those of Benjamin Barnett in the gallery. He nodded ever so slightly and turned back to face the judge.

  Sir Humphrey took a half step forward. “I would like to renew the matter of bail for my client, milord.”

  “Humor, Sir Humphrey,” said Mr. Justice Hedge severely, “can be taken only so far.”

  Barnett closed his notebook and rose. So there would be another trial. That brief nod from the professor was surely a sign that Moriarty wished to see him, he reflected. He would visit the prison as soon as possible. If there was any way he could help, he would certainly do so. Barnett’s knowledge of Moriarty, gained from two years working with the man and being privy to at least some of his secrets, told him that Moriarty was almost certainly not guilty of this particular crime. However, guilt or innocence was not a part of this equation. There was a question of honor involved. Moriarty had done as much for Barnett once, and from an Ottoman prison at that. Barnett’s wife, Cecily, might not see it in quite the same way, he realized—women tended to think of “honor” as a man’s excuse for behaving like a child. Barnett exited thoughtfully onto Newgate Street.

  [CHAPTER TWO]

  MOLLIE’S

  Come, give us a taste of your quality.

  —SHAKESPEARE

  IT HAD BEEN SATURDAY, September 13, 1890, for four hours, but Friday took a long time dying at the gentlemen’s establishment known as Mollie’s, a three-story white brick building at 33 Gladston Square, London. The last client had been ushered out, except for a marquis and a colonel of the Guards, who were using the establishment as a residence for the night, and five loo players of various ranks and stations in an upstairs room who probably wouldn’t be staggering out into the chill, damp fog until sometime Tuesday. The maids were gathering the s
oiled bed linens to be washed and ironed, the glasses to be scoured, the bottles to be rinsed and returned to the vintners, and the various frilly garments and special costumes to be cleaned, examined, and repaired if necessary. The filles de joie were enjoying the luxury of sleeping alone.

  Then suddenly there came a tapping as of someone strongly rapping, rapping at the outer door.

  “A bit late for visitors,” muttered the porter. “Or a bit early, if it comes to that.” He slid open the eye slot and peered out. The orange-white glow of the gaslight above the door showed two men in evening clothes standing outside clutching their silk hats in their gloved hands: a thin young man with muttonchop whiskers and the appearance of studied solemnity; and an older, thicker one with a bushy brush mustache and a touch of humor in his ruddy face.

  “Closed for the night,” the porter called out to them. “Come back tomorrow—or later today, as it happens. Say along about three in the afternoon. Glad to see you gentlemen then, I’m sure.”

  The young, thin gentleman brought his eye close to the eye slot. “Sorry to bother you, my man,” he said. “We’re here to retrieve Baron Renfrew. He’s late for his next, um, engagement. Has he changed his plans? Is he spending the night? Could we speak with him, if you don’t mind?”

  “Baron Renfrew, is it then?” the porter asked. “Well then, come into the parlor, gentlemen.” He pulled the door open and escorted them to the front room. “You just wait here for a minute, and I’ll fetch Miss Mollie.”

  No more than three minutes later Mollie Cobby, fair, buxom, fast approaching forty, and pleasant to look at from the red silk ribbons in her dark hair to the black satin slippers on her feet, came through the inner door, tying the cord of her silk wrap firmly around her waist. “What’s all this?” she cried. “The baron left these premises more than an hour ago, I believe—it might be two hours even. And what might you be wanting with him at this time of the morning, if I may ask?”