The Three Locks by Bonnie MacBird (learn to read books txt) 📕

are you thinking, Holmes? You risk serious damage, dislocating a shoulder like that! How did you do it? And more to the point, how did you stand it?’

‘A touch of morphine, going in. Borelli uses it, I will wager, but he claims not. It does fog the thinking. I shall try to do without. And I’ve learned to pop it back myself.’

‘You have learned? How many times have you done this?’

‘This is the third.’

‘Idiotic, man! Of all your bad habits, this takes the prize. What of your violin playing? Boxing? You could do yourself permanent harm! Those ligaments don’t always return to their original length.’

‘Light me a cigarette, would you, Watson?’ Still rubbing his shoulder, he stepped out onto the landing outside the room. ‘Mrs Hudson! Some ice if you please!’

He came back in and sat before me.

‘There is no ice, Mr Holmes,’ came Mrs Hudson’s voice. I detected a note of irritation in it.

‘Send Billy,’ he shouted. Then as an afterthought, ‘Please!’

No reply. Manners had eroded in this terrible heat, I thought. Londoners were unaccustomed to tropical life. And Mrs Hudson’s new ice box, purchased for us all by Holmes, was often empty. Ice was very expensive, and income, of late, had been scarce. I felt a twinge of guilt about my recent holiday.

‘We really must clean this place up, Watson. Get back in her good graces.’

He picked up a cigarette and lit it with difficulty. I shook my head.

‘Foolish, Holmes. You forget that I am a doctor. I know more of injuries than you do.’

‘I am careful, Watson. One can train one’s muscles, extend the ligaments over time with repetition. How else might one dance the ballet?’ He waved his good arm in a dramatic arc.

‘Over time, perhaps some so built can do so. But with repetition, you can also have your arm hanging uselessly out of the socket, Holmes.’

‘Watson, you win the ill temperament sweepstakes today. And this, after a successful trip in which you won money, swam, ate well—’

‘Stop! I am not interested in hearing this!’

‘You have gained two – no, three pounds. And I see you have begun a diet, starting today. Failing, however.’

‘Holmes!’ He could not possibly know this. It had only been a thought that very morning.

He grinned at me. ‘You have celery in your waistcoat pocket. You hate celery. One cannot buy celery on the train, therefore you have brought it with you all the way from Bath. I wager you planned to eat the celery on the train instead of—’

‘Stop!’

‘But a sandwich must have won you over. Salmon, no doubt. Day One of your reducing plans, and already you have failed!’

I shook the newspaper roughly and returned to my article in a fury. I glanced down surreptitiously at my waistcoat. Indeed, a piece of celery poked out. He was right about it all. In a fit of pique, I tossed the celery to the floor.

It landed next to a plate of uneaten food, a collection of seashells, a revolver, a dog’s collar, and what might have been a piece of flesh-coloured rubber and was perhaps a false nose. Home.

I looked up at him. ‘The salmon, Holmes?’

‘I will admit that was a guess. But it is your favourite.’

‘You never guess!’

‘But of course I do. Watson, let us call a truce. No luck, then, with your secret box in Bath? You would be crowing over that, if so.’

I glowered at him. ‘Two locksmiths failed to open it.’

The sound of the doorbell interrupted us, and Mrs Hudson appeared, announcing ‘a lady who would not give her name but insists that you have some papers of hers.’ She glanced about with disdain. ‘If you can find them.’

Holmes glanced about, as if having forgotten the chaos with which he’d surrounded himself. ‘Give us a moment, please, Mrs Hudson. Watson, why don’t we quickly tidy up?’ He was on his feet, scooping up newspapers in a flash and, irritation notwithstanding, I took up a stack of papers near my chair and rose.

‘Not those, Watson!’ he cried, but I ignored him and threw them into the grate where the flames caught. ‘They are my laboratory notes!’ he cried.

Mrs Hudson shook her head and departed.

Holmes attempted to rescue the burning pages but failed.

‘Holmes!’ He would set us all alight some day!

We heard footsteps on the landing and he flung himself into his chair, instantly assuming a pose of casual interest.

Our client appeared on the threshold. She was a striking woman of perhaps thirty, in a long red dress and an enormous hat topped with a red plume. Her black hair was arranged in a voluminous pompadour, her high cheekbones and olive skin conveying a southern birth. A waft of Oriental perfume assailed my nostrils. She was stunning, forthright, and despite the heat seemed coolly impervious. She put me in mind of the bow of a mighty ship.

I rose politely but Holmes remained seated and smiled calmly at her, his hands steepled.

She paused at the doorway and waved a folded newspaper in one hand. ‘Mr Holmes, I did not know you were a famous detective!’ Her voice was a honeyed contralto, with the seductive lilt of an Italian accent. ‘You told me you write about science. But I read of you, in this paper—’

She stepped over the threshold, took in the junkyard that was our sitting-room and laughed. ‘Oh my!’ she exclaimed. But when her eyes alighted on the hanging straitjacket, the laughter caught in her throat, and she made a sudden guttural sound, like a tiger.

‘What! You liar!’ she roared, flinging the newspaper to the floor. ‘You are no scientist. No detective either. You steal our famous illusion!’ She grimaced. ‘I will kill you!’

‘Madame Ilaria Borelli,’ said Holmes cordially. ‘You are early.’

CHAPTER 5

Madame Borelli

Her face a mask of fury, the lady scanned the clutter, glancing past me as though I were something to be stepped over on the street.

Her eyes lit upon the papers mounded on the table. She rushed over to them, snatched them up