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

second for me to realize what it was. The false nose. A laugh escaped me. Holmes shook his head when she turned to stare at me.

‘Madame, I can explain all that you see here,’ said Holmes.

‘Explain quickly.’ She caught me shifting my weight as I stealthily attempted to draw nearer. ‘Stop there, you. Or I will shoot Mr Holmes.’

Just then Mrs Hudson appeared in the doorway, brandishing a tennis racquet as a weapon. I had wondered where my racquet had gone. She stared at the three of us.

‘Mr Holmes, I heard the commotion. Put that gun away, young lady, unless you plan to shoot all three of us. And sit down, all of you.’ She glanced at the clutter. ‘If you can find a seat.’

No one moved. Mrs Hudson was full of surprises today. She advanced into the room, tennis racquet raised.

‘Sit, or I shall knock sense into all three of you!’

Madame Borelli did not seem inclined to shoot the eminently reasonable Mrs Hudson in cold blood. She wavered, then replaced the gun into her reticule and looked round for a seat. I removed a large box of what appeared to be human bones from an armchair and brushed off its dusty wool surface. Madame Borelli glanced down, gave it one more furious brush and sat.

‘Tea, then, in a few minutes. Meanwhile, behave yourselves,’ said Mrs Hudson. She gave our visitor her sternest look. ‘This is a civilized house.’

Some minutes later, we sat facing hot tea and ginger biscuits, a veneer of respectability floating above the sea of clutter. Madame Borelli had calmed herself to some degree. The summer shower had dropped the temperature, and a tepid, damp breeze wafted into the room with salubrious effect.

‘Now, Madame Borelli, you have come here on another matter, I perceive, and not merely to retrieve the pages you so kindly lent me,’ said Holmes in the soothing manner, absent of any sarcasm, which he used at times to great effect.

‘Yes, I come. But I am not sure you are what I need. I am not sure—’

‘Tell me what is troubling you. You did not wish to open your reticule when you located your husband’s pages. And you have been keeping it close to you for your entire visit. But as you drew your gun, I glimpsed—’

‘Yes, yes. I brought something.’

My attention turned to the tapestry bag with gold fringe, on a braided golden cord which hung around the lady’s neck and was fastened with a small gold clasp to the sash of her dress. Even at this moment, one hand rested protectively upon it.

She glanced down at it nervously, then looked at Holmes from under her heavy fringe of dark eyelashes.

‘It is true. You said when we met that you … you write for science journals. But you solve crimes. Scotland Yard man says amateur. Are you any good at this?’

‘He is very good, Madame Borelli,’ I interjected. ‘Mr Holmes is the world’s first consulting detective. In fact, he invented the term. The police turn to him on cases they cannot solve. Some of the men are perhaps a little—’

‘Jealous,’ she said. ‘Yes, I see this.’

Holmes smiled. ‘What is troubling you?’

‘Well … Dario. He has a temper. What you see on my arm, it is not serious, it is him clutching my arm when he is too nervous or excited.’

‘What is he nervous and excited about?’ asked Holmes.

‘He received …’ She opened her small bag carefully and removed from underneath the Beretta a small oblong object wrapped in a handkerchief. She slowly unwrapped it. ‘This.’

It was a human finger.

PART TWO

ENTANGLEMENT

‘The moving Finger writes; and, having writ,

Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit

Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,

Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.’

—Omar Khayyam

CHAPTER 6

Fingering the Threat

Holmes eyed the gruesome digit with interest. ‘May I?’

He took up his magnifying glass from the table next to him and held out his hand.

She gave the thing to him and he examined it carefully, saying nothing.

Holmes handed me his glass. ‘Take a look, Watson. Male, about fifty; workman from the callus, here, and dirt under the nail. Judging from the amount of blood on the handkerchief—’

‘There is no blood on the handkerchief,’ I said.

‘Precisely. And by the look of the cut edge, severed post-mortem. Tell me what you see, Doctor.’

I took up the gruesome item. The cut was neat, done with a very sharp instrument. I could add nothing other than this to Holmes’s observations and said so.

He turned to the lady. ‘Do you know who sent this?’

There was a pause.

‘Yes. It is complicated,’ she said. ‘Dario says he does not know who sent this thing. But he knows. I can see that he knows.’

Holmes stared at her sternly. ‘Fine, you both know. Who sent it? And if you know who sent it, why have you come here instead of to the police?’

She paused. ‘I see you are detective, a real one,’ said she. ‘All right. It is Santo Colangelo, another magician, who send. A great rival to Dario. But no, more than a rival. Because he lost tip of right index finger in accident. An accident for which he blames mi Dario. I would like you to … to help me fix.’

‘Fix? How do you mean?’

She shrugged. ‘I do not wish to harm Santo Colangelo.’

Holmes glanced at me then turned a stern eye to the lady. ‘The man who threatens your husband?’

She paused and looked uncertain.

‘You want to keep this private,’ he said.

‘Yes.’

‘This Santo Colangelo, what is he, a rival in performance? In … ah, you are blushing. In romance, then?’

She looked down at her reticule, caressing the long, gold tassel. ‘Both,’ she answered finally. ‘He tries to win our bookings. Not successful.’

‘But whose finger is this?’ I interjected.

They ignored me.

‘Give me the history,’ said Holmes. ‘And then about the finger. Leave nothing out.’ He leaned back and closed his eyes.

Madame Borelli hesitated but I nodded to