The Mystery of the Tankerville Leopard

Chapter Twenty

Ten days passed in a feverish stupor before I opened my eyes to find myself in a hospital ward with a wheezy old man with kidney stones to my left and a coffin propped up against the wall to my right. My recovery appeared to inconvenience a good many people, not least the Chief Surgeon, who had laid a fair wager on my expiring within a week of my admittance, and as a result was out of pocket, so he told me, to the tune of twenty pounds.

Even more vexing to him was the question of the amount owed to the coffin-maker for his services, which, he said, the hospital was liable for, on account of my not taking up occupancy. He suggested I should foot the bill. I objected to this on several grounds.

Firstly, I could hardly be expected to pay for a thing which I had expressly not ordered nor had every expectation of not using for some time; and secondly, because the interior had been lined with a dull yellow ribbed satin material of inferior quality. I had no intention, said I, of going to my eternal rest in anything but white silk – in short, I would not be seen dead in cream satin.

I made these comments with the lightest of touches, but the Chief Surgeon was a man curiously lacking in humour. According to his considered opinion, I was lucky to be alive at all. On that point, I could not disagree with him. My injuries had been clean enough when inflicted, my later care less so. The dirty nails of Dr Woodford had indeed been as injurious to my health as I had feared.

For ten days, I had inhabited a nightmare landscape, given life by a fevered brain. Dogs of every shape and size had bounded across the field of my imagination, dripping diamond saliva from their jaws. Ghouls on unicorns rose up to drive their steeds against me and prick me with their dagger-like horns. I had vague remembrances of fighting against my choral-induced state to surface in a world populated by shadowy figures that had pressed me to the bed and forced sleep upon me.

I had given up trying to discern where fantasy ended and reality began. When I had accepted this, then was I finally able to slip my chains. I had bruised, sore, tormented by a persistent dry cough, and a good twelve pounds lighter.

The only good thing to emerge from my ordeal was that my injuries were near healed. Another few days would see my departure from the attentions of pretty nurses and over-familiar patients. The elderly gentleman in the bed next to mine was particularly trying, being given to making hints about how difficult it was to get a good coffin these days and how fortunate he consider himself if he were to be buried in anything so fine.

In the end, I suggested he take it with him when he left. This pleased him immensely, and he said he would set it up in his living room as a talking point for the neighbours until the time came for its appointed use. I had no objections, nor indeed did the other members of the ward, when he offered to stow the thing out of sight underneath his bed and used it as a receptacle for his chamber pot and personal possessions.

Insensible as I had been, I knew nothing of what had happened following my collapse at the Tankerville Club. The nurse could tell me only that I had been brought in as an emergency case and had not been expected to last the night. She could tell me nothing of the daily news, except that Benetfink and Co. of Cheapside were having a sale – an event I was in no position to take advantage of – and furthermore seemed reluctant to provide me with a quality newspaper on the grounds that I needed my rest.

After being told this for the fiftieth time, I confided my woes to my coffin-minded friend alongside, who found an answer to my problem by producing some suspiciously square-shaped newspaper cuttings. I later discovered that he had purloined them from the caretaker's privy, a fact which I had known before might have dissuaded me from their careful scrutiny. As it transpired, the most interesting parts had vanished, leaving me with lengthy advertisements for ladies' clothing and gentlemen's outfitters.

I thought I must surely go mad with frustration until I was gratified to find that I had not been entirely forgotten. Sunday afternoon before my discharge brought the welcome sight of Inspector Lestrade, bearing news and a large bag from which came the occasional waft of something heavily seasoned with onions.

"Well," said he, smiling affably, "you're alive then, Mr Holmes."

"So it would appear, Inspector. Your exile to Rutland has been delayed also, I see."

He took the chair at my bedside. "Postponed, indefinitely I should say. Clearing up a whole bevy of murders probably had something to do with it." He brightened. "Best of all, it put that Gregson's nose out of joint, I can tell you. Apple of the Chief Super's eye he may be, but it's the results that tell in the end, and he was the one who went and arrested the wrong man."

He seemed to have conveniently forgotten the not insignificant role I had played in the affair. Most notably, I noticed no mention of my name in the account given in the The Times's leader of a week ago that Lestrade produced for my inspection. Not that I begrudged him his victory over his rival; without his assistance that night, I knew I would not have the luxury of wallowing in indignation as I was minded to do now.

"You did well, Inspector," I said, managing to be graceful in defeat.

"Well, it's not everyday we get to clear up five murders in one day: Sommers, Fanshawe, Harding, Finsbury and Major Handyman too," said he, counting the names on his fingers. "The Commissioner was well pleased. Told the Chief Super he'd be a fool to send me up north, so…" He gave a smug, toothy grin. "Here I am."

"Much to Mrs Lestrade's approval, no doubt."

"Oh, yes, she's well happy. Especially now she and the baby won't have to travel."

Events had indeed moved apace while I had slumbered. "I take it that congratulations are in order?"

He nodded, beaming as much as any proud father was wont to do. "He's a bonny lad, fit as a fiddle and a fine pair of lungs on him. The wife's having a few days' rest, so her mother's moved in to help out with the children till she gets back on her feet."

I gathered this latter remark was the one responsible for the pained look that had come to his face.

"I told her I was visiting someone laid up in hospital this afternoon and she insisted I brought some of this," said he, placing the bag with its ominous smell on the bed. He produced an earthenware pot and removed the lid with a flourish. "She's got her faults, the mother-in-law, but she's a decent cook, I'll give her that."

I peered at the contents of the pot, feeling my nostrils tinge at the overwhelming smell of stewed vegetables and my sight assaulted by a collection of unremarkable grey and brown lumps wallowing in murky gravy. "What is it?" I asked suspiciously.

"Cockaleekie soup," said he with some degree of pride. "Saves lives that does."

He had evidently gone to some trouble and consideration on my part, and I had no desire to cause offence. I steeled myself, took the spoon he held out to me, and trusted that I was not about to delay my recovery through the ingestion of inedible substances. Several spoonfuls were enough to satisfy him, after which I was able to bow out with good grace, claiming that I had eaten earlier. I offered him the remainder and he set about it with gusto while I browsed the newspapers he had brought.

"'Scandal at the Tankerville'," I read aloud. "Outrage would be a better word. They all knew, Inspector."

He nodded. "That's what I told the Commissioner. He said we couldn't go arresting the whole club, especially now half of them have shipped out with their regiments. Besides, indifference isn't a crime, Mr Holmes."

"It should be." I turned my attention back to the paper. "This reference to 'other members of the gang' – I take it they are referring to the Salisbury twins, Jeffreys and Madame Dubois?"

"Oh, she weren't no madam," said Lestrade between mouthfuls. "And she weren't French either. Jenny Clark is her real name, although she goes by Jane Clarkson or Janey Clarkenwell or whatever takes her fancy at the time. Turns out that our friends in Cardiff have been looking for her ever since she made off with an old lady's jewellery a couple of years back. She had a good thing going, our Jenny, and always worked to the same plan: she'd befriend an old dear who had a few quid in the bank, made herself indispensible, then when she hold of the keys to the safe, she helped herself and vanished."

"And her connection to Major Handyman?"

"She says he recruited her to do some thieving for him. They'd do the round of the jewellers in Hatton Garden, picking out likely candidates."

"Yes, they were seen. What of their accomplices?"

"She said her only contact was Handyman. Said she didn't know anything about none of the others. Jeffreys told the same story."

"He knew that Stanhope was involved."

"Ah, but that's all he knew, so he said." Lestrade took a moment to chew thoughtfully on his soup. "He's another one going under an assumed name. I thought he looked familiar, but for the life of me I couldn't place him. It only came to me when we had him down at the station: John Parker's his name. Nasty bit of work too. Used to run with a gang of garrotters as a nipper. Seems he's gone up in the world of crime since then. Well, this business'll see him put away for a while."

"On what charge?"

"Handling. By his own admission, he used to take the stolen gems to and from the cutters."

I gave him a sharp look. "He confessed?"

Lestrade nodded. "Said he wasn't going to be had up for no murders. Said he was willing to do his time for what he had done, but no more than that."

"He was present when Sommers was killed."

Another spoonful of soup vanished into Lestrade's mouth. "Any witnesses to that?"

"Stanhope told me."

"Hearsay. The courts' don't go for that so much these days. Stanhope's dead, so he can't confirm or deny it."

"I suppose the same applies to Horace and Maurice Salisbury?"

"No, we've got Parker's testimony about their role in the affair. An unpleasant pair, by all accounts. They 'assisted' Handyman in his torture of Michael Harding, and killed Finsbury as well. Seemed quite proud of that, they did."

"The gallows for them then."

Lestrade shook his head. "I doubt that, Mr Holmes. I dare say their destination is more likely to be Broadmoor. Those two aren't right in the head."

"Right enough when they hanged poor Finsbury."

"Well, that's the decision of the court, not mine," said Lestrade, his tone suggesting the outcome he would have preferred. "I'm content with the knowledge that we've put a stop to the goings-on of a nasty gang of diamond thieves, and got a fair few of their accomplices under lock and key."

"Presumably you mean the diamond cutter they employed to re-cut the stones and the buyers?"

"All old faces, each and every one of them. The cutter threw his hands up to it as soon as I confronted him. Claimed he did his job and got paid – no more than that. He's a sharp one, him, and crooked as a donkey's back leg. As for the buyer, I had an instinct as to who the elderly gent, Enderby, really was and I was right – none other than my old friend Harold Northcote. He's a middle man between the buyer and the seller, paid to keep his mouth shut when things go wrong, so we didn't get much out of him. We'll have to wait awhile, see if prison changes his mind about telling us who he sold the stones on to." He chuckled. "I'd wager there were a few of them Hatton Garden diamond merchants on his list though. I've never seen so many nervous people when I went round there asking questions about stolen diamonds."

"What of the stones I hid in the leopard? You did find them?"

He nodded. "Very good hiding place, if I might say so, sir. You might be interested to know that they belonged to a Mrs Forthby-Young, who had her diamond necklace pinched last week when she was at the opera. Quite upset she was when we returned them to her, especially as the big stone had been turned into six smaller ones."

"And the money?" I asked.

"Well, now that's the interesting thing. Handyman and Stanhope were well-off – both were in receipt of some large sums of money from time to time – but not as much as you'd expect from an operation of this nature."

"Suggesting that the lion's share was going elsewhere," I remarked, recalling the heated conversation that had ended with Stanhope shooting Handyman. "Did any of the people you arrested make reference to someone called the 'Professor'?"

Lestrade looked bemused. "We're up to our necks in any number of petty villains, and you want to go looking for some college type? Hardly likely, is it, Mr Holmes?"

"Any more than the possibility that two military men and a respectable London club could be involved in such activities," I retorted. "No, Lestrade, there was more to this. Stanhope referred to another, someone for whom he was ready to kill for, someone for whom he was prepared to sacrifice of own life." The memory of his last words crept back into my mind. "'Here, and no further', he told me. I understand now. He meant that it would end with him. And he was right. It has."

I caught Lestrade watching me closely, his expression unreadable. "Well, sir, I guess we'll never know for certain. If this fellow is out there, as you suggest, then I dare say we've not heard the last of him."

"I dare say not." I met Lestrade's gaze. "If he is, then I'll find him, Inspector, if it's the last thing I do."

"Don't say that, sir. Sounds too much like tempting fate, what with your habit of getting yourself into trouble. Which reminds me." He delved into his coat pocket and took out a fat white envelope, which he passed to me. "From Major Prendergast, with his thanks. He was well pleased with the outcome, now that he has been exonerated and his reputation restored, and to that end I suggested he might like to make a small donation towards your expenses, seeing how you ended up in here on his account."

"Solely his account?" I said, offering him a knowing smile. "I seem to remember we had an agreement."

"I never asked you to tackle them on your own. And, while we're on the subject, who was that scruffy urchin you sent round to my house? You do know he helped himself to my brass door knocker."

"Did he? How unfortunate for you." I opened the envelope and found seven crisp ten-pound notes within. "The Major has been too generous."

"You earned it, sir."

I shook my head. "Fifty pounds of this belongs to Michael Harding. He was…" I allowed myself a fleeting smile. "A good man, and such a rarity should be valued."

Lestrade did not look convinced. "Whatever you say, Mr Holmes. This, though, does belong to you." He produced a five-pound note. Several rust-coloured stains identified it as the one I had given him that fateful night. "The wife did her best to get the blood out. Didn't come up too badly as it happened."

"Keep it, Inspector. I meant what I said about paying my debts in full."

"What with what you did at that club, Mr Holmes, I'd say we were square. I did warn you against taking unnecessary risks."

"Indeed you did. The responsibility for what happened is mine."

"All the same," said he, "I wouldn't feel right taking what didn't belong to me." He drew three pounds from his pocket and exchanged the notes for the five. "Now we're even. Don't spend it all at once."

"I dare say the hospital fees will make a dent in this."

He seemed mildly taken aback. "Hadn't you heard, sir? Your brother took care of that side of things."

Considering the cloud under which we had parted, and his carrying through his threat to have me barred from our father's meagre legacy, I was greatly surprised to hear that Mycroft had been at all interested in my plight.

"He did?" I queried, aghast. "You actually met him?"

"Well, no, not in person. He sent someone round," he added with emphasis. "An official sort from the look of him. You could see it pained him, having to deal with ordinary people. He knew what he was doing though, I'll give him that much. He had you moved here with the instructions that no expense was to be spared in saving your life."

Given that the hospital staff had been laying wagers against my survival, I had to wonder if he had got value for money.

"Did he take my things too? I seem to be lacking my clothes."

Lestrade nodded. "He took everything, but he did say when you were ready to leave to send word to your tailor. Oh, and he said your brother wanted a word."

Knowing Mycroft, that word was likely to be neither warm nor brotherly.

"Well, Mr Holmes, if that's all, I'll be saying goodbye," said he, rising. "Glad to see you looking better."

I wondered if I should risk a mirror. "I could hardly look any worse, Inspector."

"You'll be up and about on your feet in no time." He gathered up his things and was about to leave when he paused for a moment. "I dare say it'll be a long while before I encounter any more leopards or ghosts or unicorns, but if I do come across a case that's a little out of the ordinary…"

"Yes, you may," I said, pre-empting his question. "Only, in future I intend to confine my assistance to the role I have appointed for myself, namely that of a private consulting detective. I have no intention of masquerading as a servant for anyone ever again, not even," I added, firmly, "on pain of exile to Rutland!"

Well, he had to be all right, didn't he? So, with everything wrapped up, we're almost at the end. But, what about Mycroft, I hear you say, and the small question of a rather major brotherly falling out?

Let's if they can resolve their differences in the Epilogue!