Sherlock Holmes and The Sword of Osman

A Most Surprising Letter Arrives From Mycroft

At Chequers on the Saturday a further communication arrived, addressed to Sherlock Holmes. It was deeply scored in red ink and marked ‘Most Secret’. We were clustered in the grounds with Sir Edward Grey and the Clutterbucks, having planted the commemorative Valonia on Coombe Hill. The sapling stood next to an ancient clump of chequer trees after which the house was named. Holmes squinted at the pages of foolscap and handed them to me. I excused myself and moved away from our hosts.

The letter was from Mycroft, penned in duck-egg green ink. It was one of the most stupefying documents I have ever read.

‘So that’s what they really get up to at the Diogenes,’ I breathed.

Mycroft continued,

I turned to the final page.

According to Shelmerdine’s successor, newly appointed as Mycroft’s agent, hardly two hours after I presented the Sultan with the powerful Ross military binoculars the gift had been put to use. A deaf eunuch lip-read my conversation with the dragoman at the landing-pier while the cases and cages were being loaded on the boat. Every word I spoke was relayed to the Palace. The instant I called out, bitingly, ‘But don’t worry, the skeleton in your closet is perfectly safe with us’ I had inadvertently betrayed his true role to the Palace. Shelmerdine was doomed. The death of Mycroft’s paid agent - and my central role in it - horrified me. Had I not felt so overwhelming an urge to prove the man had failed to bamboozle the greatest ‘gumshoe’ in Europe, Shelmerdine would have survived. Even reading my lips would have been more difficult if the custom for medical officers at sea hadn’t obliged me to shave my moustache.

The party by the lake dispersed. My comrade rejoined me. The Foreign Secretary and the Clutterbucks went back to the house to change for Dinner. Holmes pointed at the letter.

‘Did you notice Mycroft had the misfortune to get a smear of ink upon the outer side of his right digitus minimus?’

I passed the pages back to him to read and waited in silence. He cocked an eye at me.

‘You look mournful, Watson.’

‘Aren’t you dismayed by the news about Shelmerdine?’ I asked with some asperity. ‘After all, he was an excellent companion. So what if he was involved in a plot to overthrow the Sultan – if he was.’

‘I might normally be disturbed,’ came Holmes’s enigmatic reply. ‘Except...’

‘Except what?’ I interrupted.

‘Except for the fact he met his fate on Galata Bridge.’

‘Galata Bridge?’ I echoed. ‘How would it matter if he was shot crossing a bridge or climbing the Mountains of the Moon?’

‘Not any old bridge. The bridge. Also, if you return to the letter, Mycroft doesn’t say he was shot crossing the bridge. It only says he was on the bridge when he was shot.’

‘I know this will shake your confidence in me to the very core, Holmes,’ I retorted, ‘but I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about. What difference does it make if he was crossing the bridge or just standing on it?’

My comrade’s thin fingers tapped at the letter.

‘We are told the shot came from ‘the slopes on which Yildiz sits’, a distance of several hundred yards.’

‘So?’

‘Even for a rifle with a state-of-the-art scope and chamber pressure of 20 tons a square inch it’s a considerable range.’

Holmes was right. It was a very considerable distance to hit any sort of moving target. My years in India hunting the occasional man-eating tiger had taken place in the jungle, invariably at close range, where jungle-craft and steady nerves were more important than long-range marksmanship.

‘For the bullet to strike someone in the head he had to be standing as motionless as a pillar of salt - and for several seconds,’ Holmes continued. ‘But you saw the fishermen jerking about as though they suffered from Saint Vitus Dance.’

‘So?’ I pursued.

‘Why would our dragoman be standing so still?’

‘How do you explain it,’ I demanded.

‘Cast your mind back to the newspaper photograph which revealed our presence to the whole of Stamboul.’

‘What has that to do with Shelmerdine?’

Holmes laughed, delighted at my perplexed expression.

‘Watson, your bafflement is a perennial delight. In a word - everything! The revelation of our true identity has everything to do with Shelmerdine. How many people knew we were disguised as Royal Naval officers?’

‘A good number. I counted Grey and the Prime Minister, your brother Mycroft. Fisher at the Admiralty. The Commodore. Three or four of the most senior officers aboard Dreadnought. The Sultan’s close entourage. And, yes, Shelmerdine.’

‘Excellent, Watson! Fifteen at least. Now tell me, who knew we would choose to go ashore when the entire crew from Commodore downwards was on deck awaiting the arrival of the Royal barge? Which of them knew we would be stepping off the ship at that moment? Someone was ready and waiting with a camera. Only one person other than Mycroft and the Commodore knew in advance both our assumed naval ranks and that you and I would quit the ship at that exact time. That person was...?’

‘Shelmerdine!’ I exclaimed, my certainty badly shaken. ‘We’d arranged to meet him at 8 o’ clock.’

‘I’m surprised you didn’t note the state of his boots that first time we met him. If he’d taken the carriage straight from his dwelling why would they have been so covered with dust and horse-droppings? I’ll wager he was shot taking a photograph of Dreadnought’s departure exactly where he took the newspaper photo of us jumping into the Haroony. The Sultan’s spies would have been well-acquainted with Shelmerdine’s custom of setting up his tripod at that very spot.’

I stood in silence while my companion tapped tobacco into his briar.

‘Poetic justice, Watson,’ Holmes resumed. ‘He told us he’d converted to Mohammedism. If he’d benefit by it he would switch to any belief - Gnosticism, Yarsanism, Samaritanism, Shabakism, Ishikism, Ali-Illahism, Zoroastrianism. Even Buddhism. A man of such expediency can have many masters and will take many sides, sometimes simultaneously. Nevertheless he is due our thanks. By revealing our presence he enabled us to catch Saliha Naciye. The news that Sherlock Holmes had arrived in Stamboul panicked Saliha Naciye into snatching the sword before the engraver could complete his work.’

‘The treachery of it all!’ I exclaimed indignantly. ‘Shelmerdine must have known that revealing our arrival might have laid us open to assassination.’

‘As you say,’ Holmes returned.

‘There’s something else which mystifies me, Holmes. Why did Saliha Naciye engineer Mehmed’s murder before we snared her? I can see why she might...’

‘It was essential to cover her tracks. Not even a Sultan’s wife could gain access to the sword. She needed Mehmed’s help. Until she saw the ghillie suit and hit upon the idea of becoming a spectre she had no way to carry out her plan other than through an alliance with him. He hedged his bets and pretended to be her accomplice. After that, Saliha Naciye needed only one other - the Daughter of Jerusalem. The Jewess’s life too might have been in danger except for her enduring value as the principal negotiator with whichever band of conspirators would agree to terms in exchange for the sword. Once Saliha Naciye had hold of the sword Mehmed was not only unnecessary for her plans, he was a definite threat. He could blackmail her - even be a witness against her if the need arose to save himself. It’s not impossible it was Chiarezza who pointed this out.’

‘Did Mehmed know the Sultan’s wife was the spectre?’

‘I doubt it. She had no need to tell him. His fear was genuine.’

‘What aroused your suspicions about Shelmerdine?’

‘The photographs. First, the German submarine. A camera could have been placed almost anywhere along the length of the bridge. However, soon enough I realised it was taken from the exact vantage point as the picture in the newspaper of us getting into the pinnace. Then, if you recall, after we caught Saliha Naciye in flagrante, we took another look at the photograph Shelmerdine handed to us on our arrival, the close-up of the sword.’

‘What about it?’

‘The real sword had already been spirited away.’

He waved Mycroft’s letter at me.

‘“Shanghaied” as my brother said. Our dragoman must have considered providing us with a snapshot of the unfinished fake but he couldn’t risk it. He may have heard we inspected the sword in the oil painting. The snapshot he supplied had to be identical. He could only have taken that photograph if he had access to where they’d sequestered the real thing.’

After a pause he added, ‘And then there was the incident at the necropolis.’

‘Which incident is that?’

‘When Mehmed’s widow incriminated our dragoman.’

Marsh as deep as Grimpen Mire on the Devon moors was threatening to engulf me.

‘I don’t recall her doing anything of the sort,’ I replied.

‘But you do recall her telling us about the conspiratorial gaggle which met at her house for several nights?’

‘Yes.’

‘She said they were led by a man anxious to hide his identity behind a hood?’

‘I remember that, but...’

‘And that the man with us in the cemetery was that same person?’

‘I’m certain she said nothing of the...’ I spluttered.

‘...when she switched to French to cut out any chance her words would be deliberately misreported. She looked at Shelmerdine and said ‘Comme lui’.’

‘‘Comme lui’?’ I parroted. ‘What of it? Shelmerdine was standing right by her. If she pointed up at him it was because he too wore a hood to hide his face.’

‘You wrote down her exact words, Watson. She said, “Those men, those men who were carrying him. I have seen some of them before. They were at my house. Always at night. I saw all their faces, except the man in charge. He wore a hood over his face. ‘Comme lui’.” But we were all wearing identical hoods. If it were simply the fact the leader of the plotters wore a hood like ours she would have used the plural and said “Comme vous”, referring to the three of us. She didn’t. She was warning us. She recognised him as the man in authority she’d observed in her own home. She deliberately used the singular - comme lui - to warn us. Our dragoman realised this immediately. You recall him jumping in with “Perhaps Allah will grant you a son from your last night with your husband - that is, if you escape with your head intact”. He was letting her know he could have her killed if she didn’t fall silent.’

‘If you’re right, why did Shelmerdine risk accompanying us to the cemetery?’

‘The Chief Armourer had been poisoned. The conspirators had no idea who’d been instrumental in Mehmed’s death. They had to find out if they were about to be identified.’

‘If Shelmerdine did publish the photo in the Journal de Constantinople,’ I began, ‘why on earth...?’

‘We were a present danger. His conspiracy was well advanced. By betraying our arrival he hoped we’d decide the game wasn’t worth the candle. Either we’d flee or Sir Edward would pull us out.’

Holmes looked at me.

‘Watson, your weakness is you make a habit of liking people. You cultivate friendship far too fast. What made me suspect Shelmerdine wasn’t all he purported to be? I merely kept in mind he was exactly what Mycroft purported him to be.’

He paused, pondering.

‘Nevertheless our dragoman was never the capo dei capi of the plot. You can tell old Masters by the sweep of their brush. Behind Shelmerdine spun a being on a quite different intellectual plane, my equal, even my superior. We may never discover who lurked behind him but I tell you, Watson, if I didn’t know for a definite fact that Professor Moriarty lies in a watery grave...

‘Any plot hatched by Saliha Naciye had to be simplicity itself, Lucrezia Borgian in its ruthlessness and crudity. But the other was a plan of exceptional cleverness. Photographing us from the moment of arrival, knowing we lacked any deep knowledge of naval etiquette, reaped its reward. The forgery, costly as it was, would delay discovery of the theft until the time was ripe.’

Holmes added his own postscript.

‘We achieved Sir Edward’s goal. The Ottoman Empire will hold, at least for the while. We have kept Abd-ul-Hamid on his throne. I doubt if Saliha Naciye will make a second attempt to push him aside. If she tries again and fails she knows she’ll be seen floating in a gunny-sack in the Bosphorus.’

Twilight was descending. It was time to change for dinner.

Holmes reflected as we set off, ‘Shelmerdine’s death may have been a serious blow to the conspirators in the shadows behind him but our dragoman’s demise was a relief to Mehmed’s widow. Her life was never going to be safe while he lived.’

Absorbed in thought we walked the hundred yards or so to the sturdy mansion, the loveliest of English homes. The duck with a huge spatulate bill and dark green head which had been standing patiently at our feet waddled alongside.

As we walked, Holmes remarked almost wistfully, ‘I wish there were always a few sultans about. It’ll be a far duller world without such unscrupulous tradesmen. It might be disputed how far any singular gift in an individual is due to his ancestry rather than his own early training but villainy in the blood takes the strangest forms. A study of Abd-ul-Hamid’s family portraits - the line from forehead to upper lip, the arch and droop of the nose - is enough to convert a man to the doctrine of reincarnation. If you pricked Abd-ul-Hamid’s head the soul of every sultan before him, back to Osman Ghazi, would come hissing out like gas from a container.’

Not for a second in Stamboul had we given thought to any wider consequences of our actions. Now a particular sentence in Mycroft’s letter, that Holmes had ‘single-handedly made a great war in Europe inevitable, and within ten years’, reverberated in my head. How was my comrade to react to an indictment of such magnitude - and from his own brother?

I walked at Holmes’s side in apprehensive silence while he blew smoke rings into the air. On the front lawn some yards from the entrance to Chequers I decided to bring the matter up.

‘Holmes,’ I began, hesitantly, ‘there’s something Mycroft...’

‘You noted that, did you, Watson?’

‘...where Mycroft wrote, ‘the much-feared East Wind has begun to blow’.’

Holmes smacked his hand on the letter.

‘Not that wretched East Wind! Rather I refer you to where my brother says - and I quote - ‘we came up against each other for the first time, and you came out in front’!’

I turned to stare at him. Crow’s feet were forming around the austere grey eyes in a true and impulsive expression of pure happiness. This was the first deeply heartfelt grin I’d ever seen light up Holmes’s face.

He waved the letter. Joyfully he repeated, ‘Mycroft admits it - I came out in front!’

With an exultant gesture he said, ‘Next week we’ll dress, dine and enjoy an evening out. What do you say, a bottle of Montrachet tête-à-tête and a fine repast - none of your Everyman cut-off-the-joint-and-two-veg served by flat-footed old waiters in greasy dress-coats! We’ll start at that most restful temple of food, Simpson’s-in-the-Strand, Grand Divan Tavern. Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg is on at Covent Garden. If we hurry our meal we might get there just in time for Sachs’ full-bellied cobbling song.’

‘The Meistersinger on you, Holmes?’ I asked.

My surgery, wound-pension and fewer and fewer royalties from my publishers all lumped together hardly stretched to getting my silk grosgrain opera hat and dress boots cleaned and the cost of a ticket for a Wagnerian comedy, let alone a splendid repast at Simpson’s.

‘Better still, my dear friend...’ He tapped a bulge in his pocket. ‘...on His Majesty King Edward’s Government! Our Foreign Secretary was as good as his word. We have a considerable number of five jacks to share. Once more you’ll dine on smoked Scottish salmon, followed by treacle sponge with Madagascan vanilla custard - the very dishes I believe you ordered at the start of the case of the Bulgarian Codex.’

The memory of Stamboul was fading, its kaleidoscope of colour and sights, the stench of rubbish piled up in the streets, the smell of rotting fish pervading the quayside, the manifold grotesqueries and intrigues. Even my primal terror in the face of the gastromancy.

‘And your dish?’ I asked.

‘I too shall order as I ordered then,’ he replied, ‘slices of roast beef delivered on a silver trolley. Perhaps, as then, another anonymous note will be delivered in a Bon Bon dish,’ adding with an uncommon self-mockery, ‘written with a J pen on royal cream paper.’

The bit was clearly between his teeth.

‘If so, I shall quit my bees and you your chambers. We shall set off once more, like the scourging hounds of hell.’

The weeks went by. The intense colours of high summer in Stamboul were overtaken by the cooler palette of memory running from silver and horse-back browns to perse. The Michaelmas daisies in Regent’s Park with their mass of misty purples came and went. Holmes had long since returned to the quietude of his bee-farm. My moustache had re-established itself.

Heavily bundled-up, I took a morning constitutional around the boating-lake in Regent’s Park. A question kept repeating in my mind. Moments before Holmes set off from the Ottoman shore that last time he astounded me by identifying Shelmerdine as the principal abettor in the second plot. He swore me to secrecy. His exact words were, ‘Watson, it must remain our secret, yours and mine, do you understand?’ As he flung himself aboard the tender and set off for Dreadnought he even added, ‘Shelmerdine remains of paramount value to England’. Within minutes I had broken my word. Within hours Shelmerdine was dead. Holmes’s reticence was a familiar and often frustrating characteristic. Why, I now asked myself, hadn’t he kept the startling revelation to himself until I rejoined him aboard the battleship?

Standing there in the damp air of Regent’s Park the rose-tinted glasses through which I had long viewed my old friend were quickly becoming less rosy. He knew I would wait behind at the dockside until Shelmerdine brought Mycroft’s spices and returned my camera. The fact Holmes did not bide his time could mean only one thing: he had determined, correctly, that my affectionate regard for all things Holmesian would tempt me into a serious indiscretion. He meant me to reveal all to the dragoman. To use one of my comrade’s own phrases it was the only conclusion I could come to, ‘consistent with sanity’.

I felt as stunned as if I’d been struck from behind by a Penang lawyer wielded by a dacoit. It would have occurred to Holmes that the Palace would have us in its eye to the very moment we quit the Empire’s shores. It was Holmes, purposefully, not I inadvertently, who set in motion the shot that dropped the dragoman on Galata Bridge.

As I walked past the Heronry a second dramatic thought struck me. What role had Holmes’s brother Mycroft really played? The public disclosure of our identity through the flaming headlines in the Stambouli newspaper could not have been left to a dragoman’s initiative. Shelmerdine may have published the photograph of our arrival but only on specific orders. Whose orders? Was Mycroft the advance-agent of a movement so epoch-making that not one Englishman in fifty thousand would ever dream of it - to dismantle the Ottoman Empire with all speed and at any cost?

A casual rumour picked up - even invented - by the Diogenes Club concerning the Sword of Osman could have been transmitted back to the bazaars via provocateurs like Shelmerdine, to be acted upon by Saliha Naciye and the CUP or the rival Prince Sabahedrinne. Mycroft was aware the sword had been shanghaied before our arrival. He must have been in constant telegraphic communication with our dragoman. The meeting between Sir Edward Grey and Sherlock Holmes at the Foreign Secretary’s initiative must have come as a bombshell for Holmes’s brother. Mycroft’s letter delivered by special messenger to our train at Victoria with its mumbo jumbo about a new Convention on spies positively begged us to wiggle our way out of the case before it commenced. Looking back it seemed astonishing we weren’t assassinated the moment the Journal de Constantinople revealed our presence. The last undercover person fitted out by Gieves as an Army doctor intent, supposedly, on studying the use of vegetables in Ottoman medicine never made it back. We would have offered the simplest of targets for Shelmerdine’s co-conspirators at the crowded waterside. The open graves at the cemetery could have been dug specially for us. Our throats could have been slit in an instant when we confronted the Chief Armourer’s widow in the grove.

Had we once more lived a charmed life? Or were we allowed to live because Holmes was Mycroft’s younger sibling?