Sherlock Holmes: The Army of Doctor Moreau

CHAPTER TWO

“Well,” announced Holmes, “either the country is on the brink of disaster or word of Mrs Hudson’s kedgeree has spread to Mayfair.” From his position, cross-legged on the floor before the fire, he raised his head above the parapet of his tobacco-stained nest, a temporary blemish on the carpet built from newspaper personal columns and that morning’s mail, and pointed towards the window. “Unless I’m mistaken...”

“Which you never are.”

Holmes smiled. “… Mycroft approaches.”

The doorbell rang.

“You’ll be telling me you could smell his hair wax half a mile away,” I joked.

“No,” Holmes admitted, “at least,” he smiled, “not with the windows closed. Though I can recognise the sound of his tread easily enough and there are few men in London who can make a cab creak with such relief when they offload themselves from it.”

I heard the front door open followed by the groan of our stairs.

“Not to mention the agony of our floorboards.” We laughed as the door crashed open and the considerable bulk of Mycroft Holmes appeared breathlessly in the doorway.

“Only poor people chose to live in upstairs rooms,” he complained. “Kindly have the decency to live up to your bank balance and buy a damned house.”

“Then how would you get your bi-annual exercise?”

“Exercise? I have evolved beyond exercise. Only those without a brain would choose to obsess on the flesh. It’s a vehicle, nothing more.”

Words I’d heard Holmes himself use, though I chose not to mention the fact. “A vehicle that is in need of upkeep, Mycroft,” I said. “When was the last time you had a check-up? You’re breathing like a bulldog with a bullet wound.”

“Dear Lord!” Mycroft shouted, dropping into an unfortunate armchair. “Since when did a gentleman have to endure such slights against his person?”

“When there is so much of his person to slight,” Holmes replied and erupted into laughter, throwing the remnants of his morning correspondence, fluttering, into the air.

“Oh no,” Mycroft said, looking at me, “he’s positively effervescent! What’s wrong with him?”

“I rather imagine,” I replied, “that he is excited by the possibility of work you bring. We’ve just finished a particularly complex and unusual case and the idea of being able to sink his teeth immediately into a new one …”

“One man’s meat is another’s poison,” Mycroft said, glowering at his brother. “What brings you excitement threatens to breed another ulcer in this stomach that so fascinates you both.”

“Another ulcer?” I sighed and fetched my medical bag. If Mycroft wouldn’t go and see a doctor I’d force a medical opinion on him while he was too exhausted to move.

“Oh don’t fuss!” he said as I advanced upon him. But he knew better than to actually fight me off and I proceeded to conduct a basic examination while Holmes called down for coffee.

“Your heart sounds like a drunken bare-knuckle fight and your blood pressure would see the sleeper train to Glasgow and back. You need to look after yourself. Otherwise, sooner or later, one or the other will kill you.”

“Obviously, Doctor,” he replied. “Luckily my job is extremely relaxing.”

“I shall prescribe you a medical diet and an exercise regimen.”

“And I shall have you shot as an enemy of the Crown.”

“Follow my advice or end up in an early grave, the choice is yours.”

“Coffee,” Mrs Hudson announced, bringing in a tray, with a disapproving look on her face. It was a familiar countenance, as much a part of the Baker Street furnishings as the tobacco slipper and the shrunken head that Holmes used as a stopper on a flask of gunpowder. The decoration in those rooms was always wont to make a lady despair.

Mycroft made a childish show of taking a biscuit from the saucer Mrs Hudson had provided and popping it, whole, into his mouth.

“Might we now move onto matters of more importance than my weight?” he asked once he had swallowed. “As much as your concern is gratifying I did not make this arduous journey simply to gossip like an old lady at a bandstand.”

“We never get the benefit of your company unless the empire itself is in peril,” agreed Holmes. “What is it this time? Treasury lost the keys to the vault?” He paused for effect. “Again?”

He released himself from the clutter of that morning’s mail and walked over to the fireplace to refresh his pipe. Holmes knew well enough that a period of contemplation lay ahead and for him, contemplation was impossible without tobacco.

“Gentlemen,” Mycroft announced, somewhat theatrically, “what do you know of natural selection?”

“Survival of the fittest,” I replied. “The belief that a species adapts according to its environment, Darwinism.”

“In a nutshell, Doctor. Though we’ve come a long way since Darwin’s initial writings.”

“And who might you mean when you say ‘we’?” Holmes asked.

Mycroft shuffled in his chair, something the piece of furniture was lucky to survive. “You are, I assume, suggesting this to be a Departmental affair.” The capital “D” was clearly emphasised.

“Naturally, if only to watch you squirm. Need I reassure you of Watson’s discretion?”

“I would hope not,” I interrupted. After all, given the work I had performed alongside my friend in the name and interest of Queen and country one begins to hope one’s reputation can be taken for granted.

“No,” Mycroft agreed, “I appreciate you know when to discuss your adventures with my brother and when to keep your notebook locked within the desk.” A point that I shall, in haste, gloss over.

“Nonetheless,” he continued, “beyond a handful of individuals nobody is supposed to know of the existence of The Department. As you know, I have often been in service to the government, applying such skills as I might possess in the furtherance of the national interest. It was only a matter of time before my role was expanded. While my experience and knowledge is suitably wide there will always be the need for more expert services and that is where The Department comes in, a movable list of agents hired— often without their direct knowledge—in order to handle specific threats or research projects. I am the Headmaster as it were, supervising and selecting those needed and acting as the central focus of the network.”

“A central focus in government,” said Holmes. “What will they think of next?”

“I cannot deny that the lack of inter-departmental squabbling and compromise of purpose is refreshing,” he agreed. “In fact it was a deciding factor when it came to my accepting the post. I operate outside the changing tide of policy and opinion, I do as I see fit. Pursuing the matters that seem to me to be of the most importance.”

“And that included evolutionary theory?” I asked.

“Naturally. Whenever a grand shift in scientific thinking comes along it is always the duty of government to lend its attention. You can be sure that other governments are doing the same. Survival of the fittest, Dr Watson, just think of the possible extensions of that thought. Is this a force of nature that can be harnessed? Controlled? Imagine if it were something we could induce rather than endure.”

“I fail to see the advantage.”

“Really? As a soldier I had thought you would. Think of all the places where man is at a disadvantage, the hottest deserts, the deepest oceans. Imagine if he could adapt to that environment, embrace it rather than be threatened by it. There is no country we could not fight in, no battlefield on which we would not dominate.”

The thought was so repugnant to me that I confess I could not reply for a few moments. Was there no limit to the arrogance of man?

“It is not our place to play God, Mycroft,” I said at last.

“Ah,” he replied with a smile. “What a pleasure it must be to have the luxury of morals. They are things I have had to abandon long ago. In my position, Doctor, you must appreciate that nothing is beyond contemplation. It’s all very well my objecting to a principle but what use will that be when the Germans mobilise troops that have a biological advantage over our own? Much comfort my principles will be when our men are dying.”

“But surely someone has to draw a line. Must we all submit to our basest thoughts? Entertain the very worst behaviour just in case our neighbour does the same?”

“Welcome to my world, Doctor.”

“If we could agree to accept the pragmatic nature of your work and move on to the facts?” Holmes suggested, impatient as always to get to the actual data.

“Indeed,” Mycroft agreed, clearly happy to do just that. “Though I will just say that perhaps the doctor would not be quite so affronted by the idea were its medical applications appreciated. Imagine a body evolved beyond the reach of disease—the principle is just the same. In fact I believe that was the initial route taken by the specialist I had contracted to explore the possibility.”

Catching a look from my friend begging me to interject no further, I sank back into my seat and let Mycroft speak.

“I’m sure you do not need me to tell you of Dr Charles Moreau,” he continued, and the images brought out by mention of that man’s name did little to improve my mood.

Charles Moreau had been a prominent and extraordinary physiologist, a man with a reputation for fresh and exciting scientific thoughts as well as a quick temper when it came to expressing them. His fall from grace was sudden and—in my opinion at least—fully justified. It was also wholly engineered.

A journalist, working under false credentials, had secured a position as Moreau’s laboratory assistant. Working alongside the doctor, the journalist was witness to countless vivisection experiments against animals that can have had little grounding in scientific reasoning. Certainly, the pamphlet Moreau prepared discussing his findings—a pamphlet that was to be universally debunked by his peers—couldn’t explain the acts reported. Aware that he must justify his position of allowing the cruelty to continue, the journalist claimed that he could not intervene without betraying himself and he wished to gather enough evidence against Moreau to ensure the man’s public censure, perhaps even enough to bring criminal proceedings. Whether this is true or simply an attempt on the young man’s part to gloss over the fact that he put his desire to get good copy in the way of his moral imperative is neither here nor there.

On the morning of Moreau’s planned publication, the assistant allowed one of the animals to escape. It was a small Labrador, partially flayed, covered in surgical wounds and bristling with needles. The animal’s howls brought considerable attention. A shocked crowd gathering as they attempted to corner and placate the beast. It was in such a state of terror that a passing cab driver could see no other course than to put the animal out of its misery. It set a spark to months of suspicion and rumour amongst residents of the capital, and eventually a mob descended on his Greenwich home. The atrocities brought out into the daylight that morning damned Moreau’s reputation forever.

The journalist published and his editor took the opportunity to tap into public feeling and whip up a wave of anger against the doctor. It seemed to all concerned that the man had finally lost whatever skills he may have once possessed. London became too small to hold him. He left, setting sail for new shores, a mob of protesters jeering him off.

“Don’t tell me that Moreau was working for you?” I asked.

“Not to begin with,” Mycroft admitted. “But the journalist that exposed him was.”

“To begin with?” Holmes asked.

Mycroft smiled. “We must remember that for all his clear faults, Moreau was a genius and, as reprehensible as his methods may have been, there was no doubt that he was on to something potentially fascinating.”

“From what I recall,” I said, “his published theories were nothing but unscientific tosh. He was a spent force.”

“My dear Doctor,” Mycroft replied, “you really mustn’t believe all you read.”