The Mammoth Book of New Sherlock Holmes Adventures - Mike Ashley [192]
I was curious enough, however, to find an opportunity of visiting Baker Street again next day. But, though I found Holmes fully dressed and a great deal more alert than on my last visit, I was unable to obtain from him any hint about the direction of his inquiries. All he would do was to talk, with that vivacity of spirit which he could display whenever the mood took him, about a bewildering variety of subjects, the paintings of the Belgian artist, Ensor, the amorous adventures of Madame Sand, the activities of the Russian nihilists, the gravity of the political situation in Illyria. None was a matter on which I felt myself particularly informed, yet on each Holmes, it seemed, had a fund of knowledge. At length I went back to my medical round not one whit better able to decide whether my Hertfordshire patient was no more than the nervous Englishman, Mr Smith, whom he seemed to be, or in truth some foreign potentate sheltering under that pseudonym in the safety of the Queen’s peace.
The following morning, however, I received a telegram from Holmes requesting me to meet him at his bank in Oxford Street at noon “in re the hidden finger.” I was, you can be sure, at the appointed place at the appointed hour, and indeed a good few minutes beforehand.
Holmes arrived exactly to time.
“Now, my good fellow,” he said, “if you will do me the kindness of walking a few yards along the street with me, I think I can promise you a sight that will answer a good many of the questions which I have no doubt have been buzzing in your head these past few days.”
In silence we made our way together, along the busy street. I could not refrain from glancing to left and right at the passersby, at the cabs, carriages and vans in the roadway and at the glittering shopfronts in an endeavour to see what it was that Holmes wished to show me. But my efforts were in vain. Nothing that I saw roused the least spark in my mind.
Then abruptly Holmes grasped my arm. I came to a halt.
“Well?” my companion demanded.
“My dear fellow, I am not at all clear what it is to which you are directing my attention.”
Holmes gave a sigh of frank exasperation.
“The window, Watson. The shop window directly before you.” I looked at the window. It was that of a photographer’s establishment, the whole crowded with numerous likenesses of persons both known and unknown.
“Well?” Holmes demanded yet more impatiently.
“It is one of these photographs you wish me to see?” I asked.
“It is, Watson, it is.”
I looked at them again, actors and actresses, the beauties of the day, well-known political figures.
“No,” I said, “I cannot see any particular reason for singling out one of these pictures above any of the others. Is that what you wish me to do?”
“Watson, look. In the second row, the third from the left.”
“The Count Palatine of Illyria,” I read on the card below the portrait which Holmes had indicated.
“Yes, yes. And you see nothing there?”
Once more I gave the photograph my full attention.
“Nothing,” I answered at last.
“Not the very clear likeness between the ruler of that troubled state and a certain Mr Smith at present recovering from illness in Hertfordshire?”
I examined the portrait anew.
“Yes,” I agreed eventually. “There is a likeness. The beards have a good deal in common, and perhaps the general cast of the countenances.”
“Exactly.”
From an inner pocket Holmes now drew a newspaper cutting.
“The Times,” he said. “Of yesterday’s date. Read it carefully.”
I read, and when I had done so looked up again at Holmes in bewilderment.
“But this is a report of the Count Palatine appearing on the balcony of his palace and being greeted with enthusiasm by a vast crowd,” I said. “So, Holmes, how can this man in the photograph be my patient down in Hertfordshire but two days ago?”
“Come, Watson, the explanation is childishly simple.”
I felt a little aggrieved and spoke more sharply