Young Sherlock Holmes_ Fire Storm - Andrew Lane [15]
Sherlock drifted closer, deliberately looking away from the two of them so that they wouldn’t notice they had an eavesdropper.
As he got closer he heard the man say: ‘Time’s gettin’ on, darlin’, and there’s still no sign of the thing turnin’ up. You sure it’s in the ’ouse?’
‘There is nowhere else for it to be,’ Mrs Eglantine said in her cold, precise voice. ‘And you don’t need to remind me how long I’ve been working in that place.’
‘Anythin’ I can do to speed things up?’ the man asked.
‘’You can get rid of that brat Sherlock,’ she snapped. ‘He’s always snooping around, and he’s too clever for his own good.’
‘You want him gone temporary, like, or permanent?’
‘So permanently,’ she hissed, ‘that I want him cut up and scattered over such a large area that nobody will ever be able to find all the bits.’
CHAPTER THREE
Sherlock felt his mouth drop open in shock. He knew Mrs Eglantine disliked him to the point of hatred, but the fact that she hated him enough to want him dead – enough to actually ask someone to kill him – that was a shock. What had he ever done to her? Apart from question her position and challenge her authority, that was.
The man with the oily hair was saying something, and Sherlock concentrated on hearing what it was.
‘I’ll take that into consideration,’ he said, ‘I surely will, but the problem is that I could be seeing a nice return on what I know about that hoity-toity Holmes family, but I’m holdin’ back. Rather than get them to pay me a guinea a week to keep their secret, I’m usin’ that influence to keep you employed by them.’ He sniggered. ‘Let’s face it, who would employ a sour-faced harridan like you if they didn’t have to? I’m losing money on this deal while you get a nice little job and a wage.’
Mrs Eglantine started to speak, but the man held up a hand and she stopped.
‘I know what you’re going to say,’ he said. ‘You’re going to tell me that when you find this treasure of yours that’s hid in the house, you’ll split it with me and we’ll both be rich. The trouble is, that treasure is what’s known as “hypothetical” – I ain’t seen it and I ain’t convinced that it exists. On the other hand, the money the Holmes family could be paying me to keep their secret is real. Cash in hand, if you like – or beer in belly, in my case. So I got to ask myself, am I better off with a smaller amount of real money or a larger amount of hypothetical money?’
Mrs Eglantine sniffed. ‘We had an arrangement, Mr Harkness,’ she said. ‘If you go back on that now, then nobody will ever trust you again.’
‘I’m a blackmailer,’ Harkness pointed out calmly. ‘The only thing people trust me to do is reveal their secrets if I don’t get paid regular.’ He sighed. ‘Look, we’ve had a good thing going over the years, darlin’. You ferret out family secrets wherever you work and bring them to me, and I use them to make a few quid on a regular basis, but since you got wind of this supposed treasure the whole thing’s gone to pot. Why can’t we go back to the way things were?’
‘Firstly,’ Mrs Eglantine said icily, ‘I am not your “darling” and I never will be, and secondly, the trivial way you blackmail the local townspeople over their petty thefts and even pettier romances barely brings you in enough money to fund those big bets you like to place on the horses and the illegal boxing. If you ever want to make anything of yourself, I am your only chance.’
Harkness sighed. ‘You’ve got a sharp but persuasive tongue in your head, Betty. All right – I’ll go along with it for another month.