The Classified Dossier: Sherlock Holmes and Count Dracula(68)
“What about your own investigations?” I said. “Did you find anything that would throw more light on the situation?”
“None quite so dramatic as your own, Doctor. I talked to a number of the dock workers, looking for any sign of strange doings in the night among the ships docked there, with nothing terribly untoward to report. I begin to doubt my original hypothesis that the Mariner Priest is involved, for I see no evidence that he’s returned, and a great deal to indicate that he has not. I’ve sent telegrams to the police offices of some of the more likely counties for a refugee escaping London to attempt to corroborate the idea that Mary never went to sea. We shall see if anything develops along those lines.
“My first visit once the dawn broke was, of course, to the Merry Widow, where I was completely denied access by some very surly characters.”
“But, Holmes!” I said. “How could you have known the ship’s name? We only just discovered it.”
“Well, you have only just discovered it. I, as I said, found it this morning. Come now, Watson, an addressed envelope with a missing letter is quite out of the ordinary. Enough to warrant our attention, I should think. Typically, a person only addresses the envelope after completing the letter, so it is unusual to see one without the other. Did someone take the letter? If so, why leave the envelope?”
“I didn’t think much of it at the time,” I said. “But now that you draw my attention to it, it does seem rather muddled. Have you a theory?”
“I had several,” Holmes said, “but the one that turned out to be correct was simplicity itself. The remaining letter was misaddressed, meaning he purchased one envelope, made some mistake or another…”
“Hardweather!” I said. “Whereas Miss Apligian distinctly said the man’s name was Harweather, with no ‘D’.”
“Quite correct,” Holmes said. “Our victim, by Miss Apligian’s account, had not the most elevated of intellects, but he did not suffer for money or balk at this minor expense of buying a new envelope when your average letter writer would have simply penned in a correction. At any rate, I followed the address, and found the Merry Widow, with Mr Harweather on board where he serves as first mate. I was no welcome person on the Merry Widow, I assure you. But Mr Harweather himself was not averse to me buying him a drink or two at the nearby alehouse, which was money well spent. He avoided telling me anything he thought of as incriminating, but I gathered rather more than he realized, I should think. I noticed during my brief visual inspection that the captain has a rather expensive meerschaum pipe, while several of the mates have rather finer gear against the weather than one would expect. This causes me to suspect some additional income for the Merry Widow and her crew above and beyond legal cargo. Several details inadvertently dropped by our Mr Harweather convinced me of the fact.”
“Smugglers, then?”
“Yes.” He pulled out several telegraph forms from his desk. “Your story has, however, given us some valuable data. I think we might gather a bit more information with a few inquiries.”
“What is our next step after the telegrams?”
“I think it may be time for us to come at this from a somewhat oblique angle,” he said. He leapt to the door and bellowed down the stairway. “Mrs Hudson! A four-wheeler, if you please!”
He whirled back to face me, liberating his hat from the stand as he did so. “We’re going to the East End Rookery. Perhaps I have mentioned the name Susana Ricoletti?”
“I don’t believe so,” I said.
“When Moriarty died, he left a large vacuum in the criminal element. It was a gap too large to be filled by any one person, and now London is plagued by no fewer than seven underground fraternities, each controlling their own piece of London. They are more direct and obvious organizations than Moriarty’s intricate web was, and thus easier to trace.”
“A woman?” I said. “Surely not!”
“A woman indeed,” Holmes said, “and not one to be underestimated. Both formidable and abominable, though she does have a code of honour, in her own ruthless sort of way. Which makes dealing with her preferable to some of the other feudal lords of crime.”
“I begin to see,” I said, grabbing my hat and coat. “This Ricoletti woman’s organization spans the Albert Docks, and so she will have the information we need.” I was weary, but Holmes’s enthusiasm had reinvigorated me so that going out into the sun again did not seem as daunting as it had moments ago. “What makes you think that she will give that information to us?”
“She does not have control of Albert Docks, but has been fighting for control with the man who does,” Holmes said with a twinkle in his eye. “The two of them have had the bitterest rivalry imaginable for years, but it has come to new prominence now that each of them has managed to entrench themselves into positions of power.”
“Gentlemen,” Mrs Hudson called out, and we heard the clatter as our carriage pulled up.
“Thank you, Mrs Hudson!” Holmes called back. “Also, please send a boy to the telegraph office for me. Three messages. They are on the table. Absolutely critical!”
“What is this other crime lord’s name?” I asked as we swept our coats on and barrelled our way down the stairs.
Holmes had to fire his answer back over his shoulder. “Adamo Ricoletti. Her husband.”