I CHASE A MURDERER
I cannot say how long I stood there after the hansom passed bearing its sinister passenger, staring towards the snowy curtain which had descended upon it. The audacity of the man defied belief; hunted in every corner of the land, he had chosen to ride in broad daylight through one of London’s most frequented neighbourhoods, as if no murder had ever taken place. I had pictured him quaking in some dank hole, loath to venture out for fear of the gallows. There was something obscene about his present arrogance, which seemed to reflect a deep-seated contempt for established order. I stood aghast at his presumption.
At length, however, I shook myself out of my stupor and cast about wildly for a means of pursuit. As luck would have it, a second hansom was approaching at just that moment; I dashed out into the street and waved it down.
I caught a glimpse of the driver’s florid face, set off by a pair of massive white eyebrows, as I swung inside, exhorting him to keep the cab ahead within sight. ‘You’ve got it, guv’nor,’ said he, and we lurched into motion.
We spotted our quarry just as it turned west onto Queen Anne Street, and followed suit. Evidently Hyde was not aware of his pursuers, for his cab was proceeding at normal speed for the slippery condition of the pavement. Snowflakes swirled round us, now heavy, now light, at times blotting out the cab ahead, but always it came back into view, recognisable by the distinctive red feather which the driver wore in his hatband. We followed at a discreet distance. At Wellbeck Street he turned south. Pacing ourselves cautiously, we rounded the corner a few seconds behind him.
At this point Hyde must have become suspicious, for at Wigmore Street the hansom in which he was riding swung eastwards, describing a complete circle from where I had first caught sight of him at Harley Street. I leant out and directed my cabby to continue across Wigmore and pull over to the kerb beyond the corner.
My reasoning proved sound when, moments later, the cab bearing Hyde crossed in front of us heading west in the direction of Marylebone Lane. Our failure to follow him onto Wigmore had apparently convinced him that his fears were groundless. I gave him a few seconds and then signalled my cabby to proceed by rapping upon the roof with my stick. We turned right at the next corner and took up the chase where we had left off.
Our wheels made sucking sounds as we rolled through the slush, slowing down frequently to avoid striking the pedestrians who hurried back and forth across the street, collars turned up and heads bowed against the cold and damp. Forced to continue in this fashion, we were hard put to keep Hyde’s vehicle within sight and yet not give ourselves away. Fortunately my driver appeared to be a past master at this, as the gap between the two cabs neither increased nor diminished in spite of the many hindrances.
Our machinations were in vain, however, as on Marylebone I caught sight of the killer’s brutish profile outside the window of his cab looking back in our direction. Instantly it disappeared, the driver’s whip was brought into play, and the hansom shot forward, snow flying from its wheels. It took the corner west onto Oxford Street on one wheel and vanished beyond the edge of a building. I rapped for speed and was thrown back in my seat as our horse broke into full gallop.
Hyde’s vehicle was out of sight by the time we rounded the kerb, but the spectacle of a loiterer brushing angrily at a splash of mud upon his trousers at the southeast corner of Duke Street told us which way it had gone. On Duke we spotted it again, the cabby’s coattails flying as he wielded his whip high over his head, slush and water splattering pedestrians who scrambled out of the way lest they be run down. Fists shook and epithets flew. I paid them scant attention, as well as those which were directed as us as we sped past in Hyde’s wake, splashing the unfortunates anew.
A constable took notice of us as we clattered onto Brook Street at Grosvenor Square and came running, waving his arms and blasting his whistle stridently. When he saw that we were not going to stop, he leapt back out of the way of our wheels and was plastered with mud from helmet to boots as we thundered past. His whistle was choked off, he toppled over backwards, arms working desperately, and landed with a tremendous splash in the middle of an enormous puddle.
I was ridden with guilt, but there was plainly not time for us to stop and help the officer, as Hyde’s cab was drawing away rapidly. I made a mental note to contribute to the policemen’s widows’ fund at my earliest opportunity, and quickly pushed the matter to one side.
Up ahead, an omnibus packed with passengers was just pulling away from the kerb opposite Claridge’s Hotel when Hyde’s cab came along, narrowly missing the ponderous vehicle as he swerved right and then left, slewing wildly from side to side across the slick pavement. By the time we drew near, the gap between the omnibus and oncoming traffic was no longer passable; without hesitation my driver whipped his horse up onto the kerb on the left side, sending pedestrians scattering. We slammed back onto the street with a jar which chipped one of my molars, and rattled onwards. I thrust my head out the window to glance backwards; behind us, the team drawing the omnibus screamed and pawed the air and the top-heavy conveyance swayed precariously beneath the shifting weight of the panicking humanity upon the second deck. I breathed a brief prayer for their safety and returned my attention to the street ahead.
At New Bond Street, that favourite of tailors and toffs, I dare say that we caused more than one near heart-failure as we cast great cascades of mud from our wheels over a number of costly suits and overcoats whilst their owners were still wearing them. The language which we heard as we barreled through the quarter, however, belonged more to the rag-clad denizens of the East End.
A roast-chestnut vendor crossing at Conduit Street saw Hyde coming and abandoned his push-cart in the middle of the thoroughfare, leaping backwards just as the cab plunged between them. He had seized the handles once again by the time we came along; attempting to avoid him, we swerved right and our left wheel caught the edge of the smaller vehicle, overturning it and showering smoking hot chestnuts all over the street. The vendor himself executed a perfect somersault and landed in a heap amongst his own wares in the gutter on the left side. Before he could get up an army of street Arabs descended upon the scene and made off with every available chestnut. My last memory of him as I looked back is of an excited figure jumping up and down in the middle of the street, screaming incoherently and waving two bony fists above his head.
By this time the occupants of both vehicles had grown accustomed to the keening of police whistles all round us, and so Hyde’s driver paid no attention to a constable who was directing traffic at the Burlington Gardens crossing when the latter blasted at him and held up his hands. The cab was in the middle of the crossing when a mammoth freight-wagon loaded with fresh lumber and drawn by a four-horse team came rumbling along towards it from the left. A collision was inevitable. My own cab skidded to a halt fifty yards away, nearly tipped over as it arced sideways across the treacherous surface of the street. The driver of the heavier vehicle stood up and leant back upon the reins with all of his might, teeth bared in a grimace of determination, muscles bulging beneath his threadbare coat. His horses reared onto their haunches, but the momentum of the waggon was too much for them and it slewed sideways, slamming against a gas lamp upon the corner and bringing it crashing down over the back of the waggon. The waggon itself tipped up onto two wheels, hung there for what seemed an impossible length of time, then went on over, dashing itself to splinters on the pavement and spilling its load with a series of ear-splitting reports. The driver dove headlong from the seat an instant before it struck and landed sprawling in the street. A moment later he got up, shaken but apparently unharmed. By that time Hyde’s vehicle, which had never paused, was halfway to Piccadilly.
The street was beginning to fill with people, who ignored the attempts of the harried constable to bring some order to the chaos. We steered round the wreckage carefully and continued at a crawl until we were clear of the crowds, whereupon we broke once again into gallop.
Hyde had swung east onto Piccadilly and was proceeding at a foolhardy pace for so busy a thoroughfare. Wisdom being rare that day, we pursued him at the same rate. The snow now was falling heavily in large, wet flakes which turned the pavement, already dangerous, into a sheet of glass. Most of the other traffic had slowed almost to a stop; Hyde’s vehicle cut in and out among the hansoms, four-wheelers, broughams, and carriages like a needle passing through an embroidery hoop. We did the same, ignoring as always the shouts and curses of drivers and passengers which greeted us along our journey. Once, as we drew alongside of an official-looking coach, the coachman, angered already by the effrontery of the first cab, leant over to cut at my driver with his whip, only to slice empty air when the latter swerved left sharply. The momentum of the coachman’s swing toppled him from his high seat to the pavement, where a four-wheeler attempting to miss him went into a skid and jumped up onto the left kerb. This sparked off a chain-reaction all the way down the street; shouts, screeches, and smashing sounds filled the damp winter air. In the distance the police whistles took on a more urgent note.
The situation at Piccadilly Circus was far worse. There, where seven of London’s principal streets converge, the heart of the Empire throbbed visibly and blue uniforms were the rule rather than the exception. Hyde’s cab never slackened its pace; after cutting between an omnibus and a tram-car which were travelling side by side, it described a right angle south onto Regent Street, careering violently upon the slick pavement as it did so and coming to within a hair’s breadth of skinning a gas lamp upon the corner. As it was, one wheel jumped the kerb and struck sparks off the base of the lamp when its steel hub ground against it. From there the hansom continued unhampered.
We were not so fortunate.
The tramcar which Hyde had cut off had stopped whilst the driver laboured to bring his panicky team under control. Taking advantage of this situation, my own driver sped past it and attempted to duplicate Hyde’s sharp turn; halfway through it we began sliding towards the left.
‘Hang on, guv’nor!’ came the driver’s shout.
No further encouragement was necessary. I held on for dear life to the sides of the vehicle as the scenery reeled past in a dizzying kaleidoscope of buildings, vehicles, and faces for what seemed an eternity. I felt a sickening sensation of suspension. Then it ended suddenly with a deafening crunch, the world tipped, and the next thing I knew I was crumpled into a heap in one corner of the vehicle, staring up at the sky and the spokes of a whirling wheel through the opposite window.
Excited voices buzzed all round me. Beneath the buzz there was something else: an insidious hissing noise, faint at first, but seeming to increase in volume the more I became aware of it. I was reminded unpleasantly of the sound made by the infamous Speckled Band as it descended the bell-cord to do the evil bidding of Dr. Grimesby Roylott of Stoke-Moran in an adventure which I have chronicled elsewhere. I sniffed. The air reeked of gas.
Indeed, the cab was filled with it, as I noted when I looked round and found the features of the vehicle swimming before my eyes. Dimly I was able to put it together: we had broken off a gas lamp when we struck, and now the contents were pouring into the air.
Under ordinary circumstances I might have become alarmed, but now I felt a curious sense of well-being as if this were all a bad dream from which I was confident I would soon awake. With one part of my mind, of course, I knew that this was a delusion brought on by inhaling the deadly fumes, but it was the other part, that which told me that all was as it should be, which was the stronger. Lulled by this sensation, I drifted off into sweet unconsciousness.
I came awake reluctantly to find the driver’s florid face a few inches from my own and his strong hands shaking me by the shoulders. So tight was his grip that I felt a sharp stab of pain in my old wound; in my semi-conscious state, however, I was scarcely aware of it, or of the urgent words which he was whispering in a voice taut with anxiety. At length he gave up his endeavours to make me understand and, throwingmy arm across his shoulders, lifted me to my feet and dragged me from the cab.
The air outside was sweeter, in spite of both the crowd which pressed in round us and the stronger odour of gas as we passed the broken lamp, which had been severed at kerb level when the cab tipped over and struck it. I was vaguely aware of a man in a blue uniform at the far edge of the crowd, blowing a whistle and fighting his way towards the centre; we turned in the opposite direction and hobbled away as fast as my rescuer could manage whilst supporting my bulk. The crowd parted grudgingly before us.
Gradually my senses returned until I was able to move under my own power, albeit with the added support of my companion’s wirey shoulders. We were walking fast, prodded on by the screech of the police whistle behind us.
We had passed the Haymarket Theatre and were well on our way towards Pall Mall when it occurred to me that the driver had just saved my life. I spluttered inadequate words of thanks.
‘Later, Watson, later,’ said Sherlock Holmes, smiling at me briefly through his ruddy make-up.