BLAIR ISLAND IS A LITTLE NOTHING OF A PLACE IN THE Andaman chain, far off the coast of India in the Bay of Bengal. As a prison, it had only one thing to recommend it: it was remote. Any prisoner who was not capable of swimming two hundred miles or so, or of secretly constructing an ocean-worthy craft with several weeks of stores on board, had little chance of seeing mainland civilization ever again.
That is not to say it was the worst place Jonathan Small could have ended up. As we fuzzed in, I have to say I was rather taken with the bracing sea air, the beauty of her swaying palms and the boundless expanse of blue sky. Also, I’m told the fact that none of the natives seemed to put much stock in the idea of clothing did contribute to the island’s popularity amongst the British military staff.
Yet, these natives had proved to be less gullible than those in other parts of the world. They suffered only as much contact as they absolutely had to with the occupying foreigners. Indeed, farther up the island chain, they had a not-undeserved reputation for spearing and eating any sailors who had the misfortune of being shipwrecked there. It may seem cruel, but to give credit where credit is due: they were one of the few people our ships had reached that did not find themselves quickly placed both beneath our flag and our sailors.
Port Blair was the exception. As the prison was yet in the early stages of its construction, most of the inmates were kept chained in a large, palm-frond-topped lean-to, but released during the day to gather food and materials to build the colony. Those who showed any familiarity with the British way of life were treated much better. A number of them—Small included—had little huts at the base of the hills. Blair Island was a prison to Small only in that he was not allowed to leave it. I think if the colonel at Agra had realized he was sentencing Jonathan Small to life in a private hut in a tropical paradise, he might have been more than a little put out.
In fact, I think he might have been jealous.
Yet this did not stop Small complaining about his treatment as he showed us the cabin where he had spent his days, the officers’ mess where he served refreshments, and the little infirmary where he worked. It seems he’d acquired some medical skills in his year on the island, which allowed him to be of some help in dispensing drugs for Dr. Somerton, the army surgeon. This in turn allowed him to purloin no small quantity of said drugs, which he put to any number of dubious uses. Most prominently: trading with the local soldiers and officers in exchange for items and favors to make his life easier. But the thing he really gained was information.
In the evenings, Dr. Somerton, the officers, the sailors who ran the docks and a few civilians would gather to play cards in the infirmary. Small would sit in Somerton’s office, filling bottles, writing out forms and ordering replacements for the supplies he’d just stolen. Often he would listen to the players’ talk. And that is the scene we entered. Small in the office, busy with his thievery and eavesdropping, while seven men sat playing a card game of hideous complexity. The deck they used was gigantic and seemed to be composed of cards from several traditions: the familiar fifty-two-card deck, but also tarot cards and a few symbols that reminded one of mah-jong. It was one of those games with several rounds of betting, of discarding and re-drawing, maneuvering for advantage with an opponent’s discarded cards, and battling the shifting vicissitudes of luck.
Or, no… not luck… cheating.
There was entirely too much conversation for there not to be agreed-upon little codes about what one was holding or thinking of discarding. Too many funny little gestures that tended to be repeated. Too many raised eyebrows and answering smiles. It was clear the air was abuzz with secret language. Just as clear: the civilians spoke it fluently. The officers did not.
We watched for a few moments, trying to glean the obtuse and intricate rules, until—with a final burst of laughter and moans, a quaffing of final brandies and flicking of final cigars—the game broke up. The civilians rose. Dr. Somerton excused himself. Two officers remained.
I knew them.
One, I had seen in a painting. Major Sholto was younger, to be sure, less worn by care and his own misdeeds. Yet that shabby brand of martial splendor I’d noted in his portrait attended him already.
The other was less familiar. Yet, if one noted the general grayness of his form and character—that bitter unfriendliness of bearing and the pinched grimace of a man who thought the world owed him more than it was delivering—there could be no question. He was certainly related to Mary Morstan. He sat with his head in his hands, staring down at the table with horrible anger.
John Sholto picked up a stub of cigar from the ashtray, took an exploratory puff and said, “That last hand, Artie… What the hell was that? Couldn’t you see he was building a hangman’s bridge? You just kept betting.”
“Of course I saw what he was building! I’m not a fool! But I knew I could beat him!”
“Well… you didn’t.”
“But I had fours! Nobody was holding fours! I knew I could get them all. I had the four of diamonds, the four of cups, the four of fives and the lotus blossom four. All I had to do was stay in the game until someone dropped a four and I’d have had him!”
“Four of spades came by, didn’t it?”
“And I grabbed it up! Yet no sooner did I have it in my hand than I realized I never did have the four of fives…”
“I’d been holding the bloody five of fours! They look exactly alike!”
“Not quite.”
“Well, they’ve got those same twenty dots on them, don’t they? I mean… I dropped it as soon as I could and started looking for that last card to get my five-of-akind, but…”
Major Sholto gave a grim smile. “How bad is it?”
“All the way! I’m done!” said Morstan, throwing up his arms. “I thought I could save myself, you know? Win back all that money I was supposed to have been sending home! So I just kept throwing more and more in. I’ve nothing now. Less than nothing. How am I going to pay back those marks I was betting at the end?”
Sholto shrugged. “Well, don’t look at me. I passed the point of no return last week. I’ll be out of the army in a month; I’ll have to sell my commission to cover my debts.”
“Then I suppose I’ll see you back in England, for I think that is my only course now, too,” Morstan said.
At this point, the two men were interrupted by the sound of the closing office door. They looked up in annoyance to have their secret shame intruded upon.
There stood Young Small, with a mischievous gleam in his eye. “Oh,” he said. “So sorry, sirs, I thought the game was done.”
“It is, Small, it is,” said Morstan. “Yes, I’m afraid the game is well and truly done.”
“But you know, I’m glad to catch the two of you,” said Small, “for I’ve got a question about the army. Policy and procedures and such.”
“Tomorrow, damn it,” Sholto barked. “Can’t you see we’re busy?”
“Oh, but it’s just a small thing,” said Small, struggling to keep the smile off his lips. “I wanted to know who to report hidden treasure to.”
Sholto’s eyes brightened just a shade. Morstan’s did not. He waved his hand dismissively and mumbled, “The regional exchequer. They handle all that sort of thing. I’ll help you write a letter tomorrow if you want, but Major Sholto is right: leave us alone.”
Sholto’s hand gripped his friend’s shoulder with sudden earnestness. “Oh, but, Captain… are you sure? We’ve got time, haven’t we?”
“Time? What time have we left?”
“God damn it, Artie! Aren’t you curious? Don’t you wish to know about this hidden treasure?”
“Not really. Go away, Small.”
“You don’t think it might be amusing to find out how much it is? And… er… where it is? And how many people know about it?”
“Not particula—Ow!”
Major Sholto’s grip was now so tight it looked as if he might crush Morstan’s clavicle. He stared down with wide eyes and a smile so broad and tense it looked as if he’d eaten three pounds of large decorative rocks and was now attempting to pass them. As Morstan looked up, his countenance made it plain that he had no energy for this. Yet his friend appeared most earnest, so he sighed and said, “All right. What is it, Small? Find a shiny pebble, did you?”
“Several, actually,” Small said, with a smile. “I don’t know if you’ve heard what got me sent here, but the three Sikhs and I were sent down for the ‘possible’ murder of a merchant. His cousin said that merchant had been in possession of a great treasure at the time, but of course we didn’t know anything about that. But… well… now we’ve been on this island for a while and probably nobody’s too worked up about that merchant anymore… I thought, maybe if we did remember something about a treasure, perhaps we could exchange the information for our release.”
Morstan shook his head. “I shouldn’t think so. The charge is murder, Small. Do you think the Crown will so easily forget such a serious—”
“The treasure’s worth at least half a million.”
Several eyebrows in the room went up. Mine included, for I knew it to be a gross underestimate of the Agra treasure’s true worth. Half a million? Please. You’d be wrong to trade that iron box and its contents for the Crown Jewels. Sholto looked excited. Morstan thoughtful. After a time, Morstan said, “You may have a point, Small. The sheer value of such a contribution might make the Crown forget much. I’m not sure if it would get all four of you off, but just you… perhaps. I tell you what, I’ll write the exchequer a note tomorrow—”
“What? Exchequer? No, no, no, Artie! Think of what you’re saying!” Sholto cried. “What good would that do? Why, even if Private Small here could secure his freedom, even if he could get freedom for all his friends, where would they be? All that money would disappear into Her Majesty’s vaults. Private Small would still have no prospects. Think: might there not be a better way for us to help?”
“What do you mean?” Morstan asked.
“I mean, if what Small says about the value of the treasure is true, why, that’s enough for more than just a pardon. That’s enough for a boat. That’s enough for a one-way ticket off this island for whoever thinks they might want to go—for new papers and new names and a fresh start. All Small would need is a confederate who could come and go from the island freely.”
Morstan sniffed. “Well, good luck finding one! This island is—”
Sholto slapped him across the face and peered down at his friend with pure fury. Morstan looked up in shock and indignation for about half a second, before realization lit his features and he cried out, “Oh! Oh! We could be his confederates!”
“Hey now,” said Small, finally letting his hidden smile burst forth, “there’s an interesting idea.”
“I think we might imagine a scenario,” said Sholto carefully, “wherein one of us goes to confirm the treasure is real. If so, I’m sure release might be secured one of these nights for Private Small. Just think: half a million, split three ways—”
“No!” Small insisted. “Six ways! The Sikhs are my brothers and I swore an oath. I think I could talk them into going sixes, but whatever deal we strike has got to end with me and my brothers on a boat with our cut. I gave my solemn vow!”
“Awwwww,” said Holmes to me and present-day Jonathan Small. “Now that is nice. You see? An unexpected vein of loyalty to brighten a character stained by disrepute. Nobody is irredeemable, I always say!”
“That’s one interpretation,” I said. “But here’s mine: Jonathan Small had no intention of giving up five-sixths of the Agra treasure. Yet, if he could secure his freedom and a boat so cheaply, that would be more than worthwhile. As long as he made sure he was at sea before he murdered the three Sikhs, he could be reasonably sure he’d keep their share.”
“But that’s horrible!” said Holmes. “And besides, it would be three to one; they’d overpower him.”
“They might,” I agreed, “if he hadn’t spent a few years stealing drugs from Dr. Somerton. I imagine, just following dinner one night, the three Sikhs might find themselves feeling rather drowsy.”
Present-day Jonathan Small crossed his arms over his chest and mumbled, “Any man would have done the same.”
Holmes’s mouth dropped open. “Oh, well! Grogsson is right about you, Mr. Small. You are absolutely the worst!”
“Except he can’t have managed to pull it off,” I noted, “because when this story began, he didn’t have the Agra treasure, did he?”
Small made a horrible face and nodded. “You guessed it. I talked to the others. Singh agreed, so long as he got to keep the black coin. The other two were just glad of a way off the island. Of course, Morstan and Sholto weren’t about to throw away what was left of their careers unless they knew the treasure was real. I didn’t want to let them do it, but they swore up and down they’d be true to us. In the end we made a deal: the Sikhs and I would make a map to the treasure and we’d trade this for a full confession of our escape plan, signed by Morstan and Sholto. Then one of them would go to Agra, confirm the treasure was there and send a boat for us. We’d all go pick up the treasure together.”
“Even better,” I scoffed. “Once off the island, with all five others on a boat in the middle of the Bay of Bengal, with a pocket full of sedatives, you could be pretty sure you’d end up with the whole treasure, couldn’t you?”
“I might have. Me and Singh and Khan and Akbar made that map in good faith. I wrote ‘the sign of nine’ at the bottom and we all signed our names.”
“I’ve seen it,” I told him. “It was in the possession of Arthur Morstan, and subsequently his daughter.”
Small shrugged, “He musta got it from Sholto, then. For Sholto were the one who did us wrong.”
Just a small leap forward in time brought us to the two officers, leaning in over their massive deck of cards. Morstan cut the deck, flipped the cards in his hand upward and cried out, “Yes! The ace of aces!”
“Well, an impressive-sounding card,” Sholto said, “but let us remember that the value of ace is one.”
Now it was Sholto’s turn to cut. Was it my imagination, or was there just a flick of the wrist as he palmed the cards? Had he forced the draw? It seemed he hardly had to look at the card in his hand before he declared. “Bad luck, Artie! It’s the twelve of cards, I’m afraid. Looks like I’ll be the one to go to Agra. Don’t worry though, I’m sure I’ll be bringing back good news.”
Present-day Small frowned. “The first sign of trouble came the morning after Sholto left. I’d tucked the confession he and Morstan had signed into my shirt and slept with it overnight, while I tried to think of where to hide it. When I woke, it had dissolved into a gooey mess of nothing. Seems like it was trick paper, made with gelatin in the pulp. I was furious of course, but Morstan seemed as surprised as I was. That’s what made me really worry. Sure enough, a few weeks later, a letter comes. Says the treasure wasn’t there—either I was lying or someone else had found it. After that, nothing. Sholto should have come back but he didn’t. Instead, a few months later, we got word he’d left the army. Apparently some rich uncle nobody knew he’d had left him a pretty sizeable fortune in jewels.
“Now, with Morstan deep in debt and holding on to his commission by the skin of his teeth, it took him years to find out where Sholto had gone. At last he got word that Sholto had bought a huge house in London. He wrote and demanded to know why Sholto had betrayed him. Morstan don’t know it, but I saw Sholto’s return letter before Morstan himself did. Sholto promised Morstan half the treasure, and all Morstan had to do was make sure me and the Sikhs was dead, then come to London and claim his share.”
“Why didn’t he?” I wondered.
Small shrugged. “Probably didn’t want to risk facing a firing squad until he were damned sure he was going to get his half of the treasure. Took a little holiday to London and never come back. From what I can gather, Sholto did him in as soon as he saw him.”
“I know something of the matter,” I said. “And I am forced to agree. So you must have had a very long wait for your revenge. But how did you ever make it off the island?”
“I thought I never would. Until I met Tonga.”
“Oh! Oh!” said Holmes. “Watch this!”
Blur. Fuzz.
We were standing just behind the infirmary. It was a drizzly sort of day, and we were watching a somewhat older and more careworn Jonathan Small peeping out of the back door to talk to a small deputation of Andaman natives. One of them wore an ornate headband, decorated with beading and a few sprigs of feathers and clearly meant to say, “I know you’re not one of us, but do you think hats like this happen by accident? No. A lot of effort went in, and it looks like it denotes social importance, yeah? So, probably talk to the guy with the hat.”
Their language was strange to me. Small had picked up a smattering of the local tongue and the man who came to deal with him had learned some English. Yet, though the words were a laborious mixture of the two languages, one of the benefits of stealing another man’s memories is that the underlying meanings are clear.
“They said you wanted to talk to me?” said Small.
The head of the native deputation nodded. “It is said you know much of the white man’s medicines and poisons.”
“Yes, I suppose that’s what is said. What of it?”
The islander looked around to be sure they wouldn’t be overheard and asked, “Do you know of a way to kill a spirit?”
“A what?”
“A spirit. Have you heard our word ‘Tonga’? It means… how should I say…? It means to take revenge against somebody who has not really done you any wrong.”
Small smiled. “Is that why you fellows sometimes shoot a poisoned dart or two at us English?”
“No,” said the native, icily. “That is something different. Tonga is… Well, let us say you find a gourd. A nice one, perfect and round and you are very pleased with it. You put it somewhere for safekeeping, but forget where. You are upset you cannot find it. Then you see a neighbor with a perfect round gourd and you are angry that he has found your secret hiding spot. So, you beat him to death with a rock, pick up the gourd and head back to your hut. On the way, you walk past your favorite napping tree and catch sight of your gourd. That is Tonga.”
“And… what? You want me to stop that sort of thing from happening?” Small asked.
“No. On this island, there is a spirit. He is like a person, but different. Very small, and made of hard material. We try to avoid him because he is… how would you English say…? Ah! Just the worst. He is very much the embodiment of the idea of Tonga. Last night he came into one of our huts where we kept the bottles of the whiskey we had traded from the English. He drank them all and now he is very sick. Maybe he will die. Maybe he will wake up. We do not know. But we know this much: if he wakes up he is going to kill and kill and kill for no reason. So… um… do you think you could find a way for him not to?”
“Huh…” said Small. “Sounds interesting. Bring ’im in.”
With a blur and a fuzz, we were watching Jonathan Small betray the natives by nursing Tonga back to health. Of course I’d only seen him by moonlight before, as he fired his fingers at Holmes and me (and notably, at Hopkins), but it was unmistakably him. His skin was of a hard, bark-like material and his feet displayed the strange backward toe-claw that had made its mark in the secret attic at Pondicherry Lodge.
He was more than just hung over; he was positively poisoned—our terrestrial brews being utterly alien to his other-dimensional physiology. Yet over the next few days, Small dutifully brought him water and yams. He covered the little fellow up when he shivered and uncovered him when he sweated. Since the little blighter spoke only in utterly nonsensical clicks and rattles, their conversation was somewhat one-sided. Small bitterly recounted his misadventures with the Sikhs, the treasure, and the officers who had betrayed them.
And strangely, I think that’s what saved Tonga. He leaned in with such interest whenever Small spoke of what he wanted to do to those that had let him down, that I got the distinct feeling that what was really keeping the little fellow going was that he was hearing the story of a group of individuals who needed to have some Tonga practiced on them.
Sure enough, by noon on the fourth day the queer little man was gone. Younger Small seemed saddened by it—as if the prospect of facing life alone on the island without his little vengeance-friend was particularly burdensome. If so, he did not have to bear it long. Two nights later there came a click, click, click at the door to Small’s hut. Small swung it open to find Tonga standing just outside.
“Oh, hello. What do you want?”
The little man made no answer, just turned and trudged away over the sandy soil. Jonathan Small watched him for a moment, brow furrowed, then followed. Over the sand they went, across the moonlit camp, past the stockade where Small’s three Indian “brothers” still languished. He spared them nary a glance as he passed, but left them to their fate. As Tonga and Small neared the shore, Small saw two skeletons lying in pools of rancid liquid; one was wearing the remnants of simple robes, the other a soldier’s uniform.
“Your doing?” Small asked his tiny companion.
Tonga beamed back at him for a moment, then pointed down the beach. An angular shape jutted out into the water. Small gasped and started running. Sure enough, it was one of the natives’ canoes. Next to it lay one of the natives. He was nothing but bones and disgusting juice, but the ornate beaded headband that drooped down over the skull left no doubt as to whose canoe we were looking at.
Small turned back to Tonga and said, “So, you got that chief fellow back for tryin’ to get me to kill you, eh?”
Tonga put his thorny hands on his hips and gave a proud nod.
“Good on you!”
The canoe was well stocked with yams, coconuts, and gourds filled with drinking water: all that was needed. Yet, if it seemed Jonathan Small’s journey to freedom was about to commence, there was one more errand left.
A little farther down the beach lay a man—a Pashtun, by his dress. He was propped up against the base of one of the palms that grew nearest to the sea, snoring gently. When he saw the man, Young Small’s face hardened into a mask of rage.
“Oh dear,” I said. “Any man would have done the same, I suppose?”
“Well look here,” present-day Small protested, as his younger self began to stalk, silently, down the beach, “that man were a vile Pathan who never missed an opportunity to have a kick at me. Made me life miserable whenever he could. And besides, what if he were to wake up, eh? What if he should see me heading out to sea?”
Lestrade paused with his pencil just above a page of his notebook and mused, “Hmmm. It’s been a while. What number is this?”
But Grogsson grunted, “Quiet! Torg want to see.”
The man must have been one of the garrison, for he had a rifle beside him and a long knife tucked through his belt. Small had no weapon at all and it was clear from the way he was looking about that he wanted one. Finding none, he stopped just a few paces from his sleeping victim and began fiddling about with something on his right leg.
“Oh no,” I said, breathlessly. “You aren’t going to…”
“Yep,” said Holmes. “He is.”
By the light of the moon, we could see the asymmetrical form of Jonathan Small raise his false leg up over his head and battle-hop the last few paces to his foe. The sound must have woken the poor fellow up, for we saw him jerk in surprise just an instant before Small brought the heavy prosthetic down and cracked his skull.
Then he cracked it a second time.
And a third.
And six or seven more after that.
Holmes shook his head and tutted, “Unnecessary, Small.”
Grogsson jabbed a finger towards the murder scene and said, “Look! What he do now?”
Small was hunched over the body. He withdrew the long knife from his victim’s belt, then bent over the man’s legs, hacking and sawing away. Present-day Small colored and said, “Well, you see, Tonga had done a fine job with the yams and water, but… nothing with any protein, really…”
“You’re going to cut that man up and take him along to eat him?” I cried.
“I just took the leg muscles,” Small protested, but as his previous self wandered back past us, whistling a jaunty little tune, a small item tucked into his belt made a liar of him.
“Cor blimey,” said present-day Small, scratching at his head. “Now, why’d I take his face?”
“For use as a clever disguise, one assumes?” I said.
He snapped his fingers. “That was it! It’s funny what we remember and what we forget, eh?”
“Now look here, Small,” I said, in my sternest tone, “I just want to make my position clear, right now. Whatever Scotland Yard chooses to do with you for all these crimes, you bloody deserve it.”
He gave me an ungenerous look.
As Young Small approached the stolen canoe, Tonga applauded his recent performance and beamed with joy. If he had hoped he’d chosen the right human companion—the man who most embodied the spirit of Tonga-ism—he now knew he could not have picked a finer.
Holmes gave a little sigh and wondered, “So that’s it, eh? You sailed back to London?”
“What, in that?” Small scoffed, pointing at the little canoe. “We’d never have made it. Especially as I weren’t much of a navigator. The only thing I knew of it was I’d heard to follow the sun.”
“The sun?” I said. “The sun that rises in the east and sets in the west and would just have you blithering back and forth until you ran out of food and water?”
“That sounds about right,” Small admitted. “Ten days we tossed about, with nary a sight of land. At last we was picked up by a boat of Malay pilgrims, heading for Jeddah. But we still had no money, so it was some time before I could get us to Egypt. From there to Italy, then Germany, then France, and finally home.”
“Oh yes, let’s,” said Holmes.
Blur. Fuzz.
We were standing outside one of the lower-story windows of Pondicherry Lodge, looking in over Young Small’s shoulders at the aged figure of John Sholto, who had called his children to his side, to hear his dying words.
“Oh, look!” said Holmes. “There’s Thaddeus. Hello, Thaddeus! By Jove, I’d nearly forgotten about him. I suppose we’d better finish up and get him out of police custody, before he perishes of air inhalation.”
We could not hear what Sholto was saying to his children, but we did see the fateful moment when he looked to the window and beheld the face of the man he’d betrayed. The glass could not block the volume of his final scream of horror. We saw his children follow his gaze and swoon in sudden fright. Egad, they were so doughy and frail, it was hard to imagine a more natural action for them. Jonathan Small scrabbled at the window, desperate to find a way in, to kill his foe. Yet, fate would cheat him. Even as we watched, the face of John Sholto began to stiffen.
“Oh yes, I’d forgotten about this bit,” said Holmes. “What did you say it was, Watson? Heart attack?”
“I did, but… but see how he clutches down low there, on his right side?” I pursed my lips and watched in professional incredulity a moment, before deciding, “You know, I may actually owe you an apology, Holmes. I think what we might be seeing is the first known liver attack.”
“Well done, Major Sholto!” Holmes cheered. “Always a pioneer!”
“I don’t understand,” I mumbled. “What could…? Perhaps… No… Ah! Perhaps a burst aneurysm of the hepatic artery? Is that what I’m looking at?”
However, I must admit that my academic curiosity proved to be somewhat… well… academic. An instant later, Young Small tore open the window and rushed to his fallen foe. By God, how he raged when he saw that vengeance had been stolen from him. How he cursed fate and any divine entities that might have a hand therein. He went to the desk, swept up a pen, wrote “THE SIGN OF NINE” on a piece of paper, and flung it violently at Major Sholto’s corpse.
Well… in as much as one can violently fling paper. It just sort of fluttered at him. It would have been an impotent gesture at the best of times, but the fact that its recipient was already dead just lent it that special je ne sais quoi. Grogsson barked out a great laugh. Present-day Small rounded on him and for just a moment I thought he was about to punch Torg Grogsson. Which—now that I come to put it to paper—would have been a right and fitting end for someone who had displayed so very little self-control all the long years of his life. Instead, he stood fuming while the younger version of himself helplessly searched the room for any clue as to where his lost treasure might reside.
Clearly he found none, for a quick series of blur-fuzzes showed him sneaking in by night to dig futile holes in the grounds and indeed, the walls, of Pondicherry Lodge. Sometimes he would lift a window latch and roam the corridors by night, peeking here and probing there. Sometimes he would gaze malevolently down at the sleeping form of Bartholomew Sholto, his face a mask of rage. Yet his efforts came to naught.
Until, finally, we were standing outside the drawing-room window of an early evening. Within stood Bartholomew Sholto, excitedly slurping at a hookah much like his brother’s. Between hyperventilative puffs, he was loudly exclaiming to his butler and McMurdo how he’d found the treasure. He didn’t have it yet, but he was sure he’d guessed it right! Why else was the house four feet taller than it needed to be? Why else was there a rusted old pulley at the corner of the roof? The butler and bodyguard seemed unconvinced. Apparently they’d heard such wild theories before, and seen them come to naught. Yet Bartholomew Sholto’s excitement was mirrored in one other set of eyes. Outside the drawing-room window—opened just a crack—huddled the figure of Jonathan Small. He looked as if he was only just keeping himself from crying out in triumph.
One blur and fuzz later, we found ourselves standing beside the drooping figure of Bartholomew Sholto as the life waned from him. Looking up through the hole in his ceiling to the secret attic above, we could just see Jonathan Small entering through the roof. Little Tonga was grasping at his friend’s sleeve and pointing happily down towards Bartholomew.
“Hang on,” I said. “We’ve skipped an important bit. Mr. Small, did you direct Tonga to kill that man?”
Lestrade raised his notebook expectantly, but present-day Small shook his head. “Nah. Probably would have if I’d thought about it, but Bartholomew had never done Tonga wrong, so…”
“Ah yes,” I said. “Tonga.”
“Yep. Tonga just Tonga-ed him. Right in the neck.”
“And thus, I think, our story is complete,” I reflected.
With a final buzz and blur, we found ourselves once more in the sitting room of 221B Baker Street. Our bodies were in the same position as we’d left them. Grogsson, shocked by the sudden change in position, dropped me on my rear. Holmes let go of Lestrade’s hand, withdrew his finger from Jonathan Small’s ear, and dropped into a low bow.
“Ladies and gentlemen, this has been A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens and Warlock Holmes! Thank you for attending this evening’s performance!”