The Great Game by Michael Kurland Page A

laugh at the question. "I doubt whether he would consider me his friend."
     
                  Kasper shrugged. "An acquaintance, and a journalist. You are certainly the man we want. There is, as you must know, much curiosity and interest in the life and the professional abilities of Mr. Holmes. Several European police agencies are adopting his techniques for their own detective bureaus." He paused and took a wheezy breath, and then another. "Mr. Barnett, I would like to commission you to write, for the Staatlicher Ü berblicken, a profile of Mr. Sherlock Holmes."
     
                  Barnett stared at the fat man, speechless. There was hardly a less appropriate journalist in the world than himself to write such a piece. But how was the fat man to know of the enmity that existed between Sherlock Holmes and Barnett's friend and mentor Professor Moriarty? "Well," he said after a moment, "that is certainly an interesting suggestion. But I am not really the man for the task. I have hardly any time to do any writing at all anymore. And, although I have worked with him on several occasions, I'm hardly what would be described as a friend. Why don't you ask his associate, Dr. Watson, who has been recording various cases of his for the past few years?" Barnett couldn't escape the nagging feeling that there was something wrong with all this—the fat man, the meeting, the offer, and all—but he couldn't figure out just what it could be, or should be.
     
                  "The good doctor is not suitable to our needs," the fat man said. "He is not of the true journalistic tradition—the probing question, the in-depth answer, the letting of the chips to fall where they may."
     
                  The small, round-faced clergyman who had boarded the train with Kasper entered the dining car from the front, his black robes swishing about as he scurried up the aisle. "Signor Kasper," he called in a low, intense, breathy voice, "Desidero parlare con Lei, per piacere."
     
                  "English, please, Father Ugarti," Kasper said. "Pause for a moment. Allow me to introduce Mr. and Mrs. Barnett. This is Father Ugarti, a man of the cloth."
     
                  Father Ugarti nodded, bobbing his head up and down rapidly and peering at them through his round, thick spectacles. His face creased into a large smile that showed many brown, discolored teeth. "It is pleasurable to be making of your acquaintance," he said. "You are an English couple on your honeymoon, perhaps? Traveling through our romantic mountains and lakes. You should find our countryside most interesting. Most interesting." He turned to Kasper. "I hate to seem impolite to your charming friends, but I must, after all, speak with you for a moment."
     
                  Kasper struggled to his feet. "I will be a moment, only," he told the Barnetts. "Then we can finish our so-interesting discussion." The fat journalist and the small clergyman went off to the rear of the car and consulted earnestly together.
     
                  "This is very strange," Barnett whispered to Cecily when the other two had left the table.
     
                  "How odd that you should think so," Cecily replied, smiling sweetly at him.
     
                  "What do you suppose it's all about?"
     
                  "I imagine we shall find out soon enough, but be on your guard. That priest is not a priest; and that fat man is no journalist."
     
                  "I believe you," Barnett said. "But I wish I could figure out what they're after."
     
                  Cecily patted his hand. "I think they seek something we do not have."
     
                  Before she had a chance to explain, Kasper returned to the table and Father Ugarti left the way he had come.
     
                  "A minor matter of liturgical interest only," Kasper told them,