crime look like an act of thugee.”
“A foolish move,” said Holmes,” for it did not look like such an act at all. Thugee victims are strangled alive, Rastrakoff.”
“Only one such as you would be aware of such niceties. Your countrymen are pitifully ignorant of the people they rule. It was only after I severed their heads that I decided the third part of my plan: to lead you here, for I had recognised you immediately upon your first visit to Maxwell. I reversed the heads, added the word rastra to my message and arranged my initials so that they could be read in two different ways. I knew that you would read the message instantly. I gather now that I have been completely successful. The Viceroy has put all troops on the alert, arrested most of the political leaders of Bengal—and all on the eve of the visit of Edward the Seventh, the so-called King-Emperor.”
He stopped then and looked at me, his eyes narrowing evilly. “And finally, I shall rid the world of Sherlock Holmes.”
Rastrakoff squealed the last few words in a high falsetto, and the quick action that followed almost took Holmes by surprise. Rastrakoff lunged forwards, a dagger in hand. Holmes fell back pinned to the ground, the point of the knife now grazing his chest. He was unable to free himself. Suddenly, he was covered by a shower of warm liquid that he at first took for his own blood. He looked up, however, to see Rastrakoff’s severed head hurtling through the air, and he knew that the blood that covered him came from his severed jugular. One of the Gurkhas, aware of the situation and Holmes’s helplessness, acting instinctively and with lightning speed had rid the world of one of its archfiends.
Holmes’s eyes were now ablaze as he recalled the perilous situation into which he had fallen. I listened in amazed silence and cold fear, for even though he was before me he had related the last events with such realism that I thought he might have been slain before me.
“The rest, unfortunately, is history. I reported immediately to the Viceroy that Rastrakoff was dead, that he could call off the emergency, that the file was already on its way to its destination, and that we had failed to recover it. When hostilities broke out between Russia and Japan thereafter, we knew that the documents had been used for their evil purposes. That short war, Watson, the first lost by a European power to an Asian one, will have untold repercussions for the white race as we move further into this century.”
“What an incredible story, Holmes. And to think that Maxwell and his brother were killed needlessly.”
“Yes, Watson. Though there was more to that part of the story, a part which had to wait until my return to England. It was shortly before my meeting with you, Watson. You will recall that I was disguised as an old book dealer when we first met after my return?”
“Yes,” said I.
“A few days before, I had journeyed to Yorkshire in the same guise, to find Rose Hamilton, the mother of James.”
“Why on earth did you want to do that?” said I in great puzzlement.
“Because I had a hunch, a mere suspicion, that Reginald and James were not brothers. I had examined them in death very carefully and my knowledge of skeletal and craniological types had made me suspect that it was unlikely that they were related at all. And in fact there was something in Hamilton’s face that struck me. There was a clear resemblance to someone, but it was not to Maxwell, though there was a surface similarity that had struck his wife early on. As soon as I returned to England, I went to Wyck Rissington in disguise, located the old Hume estate, the natal home of Lady Maxwell, and then found the house where James Hamilton had grown up. It was now an abandoned shack. His mother had died several years before in an alcoholic fever. Her place had been boarded up by a man in the village so that it would not be easily vandalised. I entered the hut one night, prying off the
“A foolish move,” said Holmes,” for it did not look like such an act at all. Thugee victims are strangled alive, Rastrakoff.”
“Only one such as you would be aware of such niceties. Your countrymen are pitifully ignorant of the people they rule. It was only after I severed their heads that I decided the third part of my plan: to lead you here, for I had recognised you immediately upon your first visit to Maxwell. I reversed the heads, added the word rastra to my message and arranged my initials so that they could be read in two different ways. I knew that you would read the message instantly. I gather now that I have been completely successful. The Viceroy has put all troops on the alert, arrested most of the political leaders of Bengal—and all on the eve of the visit of Edward the Seventh, the so-called King-Emperor.”
He stopped then and looked at me, his eyes narrowing evilly. “And finally, I shall rid the world of Sherlock Holmes.”
Rastrakoff squealed the last few words in a high falsetto, and the quick action that followed almost took Holmes by surprise. Rastrakoff lunged forwards, a dagger in hand. Holmes fell back pinned to the ground, the point of the knife now grazing his chest. He was unable to free himself. Suddenly, he was covered by a shower of warm liquid that he at first took for his own blood. He looked up, however, to see Rastrakoff’s severed head hurtling through the air, and he knew that the blood that covered him came from his severed jugular. One of the Gurkhas, aware of the situation and Holmes’s helplessness, acting instinctively and with lightning speed had rid the world of one of its archfiends.
Holmes’s eyes were now ablaze as he recalled the perilous situation into which he had fallen. I listened in amazed silence and cold fear, for even though he was before me he had related the last events with such realism that I thought he might have been slain before me.
“The rest, unfortunately, is history. I reported immediately to the Viceroy that Rastrakoff was dead, that he could call off the emergency, that the file was already on its way to its destination, and that we had failed to recover it. When hostilities broke out between Russia and Japan thereafter, we knew that the documents had been used for their evil purposes. That short war, Watson, the first lost by a European power to an Asian one, will have untold repercussions for the white race as we move further into this century.”
“What an incredible story, Holmes. And to think that Maxwell and his brother were killed needlessly.”
“Yes, Watson. Though there was more to that part of the story, a part which had to wait until my return to England. It was shortly before my meeting with you, Watson. You will recall that I was disguised as an old book dealer when we first met after my return?”
“Yes,” said I.
“A few days before, I had journeyed to Yorkshire in the same guise, to find Rose Hamilton, the mother of James.”
“Why on earth did you want to do that?” said I in great puzzlement.
“Because I had a hunch, a mere suspicion, that Reginald and James were not brothers. I had examined them in death very carefully and my knowledge of skeletal and craniological types had made me suspect that it was unlikely that they were related at all. And in fact there was something in Hamilton’s face that struck me. There was a clear resemblance to someone, but it was not to Maxwell, though there was a surface similarity that had struck his wife early on. As soon as I returned to England, I went to Wyck Rissington in disguise, located the old Hume estate, the natal home of Lady Maxwell, and then found the house where James Hamilton had grown up. It was now an abandoned shack. His mother had died several years before in an alcoholic fever. Her place had been boarded up by a man in the village so that it would not be easily vandalised. I entered the hut one night, prying off the
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