Sherlock Holmes: The Army of Doctor Moreau

CHAPTER ELEVEN

We travelled in silence for the rest of our journey. I continued to watch the passing city while Holmes turned his attention towards our fellow passengers. The boat was far from full at that time of the night, but the people it did carry were, for the most part, in boisterous mood.

By the time we arrived at the docks in Rotherhithe, the main bulk of our fellow passengers had taken to singing a bawdy tune regarding the medical health of an excitable young barmaid called Sadie. I can’t say I was familiar with the tune before our journey but it was damnably hard to shake from my head after it. From time to time I even found myself whistling a few bars of it as we pushed our way through the busy quayside. I’m sure it helped me fit in amongst the sailors and warehouse men as they shouted to one another, offloading produce or loading supplies, a seemingly endless to and fro of crates and people. The air was thick with the smell of tar and the creak of old ropes. Everybody seemed to be shouting, though it was so commonplace I ceased to be able to discern a single word—the whole became a background roar of voices. It brought to mind the animal noise of a jungle, all the species calling out to one another.

“Where to first?” I asked Holmes, sticking close by his side.

“I think a drink at the Bucket of Lies, don’t you?” he replied, moving easily through the crowd. I watched him stroll away from the waterside, the people naturally parting as he came towards them. He was like a large fish, I thought, sweeping the minnows aside in the current he pushed before him. He didn’t fade into the background, no matter what his advice, his personality was too strong for that, but he certainly appeared to belong. I thought again of Charles Darwin’s theories and wondered if Holmes might be the ultimate example of them; there seemed to be no environment to which he could not adapt, and which he could not dominate. I let that be some small consolation as we drew close to the tavern in question. After all, anywhere that Shinwell Johnson considered rough was likely beyond my scale of comparison.

As we moved away from the water, the streets became quieter. Ports ignore the clock, there is always someone disembarking or arriving, but once we were in the more residential areas, Rotherhithe’s citizens were fewer and farther between. By the time we were outside the Bouquet of Lilies, it stood out a mile, the sound of drunken cheering and singing the only sign of life in the surrounding area.

“Looks charming,” I said as we drew towards the front door.

“Oh,” Holmes said. “I’m sure we’ll manage to get through a glass of wine without having our throats cut.”

“Yes, because that’s always what I look for in a hostelry.”

We stepped inside and muscled our way towards the bar, moving between the drunken regulars. I honestly couldn’t tell whether some of them were dancing or fighting. The place stank of stale beer and bodily fluids—from the look of the ale the barman handed to me, the two may have been one and the same. I took a mouthful of it nonetheless, conscious of the need to fit in. Given the state of most of the people in here they must have managed to ingest the stuff. Either that, or people stuck to the gin, preferring to lose their eyes rather than their stomachs. The floor had been cleaned once, I was sure, though maybe not during the reign of our current monarch. The clientele was not the sort to fret about such absurd niceties. Perhaps the stickiness of the floorboards even had its benefits, allowing the tired inebriate to maintain their vertical position like a fly stuck to paper.

I did not like the Bouquet of Lilies. Soon, thanks to Holmes, it would become clear that it didn’t like me all that much either.

“So,” he announced in a loud voice, “what’s this I hear about dead bodies then?”

As investigative enquiries went it was not Holmes at his most subtle.

“And who are you to be asking?” said a ruddy old man on Holmes’ left. He had a face that was bent terribly out of shape, not helped by a constant nervous twitch that set his cheeks and nose vibrating. He looked as though he was constantly being punched by an invisible assailant.

“Only curious,” Holmes replied. “Came in tonight on the Spirit of Mayfair, didn’t I? Heard some of the lads talking.”

“Spirit of Mayfair?” asked another old soak, wiping away thick strings of saliva from his chin. He was so much like a bulldog I wondered if Moreau had made him.

“Aye,” Holmes replied. “Been away from home for the best part of a year, haven’t I?” He drained his tankard, an act of almost Herculean bravery. “And built up one hell of a thirst in that time.” He nodded at the barman and handed over the empty vessel.

“Suppose you’ve the price of another pint?” the first man asked, twitching the mottled lump of scar tissue I took to be a nose, given its location on his face.

Holmes looked at him. “Maybe I have, if you keep a civil tongue and welcome an old sailor back to shore.”

“Can’t be too careful,” the old man said offering his long-empty tankard. “I’m not a man who likes people snooping around.”

“Ain’t snooping around,” said Holmes, “just interested. Who wouldn’t be? Bodies turning up with great chunks missing? You see all sorts out at sea but that ain’t the sort of thing you expect to come home to is it? Makes me wonder if this is London I’ve washed up in or New Guinea!” He laughed at that and the old man joined him, more out of eagerness to see his drink filled than sharing in my friend’s affected humour. Holmes passed him a full tankard. “So, you going to tell me about it or not? What’s going on? Some sort of animal is it? Bloke I met on the quay reckons someone’s let a tiger loose or something.”

“Ain’t no tiger,” the old man replied after taking a large mouthful of his drink. “Tiger ain’t going to chew you up and then put the bits what’s left in a sack is it?”

“Clever tiger,” I added with a laugh, wanting to do my bit.

The old man stared at me. “Who’s this?” he asked. “He’s got a bigger beard than my old wife.”

“Mate of mine, ain’t he?” Holmes said. “But he don’t get out much.” Holmes gave me a meaningful stare. He changed the subject before the old man got too distracted. “All right, so it ain’t a tiger. Still, it’s got to be some sort of animal that done for ’em, ain’t it? Unless it wasn’t as bad a mess as I heard …”

“Oh, it were a mess all right,” the old man said. “You’ve never seen the like.”

Holmes scoffed. “Don’t be so sure, I’ve seen sights in my time that would make a horse sick. Just cos you landlubbers get yourselves in a twist.”

“The thing was in pieces,” the old man insisted. “It weren’t no body, it were a bag of butcher’s meat.”

“Like I say then, an animal.”

“How’s an animal put it in a bag you bloody idiot?” shouted the old man in exasperation at Holmes’ apparent stupidity. “It wasn’t no animal!”

“Maybe an animal did it then a bloke put it in a bag,” insisted Holmes. “I heard it had bite marks on it.”

“I don’t give a monkey’s what you’ve heard. I’m telling you it was Kane or one of his lot.”

There was a silence at that, a clear sense that those around us had been shocked at the mere mention of the man’s name.

Holmes let the awkwardness hang there for a moment before, with all pretence of innocence, saying, “Who’s Kane then? Local lad is he?” Nobody saw fit to reply. “Only if he’s got any work on offer I might be convinced to keep my feet on dry land for a while.”

Someone reached out and took Holmes’ drink from him.

“I’d get out while you still have legs to do so,” said a dry, rasping voice.

“I didn’t mean nothing,” said the old man, but then shut his mouth once more as he decided silence was his best option for survival.

“Touchy lot, ain’t you?” said Holmes. “Come on, Jim,” he said and pushed his way towards the door. Realising he meant me, and needing little in the way of encouragement, I followed on.