The Holmes-Dracula File

Chapter Three

Sally could not hear the four-wheeler approaching two streets away, but when it arrived, with a clash of iron wheelrims against the curb, she heard and jumped up from her chair. It was as if those who controlled her life and the prisoner's had already detected her in the betrayal that she had dared to dream about for one dread, glorious moment. Then the sudden terror faded from her eyes, to be replaced by a mixture of relief and agonized sympathy for the old man. But without another word to him she gathered her things and fled the room, pausing at the door to cast back a piteous glance that seemed to beg for his forgiveness.

Bah.

Spent by his long, fruitless efforts at seduction, and enervated by the return of daylight, the old man endured his ceaselessly throbbing head and listened. Several rooms away, the cultured voice of the doctor, newly arrived, was probing at Sally, who gave him hasty, fearful answers. The prisoner could hear the tones though not the words of both their voices. He heard also faint morning stirrings from his two fellow prisoners in their nearby rooms. Presently Sally's feet went rapidly downstairs. A street door opened and shut behind her; the sound of her steps on the pavement dwindled and disappeared.

Soon afterward the doctor began on his brief morning rounds. He came to the old man's room freshly redolent of carbolic acid, and this time wearing a surgeon's gown, which in that year was as much of an innovation as the mask.

"Well, sir, I perceive that you are unequivocally awake this morning, which we must count as progress, I suppose." As he offered this dubious greeting, the doctor's machine-like hands, today in fine rubber gloves, were palming the victim's forehead in search of fever that was not there, palpating the gaunt abdomen, turning back an eyelid.

Not far behind the doctor came the harsh clop of the hard woman's boots. Her face, like his covered up to the eyes in gauze, looked round his gowned shoulder. "Any signs yet?" she inquired.

"No. But the incubation period may be as long as ten days, remember."

"Veil then, hardly to be expected yet."

The old man let his gaze drift vacantly away from the two faces, then brought it back to focus on them as if with a great effort.

The two exchanged a few more words, then began to strip their victim, cutting away his expensive clothing ruthlessly, dropping it into a cloth bag. Only now, after he had been their captive for so long, were his pockets searched and his papers examined, by two gauzed heads posed briefly side by side.

"If the name's Corday," the woman offered, "the nationality is likely French."

"I suppose so. He took ship at Marseilles, I see." Not that it really mattered to them; they were satisfying a passing curiosity. Then they garbed the old man in a kind of hospital shirt or gown of tight-woven fabric, fastening the sleeves upon his arms with small cloth ties.

Corday, he thought. Marseilles. The words meant something personal to the old man. Or at least he felt they should have done. The name of the city brought up a hazy recollection of its skyline as seen from the Vieux Port. But Corday was not the old man's true name, of that much he was certain; nor was French his native tongue, though he could speak it fairly well.

A stethoscope had appeared. The old man was enjoined—in awkward French, this time—to breathe more deeply. He obediently made the front of his rib cage move up and down.

The doctor spoke in English, half amused, half puzzled. "Monsieur Corday, your respiration's very shallow, almost undetectable. Heartbeat is strong, but—" He shook his head, mystified. He felt the old man in the armpits and in the groin. Then he said to the woman: "I must take a blood sample."

"Ve must not spend too much time on this particular case. There are others to be tested. Results will be required of us, not specimens and theories."

"A blood sample is necessary, in my opinion. We cannot produce good results without knowledge."

The woman turned silently away. She was back shortly with a glass syringe that gleamed with sharpness.

Two attempts upon the inner elbow of the old man's right arm, where one vein stood up prominently, brought about a broken steel needle and some upper-class profanity. A new needle was obtained and the assault renewed. At last a trickle of red crawled into a glass tube. Meanwhile familiar heavy feet had been climbing the stair from the outside world. Their owner, masked but not gowned, came upon the scene just in time to witness this small success.

"Ah, you're back," the doctor welcomed Rough-voice. "What luck?"

"On'y indifferent, Guv'nor. Which is to say Barley ain't got quite the numbers nor the quality we wants, as yet. But 'e 'as 'opes. Wot's up 'ere?"

"Hopes, has he? Our time is not unlimited. The twenty-second of June draws near. Well, we shall discuss that presently. Have you slept?"

"Ar." The workmen stretched his powerful frame, arms over head. "Could do wi' a cuppa tea and bit o' scrag, though."

"Well, before you breakfast, do have another word with the girl. I believe things went well enough here through the night, but best make sure. She seemed rather to have the wind up when we came in this morning."

"Ar."

Small glass-tubed sample of gore in hand, the doctor led the others from the room, meanwhile continuing their conversation. "And try to feed this one again when you get back; she said he took nothing but water. We want to maintain some strength in him to obtain a valid result. But mind you don't touch him, or his bed."

"Wotcher think, I'm goin' ter do that?" The door closed and they were gone.

In a few minutes the doctor was back, a fresh hypodermic in hand. Above his mask he scowled at the old man as if insulted by him, and stabbed at him for more blood. The doctor did not believe what his microscope had just informed him regarding the first sample.

Another needle splintered, a circumstance that the physician dismissed with no more than an impatient oath. No giant of research, he, to pounce upon this apparently small but truly significant phenomenon. Of course it might be claimed in his defense that he labored amid dangers and distractions notably absent from the ordinary laboratory. And there was no room in his thoughts for any truly great discovery, for they were fully occupied with the preparation of an equally great crime.

A new needle was made to work, after a fashion. Following this second tapping of his veins, the old man may have fainted for a time. His weariness had grown steadily more insupportable; for him a bed of nails would have been as easy to rest on as that cart.

From its wide summer arc the June sun lanced at the great city, striking through a worn blanket of clouds not yet changed from the night before. Pain in the head, and growing weariness, and—becoming gradually distinct from these—a most—disquieting sense of something wrong. Intrinsically wrong with his existence, in the sense of something missing or crippled. As if an arm or leg were paralyzed, though that was not the case. He suffered a lack of powers that should have been his to call upon; and this lack was linked somehow with his want of a true name.

Periods of insensibility pocked all the old man's daylight hours that day, and a relatively full awareness returned to him only with the dawn of night.

As the day died, the first fact to impress itself upon his returning consciousness was that of Sally's presence in the room again. It was not yet quite dark, and she kept the blotched side of her face averted as she stood by his bed. Her shaking hands were extended towards the old man's shackled right wrist, and in her fingers was a key.

"Thank God yer awyke!" Her whisper was as tremulous as her fingers. "I found out they mean to… Can you walk?"

"I can."

"I 'opes to God you can. Now I knows yer a gentleman. Pledge now, by your honor, that when yer free you'll give me wot 'elp you can, in turn."

The old man quickly raised his head. "I pledge by all I hold most sacred, that I will help you and defend you afterward, if you can aid me now."

Her hand was on the steel, and yet she hesitated. "By helpin', I means you not goin' ter no perlice. I'll blindfold you an' lead you out o' this, and then you just clear out and ferget about it. I never been party't' no murder, and I can't do it now. Not a gent like you, so sweet and brave, an'… an' lovely."

"I swear to you that the police shall hear no word of this from me." Hope pumped new power into his whispering voice, into the leanly cabled muscles of his confined limbs.

"You say nothing't' no one." She hissed it like a deadly threat. "Or it'll be my life an' yours as well!"

"To no one, then. Now quick, girl, quick!"

As on the previous morning, he could hear them coming long before she did. They were still many rooms away. He tried to hurry her, then had to alter plan and interject a warning; she was still fumbling with the key at the first lock when their brisk feet were about to enter the adjoining room. She had barely time to replace the keys on the shelf, beside the broken mirror, when the door opened and Rough-voice and the woman entered, masked, to stand dumbfounded at the sight of Sally where they had no reason to expect her.

The girl managed six words of attempted alibi, and one piteous outcry, before the man's fist knocked her down.

Hoisted to her feet by his ham-hand on her upper arm, she drooled out blood with her apology. Which was something about: "… on'y gettin' the gent a drink."

The gent, whom no one was bothering to watch, shook his head judiciously. It sounded very lame.

"Wot I wants ter know, right quick Sal, is why yer in this bloody room at all?"

"Lookin' fer you, I was. That's all, I swear!" Sal went on to explain why she had supposedly been in a hurry to locate Rough-voice. Her arguments were too oblique and fragmentary for the old man to grasp them at the time, or to remember them at this late date. But Sal's inquisitors seemed disposed, however grudgingly, to believe them. Bound on his cart he gave a slight nod of approval. Still no one was watching him.

From the man Sally might have escaped with no worse than a burst lip and a fierce warning; but there was yet the female of the species with whom she must contend.

In a commanding voice, which excitement turned hard-breathing and even more Germanic, the older woman urged: "Ve must impress upon't' girl't' seriousness uff tis." She gestured imperiously. Rough-voice obediently seized Sal and wrestled her into the next room, presumably better equipped for making impressions of the kind the woman had in mind. After one initial spasm of resistance, the unhappy girl ceased to struggle.

Now, thought the old man, honoring his pledge to Sal, and tried to summon up the army of his powers. The prospect of escape had acted on him as a stimulant, and he had now recovered far enough to know that unusual powers existed for him. Yet only a host of bemused ghosts responded to his call. They were the shades of energies that once had been, and might sometime be again, if only this mortal exhaustion did not kill him first.

In the other room the older woman's voice spoke softly, warmly, and with a sudden girlish eagerness. There was a rustle as of clothing being shifted, and then Sally cried out with true fierce pain, much louder than before. "Ah no, I meant no harm! Please no, I'll not do it ever again…"

Once more the scream. Then some metal implement was tossed aside, and a slight body slid through a man's grasp and crumpled on the floor, whining and gasping with ongoing pain. At about this point the doctor arrived, brisk as usual and ready for a good day's work. He had a few words of conversation with his co-workers, and delivered a short homily to Sal. She was allowed, as soon as she could stand, to make her way unsteady but unhindered from the building.

The doctor, masked, gowned, and gloved as before, soon looked in and helped himself to another sample of the old man's blood, with difficulties no smaller than before. Whatever portion of the day his study of this sample occupied, the doctor was not back again till dark. Meanwhile the old man had spent most of the daylight hours in tranced oblivion.

This last time, the doctor came into the room unmasked. This first free look at that thin cold young face with its thick blond mustache the old man correctly interpreted as an ominous sign.

"A very interesting patient you would make, old fellow. Very interesting indeed. But far too untypical, I fear, for our present needs. I would like very much to study you, just to satisfy my curiosity, but there is no time for that just now. And unfortunately no way for me to put you on ice until later." The physician bent closer to examine closely the skin of the old man's chest, and then sighed lightly. "I can't even tell if you were bitten by the fleas; if not, that would be another thumping great peculiarity… and given the present state of your blood, I doubt you'll live long enough to pose a threat as an informer or a potential witness. But of course that can't be left to chance. Dispose of him, Matthews."

"Arr, rather. Now that 'e knows me name." Matthews (or Rough-voice), who had just come in, sounded quietly outraged.

"And my own face, as you observe. So do a thorough job. As I have every confidence you will."

Matthews shook his head. "I will need a bit o' help wi' the boat, is all. I think I'd best use the same way as before."

"Are none of the lads available?"

"Not right on hand, Guv. It's been a busy time."

"I can help." The woman had just come in, and was now taking off her mask. Her eyes, with the rest of the face now visible to set them off, looked harder than ever.

The doctor, brightening, turned to her. "It would certainly help, Frau Grafenstein, if you do not mind. My own duties will prevent my leaving the building for some time."

"Mind a bit of exercise in a boat? Pah, of course not." The roses put into her cheeks by the brief workout with Sally had not yet entirely faded. "I am not one uff your fragile ladies, doctor."

And it was the woman who first approached the cart. From some shelf on its lower half she brought up a pillow, with the idea of making the patient more comfortable. She pressed it firmly down upon the face of the supine old man, blocking both nose and mouth.

How easy for him to make his chest surge up and down a little, and then hold it quite still. To strain and quiver in all his limbs, and then let them relax.

Time passed.

"That's got 'im." Rough-voice gave his professional opinion flatly. Deferring to these specialists, the physician had already walked away, hurrying back to his own mysterious and demanding job.

The woman lifted the pillow, revealing the old man's face, his color ghastly (it had not been good to begin with), his mouth ajar and eyelids likewise. It was a corpse-like face that looked as if it might be stiffening already. He had seen death by suffocation often enough to be able to mime it without difficulty. What had he not seen, indeed? Well, much. An animal like that still snuffling in the room beyond, to name one thing.

The steel fetters continued to hold his arms and legs, but were now somehow disconnected from his cart.

"These irons'll myke just a good bit o' weight if we leaves 'em on."

The woman answered: "Yes, that's all right, we have more. And leave his gown on him. We should have to dispose of that in any case."

The old man's whole body and its fetters were slid into what felt like an oilcloth bag, of a size and shape to hold a body handily. Then he was lifted free of the bed and draped over Matthews' broad shoulder. In this way he was carried out of the room of his imprisonment and through another room, then down a long flight of stairs, the bearer grunting out a pithy comment or two about the unexpected weight. Frau Grafenstein marched briskly on ahead, to open doors.

At last they came to outdoor air, enriched with horse-smells, starched with coal-smoke, larded with the stale cosmopolitan essence of the Thames. The smells of night and of damp earth served as effective stimuli for memory, or should have done.

Obviously they intended to sink him in the river, and that would be that, no? Well, no, he thought, for he had already survived smothering. Actually he was far from helpless. The thing he had to do… he should be able to…

Energized by the approach of midnight, the battered brain within the aged skull fought to repair its broken weapons. To remember the things that must and could be done would be much easier if he were able to recall just who and what he was…

He was borne on the strong man's shoulder down a ladder, with river-smell strong and sounds of water lapping near, and then he was cast roughly into the bottom of what must have been a rather large rowboat. It swayed only a little with the weight of the three people boarding, rubbing its sides against pilings to the starboard and port. The need for the lady's aid was soon apparent: two pairs of hands, one working at the bow and one at the stern, were required to work the heavy craft out of what must have been a place of snug concealment beneath a dock, a berth into which it was kept wedged by the river's current.

As soon as the craft was drifting free, Frau G. sat down in the stern and rested, one booted foot comfortably propped upon the old man's unmoving hip, whilst Matthews broke out a pair of oars.

A dozen or so strokes, and the man began complaining yet again. He was having an unexpectedly tough time transporting this particular cargo over running water. Ah, folk would grumble less if they knew more. He might have had a far more difficult evening than he did.

"Ach, man," Frau Grafenstein admonished briskly, "put your back into it." The old man in his bag could almost picture her shaking a stern finger. "Neither uff your passengers iss very big or heavy. And you ought to be used to this particular trip by now."

"That old un's heavier than you might think, Missus," Matthews grunted, pulling hard as bidden. "Somethin' queer about him. In general, I means. Weren't there?" Grunt again. "Bit o' rough current tonight, it feels like."

"One uff these nights you may be rowing this way, with your young cousin, done up zo." She treated the old man to a familiar joggle from her boot.

"Nar. With all respeck, Missus, I 'spect Sal will be a good 'un now. You made a bit of an impression on 'er tonight."

"I trust that you are right." The woman sighed; it was a delicate and almost feminine sound. Then in a little while she said: "This should be far enough. Those new electric lights across the river will be too close for comfort if we go on."

"Ar."

The oars stopped and were shipped inboard. Again two strong hands grappled the old man's oilcloth bag. They put him straight over the gunwale, wrappings, and weighty bonds and all, without delay or ceremony, almost without a splash.

Cold water tried to fasten teeth into his skin, but he was callous to its bite. His breathless lips were pressed fastidiously tight against the dirty tide. The muted shock of immersion served as a needed tonic for his brain. His powers armed themselves, were ghosts no longer, although still lacking intellectual control. He felt his iron manacles drop off, and with them the shrouding bag. But it was not the metal that melted or the cloth that tore. Some other object lost its solidity, rose like a spectral bubble through the water, and then slowly regained its substance and its shape. Now the old man stood dripping on the pier, still clad in his hospital victim's gown. His burgeoning powers were ringed around him now, a bodyguard invisible and awesome, though in disordered ranks. Still missing was their captain, the last great power: his true name. The boat had rowed up to the far end of the pier, where it was letting off the woman now. Looking between piles of shipping crates, the old man could see her quite easily, despite the forty yards or so of smoggy night between.

"Stuff and nonsense." Her voice was plain, not loud but brisk. "Uff course I shall be all right." And then her military walk came spattering the last rain's shallow mirrors in his direction, shivering the stray gleams of electric lights ranked somewhere on the Thames' far bank. Matthews meanwhile had stayed in the boat, and was now rowing it out toward midstream, inadvertently putting between himself and the old man such a stretch of running water that the latter in his weakened state perceived it as an effective barrier.

The woman's jaunty footfalls came on toward him through the night, behind tall piles of crates. All that old man needed to do was stand there in the shadow of a disused boatshed, waiting.

She came in sight again, now close enough for her to see him also. He waited almost storklike on his long bare legs below that ridiculous shirt in which she had helped to dress him. His face that she had pillowed only minutes earlier was in the shadow now, but still she could scarcely have mistaken his figure in her path for that of any other man. Her stride faltered, and the hard dominance of her own face cracked like a clay mask.

But… not one of your fragile ladies, as she had herself remarked. She could not avoid him, and after faltering once she marched on, pulling out a pistol. It barked like a toy dog from its abbreviated barrel, and sharp pain, ineffectual metallic pain, lanced the old man through the chest and flew on past him, even as his long arms reached out…

At last his combined hunger and thirst were satisfied—he had not known how strong the craving was till he began to gratify it—and he lifted his head, licking a lip thoughtfully, looking and listening. The pier he stood on, and its adjoining piers, were quite deserted. Somewhere down the long water-corridor of shipping that twisted toward the sea, foghorns were beginning conversation.

He held the body out at arm's length. Hard boots and limp hands hung straight toward their ruffled images in muddy, moving water. In that mirror the woman's body was suspended completely without support, its draperies of clothing tucked up by invisible force at knees and shoulders.

It pleased him to bestow, in his own mind, an epitaph: Not one of your fragile ladies. With that he let the drained thing splash.

In the brief struggle the hospital gown has been torn almost completely loose, and now with complete unconcern for either modesty or warmth he lets it fall. He sees the body drift and sink, and float again, but already his thoughts are elsewhere.

That he will now turn upon his remaining persecutors and endeavor to hunt them down is beyond question. But should he, can he, begin that necessary task before he has his own identity in hand?

With food his strength is waxing, but he is still in mortal need of rest, and still he cannot remember. Why has he known no fear, through all these perils? He is not immortal, no, far from it, but…

Why does the water not give him his reflection back? And, how came he flowing like fog out of the water, neither the tide nor steel bonds able to hold him? Why had that heavy, leaden bullet done no worse than kiss him with a sharp sting as it passed through his body?

There are a hundred questions more.

One above all: Who is he?