The Mycroft Holmes Omnibus Read online

  Mycroft had told the young man about the forgeries before he made his calls.

  “Before we get down to business, sir,” said Tobias, “there’s one thing I think you should know about. It’s odd, very odd.”

  “What’s that?” said Mycroft, popping a Turkish Delight into his mouth.

  “The crime figures are down, sir. In some parts of the country, London and Liverpool, for example, armed robbery has virtually disappeared. You’d think the police would be congratulating themselves about their success in lowering the crime rate, but they’re keeping very quiet. They’ve hidden the figures away in the back of this report to the Home Secretary.”

  “They don’t want anybody to know about it in case the politicians decide they need fewer policemen or less money from the Government, I expect. But it is, as you say, very odd. Now then, we need to turn our attention to these rumours about attempts to debase the currency.” Mycroft leaned back in his chair and cupped his hands round the bottom of his stomach. “There are, I think, three questions we need to address. I think we have to work on the assumption that the rumours are correct and an attempt is being made to debase the currency. The first is this, and it is almost a metaphysical one. Does anybody know how many genuine banknotes there are in circulation? And how would you find out if that number has been exceeded by the activities of the forgers? The second is a question of location. To make the forgeries, the forgers must have a printing press or presses or, maybe, access to one owned by a government printer. Where would you put them? In England or on the Continent? And the third question is, in my judgement, the most difficult. How do you flood the country with fake money? The forgers could use it for their private purposes, they could buy property with it, they could take it to fashionable watering places and casinos, but that’s not going to have much impact nationally, certainly not enough to debase the currency. I suggest that you start work on the first and the third question, Tobias. I don’t have to tell you that you must be very careful when you speak to some of these people. The Treasury and the officials at the Bank of England can’t discover what we are really about.”

  “I’ll tell them I’m writing an article for an academic economic journal, sir,” said Tobias cheerfully. “I’ve a friend who runs one of these things, full of obscure bits of theory. I’ll tell them I’m looking at the circulation of money and the velocity it attains on its travels round the economy. I reckon I could lose them in the jargon inside five minutes.”

  “Good,” said Mycroft. “I’m going to consult the last three annual reports from Watermans and the latest stuff from the Bank of England.” Mycroft padded over to the left-hand wall and returned with a series of folders. He reflected that their ammunition might seem rather dry in the battle against the forgers but he had always been a great believer in the power of his brain and his own deductive abilities.

  *

  Diogenes, the ancient philosopher, lived at the same time as Plato and was famous, among other things, for walking about with a lit lamp in his hand in the daylight, looking, he said, for an honest man. Mycroft and his friends had founded the Diogenes Club because the philosopher was famous for his dislike of socialising and social life in general. The principal rule of the Club was that you could only speak in the Strangers Room. Silence was to be observed in the reading room, the bar, the dining room, the billiard room and the library. Anybody reported three times for speaking in the wrong place was automatically expelled by the committee. Entrance was conducted by means of a written test rather than an interview.

  As Inspector Lestrade was shown into the Strangers Room, he caught a glimpse of the Reading Room where men were sitting by themselves reading the newspapers, or falling asleep in their armchairs. Mycroft appeared out of a door concealed in the bookcases at the far end of the room.

  “Good evening, Lestrade, I was looking something up in the archives down in the cellar,” he said, showing the Inspector into a chair by the fire. “What do you have to report?”

  “Well, Mr Holmes, I began with that house in Chester Square where you said the Count had lived a few years ago. It’s been sold to an American gentleman, a man by the name of Morgan. The butler said he thought the Count had gone to live in the country but he wasn’t sure. Since then I’ve been on the trail of Roach, Fettiplace Jones and Browne all day. Two of them lived in Railway Cuttings in Slough, a neat row of cottages near the station. One of them, Mrs Roach, has moved to Hampstead, the other, Mrs Fettiplace Jones has apparently gone to live in Bray on the river. The estate agents have promised me the new addresses in the morning. But Mrs Browne is still there in a house on the outskirts of the town, not far from the Watermans manufactory.”

  “And what does she have to say for herself, this Mrs Browne?”

  “Well, you wouldn’t say she was exactly prostrate with grief, Mr Holmes. It’s six months now since her husband disappeared. There’s a lot of new furniture about the house and some expensive looking silver. This is the curious thing, Mr Holmes. You know how difficult it is for the widows of people who disappear to claim any money from their insurance policies or pensions if they had any. It takes years and years before the authorities will pronounce them officially dead. When I asked Mrs Browne if she had started proceedings in this matter she admitted that she hadn’t. She said she found it all too upsetting. She didn’t look to me like the kind of woman who would find it too upsetting. I wouldn’t be surprised if the husband were still alive, I really wouldn’t.”

  “Have you talked to the Post Office?” asked Mycroft.

  “Why should I talk to the Post Office, Mr Holmes? They aren’t going to know where he is.”

  “You could be wrong there, my friend,” said Mycroft. “They might know without knowing it, if you see what I mean.”

  “I don’t, Mr Holmes, I don’t see what you mean.”

  “It’s quite simple, Lestrade. Let us assume that Browne has been kidnapped or hijacked, forced against his will to work for the forgers. He will want to let his wife know he is still alive. I doubt very much if the Count and his gang are in the habit of giving weekend passes to their victims. But they may let them write the occasional letter. Why don’t you ask the Post Office to keep a record of all the postmarks on all the letters going to Mrs Browne and the other two? You’re not allowed by law to open the letters and read them, but I’ll have a word with the Home Secretary about that if we think we have discovered anything useful.”

  “I’ll get onto it first thing in the morning, Mr Holmes. I should have thought of it myself.”

  “Never mind, Lestrade, you’ve done well finding them so fast. Continue your inquiries tomorrow. We can meet here at the same time.” Mycroft paused suddenly and began to laugh. His stomach began to wobble with mirth. “I’ve just thought of something, Lestrade. It’s obvious when you think about it. The expensive silver, the furniture. If the Graf and his gang have got him, there’s one thing the husband should have in abundance, certainly enough for a new sofa and a few pieces of plate. Maybe he’s sending her regular supplies of money.”

  “What if he is, Mr Holmes, I don’t understand.”

  “The money, Lestrade, the money. The man Browne is almost certainly keeping his wife afloat with regular supplies of banknotes. Forged banknotes. Forged banknotes that he has helped to create.”

  *

  That evening Mycroft dined alone in a private room at the club. Not only was he a founder member of the Diogenes, but he chaired the catering committee and personally picked the chef. His brother Sherlock was an ascetic where food was concerned, never very interested in it, able to go for long periods without eating anything at all. Mycroft had the appetites, and enough hunger for the two of them. The chef, a Frenchman who learnt his trade in the hotels and restaurants of Lyon, had prepared for him that evening a fish soup of considerable subtlety and a steak with the chef’s signature sauce. The porter brought him a letter and handed it over in silence. You had to write messages to the waiters in the Diogenes if you want
ed more wine or an extra helping of the vegetables.

  A note from Tobias was pinned on top of another note, written on HM Treasury notepaper. ‘Sir,’ Mycroft read, ‘this from my friend who runs the economics journal.’

  You ask about ways to flood the country with fake money and debase the currency. There are a number of ways of doing this. If you were the Bank of England you would circulate the money through the banks. If you owned a bank yourself you could keep issuing loans on the security of your forged notes and thus put the fake money into circulation. You could have loops of people endlessly changing large amounts of the fakes into German marks or French francs at the major banks or bureaux de change in all our large cities. But if, as I suspect, there is crime afoot here, the neatest way to flood the country with fake money would be to sell it to big criminal outfits. Five shillings for a five-pound note would seem a bargain to any criminal who can add up. The real criminals, the forgers, are invisible once the cash is handed over. The old fashioned criminals could then buy up assets like hotels or public houses with the phoney money and bank more than the takings to increase their wealth.

  Hope this is useful. JMK.

  Mycroft made his way back to his rooms at his usual slow pace. The chef’s own sauce, he reflected, had been a triumph and the sommelier’s recommendation of a bottle of Romanee Conti to accompany the steak, a masterstroke. He would play a little on his baby grand piano when he reached home, he decided. His parents had been musical and very keen that both their sons should learn to play an instrument. They had played occasional duets, himself at the piano and Sherlock on his violin, and had once given an informal recital to family and friends at Christmas. Mycroft’s mental powers were such that he could remember any piece perfectly after he had played it once. He now had a repertoire larger than most concert pianists. Mozart, he thought, as he dodged an enormous black car in the middle of Pall Mall. A Mozart piano concerto. That would be soothing for the nerves, for although his powers were as great as ever, their use at full stretch tired him out more and more as the years passed.

  Early the following morning, Tobias had opened Mycroft’s letters and a bundle of telegrams and laid them out on his desk. Even the act of opening an envelope was a tiresome bore for Mycroft and he would have left them lying about for weeks without his assistant. After a few moments he took a couple of telegrams and began walking up and down the room. This was so unusual that Tobias stared open mouthed as his master paraded around his vast office.

  “Tobias,” Mycroft said finally, returning to his desk and his chair and a generous helping of Turkish Delight, “this is progress. At last.”

  He was still clutching his telegrams.

  “These come from the firm in Germany that manufactures printing presses for most of the central banks of Europe. Some years ago they encountered a little financial difficulty. Their own government refused to help them. In desperation they turned to me by means of the Underground Library. I am glad to say that I was able to put together a series of measures which saw them through their troubles and which gave a very generous return over five years to the taxpayers of Great Britain. Yesterday I called in the debt. I asked for details of all the presses they had sold in the last five years. Normally this firm would not tell you the colour of their carpets or the names of their children. They are obsessed with secrecy. Each press is despatched in three different sections at different times. Each printing press is constructed in such a way that it will only work with the other two sections designed along with it. That, I may say, was one of my own suggestions all those years ago.”

  Mycroft smiled at the memory of his cleverness.

  “They have answered all my inquiries. They have kept their side of the bargain, the Gesellschaft Franz Helmut Schinkler. In the last three years, apart from their contracts with their own government, they have sold printing presses for the manufacture of bank notes to Russia, Austria, Italy, Finland, Mexico and Andorra.” He paused. “Do you see the catch, Tobias?”

  “I’m afraid I do not, sir. Not yet at any rate.”

  “Andorra does not have a currency of its own. They trade in French or Spanish money.”

  “But why should the German company manufacture a printing press for a country that didn’t need one?”

  “Here, my young friend, we see how clever the Count and his private regiment can be. Old man Schinkler tells me that they had a visitor who claimed to be a senior banker in the tiny country. Andorra, he told the Germans, was about to start printing its own currency. But they didn’t want that known before they were ready. They had to have enough notes in hand to inject into the system before they announced the change. They had high hopes, the official from Andorra told the Schinkler people in confidence, that the notes would be popular with tourists and collectors, rather like rare stamps. Secrecy, the man said, was even more important than usual, so important that the Andorra Government were prepared to pay a twenty per cent premium on the price if the machinery reached Andorra without anybody finding out about it.”

  “And that was good enough for the Germans?”

  “It was, Tobias, it was. And the premium has been paid. The good folk in Bavaria will think the launch has been postponed or the government has changed its mind. Somewhere out there, across the Channel or hidden away in this country is a printing press capable of producing enormous numbers of English banknotes. This is the first indication that the conspiracy really does exist.”

  Tobias was opening a note that had just been delivered. “This won’t surprise you, sir. It’s from the Treasurer of the Bank of England. He says they do not have an accurate idea of the exact number or the precise value of the notes in circulation. They have records of how many have been delivered by Watermans over the years, but they do not know how many have been lost or destroyed or buried under peoples’ mattresses.”

  “That means,” said Mycroft, “that we shall only know that the currency has been debased after it has happened and the price of everything has gone through the roof. There are certain indications already – they are very technical and will never be published – that prices are beginning to rise at a higher rate than normal.”

  Mycroft started shuffling the telegrams on his desk. In his mind’s eye he could see his life’s work auditing the Government departments, seeing off irregularities here, introducing superior methods there, destroyed by a fanatical German count. Well, he would not go down without a fight. In one of his adventures with his brother, the affair of the Greek Interpreter, he had been persuaded to abandon his daily routine of Pall Mall, Department, Diogenes Club in the course of the inquiry. He had actually travelled to a different part of London. On another occasion he had been a cabbie, driving Dr Watson to a dangerous rendezvous with Sherlock Holmes at Victoria Station. These deviations from his routine had cost him dear. His nerves were shattered by the unaccustomed movement. He had been forced to take to his bed for ten days or more each time, and this before he had the services of Mrs Hudson to sustain him. Now, looking out at the fog that swirled round the inner courtyard of the Government Offices, Mycroft told himself that if he had to abandon his routine he would do so, whatever the consequences. It was the least he could do for his country.

  “Tobias,” he said, “I think we should go on the attack. Can you place the following advertisement in a prominent position in all the evening papers. ‘Money for Sale. Five-pound Notes for Five Shillings. Anybody wishing to take advantage of this amazing offer should report to 68b Pall Mall at six o’clock tomorrow evening, Thursday. Deal closes at 7.30 pm’.”

  Tobias took the words down with his usual speed and headed for the private telegraph office next door, reserved exclusively by a grateful Government for the traffic of his master.

  “What do you think may happen, sir,” he asked as he reached the door.

  “Well, nothing may happen,” Mycroft replied. “People may think the offer is too good to be true. But consider, Tobias. If your friend JMK is correct and this is how the money
is distributed, the villains, the ordinary criminals, may think there is another goldmine opening up. They will not care how the money gets here, the criminals, they will just see an enormous profit. One or two of the villains may come along to check us out. There is another possibility, of course. The Count must have his people in London, maybe the infantry rather than the High Command, but representatives nonetheless. Surely they will see this advertisement or hear about it. They will wonder if they have competition. Who are these people offering money for nothing? Do we want them muscling in on our scheme? Lestrade must have men trailing every single person who comes to the rendezvous. And one other thing, Tobias. Can you talk to your contacts at the Bank of England? We’ll need five thousand pounds in Treasury notes of every denomination in my rooms by five o’clock tomorrow afternoon.”

  “What should I say if they ask the reason, sir?”

  “The reason? The reason? Ah yes, tell them it has to do with certain irregularities in the naval dockyards involved in Dreadnought construction. That could cover a multitude of sins. Indeed, now I think of it, it already does.”

  As Tobias set to work on the telegraph machines, Mycroft leant back in his chair, his mind darting out across England and the major powers on the Continent. Yesterday the plot had been insubstantial, shadowy. Now, with the revelations of the Andorra printing press, the enemy was coming into sight. And, with the advertisement in the evening papers, Mycroft felt he had issued a declaration of war.

  *

  Inspector Lestrade was in cheerful mood at the evening conference in the Strangers Room at the Diogenes Club. Mycroft was installed in a chair by the fire, smoking a brand of very strong cigarettes.

  “Don’t normally go in much for tobacco, myself. Little man in Jermyn Street runs these up for me, a thousand at a time. Virginia tobacco, extra strong.”

  Tobias was sitting quietly beside his master. Lestrade was waving the late edition of the evening paper in the air. Lestrade was not a man for the Oxford or Cambridge High Table or the more intellectual pursuits popular in the Athenaeum down the road. Action, that was what he liked, a few arrests, villains to interrogate, criminals to be charged and locked away.