Read Online Mycroft Holmes by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar - Free Book Online

himself.
    “Oh, and I shall importune my dear friend Sir James Clark to give you a thorough going over,” Cardwell muttered as he wrote. “Physician to Prince Albert and all that, retired now.”
    “Too kind, sir,” Holmes protested. “But…”
    “Tut, Holmes. As a representative of Her Majesty’s Government, we cannot have you traipsing about in ill health.”
    Holmes’s smile disappeared.
    Moments later he hurried out of Cardwell’s office, and almost immediately encountered Parfitt. The boy’s eyes were wider than ever.
    “Is there anything I can do for you, Mr. Holmes?” Parfitt inquired.
    You can learn to exhale through your nose
, Holmes thought crossly. But what he said was, “No, Parfitt. That is, yes. I shall be leaving for Port of Spain the day after tomorrow. Kindly make the necessary arrangements on the West India and Pacific Steamship line bound for Barbados. Do not put me ’tween decks, for pity’s sake, but take care that the cabin is economically priced. No view, nothing fancy, room for two.
    “Oh, and there’s this,” Holmes said as he handed back the research on Trinidad. “One item I found puzzling. Has to do with large sums of money making their way from Luxembourg to Jamaica via Colonial Bank, an adjunct of the Bank of England.”
    “Yes,” the boy said, “I noticed it too. Did look a bit odd.”
    “Well, there’s no need to make anything more of it, Parfitt. It’s no doubt the usual corruption. Nothing obvious, and nothing much to be done about it. But we don’t want to be caught off guard at a time of incipient war.”
    “No, sir, we do not,” the boy agreed solemnly.
    “If anything should be amiss, send word to me via the post in Port of Spain.”
    “Yessir, Mr. Holmes,” the boy said.
    “Oh, and would you be so kind as to see after my horse? You may of course ride him…”
    “Yessir, Mr. Holmes,” Parfitt said with a huge grin. “I would be delighted, sir!”
    “Well, pray don’t run him into the ground, Parfitt.”
    “Of c-course I shall n-not,” the boy stammered nervously, but Holmes was no longer paying attention.
    I shall have to purchase a third topcoat in as many weeks
, Holmes thought sourly,
one light enough for the tropics.
    And just in case anything happens to me
, he continued to himself,
I should probably go round and say goodbye to Sherlock.
    But first
, he amended,
that
blasted
physician…
    * * *
    Clark’s examination room was off the main parlor of an old edifice on Borough High Street. It boasted the frilly architecture meant to suggest the Italian Renaissance, but it was so faded—and its masonry so crumbled—that it looked more like a layer cake left in the sun too long.
    Holmes followed a housemaid, who looked nearly as ancient as her surroundings, down a decrepit hall. He had to open his eyes wide to take in what little light could be had. She led him into the examining room and left with a grunt, as if he had importuned her somehow.
    Everywhere he looked, boxes of surgical instruments were open and had been left untouched for so long that dust had settled upon them like the sprinkling of some inferior grade of flour. Lining the shelves were moth-eaten books, along with rows upon rows of jars, many with something or other floating within. Even his quick eye and sharp brain couldn’t discern what those uniformly gray masses were or might be.
    Sir James Clark—ninety if he was a day, stethoscope in hand—toddled in. With no word of greeting, he set off to explore Holmes’s chest, all the while wheezing in a most unpleasant manner, then stared at Holmes accusingly with his cloudy blue eyes.
    “Did you have rheumatic fever as a child?” he asked.
    “Aged three,” Holmes replied. “Why?”
    “Your heart is not the better for it.” Clark placed the stethoscope in another spot and listened more closely. “Not a pleasant sound at all—like water sloshing in there, Mr. Holmes.” He straightened up with some difficulty. “And you