For the Sake of the Game Read online

  Cheers from the ladies in the galleries.

  “Yes, you, ladies. Don’t think I don’t know what, or do think it, because I do know, I know all too well. Why, I—”

  “Why, I myself!” shouted the audience.

  “Have preached among the fallen women, have seen many a harlot on her knees before me . . .”

  There was a guffaw from the men.

  “I’m sure I don’t understand your reaction,” he said, blinking in confusion.

  “You will, Reverend,” said the Chairman, coming over to take his arm. “Let’s get you someplace where you can sleep this off. Again. In the meantime, ladies and gentleman, it gives me the greatest of pleasure to introduce to you that loveliest of ladies with the sunniest of smiles, our very own Mademoiselle Susan Brett!”

  The curtains parted and a vision of beauty stood before them, the same Thames backdrop behind her.

  She couldn’t have been more then sixteen or seventeen, and the blush in her cheeks was her own, although her lips were painted strawberry red to complement her creamy complexion. Her hair cascaded in brunette ringlets down her neck, and she wore a frilled, floral-patterned dress that swirled about her like rose petals in a whirlwind as she stepped to the front of the stage. A flowered bonnet adorned her head, and she twirled a parasol behind her as the music began.

  Holmes found himself leaning forward in his seat as she sang:

  “Now hark to my melancholy story:

  I love a lad who loves a boat.

  It’s only a wretched little dory.

  It’s a wonder that it still can float.

  Though he gave me his pledges

  That he’d give up his dredges,

  He still searches the riverbed for gems.

  And against all my wishes

  He goes out and he fishes,

  Even though there’s no fish left in the Thames!”

  The music shifted to a waltz rhythm, and she began to sway back and forth with it.

  “I love the boy who rows on the river.

  I thrill when he pulls on his oar.

  He glides with the tides, and my heart starts to shiver.

  His muscular arms I adore.

  And when he’s on land, we will walk hand in hand.

  His kiss leaves me longing for more.

  Yet I’m left on the banks without one word of thanks,

  As he rows away from shore.

  As he rows away from shore.”

  Many in the audience joined in the chorus. Holmes was surprised at their familiarity with the song until his neighbor at the table leaned over and indicated on the programme the lyrics, with the heading importuning them to “SING ALONG!”

  Mademoiselle Brett, in the meantime, had begun the second verse:

  “You’d think that a fellow would prefer maids,

  After spending so much time a-sail.

  But my little skipper must like mermaids.

  It’s a pity I can’t grow a tail!”

  On this, she turned to the side, leaned forward, and planted her parasol point down, then gave her bottom a minute wiggle as the drummer echoed the movement on his cowbell. This microscopic display of eroticism elicited an immense masculine bellow of approval.

  Idiotic, thought Holmes with disdain.

  “There are others who woo me,

  But they mean nothing to me,

  For the one man I yearn to have is him.”

  What is it about mermaids that fascinates so many men? he mused. Sirens, Lorelei, all the dangerously alluring females of the deep.

  “Yet I can’t be ecstatic

  With a romance aquatic . . .”

  What could one even do with a mermaid?

  “For you see, I have never learned to swim.

  I love the boy who rows on the river . . .”

  A low, rumbling noise was emanating from his throat, and he realized to his surprise that he was humming along. Oh, well, he thought.

  And Sherlock Holmes sang along with the crowd as Mademoiselle Brett skipped along the stage, pirouetting so that her skirts rose, revealing a dainty pair of ankles and the beginnings of white-stockinged calves, bringing forth another paroxysm of approval.

  She finished to lusty applause, curtseyed, and scampered off.

  The rest of the evening passed in a blur. The gong announced the magician, who sounded more East End than Eastern and relied heavily on bursts of flash powder. Holmes enjoyed figuring out each trick as it happened.

  The final act was Master Brett. He proved to be a quick-change artist, passing several times behind a screen to emerge in a completely different costume and persona, all of whom were immensely amusing. Mademoiselle Brett returned to perform a comic sketch with him, reacting with dismay and bewilderment each time a new character appeared. He finished with a swordfight between two equally inebriated pirates, thanks to a cleverly split costume that allowed him to play both through the simple expedient of turning from one profile to the other.

  And then it was over. The cast took their bows and the crowd filtered out, the gentlemen who had been in the private boxes looking satisfied and disheveled. Holmes approached the boy who had handed out the programmes.

  “I would like to speak with Master Brett,” he said.

  The boy led him back into the theater, up the steps to the stage, then into the wings.

  “Mind your head,” he said, ducking through a low door that led to a stairway going down.

  Holmes followed him to a narrow hall with a series of doors. The boy rapped respectfully on the last one.

  “Come!” said a man, and the boy held the door open.

  Master Brett sans costume and wig was a surprisingly thin man with a head shaved clean. He was sitting at a dressing table crowded with jars of powders and creams. A large mirror was mounted on the wall behind it. Brett was in the middle of wiping off his makeup, but turned to look at Holmes, his washcloth hiding the lower part of his face.

  “Well? What business do you have?” he demanded.

  “The return of my wallet, for a start,” said Holmes.

  Brett opened a drawer, pulled it out, and tossed it to him.

  “It’s all there,” he said.

  “Do you expect me not to count it?” asked Holmes.

  “You’d be a damn fool if you didn’t,” said Brett. “Sit there while you do, Mr. Holmes.”

  Holmes sat uncomfortably on a low stool and verified the contents of his wallet.

  “You know my name because you went through it,” he observed.

  “I know who you are because if I took your brother and locked him in a cupboard without food for a month, the end result would be you.”

  “Could you do that?” asked Holmes. “I would enjoy it tremendously.”

  “Tempting, but no,” said Brett, peering into a mirror and scrubbing diligently at the remains of some adhesive on his upper lip. “Is that all?”

  “Don’t you want to know how I knew you were the woman who sat in my lap?”

  “Everyone knows I’m her,” said Brett. “It’s the act. But tell me what gave it away.”

  “The bulge of the Adam’s apple under your choker,” said Holmes. “And the, um, the way your . . .”

  He held up his hand and made a squeezing motion.

  “The falsies, eh?” chuckled Brett. “So, you do know what a real one feels like. Your brother had his doubts.”

  “I worked in a mortuary last summer. I am well acquainted with the human body.”

  “Not the best way to learn,” leered Brett. “Why are you really here?”

  “Mycroft sent me. I gather he wants me to learn how to disguise myself.”

  “For what reason? You’re too green to be one of his lads.”

  “I am a consulting detective,” said Holmes grandly.

  “What the hell is that?”

  “I, uh, investigate matters for people.”

  “They have the police for that.”

  “The police are not always effective. Or int
erested.”

  “True enough,” said Brett. “Very well. I can teach you a few things. My rates are—”

  “Rates?”

  “Did you think you could come into my inner sanctum and learn the secrets of my trade, secrets that I have spent years in acquiring, for nothing?”

  “I thought Mycroft—”

  “I charge him for educating his people, and I’ll charge you for it as well. Two shillings a lesson.”

  “Two shillings!”

  “Not a penny less.”

  “How many lessons will I need?”

  “To master this would take years.”

  “How many to pass as a denizen of the docks?”

  “If you are apt, six or seven lessons. If you would add other professions and areas of London, then more.”

  “I am a poor man,” said Holmes. “What you saw in my wallet are my current holdings.”

  “Then you should be more careful with it,” said Brett. “Good-bye, and good luck with the detecting, Mr. Holmes.”

  Holmes rose, then hesitated.

  “Could I barter for it?” he asked.

  “I have no quandaries that need investigating.”

  “Could I work here? For my lessons?”

  “Doing what?” laughed Brett. “I have no need for slave labor, and unless you have an act—do you have an act? Any theatrical talents?”

  “I have declaimed a little Shakespeare in my time.”

  “I don’t need any declaimers, thank you. That’s it?”

  “I play violin. Could you use another instrument for your orchestra?”

  “Interesting. Any good?”

  “I fancy so.”

  “Hmm,” said Brett, thinking. Then he came to a decision and stood. “Come with me.”

  Holmes followed him down a flight of steps. Brett unlocked a door and ushered him into a large storage room filled with shelves of props and costumes. He reached up to a top shelf and pulled down a plain wooden box and handed it over.

  Holmes opened it to see a violin and bow inside.

  “We had a fiddle-player,” said Brett. “Mister Scarpelli. Decent musician, terrible drunk. He’d vanish on benders, come back whenever. Last week, he didn’t come back, so we’ve been a man short. Play something.”

  Holmes lifted it carefully out of the box and ran his thumb over the strings. They were surprisingly in tune.

  “He didn’t have a regular case for it?” he asked as he tightened the bow.

  “Probably pawned it,” said Brett.

  “Sarabande in D minor,” Holmes announced, and he set the bow to the strings.

  The sound, melancholy and beautiful, echoed through the room, and Holmes closed his eyes, feeling the old rapture of—

  “My God, that’s lugubrious,” interrupted Brett. “Got anything up-tempo?”

  “Allemande, from the Partita, also by—”

  “J. S. Bach, yes, I know. Get on with it.”

  Slightly rattled, Holmes launched into the piece. He observed Brett had a happier expression this time. Encouraged, he let the music soar.

  There was a sudden scream from outside, then the door was flung open and a young woman rushed in, her face pale.

  “Is he back?” she cried, then she stopped short as she saw Holmes. “Oh. Forgive me. I thought—”

  “Mr. Holmes, may I introduce my daughter, Susan?” said Brett.

  She looked tiny off-stage, her flowered dress replaced by a plain, woolen dressing gown. She was just as lovely without makeup as she was in the footlights with it. Lovelier, thought Holmes.

  Almost without thinking, he bowed.

  “A pleasure, Mademoiselle Brett,” he said. “You performed admirably, in my opinion.”

  Admirably, Sherlock? he thought, mentally kicking himself. Is that the best you can do?

  “Thank you, sir,” she replied. “Nice mouse.”

  “Mouse?” repeated Holmes.

  She pointed to the bruise under his eye.

  “Oh, that,” said Holmes. “A bit of a contretemps last night. We sorted things out.”

  “Would you like her to kiss it and make it better?” asked Brett.

  “Stop teasing him, Papa,” she said. “Please excuse my behavior, Mr. Holmes. Mr. Scarpelli’s violin has a very distinct tone. I thought that was him playing it. I have been worried about him.”

  “Mr. Holmes is going to fill in until he returns,” said Brett.

  “I passed the audition?” asked Holmes.

  “You did,” said Brett. “We do two shows a night, four on Saturdays, dark on Sundays. Come in for your lesson at four, then you’ll have an hour to look at the music. Do you have your own fiddle?”

  “Not in London,” said Holmes.

  “Then you can use Scarpelli’s. But leave it here.”

  “Tomorrow at four,” said Holmes. “Good evening, Mademoiselle and Master Brett.”

  The following afternoon, he sat next to Brett at his dressing table.

  “Look into the mirror,” said Brett. “What makes that face recognizable?”

  “The narrowness of the visage,” said Holmes. “Surmounted by the noble family beak.”

  “Good,” said Brett. “Now, theatrical makeup works well in the theater. We simplify and accentuate our features so they can be read from the last row of the balcony, allowing for the lighting. But you’ll be lit how?”

  “By sun at day and lamplight at night.”

  “Precisely. So, you don’t want to look like a man wearing makeup, unless you are venturing into establishments where men wear makeup.”

  “I won’t be.”

  “You never know, do you? But let’s take your immediate quest. The docks. You want to pass for a sailor.”

  “Obviously.”

  “What do they have that speaks of a life at sea? Think of their faces. Sunburnt. So, you have to change your skin.”

  He brought out a jar of powder.

  “Mix of red and brown,” he said. “Apply gently. Don’t overdo it, and—no, that’s too much!”

  Holmes looked in the mirror at an apparent victim of some conflagration.

  “I could tell them I was in a boiler-room explosion,” he said.

  “Needs more soot,” said Brett.

  “What would you use for the appearance of soot?” asked Holmes.

  “Soot, you ninny,” said Brett. “Wash it off, try again.”

  And so the hour passed.

  After the lesson, Holmes went down to the storage room. He removed the violin and bow from the box, then stood on a lower shelf to look at the area where the box rested, running his finger along the edge.

  He went to the stage, where Maestro Hardwicke was waiting for him.

  “You’re the new fiddle player?” he asked.

  Holmes held up the violin in response.

  “My right hand thanks you,” said Hardwicke. “It’s been doing double-duty playing the violin lines. Hope you’re a sight-reader. Two hardest parts are the overture and the knockabout music. Lots of tempo shifts, glissandos, what have you. Watch my nose—when it goes up and stops, you stop. I give you the tempos, you keep up, hear me?”

  “Yes,” said Holmes.

  A second stand and chair had been placed between the trumpet player’s and the stage. The chair wobbled as Holmes sat. He got up and inspected the legs.

  “Yeah, one of them is short,” commented Hardwicke. “Scarps stuck a piece of cardboard under it.”

  “I see it,” said Holmes, squatting to retrieve it from the floor.

  He looked at it, then slid it under the chair leg.

  “They clean in here much?” he asked.

  “They sweep it out twice a week. Why?”

  “Just curious.”

  He sat, opened up his part, and began to practice until the audience began to file in.

  He waited off-stage with Hardwicke, who introduced him to Mal, the drummer, and Derek, the trumpet player. The latter leaned over and whispered, “Watch for Heaven.”

>   “What do you mean?” asked Holmes.

  “You’ll see.”

  Brett’s dissolute courtesan began working his way through the audience, and the musicians took their places. The Chairman came on, and Hardwicke raised his hands. Holmes brought his bow up. Then the overture began.

  Holmes kept pace, and Derek patted him on the arm when they came to their first break during the ventriloquist’s act. The music for the Condolinis proved to be fiercely difficult, but Holmes’ mistakes were unobserved other than the fierce glares cast by Hardwick. Behind him, Mal winked in sympathy.

  His part for Mademoiselle Brett was simple, mostly providing the “pah pahs” to Hardwicke’s “ooms.” He scanned ahead in the part, and noticed a penciled circle over one bar around the word “Heaven.” There was an arrow pointing up and to the left.

  Holmes duly glanced in that direction when the measure arrived. It turned out to be the moment in her dance when she twirled, revealing her ankles and calves to the audience. Holmes, from his vantage point next to the stage and almost directly under her, saw a great deal more. He immediately fixed his eyes on his music, hoping his blushes went unnoticed.

  They finished the first show. Hardwicke looked at Holmes and nodded curtly.

  “I won’t tolerate any mistakes like that again,” he said.

  “There won’t be any,” promised Holmes.

  “Come on,” said Derek, plucking at his arm. “They put out a cold supper for us between shows.”

  Apart from those crew members resetting the stage, the entire company crammed into a small room to share the meal.

  “Well?” said Derek, nudging Holmes in the side. “Did you get a glimpse of Heaven?”

  “Shut up,” said Holmes.

  “I’m sorry they replaced Scarpelli,” continued Derek. “I had the prime view with him gone. Maybe we could switch seats?”

  “You depend on your mouth for your livelihood,” commented Holmes.

  “Yeah, so what?”

  “So if I were to punch you very hard in that mouth, you’d have to find other means of employment.”

  “Here, now!” protested Derek.

  “I will treat Mademoiselle Brett with the respect due to a lady,” said Holmes. “I recommend that you do likewise.”

  “Prig,” muttered Derek, walking away.