‘Sherlock blooming Holmes!’ he bellowed, slamming his fist down on the side-table. ‘Everywhere I look, they’re talking about that charlatan!’
‘I see, sir,’ I replied as meek as I could. My eyes tracked his hands as they swung this way and that, knowing that a cup, a pen, a piece of coal might quick as a flash get seized and hurled across the room at my head.
‘If we had his cases we’d be living in Belgravia, Barnett,’ he declared, his face so red I thought it might burst. ‘We’d have a permanent suite in the Savoy!’
He dropped to his chair as if suddenly tuckered out. On the table next to his arm, I spied what had caused his temper: The Strand magazine, open at the latest of Dr Watson’s adventures. Fearing he’d notice me looking, I turned my attention to the fire.
‘I’ll put the tea on,’ I said. ‘Do we have any appointments today?’
He nodded, gesturing in the air in a defeated manner. He’d shut his eyes.
‘A lady’s coming at midday.’
‘Very good, sir.’
He rubbed his temples.
‘Get me some laudanum, Barnett. And hurry.’
I took a jug of scent from his shelf and sprayed his head. He moaned and waved me away, wincing as if I were lancing a boil.
‘I’m ill,’ he complained. ‘Tell her I’m indisposed. Tell her to come back tomorrow.’
‘William,’ I said, clearing away the plates and newspapers scattered across his table. ‘We haven’t had a case for five weeks. I have rent to pay. I’ll have to go work on Sidney’s cabs if I don’t bring money home soon, and you know how I don’t like horses.’
‘You’re weak, Barnett,’ he groaned, slumping further in his chair.
‘I’ll clean the room, sir. And we’ll see her at midday.’
He did not respond.
At twelve o’clock sharp, Albert knocked on the door.
‘A lady to see you,’ he said in his usual sorrowful fashion.
I followed him down the dark corridor to the pudding shop that fronted the guvnor’s rooms. Standing at the counter was a young woman in a bonnet and a billowing skirt. She had the complexion of a rich woman, but her cuffs were frayed and brown, and the beauty of her almond face was corrupted by a chipped front tooth. She smiled a quick, unhappy smile, then followed me through to the guvnor’s rooms.
I could see him weaken the moment she walked in the door. He began to blink and jumped to his feet and bowed his head low as he took her wilted hand.
‘Madam.’
He gestured to the best seat – clean and next to the window so there was a little light thrown onto her handsome physique. Her eyes quickly took in the piles of old newspapers that lined the walls and were stacked in some places to the height of a man.
‘What can I do for you?’
‘It is my brother, Mr Arrowood,’ she said. It was clear from her accent she was from the continent. ‘He’s disappeared. I was told you can find him.’
‘Are you French, mademoiselle?’ he asked, standing with his back to the coal fire.
‘I am.’
He glanced at me, his fleshy temples red and pulsing. This was not a good start. Two years before, we’d been thrown into the clink in Dieppe when the local magistrate decided we were asking too many questions about his brother-in-law. Seven days of bread and cold broth had crushed all the admiration he had for the country right out of him, and to make it worse our client had refused to pay us. The guvnor had held a prejudice against the French ever since.
‘Mr Arrowood and me both have a great admiration for your race, miss,’ I said before he had a chance to put her off.
He scowled at me, then asked, ‘Where did you hear of me?’
‘A friend gave me your name. You are an investigative agent, yes?’
‘The best in London,’ I said, hoping a little praise would soothe him.
‘Oh,’ she replied. ‘I thought Sherlock Holmes . . .’
I could see the guvnor tense again.
‘They say he is a genius,’ she continued. ‘The best in all the world.’
‘Perhaps you should consult him then, mademoiselle!’ snapped the guvnor.
‘I cannot afford him.’
‘So I am second best?’
‘I mean no offence, sir,’ she replied, now noticing the edge to his voice.
‘Let me tell you something, Miss . . .’
‘Cousture. Miss Caroline Cousture.’
‘Appearances can be deceptive, Miss Cousture. Holmes is famous because his assistant writes stories and sells them. He’s a detective with a chronicler. But what about the cases we never hear about? The ones that do not get turned into stories for the public? What about the cases in which people are killed by his blundering mistakes?’
‘Killed, sir?’ asked the woman.
‘Are you familiar with the Openshaw case, Miss Cousture?’
The woman shook her head.
‘The Case of the Five Pips?’
Again she shook her head.
‘A young man sent to his death by the Great Detective. Over the Waterloo Bridge. And that isn’t the only one. You must know the Case of the Dancing Men? It was in the newspaper.’
‘No, sir.’
‘Mr Hilton Cubitt?’
‘I do not read newspapers.’
‘Shot. Shot dead and his wife almost killed as well. No, no, Holmes is far from perfect. Did you know he has private means, miss? Well, I hear he turns down as many cases as he accepts, and why do you think? Why, I wonder, would a detective turn down so many cases? And, please, don’t think I’m envious of him. I am not. I pity him. Why? Because he’s a deductive agent. He takes small clues and makes large things of them. Often wrong, in my opinion. There.’ He threw his hands in the air. ‘I’ve said it. Of course he’s famous, but I’m afraid he doesn’t understand people. With Holmes, there are always clues: marks on the ground, the fortuitous faggot of ash on the table, a singular type of clay on the boat. But what of the case with no clues? It’s commoner than you think, Miss Cousture. Then it’s about people. About reading people.’ Here he gestured at the shelf holding his small collection of books on the psychology of the mind. ‘I am an emotional agent, not a deductive agent. And why? I see people. I see into their souls. I smell out the truth with my nose.’
As he spoke, his stare fixed on her, I noticed her flush. Her eyes fell to the floor.
‘And sometimes that smell is so strong it burrows inside me like a worm,’ he continued. ‘I know people. I know them so badly it torments me. That is how I solve my cases. I might not have my picture in the Daily News. I might not have a housekeeper and rooms in Baker Street and a brother in the government, but if I choose to accept your case – and I don’t guarantee that until I hear what you have to say – if I choose to accept it, then you’ll find no fault in me nor in my assistant.’
I watched him with great admiration: when he got into his stride, the guvnor was irrepressible. And what he said was true: his emotions were both his strength and his weakness. That was why he needed me more than he sometimes understood.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Miss Cousture. ‘I do not mean to insult you. I know nothing of this detective business. All