Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Sword Princess (34 page)

But these girls had faced fear before—and won.
 
And well they knew it.

Turning ninety degrees to face her captors, Susan raised her tied hands in a passable imitation of a two-handed badminton swing.

“What ‘ere ye doin’ ye little brat?” McVittie demanded, pointing his gun at her, even as they all gasped.

“Would you like this cigar?” Susan squealed in an amazingly high-pitched voice which momentarily stunned everyone.
 
Swinging her arms forward, the child sent the compact metal baton directly into the open gear box of the steam engine.

For a moment, all involved looked apprehensively towards the mechanism.

Pop!
 
Crack! Grrrrrrnd
!
 
One of the brass main gears popped off its axle, cracked on one side.
 

All the girls began screaming and jumping up and down, suddenly elated.
 
There was no sporting event to match it.
 

“
Noooo
!!” screamed McVittie as the momentum of the vessel began to slacken.

“You little monster!” screamed Corbie.
 
“I’ll kill you!” And he raised his pistol at the suddenly terrified child.

God guide my throw!
Mirabella prayed, hurling her dagger at the big man. The blade turned a lazy full spin in the air and settled with a satisfying
thunk
in the crook of Corbie’s shooting arm. He screamed like a hyena and the revolver clattered once on the gun rail and then added itself to Davy Jones’ armory.

“By God, you’ll pay for that!” Corbie growled as he pulled the blood-covered blade from his arm.
 
Probably a mistake as much more blood gushed forth from the open wound.
 
He threw the knife back at her with his left hand, sending it high and wide as it bounced on the deck beside her.
 
She turned to grab it but had run out of time.
 
Corbie had already started towards her with arms wide to entrap her.

She stepped into his embrace, pivoted and slammed her hip into his groin causing him to bend slightly, all the while grabbing his lapel.
 
Bending her knees, she pulled and the fulcrum effect of the
Jiu-Jitsu
maneuver sent him over her shoulder, his appearing to fly for a moment. The hulking man landed hard across his shoulder blades on the upraised gunwale, the force of his fall catapulting him into the water.

Mirabella gasped in surprise.
 
That had a far better outcome than I anticipated
.

Quickly she glanced at the bicyclers’ progress, noting that they were turning towards the Fifth Avenue Bridge, some four hundred feet ahead of the drifting boat.
 
Still, the little steamboat was a long way from shore and the bridge was completely unreachable from the boat.

“Girls!” she yelled, “get to the back of the boat, now!” and the children, though still amazed by her feat, rushed as best they could to do as she ordered, all tied together as they were.
 
As she stood there, she heard a metallic
shhiinng
sound and turned to see Sweeney coming down the walkway with her own sword cane in his hand, its gleaming Sheffield steel ready to eviscerate its owner.
 
She looked around frantically and saw where the knife had fallen.

Just in time she snatched it up but soon wondered if it had been worth the trouble.

Predictably, the rat-faced Sweeney hesitated when he saw his prey had a chance of fighting back, but quickly came to the conclusion that the sword was mightier than the jackknife—as did Mirabella. She tensely watched him maneuver around her, and thought to herself how terrifyingly different a real fencing situation was in comparison with a training session.
 

A real fencing situation without a sword.

Sweeney came towards her, and she realized she was up against the engine with nowhere to go.
 
He pulled his arm back to deliver the final thrust . . .

Whiz!
 
Oh, he was hit!
 
Sticking in his forehead was a . . . a . . .
poison dart!
 

Thud!
 
He fell towards her—and that alone might have been her demise if she hadn’t moved in the nick of time.

Turning to look behind her, she saw the colorful container in Gloria’s lips!
 
Smiling around the dart gun, her dimples had never shown her to greater loveliness.
 

Mirabella ran to the girls and they all hugged each other.

“I missed,” Gloria stated.
 
“I was aiming for his chest.”

“That is the best mistake I have ever seen!”
 
Mirabella hugged her.

 
“Look, Miss Bickers and Mr. McVittie are gettin’ away!” Candice yelled.
 
Evidently Miss Bickers and McVittie had decided to flee incarceration and probable hanging, showing more sense than she would have given them credit for.
 
The two of them were in a very long rowboat that had been tethered to the steam launch and they were pulling away under the high bridge towards shore, several of the boxes from the boat with them.

“There you are, you little whore!” Bickers screeched.
 
“Everything we’ve worked for, gone in flash!
 
Well, you’ll pay, miss! You surely will!”
 
To Mirabella’s horror, the older woman raised a revolver that was the twin of Corbie’s and aimed it directly at her over the intervening twenty-five yards, growling, “SAY ‘YER PRAYERS!”
 

Bang!
 
Before Mirabella could move she heard the explosion from the gun, expecting to fall to the ground.
 
Instead she stood where she was.
 
In terror, she looked behind her to see if any of the girls had been hit.

It appeared the shot had gone high.
 
Looking back to the boat, she saw Miss Bickers clutching her bleeding hand with no gun in sight.
 
She looked up to see John Watson standing on the bridge and holding a smoking revolver.
 
Sherlock had always said Watson was a capital shot, and he had not understated the matter!
 

In addition, what appeared to be a large paving stone fell from the bridge and neatly smashed through the rowboat’s bottom. The impact knocked McVittie off balance, leaving him splashing in the Thames.
 
Miss Bickers just sat there, watching the boat fill with water as she clutched her hand.

“We have these two, my dear!” Mirabella heard a familiar voice call out, John Watson waving at her, as the police joined him, apparently tired of harassing Princess Elena.

“It’s a little invention of mine I like to call
the
rock
,” Holmes yelled.

Something is not right.

Mirabella and the children were now ashore, and Watson was congratulating them on their intrepid handling of the situation as the little girls enthusiastically told him the tale.

“Well, Miss Hudson, it seems my teachings were not wasted.”

She sighed heavily, her torn dress revealing almost the entirety of one leg, her long chestnut brown hair having come loose and fallen past her shoulders, and her skin flushed.
 
“I see.
 
You are going to take credit for this, Mr. Holmes?”
 

“Naturally.
 
Credit where credit is due.”

“I thank you both for your most timely intervention, Mr. Holmes and Dr. Watson,” she muttered between barred teeth, looking astonishingly bewitching in her disheveled state.

“You are welcome,” Sherlock replied, taking his jacket off and putting it around her shoulders, which did nothing to cover that . . . very shapely . . .leg.
 
“Hmm hmm.”
 
He cleared his throat.
 
“We must give you some credit as being an apt pupil, Miss Hudson.”
 

“You astonish me, Mr. Holmes.
 
Heavens, is that a compliment?”

“Although your escapade diverted us from the actual case we are working on, bringing our client we are supposed to be protecting into the open.”
 

“
My
escapade?
 
Do you seriously put this at my door, Mr. Holmes?” she demanded, anger effectively replacing the previous glow in her expression.
 
“I have no control over the criminal element in London any more than you do!”

Sherlock looked over her shoulder, his mood moving from approval—although he would never reveal that to Miss Belle—to hawkish intensity in a moment’s time.
 

Mirabella glanced in the same direction to see what he observed:
 
police officers attempting to lead the princess of Montenegro into a ‘paddy wagon.’

“Watson,” Holmes looked back at his friend, “Is your Webley reloaded?”

“No Holmes, the counterfeiters are caught, so I thought it unnecessary.”
 

“Always be prepared, my good man.
 
Please reload it, and follow me.
 
I do not like the look of these bobbies.”

“The princess will have diplomatic immunity.
 
It will no doubt be cleared up at the station,” Watson replied, inserting new cartridges into the heavy revolver even as he protested.
 
“Should we directly involve ourselves, Holmes?”

“How strange,” Mirabella murmured, peering in the direction of Princess Elena.

“What is it, Miss Belle?” Sherlock asked.

“The Bobbies are carrying weapons.
 
British police do not carry weapons.”

“Ah, yes,” Sherlock replied.
 
“But we do.
 
Watson, the policemen are armed.
 
American Schofield revolvers, if I am not mistaken.
 
I know you see the import of that.”

“Imposters!”
 

“Indeed, let us make haste.”

Sherlock and Watson were both now at a running pace.
 
Princess Elena was not one to be manhandled and was resisting the two men attempting to drag her into the horse-drawn barred wagon.
 
One of the policemen drew his pistol in an attempt to persuade her just as Holmes stepped between him and the princess.
 

The man raised his forearm so that the gun aimed directly at Sherlock’s face.
 

“I’ll take that, my good man.”
 
No sooner had the gun swung upward than Sherlock had slammed the edge of his left hand into the man’s inner elbow while his other hand slapped the weapon out of the imposter’s hand.

CLANG!
 
The revolver fell, sliding underneath the paddy wagon.
 

The man deprived of his weapon pulled back his arm to strike Sherlock, only to be met with a flurry of rapid Chinese boxing strikes to his face and throat.
 
The stranger toppled over backwards, stunned and bleeding.

The other assailant had recovered from his astonishment at the unexpected attack, drawing his own firearm when he felt the cold barrel of Watson’s Webley pressed rather aggressively into his ear.
“Go ahead, my friend,” Watson stated in tone of encouragement.
 
“I’m having a bit of a peevish day, and removing a vile assassin from the world might cheer me up immensely!”

In the darkness Elena met Prince Amadeo, Duke of Aosta and former King of Spain.
 
He was a large man, six foot six.
 

He looked all about him and pulled out a rifle.
 
She swallowed hard.

“This is for you, your Highness,” he stated.
 
He motioned with his head to his manservant, who handed her clothing.

“Thank you,” she murmured.
 
“Why are you helping me?”

“For family, of course,” he replied.
 
“I do not wish an unhappy marriage for my nephew.”

She did not know how to read Prince Amadeo’s expression, whether or not he wished her as far from here as Hades.
 
But regardless of his intent, she would take this opportunity and turn it to her advantage.
 

She did not wish to marry a man who did not love her.

***

“AIEEEE!”
 
She picked up her rifle and fired, racing over the rolling hills surrounding Althorp, the lands belonging to
The Honourable Charles Spencer, the fifth Earl Spencer and the Liberal MP.

“I have to say, Uncle Amadeo, this young friend of yours is truly motivated to wring the most out of life, is he not?”
 
Prince Vittorio asked his uncle, chuckling.

“Indeed.”
 
Amadeo replied, pursing his lips.
 
“If one likes exuberance.”

“One does.”

The uneven ground beneath her horse
necessitated both an excellent horse and great riding skill—and fortunately Princess Elena Petrovi
ć
-Njegoš had both.
 
Initially the party had wished to go to
Hatfield House in Hertfordshire, the Seat of the Marquis of Salisbury, but
Lord Salisbury was an advocate of "splendid isolation" for Great Britain, with no wish to be part of European affairs or shaping European alliances.

And this was an exotic alliance indeed.

“Who is this madman you found, Uncle Amadeo?” Vittorio asked, laughing.
 
“He is insane.
 
He is a wild man!”

“Do you like him?” Amadeo asked.
 

“Of course!
 
Why shouldn’t I?
 
I would like to enlist him into the Italian army.
 
We would be undefeatable.”

“Ah, you would like to keep him close rather than far?” Prince Amadeo pressed.