Oscar Wilde and the Vatican Murders Page 3

  ‘Do they not? How can you tell? Their colour is identical.’

  ‘They have been preserved in the same way, pickled in the same fashion. But look at the hand: it is a complete right hand. And look at the finger. From the shape of the joint and the curvature of the nail and the tip, you can see that it is a finger from a right hand also, and an altogether larger hand than the other. The hand and the finger come from different bodies.’

  ‘Good God,’ murmured Oscar, putting down his glass. ‘A double murder.’

  I laughed. ‘Or no murder at all. These could simply be limbs cut from two people who have died of natural causes. Or, alternatively, limbs cut from individuals who are still living.’

  ‘Is that possible?’

  ‘Quite possible,’ I said. ‘Have you heard of the Mafia?’

  ‘Is it a restaurant?’

  ‘It is a secret criminal society based in Sicily, Oscar. Members of the Mafia are sophisticated bandits whose power and influence grow by the day. They hold sway far beyond the toe of Italy. They are brutal and they are fearless. Cross them, betray them, and they will exact their revenge in barbaric ways.’

  Oscar gazed wide-eyed at the severed limbs laid out on the handkerchiefs before him. ‘I am beginning to warm to the Godalming Gardening Society. Dismemberment has never been a feature of everyday life in Surrey.’

  ‘But, of course,’ I added, ‘this horror may have nothing whatsoever to do with the Mafia. The Mafia simply sprang to mind because I have been considering involving them in one of Holmes’s yarns.’

  ‘Have you told anyone of this?’

  ‘No one. No one at all. That’s what makes it so curious.’ I glanced towards the bottle of Perrier-Jouët. ‘Is there any left? I think I’m ready for a drink now.’

  ‘I’ll order more,’ cried Oscar, as he poured the remains of the champagne into my glass.

  ‘No more, thank you. This will be enough. We must keep our heads clear. We must think. And think carefully.’

  ‘No, Arthur, we must act. And act recklessly. We must pack our bags. We must order our tickets. We must be on our way.

  ‘What do you mean, “on our way”? I have only just arrived.’

  ‘Yes, but you can’t wait to leave and neither can I.’ He looked around the deserted hotel lounge. Outside, the sun was shining; within the room, there was a settled gloom. ‘We don’t belong here, Arthur. This ghastly place is for the old and the decrepit—’

  ‘Some of the guests are younger than you are, Oscar.’

  ‘They are older in spirit, all of them. They don’t drink, they won’t smoke, they can’t talk — why do they bother to breathe?’ He threw back his head, expanded his chest, raised his broad shoulders and drew deeply on his little cigarette. Turning towards the window, he looked out on to the road leading to the spa. ‘These sad folk, look at them, with their dreary faces and their ludicrous lederhosen, “taking the cure”, “drinking the waters” — they don’t live. They exist. And then they die.’ He turned back towards me, tears in his eyes. He raised his glass and bumped it gently against mine. ‘That’s not our way, Arthur. Whatever our age, we are to be young. Here’s to us! Here’s to Life!’

  ‘Here’s to you, Oscar,’ I said, oddly moved by his sudden outburst. He was thirty-seven years of age, but, in truth, because of his bulk and his crooked teeth, with his blotchy complexion and his red-rimmed eyes, he looked older. ‘Where do you want us to go, my friend?’ I asked.

  ‘Is it not obvious?’

  ‘To the police, I suppose. We should. We should indeed. But what would the police make of this? Are they going to scour the streets of Rome in search of a man with a missing finger and a woman who has lost her hand? Why should they?’

  ‘We are not going to the police, Arthur. You are right: there would be no point. But we are going to Rome, Arthur, this very afternoon. We must. We are going to solve this mystery, you and I.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because it’ll do us good! It’ll be an adventure — and that’s the only “cure” we need.’ He looked down at the littered card table and touched the brown wrapping paper and the envelopes that had contained the severed limbs and the lock of hair. ‘Besides, for whatever reason, someone has sought to make contact with Sherlock Holmes. Holmes is your creation, Arthur. You need to discover what is going on.’

  ‘I need to be back in London in ten days.’

  ‘You will be, I promise you, and when you get there, what a story you’ll have to tell. And if you don’t get there — if the Mafia get to you first — what a way to go! The obituary writers will have a field day.’

  ‘Oscar, you have drunk too much.’

  ‘On the contrary, I have drunk too little.’ He pushed back his chair and beamed at me. ‘I can see the headlines, Arthur: “Scottish author cut down in prime. Creator of Sherlock Holmes slain by Sicilian bandits.”’

  ‘Oscar, you are drunk and you are absurd.’

  ‘Nevertheless I am taking you to Rome to unravel the mystery, to unmask the murderer!’ He clapped his hands in glee.

  ‘Who is to say there’s been a murder, Oscar?’

  My friend looked down at the table and indicated the hand and finger lying there before us. ‘There’s clearly been a murder, Arthur, and, by the look of it, more than one.’

  ‘This is not evidence of murder, Oscar.’

  ‘It’s evidence of mutilation, at the very least.’ He pushed his chair further from the table and got to his feet. ‘Kindly wrap up the exhibits. As you’re the medical man, we will leave them in your care. Have a special regard for the honey-coloured lock of hair and the finger. I shall enquire about the train. You go and pack your bags. Rome calls.’

  I began to move, reluctantly. ‘It’ll be a wild-goose chase, Oscar.’

  ‘And when we get there, we’ll be searching for a needle in a haystack. I know, Arthur. But at least, thanks to the ring, we’ll have somewhere to start.‘

  ‘Thanks to the ring?’ I repeated.

  ‘Ah,’ he said, smirking. ‘Can it be that Oscar Wilde, even when intoxicated, has noticed the tell-tale clue that the creator of Sherlock Holmes, entirely sober, has missed? Examine the ring, Arthur.’

  Oscar had removed the ring from the finger. He handed it to me. ‘It’s a simple gold band,’ I said.

  ‘Rose-gold,’ said Oscar. ‘The colour is distinctive.’

  ‘Rose-gold,’ I agreed, ‘but otherwise unremarkable.’ I turned over the ring in the palm of my hand. ‘A little scratched on the inside perhaps.’

  ‘Examine the scratch marks carefully, Arthur.’

  I peered closely at the ring. ‘This is where I need Holmes’s magnifying glass,’ I said.

  ‘Or Wilde’s eagle eye,’ my friend countered. ‘Do you not see a shape in the scratch marks?’

  Screwing up my eyes, I saw something. ‘The outline of a key?’ I suggested.

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Two keys, in fact, lying end to end, overlapping.’

  ‘Crossed, I think,’ said Oscar. ‘The keys of St Peter, I suggest. The symbol of His Holiness the Pope. When we get to Rome, Arthur, we will start our investigations in the Vatican City. We will begin at the basilica of St Peter’s. The key to the mystery lies in the keys. The game’s afoot, my friend.’

  3

  The train to Rome

  The soul is born old but grows young. That is the comedy of life. And the body is born young and grows old. That is life’s tragedy.’

  On the little local train that took us from Homburg to Mainz, Oscar was in a philosophical frame of mind. He resisted all my attempts to get him to talk seriously about the practicalities of the assignment we had embarked upon. Instead, gazing dreamily out of the window at the passing mountain scenery, he offered up epigram after epigram — some, no doubt, original; others, I suspect, borrowed from Montaigne or Mark Twain. (Oscar maintained that he had an arrangement with Mark Twain: on their respective sides of the Atlantic they could appropriate one another’s q
uips with impunity and without acknowledgement. Oscar liked to say that plagiarism is the privilege of the appreciative man.)

  At the railway station in Mainz, Oscar bought cigarettes, salami, bread, cheese and a small cask of red wine. For a man who worshipped youth and beauty above all else, he most surely did not treat his own body as a temple. From Mainz to Zurich, we had no choice but to travel third class, sitting on a wooden bench, side by side, awkwardly, in the corner of a crowded and airless compartment, consoling ourselves with our picnic and our cigarettes, and talking in whispers. None of our fellow travellers (six dour-faced working men in blue overalls) looked in the least likely to be English speakers, but nevertheless I felt uneasy with Oscar’s line of conversation. He had moved from philosophy to religion.

  ‘It is curious how the love of God can lead to acts of unspeakable cruelty,’ he said, chewing on a piece of cheese. ‘You were brought up by Jesuit priests, Arthur. Were they unspeakably cruel?’

  ‘I was brought up by my mother, Oscar, but I went to a school run by Jesuit priests, yes. It was a boarding school and the regime was Spartan. Everything in every way was plain to the point of austerity. Dry bread and well-watered milk was all we had for breakfast. The life was harsh, but the priests were not cruel.’

  ‘Did they beat you?’

  ‘All the time.’ I laughed at the recollection. ‘And I was beaten more than most. The corporal punishment at Stonyhurst was severe, I grant you that.’

  I gave Oscar a sidelong glance. He was studying me with disconcerting intensity. ‘Go on,’ he said.

  ‘It was peculiar, too, administered with an instrument of torture imported from Holland, as I recall.’

  ‘An instrument of torture,’ he repeated.

  I lowered my voice further. ‘It was called a “Tolley” — I don’t know why. It was a piece of India rubber the size and shape of a thick boot sole. One blow of this “Tolley”, delivered with intent, would cause the palm of your hand to swell up and change colour. Nine blows to each hand was the customary punishment and, once you’d taken it, you’d not be able to turn the handle of the door to get out of the room. To take twice nine on a cold day was about the extremity of human endurance.’

  ‘And why were you, Arthur Conan Doyle, beaten more than most?’

  ‘Because I was mischievous. Because, deliberately, I broke the rules. Because I wanted to show them that I would not be cowed.’

  ‘Bravo, Arthur.’

  I returned Oscar’s gaze. ‘In the end, I think the beatings may have done us good, because it was a point of honour among us boys to show that we were not hurt. And that’s a useful training for a hard life.’

  Oscar took a swig of the red wine. Now he looked at me with gently mocking eyes. ‘So you emerged from Stonyhurst upright and uncowed, bruised but unbroken.’

  I smiled. ‘I like to think so.’

  ‘And well educated?’

  ‘The curriculum, like the school, was medieval but sound.’

  ‘And chaste?’

  ‘That’s a curious question, Oscar.’

  ‘I’m a curious fellow, Arthur.’

  I lowered my voice still further. ‘Since you ask, the answer is “yes”. Jesuits have no trust in human nature. Perhaps they are justified. At Stonyhurst we were never allowed for an instant to be alone with each other and I think that in consequence the immorality that is rife in other schools was at a minimum. In our games and in our walks the priests always took part and a master perambulated the dormitories at night — all night. Such a system may weaken self-respect and self-reliance, but it at least minimises temptation and scandal.’

  Oscar exhaled a thin plume of blue-green cigarette smoke and murmured: ‘What is the point of life without temptation and scandal?’

  At Zurich we changed trains once more. For the penultimate leg of our journey — overnight from Zurich to Milan, via the Gotthard railway tunnel — Oscar had succeeded in securing us a second-class sleeping berth. For the first time since leaving Homburg, we had some privacy. At midnight, as the train departed and we stood together alone in the narrow galley adjacent to our bunk beds, Oscar suggested we ‘inspect the evidence’ once more before retiring. I still had the hand and finger, wrapped in their respective white and apricot shrouds, hidden about my person. Oscar had placed the lock of hair in its envelope inside his wallet. We laid out the specimens on the upper bunk, immediately beneath the Pintsch lighting gasolier, and stood, shoulder to shoulder, staring down at them.

  ‘What do you think?’ asked Oscar.

  ‘We have indeed embarked on a wild-goose chase,’ I said. ‘I don’t know how I’ve allowed you to cajole me into this.’

  Oscar rubbed his knuckles against his chin. ‘Has a murderer sent these to Holmes as a challenge?’ he mused.

  ‘It is an extraordinary act of hubris if he has.’

  ‘Or is it a witness to murder who has sent them? That’s more likely.’

  I shook my head. ‘I think this is the work of a rival author bent on distracting me from my proper labours.’

  Oscar laughed. ‘Your rival must be exceedingly jealous to go to so much trouble to keep you from your desk, Arthur. This is a human hand, this is a human finger, this is human hair.’

  ‘The hair does not feel like real hair to me,’ I said.

  ‘And what about the ring? You’ll concede that the ring tells us something.’

  Using Oscar’s handkerchief, I lifted the finger to examine the gold band once more. With my own finger, I touched it. The ring moved easily. ‘It’s loose,’ I said.

  ‘Remove it,’ said Oscar.

  I obeyed his instruction and handed my friend the rose-gold band. He took it between his thumb and forefinger and held it up to the gas lamp to examine. ‘These are the crossed keys of St Peter, without doubt, but there’s nothing else. There’s no inscription and no other marks on the inside of the ring.’

  ‘And there is no mark on the finger either,’ I said, inspecting the digit more closely now that it was unadorned. ‘There’s no indentation where the ring was resting. It seems that the ring and the finger do not belong together.’

  ‘The ring was placed on the finger after the finger was severed?’

  ‘And after it was embalmed. Look at the colour of the finger: it’s consistent along its whole length.’

  ‘This ring is a sign,’ cried Oscar, ‘and intended as such. It must be.’

  ‘It is certainly all we’ve got, but if the pope had been murdered I rather think we’d have heard, don’t you?’

  ‘Sarcasm ill becomes you, Arthur,’ Oscar snapped. ‘This isn’t the papal ring, I know that. The papal ring depicts St Peter the fisherman casting his net in the Sea of Galilee. I have kissed the papal ring. I know what it looks like.’

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘You have told me often enough.’

  ‘This ring is not the papal ring, but it does feature the keys of St Peter. It was sent for a reason and, mock as you may, Arthur, popes have been murdered — poisoned, strangled, mutilated. Leo XIII is not the beloved figure Pio Nono was. He may be in mortal danger.’

  ‘Don’t be absurd, Oscar. It’s a thousand years since a pope was murdered. Let’s get some sleep. We’re both exhausted.’

  I wrapped up the severed limbs and returned them to my pocket; Oscar placed the gold band and the lock of hair inside his wallet. We loosened our collars and took off our boots, then turned down the gasolier and clambered onto our bunks. Oscar lay above me, breathing noisily in the dark. I knew he was not asleep. Eventually, in a low whisper, he said: ‘Yes, it is nine hundred years since the murder of Pope John XII. He was a notorious debauchee, you’ll recall, killed by an irate husband whom he had cuckolded. But, though some dispute it, I am almost certain that Benedict XI was poisoned by a rival as recently as 1304.

  I laughed. ‘Goodnight, Oscar,’ I said. ‘I believe we have had enough excitement for one day.’

  He lay silent for a minute or two, then, through the darkness, he spoke ag
ain. ‘Did you send Touie the telegram from Zurich?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘And what did you tell her?’

  ‘The truth.’

  ‘Oh, Arthur, that was a mistake. When a husband starts telling his wife the truth the marriage is as good as over. Certainly, the mystery’s all gone.’

  ‘Goodnight, Oscar.’

  ‘Goodnight, Arthur.’ He fell silent once more, but not for long. ‘What was it called, Arthur, that instrument of torture? A “Tolley”, did you say?’

  I made no reply.

  He went on: ‘There’s never been a Jesuit pope, you know.’

  I said nothing. Minutes passed. I listened to his breathing. Gradually, it quietened; eventually, it slowed. Lulled by the steady lurch of the train, we both slept till dawn.

  In Milan, we changed trains for the final time. At the station hotel, we washed and shaved, changed our linen and took breakfast. We each bought a newspaper to read with our coffee and brioches.

  ‘I see the pope is alive and well,’ I said, mischievously, looking up from my paper. ‘There is a photograph of His Holiness here. He appears to be in remarkably good health for a man of eighty—two.’

  ‘I’m pleased to hear it,’ said Oscar, tersely. ‘Your paper is evidently more diverting than mine.

  I pressed home my advantage. ‘It seems the Holy Father is on his way to his summer retreat.’ I took a sip of my coffee and muttered: ‘Remind me, Oscar. Why are we going to Rome?’

  My friend lowered his newspaper and looked me in the eye. ‘I will not be discomfited by you, Arthur. I don’t know why we’re going to Rome — except that all roads lead there and there is the most wonderful tobacconist’s shop in a corner of the Piazza del Popolo. It stocks cigarettes from four continents, while in Bad Homburg they don’t stock cigarettes at all.’ He put down his coffee cup so dramatically that it rattled in its saucer. ‘We are going to Rome to get away from Homburg, the dullest place in Christendom. Even the Germans find it dreary. We are going to Rome in search of adventure and to escape dullness. Could there be a better reason?’ He waved at the waiter for our bill. ‘Dullness is the coming-of-age of seriousness. It is our duty to avoid it. Throw away your newspaper, Arthur. I am throwing away mine. It’s dull, dull, dull.’ He tossed his paper onto the floor beside the table. ‘Even the typeface is dull. When I am editor of The Times, the commas will be sunflowers and the semicolons pomegranates.’