Sherlock Holmes and the Boulevard Assassin by John Hall Read Free Book Online Page A

which was sordid; and alike also in style – of which more in a moment. None of them was given his real name. ‘The comrade from Lyons’ was followed by ‘The comrade from St-Germain,’ and ‘The comrade from Marseilles.’ If these styles were geographical descriptions, and not mere nommes de guerre , then the anarchist movement was widespread indeed, thought I.
    And indeed the meeting as a whole seemed to have an air of importance about it. Partly, perhaps, that may have been because the speakers were from such diverse locations, but there was more to it than that. They were attended to with an air almost of expectancy – an air which was most definitely not justified by the content of their speeches, which were alike in being pretty well incoherent.
    Such as was intelligible was pretty malignant stuff, most of it. We were exhorted to ‘trample the oppressors underfoot,’ and to ‘tear down the bloodstained banner of slavery,’ and God alone knows what else. There were naturally a good many references to the assassination of President Sadi Carnot, especially from the comrade from Lyons, where the crime had taken place. These men did not consider it a crime, of course, and the atrocity was discussed in a sort of hideous gloating tone, the ‘Yah-boo!’ style of oratory which should be thrashed out of a boy at ten or eleven years old. The sole consolation was that these speeches did not last much longer than five minutes. For me, even this was five minutes too long, and I fear that I began to grow restive, and glanced at my watch.
    Holmes dug me in the ribs, and at first I assumed that he meant it for a reproach, that he was warning me to try to look more like a committed anarchist, but then he gave a little nod towards the front of the room, where another speaker was taking the floor.
    This fellow was a different kettle of fish from the poor flounders who had harangued us up to then. For one thing he was introduced differently, not called ‘The comrade from somewhere or other,’ but referred to only as ‘our main speaker.’ Then his appearance was altogether more prepossessing than that of his predecessors. He was tall, cleaner than the bulk of the room’s occupants, and well enough dressed, though without any pretence to fashion, or to show – he gave me the impression that he would ordinarily have been very well dressed, but had tailored his coat to suit his company that evening. And, above all, he could speak. There was none of the ranting note of badly stifled anger here, but instead a kind of calm reason which was the worse for the hatred which lurked unseen behind it.
    He began by giving us a kind of introduction to the anarchist manifesto, an exposition of the ‘ideals’ – if that is the right word – of the organization. And I have to admit that it was devilish convincing. He pictured an ordinary man, poorly educated and worse paid, whose gnawing sense of discontent mirrored his constant, gnawing hunger, until discontent turned to anger, anger for his own state and that of his starving children, until the point at which the only possible response was to lash out in a kind of blind, unreasoning fury. Listening to him, I almost felt ashamed of the contempt I had felt for the earlier speakers. After all, I thought, those ‘comrades’ had not been to a good school, they did not have three, sometimes four, square meals a day, or any of the other advantages which I and my kind took as if of right.
    I have said that I almost felt like that. But not totally. It was not, you are to understand clearly, that I had any sympathy at bottom for anything he said. There was nothing like that about my reaction to his words. But his style of delivery was so good, so damnably persuasive, that you felt as if you were listening to a very clever speaker in your club; it was not that you agreed in the slightest degree with what he said, but that you thought it deserved a proper, a reasoned response – if you had but