Looking at his face, I saw that his complexion and Oriental features were a careful artifice of cosmetics.
I closed his eyelids and looked up. Peering over me, Inspector Lanners stood beside Holmes. “I was in the audience,” he said.
The stage was a grim scene as we huddled around the corpse. People filed out of the theatre. While the body of Sun Ching Foo lay still, couples were holding hands and mothers towed away their entertained children.
Holmes searched the stage. He took out his pocket lens and hovered around the wall. “Lanners,” he said, “the bullet has lodged itself,” he said, pointing. Holmes pried it from the lincrusta wallpaper and turned it around under the magnifying glass. The weapon that pierced Sun Ching Foo had been rendered into a shapeless lump of metal.
“Could it have been from another gun? Someone in the audience or secreted near the stage?” Lanners asked.
Holmes shook his head. “We would have heard a separate shot fired. Sun Ching Foo must have been killed by his own gun; otherwise, the report from another fire-arm would have revealed itself. No marksman could have timed his gun to have fired simultaneously.”
“Would you be willing to join us at Scotland Yard?” Lanners asked.
“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Holmes responded.
* * * *
The constabulary took the soldier and Sun Ching Foo’s stagehand to Scotland Yard while we followed in a cab. The new Metropolitan Police building was two levels of grey granite lifting red and white stripes of bricks. Windows in gables and dormers looked out from an additional five floors. Lamps along the Victoria Embankment glowed in the settling dusk.
After we arrived, Lanners allowed us to meet with Alastair Franklin. The large man had side whiskers linked to his moustache. White hairs sprouted from his blond hair and his skin had a tanned complexion.
Holmes asked, “Did you know Sun Ching Foo? Any business or relationship with him?”
“No, inspector.”
Holmes held up his hand. “Just Mister Holmes. Had you seen him before?”
“I’m in the navy, just returned from Alexandria the day before last. My wife and our son were at the show—they’ll be wondering what happened to me, I expect.” Despite his sturdy build, his hands trembled anxiously. “I don’t know what happened upon the stage; all I did was as I was told.”
“Did you know that you would be selected from the crowd?”
He shrugged his shoulders, lifting his palms up, while shaking his head. “Now how would I know that?”
Holmes turned to Lanners and asked, “Where is the gun?”
After locking the sailor into an interrogation room, the inspector led us to an office where the muzzleloader laid across a desk. The rifle butt was pentagonal with an upward curve. The whole stock was painted white and fastened with shiny buttons that looked like jewels.
“These extra screws hold an exceptionally pronounced ramrod holder substituted for the original one.” Holmes pointed to a slender tube beneath the barrel, running from breech to muzzle.
Lanners opened the door and ushered in the conjurer’s assistant. She remained wearing a black cossack. Lai Way sat then she removed her wig. Her red-gold titus hair contrasted with the cascade of her brunette wig.
“You are not Chinese, either?” I said.
Lai Way agreed. “We have been Hindoos, Muhammedans, and Injuns. Sun Ching Foo was my husband. His real name is Cecil Windham.”
“You must be Thomasina, the name he called out,” Holmes said.
She nodded as she rubbed her face. The make-up that darkened her complexion and drew out her eyes smeared away.
“How did you meet him?” Holmes said.
“I was a showgirl in America and Cecil hired me as assistant. When he came to London, he became Sun Ching Foo.”
“How does the bullet-catching trick work?” Holmes asked.
“I don’t know. Cecil never explained the trick to me,” she said.
“What was supposed to happen?” he said.
“He was supposed to catch the bullet in his hand.”
“But you cannot catch a bullet in your hand!” Lanners exclaimed.
The assistant shrugged. “Cecil did.”
“Tell me about your part in the trick,” Holmes said.
“A man in the crowd marks the bullet. As I walk to the stage, I switch the bullet with a different one. The one that I replace it with has my own markings. Then, when the bullet is fired, Sun Ching Foo catches the bullet. He shows it to the soldier—and it’s the same one that I have marked.”
“Is this the bullet?” Holmes reached into his pocket and held out his fist. Unfurling his fingers, he revealed a minie ball.
Thomasina’s face went white. “How … how did you … ?”
“It was clutched in his hand while Watson attempted to save him. Clearly, the bullet was not meant to kill but instead, he was to hold up his bullet as if the shot traveled from the barrel and into his grasp.”
“Then where was the bullet from the gun supposed to go?” she asked.
“Perhaps the soldier was to fire away and not actually strike Sun Ching Foo?” Lanners asked.
“You mean, somehow the soldier’s aim would be off?” Holmes said.
Lanners mused. “Could Sun Ching Foo have created some kind of illusion, so the soldier would not be actually aiming properly?”
“That’s no better than saying ‘magic’,” Holmes said.
Thomasina agreed. “I have been part of every performance of the trick, but I noticed no changes to the stage.”
“Perhaps it was supposed to be arranged? Perhaps the soldier was a confederate?” I said.
“We already talked to the solider. I am convinced of his innocence.” Holmes said.
I added, “Perhaps there was a confederate in the audience. Someone who would have fired away from Sun Ching Foo. But rather, she picked someone else.”
“No, sir! This is not true,” Thomasina said.
“Perhaps someone uncovered his American identity?” I asked.
Holmes shook his head. “And this person knew the secret to the magic trick and, moreover, had enough access to bedevil it? I think it unlikely.” He continued speaking. “Did Windham have any enemies?”
She shook her head. “His only concern was other conjurers who had more business than he.”
“What
