let go of what was mine. Instantly my enemy grabbed hold of the chain with both forepaws and became entangled, and it took but a single swipe for me to knock him over the side into the water. The carrion-thing let out a hideous yowl, then exploded into steam upon contact with the water and was gone.
As was my pretty treasure.
* * * *
The rest is less interesting. Holmes, seeing a variety of carrion humans emerging from the wooden boxes, heaved first the barge’s anchor, then the semi-conscious Watson and the inert crewman over the side and leapt into the water himself. He stood up, awash to his shoulders. I might have been in a difficult situation had he not allowed me to ride atop his head all the way to shore, while he dragged Watson and the nautical thug.
Once on land, we watched the hideous spectacle of the carrion things stumbling about, seemingly unable to figure any way out of their present predicament.
“The vampires are rendered helpless by the running water of the good Thames,” Holmes explained. “So enfeebled, they cannot even raise the anchor. Daylight will force them back into their boxes, where they are easily destroyed.”
“What I don’t understand,” said Watson, the following morning, back in Baker Street, “is how the locket got there in the first place.”
While they spoke, I lapped a well-deserved saucer of milk, despite Watson’s disapproval.
“I think Count Dracula—who was not among the vampires destroyed, and has yet escaped us—was betrayed by his cat.”
Holmes got out the locket and dangled it by its chain.
Watson stuttered. Even I looked up in amazement.
Holmes laughed. “When the sun rose and the tide went out, I hired one of the Irregulars to splash around in the shallow water until he found it.”
The thought of a “street arab” immersing himself in the nasty element to recover my prize made me think that even boys have their uses.
“Dracula’s feline,” said Holmes, “must have passed from ship to shore many times, perhaps carried by a human agent, to serve as a scout. On one of those missions, it stole the crucial locket, hen, losing interest, abandoned it. The object is a perfect cat-toy, don’t you think?”
He dangled the beautiful thing on its chain. I watched, fascinated. But I continued with my milk. It was mine, after all, and I could play with it later.
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