Free Sherlock Holmes in Russia by Alex Auswaks

the depot manager went up to Bakhtadian, pacing up and down the platform, took him aside and very gravely and very carefully began to explain something to him. A third man, who looked like a foreman, joined them. While they spoke, a goods train came into the station.
    The depot manager walked away slowly from them towards the stationmaster who came out of his office on the platform. The two of them together walked alongside the train, stopping at the fifth carriage from the rear. I saw the stationmaster give a nearly imperceptible nod at this carriage.
    It was at this moment that Bakhtadian and his companion, both of whom had been watching the other two from a distance, jumped on the platform at the end of a carriage.
    ‘Let’s follow where they are going, Watson,’ said Holmes. ‘They are being very circumspect. I am sure it is the fifth carriage from the rear that the stationmaster indicated to Bakhtadian. We’ll have to make sure nobody sees us. First, the other side ofthe train and then let’s get on one of the empty platforms at the rear end of a carriage.’
    We did so. We went around the train and, on the other side, began to walk beside it.
    Now the third departure signal rang at last. The train began to get under way. We picked an empty platform at the end of a carriage and jumped on it as the train moved.
X
    As soon as the train began to slow down before the next station, we jumped off and hid under the carriage of a train standing on the adjoining track. No sooner had we concealed ourselves when we saw the figure of Bakhtadian and his travelling companion. They marched quickly past us, stopped just before the fifth carriage from the back and, like us, hid on the track underneath the train. But the moment the third signal for departure sounded and the train began to move, both jumped on the platform of the fifth carriage. We, too, jumped up to take our former place on the platform. There were four carriages between us.
    The train had moved little more than half a mile and the steep cliffs reappeared to our right, when the darkness descended, so that we couldn’t even see the telegraph poles along the route. We went through tunnel after tunnel. Going through them, the din was so deafening that we couldn’t hear anyone or anything no matter how we strained our ears.
    But now the train began to climb uphill. The train slowed down and at the next tunnel was climbing at a crawl. But even here, despite the slow progress, the din was so great that it was impossible to hear any extraneous sounds.
    As soon as we emerged from the tunnel, Holmes said to me, ‘Listen, my dear Watson, at the very first stop, get off and try to get home as soon as possible. You should be able to get back bythree o’clock to accept the delivery. When Bakhtadian arrives with the goods, tell him that, because of a lucrative deal, I’m away for a day or two. Tell him you can’t unwrap and evaluate the goods and if he doesn’t trust you, he can take the chests away till I return.’
    ‘What about you, Holmes?’ I asked.
    ‘I’ll be back in approximately a day, perhaps even earlier or later, depending on the circumstances,’ he said. ‘In any case, watch carefully everything going on around you.’
    He gave me certain instructions and, when the train entered the station, he got off. I got off, too, but did not see him. I was lucky! The return train was standing at the station. Since it was night, nobody intercepted me and I was able to find myself a platform on a freight train. At a quarter past two I was already home.
XI
    At about half past three there was a knock on the door. It was Bakhtadian with two others, bringing four chests of goods. He expressed great surprise that Holmes, whom he knew as Vedrin, wasn’t home. Obviously, he wanted to get rid of the goods as soon as possible, collect his money and then he could consider himself on the sidelines. But there was nothing to be done. He didn’t feel like taking the goods back,