Sherlock Holmes and the Curious Affair of the Waiter’s Scarf
Saturday started as idyllic as one could expect of life around Holmes, with a series of crashes. Had they occurred irregularly, or been muffled to the least degree, I would have been able to sleep through them. Unfortunately, the noise came so regularly that it might have been mistaken for clockwork. When at last I could tolerate it no longer I pulled on my robe to see what was the matter. I found Holmes crouched intently in the middle of the carpet, chairs pulled back to permit the presence of a slate slab. He had several stacks of plates at his left elbow and a crate of the shattered remains at his right. Upon my entrance he looked up from scribbling something in his notebook.
“I hope I didn’t wake you,” he said. “What time is it?”
“Three,” I yawned, rubbing the sleep from my eyes.
“My sincerest apologies, then. I am conducting a survey of fracture patterns in commonly available flatware of the lowest grade. If you recall the Chattoway case, the fracture patterns in the plate that was purportedly used as a murder weapon were suspect to me, but I was never able to articulate my suspicions. Instead we had to rely upon the lodge-keeper’s recollection of his employer’s unusual habits, and the eventual discovery of the neighbour’s Australian brother. Had I published this monograph prior to that case, it would have been resolved in a matter of minutes rather than the days of fumbling.”
I sighed, knowing there was no possibility of returning to slumber now that Holmes’s curiosity had been piqued.
“For example, this shard here shows the pattern frequently seen when the plate is dropped on its edge. Note the smaller chips out of the face. This is by no means a clean break, and will have left smaller shards to be swept up. This piece, by comparison, has a sharp edge consistent with being dropped while being carried horizontally. These tend to exhibit Y-shaped fractures and seldom break into more than a few pieces.”
“The Chattoway plate had roughed edges,” I said, comprehension dawning.
“Precisely!” Holmes cried. “Not only that, but there were chips of ceramic that had landed under the table in the dining room. The plate had been deliberately smashed with a great deal of force. The second consideration is that while a plate makes an unlikely weapon, it is unlikelier still as an edged weapon. These shards might very well be used as ex tempore knives, but I think you’ll find bludgeoning is a far more common reflex when wielding unfamiliar objects.”
“Does Mrs. Hudson know to what untimely end you are sending her dishes?” I asked.
“Our landlady may rest assured that her plates are safe from my meddling,” Holmes replied. “I picked up a crate of the cheapest to be had at the Chancery Lane market. No more than a few farthings for the lot, and you can be sure several of them have been glued before. That only aids in our research on account of authentic fracture patterns already being present.”
I turned up the gas and contented myself with one of the books I so infrequently treat myself to.
“I must say, this Wells chap certainly has peculiar ideas about invention,” I said after an interval of reading during which Holmes had not ceased his loud experimentation. “If his predictions are correct, we could be travelling through time to different centuries as soon as three years. Imagine travel through time being revolutionized as the railways have done with distance!”
“Mmm,” was my friend’s reply, still ensconced in miniscule fissures on the ceramic. “If submarines had been invented when da Vinci first tendered the idea, Verne’s work would have had a greater fraction of fact than fiction.”
I have to admit, I was surprised by Holmes’s familiarity with recent literature, and did not hesitate to tell him so. He had once made a comment that worthless facts were nothing more than clutter for an incautiously cultivated mind, and openly admitted full ignorance of contemporary literature and philosophy.
“It is my job to be aware, Watson,” he merely said. “Some facts cannot be avoided, just as some fellows will halloo to any passersby regardless of whether or not they are of an acquaintance. In a few weeks or months I will have forgotten entirely what I know of today’s literature and customs, and have tomorrow’s in their stead.”
I settled further back in the chair and opened my book once more. Be that as it may, I have never had my companion’s talent for choosing what facts I would keep and which were ‘the lumber of a fool’. Thus we passed the hours as the sun rose and cast its light at an ever-softening angle through the window, Holmes on the floor shattering plates and me with my book. It was only when the master detective had smashed his last plate and looked ready to stir from his perch that the knocker sounded. Holmes sprang up, moving the chairs back to their habitual locations and dusting off his hands. The slate and crate of remnants were thus neatly hidden, I noted, already missing our landlady’s keen eye that kept my companion’s dismissive cleaning tendencies somewhat in check.
Holmes reappeared shortly, followed by a man of perhaps thirty. He had the docile good humour of one whose earnings rest on the good faith of others, coupled with the strong features that showed him to be a man of no dubious character.
“This is my associate, Doctor Watson,” Holmes said, gesturing our guest to a seat. “Now, Mr. Perriman, if you would be so good as to relay your tale.”
Perriman sat stiffly, as though partaking in an interrogation rather than a consultation.
“It began about three nights ago,” he said, “and it hasn’t stopped since. I wouldn’t mind my career so much, sir, but there’s Celia to think about.”
“What began three nights ago?” Holmes inquired. “You forget, sir, that we know nothing of your case. Pray include the necessary background, and do not omit so much as a detail.”
“The rumours, sir,” Perriman said, flushing. “Rumours that I may not be a man of honour, or fit for an establishment such as Stockwell’s. I have been a waiter there for five years, and not so much as broken a glass. I worked my way up from dishes, and they know I’m honest. That’s no protection against the sort of things people are thinking, though.”
“But not saying,” Holmes noted.
“No,” our visitor conceded, “but it’s only a matter of time, isn’t it. Let me put all my cards on the table, then. It was Thursday that I returned home long past ten, when my landlady locks the door. I awakened her by pounding – fit to break the door down, she said – at two or so the next morning. I was in great personal disarray, and she drew the conclusion about how I had spent the night. She means well, but you know how some can’t keep their thoughts quiet. Now my reputation is at risk, and I have nowhere else to turn.”
“That’s it,” Perriman added, when it became obvious that Holmes was waiting for the rest of the story.
“That’s all of it?” Holmes asked. “Then why do you need to consult a detective? Surely a man must be forgiven the occasional slip now and again.”
“Because I can’t bloody well remember any of it, can I?” our visitor fairly shouted before getting a hold on his temper. “As I said before, that’s not how I prefer to spend my time nor my wages, Mr. Holmes.”
“While it would have been useful to know – perhaps at the outset of your dialogue – that you had no recollection of that night, I still fail to see why you have come to me. No,” he said, holding up a hand to forestall Perriman’s interjection, “let me finish. You have come to me in hopes that I may deliver you from your current difficulties, but expect me to do so without facts. I must know all the facts, in one form or another, before I am capable of solving a case. So far what you have told us is hardly more than a summary. Let me enumerate.
“One. Three nights ago, you returned home unusually late, obviously removed from your normal state. Two, your landlady was freer with her gossip than was in your best interest, which poses an issue to both your career and the young lady’s father’s eventual consent. Three, you remember nothing of the events that passed during that crucial period. Correct me if I have neglected some detail.”
“But surely you can–”
“Not without the facts,” Holmes repeated. “Contrary to what you might read in the papers,” he said, and such was his self-control that he refrained from flicking so much as the merest glance in my direction, “I am a scientist, not a miracle worker. My results manifest themselves from a progression of logic, not a conjurer’s sleight of hand.”
“You’re Sherlock Holmes!” Perriman burst forth. “This is what you do!”
“Be that as it may, there are limits to even my deductive powers. All paintings must start with an initial stroke, and you have barely provided me the subject matter, to say nothing of the details.”
“You must at least have an idea,” our visitor pleaded.
“Too many,” Holmes said curtly. “There are a thousand ways you might have ended your night on your doorstep in such a manner. To find the correct solution I must first have the facts, which you are apparently unable to provide. Good day to you, sir, and may you have better luck elsewhere.”
“Where?” Perriman demanded. “You are my last resort, for God’s sake. Can’t you at least look into it?
Holmes sighed.
“For the last time, Mr. Perriman, I have no interest in your case. A man who wakes up in your situation usually has only one question to ask himself, and that is whether he tipped sufficiently to keep the night’s affairs solely between the interested parties.”
Our visitor flushed a deep crimson.
“I can assure you that I most certainly did not spend the night in such a disreputable fashion,” he protested. “That is not the sort of man I am.”
A raised eyebrow was the detective’s only response.
“You have to believe me!” Perriman said. “Celia’s father caught wind of the incident, and refuses to let me see her. She hasn’t answered any of my letters or telegrams. Please. I don’t know what else to do.”
“If I took on every case of mundane domestic troubles that came to me,” Holmes yawned, “I could spend several lifetimes doing nothing useful or interesting. I am sure you can find your way to the door.”
Perriman’s shoulders sunk and he folded in on himself as a man defeated. As he turned to go, a corner of green poked out of his pocket. Holmes snapped to attention, alertness in every line of his attitude.
“Wait,” he commanded. “What’s that?”
Perriman froze in the doorway, an absurd expression of hope lighting up his face. His hand drifted to his pocket and he produced the item in question. It was a scarf of some light material, perhaps a hand and a half in width and a metre in length. Holmes took it in his hands and looked up at our visitor.
“You never mentioned a scarf,” he said sternly.
“It was hardly a point in my favour,” Perriman protested. “When one returns home at two in the morning with a strange woman’s scarf around one’s neck, his landlady is bound to draw the obvious conclusion. Mine is no exception, and I can’t set her straight because any stranger knows as much about what happened that night as I do.”
He collapsed back into the chair he had so recently occupied, head in hands. Here was a man at his wits’ end, finding solace as so many had before in the infallible reputation of Sherlock Holmes.
“Are there any other details you didn’t see fit to mention? Have there been any unusual occurrences in the last few weeks?”
Our visitor’s brow furrowed, and he shook his head.
“Very well,” Holmes continued. “If that is all, we will contact you when there is a development. May I keep the scarf?”
“By all means. I never want to see that thing again.”
“Watson, tell me what you think of this,” Holmes said as soon as our visitor had departed.
“Silk, in a lovely shade of green. The woman who owns it wears exotic perfume, probably imported.”
Holmes groaned.
“Have you learned nothing? You have missed all but the most blindingly obvious of the evidence. For example, it is not solely the scarf that is from abroad. No English tart would be able to afford silk of this quality, nor would she have the connections necessary to find it. No English lady would wear such a scarf. The dye, such a vivid shade of green, was clearly done by an experienced artisan, of which there is a notable shortage in England. Very well, the scarf is foreign as is its owner. The perfume, as you so naïvely referred to it, is in fact incense. Primarily sandalwood and orange. What do you notice about the fringe?”
“It has glass beads on it?” I offered. Holmes winced.
“Which, if you would care to take a closer look, are not rounded.”
“Really, Holmes, I fail to see the significance of whether or not the beads are rounded,” I said.
“It means,” Holmes replied gravely, “that I am surprised our Mr. Perriman made it through the encounter alive.”
“What on earth are you getting at?”
“You have all the evidence. The only questions remaining in this case are who and why. We already have part of an answer to the former, and when we find the rest it will naturally lead to the resolution of the latter.” He retrieved his hat and cane from beside the door. “Please be so kind as to only set the supper table for one this evening. I have some acquaintances to visit. No, my dear fellow, you have no need for your hat. Where I am headed, no one so respectable as John Watson will ever set foot.”
“Surely there must be some small manner in which I may be of aid,” I declared.
“Not presently, I am afraid,” came the reply. “My networks of information are fragile, and therefore easily disrupted. I must beg you to find some other diversion for the interim. Perhaps after I have found what I am looking for I will pay Sir Charles Brydon a visit.”
“What, a new case already?”
I must not have noticed him sifting through the stacks of mail he was in the habit of receiving.
“His letter was most distressed – you will find it upon the end-table, unless I am mistaken. There were one or two points of interest, not so much in the content as the form. Until then I must bid you farewell.”
With that the great detective was off down the stairs, out of hearing before I could inform him that no such document was to be found in the place he had named. I settled back to read the morning paper, but the words seemed to float off the page. At long last I gave up the pretence and gazed out the window. It would be hours before Holmes returned, but my good mood had vanished with him. I scanned the room restlessly, looking for some diversion. Finding none – Holmes’s library caters solely to the criminologist of a most specific variety, a field in which I have little practical experience – I decided to venture into the mild spring air instead.
I returned much refreshed, the sunshine having served as a wonderful tonic for my mood. Most of the day remained, during which I intended to write out several prescriptions. I had barely reached the doorstep when a boy ran up with a telegram clutched in his fist.
“For you, guv,” he said, disappearing only after he had received his tip.
Most likely Holmes. Eager for news, I tore open the envelope as soon as I was inside. True to form, it contained only the barest of sentences. Fairford, 10:30 Charing Cross. Family Clerin – utmost importance. Following other paths of inquiry. Holmes. Fortunately, by now I was well used to Holmes’s sudden impulses. My effects were in order in a matter of minutes and I was shortly aboard the 10:30 for Fairford. It was a truly lovely day, the first warmth of summer bringing an effervescent freshness to the air.
The journey passed with amazing rapidness, the sullen greys of London exchanged for the green of the countryside. A small river wound its way through the fields, a rutted road cutting a meandering line away from the platform to a small village. A low footbridge roughly constructed of wood served to join the two ends of the road where they met on either side of the river. A small ways upstream a fisherman sat motionless with his rod. He turned readily enough as I hailed him, testament to the occupation as a pastime rather than the source of his evening meal.
“Begging your pardon,” I called, “But I’m looking for a Clerin family. Do you know where I might find them?”
He scratched under his straw hat and paused to think.
“You’ll find a couple o’ them types next to the church,” he said. “Otherwise, you’d be better off asking in town. Last Clerin I knew moved on to greener pastures when you were no higher than your father’s knee.”
I lifted my hand in thanks and set off towards the village, and the man went back to tending his line with the carefree attentiveness in which I had found him. On entering the village proper the church was the first building to commend itself to the eye. It towered over the other buildings, the only other boasting a second storey being the pub a ways down. It was an impressive structure, solidly built of cream-coloured stone and lined with rows of stained glass. One of the locals noticed my gaze.
“It’s a beauty, isn’t it?” he said, hoisting his shotgun to rest more comfortably on his shoulder. “Church of Saints Peter and Paul, perpindiclar gothic as they call it. Windows are a beauty. You one of them cathedral admirers?”
“Not really,” I admitted. “I’m here looking into some family history. Trying to trace the Clerins.”
“Come have a look,” the hunter cajoled. “T’won’t take but a minute for a sight you’ll never forget.”
I followed him through the doorway into the interior of the church. I was expecting it to be dim and that I would need a minute for my eyes to acclimatize after the brilliance of the summer day, but the enormous stained glass windows let in almost as much light as if the walls had been glass themselves. Some of my surprise must have shown itself on my face, for my guide chuckled.
“Perpindiclar gothic,” he repeated. “All them lovely windows, each with a lesson from the good book.”
I stood there for a while, enraptured by the jewel tones of the windows, before remembering my mission.
“Where might I find the Clerins?” I enquired of my self-proclaimed guide.
“Couple out that way,” he answered, hooking a thumb towards the near wall. “If you mean living ones, you’d best ask Silas. You’ll most likely find him in the vicinity of an empty pint this time of day, or any for that matter. I’d best be off now, if it’s all the same to you.”
He tugged the brim of his cap and was gone as silently as he had appeared, leaving me once more in silent admiration of the long-ago artisans who had forged such an enduring masterpiece. Eventually I turned and reluctantly left. Holmes expected me to find answers, not spend the day engaged in what he would be sure to view as a useless pastime. I continued down the road to the public house, a squat building that seemed to be the second-oldest in the village.
Stepping over the threshold, here was the dimness I had been expecting. Once I was able to take in my surroundings once more, the prominent features were the low time-blackened rafters and scuffed bar common among country alehouses. The publican might have been taken straight from a cartoonist’s sketch, replete in tweeds almost as ancient as their owner with well-worn elbow patches. The size and hue of his nose spoke of a man who had gotten into the habit of imbibing his own wares, and coupled with the roughness of his hands to suggest a man who either started brawls, or else ended them. He looked up when I entered and gave a friendly nod, hands seemingly polishing glasses of their own accord.
“A pint, then?” he inquired. “Here for the church, I take it. Not as popular among sight-seers these days, but a beauty nonetheless. How’s the country treating you? Lovely weather, once you’ve gotten all the way out of London.”
I accepted the proffered pint and placed the requisite number of coins on the bar.
“Actually, I was looking into some family history for a friend,” I said. “Trying to see if I can get on the track of the Clerins. I was pointed in this direction with the recommendation to find Silas.”
“Good luck with that,” the bartender commented.
“How do you mean? Isn’t he here?”
“Oh, that’s him over there, all right. You may not get much sense out of him. As he ages, like a fine wine, the best you’ll get out of him is vinegar. Never been quite right in the head ever since he came back from the Crimean War, and as of late he’s only been going downhill. Still, if you want to try I won’t stop you.”
I made my way over to the corner indicated, occupied by a single slouched figure and an empty tankard. He was hunched over, leaning on one elbow with the other forearm thrown in front of the absent pint like a hound protecting its bone. He raised his head to regard me muzzily as I approached, bleary eyes peering out of a whiskery face that made the grizzled publican look to be a smooth-faced schoolboy in comparison.
“What d’you want?”
“I came to ask a few questions,” I said, taken aback by the hostility in my companion’s voice.
“He’s wondering about a local family,” the publican cut in. “Not trying to stir up trouble for anybody, Silas. Clerin, I think he said he was looking for.”
I nodded an affirmative.
“Why didn’t you just say so instead of sidling over looking intent on mischief?” the old man demanded querulously. “Bartender, another wouldn’t go amiss.”
The publican continued polishing as he shook his head. “Sorry, Silas. That’s as much credit as I can afford to give anyone.”
Seeing the expression of mulish obstinacy dawning across Silas’s features, I quickly set my own tankard down as an offering of peace. Mollified, my informant took a long draft before wiping the foam away with the back of a mottled hand.
“You don’t hear much of the Clerins these days,” he remarked. “You would have had better luck ten or fifteen years back. Powerful, they were, a right force to be reckoned with. Then came Harold. He was a black sheep, mark my words, and the end of their reign.”
“Where might I find his descendants?”
“Not here, nor anywhere on this earth. Thank your stars for that, he was a rotten one. His sister Clara was the only among the three to start a family, Robert having died young. We were sore heartbroken at that, on account of the estate passing to Harold. Clara would have done the family proud, but that’s not how the law saw things. Harold was next in line and so to him it all went and he spent every last penny, the blackguard.”
“What about Clara’s heirs?” I asked. “Surely you must remember what became of them, or can point me towards someone who might.”
“Lucy is the only one as lived,” Silas continued in gloomy tones that harkened the pending apocalypse. “Effie they lost to scarlet fever, Michael to the wars. So many deaths, so much pain…”
His voice trailed off, gaze unfocusing into the depths of his beer. The publican, seeing that nothing more could be gotten from Silas, waved me over.
“Caught him in a moment of lucidity,” he said in a low voice. “Doesn’t happen too frequently nowadays. Sorry if he disturbed you. Has a way with words, he does.”
I demurred, reluctant to draw attention – or perhaps pity – for my own inglorious roll in Britain’s displays of martial power.
“If you’re looking for Lucy, then, I would try the Coxwalds if I were you. Rent a bike or walk, first and only house due west.”
I thanked the publican for his advice and emerged blinking in the dazzlingly bright sun, standing a moment in the shade of the eaves to get my bearings again.
Unfortunately I fared no better the rest of the day, and returned late to find London cloaked in a heavy downpour. It was with a sodden coat and heavy heart that I bore the news of my stymied search back to Baker Street, the cab bouncing along half-empty streets.
My spate of ill luck continued when I arrived at the flat and checked my pockets, only to discover that I must have left the key on the dresser when I left. It was only seven, but with the black clouds overhead it might as well have been the dead of night. The window was dark – wherever he had gone, Holmes had yet to return. I knocked to rouse Mrs. Hudson, but to no avail. Ah, that was right. Our inestimable landlady was visiting her sister. It took a full five minutes of pounding before the door opened. In Mrs. Hudson’s absence, the gas lights in the hallways had yet to be lit, despite the overcast skies. Around me, the downpour continued. Holmes leaned on the doorframe for a moment , his lean figure silhouetted against the dimness inside. He waved to the cabbie, who tipped his hat and clicked the horse away from the curb. We must have made quite the spectacle, me waiting on the step as curtains of water parted over my head while Holmes stood motionless on the threshold. I cleared my throat. Holmes surfaced from his reverie with a start.
“Watson, might I impose upon you to take a message to the telegram office?”
“I may as well. I’m already drenched,” I replied. There would be no speaking sense to Holmes if he was in one of his moods.
“If it’s no trouble,” he said absently, handing me an envelope.
I sighed. I had been looking forward to changing into dry clothes and sitting by the fire after dinner, but that was clearly out of the question for the moment. I was glad to see the door upon my return, especially since I had taken pains to ensure that it was unlocked.
As I reached the top of the stairs, I noticed that the light was still off in our rooms. Evidently Holmes had had as much of a trying day as I had. This state of things suited my current disposition perfectly, as I had determined to turn in immediately. I turned on the light and froze. Holmes, limbs draped carelessly over the arms of the rattan chair, blinked awake. Even with the gas turned all the way down, the room was clearly in a state of disorder. Bottles had been swept off the workbench, spilled chemical mingling with the shards of glass that littered the floor. The small end-table which it was Holme’s wont to overload with papers had been overturned and its burden spread in a great drift across half the room. Several had been crushed underfoot, and bore foot-marks as testimony. Holmes’s room had been thoroughly searched, drawers and their contents in disarray as though a whirlwind had passed through Baker Street. The door to my room had been flung open to display my possessions in a similar state. A thought struck me and I hurried to the bureau, to find my pocketbook just as I had left it. I turned to Holmes, puzzled.
“What sort of burglar is so thorough in his search, and yet leaves a pocketbook?”
“Either one who has come with other objectives, or no burglar at all.”
“Well, what were they looking for, then? Or was it someone trying to frighten you off a case?”
Holmes chuckled quietly. “Whereupon they kindly locked the door after themselves, so that common criminals might not simply stroll in off the street. No, Watson, we were not burglarized.”
“Holmes,” I said, resisting the urge to grit my teeth, “I am hardly in the mood for riddles. I spent all morning in Fairford on your wild goose chase about the local family, only to be informed around noon that the name had died out with a Widow Clerin some twenty years ago. Some thief had pinched my bike, and by the time I walked back to the station the one-fifteen had departed. Fine. I waited until three for the next one, which was delayed for two hours due to cows on the track, of all things.”
“Fairford is a rural community,” Holmes observed mildly. “They can hardly outlaw cattle husbandry on the basis that it occasionally inconveniences rail passengers.”
“Then I returned to find London in a downpour and my key, which I distinctly remember putting in my pocket, conspicuous in its absence. After a good deal of knocking you finally opened the door, only to send me on another errand. Apparently while I was gone, the room was burglarized by amateurs. I am cold, tired, and you refuse to utter anything but confounded enigmas.”
Holmes looked chagrined.
“I made rather more of a mess than I realized,” he admitted. “I was engaged in a rather time-sensitive matter at the moment.”
“Holmes, what the hell is going on here?” I demanded. “First you send me larking about in the countryside on some ‘urgent task’ with blatant disregard for the fact that I have patients to attend to. I return to find you sitting in the dark, and my belongings rifled through as though by a petty criminal with no respect for my privacy. I deserve an explanation, at very least.”
Holmes visibly rallied, and for the first time I noticed how utterly exhausted he looked. The colour had drained from his normally pale complexion, leaving veins showing as blue tracery under translucent skin.
“You most certainly do. However, as this will be a long tale, might I suggest you take this opportunity to refresh yourself after your travels. Very good. I attend your return.”
By the time I re-emerged, I was willing to grudgingly admit that the sensation of being warm and dry was distinctly pleasant after the soaking I had received. Holmes was bent over the grate, building the fire.
“Ah, very good. If you would be so kind as to hand me a match, I would be most grateful.”
He accepted the proffered match and lit several places at the base of the sticks before resuming his place in the rattan chair. I hung my wet garments to dry, and pulled my armchair closer to the fire. Holmes cleared his throat.
“First of all, my dear Watson, I would like to thank you for your patience in this endeavour. I realize that my actions may be rather trying at times, but you put up with my follies with good humour. With that in mind, this is about the Perriman case. I was a fool not to have seen it from the start, and to have let a criminal escape my attention for even a brief period of time as these last weeks represents the gravest oversight on my behalf. Initially, our waiter should have told me the whole story. His omission of the scarf nearly cost him dearly, as well as having other undesirable consequences. But we shall get to that presently.
“If you recall, when the venerable Mrs. Hudson informed us that she would be visiting her friends in the countryside, what were the words she used?”
“She said that Hampshire was supposed to be lovely this time of year, and that she always loves seeing the lambs.”
“And, more importantly, that she was going because ‘something came up’. In other words, this vacation was not of her artifice. Very well, something occurred to induce Mrs. Hudson to leave. An uncommon scenario, but hardly unheard of. This was after our visit from Mr. Perriman; I trust you remember the salient points regarding the scarf. The beads were significant not as adornment, but rather their purpose as a weapon. Whoever had placed the scarf around Perriman’s neck had done so with the utmost intention to throttle him, most likely having slipped some sort of drug into our waiter’s drink and tailed him until he was thoroughly under its influence. Thus far we have a criminal who shows remarkable patience, is of Indian origin, and displays a distinct lack of regard for those around him.”
“A sociopath,” I supplied.
“Not all criminal actions may be excused by a prognosis. Some are criminal to the bone, a foreign concept to one as morally upright as yourself.”
I was saved from finding a response to my friend’s rebuke by the sound of a footfall on the stair.
“Watson,” Holmes said softly, “If I might trouble you to retire to your room for a moment, it would be most convenient. I suspect that our imminent visitor is Lestrade come as requested, but one cannot be too careful now. The case is delicately balanced indeed.”
I gave Holmes a searching glance, but the thinly veiled tension in his voice led me to comply without further questioning. Fearing lest the snick of the latch should betray my presence, I contented myself with swinging the door closed and standing behind it. Through the hinges I saw the door handle turn and rapidly withdrew beyond the narrow band of light. The door to our rooms swung stealthily open to admit a small, weasel-like shadow. The figure crept over to where Holmes was slumped in his chair.
“Hsst. Hsst, Holmes.” It was Lestrade.
“I take it you have followed my instructions to the letter?” Holmes asked quietly without making any effort to sit up.
“I have, although I can hardly see what good it might have done. I sent a plainclothes to search the bins you requested, and have four more loafing within a quarter-mile radius. If this criminal is as dangerous as you think he is, and I had my way, we would have had double the men, but London has smaller criminal concerns to tend to as well.”
He paused after this speech, having instinctively followed Holmes’s lead in the quiet tone in which he spoke and reluctance to stand upright.
“Watson,” Holmes said in a conversational tone, “the Inspector is here. Be so good as bring your bag and stethoscope when you come out, but take care that they remain below the level of the window.”
Lestrade favoured me with a nod as I resumed my seat by the fire.
“Now then, Holmes, what is all this about?” he asked as soon as I had settled in.
“I was in the process of explaining that to Watson when we heard your entrance. Provided that you managed to access the back door sufficiently subtly, Lestrade, I do not foresee any complications in the matter at hand and by midnight at the very latest our quarry should be firmly within our grasp. Now, gentlemen, we do not have the luxury of time on our side. In approximately–” here Holmes broke off to check his watch, “five minutes a message will arrive for Doctor Watson. One of his patients is deathly ill, and requires his immediate attention. He will furnish himself with bag and rush off in the waiting cab. Be so good as to turn out the light when you go, Watson, but add another log or two to the fire. It is of paramount importance that our visitor believe me to be alone in the house. The cabbie will have instructions for your covert re-entry to the premises.”
“What shall I do?” Lestrade asked, having noted the room’s state of chaos with some distaste.
“You shall ensconce yourself in the doctor’s bedroom with the door shut but not latched, as he was when you came in,” Holmes said. “Take any necessary pains to remain out of sight from the street. When Watson returns, he will endeavour to join you by means of the ladder in the alley and his window, which I unlatched earlier today. Neither is to stir or make the slightest sound until Lestrade is absolutely certain that there is enough evidence to convict our adversary. He is cunning as a fox, and liable to slip away at a moment’s notice if he catches scent of the hounds. Unless I am mistaken, there is the brougham now.”
True to his prediction, the cab stopped at our door its occupant began pounding on the door with surprising vehemence. I bustled downstairs to admit our visitor. A lad of no more than fifteen stood dripping in the hall.
“Come quick, sir!” he cried. “You’ll need your bag. Mrs. Pendlewick has taken ill.”
He grinned and winked to show that he was quite enjoying his role in this scheme, and I hurried upstairs to gather my effects. On the way down the stairs I remembered Holmes’s admonition and returned to turn off the gas before hurrying back downstairs. In a moment the cab was bouncing away down the half-deserted street, and I was drenched once more. The cabbie slowed just long enough for us to disembark as he was turning the corner before rattling away again at a furious pace.
“Follow me, sir,” the lad advised, as he led the way through a maze of narrow alleys until I recognized the back of Baker Street. He took the ladder from where it was concealed and leaned it against the house. “Up it quick, sir, then I’m off,” he said cheerfully in a hushed tone.
I scaled the ladder as quickly as I dared, the torrential rain making the rungs dangerously slick. I was soon at the top, however, and slid the window open. Holmes had evidently been at work, for it made no more than the merest whisper in place of its normal groan of complaint. Lestrade whirled at the noise. Recognizing that it was me, he offered a hand to pull me inside and shut the window. Through the rippling water I could see my helper making off with the ladder. I unearthed a towel and dabbed myself dry as best I could, then joined Lestrade in peering through the hinge of the door.
No more than ten minutes had passed before a second cab drew up before the door and disgorged a passenger before promptly departing once more. Lestrade tensed beside me, but Holmes appeared to be fast asleep. A floorboard in the hallway creaked ever so slightly, just loudly enough to be heard over the crackling fire in the grate. Lestrade and I sensed the fourth presence in the building simultaneously, his arrival heralded by a faint whisper of cloth against the bannister. A shadow stole into the room, hesitating on the periphery to glance keenly around. Spying the closed door, he crept forwards and pushed it open. Neither of us dared breathe; rather, we pivoted back as a unit and stared at the wood inches from our noses. Evidently the interloper was satisfied that the room was unoccupied, for he returned to the fireplace and drew a small vial from his pocket. Holmes stirred.
“A question, if I may.”
“A dangerous business as you have discovered, Mr. Holmes, even for one such as yourself. However, seeing as I am a gentleman, I can hardly help but comply. What detail is of such tantamount importance that the great Sherlock Holmes would bring it to his grave?”
“Perriman,” Holmes said. “A waiter at Stockwell’s is a man of limited means; even if he were firmly under your thumb he could grant access to only a few of the more fashionable middle class. His cousin’s law firm recently lost their most valuable client, and as such has nothing of any great significance in the safe. What could you possibly have hoped to gain from him that could not be gotten in a dozen easier ways?”
The man chuckled. “So famous, so infallible, and yet his intellect balks at the most basic answers. Such trivial matters are below him. It is so simple a solution that you would not possibly have considered it. I wanted your attention.”
The voice was low, purring, the voice of a man who knows he has the upper hand.
“I trust by now you realize the err in such hubris,” the man continued with evident relish.
“You thought that there would be no more great criminals against whom to test your cunning, and so you let your guard down. You were wrong. I had been waiting for the day when Moriarty would at long last overreach himself. Pride comes before a fall – it came to Moriarty before his, and now it is your turn. My only regret is that the cyanide in your pastry this afternoon was evidently not enough to finish you off.”
The entire time his back had been to us, Lestrade and I had focused on easing the door slowly open. As the man uncapped the vial, Holmes sprang like a tiger. In the light of the dying embers, they looked like a pair of demons grappling for control. Lestrade and I leapt to Holmes’s aid, but in my haste my foot caught on a pile of books to send them tumbling to the floor with a crash. Lestrade demonstrated a remarkable bent for steeplechase as he cleared the obstacles in a bound. I was up again in an instant to join in the fray. Although he had not the convulsive strength of Jefferson Hope, our nocturnal visitor struggled with astonishing tenacity. When capture seemed nigh, he gave a sudden half-turn and flung the contents of the vial in Holmes’s face. Holmes dropped like a stone, breath coming in queer little gasps and searching frantically under the rattan chair for something. Deprived of our friend’s aid, all might have gone poorly had one of Lestrade not fetched our adversary a ringing blow to the head with a fire iron in a surprising display of dexterity. Lestrade took the opportunity to cuff our prisoner and firmly pinion his feet.
I turned the gas all the way up and rushed to Holmes’s side. He sat with his back against the chair, eyes closed, taking ragged breaths and looking distinctly ashen.
“Holmes,” I said, shaking him by the shoulders. “Holmes, answer me.”
He must have heard the panic seeping into my voice, for his eyes drifted open and he treated me to a weak smile.
“Watson, if you would be so good as to assist me to the dining room while Lestrade sees to our prisoner, I would be eternally grateful. I believe fresh air is in order.”
At that moment a plainclothes came pounding up the stairs clutching a stitch in his side. Spotting our handcuffed visitor lying sullenly on the floor, he opened the window and blew deafeningly on his whistle. Two other dark shapes detached themselves from nearby buildings, and we were soon joined by the other plainclothes. Between Lestrade and myself we managed to get Holmes down the stairs, each taking an arm over the shoulders. We were joined in the dining room by the four plainclothes detectives, water streaming from their greatcoats, and our prisoner. As the plainclothes brought him in I saw his face for the first time since his entrance what seemed like an eternity ago.
“Brydon?” I asked incredulously.
“I always wondered why Holmes would keep you around if the limit to your intelligence consists of making the most obvious observation,” Brydon said by way of reply.
“Losing doesn’t agree with you,” Lestrade contributed. “Fortunately for you we have a cell back at the Yard you can have all to yourself and your superior intellect.”
Taking their cue, the plainclothes manhandled Brydon out to the waiting Black Maria. Holmes chuckled, a sound that morphed into a racking cough. Lestrade and I stepped forwards, but he waved us away and instead took a liberal gulp from the bottle in his pocket. Once the coughing had subsided he settled back in the chair, two spots of feverish red on his cheekbones.
“Lestrade,” I said, “Open the window a crack. From the top, mind you, otherwise Mrs. Hudson will have our skins for letting all the rain in. I’m off to do the same for the upstairs.”
Stepping back into our rooms, the fury of the struggle became doubly apparent. There would be a good deal of cleaning to do before our venerable landlady returned. I opened the windows and pushed the papers to one side, where they could be neither a nuisance nor wetted by spray that might find its way inside. Once this was done I retrieved a blanket from the jumble on Holmes’s floor and returned downstairs. Holmes accepted the blanket readily enough, and was now situated beside a fire roaring in the grate.
“You had better change yourself, before you catch cold,” was Lestrade’s only commentary. I cast a glance at Holmes, whose thin lips twitched in amusement.
“I will be just as capable of explaining the night’s events when the doctor among us is no longer at risk of giving himself pneumonia through neglect,” he supplied.
I hurried upstairs and returned to find Lestrade leaning easily against the table.
“Now then, you have some explaining to do, Holmes.”
“You both have my sincerest apologies for this evening, gentlemen. Had I considered it safe to do so I would have told you everything, but had Brydon heard so much as a whisper that I was on to him the game would have been up. Hence the secrecy, which I only broke tonight by sending Lestrade a telegram with incomplete details.”
“’None’ would be closer to the truth,” the policeman remarked.
“The pressing need for secrecy also dictated my feigned ignorance of the telegram I supposedly sent Watson. With Brydon so close, to have any others in his crosshairs would surely have resulted in disaster. Having therefore neatly disposed of Watson and Mrs. Hudson for the time being, he had only to arrange for the dredging of the Hersey Street canal to yield a body in order to distract the police. He knew that it would likely be several days before they realized the victim’s name would be found among the death-ledgers of a local poorhouse. He most likely arranged for her body to be removed under the guise of proper burial by a charitable organization. This being done, he set his trap.
“When he first requested to consult me on a ‘delicate family matter’, I entertained no suspicions. A consulting detective must rely on senses, not sentiment. The letter itself was ordinary enough, or at least as much as can be expected from any mail I receive. Good paper, sealed with a signet, black ink all standard and presented no points of interest. The sole mystery lay in our man himself.
“For all his show of refinement, Brydon was born in the slums. There he stayed in an orphanage until he came of age to work in the sweatshops, whereupon he most likely slept on the premises. He is a consummate actor, but even the finest can hardly keep his origins from shining through on occasion. He offered only the briefest glimpse when he turned his head too far to the left. Something about it struck me, but it was only too late I realized the true significance. There is a faint discoloration behind his right ear, the result of soot healing beneath the skin. Brydon was therefore not the country gentleman he claimed to be, unless part of his education was undertaken by sweeping chimneys. Had I recognized the soot sooner, I would not have had the regrettable experience of ingesting the cyanide–laced biscuit he insisted on serving with tea. I knew as soon as the cramps set in what had happened, but it was only due to sheer coincidence that I was permitted to leave.
“His neighbour down the hall was insistent on meeting the newcomer, and rang the doorbell rather more than was truly necessary. By this point Brydon could see full well that I knew what he had done, and would have had no compunction about holding me at gunpoint until the poison did its work. His neighbour had heard us talking, though, and the one thing he could not afford was to raise suspicion. He was therefore forced to open the door to greet her. While his back was turned I made good my escape through the window and hailed a cab to Baker Street. The cabbie did an admirable job, whereupon I offered him five bob to fetch the police if I failed to reappear within half an hour. That half-hour mark was when Watson showed up on the doorstep back from Fairford, and I was forced to somewhat alter my plans.
“After sending Watson away again with the telegram that summoned Lestrade, I set about preparing for Brydon’s inevitable second visit. This time there would be no neighbour to interrupt, so I had to ensure my own intervention by securing your aid. The rest you know.”
“What I would like to know,” Lestrade remarked after a moment of silence, “is how you managed to find some sort of cure for the cyanide.”
“A trifle,” Holmes replied without opening his eyes. “Brydon forgot one of the foremost rules of murder – never poison a chemist. Certainly never poison a chemist and then let him go to ground. Although in my case, it was not my store of chemicals that was my saving grace, but the fact that I share a flat. I have recently exhausted my supply of sulphur, and my usual supplier is in the midst of reorganizing his business. Lacking, therefore, the time and materials necessary to fabricate sodium thiosulfate, I was obliged to obtain some from as close at hand as possible. I regret to inform you, Watson, that you are now the possessor of an empty shampoo bottle.”
No adequate replies presented themselves, so I settled for accepting the barren vessel.
Lestrade chuckled once, then again. We both regarded the inspector with, I believe, the same concern for his sanity.
“I never –” he began, before succumbing to more laughter. “Every time I think I have you figured, Holmes, you find new ways to confound me. And with that, gentlemen, I must take my leave. The missus doesn’t like me to leave dinner cooling.”
He retrieved his coat from the pantry and departed into the night, still chuckling to himself.
“Perhaps less lavender next time,” Holmes remarked after the inspector had taken his leave. “I by no means force you to consider French scents over the stolid English favourite, but cypress rarely goes amiss.”
I refrained from reminding my friend that one does not choose any sort of soap on the merit of flavour, on the basis that it is not intended for consumption. Instead I gave rise to the question that had been nagging at the back of my mind ever since Brydon had first spoken by the fire upstairs.
“How did you fail to detect that Brydon was a threat? Surely you knew he was dangerous from the moment he stepped onto British soil.”
There was a silence, and I realized that I had offended Holmes considerably.
“In a country as bustling and corrupt as India,” he responded coolly, “it is difficult to keep track of even the persons with whom one is in correspondence, to say nothing of the criminals. There is no authority there to whom I might plead my case who would have had the necessary information, no great criminologist anywhere near the region. I suspect there will be, sooner or later, but until then information is at a disorganized premium. I am a scientist, not a magician. If someone came to me requesting that I track down a criminal on whom no records exist, or indeed have ever been kept, it would be a sore trial in even a small country. Consider, my dear fellow, that prior to his ill-advised attempt at poisoning we had no idea what Brydon looked like, nor any of his personal habits. With these we surely would have been able to find him within a week at most. Without them, the path to the solution was a great deal more crooked and thorny.”
“But you keep up to date on crime abroad, too,” I exclaimed. “What I do not see is how Brydon escaped your notice, when you have divined the existence of no fewer than five men from the presence of a single nail.”
I was referring, of course, to the well-known Edmundson burglary, when Holmes had stepped in just in time to save an innocent man from the gallows. My friend, however, continued to grow irritated by my questions.
“There are limits to what can be learned via telegram,” Holmes replied. “Were I there in person, the good Mr. Perriman would not have found it necessary to engage my services in the first place. I can gather information and see clearly what is not being said – there are libraries of information nobody bothers with simply because it requires reading beyond the printed text that could solve many of mankind’s mysteries if he only bothered to read them – but even I, Watson, cannot prevent crime across the globe. Some of it, but only the very tip of the iceberg.”
“Besides which,” he amended, leaning back and lighting his pipe, “until very recently – four weeks at most, I should say – Brydon was no more than a pawn in a larger game. The police can catch the pawns. I trouble myself with the larger fish, because that is where my interests lie. The Yard would be overreaching itself without my aid; while there is seldom an original crime performed now, murder and robbery entered into Man’s history early on.”
He extinguished his pipe moodily and sat staring out the window. I was loathe to interrupt, but I had one more question. From the tilt of his head he already knew this and was biding his time until I could wait no longer, so I relented.
“But how could you know all this from a scarf? You saw nothing more than I did, and yet you already had the case half solved far before I ever set foot in Fairford.”
Holmes turned to face me once more.
“You should know by now,” he remarked, “that I never form conclusions until I have seen all the evidence. After examining the scarf I saw several possibilities, which dictated my actions, that I might determine which path of inquiry to follow. However, until Tuesday you had access to all the same facts as myself. The scarf was clearly Indian – between the dye and the incense there was no doubt about that. Very well, the next question is what it was doing around our Mr. Perriman’s neck. Both you and his landlady jumped to what seemed like the logical conclusion, that it was a reminder of his choice of nocturnal entertainment.”
I nodded.
“But if it was of Indian origin, and obviously expensive, why would its owner have parted with it so freely? A woman of the night would have sooner parted with a less signature portion of her wardrobe, such as a stocking or handkerchief. Additionally, Perriman is a man of abstinence. Why would this anonymous woman of the night needed to drug him? He does not drink, gamble, indulge in drugs, or visit ladies of the night. Therefore your mysterious woman is merely a convenient explanation assumed upon incomplete analysis of the evidence.”
He paused to adjust a log on the grate.
“There were characteristic wrinkles in the cloth, concurrent with those resulting from twisting or knotting. I have already remarked upon the shape of the beads.”
“I still don’t see where this train of logic leads,” I admitted.
“Patience. The beads were not rounded, from which several conclusions may be drawn. Rounded beads are easier to manufacture, so effort and some small expense had been put into finding these particular specimens. Their location on the tassels – the utmost ends of the scarf – suggested that its purpose was as a weapon rather than an accessory. There is an art form known as silat, practiced in southeast Asia and some portions of India, teaching the use of flexible weapons such as scarves or rope for self–defence. Combined with the incense – in particular, the scent of a small white blossom known in southern India as devaga nagale – the owner of the scarf had spent a significant period of time in India, if he was not a native. This lead to the next logical step, that the scarf was in fact placed around Perriman’s neck to be used as a weapon. The only questions remaining then were who and why. Finding the answer to one would soon lead us to the other, so I undertook to locate persons holding a grudge against our waiter. As he readily admitted, he was correct in the assertion that he has none. He is friendly and well-disposed.”
“So then whose was it?” I burst out.
“The scarf itself belonged to a certain Nathaniel Perkins, of 419 Cummings Lane. Or, rather, it belonged to his late mother, who brought it back from her travels to the Orient. Brydon obtained it by bribing the clerk whom Perkins had hired to deliver the item to a small boutique for repair. The other details I trust you may fill in from what Brydon deigned tell us. He is a uniquely twisted sort of criminal, one whose talents do not merit his ego but still manages to hide in plain sight. In the end, it was his delusions of grandeur, of being better than Moriarty and the immortality of fame in the annals of criminal history, that were his downfall. Now if you will excuse me, I suggest we turn in. It has been a trying day.”
By the time Mrs. Hudson returned the next day, only the barest traces of the week’s adventures remained to be seen. Our housekeeper was not one to be easily distracted from her duty and noticed the lingering mess. I had done my best to clean, but the night’s events had left me worn out and by the time I rose the sun was already well above the horizon. The door to Holmes’s room was ajar, its occupant long gone, in all likelihood already hot on the trail of some fresh enigma to occupy his mind.
Footnote: The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells, is set in 1895