The Redacted Sherlock Holmes, Volume 3

by Orlando Pearson

  Just as Holmes had not been overt in his sympathy over the loss of Mary, so his sympathy was muted over the loss of my practice. As he waited for his consulting business to rebuild following his return, I keened for the loss of my own business and found solace at the billiard table of my club. My reader may recall my billiard partner Thurston, about whom Holmes was to make a typically brilliant deduction at the time of the grave matter I have chronicled as “The Adventure of the Dancing Men”. Thurston was a company promoter and would regularly try to interest me in shares in companies which were seeking a floatation. Normally the sums he was seeking were beyond my pocket but one evening, poised over a shot, Thurston straightened up and said:

  “You know, Watson, there is a real opportunity for you to make some money from a business not far from where your practice used to be. The Paddington Brewery is a highly profitable company mainly owned by the Winsome family and they are looking to sell a large minority stake. I have a prospectus in my briefcase, which I shall give you at the conclusion of this frame.”

  My only previous investment with Thurston had been several years previously when he had interested me in the prospectus of a company which manufactured buttons. The prospectus had failed to disclose some of the liabilities the company had in respect of former long-standing employees. These were identified only when they vested two years after the floatation and the disclosure of them prompted a dramatic slide in the share price. My somewhat haphazard approach to finances meant that I had quite forgotten I owned the shares and the loss of capital only came to light when I was assessing my existing assets with a view to buying my Paddington practice. As a result of the experience I viewed Thurston’s suggestion of an investment with circumspection.

  I think Thurston saw my look of hesitancy and he re-assured me: “Although the Paddington Brewery is a long-established business, it has a predominantly young work-force to whom it has no obligations - I checked this with the main shareholder, whom I know well. You can invest with confidence in this business. When they float, there will be a significant premium on these shares and there will always be a demand for beer.”

  I mentioned Thurston’s proposal and the outcome of my previous venture with Thurston when I was back at Baker Street. Holmes asked to look at the prospectus.

  “It is curious,” he commented after a brief examination of the balance sheet, “that a large business like the Paddington Brewery has no pension obligations at all. Recent company legislation requires such liabilities to be stated in the company’s accounts and in any prospectus - just as you had to disclose your pension obligation to your receptionist when you sold your practice.”

  “Indeed,” I commented grimly. “The lengthening of anticipated lifespans made my pension obligation to my receptionist much the biggest liability on my business’s balance sheet and that, along with the precipitous decline in takings as a result of the investigation by the British Council of Physicians, is why the proceeds on its sale were so small.”

  “Who are the current shareholders of the Paddington Brewery who are looking to sell a stake?”

  “I understand that it is a predominantly family-owned business but the full listing of shareholders is disclosed at the back.”

  We were surprised to see that amongst the shareholders listed on the last page of the prospectus was the widow of Dr Anstruther. This discovery prompted a sharp intake of breath from Holmes.

  “A motive at last for the high death rates in Paddington!” He exclaimed. “When we were looking at Dr Barker’s scandalous accusation, I was unable to find any motive that Dr Anstruther might have had in respect of the death of any of the people whose death certificates he signed. I do, however, recall that three of them had worked for the Paddington Brewery. This was not a great surprise to me as the brewery is the largest business in Paddington. These deaths occurred just before the deceased attained pensionable age. The company clearly replaced them with young employees, who could be offered a much less costly money purchase scheme rather than a pension based on their final pay. This is a very material motive for a shareholder in the brewery. And you will remember that we were unable to account for the doctor’s apparent financial well-being in spite of the fact that his practice seemed to have an even slower turnover of patients than yours. The dividends from this stake will have been a major source of income for Dr Anstruther.”

  Holmes said no more that evening, but he disappeared for the next two days. It was at lunchtime of the third day when he reappeared. The gleam in his eye told me that he had made progress in his investigations, which was confirmed as we sat down to our midday repast.

  “This case has its inception from our case in Birmingham several years ago and, while I have not found enough to go before a jury, I am making progress in finding enough to put before Dr Antony-Ball.”

  “But Holmes, the matter is closed. I have lost my practice, Dr Barker has lost his livelihood. We must all make the best of the situation, as I seek to do in selling my works about you and in looking for suitable investments.”

  “Our investigation to date,” continued Holmes, seeming not to hear my wan expression of despair, “had failed to find a motive for the high number of deaths among Dr Anstruther’s patients, or an obvious means for him to carry out killings with so little fear of detection that he let you sign death certificates. But my research among the companies around Paddington has shown me that Anstruther had holdings in several of them.”

  “But why would that provide him with a motive for killing his patients?”

  “They all had generous pension schemes based on the final salary of the employee. By killing the more mature employees before they could claim their pensions, he removed a substantial liability from the companies of which he was a shareholder and thereby increased the value of his stakes as well as removing the cost of pension contributions from those companies’ outgoings.”

  “Is that not somewhat fanciful?” I responded. “Have you a means that is more tangible?”

  “I cannot deny that my theory for a motive is speculation. But having found a possible motive, I then started to speculate about the means.”

  For all my friend’s normal dispassionate air in his dealings with me, my reader will appreciate how grateful I was to have him on my side in my struggle to regain my professional reputation.

  “And have you got something, Holmes?”

  “Only an inkling,” he replied. “I was struck when we were in Anstruther’s practice that for all the artistic interests you ascribed to him, the walls of his practice were bare of any paintings, and when I looked up his will at the Public Record Office there were no paintings in his effects. Let us see what the Paddington art-supplies shop knows about Dr Anstruther. Please leave the talking to me, Watson. I am going to present myself as the solicitor acting on behalf of the widow of Dr Anstruther’s and will present you as my clerk. I would advise you, Doctor, that you may hear things in this interview you do not like. I would beg you not to respond.”

  In my eagerness to redeem my name, I confess I only half-heard my friend’s last remark. As my reader will discover, it was fortunate indeed that I did not miss it altogether.

  We were soon at Adams & Johns, a shop round the corner from Dr Anstruther’s practice. The shop proprietor, Mr Johns, was standing behind the counter as we came through the door. Holmes introduced himself as Mr Grove, senior partner at Grove, Grove, Perry & Co and introduced me as Mr Wilson, the firm’s senior clerk.

  “In the course of my duties to Dr Anstruther’s widow,” Holmes told Mr Johns, “I have been going through his effects. As you will understand, she is still too distraught by events to be able to do much. During my compilation of an inventory of Dr Anstruther’s assets, I came across a large amount of paint for artwork which I assume you supplied him with as you are the only supplier of this type of material in Paddington.”

  “A tragi
c case, the death of Dr Anstruther,” said Mr Johns, a tall man with an Irish accent. “Such a kind man. Always out at his patients, always listening to their cares. We had him as our doctor and often he came to us rather than us going to him. And that saved us going to the apothecary. He always believed in injections, did Dr Anstruther, which he would give to us on the spot. A bodkin was never out of his hands. I never went to his neighbour, Dr Farquhar, or to Dr Farquhar’s successor. I always heard that at that practice they simply told you to go and get some pills.”

  I was about to open my mouth to interject when I felt Holmes’s heel stab into my shin and remembered his injunction to remain silent.

  “To realise as much as I can for the estate,” continued Holmes, “I want to see how much this paint is worth. There are three large boxes containing tubes of it at his house and I wanted to form a view on whether the paint has a disposal value.”

  “A very keen painter, Dr Anstruther, God bless him,” said Mr Johns thoughtfully. “Always busy painting seascapes and cloudscapes. It’s easy for me to tell you how much his paint cost him because he was the only customer for the Prussian Blue which I ordered in specially for him. Most of my other customers only bought paints for their children or for painting local scenes. Let’s have a look at his account and see what I charged him for it. I might be able to do his widow a favour. Seems only right.”

  He reached up to a shelf behind him and got down a large file. He pulled out several invoices to Dr Anstruther, all containing details of purchases of Prussian Blue with some small amounts of other paints. Eventually he straightened himself up:

  “I can try to see if I can get my supplier to take it back. I can offer you one guinea a box for it. Prussian Blue is an expensive paint to make, though it is not all that often used unless you’re doing what Dr Anstruther was doing.”

  “Thank you,” said Holmes gravely. “This may be of some comfort to poor Mrs Anstruther.”

  We emerged from the shop and once we were out of earshot I turned angrily to Holmes:

  “So what did that show us? All we confirmed was that Anstruther bought blue paint for his skyscapes and you gave yet another person the opportunity to traduce me.”

  “On the contrary, dear Watson, the invoices have given us a major weapon in our battle to restore your professional reputation.”

  “So Anstruther bought paint. What else?” I retorted, barely able to rein in my fury.

  “Precisely, Watson,” soothed Holmes. “What kind of painter has need of paints, but no need for brushes, canvasses and other art requisites? Paint was the only thing on any of the invoices that Adams showed to us.”

  I may have looked even more blank than usual at what my friend was clearly regarding as a major coup. So Holmes continued:

  “Prussian Blue pigment - the main paint that Anstruther bought - is what is used to make cyanide. That is why Hydrogen Cyanide is sometimes called prussic acid. I would speculate that making cyanide was what he was using the Prussian Blue for and that is why paint was the only thing Anstruther bought at the art-supplies shop. That is also why we can find no paintings.”

  “So that was why he was happy for me to sign off two of the death certificates!” I exclaimed, realising at last the importance of Holmes’s deduction. “Death by cyanide poisoning produces distorting of the facial features very similar to distortions caused by death from heart disease, and the medical notes of the two deceased both had references to treatments for heart problems. Accordingly, it was easy for me to read the medical notes of Anstruther’s patients and ascribe the deaths to heart failure rather than looking for any outside cause. And the cremation of the bodies would mean that any evidence of foul play would be destroyed!” I said with mounting excitement.

  “And Dr Anstruther’s preference for visiting his patients also explains why his stairs were so little worn. His practice may have been more profitable than I surmised on the way back from Birmingham after the capture of Beddington.”

  “So, Holmes, what are to be your next moves?”

  “No, good Doctor, what do you want your next moves to be?”

  I looked into the eyes of my friend. “As a matter of personal pride, I would like to have a practising certificate again even if I do not work as a doctor.”

  “Then let us go and see Dr Antony-Ball.”

  When we arrived at the British Council of Physicians, Dr Antony-Ball at first declined to see us. It was only when Holmes said we would not leave until he saw us that we were granted an interview.

  “Have you anything new to say, Mr Holmes?” asked Antony-Ball.

  “I have indications, Doctor Antony-Ball, promising indications.”

  “Indications - promising, or otherwise, though your choice of adjective seems wildly inappropriate for an investigation of the kind you seem to be conducting - hardly provide a reason why I should prolong an interview with you, Mr Holmes.”

  Holmes explained how he had identified not only a plausible financial motive for Dr Anstruther to have ended the lives of his patients once they had reached a certain age, but also a clue as to the means he had used.

  “You are merely adding speculation to the speculative work of a now-discredited statistician on a matter where the only person who could have definitive knowledge of what happened is dead. It is not therefore possible to form an opinion on the validity of your accusations. The means you suggest that Dr Anstruther used are unprovable and the motives you suggest, flimsy,” said Antony-Ball flushing with anger. “I decline to enter into conjectural discussions.”

  “So you are refusing to agree to any sort of investigation into a matter of the utmost gravity?”

  “To conduct any sort of investigation into your accusations will only give them an unwarranted credibility among the more suggestible of our fellow citizens and they will be used to blacken the name of every doctor in the land.”

  We had reached an impasse and I was preparing to gather up my things to go.

  “Are you aware of the literary successes of my friend?” asked Holmes.

  “I confess I can see no reason why I should follow the literary career of a struck-off doctor.”

  “My friend’s works are widely read, Dr Antony-Ball, widely read. I am sure that he could make a most entertaining tale about a disproportionate number of deaths in Paddington, the reluctance of the British Council of Physicians to investigate them, and the treatment of those who had the courage to raise their concerns. And since you yourself regard the matter as trivial, the main speculations could be written so as to appeal to as wide an audience as possible.”

  “Mr Holmes! I represent the affairs of every registered doctor in the country. Each doctor I represent has passed an arduous program of examinations to be a fit representative of the medical profession. As far as I can observe from your line of questioning, both now and at our previous interview, you carry out your investigations through ill-founded allegations proper to a gutter journalist using the restricted mind-set of a bookkeeper.”

  “Dr Antony-Ball, you have ended the medical livelihood of both my colleague, Dr Watson, here and also of Dr Barker. Your refusal to conduct any sort of investigation into these allegations and your treatment of those who have raised them seems to be motivated by the desire to protect the reputation of your organisation’s members rather than to defend the interests of patients.”

  “I am not prepared to start a witch-hunt against my brother doctors based on the insubstantial evidence you are providing of malpractice in one surgery out of thousands.”

  “You state, Dr Antony-Ball,” replied Holmes, “that I have the investigative methods of a sensation-seeking journalist and the intellect of a bookkeeper. Let me put it to you that far from being an obstacle to my investigation, these qualities allayed to the literary talents of my friend and the statistical skills of Dr Barker, are precisely what are n
eeded for us to progress in this case. Dr Barker is at a loose end. Dr Watson has a following as a writer. I am sure Dr Barker could be asked to conduct investigations into death rates at any practice in the country and Dr Watson would have nothing to lose in providing commentaries of a most prurient nature to the popular press. You could, of course, refuse to conduct a properly funded and resourced investigation of your own. A headline in the popular press to this effect would sell a lot of newspapers. ‘BCP bigwig: no investigation into high death rates’ would make a good opener.”

  “I had no idea that attempted blackmail played so prominent a part in your successes,” said Antony-Ball, flushing to the roots of his hair.

  “In a good cause I am a practitioner of many of the so-called dark arts,” responded Holmes. “Let me, therefore, add the skills of a cleric to those of the bookkeeper and the journalist. Dr Antony-Ball, in the words of St Luke, I would say to you, every hair on your head is counted and that your head of hair is as false as your defence of your members’ vested interests. While a first headline may say ‘BCP bigwig: no investigation into high death rates’, a subsequent headline may confirm that the term bigwig is even more an indication of falsity than it appears at first sight.”

  Antony-Ball stood up and then sat down. As he did so, I could see that his thick head of hair had a seam which was, as is always the case once Holmes points a matter out, childishly obvious.