The Redacted Sherlock Holmes, Volume 3

by Orlando Pearson

  “I am fully seized of the professional requirement to retain my independence and integrity,” he said at length. “Nothing will persuade me to abuse the powers with which I have been endowed to give a false opinion. I shall conduct my research and pronounce my opinion on my findings without fear or favour even if the answer I give is not to the liking of The Climate Almanac.”

  “How do you propose to investigate a subject as complex as a possible change in the climate?” I pressed. “For your own activities, you have me, with all the inadequacies you regularly point out, to act as your chronicler. The climate does not enjoy the services of any similar biographer whom you can consult.”

  “On the contrary, dear Watson,” said Holmes, unbending slightly. “There are few topics which have attracted greater volumes of ink over the centuries. From Homer talking of rosy-fingered dawn three thousand years ago, to the records of monks in the Middle Ages, and the writings of otherwise under-employed country parsons over the last two hundred years, we are blessed with weather reporting that, while lapidary in nature, is nothing if not comprehensive.”

  For the next two weeks I again saw little of my friend. He was gone before I breakfasted and I had retired by the time he returned. On one occasion I caught sight of him when I visited the London Library in St James’s Square. He sat surrounded by printed papers and yellowed manuscripts. But though his eyes turned in my direction, he bore a glazed expression on his countenance, and was far too engrossed even to acknowledge me.

  One evening he returned to Baker Street and warmed himself by the fire for a few minutes before nestling into his customary armchair. He sat back, filled his pipe and lit up.

  “I am not a man easily given to fear, Watson,” he said at length, “but I have had three very near escapes today. Although the Southwark case might have proved dangerous to me, my complete failure to track down the couple in the stable means that I would not expect any assault from anyone espousing the current view of Christian history. Other than that, my casebook remains as empty as ever, while the investigation I am undertaking on the climate seems to me to be a mere sinecure for an overfunded non-governmental organisation.”

  He paused as he recharged his pipe, tamping down the tobacco before he spoke again.

  “Crossing Cavendish Street this morning, a two-horse van whizzed out of a side street and was on me like a flash. I sprang for the footpath and saved myself by the merest fraction of a second. The van dashed round by Marylebone Lane and was gone in an instant. The whole thing happened so quickly that I was unable even to see any identifying feature on the vehicle, but I continued my journey with extreme wariness thereafter. On Oxford Street, a solitary rider apparently lost control of his mount, which reared up onto the pavement and knocked me off my feet. It was only by reacting the instant I struck the ground that I was able to avoid being trampled underfoot. The horse, its rider grappling with the reins, galloped off round the corner, but to have had two near misses in the space of a couple of minutes was disconcerting in the extreme. Such a sequence of events has only occurred to me in the final stages of my struggle with Professor Moriarty and, were I not entirely satisfied that he lies at the bottom of the Reichenbach Falls, I would suspect his malign influence in this.”

  “Did you not raise these apparent assaults with the police?”

  “I had nothing of a sufficiently tangible nature to convince them. They attributed the assaults to the animals being hard for their handlers to control after their long idleness. The officers I spoke to said that they had had a spate of such incidents reported to them. This does not explain the third brush with death I had.”

  “A third brush with death? That must surely rule out the possibility of coincidence.”

  “I decided to return from the London Library to here via a circuitous route. As I was boarding an Underground train at Embankment Station, I felt something like a push in the back and almost ended up on the rails. I turned round, but could not identify who my assailant might have been in the heaving crowd.”

  “So do you think these apparent assaults are a consequence of your research into climate change or revenge for previous brushes with the criminal world?”

  Holmes did not answer but drew his violin to his chin and, unusually for him, played a soothing melody which I did not recognise. This continued for several minutes before he put the violin back into its case.

  “Moriarty’s gang is gone,” he said eventually. “There is no criminal currently on the loose capable of launching a campaign of terror against me. The Bedlam case is inactive. The only case I am pursuing is into weather patterns and that field of research is the preserve of harmless eccentrics and the otherwise under-occupied - not of dangerous criminals.”

  “So what is your next move to be?”

  “We head out of London tomorrow.”

  “Out of London? To where?” I ejaculated.

  But Holmes would not say. Instead he leant down to tend the fire and then stood again before it, although for the first time for several months our sitting room was not cold. Although I reiterated my question, he would not be drawn further and eventually I retired to my room.

  The next day we descended the stairs of the house in Baker Street and proceeded with great circumspection south towards the Metropolitan line station at the junction with the Marylebone Road. I had packed an overnight bag. To my surprise Holmes had not only an overnight bag but also something that looked like a weighty tool box. A couple of hansoms trotted past us and when a third offered its services to us, Holmes sprang into the road to hail it and then dragged me inside. He barked at the driver, “Victoria Station as fast as you can go!”

  On our journey down to Victoria Station, Holmes regularly leant out of the window to check that we were not being followed and leapt to his feet in alarm when the cab went over a section of the road that had been potholed as a result of the recent frosts. He sat down with a brief apology, but even at the time of “The Final Problem” I do not think I had seen him so obviously on edge.

  At Victoria Station he booked us two tickets to Pulborough. It was only when we were seated in our compartment in the first-class carriage of the train that was to take us to Horsham on the first leg of our journey that he relaxed a little and, puffing at a cigar, started to adumbrate on the findings he had made from his research into climate history:

  “At the time of the compilation of the Domesday Survey in the late eleventh century, vineyards were recorded in forty-six places in southern England. By the time King Henry VIII ascended the throne, the climate had improved to the extent that there were one hundred and thirty-nine sizeable vineyards in England and Wales and our towns are full of road names such as Vine Street and public houses called The Bunch of Grapes. There are now no longer any commercial vineyards in this country and all wine is imported.”

  “But Holmes,” I countered, “could the decline of English vineyards not just be due to the fact that the wine they produced was not very good and the vines not particularly productive? I would suggest that increased prosperity and improved means of transport mean that it is cheaper to import grapes than to grow them domestically.”

  “That may be admissible, but consider this: there were no frost fairs on the Thames until 1606. This period of colder weather seems to have started in the early seventeenth century. There were seven frost fairs on the Thames starting in 1607 with the last one eighty years ago in 1815.”

  “But you are merely pointing out seven extreme winters in a period of over two hundred years, the last of which was nearly a century ago. You cannot base any firm conclusions on anecdote and a few isolated observations.”

  “A very astute remark, dear Watson, and that is why we are heading into Sussex. You will remember the case I told you about, which began my professional career as a consulting detective even before I first knew you. You will recall that I lived in Montague Street by th
e British Museum and had very few cases. You produced a version of this, the first case that brought me to the wider attention of the public - “The Musgrave Ritual” - where I saw that what seemed to be a nonsense rhyme was in fact a set of instructions identifying a historical treasure’s location.”

  “But why are we visiting a scene of a long-closed case of yours to look into developments in the climate?”

  “You will recall that two trees - one an elm that had probably been three hundred years old when it was struck by lightning ten years before the case, and one an oak which is over a thousand years old - played a significant role in the story. I propose to look at the growth rings of the trees to see what I can make of changes in the climate over the last thousand years.”

  “How will you look at tree rings of the oak tree unless the tree is cut down?”

  “I have this tool box with me containing a large drill. I hope the remains of the elm will provide me with sufficient information to avoid having to drill into the trunk of the great oak - it was twenty-three feet in girth last time I saw it - to look at the rings in it. But just in case this proves to be necessary, I have already telegraphed my old acquaintance, Reginald Musgrave of Hurlstone House, to obtain his permission to do this.”

  After an uneventful journey, we arrived at Hurlstone House. My reader may have seen pictures or read descriptions of the famous old building - the oldest in the county - and its splendid landscapes, designed like so many parks in Sussex by that renowned park planner, Howard Lucie.

  Musgrave, a slim, debonair figure the same age as Holmes, was at the threshold of the great house to greet us. “Pleased to meet you, Dr Watson!” he commented amiably. “I note from your retelling of Holmes’s previous investigation down here that our fellow student Hugh Trevor, you and I are the only people who call him Holmes rather than Mr Holmes, or sir. I read too, Holmes,” he continued, turning to my friend, “that your brother calls you Sherlock - strange that I should never have known your first name. I must say I take great pride that Hurlstone House, uniquely among the settings of your adventures, should feature twice. I have got some of the gardening staff readied in case you need any help.”

  We went into the park and first of all looked at the stump of the great elm. It had been cut right down but Holmes spent a considerable amount of time with a hand lathe smoothing out the surface. Musgrave told us that the elm had been struck by lightning in 1870. Holmes counted the rings. There were three hundred and forty of them, meaning that the tree had been growing from 1530. I could see Holmes was on a hot scent, as his eyes were bright and his tone brisk.

  “Look at this tiny ring,” he exclaimed at one point. “This is the year 1816, the year famously without a summer - and almost no growth in the tree.” He carried on with his minute examination and in the end sat up and lit his pipe. “This tree stump undoubtedly offers evidence,” he said. “The rings are noticeably narrower after 1607, meaning that the tree enjoyed better growth conditions in the years before then. But our data from here only extends back another sixty-seven years which is too short to draw any conclusion. We will have to drill into the oak tree.”

  The core of the ancient oak proved almost adamantine, especially as Musgrave was insistent that no permanent or visible damage should be done to the tree. Nevertheless, the drill had eventually driven a hole a substantial distance into the wood. Holmes reached into the depths of his toolbox and pulled out, to my considerable surprise, an instrument which I recognised as an endoscope. That he should even have heard of such a specialist medical instrument spoke volumes for the breadth of his learning. More time passed as he called out to Musgrave and me, acting as his scribes, what he could make out while he peered down the tube. We took notes of what he said.

  “This year confirms what the elm told us about 1666 - a hot summer - and here we are back in the late sixteenth century ... Most of the tree’s growth seems to have been before then as we are only a quarter of the way in ... warmer summers in the sixteenth century and earlier, coinciding with the growth of English viticulture, and again between 1450 and 1480.”

  Eventually he rested from his endeavours and sat down with us.

  “I have seldom come upon an investigation with such a complete record of data, for all that this is the first time I have sought to construct a case of this type,” he said as he lit a cigarette. “There is a clear reduction in the width of the tree rings after 1550, suggesting a cooling of the climate and a deterioration in growing conditions. That coincides with the decline of vineyards after the reign of Henry VIII, poor harvests prevalent at the end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I and the start of frost fairs in London in 1607.”

  “So there is a cooling of the climate!” I exclaimed.

  “We progress,” said Holmes, “but we have only covered half the ground. You remember that we were commissioned to establish not only whether there was a deterioration of the climate, but also whether this was due to industrialisation. This cooling precedes what is known as the industrial revolution by several hundred years so we are halfway to ruling out industrialisation as a cause of the recent cooling of the atmosphere. We must, however, check whether industrialisation is accelerating this cooling. We are at present only at the halfway point in our investigations.”

  We set off back to London and Holmes outlined his next steps in the train. My friend was much more relaxed on our journey home though whether it was due to his progress in establishing an unbroken narrative of climate history dating back several hundred years, or to the absence of any further apparent attacks on him I could not be sure. In any event, there were no worried looks over his shoulder or stratagems to put a would-be pursuer off his track.

  “We are indeed touching on some old history in this case, my friend,” he enthused, as our train headed north, “looking back into the fifteenth century, looking in at Reginald Musgrave’s and, for our next step, returning to the great hospital at St Bartholomew’s, where you and I first met. We must conduct some experiments on the heating and cooling of objects in a bell jar to see what effect the changing of gases in the atmosphere has on the way the objects warm and cool. St Bartholomew’s hospital is the only place which would be able to provide me with the equipment for such an experiment.”

  We spent the next day in the laboratory where, with my assistance, he carried out numerous experiments along the lines he had proposed. At the end of the day we sat down next to each other on laboratory stools and he explained his findings.

  “My experiment has produced a rather unexpected result,” he confided as he drew on a cigarette. “My measurements established a time for how quickly objects warm and cool when heat is applied to them in a bell jar. I then added increasing quantities of first dioxide of sulphur and then dioxide of carbon to the air. The dioxide of sulphur seemed to have no effect on the speed with which the contents of the bell jar changed temperature. The dioxide of carbon, on the other hand, resulted in a slightly lower rate of cooling although I have not yet devised a theory of why this should be. Could the dioxide of carbon hold in heat released by the earth but at the same time let heat transmitted to the earth by the sun pass through?”

  “So what are you going to say to Mr Lawler? That is not a conclusion that corresponds with his view of climate change.”

  “As I indicated to you, Watson, magna est veritas et praevalebit - great is truth and mighty above all things. I shall not allow what I say to be swayed by pecuniary reward and shall tell Mr Lawler my conclusions as I see them. I will set them out in a report. I will qualify my findings, which only cover a few hundred years and stress that, while I have observed the apparent warming effect of carbon dioxide on the atmosphere, I cannot explain it.”

  Holmes wrote a note to Mr Lawler and an appointment was agreed at Baker Street at ten o’clock on the following day.

  Just before the appointed hour, the buttons knocked on the door and presented, to my
own surprise and that of Holmes, the couple whom we had seen in the stable with their by now fourteen-week-old baby. Their son, a bonny lad with a shock of blond hair and clear blue eyes, made a sharp contrast to the couple’s dark features. The girl was fully engrossed in looking after the baby and it was the man who did the talking.

  “I wanted to thank you, Mr Holmes, for your attempts to help us in January, even though we chose not to take you up on it,” he said. “After you left us in the stable, it suddenly occurred to me where I could get help for ourselves. We are of nomadic stock and there is a small place in Buckinghamshire where such people gather. We got there before the cold set in and have been there ever since.”

  “Indeed,” said Holmes calmly although I could see that he was still puzzled. “I confess I conducted a thorough search for you, and I would be grateful if you could disclose to me where in Buckinghamshire that was so that I can close a gap in my network of contacts.”

  “It’s just north of Slough, sir. You wouldn’t have heard of it but it’s a hamlet called Egypt because lots of gypsies gather there.”

  “Ah,” said Holmes, “I shall indeed have to broaden my network of people I retain to look out for me.” Holmes looked even more discomfited after this disclosure but his voice was bland as he added. “I am glad that matters have resolved themselves. I confess, it is not my normal practice to involve myself in intimate family matters, but may I ask if your fiancée is still saying things that trouble you?”

  “I’ve learnt to get used to it when she says things that sound a bit funny,” replied the man. He looked lovingly down at the child in his fiancée’s arms. “I wonder how he will turn out.”

  The couple went almost as suddenly as they had come and before Holmes or I could make any further comment, Mr Lawler appeared at our door, as full of smiles as ever.