The observation hung in the air as Miss Brusher continued. She read a passage where Carr had written “Once a week Carr visited a girl called Elsa, who worked as a waitress till the small hours and during the day only received guests in bed,” when Holmes called a peremptory halt.
“Miss Brusher, the text you are reading is very striking, but it is also extremely lengthy. Could you explain what you want me to do?”
Our client looked up. “Mr Holmes,” she said. “Mr Carr is in considerable personal distress. He badgers me both at home and at work with attempts to make contact with me. When I can no longer avoid him, he reads to me from this large and growing typescript. He is aging before my eyes and I feel the authorities he describes in this text are making his life impossible. This is rebounding onto me to such an extent that I have been constrained to take steps to avoid him altogether and accordingly I have asked a friend to share my room in the hope that Mr Carr will leave me alone when he sees I have company. At the same time, he writes about authorities I do not recognise but which seem to have a power over him such as that a state might have. I feel this matter should be raised with someone in authority, but I do not know with whom.”
“Miss Brusher, you place me in a very difficult position. On the one hand, you have no evidence that any real crime is taking place, or even that any of the events you talk about occur anywhere except in the imagination of Mr Carr. On the other hand, your fellow lodger’s writings suggest some gigantic conspiracy, though one of which I know nothing beyond what you have read out. You say that Mr Carr is oppressed by an authority which you have never heard of and yet suggest that this case may be something for the authorities. I suggest, as the entirety of your concerns rests with this tome-like typescript, you leave it with me and I will go through it thoroughly. I will revert to you when I have formed a plan of action, should one be required.”
“What did you make of her, Watson?” Holmes asked thoughtfully after our visitor had left.
I ventured “Pleasant, respectable, pretty, smartly turned out and deeply disturbed by her fellow lodger ...” before a snort from Holmes brought me to a halt.
“Really, Watson, how often do I have to remind you to look at detail and not merely state vague and, if I may make so bold, rather subjective impressions? The lady is obviously disturbed by the attentions of Carr - that is precisely what she said herself - but you are failing to look at the minutiae that demonstrate it and which illuminate other things about her and her surroundings. The streak of powder by her left ear, just where the light caught her, shows both her interest in theatre and her distraction in that she failed to remove it. The speck of brick dust on her blouse, just above the waist, shows it has been hung out of the window to dry and thus that there are no clothes-drying facilities at her lodgings. When you see an otherwise orderly person failing to remedy such flaws in their appearance, you can be sure that their attention is focused on something outside their normal sphere of activity.”
“And what do you make of her problem?”
“My first idea was that it was some vulgar, romantic intrigue, as Carr always seems to accost Miss Brusher when she is on her own. The content of the typescript rules that out, however. No man would seek to make love to a lady by reading a document suggesting he was subject to a persecution by an unknown authority, let alone one detailing weekly visits to a lady who only receives visitors in bed during the day - at which point, you will note, I called Miss Brusher to a halt. I will have to dedicate further attention to the text that Miss Brusher has brought.”
And, rather to my surprise, Holmes abandoned his chemical research and for the rest of the day said not a word to me as he sat hunched in his chair turning over the pages, puffing at his hookah, which was his closest companion in his moments of deepest introspection. He seemed focused not only on the words but also on the paper and sometimes took out a magnifying glass to look at it more closely. At one point he even put one page under his microscope and stared intently and at considerable length down the tube as greyish-blue tobacco smoke blew out ever more fiercely into our sitting room.
It was only when I was about to go to bed that he spoke any further words and even then they seemed to be addressed to himself.
“A perfectly unique document. As to where it leads us, I am still no clearer than when Miss Brusher arrived this morning. The core of this case is all contained in this text and, even after concentrating my attention on it all day, I remain undecided on whether this is a work of invention, a statement of events, or a conflation of the two. It was typed on the same typewriter over an extended period, as review of the quality of the type face under the magnifying glass shows how the letters have deteriorated with use over time. It also contains amendments by another party, which have been entered by hand.”
“Was it not Carr himself who put in the manual changes?” I interjected.
“If you look, the person who pulls the paper out of the typewriter and hence is typing the document does so with the left hand, as some of the pages show a faint thumb mark at the top on the left-hand side. The person who makes the manual amendments does so writing with the right hand.”
“You can tell that from their handwriting?”
“Not so much from that as from the fact that the person writing by hand does so while having a sandwich in his left hand. The breadcrumbs from the sandwich have fallen onto the pages on the left side of the paper and are sometimes over-written by the manual corrections but they are never over-typed. That was what I was using my magnifying glass and microscope for, as the broad pattern of the scatter is very particular. This suggests that the other person is a close acquaintance of Carr as he is showing him his work. Yet he is one who does not take the task very formally as he would hardly be eating and reading at the same time if that were the case.”
“Is it not possible that Miss Brusher, who is a professional typist, typed the document and that Carr made the manual amendments?”
“My dear Watson, that explanation had of course occurred to me, but the typing is of too poor a quality to be by a professional typist. Look at the errors and corrections made by the typist of this document. Such errors would not occur to a professional, so I believe there is a second person with whom Carr is working. The second person advises Carr on his output after each section of the typescript is completed. He probably does it over lunch which explains the dropping of food onto the paper. Carr himself is typing this while he is at work as the paper is of the standard mass-produced quality used in businesses and Miss Brusher makes no mention of Carr typing at the lodgings. This suggests Carr and the other party work in close proximity to each other.”
“You seem more interested in the second party than you are in Carr himself or Miss Brusher.”
“Miss Brusher seems to me to be purely an occasional sounding board for Carr and is only of interest to us for having brought this case to our attention. Beyond his untidy eating habits, and that it is likely he meets Carr close to his workplace, I can tell little about the second party. Carr obviously trusts him as otherwise he would not be showing him his work. The second party makes frequent changes to Carr’s work with a pencil with high graphite content, one that is sharpened only very irregularly with a blunt pocket-knife, but these hardly amount to details that will readily enable us to identify him. The changes are stylistic rather than substantive and replace vague terms with more specific ones. For example, in the first sentence, the word “arrested” replaces the original typed word “caught” and this suggests a high level of education in the second party. I think that Carr regards him as a figure of authority as he has not sought to reverse any of the changes the second party has made.”
“And Carr?”
“I have already indicated that he is an indifferent typist. I would also observe that in his narrative he describes himself as Company Secretary at a bank, which suggests that Miss Brusher’s fellow lodger
occupies a senior position and enjoys a high income.” He tailed off and gazed into the yonder.
“So you think that what Carr writes about himself in the narrative actually corresponds to his real situation?” I broke in.
“Miss Brusher says that Carr is a fellow lodger of hers, that he works at a bank and that he presses his life story on her. All these details conform to this typescript which has a strange narrative style as, although it is in the third person, it is told entirely from the point of view of Carr. In the section Miss Brusher read out, he is arrested but not charged and, in later sections, he goes to committal proceedings in a particularly down-at-heel part of town. The proceedings as described are farcical. He complains about his treatment at his arrest and says the officials who arrested him have stolen his possessions, but these accusations seem to have no impact on the officials of the court who are processing his case. One is constantly left to wonder whether this is a description of actual events or something more fantastical. These are uncharted waters indeed ...” Holmes’s speech lacked its normal incisiveness as he sank again into thought.
“And what are to be your next steps?”
“I shall continue to introspect,” said Holmes with a yawn and, pulling his violin onto his knee, drew the bow languidly across the strings to make an inchoate sound I would not categorise as music.
“I need to decide,” he continued. “Is anything criminal or untoward happening? And if so, is this something I should investigate myself, or should I turn it over to the authorities and, given the nature of the text, to which authorities? The results of my introspections may of course alternatively lead me to the conclusion that Carr is something of a bore who likes reading his rather dull, largely fictional works out to his fellow lodger and others who have little choice but to listen to them. My instinct at present, however, is against what would be a rather tame resolution to the events, even though it does explain all of them. In my view, there is a case for us to investigate, although what direction it will take us in, I would be unwilling to speculate.”
My pulse quickened with excitement at Holmes’s comment.
“Is there anything I can do to help you in our investigation?”
“Be prepared, dear boy, be prepared. Your main limitation and your main strength are that you are a man of action rather than of thought. I need to focus my thoughts and I shall be surprised indeed if there is not some need for action in the next few days.”
When I came down the next morning I was unsurprised to find Holmes slumped in the same position as I had left him, and the air in the sitting room laden with the bitter reek of tobacco, mingled with the heavy smell of strong coffee.
“As you see, Watson, I have been up all night and, though a fixture here, I have at least found my way into Joseph Carr’s world.”
“And have you come to any conclusions?” I asked.
“Only negative ones so far. I have reviewed my files and the recent press. There is no legal action official or private being taken against Carr and no criminal offence of which he is a suspect.”
“And what about the narrative?”
“I have read to the end of what Miss Brusher has brought us. The document is incomplete inasmuch as it does not come to a conclusion, but each chapter is essentially complete in its own right, which leads me to think that there will be further chapters to come.”
“Have you then formed a view on whether it is a work of fiction or a work of record?”
“Carr is undoubtedly writing factual information when he describes himself as working at a bank. He is the Company Secretary of C&S Bank, which is headquartered at Aldersgate. I was able to track this down by reference to some of the depositions the bank has been making on its non-cash assets to the Government. Among the other events he mentions in this work, he talks of going to a courthouse in Hackney even though the court appears to be of a somewhat informal nature. I know of no legal buildings in the area that Carr describes.”
“So do you propose to go down to Hackney to see whether this courthouse really exists?”
“Carr discloses a road name where the courthouse is, but no house number for where the courthouse might be. Indeed, when he set off to Hackney, he did not have this vital detail at all. He ended up having to try to gain access to the houses by the device of asking people if they knew of a Captain Spear, a name he made up based on the name of another lodger in the room adjoining his. Once inside, he used the pretext of asking after Spear to look around within the building for a courtroom.”
“So are you going there this morning?”
“My dear Watson, I have already delayed my chemical research by a day to investigate what may prove to be nothing more than a somewhat rambling work of fiction. Accordingly, I propose that you should go down to Hackney this morning to see whether there is anything in Carr’s narrative we can substantiate.”
I was crestfallen to be sent on a task Holmes so obviously thought may well be a fool’s errand, especially as his preferred activity was chemical analysis, which frequently rendered our sitting room all but uninhabitable yet which seemed to produce very few results. However, I had no activities of my own on hand, so I agreed.
Carr’s typescript had disclosed that the courthouse was in Caesar Street. When I got there, it turned out to be a long road with high residential blocks on both sides. There were children playing a variety of games on the street and assorted residents performing chores like ironing, cleaning boots and sharpening knives either in their doorways or at the window of rooms facing out onto the street. The air was foggy and fetid.
I examined each rather dowdy block carefully for an indication of one which might contain the courtroom, but none gave any sign that it might do so. In the end, I decided I would have to follow Carr’s own device for gaining access to the tenements and started to stop passers-by to ask them if they knew of a Captain Spear.
Verily the English are a helpful race. Within a few minutes I had learnt details about the inhabitants of the street, some of whom had been to sea, and some of whom had a name which if not Spear had at least a connection with combat - Archer, Gunn, Bowyer, Fletcher - and I had been shown into any number of buildings, none of which contained anyone called Captain Spear and were entirely devoid of any courtroom.
Carr’s expedient had expedited nothing and I was back on the street on the point of heading back to the station when an elderly lady in slippers opened the door to yet another tenement house, shuffled down the stairs at the front of the building and asked: “Are you another gentleman who said he was looking for Captain Spear?”
“Yes,” I replied half-truthfully. “Do you know where I might find him?”
“What you are seeking is through here,” she said and headed back up the stairs.
I followed her up and at the top of the stairs, I could look past her through the door into an interior quite different to the interiors of the other buildings I had seen. It was a large, darkened room with a raised platform and a droning of voices apparently transacting some sort of official business.
I was about to go in when the lady turned to me and blocked my way, saying: “This was not meant for you.”
“Then why did you come down the stairs to help me?” I asked.
“I heard you were asking for Captain Spear, sir, like the other gentleman. I probably took more on myself than I should have done by coming down the stairs and talking to you. I really don’t know much about this at all,” she said in a low voice,and looked around surreptitiously as though to ensure we could not be overheard. “But I knew what it was you were looking for and I thought I should at least show you where you might be able to find it. In any case, Captain Spear is not here and this door was meant to admit the gentleman who was first looking for him only.”
With this the door closed abruptly in my face and no amount of calling out or knocking prevailed upon her
to open it. I looked for windows but this was the one building on the street with no windows at ground level. I looked around. The street was now empty of people and the sun had come out. I could see no purpose in staying any longer and was relieved to head back to Baker Street.
Holmes’s face grew longer and longer as I recounted my experience. Finally he said: “Well in all the tasks I have set you, I can think of none where the harvest of information you returned with has been so scant.”
“That may be because of the difficulty of the task set,” I retorted.
“Hardly so, Watson, hardly so. Why did you not ask for a courthouse rather than trying to gain access to the houses in the same ineffectual way as Carr? Why did you not try and find a landlord who might have been able to give you an overview of the street and its inhabitants? Why, you seem not even to have noted the number of the house where you looked into the large room!”
“Maybe you would have done no better,” I responded. “And I did note the house number, which is more than Carr did,” I added sourly, for I was hurt by his lack of empathy on the performance of a task which was far from straightforward. “It was eighty-four.”
“I think any fair observer would conclude that I have done considerably better than you. While you were hunting for Captain Spear in Hackney, I searched the land registry and hunted down the identity of the landlord from those parts. Caesar Street is a development thrown up twenty years ago to provide accommodation for employees of the local blacking factory. The factory owner is the landlord and he has the sort of arbitrary ideas about how other people should live which you can impose on them when you are both their employer and landlord. The tenancy management is farmed out to the company whose representative I spoke to at his office in Regent Street this morning. All the blocks are made out of the same grey brick and with the same intention of squeezing as many poor people into the smallest amount of space possible. Anyone who works at the factory is obliged to live in the blocks around Caesar Street, the development is dry, the owner insists that the inhabitants are not allowed to hang washing up outside and that the streets are clear of people between twelve and one each day.”
The Redacted Sherlock Holmes, Volume 3 Page 15