My Sherlock Holmes

by Michael Kurland

  “But these are lecturers and students,” I protested. “They haven’t been trained in the arts of savagery. It is not that they do not care to rip their adversary’s throat out. They just don’t know how.”

  “If that’s your view of the academy,” said Holmes, “then this education is being wasted on you.”

  I ignored this.

  “What remaining choice do we have?” I asked. “Obviously we should restrict our scrutiny to whose who love and admire our Mr. Dodgson, for you have excluded everybody else.”

  “So it would seem,” said Holmes, with a smile. “But I have faith in you.”

  “In me?”

  “Yes,” said Holmes, “you’re going to solve this case. You are already on your way.”

  His confidence depressed me. Didn’t I have enough to do without having to save the good name of Dodgson? And who was the lionized consulting detective around here? Not I! And, most importantly, what if I failed? What if I failed? Still I owed too much to Professor Dodgson and Mr. Holmes. If this is what was expected of me, then this was what I must do. I felt even sorrier for Mr. Dodgson. He thought he was getting Holmes to help him, and instead he was getting the last of the Baker Street Irregulars.

  “Don’t worry, young man,” said Mr. Holmes. “I’m not deserting Dodgson or you. I will be helping. But I believe that you have certain resources which well equip you for this case.”

  Here was good news.

  “The most significant of which,” he said warmly, “is that nobody knows who you are.”

  Well, that was something. To be involved with Mr. Holmes and his crusade against lawbreakers is an experience that is both unsettling and exhilarating. Usually Mr. Holmes assigns some mysterious task and we have no idea as to what we really are doing or why. He confides in us almost as much as the puppeteer confides in his marionettes. He often praises us for a job well done and we stagger into the fog wondering just what in blazes we have accomplished—but still with a certain sense of pride. In this Dodgson matter, however, I clearly was going to navigate without being blindfolded.

  “Here is how you will do it,” said Mr. Holmes.

  I was to pose as a reporter who was commissioned by an American magazine to write an article about Dodgson, the man behind the beloved Lewis Carroll. And for this purpose my editor wanted me to seek out important people who were able to provide illuminating anecdotes about Dodgson.

  “Won’t they know I’m not an American?” I asked.

  “Of course,” Mr. Holmes said patiently. “But you’re just to say the magazine selected you because you are at Christ church and they thought that gave you a leg up.”

  “I can do it,” I said.

  Playing the part of a Christ Church scholar when in fact I really was one tickled me. It was refreshing to portray something that I was instead of something that I was not. As for the reporter part, that sounded like great fun also. I was to question them as thoroughly as possible as to the habits and vagaries of Mr. Dodgson. I was to forget everything about propriety and manners I had learned with such painstaking care. Apparently, impertinence was the mark of a respected journalist. If anyone questioned my line of inquiry, I was to allay their fears with the following explanation:

  By telling me their private observations of Dodgson, they will be allowing the American public to feel as if they know him; and that will increase his book sales in America.

  “These are the people to whom you shall pose questions,” said Mr. Holmes, as he handed me Dodgson’s list. Mr. Holmes crossed out most of the names with broad, firm strokes.

  “I took the liberty,” he said, “of eliminating all the obvious innocents. And what we want to know here, Mr. Wiggins, is what they know about Dodgson and what they don’t know about him; what they are revealing and what they are striving to conceal.”

  “What questions shall I ask?” I inquired.

  “Oh, you’ll think of something,” he said. “You’ll find your ‘victims’ both here and in London. You’ll start your inquiries in Christ Church and conclude in London. Report to me at Baker Street with your findings in no more than seven days.”

  Nothing prepared me for my new identity as a journalist for a great American magazine. Still it fit me as comfortably as my favorite slippers. It was not just that people award you with kindness and hospitality and little sweets and mementos. These kindnesses were not intended to influence your assessment and depiction of them, mind you. They bestowed these favors just because they liked you and wanted you to like them. What could be fairer and more natural? Of course, while brushing away the crumbs of one more serving of gateau, you might idly wonder what they don’t want you to know about themselves. But such thoughts quickly dissipate into the perfumed fog of fellowship and earnest amiability.

  What I really loved was that when I asked them questions, they answered. This may seem to you like the normal pattern of discourse. But mind I still was a student. To see my betters jump at my command, to see those so universally respected strive to please me was a pleasant change and one to which I easily could get more accustomed.

  In those rooms and at those times, nothing was more important than to be able to honor them with the flattering portraits they so richly deserved. I actually felt a twinge about my necessary deception.

  My first encounter was with Friedrich Max Muller, Professor of Comparative Philology and Honorary Member of Christ Church. In 1876 there had been a great to do over Muller’s desire to change his academic status and Dodgson’s attempt to throw a shoe into the machinery, or so Muller put it. It seems the Vice Chancellor approved of Muller’s plan to stop teaching and immerse himself in scholarship, while retaining his full salary. Dean Liddell, who was a friend of Muller’s, pulled a rabbit out of his administrative hat by getting a deputy professor to assume Muller’s teaching responsibilities—but at half the salary.

  Dodgson, who bore no particular malice toward Muller, thought that Liddell was being unjust. He held that the position should determine the fee. The voting members of the faculty endorsed Liddell’s view. The affronted Muller thought that transferring his responsibilities to somebody getting half pay was ingenious and even when I interviewed him so many years after the fact could not understand Dodgson’s inability to appreciate the genius of the idea. I, of course, thought Muller was a selfish boor but kept that opinion to myself. I just nodded and winked and let him talk.

  “The young man who was allowed to take over my classes,” said Muller, “told me what a privilege it was to be my successor. I assured him he would prove worthy of the confidence Liddell placed in him.

  “You see,” he continued, “in the university there were those who could not bear Liddell’s towering high above them—not just because he was tall but because of his character and position. Nasty things were said and written, but everybody knew from what forge those arrows came.”

  “Do you mean Professor Dodgson?” I asked.

  “You said his name,” replied Muller. “I didn’t. But you may presume what you like.”

  I solemnly inscribed his words in my notepad. Interviewing people was much like taking notes at a lecture, except that you asked questions and they answered.

  “I will say this about the man,” said Muller. “He baffles me. He makes all these outrageous comments on character and rectitude; he goes out of his way to damage a reputation and then acts as if he did nothing wrong. Last year he gave me this photograph of me he had made years before, attached a silly little rhyme based on my name and generally acted as if nothing were amiss.”

  “You kept the picture,” I said.

  “Yes, I did,” said Muller. “It’s a good likeness, don’t you think.”

  Dean Liddell had only the kindest, most supportive and utterly dismissive things to say about Dodgson. I met with the Dean in his study. He sat on his imposing straight-back chair, which he had turned away from his massive rolltop desk. I sat on an adjoining fleur-de-lis-patterned sofa. His missus, Lorena Liddell, sat on a c
orner chair embroidering a throw pillow for one of her daughters. The Dean was a learned man and an inspiration to struggling scholars, such as myself. Framed certificates and degrees attesting to his position hung on all sections of the wall. A photograph of the Prince of Wales stood on the mantelpiece. Everyone knew the story of how the Prince of Wales had been a Christ Church student and was an occasional visitor to this very same room. Even his mum graced this room with her presence. It was bandied about that the Dean had a serious talk with HRH about the Prince’s limited academic prospects. Next to the image of the Prince was a photo of a young woman.

  “Is that,” I asked, gesturing with my thumb, “a portrait of Alice?”

  “Oh, no,” said the Dean, “that is our daughter Edith.”

  “She looks like quite a heartbreaker,” I said, wishing to ingratiate myself.

  “She was an angel,” replied the Dean. “The Lord saw fit to take her in 1876 in the prime of her young womanhood.”

  Now I’ve gone and done it, I thought.

  “Dodgson made that portrait in 1867,” said the Dean, “and gave it to us several months after Edith passed.”

  “That was good of him,” I said.

  “Yes,” said the Dean.

  “Yes,” whispered Mrs. Liddell.

  “An unexpected and touching kindness,” said the Dean. “You know we had grown apart over the years—not that we ever were as close as he imagined or proclaimed. But owing to our separate roles in the University, and his penchant for adopting idiosyncratic positions, it looked to the outside world as if a once cordial and intimate relationship became strained. In all candor, that relationship was mostly professional to begin with but with all of that ‘Alice’ business, the world presumed what it chose to presume.

  “Despite his intellect and the respect he earned here,” the Dean continued, “Dodgson seemed to be a lonely man. He attached himself to our family, even conspiring to magically appear at places where he knew we would be. I suppose some good came out of those awkward moments. He did write those children’s books. Although I do not fancy the whole world knowing that the books were named after my daughter Alice.

  “And the children are portrayed as being mere casual listeners to the story when in fact they had a hand in the formulation of the tale. Did you know that when he was telling them the story, Alice asked if there couldn’t be more than one cat in the tale because she so loved cats?”

  “No,” I responded with a show of astonishment. “I never knew that.”

  “Nobody does,” he said, “and apparently nobody cares to. There’s something to be put in your article.”

  I dutifully scribbled some notes.

  “Your editors probably will excise it,” he added. “That’s what they do.

  “No doubt that Dodgson is a clever and industrious man,” continued Liddell. “He has the rare ability to immerse himself in pursuits and enterprises that the rest of the world never had thought about and is unlikely to think about in the future. He’s forever offering advice about how people should go about their business. Sometimes there is even some merit to various of the rules and proscriptions he’s taken it upon himself to offer. I suppose he means to be helpful, but he’s constantly standing in the path of my efforts to improve this hallowed institution. And he’s only gotten worse over the years.”

  The Dean turned to his wife.

  “Mrs. Liddell,” he asked, “when did we notice that he had become more obstreperous?”

  She looked up from her meticulous stitching.

  “He had invited himself over for dinner again,” she said slowly, “and the girls were all chattering about the impending wedding of the Prince of Wales.”

  “That’s right,” said the Dean. “And Dodgson said, ‘Well I’m going to marry Alice.’ And then he winked at you. It was intended to be a playful wink but there was something about it that chilled us. And you spoke right up, dear.”

  “That’s right,” said Mrs. Liddell. “I said, ‘You’ll do no such thing, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson,’ and he quickly changed the topic.

  “Well,” Mrs. Liddell continued. “It was unthinkable. She was just too young for him.”

  “That sort of arrangement,” said the Dean, “is not all that uncommon, even in this modern age.”

  “It was more than that,” said Mrs. Liddell. “He was not a fit prospect for our daughter. He had no title, no family wealth, no likelihood of advancement in Oxford. We wanted something more substantial for Alice than books and games and mechanical contraptions. Prince Leopold himself was one of her suitors.”

  “Whatever the cause,” said the Dean, “Dodgson had become an annoyance. Not that he got his way very often; but still he made my job harder. Nevertheless some alumni include him in their lists of illustrious personages who have spent time here and a few of the students like him, and he has tenure, in accordance with Christ Church rules, so we are stuck, or blessed, with him—depending on your point of view and his crusade of the moment.”

  The round of interviews continued.

  I sat in Ellen Terry’s dressing room as she applied makeup and told me of the years in which Dodgson would not communicate with her. He disapproved of her liaisons and the issue they produced. She also gave me complimentary tickets to the performance of As You Like It that night because of the article she believed me to be writing. The seats were not as good as I would have liked, but perhaps with more notice she could have provided better.

  Charles Collingwood, the nephew, prattled on about how Dodgson encouraged him to pursue a career of letters. I never mentioned the pointed comment on Dodgson’s list about Collingwood’s abilities. Instead I expressed admiration and envy. He told me how he would dedicate his life to furthering Dodgson’s reputation.

  To hear these and the others talk, each was the rock upon which Dodgson clung to for support or the misunderstood victim of his childish and ill-conceived crusades. I learned of his steady stream of good works. He printed copies of the Alice books at his own expense and donated them to children’s hospitals. He sought employment for a friend of his, the schoolmaster T. J. Dymes. Dodgson sent out 180 letters soliciting help for the man. Dodgson went to the home of a friendless college servant who was afflicted with typhoid fever and looked after the man.

  And I learned of eccentricities—list making, a nearly compulsive orderliness and absentmindedness being the most constant theme. His nephew related the most dramatic incident. Dodgson went to a children’s party and after entering the house, dropped on his hands and crawled where he heard the hubbub of voices, and he started emitting strange sounds. He thought it would be amusing if he entered as if he were a bear. Unfortunately he actually had gone not to the party but in error to the house next door where a conference of females was taking place in connection with some reform movement or other. Realizing his mistake, Mr. Dodgson suddenly rose to his feet and fled the house.

  And I heard the catalog of storms when his sensitivities were aroused. There were too many of these to enumerate. And he always seemed to be distributing photographs sometimes in the generous spirit of friendship and sometimes when he sought to curry favor.

  I presented all these details to Mr. Holmes on the appointed day. He listened to my report impatiently. He paused a few times to relight his clay pipe. I took this to be a subtle rebuke but proceeded with my recitation.

  “I hear no conclusion,” he said. “Are we no better off than we started?”

  “We know more,” I said.

  “So it would seem, and so much to the good,” said Mr. Holmes.

  “If I were to pick a culprit on the basis of these inquiries,” I said, “it would be Collingwood.”

  “Interesting,” said Holmes.

  “It would seem that Collingwood had the most to gain from possession of the four diaries,” I said. “He clearly wants to build a career on the shoulders of his uncle—establish himself as conservator of the legend and heir to the literary throne. Owning those diaries would enable him t
o write convincingly and knowledgeably of the intimate thoughts of his uncle during what some would call Dodgson’s most creative period. And if he cared to slip a little dagger into his uncle’s reputation as a revenge for Dodgson’s unkind judgments of Collingwood’s abilities, well, he’d have the means.”

  “What about Dean Liddell?” asked Mr. Holmes. “The two have been at odds for the longest of times.”

  “True,” I said, “and he’d love nothing better but the sudden and complete departure of Charles Dodgson from Christ Church. The diaries would no doubt give him means to fulfill this petty dream. He’s certainly autocratic enough to confront Dodgson with the diaries and demand his immediate departure but it hasn’t happened. I conclude that poor Dean Liddell does not have the books in hand.”

  “Then,” asked Mr. Holmes, “shall we call upon Mr. Collingwood?”

  “No,” I said. “I do not believe he is our thief. He doesn’t have the spine or the imagination.”

  “Excellent,” said Mr. Holmes. “And therefore?”

  I let the question dangle in the air for a moment and then replied, “I have a theory both as to whom, why, and how.”

  Mr. Holmes beamed with a smile so broad, it would have cut a path through the densest of London fogs. “To whom do we then turn?”

  “I have a theory,” I replied, “but I wish to test it. Let us arrange a meeting with Mr. Dodgson.”

  “Capital,” said Mr. Holmes. “Now, tell me, young man, isn’t this fun?”

  I nodded and he beamed.

  Three days later we were back in Dodgson’s study. Instead of tea we were drinking ginger beer. After a proper review of our steps, Holmes gestured to me and bade me to speak.

  “I have a theory, professor,” I began, “and a hope. Your facility with the photographic arts is well known and revered. Do you, by any chance, have any photographs of this room.”

  “Yes,” he replied. “It has been my practice to photograph this and other chambers here on a regular basis and to make appropriate notations including the date, the time of day, quality of light coming though the window and atmospheric conditions. I have approximately twenty-five such studies of this room—Actually that would be forty-two images, if you count photographs taken by students and presented to me. “You see,” he added,”I stopped playing with photography in 1880 when they changed the materials. It just diminished the quality of the pictures. However some students needed help and encouragement, and so called on Dodgson.”