The Mystery of Briony Lodge
Page 9
* * *
In the cab home I fell into a brown study. Miss Lodge’s effect upon me had been far deeper than I had realized. By an irony of fate, the letter from George that had secured us freedom from a police charge had, in the same instant, revealed my dear Briony’s complicity in the crime. What motive she may have had in spinning her false tale I could not tell, unless she meant to distract the real Holmes from the real Briony Lodge, and whatever intrigue there was about that place that involved kings and contraltos.
And yet, and yet… There was something about Briony that still rang true through all the falsity. Was it her precise, forthright manner that suggested she always spoke plainly and honestly? Whether she were addressing the girls in her charge (if she had any), or the very mightiest in the land, or St Peter himself at the Last Trump—it would make no difference to that noble heart. No, there was not an ounce of guile in her. Or were my thoughts simply those of a lovesick man, who judges character by the curve of a neck and gives credence to the prettiness of a mouth? I did not know. Of one thing only I was certain: that I would never see her again.
We paid off the cabbie, and went up to my rooms, giving Boots sixpence to bring up the luggage.
‘Sixpence, guv?’ replied Boots. ‘Sixpence? Sixpence—to cover a lifetime’s hosteopathy treatment and provide for my loved ones?’
I gave him another threepenny bit and he suddenly seemed quite contented. Boots will never be a businessman.
‘Psst! Psst! This way, Mr J.!’
It was Mrs Hudson, waylaying us before we had reached my rooms.
‘Whatever is it, Mrs H.?’ I said.
‘It’s Miss Briony, sir. She’s here in the house. I’ve hid her. Those two Germans were back here looking for her. Then she herself come along in the middle of the night, looking like a drownded rat, the poor lamb. She’d been hiding from them and thought they wouldn’t come back here again, but I’m not so sure. I’ve got to go out now, sir. Mr Holmes is due back any minute and I’ve no porter for him. He loves ’is porter, he does, after a night out. Can get all mopey without it, and you know what that means. So can I leave her in your care?’
I nodded, hardly daring to believe this turn of events. Hardly daring even to breathe.
‘That’s very kind, Mr J. She’s been looking forward to seeing you again, she has!’
Mrs Hudson led us into the kitchen, where Briony, looking lovelier than ever, was holding Montmorency to her bosom. For a moment, with the light streaming in from the pantry window and illuminating her hair, I dared to imagine… no, I can hardly admit it. And yet I must. If this small memoir of mine is to have any lasting worth, it must record the whole truth. I dared to imagine that one day that vision of loveliness would be holding not my dog but… I must write the words… our child!
‘Miss Lodge! But I thought… George wrote and told us…’
‘I know what you must think of me, but I can explain everything.’
‘We cannot stay here,’ I pointed out. We must go to my rooms. We can keep you safe there. Come on, Harris. Harris?’
‘With you in a sec, old chap. Do you know how long it’s been since breakfast? And I see that Mrs Hudson has just made another of her superb fruit pies.’
‘All right, then. But don’t dally, and come up as soon as you are finished. We must protect Miss Lodge.’
‘Righto,’ said Harris, spoon already in hand.
* * *
I let Briony and Montmorency into my room and was careful to lock the door behind us. It was an irregular way of entertaining a young lady, but I felt I had Mrs H’s blessing.
‘Mr Jerome. J.—I may call you J., mayn’t I? It is not too familiar of me, is it? I know from Mrs Hudson what Mr Wingrave has told you about me, for he also told it to her: that I am an imposter. I can only say it is not true. My name is Briony Lodge and I can prove it if necessary. Until yesterday I did not even know that in the same avenue as mine there was also a house called ‘Briony Lodge’. It is at the other end of the avenue, and in my brief time here, and with my work and late hours at the school, I had no cause to explore up there. When I first heard, I assumed that the letters I had received were intended for the house; that someone there was being threatened and not me after all. But that does not explain it, does it?’
‘Why not?’ I asked, secretly joying within myself to hear this magnificent girl affirm her innocence.
‘Don’t you remember? The letters were addressed very specifically to “The Woman Briony Lodge”—don’t you see? The woman, and not the villa! They were meant for me! But why and how, that I do not understand.’
At this point there was a knock on the door—Harris back from his demolition of Mrs Hudson’s latest creation, no doubt—and I walked over to unlock the door for him. Eagerly I resumed my conversation with Briony.
‘No, Miss Lodge. You are quite wrong. I am sorry to be direct, but I must be on this point, as you would be with your girls if any of them were to make a mistake in punctuation.’ I delighted to see her reaction.
‘Punctuation, J.? I do not understand.’
‘Check your envelopes, the ones you showed me. You will find that they were addressed not to “The Woman Briony Lodge” but rather to “The Woman, Briony Lodge”. The postman knew of two Briony Lodges in Serpentine Avenue, as it was his job to know, and assumed that the designation was to help him. What he did not know was that the resident of Briony Lodge, Irene Adler, had an alias, as I heard last night from the superintendent of Maidenhead Police, which her agents used: “The Woman”. The letters were intended for her after all. You have nothing whatever to do with this conspiracy. Your innocence is assured!’
I took Briony’s hands in mine, and stared into those twin pools of blue.
From the open door came the sound of a slow handclap. If ever a handclap could be described as dripping in sarcasm, it would have been that one.
‘Don’t be an ass, Harris,’ I said, without looking away from those mesmerizing eyes.
‘Not at all, Mr Jerome,’ said a voice that was not Harris’s. ‘You have done very well for an amateur. Very well indeed. Under other circumstances I could happily have found a man of your skills a place in my organization. But, alas, quite another fate lies in store for you: you know too much. May I come in? Thank you.’
Now I did turn around, to see the man who had called himself Lestrade close the door to and stride to the centre of the room. He took out a Mauser pistol from one pocket of his raincoat and a silencer from the other, and fitted them together with a practised air.
‘Oh, do not try to call for your friend Mr Harris. You would in any case be dead before he got here. Besides, my assistant Steiner is with him in the kitchen. Steiner does not say much, but he gets his point across, if you know what I mean. There is no-one else in the house at all. No-one to disturb us. You know, it grieves me to have dispose of such a lovely young couple as you—to say nothing of the dog, of course—on such a short acquaintance. But, as you can imagine, it goes with the job, as your quaint English phrase has it.’
At this, Montmorency began to whine pitifully and to pull me back by the trouser leg. Briony edged back with us, until we reached the wall and could retreat no further.
‘You are forgetting one thing, Lestrade. If that is your name,’ I said.
‘Indeed? I cannot imagine I have done so. And, if I have, would it not be extremely foolish of you to remind me of it at this juncture?’
‘Mrs Hudson told us that Holmes was expected back at any moment. He is bound to notice that something is wrong, and your game will be up.’
‘You are of course quite right, Mr Jerome. (Oh, by the way, my name is Bahn. Otto Bahn, not Lestrade. I believe that you have a strange habit in this country of being allowed to know the name of your executioner.) There was always the chance of Mr Holmes coming back. But I have it on excellent authority that he is not. Not yet at least.’
‘How do you know?’ asked Briony, her voice clear and unafraid.
‘Good—I see that you have lined yourselves up against the wall in the time-honoured fashion, without any bidding from me. Now, if both of you would keep very still, I can assure you a quick death without suffering. I am an excellent shot and can do this with two rounds only. I do not intend to waste a bullet on your little dog. My boots are quite heavy enough, don’t you think?’
I took Briony’s hand in mine and squeezed it. She squeezed back, but continued to gaze ahead with those intense blue eyes, defying her murderer to the last. She showed no fear whatever. Montmorency rubbed against the back of our calves, whimpering softly.
Bahn raised the Mauser and took aim at my forehead.
Two shots rang out in quick succession. And Otto Bahn fell forward, lifelessly, to the floor.
Chapter Seventeen
The real Inspector Lestrade—A dreadful conspiracy unveiled—How George saved the day without ever understanding anything
There were six of us: Briony Lodge, William Samuel Harris, George Wingrave, Montmorency, myself—and Inspector Lestrade. The real one, I mean. Not Otto Bahn, who called himself Lestrade, whose body was even now being removed from the house in a police ambulance. We sat in the kitchen, each one of us with a cup of strong, sweet tea, with just a spot in it of the stuff that both cheers and inebriates. A sovereign remedy for shock, says Mrs Hudson. And who were we to disagree?
‘Well, gentlemen—and you, miss—it seems you are all to be congratulated,’ said Lestrade expansively. ‘Miss Lodge and Mr J. managed to disarm, and to kill with his own gun, one of the most desperate foreign agents operating in London. And you, Mr Harris, laid his lieutenant out cold with a piece of kitchen equipment. But how you all did it… that’s what I want to know!’
‘The greedy blighter had eaten Mrs Hudson’s fruit pie and still wanted more. I told him I thought she had baked some Welsh cakes as well, and suggested he took a look in the stove. He never expected the girdle stone!’
‘And now you must tell us something, Inspector,’ said Briony, deftly changing the subject. ‘What was the mystery of Serpentine Avenue? I have heard all sorts of things about mysterious contraltos and crowned heads. What was it all about, and where did I fit into their scheme?’
‘Well, I suppose you have a right to know,’ said Lestrade, scratching his head. ‘But first I shall have to swear you to complete secrecy on your word of honour as a gentleman or as a lady, depending. It seems that the King of Bohemia had once known this Irene Adler person very well, if you get my drift (begging your pardon for speaking direct, miss), and there existed a rather compromising photograph of the pair. The King was due to be married to another party, and was naturally anxious to retrieve the said item in case it were held over his head for blackmail. But Miss Adler was equally anxious to hold on to it. It was her security, if you like. He sent his best agents after it, but Miss Adler outwitted them every time.’
‘She sounds like a formidable woman,’ said Briony.
‘Oh, she is that, miss. I think you two would get on if ever you met… Anyway, at last the King saw sense, and engaged the services of Mr Holmes, like he should have done in the first place. And there you might have thought it was all over bar the shouting, as they say. But what neither the King nor Miss Adler knew was that there was a group of Bohemian anarchists loose in England. They wanted the photograph in order to embarrass the King and start an anarchist revolution over there. They got spooked good and proper when Mr Holmes joined the fun. So they started sending orange pips to Miss Adler—a familiar enough way among these secret societies of threatening imminent assassination—to panic her into making the photograph public.’
‘It wasn’t familiar to me,’ protested George, sounding rather aggrieved. ‘I mean, that business of the orange pips.’
‘Nor to me,’ I said.
‘Well, sirs, that just goes to show you don’t move in the wrong circles. Now these anarchists might have pulled it off too, but for two factors they could not have predicted. The first was that Mr Holmes’s brother, who I understand is quite a big-wig in Whitehall, knew all about them and Dr Watson was sent to their hide-out in Oxford to keep an eye on them, supported by the local police. The second factor was that, unfortunately for them, the orange pips got sent to Miss Lodge by mistake. Miss Lodge came to Baker Street, and they feared that Mr Holmes would put two and two together. But by a stroke of luck—for them, this time—Miss Lodge was sent up to 221d instead of 221b. Mr Harris and Mr J. go off to Maidenhead, and in some manner I’m still not clear about, did for the anarchist called ‘Jan’, then came back here, and accounted for Bahn in the same way and put Steiner in the prison hospital. That’s what I call a result.’
‘And let’s not forget Miss Lodge’s contribution,’ I said firmly, and Montmorency seemed to bark his approval, to general mirth.
‘No, Mr J.—a braver woman than Miss Lodge I have not yet met,’ said Lestrade.
‘And let’s not forget George,’ said Harris, sportingly. ‘Without his letter J. and I would still be in that Maidenhead lock-up.’
‘Mr Wingrave did more than that—much more—I assure you. You see, it had been Mr Holmes’s plan all along to gain entry to Miss Adler’s villa by posing as a clergyman who had been knocked down in a fracas outside her front door. He then hoped to observe where she hid the photographs by raising the alarm of fire. A woman, you see, will invariably rescue the thing most dear to her before making her own escape. For a mother, it would be a babe in arms. For an adventuress like Irene Adler, it would be her assets. Mr Wingrave not only laid Mr Holmes out—incidentally, Mr Wingrave, Mr Holmes asked me to tell you to feint with your right before striking with your left, and of course to work on your accuracy—but even set fire to the curtains which had the desired effect on Miss Adler’s psychology, as Mr Holmes was able to observe from the comfort of his sofa. So—a fine job all round. If ever I find myself stretched and in need of cool brains and stout fists, I might well call on you again, if I may.’
Lestrade pushed his cup and saucer aside and stood.
‘And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to the Yard. You would not believe the paperwork this case has generated. Why, even the message on that little wrapper thing that Jan the anarchist dropped…’
‘Die Hamburgerischeschokoladevereinsgesellschaft?’ offered Harris.
‘That’s the one. Did you know that that string of letters contains thirty-two possible combinations of secret messages, if the target language is English, according to the lab boys? Six hundred and forty-eight, if it is Welsh. I reckon it was just a chocolate wrapper, though. Anyway, good afternoon, Miss. Gents. I know my way out.’
As Lestrade left the kitchen, Mrs Hudson entered.
‘Oh, Mr J. That German friend of yours has left a terrible mess on your carpet. Right in the middle of the room as well. I’ll do my best to get it up, but there’ll always be a stain. I’ve a good mind to stop it out of your deposit.’
‘Do as you wish, Mrs H. I really don’t mind,’ I laughed, looking deep into Briony’s eyes.
‘Well, there is an old round rug I never use which would cover up the bloodstain nicely. No-one would ever know. Now then, gentlemen, if you would kindly leave my kitchen I would much appreciate it. I have plenty to be getting on with, and what with inanimate Germans cluttering up the place I am all behind. Oh, not you, Briony, nor you, Mr J. I think you two need to go into my parlour and have a quiet word, don’t you? And Montmorency, of course.’
Chapter Eighteen
The mysteries of canine communication—My proposal to Miss Lodge—Her surprising proposition to me—Man proposes, Dog disposes
Without any demur, Briony, Montmorency, and I went into Mrs H.’s private parlour, conscious that we had been granted an exceptional honour.
‘Well, Miss Lodge,’ I said when we were seated.
‘Well, Mr Jerome,’ she replied.
Then we both fell about laughing.
‘We shouldn’t really laugh, you know. The man is dead,’ I reproved her, but was unable to keep a straight face myself.
‘I know,’ she said, still laughing heartily. ‘I suppose it is just the sudden release of pent-up emotion. It’s not in the least funny. He couldn’t have had any idea what was happening when Mr Holmes fired those shots through the floor. And all because Mrs Hudson hadn’t got him his porter in time!’
Then she collapsed into renewed peals of laughter.
‘But… but what I don’t understand is why Montmorency did not bark. He must have heard Holmes enter by the street door.’
‘Oh, J.—you really don’t speak Montmorency at all, do you? Monty only barks when a stranger comes to the street door. Mr Holmes isn’t a stranger. He lives here. But one always expects a dog to bark. That is where Lestrade—I mean Otto Bahn—made his mistake. Monty was the dog that did not bark.’
Montmorency—or ‘Monty’, as he had now been christened by Briony, and I admit the name does suit him very well—shared himself between us, jumping and wagging his tail before quietly settling down on Briony’s lap with a highly proprietorial air. Our laughter had subsided, and I was alone in the parlour with the two beings whose company I craved most. George and Harris were good friends—the best—but Briony and Montmorency were like a part of myself. There was something I knew I had to ask Briony. But I did not know if it were the right time.