by Otto Penzler
VIII
Next morning, for a change, I was up before my friend. But I had hardly swung out of bed when Holmes opened his eyes. He was a remarkably light sleeper. No matter how tired out he had been, the slightest movement served to waken him.
“Aha, my friend,” he exclaimed cheerfully. “I’m not quite myself this morning. Surely you couldn’t have wakened before me.” I gave an involuntary smile.
We began to dress. Our movements and voices must have come to the attention of the household. Hardly twenty minutes had gone by when there was a knock on the door. A servant had come to ask whether we’d like tea served up in our room.
“No thanks, my dear chap,” Holmes answered. “We’ll have it in the dining-room.”
He waited till the servant had gone before giving me a look fraught with meaning, saying “It’ll be safer this way, especially being able to see the host drink first.”
Having completed our toilet, we entered the dining-room, where Boris Nikolayevitch and Nikolai Nikolayevitch were already sitting at breakfast.
There most probably had been a slight tiff between the brothers, at least judging from the end of the sentence uttered by Boris Nikolayevitch, “—you cannot possibly lay claim to any part of the inheritance. After all, you never paid so much as a visit to our uncle and he was entirely in my care.”
“A will represents the will of the departed,” Nikolai Nikolayevitch answered coldly. “Whether I visited him or not is beside the point. Since he left me a part of his estate, this is how it must be.”
Boris Nikolayevitch was about to say something, but noticing our arrival, broke off the conversation abruptly, greeted me very cordially and offered tea. “I hope you slept well,” he addressed us both.
“Oh, yes,” I said. “I slept like a log till morning.”
“And I, too,” said Holmes. “Country air does predispose one to sleep, especially after an energetic stroll. And we must’ve strolled round your place at least a full hour before retiring.”
“You have such a lovely nanny,” he added, turning to Nikolai Nikolayevich.
“Oh, indeed!” answered the young man smiling happily. Evidently, he liked having the old lady praised. His face lit up with a kind and sympathetic smile. “I do love the old lady,” he said tenderly, “for I have neither father nor mother. She is all I have left as the only loving reminder of my happy childhood.”
The brothers reminisced about their childhood, their capers and pranks. Our presence didn’t seem to divert them from their memories. However, when breakfast was over, before leaving the table, Boris Nikolayevitch turned to my friend, “You will allow me to ask a question, Mr. Holmes?”
“By all means,” came the answer.
“Forgive me for what might be considered an insolent question, but I am curious to know how far advanced is your investigation into clearing up the mysterious murder. In fact, has it advanced at all?”
Holmes gave an enigmatic smile. “Yes, one could say that it is advancing and successfully so,” he said. “But owing to certain circumstances I have to be circumspect and consider the time is not yet ripe for me to reveal the results. Of course, while I know I can rely on your discretion, nonetheless, an incautious word, involuntarily dropped, may serve to harm the course of events.”
Boris Nikolayevitch shrugged, “Of course, you know best and it would be silly of me to insist. Sooner or later, however, you’ll reveal all yourself, but since I do not belong amongst the ranks of the curious, I shall be silent, at least until such time as you yourself choose to share your secrets with me.”
We exchanged various trivia and then Holmes announced he had to say something to me in private. We thanked our host for breakfast and left the dining-room. We went back to our room, put on our hats and went out, following the country road further out. Holmes glanced around him, saw that nobody followed and we lessened our pace. Well over a mile later, we threw ourselves on the soft grass beside the road.
“Well, then, my dear Holmes, last night you promised you’d reveal something interesting to me concerning your preliminary findings. We are all alone here, and since we cannot be overheard, there is nothing to prevent us from speaking loudly and clearly.”
“True, true,” said Holmes and stretched himself out with evident pleasure on the green sward. “When we set off, it was with the intention of sharing with you everything I have done up to this point. If you are ready, I’ll begin.”
“Of course,” I said in joyful anticipation of a good story.
IX
Holmes stretched himself lazily, turned his head to face me and began his story.
“You probably remember, my dear Watson,” he began, “our first arrival on the scene. As soon as we arrived at the scene of the crime, I was really amazed at the inadequate attention the investigative authorities had given the matter. It was as if the crime was of no particular interest. They didn’t even bother to examine the room in which Kartzeff died. By the way, even from my initial glance at the bed on which he died, I was able to spot clues with the use of my magnifying glass and that put me on the right track. It was from that moment that I was convinced that the crime was committed not by a man, but by a beast.
“I spotted a few soft grey hairs on the blanket and the pillows. I examined them with a magnifying glass and established that they undoubtedly belonged to an animal. Then a close examination of the waxed parquet floor showed several traces of movement from the window to the bed and back again. These were long, with a narrow heel and long toes. They had definitely been made by an ape. I found the same sort of traces by the wall from which the window of the dead man looked out.
“It was clear that the ape had crept into Kartzeff’s room through the window pane, strangled him, clambered up to the roof and then descended using the rain pipe attached to the wall.
“An examination of the corpse only confirmed my assumption, as there were traces of an ape’s paws round the throat of the corpse.
“You know, of course, that I have often journeyed through India. I have covered nearly all the shores of the Indian Ocean, often travelling deep inland and, on several occasions, I saw the baboons which local Indians utilized for hunting. It was enough to show these dreaded animals the intended victim for them to leap on it with lightning-like agility, using their muscular paws to choke the life out of it. For some reason, these Indian baboons somehow came to mind when I looked at the scene of the crime.
“I have to admit that, at first, my suspicions fell strongly on Nikolai Nikolayevitch, of whom it was said that he visited his uncle extremely rarely and when departing never ever displayed any warmth. That’s why I hastened away with you to test my suspicions. But the old nanny’s account caused me to change my mind completely and all suspicions directed at Nikolai Nikolayevitch flew out of my mind.
“In fact, since then I had no doubt that his brother, Boris Nikolayevitch had committed the crime, although the latter hadn’t betrayed guilt in the slightest manner. His service and dismissal from the navy and merchant marine, his poor reputation and finally his travels up and down the Indian Ocean gave rise to the first suspicions. Even then, the thought struck me that it could have been there that this sort of ape was acquired by him.
“The threatening letter which came to us in the hotel only strengthened my suspicion. That letter was a terrible blunder on the part of Boris Nikolayevitch and became the prime mover in establishing his guilt. Of course, it is possible to disguise handwriting, but I am certain that a handwriting expert will prove that it is that of Boris Kartzeff.
“And so, this was the course of my thinking: he’d lost everything in riotous living and now he couldn’t wait for the death of his uncle. He knew about the will. And so, seeing that his own estate was about to go under the hammer, he decided to advance his way out of the situation.
“The fact is that from the moment of his arrival he had kept the ape under lock and key, let nobody see it, all this was a clear indication that he was up to no goo
d. Evidently, that damned beast had been prepared for its task long before and all he had to do was point it at the victim for it to carry out its task. This is how Kartzeff distanced himself from the crime, substituting a creature that had no sense of what it was doing, thus guaranteeing his own safety from punishment.
“I fully comprehended his train of thought and action, but I have to admit that as an intelligent man he too read my mind and intuitively realized he could not escape from me. Of that he must actually have been convinced on the very first day we met, and when we arrived the very first time he immediately decided to put an end to us. You, of course, hadn’t noticed that we had been assigned a room in which the window had a pane with a broken latch, nor that the room in which old Kartzeff had been strangled had a pane with a similarly broken latch.
“But on that occasion, his plan did not work. With foresight, I had nailed down the pane and for it to be opened there would have to be enough noise for us to be alerted. And that wasn’t part of the villain’s plan. I think you saw him in the window during our stroll last night—”
“Oh, I shall never forget that look, a mixture of fear and loathing,” I said.
“If until then I had any reservations about his guilt, all doubt vanished from that moment. And so, during the night, I waited for confirmation of my presuppositions,” said Holmes. “In any case, there’s not much more to tell you about the most recent events. You saw for yourself how an invisible hand tried to open the pane for that cursed animal to get into our room. Now, Watson, all that’s left is to lure him to a last desperate step. As soon as we return, I will announce that we have decided to depart for the city and, depending on how he reacts, we’ll decide what to do next. In the meantime, let us take our time getting back.”
X
We strolled back.
Boris Nikolayevitch was busy in the yard, handing out some sort of orders concerning household matters, when Sherlock Holmes approached and firmly stated that we had to return to Moscow this very day.
A hardly discernible gleam appeared in Kartzeff’s glance. But it was only momentary and, taking himself in hand, he said indifferently, “I am so sorry you cannot stay longer, but it can’t be helped. Work must come first. If you don’t intend to stop off at Silver Slopes, I’ll send you to the station by the direct road. I am only sorry that I cannot do so immediately. My horses are all out on the road and you’ll have to wait a few hours.”
“Oh, that’s no problem,” answered Sherlock Holmes.
“I’ll give instructions for you to be driven to the ferry. It belongs to me, by the way. From there, the same horses will take you to the station.”
“Excellent!” said Sherlock Holmes.
We thanked him again and went inside, where we chatted with Nikolai Nikolayevitch and Boris Nikolayevitch who occasionally dropped in on us. Nevertheless, hour after hour went by and no horses appeared.
At a convenient moment, when both brothers were out of the room at the same time, Holmes whispered to me softly, “I forgot to tell you another little detail. This morning a sock went missing. I deliberately placed my boots outside the door and stuffed my socks inside them. Tell me, why do you think a sock went missing?”
“I haven’t a clue. Now why should he need an old sock of yours,” I said with a smile.
“All the same, it is a serious matter,” said Holmes. “I am nearly certain that he needed the sock for that ape to scent.”
Dinner was served at five and went off normally. It was another two hours before the host informed us the horses were ready and awaited us by the porch. But even here there was a delay. Kartzeff examined the carriage and claimed it hadn’t been properly oiled. He gave instructions for it to be oiled all over again. It was clearly a deliberate attempt to delay us further.
Night was beginning to fall when, at last, we thanked the brothers for their hospitality, bade them farewell and departed. After a mile along the road, the carriage entered a forest. Now the sun set and it became completely dark.
“Be even more on your guard and hold on to your revolver,” Holmes whispered.
As we drove into the forest, the driver slowed down.
Holding his revolver in his hand, Holmes looked back and ordered me to do the same. The precaution was not wasted. A couple of miles into the forest, Holmes pressed my hand forcefully. Leaning over the seat with his outstretched hand holding a revolver, it was as if he was expecting some invisible foe. And suddenly, despite the darkness, I saw the fairly large, dark silhouette of some strange creature. It sped along the road after us in silent leaps. I had hardly become aware of what was going on, hardly had the thought flashed through my mind that this might be the apestrangler, when the terrifying creature caught up with us and made a colossal flying leap.
Simultaneously, our shots rang out. The damned creature crashed to the ground.
At exactly the same moment the driver tumbled head over heels off the coach-box and vanished amongst the trees. The horses surged forward, only to be stopped by Holmes’s powerful grip. He quickly passed the reins to me and, revolver in hand, jumped off the carriage. He ran a few quick steps towards the animal lying on the ground and a third shot rang out. He returned dragging the dead ape along with him. He threw it in, jumped on the coach-box, seized the reins and we galloped away. We raced through the forest with the speed of lightning. The foaming horses pulled up by the ferry.
We yelled and yelled, but nobody appeared. We had no idea how the ferry operated and ended up wasting the best part of an hour in fruitless activity, jumping on and off it and then alongside.
“The devil!” said Holmes fiercely. “He’ll catch up with us.”
We made another desperate attempt and this time success crowned our efforts. Just as we managed to find the end of the mooring rope, we heard the sound of horses galloping, but we had hardly managed to cast off when a troika came straight for us and into the water.
Two men leaped out and before we had time to gather ourselves together, they scrambled on board.
“Aha, so that’s what you are up to,” we heard a hoarse voice rage. In that moment I saw Boris Nikolayevitch leap like a cat at Holmes standing by the mooring rope. I threw myself to help him but powerful hands pinioned me.
The ferry forged ahead at full speed and there was nobody to see the life-and-death struggle being waged on board. We fought with every ounce of strength we possessed, we fought tooth and nail as we rolled over and over. In the heat of the struggle I couldn’t see what was happening with Holmes. I gathered up my last reserves of strength, seized my opponent by the throat and with every ounce of strength bashed his head in the darkness against the wooden planking. He, too, made a desperate effort, slipped out of my hands to roll over and vanish beneath the waves.
I leapt to my feet to help Holmes. But it was too late. I was nearly at his side, but he was in a deathly embrace with Kartseff and they went overboard together. Holmes vanished out of sight.
I kept on yelling and screaming for him, but the river was as unresponsive as the grave. Somehow I managed to steer the craft to the opposite shore and at the first village I raised the alarm. I invoked the help of the villagers, and entreated them to find my friend.
All night and day we searched and searched. We even requested the help of the village downriver, but all was in vain. Holmes had irrevocably vanished. We searched a further five days but to no avail. I set off for Moscow, where I laid everything before the police. Soon I departed for England, grieving the premature end of my best friend.
VLADIMIR NABOKOV
REVENGE
Although Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (1899–1977) became a naturalized American citizen in 1945, it is appropriate for him to be regarded as a Russian, too, having been born in St. Petersburg to an old family of nobility. In his childhood, he and his family spoke Russian, English and French fluently, and the boy was more comfortable in English during his pre-teen years. After his home was taken by the Bolsheviks, he left Russia, living in Ger
many and France from 1922 to 1940, when he moved to America. He earned his living by writing poetry and prose; his first nine novels were written in Russian, and subsequent work in English. Regarded as a major emigre Russian writer in the 1930s, his books were banned in the Soviet Union.
With the publication of Lolita in 1955 and its immediate (and enormous) success, he was able to retire from teaching (Russian and European literature at Cornell) and returned to Europe in 1961 to devote full time to writing. He settled into a luxury hotel in Switzerland and lived there for the rest of his life. Lolita is the famous novel of Humbert Humbert, a man who becomes obsessed with a 12-year-old girl, whose name has become part of the English language as a description of a sexually precocious girl. It was selected by the Modern Library as #4 on the list of the 100 greatest English language novels of the twentieth century. His other major works include Pnin (1957), Pale Fire (1962) and Ada, or Ardor: A Family Chronicle (1969).
“Revenge” was written in Russian and first published in 1924; it is collected in The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov (New York, Knopf, 1995).
1
Ostend, the stone wharf, the gray strand, the distant row of hotels, were all slowly rotating as they receded into the turquoise haze of an autumn day.
The professor wrapped his legs in a tartan lap robe, and the chaise longue creaked as he reclined into its canvas comfort. The clean, ochre-red deck was crowded but quiet. The boilers heaved discreetly.
An English girl in worsted stockings, indicating the professor with a motion of her eyebrow, addressed her brother who was standing nearby: “Looks like Sheldon, doesn’t he?”
Sheldon was a comic actor, a bald giant with a round, flabby face. “He’s really enjoying the sea,” the girl added sotto voce. Whereupon, I regret to say, she drops out of my story.