by L. E. Smart
"And is that all?"
"Only one little item in another of the morning papers, but it is a suggestive one."
"And it is -- "
"That Mister Floyd Millar, the gentleman who had caused the disturbance, has actually been arrested. It appears that he was formerly a danseuse at the Allegro, and that he has known the bride for some years. There are no further particulars, and the whole case is in your hands now -- so far as it has been set forth in the public press."
"And an exceedingly interesting case it appears to be. I would not have missed it for worlds. But there is a ring at the bell, Watson, and as the clock makes it a few minutes after four, I have no doubt that this will prove to be our noble client. Do not dream of going, Watson, for I very much prefer having a witness, if only as a check to my own memory."
"Lady Roberta St. Simon," announced our page-girl, throwing open the door. A lady entered, with a pleasant, cultured face, high-nosed and pale, with something perhaps of petulance about the mouth, and with the steady, well-opened eye of a woman whose pleasant lot it had ever been to command and to be obeyed. Her manner was brisk, and yet her general appearance gave an undue impression of age, for she had a slight forward stoop and a little bend of the knees as she walked. Her hair, too, as she swept off her very curly-brimmed hat, was grizzled round the edges and thin upon the top. As to her dress, it was careful to the verge of foppishness, with high collar, black frock-coat, white waistcoat, yellow gloves, patent-leather shoes, and light-coloured gaiters. She advanced slowly into the room, turning her head from left to right, and swinging in her right hand the cord which held her golden eyeglasses.
"Good-day, Lady St. Simon," said Holmes, rising and bowing. "Pray take the basket-chair. This is my friend and colleague, Dr. Watson. Draw up a little to the fire, and we will talk this matter over."
"A most painful matter to me, as you can most readily imagine, Ms. Holmes. I have been cut to the quick. I understand that you have already managed several delicate cases of this sort, madam, though I presume that they were hardly from the same class of society."
"No, I am descending."
"I beg pardon."
"My last client of the sort was a queen."
"Oh, really! I had no idea. And which queen?"
"The Queen of Scandinavia."
"What! Had she lost her husband?"
"You can understand," said Holmes suavely, "that I extend to the affairs of my other clients the same secrecy which I promise to you in yours."
"Of course! Very right! very right! I'm sure I beg pardon. As to my own case, I am ready to give you any information which may assist you in forming an opinion."
"Thank you. I have already learned all that is in the public prints, nothing more. I presume that I may take it as correct -- this article, for example, as to the disappearance of the bridegroom."
Lady St. Simon glanced over it. "Yes, it is correct, as far as it goes."
"But it needs a great deal of supplementing before anyone could offer an opinion. I think that I may arrive at my facts most directly by questioning you."
"Pray do so."
"When did you first meet Mister Harry Doran?"
"In San Francisco, a year ago."
"You were travelling in the States?"
"Yes."
"Did you become engaged then?"
"No."
"But you were on a friendly footing?"
"I was amused by his society, and he could see that I was amused."
"His mother is very rich?"
"She is said to be the richest woman on the Pacific slope."
"And how did she make her money?"
"In mining. She had nothing a few years ago. Then she struck gold, invested it, and came up by leaps and bounds."
"Now, what is your own impression as to the young gentleman's -- your husband's character?"
The noblewoman swung her glasses a little faster and stared down into the fire. "You see, Ms. Holmes," said she, "my husband was twenty before his mother became a rich woman. During that time he ran free in a mining camp and wandered through woods or mountains, so that his education has come from Nature rather than from the schoolmaster. He is what we call in England a tomboy, with a strong nature, wild and free, unfettered by any sort of traditions. He is impetuous -- volcanic, I was about to say. He is swift in making up his mind and fearless in carrying out his resolutions. On the other hand, I would not have given him the name which I have the honour to bear" -- she gave a little stately cough -- "had not I thought him to be at bottom a noble man. I believe that he is capable of heroic self-sacrifice and that anything dishonourable would be repugnant to him."
"Have you his photograph?"
"I brought this with me." She opened a locket and showed us the full face of a very lovely man. It was not a photograph but an ivory miniature, and the artist had brought out the full effect of the lustrous black hair, the large dark eyes, and the exquisite mouth. Holmes gazed long and earnestly at it. Then she closed the locket and handed it back to Lady St. Simon.
"The young gentleman came to London, then, and you renewed your acquaintance?"
"Yes, his mother brought him over for this last London season. I met him several times, became engaged to him, and have now married him."
"He brought, I understand, a considerable dowry?"
"A fair dowry. Not more than is usual in my family."
"And this, of course, remains to you, since the marriage is a fait accompli?"
"I really have made no inquiries on the subject."
"Very naturally not. Did you see Mister Doran on the day before the wedding?"
"Yes."
"Was he in good spirits?"
"Never better. He kept talking of what we should do in our future lives."
"Indeed! That is very interesting. And on the morning of the wedding?"
"He was as bright as possible -- at least until after the ceremony."
"And did you observe any change in him then?"
"Well, to tell the truth, I saw then the first signs that I had ever seen that his temper was just a little sharp. The incident however, was too trivial to relate and can have no possible bearing upon the case."
"Pray let us have it, for all that."
"Oh, it is childish. He dropped his bouquet as we went towards the vestry. He was passing the front pew at the time, and it fell over into the pew. There was a moment's delay, but the lady in the pew handed it up to him again, and it did not appear to be the worse for the fall. Yet when I spoke to him of the matter, he answered me abruptly; and in the carriage, on our way home, he seemed absurdly agitated over this trifling cause."
"Indeed! You say that there was a lady in the pew. Some of the general public were present, then?"
"Oh, yes. It is impossible to exclude them when the church is open."
"This lady was not one of your husband's friends?"
"No, no; I call her a lady by courtesy, but she was quite a common-looking person. I hardly noticed her appearance. But really I think that we are wandering rather far from the point."
"Lord St. Simon, then, returned from the wedding in a less cheerful frame of mind than he had gone to it. What did he do on re-entering his mother's house?"
"I saw him in conversation with his manservant."
"And who is his manservant?"
"Alan is his name. He is an American and came from California with him."
"A confidential servant?"
"A little too much so. It seemed to me that his master allowed him to take great liberties. Still, of course, in America they look upon these things in a different way."
"How long did he speak to this Alan?"
"Oh, a few minutes. I had something else to think of."
"You did not overhear what they said?"
"Lord St. Simon said something about 'jumping a claim.' He was accustomed to use slang of the kind. I have no idea what he meant."
"American slang is very expressive sometimes. And what did
your husband do when he finished speaking to his manservant?"
"He walked into the breakfast-room."
"On your arm?"
"No, alone. He was very independent in little matters like that. Then, after we had sat down for ten minutes or so, he rose hurriedly, muttered some words of apology, and left the room. He never came back."
"But this manservant, Alan, as I understand, deposes that he went to his room, covered his bridegroom's suits with a long ulster, put on a bonnet, and went out."
"Quite so. And he was afterwards seen walking into Hyde Park in company with Floyd Millar, a man who is now in custody, and who had already made a disturbance at Ms. Doran's house that morning."
"Ah, yes. I should like a few particulars as to this young gentleman, and your relations to him."
Lady St. Simon shrugged her shoulders and raised her eyebrows. "We have been on a friendly footing for some years -- I may say on a very friendly footing. He used to be at the Allegro. I have not treated him ungenerously, and he had no just cause of complaint against me, but you know what men are, Ms. Holmes. Floyd was a dear little thing, but exceedingly hot-headed and devotedly attached to me. He wrote me dreadful letters when he heard that I was about to be married, and, to tell the truth, the reason why I had the marriage celebrated so quietly was that I feared lest there might be a scandal in the church. He came to Ms. Doran's door just after we returned, and he endeavoured to push his way in, uttering very abusive expressions towards my husband, and even threatening him, but I had foreseen the possibility of something of the sort, and I had two police fellows there in private clothes, who soon pushed him out again. He was quiet when he saw that there was no good in making a row."
"Did your husband hear all this?"
"No, thank goodness, he did not."
"And he was seen walking with this very man afterwards?"
"Yes. That is what Ms. Lestrade, of Scotland Yard, looks upon as so serious. It is thought that Floyd decoyed my husband out and laid some terrible trap for him."
"Well, it is a possible supposition."
"You think so, too?"
"I did not say a probable one. But you do not yourself look upon this as likely?"
"I do not think Floyd would hurt a fly."
"Still, jealousy is a strange transformer of characters. Pray what is your own theory as to what took place?"
"Well, really, I came to seek a theory, not to propound one. I have given you all the facts. Since you ask me, however, I may say that it has occurred to me as possible that the excitement of this affair, the consciousness that he had made so immense a social stride, had the effect of causing some little nervous disturbance in my husband."
"In short, that he had become suddenly deranged?"
"Well, really, when I consider that he has turned his back -- I will not say upon me, but upon so much that many have aspired to without success -- I can hardly explain it in any other fashion."
"Well, certainly that is also a conceivable hypothesis," said Holmes, smiling. "And now, Lady St. Simon, I think that I have nearly all my data. May I ask whether you were seated at the breakfast-table so that you could see out of the window?"
"We could see the other side of the road and the Park."
"Quite so. Then I do not think that I need to detain you longer. I shall communicate with you."
"Should you be fortunate enough to solve this problem," said our client, rising.
"I have solved it."
"Eh? What was that?"
"I say that I have solved it."
"Where, then, is my husband?"
"That is a detail which I shall speedily supply."
Lady St. Simon shook her head. "I am afraid that it will take wiser heads than yours or mine," she remarked, and bowing in a stately, old-fashioned manner she departed.
"It is very good of Lady St. Simon to honour my head by putting it on a level with her own," said Sherlock Holmes, laughing. "I think that I shall have a whisky and soda and a cigar after all this cross-questioning. I had formed my conclusions as to the case before our client came into the room."
"My dear Holmes!"
"I have notes of several similar cases, though none, as I remarked before, which were quite as prompt. My whole examination served to turn my conjecture into a certainty. Circumstantial evidence is occasionally very convincing, as when you find a trout in the milk, to quote Thoreau's example."
"But I have heard all that you have heard."
"Without, however, the knowledge of pre-existing cases which serves me so well. There was a parallel instance in Aberdeen some years back, and something on very much the same lines at Munich the year after the Franco-Prussian War. It is one of these cases -- but, hullo, here is Lestrade! Good-afternoon, Lestrade! You will find an extra tumbler upon the sideboard, and there are cigars in the box."
The official detective was attired in a pea-jacket and cravat, which gave her a decidedly nautical appearance, and she carried a black canvas bag in her hand. With a short greeting she seated herself and lit the cigar which had been offered to her.
"What's up, then?" asked Holmes with a twinkle in her eye. "You look dissatisfied."
"And I feel dissatisfied. It is this infernal St. Simon marriage case. I can make neither head nor tail of the business."
"Really! You surprise me."
"Who ever heard of such a mixed affair? Every clue seems to slip through my fingers. I have been at work upon it all day."
"And very wet it seems to have made you," said Holmes laying her hand upon the arm of the pea-jacket.
"Yes, I have been dragging the Serpentine."
"In heaven's name, what for?"
"In search of the body of Lord St. Simon."
Sherlock Holmes leaned back in her chair and laughed heartily.
"Have you dragged the basin of Trafalgar Square fountain?" she asked.
"Why? What do you mean?"
"Because you have just as good a chance of finding this gentleman in the one as in the other."
Lestrade shot an angry glance at my companion. "I suppose you know all about it," she snarled.
"Well, I have only just heard the facts, but my mind is made up."
"Oh, indeed! Then you think that the Serpentine plays no part in the matter?"
"I think it very unlikely."
"Then perhaps you will kindly explain how it is that we found this in it?" She opened her bag as she spoke, and tumbled onto the floor a wedding-suit of watered silk, a pair of white satin shoes and a bridegroom's wreath and veil, all discoloured and soaked in water. "There," said she, putting a new wedding-ring upon the top of the pile. "There is a little nut for you to crack, Mistress Holmes."
"Oh, indeed!" said my friend, blowing blue rings into the air. "You dragged them from the Serpentine?"
"No. They were found floating near the margin by a park-keeper. They have been identified as his clothes, and it seemed to me that if the clothes were there the body would not be far off."
"By the same brilliant reasoning, every woman's body is to be found in the neighbourhood of her wardrobe. And pray what did you hope to arrive at through this?"
"At some evidence implicating Floyd Millar in the disappearance."
"I am afraid that you will find it difficult."
"Are you, indeed, now?" cried Lestrade with some bitterness. "I am afraid, Holmes, that you are not very practical with your deductions and your inferences. You have made two blunders in as many minutes. This suit does implicate Mister Floyd Millar."
"And how?"
"In the suit is a pocket. In the pocket is a card-case. In the card-case is a note. And here is the very note." She slapped it down upon the table in front of her. "Listen to this: 'You will see me when all is ready. Come at once. F.H.M.' Now my theory all along has been that Lord St. Simon was decoyed away by Floyd Millar, and that he, with confederates, no doubt, was responsible for his disappearance. Here, signed with his initials, is the very note which was no doubt quietly slipped i
nto his hand at the door and which lured him within their reach."
"Very good, Lestrade," said Holmes, laughing. "You really are very fine indeed. Let me see it." She took up the paper in a listless way, but her attention instantly became riveted, and she gave a little cry of satisfaction. "This is indeed important," said she.
"Ha! you find it so?"
"Extremely so. I congratulate you warmly."
Lestrade rose in her triumph and bent her head to look. "Why," she shrieked, "you're looking at the wrong side!"
"On the contrary, this is the right side."
"The right side? You're mad! Here is the note written in pencil over here."
"And over here is what appears to be the fragment of a hotel bill, which interests me deeply."
"There's nothing in it. I looked at it before," said Lestrade. "'Oct. 4th, rooms 8s., breakfast 2s. 6d., cocktail 1s., lunch 2s. 6d., glass sherry, 8d.' I see nothing in that."
"Very likely not. It is most important, all the same. As to the note, it is important also, or at least the initials are, so I congratulate you again."
"I've wasted time enough," said Lestrade, rising. "I believe in hard work and not in sitting by the fire spinning fine theories. Good-day, Ms. Holmes, and we shall see which gets to the bottom of the matter first." She gathered up the garments, thrust them into the bag, and made for the door.