by Mike Hogan
“Who drew this? Who was the artist? It is very fine.”
Churchill and Billy chuckled.
“It was drawn by Wiggins’s uncle Josiah,” said Holmes. “He specialises in drawings of Britannia.”
“Eh?”
“Five-pound notes: he is a forger.”
There was a long, loud ring at the doorbell.
“Damnation,” I said, hobbling to the window. “That will disturb Mrs Hudson’s rest. Quick Billy, go down and answer - oh.”
Holmes joined me at the window.
“It is a police officer,” he said. He turned to Churchill. “If there is anything we should know about your adventure last night, young man, now is the time to confess it.”
3. The Police Constable and The Milliner
The Stalking of PC DR42
Billy led a tall police constable with a fine, black walrus moustache into our sitting room.
“Good morning, Constable,” I said. “You can put your helmet on the table.” I ushered him to the sofa where he sat stiffly, looking ill at ease. He turned to Holmes.
“Am I correct in assuming, sir, that I am addressing Mr Sherlock Holmes?”
“Yes,” said Holmes flopping back into his chair. “May I ask how you knew?”
“My sergeant gave me a description of you, sir, and of Doctor Watson.”
I bowed.
“Your informant is Sergeant Baynes?” I asked.
“Indeed, sir. He was most insistent that I put my position fairly before you, and ask for your help. I am in the most awkward bind any police officer has ever been in. It is the women, sirs: they dog me night and day.”
“Well,” said Holmes reaching for his pipe. “Constable DR42 Endaby, why don’t you tell us your side of this unfortunate Caspar affair.”
The policeman sprang up, bewildered.
“How did you know, Mr Holmes?”
Holmes shook his head and blew a smoke ring across the room.
“Your number is on your collar, Endaby,” I said. “Come to the window.”
PC Endaby and I looked down at Baker Street. A half-dozen respectably dressed young women congregated on the pavement below talking animatedly. Two held banners on poles: the first said ‘Women’s Rights’, the second simply, ‘Fiend’.
“They’ve dogged me from Tottenham Court Road,” said Endaby shaking his head.
One of the women looked up and spotted us. She pointed and let out a shrill cry that the others instantly took up.
“Dogged,” said Holmes, “is hardly the mot juste.”
Holmes settled in his accustomed chair before the fireplace, bent forward with his elbows on his knees and his hands steepled before his face.
“Endaby, you will understand that I, like the rest of London town, have read the newspaper version of events in the Elizabeth Caspar affair. Pray you begin your tale.”
I took my pocket notebook from my jacket pocket and hunted on the desk for a pencil.
“Spencer-Churchill,” said Holmes. “Take notes.”
I replaced my notebook as the boy sat at the table, opened a large notebook and regarded PC Endaby with the eagerness of a hunting dog on point. I noted with some annoyance that the pencil he held was mine.
“It’s like this, sirs,” said Endaby. “On the day in question, I was on fixed-point duty in Regent Street -”
“Where exactly?” asked Holmes. “Be as exact as you can. I need precise data.”
“The west side, sir, at the corner of Conduit Street. A constable is on duty there day and night. I came off my shift at eight in the evening, and I thought I would take a turn along Regent Street towards Oxford Circus.”
“Why?” asked Holmes.
“It was a fine evening, sir. And I hoped to meet one of my colleagues stationed there to arrange a quiet drink or two after work.”
“You trace this route habitually?”
“Mostly of a Friday. I walked up Regent Street at a steady pace and reached Oxford Circus. My pal wasn’t in sight, so I crossed Oxford Street -”
Holmes held up his hand.
“Your simplest way back to Tottenham Court Road and your station would be to turn right into Oxford Street, would it not?”
“Yes, sir, but I thought I might catch my pal on the corner of Great Castle Street.”
Holmes nodded.
“The crowd thinned after I left the Circus behind. I noticed a well-dressed young woman walking in a certain manner, sir. She was swinging her bag and her parasol, and stepping, almost dancing along the pavement in a way that attracted attention. I saw a gentleman, and then another, move up to her and say a word or two. She talked to them quite freely and with a smile, so I was immediately suspicious that she might be inebriated or a -” He stopped.
“What is it?” Holmes asked.
Endaby nodded at young Churchill.
“Eh? Oh, I see. Master Spencer-Churchill,” said Holmes. “Why don’t you trot downstairs for a while? You can play in the backyard.”
Churchill gave Holmes a furious look and stalked out the door. It closed with a loud crash.
I raised my eyebrows.
“What?” said Holmes looking back at me with a puzzled frown.
I took out my notebook and retrieved my pencil from the table where Churchill had flung it down.
Holmes turned to the policeman. “Continue.”
“I watched as this spectacle continued, sirs, with several men talking with the lady.”
“She was accosted by the men,” I said. “She did not start the conversation.”
Endaby laughed. “No, no, these street ladies are much too fly for that, sir. They flaunt themselves and the customers cluster around them. That area near Peter Robinson’s is a well-known pickup point. I saw the same lady there on at least three other occasions, although she denies it.”
“You arrested Miss Caspar and took her to Tottenham Court Road Police Station,” said Holmes. “Did she protest her innocence?”
Endaby shrugged in an ill-bred fashion. “Most vehemently.”
“I understand that Miss Caspar was found innocent,” I said.
“She appeared the next morning at Great Marlborough Street Police Court before Chief Magistrate Newton,” said Endaby. “I gave evidence of the arrest and testified that I had seen her three times before in Regent Street, late at night, soliciting for prostitution. Miss Caspar’s employer, Mrs Barker, testified in her defence that she had been in London only a few months and that she could not have been in central London on the dates I gave in evidence; she further said that Miss Caspar had never been out late at night before the day she was arrested. She said that Miss Caspar was a respectable woman of perfect character in a good job. Mrs Barker was unshakeable in her evidence. Faced with this, the magistrate had no option but to find Miss Caspar not guilty. However, he then added the following.”
Endaby pulled his police notebook out of his breast pocket and read from it.
Just take my advice: if you are a respectable girl, as you say you are, don’t walk in Regent Street at night, for if you do, you will either be fined or sent to prison after the caution I have given you.
“So,” said Holmes, “it seems, from this statement, that the magistrate believed Miss Caspar was guilty and that she had persuaded Mrs Barker to perjure herself to secure her acquittal.”
“That seemed obvious at the time, sir.”
I recalled from The Pall Mall Gazette that the case was taken up by Llewellyn Atherley-Jones, MP, barrister and a rising star on the radical wing of the Liberal Party. The Home Secretary was forced to order the Commissioner of Police, Sir Charles Warren, to undertake an inquiry into the case. The Metropolitan Police held six days of hearings and sent a report to the Home Secretary. The contents were not released.
“Did you testify at the hearing?” I asked Endaby.
“Yes, sir. I was suspended, and I gave my evidence. And now I am sued for perjury in a private prosecution by Mrs Barker and Miss Caspar. However, I have been assured by certain personages -”
Holmes stood.
“Thirsty work, Watson. Let us have a whisky and soda. I suppose I cannot tempt you constable, as you are in uniform.”
“I am under suspension, Mr Holmes. And those shrieking harpies would drive any man to drink. I wore my uniform as protection against them. They are camped outside my house.”
“A large Scotch for the constable, Watson.”
Hyenas at the Door
I watched from the window of our study as a cab stopped at the kerb below. Our pageboy leapt out before the cab halted. PC Endaby left the house at the run and jumped in to take his place. The cabby, warned by Billy, took off at a great rate. He flicked his horsewhip at the women protesters on the pavement as he passed them.
“I say, Holmes, that is too much. The cab driver took his crop to those women downstairs. I hope that Endaby noted his number.”
“One does not reason with hyenas, Watson. One flogs them away.”
The protesters, jibbed of their quarry, continued to shout up at our windows.
“Well,” I conceded. “They do sound like hyenas. Do you not feel, Holmes, that women in groups, fired up to a frenzy, are unfeminine to a gross degree?”
I sat and took a cigar from the scuttle. “Was Endaby telling the truth?”
“Ignoring, for the moment, the fool of a magistrate,” Holmes answered. “Why do we keep these old dodderers on the bench until they are half in the land of gaga - ignoring him, I say, leaves us with three possibilities.”
He counted them on his fingers.
“One: Endaby saw Miss Caspar apparently soliciting and arrested her in good faith. Two: ditto, but after the arrest and before they arrived at the station, she convinced him by her vehement denials and behaviour that she was innocent. To avoid an action for false arrest, he made up the circumstantial evidence of the three earlier sightings in Regent Street. Three: he is the lying hound that those harpies below think him to be.”
I considered. “He seemed a truthful person. He must have a good moral character or he would not have been accepted into the Metropolitan Police.”
“He meets the height specification, and he has the requisite facial hair,” said Holmes. “Nothing more is necessary. There are no intellectual or ethical requirements.”
He took a pipe from the mantel and filled it with tobacco from the Persian slipper.
Holmes’s flippant gibe against the police had, I thought, some basis in truth. The police officers that we encountered in the cases that we investigated did not give a very professional impression as they stumbled in Holmes’s wake, tripping over clues and thumping into dead-end walls. However, I believed that the canny distrust, doggedness in pursuit, and evident bravery of Inspector Lestrade and his kin were as much tools of the detective trade as the application of abstruse theory.
I had often shared Holmes’s intellectual and moral satisfaction when a complex case was solved through our efforts, but it was an undeniable fact that most crime was as degenerate as it was commonplace. Not every solution to a case turned on the texture of the killer’s cigar tobacco; not every murder was committed by a one-legged dwarf who condescended to leave pockmarks in the doormat. Most cases were solved by arresting the nearest person with a blood-stained knife or bludgeon.
I put that thought aside and concentrated on the case of the unfortunate Miss Caspar. I was much concerned at the circumstances in which she had been taken into charge.
“What strikes me, Holmes, is the randomness of the arrest. It is almost Continental in character. We do not expect our police force to arrest people on the streets of London, even young women, and even in the late evening, without firm evidence that they have done wrong. This is not St Petersburg or Berlin.”
“I agree,” said Holmes. “And the charge levelled against her is almost impossible to disprove. It will scar the lady for life, whether true or not.”
“As the charge of lying in court will confound Endaby’s hopes of career and promotion.”
“Yes,” said Holmes. “In his shoes I would not rely on the assurances of his ‘certain personages’, especially not with the Press aroused. I should be more, rather than less concerned at the involvement of the mighty. The case does not have the international colour or forensic profundity of some of my recent cases, Watson, but it has demonstrably serious repercussions. Lives may be ruined.”
“So you will help the constable’s defence?”
“I shall work to determine the truth.” He jumped up from his chair and rubbed his hands together. “Luncheon: something simple in the circumstances. I will see what Bessie can provide.”
He left the door open and bounded down the stairs.
“Oh, dear,” I said to myself.
A moment later, there was a shout, a screech, and Holmes came pounding back up the stairs. He strode to the window.
“I am a simple man, Watson,” he said grimly. “I have simple tastes. All I require for lunch is a pot of piping hot coffee and two roast-beef sandwiches. You would think I am asking for Culotte de bœuf Salomon avec pommes Anna for all the cooperation I received downstairs. Your nurse is out on an errand, and Bessie flatly refuses to leave the Sick Room. She says that she is under your orders.”
“Mrs Hudson is still unwell, Holmes. She must be carefully watched.”
I stood. “I will check the larder and see what there is.”
“There’s a fair bit of leftover rabbit stew with dumplings,” said Churchill softly from the doorway. “I looked.”
I sat. We stared glumly at one another.
“The stew has been tested,” I said. “It is completely unarsenical.”
Churchill sighed and sat at the dining table.
“Wait,” said Holmes. “Watson, you are a member of the Junior United Services Club, are you not?”
“I am.”
“Excellent. Come, Spencer-Churchill,” said Holmes making for the door. “Watson, my dear friend, you are allowed up to three guests per visit for your seven guineas a year subscription. They do an excellent roast beef luncheon on Tuesdays; the last sitting ends at two. We will just manage it if you tip the driver sufficiently. There is not a moment to be lost.”
We followed him downstairs into the hall. He whispered instructions to Billy; the boy slipped out the front door, closing it behind him.
“I thought that those female harpies had marched off,” Holmes said softly. “But there are still two hyenas dawdling on the pavement outside, no doubt gathering sufficient courage to come in and face us. They are minions of the Caspar female come to complain that we act for Endaby - ah.”
Billy opened the door and Holmes darted across the pavement to a waiting hansom cab. The older of two well-dressed ladies standing outside our door moved to accost him, but he waved her away with his top hat.
“Urgent business, Madam, that will brook no delay. I act for the Akond of Swat.”
He jumped into the cab. I followed him across the pavement leaning on my stick. My wound still troubled me a little.
“Come along, Watson,” Holmes shouted. “Spencer-Churchill will perch on your knee.”
“Doctor Watson, I presume.” A pretty young lady in a sober grey dress and jacket, a white blouse, and a straw hat touched my arm as I passed her.
“Good afternoon.” I doffed my hat and endeavoured to slip past her to the cab from which Holmes furiously beckoned me.
“You are Miss Caspar,” said Churchill coming up beside me. “I saw your picture in the newspaper.”
“I am,” said the lady. “And this is my employer, Mrs B
arker.” She indicated a short older lady dressed in black. “We are here to see Mr Sherlock Holmes.”
“I am Winston S Churchill, how do you do?”
“Oh, ah, Doctor John Watson at your service,” I said.
The two ladies demurely acknowledged our bows. We all turned to the cab, where Holmes sat immobile.
“Holmes -” I began.
He sprang down and stalked between us.
“Have the cab wait, Watson. We shall not be long.”
He disappeared back through the front door of our lodgings held open by our bemused pageboy.
The Respectable Milliner’s Refutation
I ushered the ladies into the hall, and we followed Holmes through the open door of the waiting room. The walls, carpet, and furniture had been carefully cleaned, but the curtains had not yet been replaced. Bright sunlight streamed through the light, netted lace that covered the windows.
Miss Caspar and Mrs Barker sat together on the sofa. Miss Caspar looked to be in her early twenties. Her oval face was pale, but her blue eyes sparkled clear in the bright light. Her hair was auburn and pulled back into a bun at the back of her head. Her straw hat with its violet band was tilted at a slight, but modest, angle. She gave me a reserved look and a shy smile.
Mrs Barker glared at me, and I looked away, abashed.
Holmes stood with his back to the window, in shadow. I sat in an armchair by the door. I noticed that Churchill had slipped in and taken his place by the fireplace. I motioned for him to leave, but he ignored me.
“Now, ladies,” said Holmes after I made the introductions. “You should know that this morning we received Police Constable Endaby. I understand that you have initiated a private prosecution against him for perjury. He has told us his side of the story, and requested that we act for him in the matter. Although I have not given Endaby a firm acceptance of the case, I feel it would not be correct for me to enter into communication with his accusers. I suggest therefore -”