That Glimpse of Truth

by David Miller

  “To an English lawyer named Norton.”

  “But she could not love him.”

  “I am in hopes that she does.”

  “And why in hopes?”

  “Because it would spare your Majesty all fear of future annoyance. If the lady loves her husband, she does not love your Majesty. If she does not love your Majesty, there is no reason why she should interfere with your Majesty’s plan.”

  “It is true. And yet – Well! I wish she had been of my own station! What a queen she would have made!” He relapsed into a moody silence, which was not broken until we drew up in Serpentine Avenue.

  The door of Briony Lodge was open, and an elderly woman stood upon the steps. She watched us with a sardonic eye as we stepped from the brougham.

  “Mr. Sherlock Holmes, I believe?” said she.

  “I am Mr. Holmes,” answered my companion, looking at her with a questioning and rather startled gaze.

  “Indeed! My mistress told me that you were likely to call. She left this morning with her husband by the 5:15 train from Charing Cross for the Continent.”

  “What!” Sherlock Holmes staggered back, white with chagrin and surprise. “Do you mean that she has left England?”

  “Never to return.”

  “And the papers?” asked the King hoarsely. “All is lost.”

  “We shall see.” He pushed past the servant and rushed into the drawing-room, followed by the King and myself. The furniture was scattered about in every direction, with dismantled shelves and open drawers, as if the lady had hurriedly ransacked them before her flight. Holmes rushed at the bell-pull, tore back a small sliding shutter, and, plunging in his hand, pulled out a photograph and a letter. The photograph was of Irene Adler herself in evening dress, the letter was superscribed to “Sherlock Holmes, Esq. To be left till called for.” My friend tore it open and we all three read it together. It was dated at midnight of the preceding night and ran in this way:

  MY DEAR MR. SHERLOCK HOLMES,

  You really did it very well. You took me in completely. Until after the alarm of fire, I had not a suspicion. But then, when I found how I had betrayed myself, I began to think. I had been warned against you months ago. I had been told that if the King employed an agent it would certainly be you. And your address had been given me. Yet, with all this, you made me reveal what you wanted to know. Even after I became suspicious, I found it hard to think evil of such a dear, kind old clergyman. But, you know, I have been trained as an actress myself. Male costume is nothing new to me. I often take advantage of the freedom which it gives. I sent John, the coachman, to watch you, ran up stairs, got into my walking-clothes, as I call them, and came down just as you departed.

  Well, I followed you to your door, and so made sure that I was really an object of interest to the celebrated Mr. Sherlock Holmes. Then I, rather imprudently, wished you good-night, and started for the Temple to see my husband. We both thought the best resource was flight, when pursued by so formidable an antagonist; so you will find the nest empty when you call to-morrow. As to the photograph, your client may rest in peace. I love and am loved by a better man than he. The King may do what he will without hindrance from one whom he has cruelly wronged. I keep it only to safeguard myself, and to preserve a weapon which will always secure me from any steps which he might take in the future. I leave a photograph which he might care to possess; and I remain, dear Mr. Sherlock Holmes,

  Very truly yours,

  IRENE NORTON, nee ADLER.

  “What a woman – oh, what a woman!” cried the King of Bohemia, when we had all three read this epistle. “Did I not tell you how quick and resolute she was? Would she not have made an admirable queen? Is it not a pity that she was not on my level?”

  “From what I have seen of the lady she seems indeed to be on a very different level to your Majesty,” said Holmes coldly. “I am sorry that I have not been able to bring your Majesty’s business to a more successful conclusion.”

  “On the contrary, my dear sir,” cried the King; “nothing could be more successful. I know that her word is inviolate. The photograph is now as safe as if it were in the fire.”

  “I am glad to hear your Majesty say so.”

  “I am immensely indebted to you. Pray tell me in what way I can reward you. This ring –” He slipped an emerald snake ring from his finger and held it out upon the palm of his hand.

  “Your Majesty has something which I should value even more highly,” said Holmes.

  “You have but to name it.”

  “This photograph!”

  The King stared at him in amazement.

  “Irene’s photograph!” he cried. “Certainly, if you wish it.”

  “I thank your Majesty. Then there is no more to be done in the matter. I have the honor to wish you a very good-morning.” He bowed, and, turning away without observing the hand which the King had stretched out to him, he set off in my company for his chambers.

  And that was how a great scandal threatened to affect the kingdom of Bohemia, and how the best plans of Mr. Sherlock Holmes were beaten by a woman’s wit. He used to make merry over the cleverness of women, but I have not heard him do it of late. And when he speaks of Irene Adler, or when he refers to her photograph, it is always under the honorable title of the woman.

  A LECTURE TOUR

  Knut Hamsun

  Knut Hamsun (1859–1952) is one of two Norwegians to have been awarded the Nobel Prize. Best known for his novel Hunger – perhaps the verbal equivalent of Edvard Munch’s painting The Scream – he was the author of over a dozen novels, as well as poetry, plays, journalism and shorter fiction. It’s probably best to gulp when reading that he sent Joseph Goebbels his Nobel Prize medal as a gift during the Second World War, but the Norwegian state fined him heftily for his political views.

  I was going to give a lecture on modern literature in Drammen. I was short of money, and this seemed to me a good way to get hold of a little. I didn’t think it would be all that difficult either. So one fine day in the late summer of 1886 I boarded a train bound for that splendid town.

  I didn’t know a soul in Drammen, nor did anyone there know me. Nor had I advertised my lecture in the papers, although earlier that summer, in an expansive moment, I had had 500 cards printed, and I intended to distribute these in the hotels and bars and large shops, to let people know what was in store for them. These cards were not wholly to my liking in that they contained a misprint in the spelling of my name; yet I was so comprehensively unknown in Drammen that a misprint was neither here nor there.

  As I sat in the train I took stock of my situation. The prospects did not dishearten me. I had overcome many difficulties in my life with little or no money, and though I was not rich enough to live in a style befitting the dignity of my aesthetic mission in this town I was confident everything would be all right if I took care with my money. No fancy gestures now! As for food, I could always slip down to some basement-café after dark and get something to eat there, and I would lodge at a bed-and-breakfast that catered for travelling salesmen. Apart from that, what other outgoings would I have?

  On the train I sat and studied my lecture. I was going to talk about the novelist Alexander Kielland. My fellow-passengers were a group of high-spirited farmers returning from a trip to Kristiania. They were passing a bottle round and offered me a drink, to which I said no thank you. Later, in the manner of all friendly drunks, they made other approaches to me; but I continued to ignore them until finally they realised, from my general demeanour and from all the notes I was making, that I was a learned man with a lot of important things on my mind. After that they left me in peace.

  On arriving in Drammen I got off the train and carried my carpetbag over to a bench in order to compose myself before setting off into town. As it happens I had no use for this carpet-bag at all, I took it with me solely because I had heard that it was easier to book in and out of a bed-and-breakfast if one were carrying such a bag. It was anyway a wretched old worn-out y
ellow cloth bag, not really suitable for a travelling man of letters. My outfit, including a dark blue jacket, was considerably more respectable.

  A hotel porter with writing on his hat came over and wanted to carry my bag.

  I declined the offer, explaining that I had not yet made up my mind about a hotel, I had first to meet a couple of newspaper editors in town. It was I who was going to give this lecture on literature.

  Well, I would need a hotel whatever, I had to stay somewhere, didn’t I? His hotel was beyond all comparison the best in its class, with electric bells, a bath, a reading room. It’s just round the corner here, up this street then left.

  He picked up my bag by the strap.

  I detained him.

  Did I want to carry the bag to the hotel myself?

  Well, I was going the same way as my bag so I might just as well hang it over the crook of my finger and that way we’d both get there.

  At this the man looked at me, and realising that I was not a wealthy gentleman he headed off down towards the train again on the lookout for someone else. But there were no other travellers, so he returned and again began touting for my custom, persuading me finally that in fact he had come down to the station for the specific purpose of meeting me.

  Well, that changed matters. The man had perhaps been sent by the committee of some society – the Workers’ Educational Society, for example – who had got wind of my arrival. Drammen was obviously a town with an active cultural life and a healthy awareness of the need for good lectures. As a matter of fact, in this regard it seemed to me somewhat ahead of the capital itself, Kristiania.

  “Of course you may carry my things,” I said to the man. “Oh, by the way, I presume the hotel serves wine? Wine to drink with one’s meal?”

  “Wine? The best there is.”

  “Right. You can go now. I’ll be along later. I must just pop into these newspaper offices.”

  The man looked as if he might know a thing or two so I took a chance on him:

  “Which editor do you recommend? I can’t be bothered to visit them all.”

  “Arentsen is the best man. Everyone goes to him.”

  Arentsen the editor was naturally not in his office, so I visited him at home. I told him my business, that I had come in the service of literature.

  “Not much interest in such things here. We had a Swedish student come last year with a talk about everlasting peace. He lost money on it.”

  “I am going to talk about literature,” I repeated.

  “Yes,” he said, “I realise that. I’m just warning you, you’ll probably lose money on it.”

  Lose money on it? Priceless! Perhaps he thought I was a salesman travelling for a firm. I said merely:

  “Is the large Workers” Hall available for hire?”

  “No it isn’t,” he replied. “It’s booked out for tomorrow evening by an anti-spiritualist. There are apes and wild beasts on the programme too. The only other venue I can suggest is the Park Pavilion.”

  “Do you recommend it?”

  “It’s very large. Spacious. The cost? Well, I don’t know. It certainly won’t cost you much. You’ll have to speak to the committee.”

  I decided on the Park Pavilion. It sounded just right. Those Workers’ Society halls were often such small, uncomfortable places. Who were the committee?

  Carlsen the lawyer, so and so the furrier, and bookseller somebody else.

  I set off for Carlsen the lawyer’s house. He lived out in the country, and I walked and I walked until eventually the road came to an end. I told him my business, and that I wanted to hire the Park Pavilion. It sounded the perfect place for a unique event like a lecture on literature.

  The lawyer thought for a moment, and then said he doubted that it was.

  No? Was it really so big? Surely he could see for himself how unfortunate it would be if people had to be turned away at the door simply because there wasn’t enough room for them inside.

  But in fact the lawyer went on to advise me against the whole enterprise. There really wasn’t much interest in such things here. Only last year we had a Swedish student …

  “Yes yes, but his talk was about everlasting peace,” I interrupted. “I’m going to talk about literature. Serious literature.”

  “In any case,” he went on, “you’ve come at a bad time. An anti-spiritualist is doing a show at the Workers’ Hall. He has apes and wild beasts with him.”

  I gave him a pitying smile. He seemed to believe what he said so I gave him up as hopeless.

  “How much for the hire of the Park Pavilion?” I said curtly.

  “Eight kroner,” he replied. “I’ll have to put it to the committee, but I can promise you an answer in two days’ time. Informally I think I can safely say that the place is yours if you want it.”

  I did some quick mental arithmetic: two days’ waiting would cost me three kroner, the hire of the pavilion eight, that was 11. A ticket-seller 12. An audience of 25 at 50 øre each would cover my entire outlay. The other couple of hundred who turned up would represent clear profit.

  I agreed. The pavilion was hired.

  At the hotel a maid asked:

  “Do you want a room on the first or second floor?”

  I replied quietly and modestly:

  “I want a cheap room. The cheapest you have.”

  The maid looked me up and down, trying to work out if perhaps I was a gentleman who found his amusement in asking for cheap rooms. Wasn’t I the one who had been asking the hotel porter about wine with the meals? Or was I being so modest in order to avoid embarrassing the hotel? Whatever, she opened a door. I caught my breath.

  “Yes, it’s empty all right,” she said. “This is your room. Your bag’s got put here already look.”

  There was no way out of it, so in I went. It was the finest room in the whole hotel.

  “Where’s the bed?”

  “There. It’s a sofa-bed. An ordinary bed in a room like this would spoil it. You just pull it out at night.”

  The maid left.

  I was in a bad mood. My bag looked so scruffy in such surroundings, and after that long walk along the country roads my shoes were a mess. I swore out loud.

  At once the maid popped her head round the door:

  “Can I help you?”

  Well how about that? All I have to do is open my mouth and a crowd of servants comes swarming in!

  “No,” I answered curtly. “I want some sandwiches.”

  She looks at me.

  “Nothing hot?”

  “No.”

  Then she understood. The stomach. It was spring. My bad time of the year.

  When she came with the sandwiches she brought a wine-list too. The over-solicitous creature gave me no peace for the rest of the evening: “Would you like your blankets warmed?” “The bath’s in there, if you want a bath …”

  In the morning I hopped nervously out of bed and began dressing. I was freezing. Naturally, that damn sofa-bed had been much too short for me and I had slept badly. I rang. No one came. It must still be very early in the morning, I couldn’t hear a sound from the streets, and when I was fully awake I realised that it was still not quite daylight.

  I studied the room. It was the most elegant I had ever seen. With a sense of deepest foreboding I again rang, and then waited, up to my ankles in soft carpet. I was about to be stripped of every penny I had. Maybe I wouldn’t even have enough to pay. In haste I began once again to count up how much I had. Then I hear footsteps outside and I stop.

  But no one came. The footsteps were my imagination.

  I started counting again, in a fearful state of uncertainty. Where was she now, that maid of yesterday, with her oppressive eagerness to be of service to me? Was the lazy creature still lying asleep somewhere, though it was now almost daylight?

  At last she came, half-dressed, wearing just her shawl.

  “Did you ring?”

  “I would like the bill,” I said with as much composure as possible.<
br />
  “The bill?” Well that wasn’t so easy. Madame was still asleep, it was only three o’clock. The maid stared at me, utterly confused. What sort of look was that to give a person? Was it any business of hers if I chose to leave the hotel at such an early hour?

  “I can’t help that,” I said. “I want my bill now.”

  The maid left.

  She was away an eternity. Compounding my unease was the thought that the room might be charged for by the hour, and that here I was wasting yet more of my money with all this useless waiting. I knew nothing about the way posh hotels are run and such a method of charging seemed highly likely to me. On top of that there was a notice above the hand-basin which said that any room not vacated by six o’clock in the evening would be charged for another day. Everything filled me with anxiety and spread confusion in my serious, literary head.

  Finally the maid returned and knocked on the door:

  Never, never will I forget fate’s little joke that morning! Two kroner 70 øre – that was all! Nothing! A tip I might have given the maid to buy her hairpins with! I tossed a few kroner onto the table – and then one more. “Keep the change, my friend!”

  One had to show a certain amount of savoir-faire. Not to mention the fact that the maid deserved it, this rare and warm-hearted maid whom fate had deposited in a Drammen hotel to be the butt of any traveller’s whim. They don’t make women like that any more, the race has died out. And how solicitous she was of me once she realised that she was dealing with a wealthy man:

  “I’ll get the porter to carry your bag.”

  “Certainly not! Certainly not!” I said, anxious to save her the bother. “It’s just a carpet-bag, an old carpet-bag. I always have to have it with me when I’m away lecturing on literature. It’s a little peculiarity of mine.”

  But my protests were in vain, the porter was ready and waiting for me outside. As I came walking towards him he stared at my bag as though transfixed. Remarkable, the look such a man can give a bag, as if he’s just burning up with the desire to be carrying it.

  “I’ll carry that,” he said.