“Well, Mr. Mac, it is very good and very clear so far as it goes. That is your end of the story. My end is that the crime was committed half an hour earlier than reported; that Mrs. Douglas and Mr. Barker are both in a conspiracy to conceal something; that they aided the murderer’s escape—or at least, that they reached the room before he escaped—and that they fabricated evidence of his escape through the window, whereas in all probability they had themselves let him go by lowering the bridge. That’s my reading of the first half.”
The two detectives shook their heads.
“Well, Mr. Holmes, if this is true, we only tumble out of one mystery into another,” said the London inspector.
“And in some ways a worse one,” added White Mason. “The lady has never been in America in all her life. What possible connection could she have with an American assassin which would cause her to shelter him?”
“I freely admit the difficulties,” said Holmes. “I propose to make a little investigation of my own to-night, and it is just possible that it may contribute something to the common cause.”
“Can we help you, Mr. Holmes?”
“No, no! Darkness and Dr. Watson’s umbrella—my wants are simple. And Ames—the faithful Ames—no doubt he will stretch a point for me. All my lines of thought lead me back invariably to the one basic question—why should an athletic man develop his frame upon so unnatural an instrument as a single dumb-bell?”
It was late that night when Holmes returned from his solitary excursion. We slept in a double-bedded room, which was the best that the little country inn could do for us. I was already asleep when I was partly awakened by his entrance.
“ ‘Well, Holmes,’ I murmured, ‘have you found out anything?’ ”
Frank Wiles, Strand Magazine, 1914
“Well, Holmes,” I murmured, “have you found anything out?”
He stood beside me in silence, his candle in his hand. Then the tall, lean figure inclined towards me. “I say, Watson,” he whispered, “would you be afraid to sleep in the same room as a lunatic, a man with softening of the brain, an idiot whose mind has lost its grip?”
“Not in the least,” I answered in astonishment.
“Ah, that’s lucky,” he said, and not another word would he utter that night.77
“ ‘Watson, would you be afraid to sleep in the same room with a lunatic?’”
Arthur I. Keller, Associated Sunday Magazines, 1914
70 The Strand Magazine for December 1914 contains the following summary:
The opening chapters of this new and thrilling adventure of Sherlock Holmes described the receipt by Holmes of a cipher message, from which he deduces that some devilry is intended against a man named Douglas, a rich country gentleman living at the Manor House, Birlstone, in Sussex, and that the danger is a pressing one. Almost as soon as he has deciphered the message he is visited by Inspector MacDonald, of Scotland Yard, who brings the news that Mr. Douglas has been murdered that morning [sic].
Holmes, Dr. Watson and the inspector proceed to the scene of the tragedy, where they are met by Mr. White Mason, the chief Sussex detective. The murdered man had been horribly injured, while lying across his chest was a curious weapon—a shot-gun with the barrel sawn off a foot in front of the triggers. Near him was found a card with the initials “V. V.” and the number “341” scrawled on it in ink, and about half-way up the forearm was a curious design—a branded triangle inside a circle. His wedding-ring had been removed and the ring above it replaced.
There is no clue to the murderer except a bloody footprint on the window-sill, and he had apparently made his escape by wading across the moat. Holmes is much struck by the fact that one of Douglas’s dumb-bells is missing.
Cecil Barker, Douglas’s most intimate friend, is considerably flustered while being cross-examined by the detectives, and confesses that Douglas had been jealous on account of his attentions to Mrs. Douglas. Holmes ascertains from Ames, the butler, that on the previous evening Barker was wearing a pair of bedroom slippers which were stained with blood. The last instalment ends with the following dialogue, which takes place in the study. Holmes, having brought with him the blood-stained slippers from the hall:—
“Strange!” murmured Holmes as he stood in the light of the window and examined them minutely. “Very strange indeed!”
Stooping with one of his quick feline pounces he placed the slipper upon the blood-mark on the sill. It exactly corresponded. He smiled in silence at his colleagues.
The inspector was transfigured with excitement.
“Man!” he cried, “there’s not a doubt of it! Barker has just marked the window himself. It’s a good deal broader than any boot-mark. I mind that you said it was a splay foot, and here’s the explanation. But what’s the game, Mr. Holmes—what’s the game?”
“Aye, what’s the game?” my friend repeated, thoughtfully.
White Mason chuckled and rubbed his fat hands together in his professional satisfaction.
“I said it was a snorter!” he cried. “And a real snorter it is!”
71 The manuscript of The Valley of Fear contains a half-page of dialogue that was omitted from the published version. Its placement is unclear, but it is reproduced here:
“Mr. Holmes,” said Cecil Barker. “Mrs. Douglas and I have determined to put ourselves in your hands and I tell you the exact truth as to what did occur upon the night of January the sixth.”
“One moment,” said Sherlock Holmes. “You will realise, Mr. Barker, and you also, Mrs. Douglas, that neither Dr. Watson nor I can make any promise as to the use we may make of what you tell us. We ae naturally working with the police and in the interests of Justice.”
“We appreciate that, Mr. Holmes. But we have talked it over and we have thought it best to put ourselves in your hands and then you will tell us how we stand with Mr. MacDonald and the police. We will ask no promise from you, and tie your hands in no way.”
“Then pray be seated. I should be glad to hear anything that you may have to say. I will not disguise from you
Reproduced in Bruce Kennedy and Robert Watson Douty’s In the Footsteps of Birdy Edwards.
72 Edward J. Van Liere, in “Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson, Perennial Athletes,” scoffs at Holmes’s conclusion: “The single dumb-bell which worried him could have been used alternately by the right and left hand, and thus unilateral development prevented. Watson, as a medical man, knew this; but like a good soldier he let Holmes have his fun and made no reply.”
73 An alcove next to a large open hearth, usually containing a seat.
74 This is certainly a gentler statement than Holmes’s proclamation in The Sign of Four: “Woman are never to be entirely trusted—not the best of them.”
75 Literally, the “resident spirit” or “spirit of the place.” Holmes’s attention to the crime scene (about which he jests here) is perhaps his greatest contribution to the forensic sciences.
76 A heavy, double-breasted jacket with a short cut and a close fit. The origin is nautical, as for a garment worn by a midshipman, or one who reefs.
77 Holmes is here apparently chiding himself, along the lines of his self-chastisement in “The Man with the Twisted Lip.” But for what error in judgement?
CHAPTER
VII
THE SOLUTION
NEXT MORNING, AFTER breakfast, we found Inspector MacDonald and Mr. White Mason seated in close consultation in the small parlour of the local police sergeant. On the table in front of them were piled a number of letters and telegrams, which they were carefully sorting and docketing. Three had been placed upon one side.
“Still on the track of the elusive bicyclist?” Holmes asked cheerfully. “What is the latest news of the ruffian?”
MacDonald pointed ruefully to his heap of correspondence.
“He is at present reported from Leicester, Nottingham, Southampton, Derby, East Ham, Richmond, and fourteen other places. In three of them—East Ham, Leicester, and Liverpool—there is a
clear case against him, and he has actually been arrested. The country seems to be full of the fugitives with yellow coats.”
“Dear me!” said Holmes sympathetically. “Now, Mr. Mac, and you, Mr. White Mason, I wish to give you a very earnest piece of advice. When I went into this case with you I bargained, as you will no doubt remember, that I should not present you with half-proved theories, but that I should retain and work out my own ideas until I had satisfied myself that they were correct. For this reason I am not at the present moment telling you all that is in my mind. On the other hand, I said that I would play the game fairly by you, and I do not think it is a fair game to allow you for one unnecessary moment to waste your energies upon a profitless task. Therefore I am here to advise you this morning, and my advice to you is summed up in three words: Abandon the case.”
MacDonald and White Mason stared in amazement at their celebrated colleague.
“You consider it hopeless!” cried the Inspector.
“I consider your case to be hopeless. I do not consider that it is hopeless to arrive at the truth.”
“But this cyclist. He is not an invention. We have his description, his valise, his bicycle. The fellow must be somewhere. Why should we not get him?”
“Yes, yes; no doubt he is somewhere, and no doubt we shall get him, but I would not have you waste your energies in East Ham or Liverpool. I am sure that we can find some shorter cut to a result.”
“You are holding something back. It’s hardly fair of you, Mr. Holmes.” The Inspector was annoyed.
“You know my methods of work, Mr. Mac. But I will hold it back for the shortest time possible. I only wish to verify my details in one way, which can very readily be done, and then I make my bow and return to London, leaving my results entirely at your service. I owe you too much to act otherwise; for in all my experience I cannot recall any more singular and interesting study.”
“This is clean beyond me, Mr. Holmes. We saw you when we returned from Tunbridge Wells last night, and you were in general agreement with our results. What has happened since then to give you a completely new idea of the case?”
“Well, since you ask me, I spent, as I told you that I would, some hours last night at the Manor House.”
“Well, what happened?”
“Ah, I can only give you a very general answer to that for the moment. By the way, I have been reading a short but clear and interesting account of the old building, purchasable at the modest sum of one penny from the local tobacconist.”
Here Holmes drew a small tract,78 embellished with a rude engraving of the ancient Manor House, from his waistcoat pocket.
“It immensely adds to the zest of an investigation, my dear Mr. Mac, when one is in conscious sympathy with the historical atmosphere of one’s surroundings. Don’t look so impatient, for I assure you that even so bald an account as this raises some sort of picture of the past in one’s mind. Permit me to give you a sample. ‘Erected in the fifth year of the reign of James I, and standing upon the site of a much older building, the Manor House of Birlstone presents one of the finest surviving examples of the moated Jacobean residence—’ ”
“You are making fools of us, Mr. Holmes!”
“Tut, tut, Mr. Mac!—the first sign of temper I have detected in you. Well, I won’t read it verbatim, since you feel so strongly upon the subject. But when I tell you that there is some account of the taking of the place by a parliamentary colonel in 1644, of the concealment of Charles for several days in the course of the Civil War,79 and finally of a visit there by the second George,80 you will admit that there are various associations of interest connected with this ancient house.”
“I don’t doubt it, Mr. Holmes; but that is no business of ours.”
“Is it not? Is it not? Breadth of view, my dear Mr. Mac, is one of the essentials of our profession. The interplay of ideas and the oblique uses of knowledge are often of extraordinary interest.81 You will excuse these remarks from one who, though a mere connoisseur of crime, is still rather older and perhaps more experienced than yourself.”
“I’m the first to admit that,” said the detective heartily. “You get to your point, I admit; but you have such a deuced round-the-corner way of doing it.”
“Well, well, I’ll drop past history and get down to present-day facts. I called last night, as I have already said, at the Manor House. I did not see either Barker or Mrs. Douglas. I saw no necessity to disturb them; but I was pleased to hear that the lady was not visibly pining and that she had partaken of an excellent dinner. My visit was specially made to the good Mr. Ames, with whom I exchanged some amiabilities, which culminated in his allowing me, without reference to anyone else, to sit alone for a time in the study.”
“What! With that?” I ejaculated.
“No, no, everything is now in order. You gave permission for that, Mr. Mac, as I am informed. The room was in its normal state, and in it I passed an instructive quarter of an hour.”
“What were you doing?”
“Well, not to make a mystery of so simple a matter, I was looking for the missing dumb-bell. It has always bulked rather large in my estimate of the case. I ended by finding it.”
“Where?”
“Ah, there we come to the edge of the unexplored. Let me go a little further, a very little further, and I will promise that you shall share everything that I know.”
“Well, we’re bound to take you on your own terms,” said the Inspector; “But when it comes to telling us to abandon the case—why in the name of goodness should we abandon the case?”
“For the simple reason, my dear Mr. Mac, that you have not got the first idea what it is that you are investigating.”
“We are investigating the murder of Mr. John Douglas, of Birlstone Manor.”
“Yes, yes; so you are. But don’t trouble to trace the mysterious gentleman upon the bicycle. I assure you that it won’t help you.”
“Then what do you suggest that we do?”
“I will tell you exactly what to do, if you will do it.”
“Well, I’m bound to say I’ve always found you had reason behind an your queer ways. I’ll do what you advise.”
“And you, Mr. White Mason?”
The country detective looked helplessly from one to the other. Holmes and his methods were new to him. “Well, if it is good enough for the Inspector, it is good enough for me,” he said at last.
“Capital!” said Holmes. “Well, then, I should recommend a nice, cheery country walk for both of you. They tell me that the views from Birlstone Ridge over the Weald are very remarkable. No doubt lunch could be got at some suitable hostelry; though my ignorance of the country prevents me from recommending one. In the evening, tired but happy—”
“Man, this is getting past a joke!” cried MacDonald, rising angrily from his chair.
“Well, well, spend the day as you like,” said Holmes, patting him cheerfully upon the shoulder. “Do what you like and go where you will, but meet me here before dusk without fail—without fail, Mr. Mac.”
“That sounds more like sanity.”
“All of it was excellent advice; but I don’t insist, so long as you are here when I need you. But now, before we part, I want you to write a note to Mr. Barker.”
“Well?”
“I’ll dictate it if you like. Ready?
“ ‘DEAR SIR,—It has struck me that it is our duty to drain the moat, in the hope that we may find some—’ ”
“It’s impossible,” said the Inspector. “I’ve made inquiry.”
“Tut, tut! My dear sir! Do what I ask you.”
“Well, go on.”
“ ‘—in the hope that we may find something which may bear upon our investigation. I have made arrangements, and the workmen will be at work early to-morrow morning diverting the stream—’ ”
“Impossible!”
“ ‘—diverting the stream; so I thought it best to explain matters before-hand.’ Now sign that, and send it by hand about four o’clo
ck. At that hour we shall meet again in this room. Until then we may each do what we like; for I can assure you that this inquiry has come to a definite pause.”82
Evening was drawing in when we reassembled. Holmes was very serious in his manner, myself curious, and the detectives obviously critical and annoyed.
“Well, gentlemen,” said my friend gravely, “I am asking you now to put everything to the test with me, and you will judge for yourselves whether the observations I have made justify the conclusions to which I have come. It is a chill evening, and I do not know how long our expedition may last; so I beg that you will wear your warmest coats. It is of the first importance that we should be in our places before it grows dark; so with your permission we shall get started at once.”
We passed along the outer bounds of the Manor House park until we came to a place where there was a gap in the rails which fenced it. Through this we slipped, and then in the gathering gloom we followed Holmes until we had reached a shrubbery which lies nearly opposite to the main door and the drawbridge. The latter had not been raised. Holmes crouched down behind the screen of laurels, and we all three followed his example.
“Well, what are we to do now?” asked MacDonald with some gruffness.
“Possess our souls in patience83 and make as little noise as possible,” Holmes answered.
“What are we here for at all? I really think that you might treat us with more frankness.”
Holmes laughed. “Watson insists that I am the dramatist in real life,” said he. “Some touch of the artist wells up within me, and calls insistently for a well staged performance.84 Surely our profession, Mr. Mac, would be a drab and sordid one if we did not sometimes set the scene so as to glorify our results. The blunt accusation, the brutal tap upon the shoulder—what can one make of such a dénouement? But the quick inference, the subtle trap, the clever forecast of coming events, the triumphant vindication of bold theories—are these not the pride and the justification of our life’s work?85 At the present moment you thrill with the glamour of the situation and the anticipation of the hunter. Where would be that thrill if I had been as definite as a time-table? I only ask a little patience, Mr. Mac, and all will be clear to you.”
The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes Page 83