by David Fable
“Thank you,” she said as she unwrapped herself from the lamppost and massaged her upper arm.
“Did you break that window on Wigmore Street, Lilian?” I inquired.
“Change does not come easily, Mr. Walton,” she said ardently.
“The name’s Watson, and I’ll take that as yes.”
“We have to make them understand it is impossible to govern without consent of the governed. Who are the people, Mr. Watson? We are,” she declared, answering her own question. Two of her associates came over, helped Lilian to her feet and handed her a sign.
I admired the spunk of these women and thought they were one hundred percent right in their purpose, but not in their tactics. Some, like these, were accused of vandalism and even worse, arson and bombings. “I see,” I said noncommittally. “Well, take care of yourself, Lilian.”
“That I will do, Mr. Watson,” she answered fiercely.
I walked off down Bond Street. The police were gone. The suffragettes gathered their signs and resumed their march. As I turned on Brook Street, I heard behind me the crash of a window and heaved a regretful sigh.
31
CHRISTOPHER
I don’t even remember when I fell asleep. I was working on my time-line. The pieces of the story were now fitting together. In the early stage of pregnancy, Holmes had moved Lilah to Sussex, and concocted the scenario regarding the pursuit of Moriarty and his staged death so that he could disappear and live with her and the child. Holmes was an expert with disguises as well as accents, so, as long as he kept his distance, people would not recognize him as anything but what he claimed to be—a French importer named Hermes Hollocks. But, after a year, Holmes must have grown restless. He left Lilah and his child and, in all probability, did, as he claimed, travel to the Far East, but his conscience made him feel responsible for the young woman and the child she bore. Whether all this had anything to do with Holmes’s murder was not certain, but it clearly explained his support of Lilah and Alexander and her inclusion in the will.
I knew the doctor was taking this revelation hard. His notions of what is proper condemned him to a certain mindset, but Lilah had been seventeen, and by all standards of full marrying age. She clearly was willing as evidenced by her own words. Granted, the consequences of such unplanned romances are many illegitimate sons and daughter, and that is unfortunate, but Holmes did more than most in this situation. He might have denied it. I do not believe Lilah ever would have betrayed him. He certainly couldn’t have been expected to act as husband to the woman and, yet, he did.
It was clear to me now that Moriarty knew about Lilah. He had the advantage of knowing that he himself certainly was not dead during Holmes’s absence, and, therefore, there was a reason that Holmes had created the ruse. How and when he came to know, I may never find out, but his statement during our discussion of Nietzsche, that “Holmes’s false morality was his downfall,” echoed in my mind. “Downfall” was the word he used, and I don’t think he meant it figuratively. He was connecting the situation with Lilah to Holmes’s murder in some way.
It was possible that someone was blackmailing Holmes. This information would have been valuable currency for someone’s use. But blackmail hardly leads to murder. It seems to me the last thing you want to do to your blackmail victim is murder him.
I was pondering all these pieces when I sat down on the couch and must have dozed off. Not surprising, as I had slept for only an hour the night before. I was awakened by an insistent pounding on my door. “Doctor Watson! Mr. Hudson!” came the urgent voice from the other side. It was somewhat familiar to me, but I was still a bit disoriented and couldn’t identify it. I glanced at the clock on the mantel and saw that it was a quarter past noon. I had been napping for over three hours.
“Who is it?” I called through the door.
“It is Alexander Hollocks,” returned the urgent voice. “My mother is missing!”
I opened the door to find Alexander looking disheveled and literally beaten. “She’s not missing. She’s here.”
“Thank God! I was hoping!” he cried and rushed past me into the flat.
“She’s sleeping right now,” I said and closed the door. “It will do her some good. I suspect she spent the night walking around London.” I did not mention the fact that we had administered her phenobarbital or that she was in a delusional state when she arrived at the flat. “What happened to you?” I asked. Alexander had a rather large bump on the right side of his forehead, a raw, red bruise on his right cheek, and had lurched in with a noticeable limp.
“I fell down the stairs,” he replied.
“That’s unfortunate,” I said trying to sound sympathetic. “Why don’t you take a seat? Your mother is fine for the moment, and I’d like to have a chat.”
He sat down on the couch, calmed himself and to my surprise proceeded to tell me everything, completely unsolicited. “My mother, as you have obviously observed, is not well. She believes many odd things, and has told me different versions of the facts of my birth and childhood. She has probably told you that I am the son of Sherlock Holmes. This is in all likelihood true, for Holmes himself believed it.” Alexander said this without prejudice, as if it was not an absolute fact and he was willing to consider any evidence that might dispute it. “I’m sorry that when you came to the apartment the other day I was coy about this fact, but I was not aware whether this information had been disclosed to Dr. Watson, and I knew that when he found out the circumstances of my mother’s relationship with Holmes it might be…” he searched for the right word, “…diffi'cult for him.”
I was stunned by his very forthright recitation of the facts. I was expecting to have to pry to the truth out of him. There was no mistaking the resemblance between Alexander and Holmes—the narrow features, piercing eyes and hawklike nose. “I have no question that you are Holmes’s son, Alexander, and I thoroughly believe what your mother told us this morning.”
“Which was?”
“That your mother was indeed pregnant by Holmes, and he took her to live in the cottage in Sussex.” I saw no reason to go into every detail of the disclosure. “Would you be so kind as to tell me your recollections? It may be helpful in our search for your father’s murderer.” It was so strange to refer to Holmes as “your father.”
Alexander’s eyes wandered to the scraps of paper on the wall. “I see you are making a timeline.”
I was alarmed by the sudden realization that all my information was in full view. “I’m sorry. I must ask you not to look at that. Some of those facts are considered privileged and confidential,” I said firmly.
“Forgive me, Christopher. May I call you Christopher?”
“You may.”
“I’d like to be quite candid with you,” he said, looking down at his lap as if in shame. He looked back up at me as if waiting for my approval.
“Proceed,” I said evenly.
“You see, I’m a bit useless. You would think with such an illustrious father I would be better equipped. Not so. I have no more talent than the average factory worker. I am good at nothing…Not even caring for my mother. You see, Christopher, I drink to excess, and last night, while Mother was asleep, I went out and got quite drunk. When I returned home late, I found that she was gone. I staggered out of the apartment and must have fallen down the stairs, because there on the landing is where my landlady found me. That is why you see me in the battered state I’m in. This isn’t the first time I’ve hobbled myself in a drunken stupor.” Again he looked down in shame. “I’m disgusted with myself.” He put his hand over his face and shook as if crying.
“I think it’s healthy that you make such an admission. And be comforted by the knowledge that many other drunks have found rehabilitation. Perhaps there’s a chance for you to turn around your state of uselessness.” For some reason I could not muster a bit of empathy for this character.
“You see, that’s just it,” he exclaimed reaching across and grabbing my hand in a sort of gesture
of desperation. “Let me help you find my father’s murderer. That would be my redemption.”
I studied him for a moment. I had so many questions for him. They might not even bear on the case, but I was fascinated to know about relationship between him, Lilah and Holmes. “Perhaps the greatest benefit you could be right now is to tell me about your upbringing,” I said gently pulling my hand away.
“All right,” he said willingly. He sat back on the couch as if settling in for a lengthy account. One thing I had noticed about him in our limited time together was that he liked to hear himself talk. “I have no memory of him from when I was a small child,” he commenced. “From the first I can remember, I was told that my father was Hermes Hollocks and that he was forced to move away to France when I was small, but that he loved us very much and would always take care of us. As I told you before, we lived in virtual isolation at the cottage. I knew no different, so I was perfectly happy. I had one friend from the village. He was the grocer’s boy and his father would let him stay and play with me while he was doing his deliveries. We used to throw rocks off the cliff for hours.”
“Did Holmes ever come to visit you?” I asked.
“Not that I can recall. If he had, my mother would not have identified him as my father.”
“And the story about going to Brittany and looking for your father, Hermes Hollocks, was a lie?”
“Yes, actually during those five years we moved to Manchester. The school headmaster in Sussex showed up at the door one day and asked about me. After he left, Mother became very anxious. She took me up to London and we stayed in a hotel. I can’t remember which one as I was only five, but it was the most exciting thing that had ever happened in my life. I had never been outside a two-mile radius of the cottage. She bought me a tin of cookies and a jigsaw puzzle of the British Isles and left me alone in the room while she undoubtedly went to visit Mr. Holmes. A week later we moved to a flat in Manchester, and Mother took a job designing linens for the Havelock Mills. During our lives in Sussex, Mother taught herself to be an excellent embroiderer. She drew inspiration from those botanical illustrations on the walls of our flat.”
“Bauer brothers.” I was familiar with such drawings as they are exquisitely accurate and remind me of the exactitude of da Vinci’s anatomical drawings.
“Yes, very good. You’re a student?” he asked surprised.
“I have seen them in books. I presume those are authentic?”
“I believe they are. They were in the cottage since I was born. I assume Holmes purchased them originally.”
“Yes, fine. Continue.”
He pulled out a package of cigarettes, offered me one and then lit up. “When the mill closed, we did move into a flat in Harrow. The rest of what I told you before is essentially true.”
“When did you find out that Holmes was your father?”
“The first I heard of it was when I was seventeen. When my mother was injured in the union riot, Mr. Holmes arranged for her medical care. She told me when she was in the hospital. She thought she was dying and believed I should know. I didn’t believe her at first. She had already had bouts of disordered thinking. I asked her about Hermes Hollocks and she told me there was no such person. Later she withdrew everything she had told me that day, saying that she was not in her right mind. It was all quite confusing.”
“Surely, you must have seen the physical similarities between you and Holmes. Didn’t that make you wonder?”
“If you were me, would you have believed Sherlock Holmes was your father?”
“I might have, yes,” I said instantly.
“Then I suppose you’d have to be me to understand how I think and feel,” he responded with an unhappy smile. “After I first heard it mentioned, I thought it very unlikely. My mother had already shown a tendency to be…erratic, and make unfounded claims. Sherlock Holmes touched the lives of many people. I believed she was merely just one of them.”
“Then when did you come to believe he was actually your father?”
“When mother tried to kill herself. He rushed down to the hospital, and there I met him for the first time. We had a long talk, and he apologized for not being present in my life, but as he put it, 'Fatherhood was not for him.’” Alexander fell silent and looked into my eyes as if trying to gauge my reaction. I remained impassive. His account was plausible enough.
“And what was your relationship like in the last two years?” I continued to probe.
“We were on excellent terms,” he said, smiling as if reminded of some pleasant occasion. “He has shown great concern for my mother and me. However, it was always understood that confidentiality was of the utmost importance.”
“Of course. He was a very private individual.” I don’t know why I said this. Obviously it did not speak to the reason for the confidentiality, but I felt compelled to agree once in a while in order to seem sympathetic.
“I thought Dr. Watson did an excellent job with the eulogy, didn’t you?” he said with great earnestness as he crushed out his cigarette.
“I agree. Clearly, no one was more qualified.”
There was an awkward silence as we gazed at each other. He was so like Holmes in countenance but totally opposite in character, unctuous and self-pitying. Watson was right—I had a natural antagonism toward Alexander. Did I dislike him because he was Holmes’s actual flesh and blood? Was it as simple as that? Was I jealous? “I shall wake your mother,” I said, breaking the silence and rising from my chair. “You should take her home and let her rest.”
“Yes, yes,” he said most gratefully and sprung to his feet.
As I approached the bedroom door I glanced over my shoulder and casually asked, “Did you drive here?”
“No. I don’t drive,” was his immediate response. “I came here bycab.”
I quietly pushed open the bedroom door. Lilah was sleeping peacefully. He came up beside me and smiled with relief. “Thank you, Christopher. Mother and I can make it home on our own.”
My mother came upstairs, got Lilah out of bed and dressed her in a pair of my fencing pants and a flannel shirt. Thankfully, Mother asked no questions, as I had no time for explanations. I’d lost a good part of the day already. There were several things I had intended to pursue, and I was scheduled to meet up with Doctor Watson at Scotland Yard to confer with Lestrade and Gregson later that afternoon.
Alexander departed with Lilah, who was still quite sleepy and leaning against her son as they descended the stairs. I washed up and changed clothes, carefully emptying my pocket of the evidence I had accumulated the night before. I was anxious to analyze the hairs and cigar ash I had found in the Renault. I suspected I already knew what the results would be, but I hadn’t the time now. I put it on my worktable for later inspection.
I unlocked my motorbike, which I kept in the hall in front of my parents’ door, and rode off toward the assessor’s office on Lambeth Road, where a college friend of mine worked. I turned down Park Lane with the midday sun in my face. Weaving in and out of traffic, I tried to interpret the strands of Mrs. Smithwick’s web. She had directed Watson and me to the building where her young Latin “companion” tried to murder us. She said she owned the building. I assumed that was true. She had been complicitous in the murder attempt or had been directed by someone to send us to the location. It is possible she did not know there was to be an attempt on our lives, but judging from her reaction when Watson and I showed up at her door, I believe she was aware what her mission had been. Daisy had confirmed that she had a prior relationship with the young Latin man, Sergio, and it was a good bet that the hairs I found in the Renault would match the one I found in Watson’s apartment after the burglary. Unfortunately, without Sergio’s body I would be unable to make a verified match. Christ, why hadn’t I swept the area of the building for hair samples when I returned last night? Holmes would have thought to do it. I stopped at a traffic signal on Piccadilly. “It’s the details,” Holmes used to say. That’s where the truth lies. T
he truth does not contradict itself. It leads to one indisputable conclusion. But in the category of contradictions, the hair from the Renault might have belonged to Sergio, but he surely wasn’t driving the automobile last night as dead men make very poor drivers.