The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Part IV

by David Marcum

  “What could that have been?” I asked.

  “Probably that Mr. Lidington was not at home.”

  “How could the man with the large feet have known that, if he had just walked down from the field behind the house?”

  “Probably he had observed that there was no smoke rising from any of the chimneys, and had seen from over the back hedge that Mr. Lidington was not in his study. If large feet was indeed Colonel Strother, as Mr. Lidington suggests, then you must remember that he is an old military man, and would be used to making such observations as a matter of habit. Anyway, although he could not admit it, the other man was no doubt already aware, of course, that Mr. Lidington was not at home. He had probably watched him go for the train at Ham Street. That is why he had not called at the house in a normal sort of way, but was making his way up the little track at the side of the property when he encountered the colonel.”

  “What do you think he had intended to do?” asked Lidington.

  “Probably to break a window round the back of the house and gain entry that way. Only the colonel’s chance arrival prevented it.”

  “What a pity that we do not know who the other man was,” said Lidington.

  “Oh, there’s no mystery about that,” said Holmes. “It was undoubtedly the commercial traveller.”

  “How can you be so sure?” I asked in surprise.

  “It is an elementary matter of observation, Watson. Come and see,” he continued, leading us up the side-track a little way. “This is where the two men stood together for a few moments, as you can see from the scuffed footprints on the ground. Large shoes has come down the track, nicked sole has come up the track, and they have both stopped here. But what else do you see?”

  I looked where he was pointing and saw that at the side of the footprints was a large, square-cornered oblong mark, about two and a half feet long by eight inches wide.

  “It is his suitcase!” I cried, as I realised the meaning of the mark. “He has put it down while the two of them were speaking!”

  “Precisely! Come, let us now make haste back to Ham Street and see if we can find where this bogus commercial traveller has been staying!”

  “It is all very puzzling to me,” said Lidington, as we walked along. “When he and I spoke the other day, he struck me as a quite exceptionally pleasant man.”

  “Perhaps he did,” remarked Holmes, “but as a commercial traveller he is certainly something of an oddity. In the first place he appears, from your description of him, to be a little mature for that sort of work. In the second place, he seems to have spent at least a week, perhaps more, wandering about Apstone and district when it is apparent that there are only enough houses here to occupy him for an hour or two at most. In the third place, considering how few households there are, it is strange that he does not appear to have actually called at any of them.”

  We were soon back in Ham Street, and Lidington took us first to an inn called The Plough, but the landlord there did not recognize the description he gave him. Lidington then led us down the village high street until we came to a large, imposing inn, painted in a black-and-white Tudor style. A sign hanging over the entrance identified this as The George. “This is the most popular place with commercial travellers, I believe,” said Lidington as he pushed open the door. Inside was a large tap-room, with five or six men sitting in lively conversation and another couple leaning on the bar, talking to the landlord. Lidington described to him the man we were looking for, at which he nodded his head.

  “That would be Mr. Beresford,” said he in a jovial tone. “He’s in the back-parlour now.”

  We thanked him and pushed open the connecting door which led to the parlour. There, sitting by himself at a small table, was a grey-haired man in a tweed suit, nearer sixty than fifty, I judged. He had a pipe in his mouth and a tankard of ale before him, and on his face was a far-away, thoughtful expression. As the three of us approached his table, he turned. Upon his face was a look of surprise and also, I thought, of apprehension. He put down his pipe and began to rise to his feet.

  “Don’t trouble to get up,” said Holmes in an affable tone. “Instead, we’ll sit down. It’s Mr. Beresford, isn’t it?”

  The man nodded his head. “What can I do for you, gentlemen?” he asked, as we drew up chairs to the table at which he was sitting.

  “You could answer a few questions,” returned Holmes.

  “What sort of questions?”

  “First and foremost, you could tell us why you have been persecuting Mr. Lidington here recently.”

  “I don’t know what you are talking about. Why should I answer your questions, anyway? Who are you?”

  “My name is Holmes. I am an investigator of mysteries.”

  “What, another one of those infernal crack-brained and fraudulent alchemists?”

  “Not at all. The mysteries I investigate have no such pretensions to profundity, but nevertheless affect people’s lives more directly. Such mysteries cause people to become puzzled or anxious, miserable or frightened. That is why I try to solve their problems for them.”

  “Best of luck with that,” said the other in a sarcastic tone, picking up his pipe again from the table, “but I don’t see what it’s got to do with me.”

  “Why do you refer to alchemists as ‘crack-brained’ or ‘fraudulent’?”

  “I misunderstood you, that is all. It’s not important.”

  “On the contrary, I think it is very important. My client, whom I believe you have met,” Holmes continued, nodding his head in the direction of Lidington, “happens to live in Naxon House, which was once owned by Serenus Charling, a noted alchemist, and there you are, bringing up the subject of alchemy without any prompting from me. That seems something of a coincidence, would you not agree? Incidentally, we know that you were out at Naxon House today. Unfortunately for your plan to force an entry to the house, you ran across one of Mr. Lidington’s neighbours in the lane beside the house and had to abandon the scheme.”

  Beresford seemed about to reply, but hesitated and remained silent.

  “I might also mention,” Holmes continued, “that we know all about the bungled railway robbery of 1869, of Farley’s escape from Maidstone Prison the following year, and his subsequent recapture at Charling’s house.”

  Beresford remained silent a moment longer, then he turned to Lidington, a bitter expression on his face. “You are, I take it, a relative of that devil, Charling?”

  “I?” returned Lidington in surprise. “No, I have no connection with him at all. I just happen to live in his old house.”

  “I don’t believe you,” said Beresford sharply. “I made enquiries some time ago, and learned that Naxon House was now owned by a relative of Charling’s.”

  “I believe that that is true,” said Lidington, “but I am not that man. I am a mere tenant. The owner of the house lives somewhere else, and I have never even met him. I know nothing whatever about him, nor, for that matter, about Serenus Charling himself. I have read one or two of Charling’s books, that is all.”

  “I made other enquiries locally,” persisted Beresford, “and was told that you have spent most of your time in the last two years studying alchemy.”

  “That is also true,” said Lidington. “I had had an interest in the subject for some time, and when I was looking for somewhere to live, I happened to discover quite by chance that Charling’s old house was vacant. I thought then that fate must have intended me to move in there, and took a two-year lease on the place. That is my only connection with it, or with Serenus Charling.”

  Beresford bowed his head, blew out his cheeks and ran his hand through his hair. “It seems I have made a mistake,” said he at last, raising his head after a long silence. “I put two and two together and made five.”

  “More pertinently,” said Holmes, “you als
o frightened the wits out of my client.”

  Beresford nodded his head slowly. “I wouldn’t blame you if you never forgave me,” said he to Lidington in a voice full of contrition, “but please believe me when I say I am sorry if I have caused you distress.”

  “You appear to have some grudge against Serenus Charling or his family,” said Holmes. “Would you care to tell us about it?”

  “You would not believe me if I told you,” said the other after a moment.

  “We might if what you told us was the truth,” returned Holmes. “I think we are entitled to some sort of explanation.”

  “I agree,” said Beresford. “Perhaps the first two things you should know, then,” he continued after a moment in a dignified tone, “is that my true name is not Beresford, but Walters, and I, like that man Farley that you mentioned, am an ex-convict.”

  “I find that difficult to believe,” I said in surprise.

  “Thank you, sir,” said he; “but it is true. I was convicted, along with four other men, of that bullion robbery in ’69 that your companion mentioned, although I had nothing whatever to do with it.”

  “Then how came you to be convicted?” asked Holmes.

  “Purely on the lying testimony of others. I will explain, so you will understand the depths of bitterness that have poisoned my soul for nearly twenty years. As a boy I had little formal education, but I was a very keen reader, read every book I could lay my hands on, and thus educated myself in that way. I was born and raised in Ashford, and at the age of thirteen was apprenticed to a small engineering concern there, owned by a very kind and generous man by the name of Beresford. It had begun by making various items of ironwork for farm-carts and the like, but the coming of the railway had increased the demand for all sorts of ironwork enormously, and we were very busy. As the years passed, it became clear to me that Mr. Beresford had come to rely heavily on me, but I was taken by surprise one day when he offered me a half-share in the business. He and his wife, who had died by then, had never had any children, and I think he had come to look on me as a son. More years passed, and when Mr. Beresford himself died, I discovered that in his will he had left me the other half of the business, saying that he wished above all for it to continue successfully. I was thus, at a relatively young age, the owner of a prosperous business, comfortably-off and well-respected in the area. Sadly, my wife had not lived to enjoy this prosperity, but she had borne me a child, our daughter, Florence, who was now my greatest source of happiness.

  “There is in Ashford - or, at least, there was in those days - I know nothing of it now - a literary and scientific society, whose members would meet once a month to discuss various intellectual matters. Often someone - one of our members or a visitor - would read a paper on some subject or other and then we would discuss it. On one occasion, Serenus Charling, the well-known writer on alchemy, read a paper. In the discussion afterwards, I raised several objections to points he had made, as did some of the others, and a good discussion ensued. A couple of months later, I myself read a paper defending the conventional, scientific view of the world and, I suppose, dismissing alternative ‘mystical’ views. My criticisms of the latter were not particularly harsh, and I had certainly intended to make them in the friendly, open spirit which usually marked our discussions, but I felt afterwards, from Charling’s manner towards me, that I had perhaps offended him and he had taken against me in a personal way. Still, on the surface at least, we remained on good terms, and he invited me to his house on a number of occasions to discuss our intellectual differences.

  “I must now mention the one mistake I made in running the firm of Beresford and Walters, as it was still known. Generally speaking, when taking on new men, I prided myself on being able to judge the character of each prospective employee, but on one occasion I erred badly. I took on a man by the name of Seth Woodall, who soon proved to be nothing but trouble. From the very start, he showed a marked reluctance to put any effort into what he was supposed to be doing, and he had been with the firm scarcely two months when he began to complain about everything - the premises, the equipment, the work he was required to do, and his fellow workers. None of these complaints was justified, and they were generally made simply to explain away his own shortcomings and mistakes. Matters finally came to a head when there were a number of petty thefts, both from the firm and its employees, and after a thorough investigation it became clear that Woodall was responsible. I had no choice but to dismiss him, but it was an unpleasant situation, and he left the premises mouthing the foulest of oaths and vowing vengeance against me.

  “I come now to the fateful evening of April 25th, 1869.”

  “The day of the bullion robbery.”

  “Exactly, Mr. Holmes. I had gone down to Apstone to see Charling. We had supper together and discussed our differing views on alchemy. Then, leaving with him an essay I had written on the subject, summarising my opinions, I drove myself home to Ashford. The following morning, news of the robbery had spread round Ashford like wildfire. Two of the four criminals had been captured at the scene of the robbery and the other two were being sought in Ashford. By the time the local evening newspaper appeared, all four men were in custody.

  “Early that evening, I was sitting at home, having a cup of tea and reading the paper, when there came a ring at the bell. Next moment, three large policemen were shown in, one of whom produced a warrant for my arrest. I was utterly astounded at this, but even more astounded to learn that I had been incriminated in the robbery by one of the captured men. This man was Seth Woodall, the man I had had to dismiss from his job for dishonesty the previous year. That evil, lying rat had told the police that I was ‘the clever one’ they suspected had planned the robbery. He had evidently seized the chance to wreak vengeance upon me, as he had threatened. His confederates, evidently as foul and depraved as he was, said nothing to dispute his false claim.

  “If I had been shocked and astounded by these base lies, I was soon to find that there was a yet greater shock awaiting me. I told the police that I knew no more about the robbery than any other member of the public, and that I had been visiting Serenus Charling on the evening it took place, but when they interviewed Charling he denied ever having seen me that day. I said I had taken him an essay I had just finished writing, as my housekeeper could attest, as she had seen me writing it, but Charling said he had no knowledge of any such essay. My mind was reeling at this, and I could not believe what I was hearing. Surely the man’s mind could not be so poisoned with hatred for me just because I had argued against his opinions, so poisoned that he would condemn a perfectly innocent man to a brutal term of imprisonment? But that was how it was, and what was seen as my lie in stating that I had visited Charling on the evening of the robbery only added to my appearance of guilt in the eyes of the authorities. I was convicted and sentenced to seven years’ hard labour in Maidstone Prison. For seven years I was locked away from the world, with only the most vicious and brutal of men for company. For seven years I was separated from my only daughter, Florence. She had gone to live with my sister in Canterbury upon my arrest, and it was there she grew from childhood to adulthood, and eventually married, from all of which I was completely cut off.

  “I was released back into the world in ’76, almost broken both in body and spirit by my time in prison. Florence and her husband invited me to join them in York, where they now lived, and where her husband had a small engineering business not so dissimilar from the business I had once had in Ashford. This I eventually did, and I like to think I have proved myself useful to the business, but first I returned to Ashford, to tidy up my affairs there. I spent some time reading old newspapers, and soon learned that Charling had died five years previously, in ’71, and that after Farley’s escape from prison in 1870, of which I was already aware, he had lived at Charling’s house until he was recaptured in ’73. What had become of Woodall and the other lying criminals, I neither knew no
r cared. I do remember wondering if Farley had in fact murdered Charling. It did not seem that the authorities had ever considered that possibility, but as I was only too well aware, the authorities were capable of making dreadful errors. However, I did not wish to dwell on the past, so when I had finished my business in Ashford, I shook the dust of Kent from my feet and set off for the North, doubting that I should ever return.

  “Several years passed. My son-in-law’s business was flourishing, Florence had borne two children, so that I was now a grandfather and in constant demand from that quarter, and the events of the past had almost faded from my memory. Then, one afternoon, as I was walking home and crossing a bridge in the middle of York, I paused to look down at the river, and for no reason I have ever been able to determine, Charling, Naxon House and all the rest of it came flooding back into my mind. As I stood there a moment, almost overcome by the suddenness of these recollections, a fresh thought struck me like the blow from a sledgehammer, something I had never considered before, even in my wildest imaginings. Could it be that there really had been a ‘clever one’ behind the bullion robbery, as the police had always suspected? It was certainly not me, but could that ‘clever one’ have been Charling?

  “The more I thought about it, the more possible did it seem. It would have given Charling a stronger motive for lying about me than simply his dislike of my intellectual arguments and criticisms. Woodall’s initial lies about me would in fact have given Charling the opportunity to use me as a sort of scapegoat, to provide the police with the ‘clever one’ they were looking for, and take any attention away from Charling himself. Charling’s involvement might also explain the whereabouts of the missing gold. Perhaps after I had left him, on the night of the robbery, the two men who remained at large for nearly twenty-four hours had arrived with the gold and it had been hidden for safekeeping at Naxon House.