by John Hall
“Indeed,” said Holmes. “He has, of course, a weakness for gin … you spotted that? No? It has not developed to be detrimental to his duties as yet, but he needs to keep it in check.”
“And do you think he will be able to tell us anything?” I asked. “You don’t really suspect the butler, do you, Holmes?”
He laughed. “At the moment, he is probably as likely as anyone, for I cannot see for the life of me why the very obvious suspect would have committed the crime. No,” he went on, before I could ask who this very obvious suspect might be, “no, it is less a matter of accusation than of information. Fisher, we are told, has been in the Masterton house longer than any of the other servants, so if anyone knows what is going on, he should.”
“And you think there is something going on, as you put it?” asked Ingham quickly. “Do you suspect the Mastertons, or one of them, at any rate?”
“There are surely only three possibilities,” said Holmes, as he reached the door of the little bar, and stood aside to let Ingham enter.
The place was certainly not the Raffles Hotel, I thought, as I glanced around. Tiny, dark and cramped, the only merit that I could see in it … from Fisher’s point of view … was that it was handy for the Masterton house; and come to think of it, it was probably quite discreet, for it was not the sort of place that a man owns up to patronizing. Quite suitable for a butler who was in the habit of popping out for a quick one, in fact. It was cool, though, or at any rate a touch cooler than the air outside.
We bought our drinks at the little bar … no credit or waiters here … and found a table in a far corner, although, as I say, the place was all but empty. And I have to add that it was soon emptier still, for some of the patrons took a look at Ingham and remembered urgent appointments elsewhere.
“Well, Holmes?” I said, with a touch of impatience.
“Well, then?”
“The three possibilities,” I cried.
“Oh, those … one, some peripatetic lunatic poisoned Mrs Gerard, quite at random.”
“Nonsense!”
“I agree. Two, Charles Gerard poisoned his wife.” He tilted his head to one side, and regarded Ingham and me, as if inviting comment.
“Motive?” asked Ingham doubtfully.
“Ah, that is the weak point. That, and Charles Gerard’s curious behaviour with regard to the bottle of arsenic and the box of sugarplums.”
“H’mm. I suppose the curious behaviour with the box was that he did nothing with it?” I said. “Yes, that is odd. Anyway, the third possibility is that it was one of the Mastertons, motive unknown yet again. And that’s why we are sitting in this rather grimy den waiting for a butler who may, or may not, have something to tell us?”
“You sum it up tolerably well,” said Holmes.
“There is a fourth possibility,” said Ingham. “Though it may not be very sensible or likely. Mrs Gerard really could have committed suicide, and chosen a very confusing way of doing it.”
“Very confusing indeed,” said Holmes, and seemed about to add more, but was prevented from doing so by the appearance at the door of Fisher. Holmes stood up and shook the butler’s hand. “Gin, was it not? And tonic?”
“Ah … just a touch of bitters, sir, if it’s all the same to you,” replied Fisher. “They know how I take it,” he added, as Holmes went to the bar.
“There you are,” said Holmes, returning. “Please sit down, Mr Fisher.” As the butler murmured his thanks and took a sip of his gin, Holmes went on, “Now, I told you that my questions would not involve any sort of disloyalty to your employers, and that is true enough. But, as a man who has been in the Masterton house several years, and as a shrewd and an observant man to boot, you might be very helpful to our investigations.”
Fisher nodded. “I’m your man, sir. Ask away.”
“Did the Mastertons ever quarrel?”
Fisher permitted himself a smile. “You’re a bachelor, I take it, Mr Holmes? Yes, sir, there was an occasional little difference of opinion. Very little, and very occasional, for the master is an easy-going gentleman, and not too particular about details like the colour of curtains, or the exact number and position of chairs in a room, and that sort of thing which is the cause of many minor disputes ‘twixt husband and wife. But when there is a trifling debate that has to be resolved, then Mr Masterton states his own opinion very forcefully, and then goes out and does just what Mrs Masterton says.” And he took another sip of his gin, and allowed himself another smile at his brilliant originality.
“H’mm.” Holmes forced a thin smile. “You have been with the family for some time; what is Mr Masterton’s background?”
Fisher looked down at his glass.
“I ask out of mere curiosity,” said Holmes casually.
“Oh, it is not that I am particularly reluctant to answer,” said Fisher, “but rather that Mr Masterton is what you might call a ‘man of mystery’. Not in any dark and sinister sense, or at any rate I don’t think so, but just that nobody seems to know very much about him, where he comes from, what he did before he came to Singapore, that sort of thing. He has a trace of an Australian accent, at times. Or perhaps New Zealand or South Africa?”
“I see. Tell me, were you in the house when Mr Gerard called, the day Mrs Gerard died?”
Fisher’s brow clouded. “I was, sir.”
“Was Miss Earnshaw in the house?”
“No, sir, she and the nursemaid had taken the children out for some fresh air.”
“Did you remain in the room whilst Mr Gerard was talking to the Mastertons?”
“Certainly not.”
“Who else was in the house?”
Fisher thought. “The maids, of course. The cook and the kitchen boy.”
“But none of them would have advised Mrs Masterton on her choice of a gift for Mrs Gerard? No, of course not,” Holmes added quickly as Fisher frowned again, puzzled by the question.
Fisher coughed delicately, and consulted his watch. “Was there anything more you wished to know, sir? If not, I should be returning to my duties.”
“Yes, of course. You have been most helpful,” said Holmes – though his voice did not perhaps have the conviction to match the words.
Fisher shook hands all round, and nodded farewell.
As the door closed behind the butler, Holmes laughed. “Perhaps not quite as helpful as one might have wished,” he told us. He raised an eyebrow. “Well, gentlemen? Any thoughts on the progress of the case thus far?”
“If we’re to have a lengthy discussion, I need another drink,” I told him. “What about you two?” I noted their requirements, and marched off to the bar. “Now,” I said, when I had returned to my seat, “let us examine the sequence of events. Charles Gerard talks to Mrs Masterton, who gives him a box of sugarplums containing arsenic …”
“Ahah!”
“Holmes? I trust you’re not going to interrupt me at the end of every sentence?”
“Do we know that the arsenic was in the sweets at that stage?”
“No, I suppose not,” I said gloomily. “Very well, then, Charles Gerard talks to Mrs Masterton, who gives him a box of sugarplums which may … or may not … contain arsenic.” Holmes nodded his head at this. I went on, “Charles Gerard gives the box to his wife, and then leaves her alone again. He returns, to find his wife dead, a bottle of arsenic, a suicide note, and a glass on the table … all of which he attempts to conceal … oh!” I hesitated. “We have only his word that there was a note, but we do know that we found a bottle of arsenic where he said he put it.”
Holmes nodded in satisfaction. “Admirably summed up, Watson. I would add only that the arsenic that was found in the sugarplums was confined to those with a centre … that Mrs Gerard would avoid. So, any offers as to theories, then?”
“Well,” I said, “I know that you have a weakness for the involved explanation, Holmes, so how’s this? The sugarplums which Mrs Masterton gave to Gerard to give to Mrs Gerard … sorry, that’s confused,
but you know what I mean … the sugarplums were untouched, in every sense. Mrs Gerard herself set out to poison them, or some of them, in order to kill … ah …”
“Her sister, perhaps? Her husband?”
“I can’t explain every last detail, of course,” I said patiently. “But, in the course of poisoning the ‘Violet Cremes’ … and that rather suggests that the intention was to kill Mrs Masterton, who had a weakness for that particular centre … Mrs Gerard is unable to resist her craving for ‘Walnut Whirls’.” I paused here, to check that I had this the right way round. “Yes, that’s right. She eats those, the ‘Walnut Whirls’, but in doing so accidentally transfers some of the arsenic to her mouth, and kills herself accidentally. The remains of the walnut sweets, and the arsenic, are thus both found in her body, so we all think they got there together, though in fact they got there more or less separately. How’s that?” And I leaned back in triumph and sipped my drink.
“She would have to transfer a large amount … accidentally,” said Ingham.
“H’mm.” I thought. “Possible, though?”
“And the note?” asked Holmes.
“Oh! The note, yes.” I thought a moment. “Ah, but we only have Gerard’s word that there ever was a note. He finds the body, the bottle … no note … thinks his wife has killed herself deliberately. Wanting to keep his wife’s name unsullied, free of the taint of suicide, he hides the bottle, but not the box … because, of course, he doesn’t know that she’s put poison in it … and raises the alarm. But then later, when he himself is suspected of murder, he realizes that a bit of a slur on the family name is preferable to the gallows, so he seizes eagerly on your suggestion that there was a note, Holmes, and stresses the suicide aspect. Well?”
“Tolerably well, indeed,” said Holmes, in a tone that was almost admiring. “In fact, you have pointed out something which had entirely escaped me.”
“Oh!”
“Indeed.” Holmes smiled at me. “And Mrs Gerard’s motive for wanting her sister dead?”
“Ah, that is a puzzle. But then the motive is obscure with any theory,” I pointed out. “If we knew the motive, we would know the killer.”
“True enough,” nodded Holmes. “Superintendent?”
“Charles Gerard,” said Ingham shortly. “Poisons his wife … whether using the box of sweetmeats or not, I couldn’t say … and arranges all the rest, the poison in the ‘Violet Cremes’ and the like, to obscure the facts. He knows he’ll be the first one to be suspected, and he muddies the waters accordingly, by poisoning sweets he knows his wife won’t eat, to make it look as if a stranger did it.”
“Motive?”
“To be rid of his wife, probably got another woman tucked way.”
Holmes smiled. “Now, I could agree, if Charles Gerard stood to inherit his wife’s money. But he did not. If he wanted to marry this other woman, then why on earth did he not do so a year or more ago? He had as much money, or as little money, rather, as a bachelor as he does now as a widower. And remember, it was he who prompted his wife to dispose of her money in that odd … relatively odd … way that she did.”
“Insurance!” I cried.
Holmes and Ingham stared at me.
“He might not inherit his wife’s money, but what if he had insured her life for a large amount?” I went on. “That way, he collects a hefty chunk of cash, but no suspicion falls upon him.”
“Excellent!” cried Holmes, rubbing his hands together.
“Is that the answer, then?” I asked.
“I do not think so.”
“Oh.”
“The problem is that being convicted of murder would rule out Gerard as a beneficiary, and he is, you will recall, at present under arrest on just that suspicion. The difficulty is that bottle, that dratted bottle which he hid in the dustbin,” said Holmes. “If he wanted to throw suspicion upon Mrs Masterton, or anyone else, then surely he would conceal the bottle more carefully earlier on, and not wait until the very last minute and then use so clumsy a method? And why would he poison the ‘Violet Cremes’, thereby deflecting suspicion from Mrs Masterton, who knew that her sister disliked them? Any other flavour would have done, but not that. It makes very little sense. But I do not criticize you, Watson … it is a possibility which genuinely had not occurred to me.”
“It’s kind of you to say so,” I replied, a touch put out. “Well, Holmes, you have poured cold water on the theories advanced by Superintendent Ingham and myself, but what’s your hypothesis?”
Holmes laughed, and shrugged his shoulders. “I confess that although I can see objections to your suggestions, I cannot think of any explanation that is free from very similar objections.” He frowned. “It might be worth thinking about who would benefit, or stand to benefit, though. We know that Mrs Gerard was poisoned … even if we do not know the precise means whereby the poison was administered. And we know that there was poison in the centres favoured by Mrs Masterton, and that Mrs Masterton … unprompted by any third party … gave the box of sugarplums to Charles Gerard. Suppose she had not done so? And she might easily not have done so … indeed, the probability must be that she would not give the box away, that she herself would have opened the box and eaten the poisoned sweets. Now, if both Mrs Gerard and Mrs Masterton had died, who would gain?”
“Derek Masterton!” cried Ingham and I with one voice.
Holmes nodded. “He had the opportunity … we are told that he was out of the house, ostensibly on business. And Charles Gerard had left his wife alone in their rooms. Masterton could have gone round to the Gerards’ lodgings, offered Mrs Gerard a drink … perhaps a remedy for her headache? He poisons her, leaves the note … a portion of a letter sent by Mrs Gerard to Mrs Masterton, let us say … and goes about his lawful occasions.”
“Wait just a moment, though,” I said. “If Mrs Gerard had died first, her money would have gone to Mrs Masterton; and if Mrs Masterton had then died, Derek Masterton would inherit everything. But suppose that Mrs Masterton had eaten the sugarplums, the poisoned ones at any rate, before Mrs Gerard had been poisoned? Wouldn’t Mrs Gerard’s will then be invalid, and the money go to Charles Gerard?”
Holmes nodded. “It is an interesting legal point. But then Masterton would know that his wife was still alive when he left the house, so he would think that he had time to poison Mrs Gerard before Mrs Masterton ate the sugarplums. He could not guess that she would give them away.”
“He’d see them in Mrs Gerard’s room,” I objected.
Holmes shook his head. “How could he possibly know it was the same box? He was not in the house when his wife gave the box to Gerard, remember. And more to the point, it may not all have been about money. Suppose, let us say, that Derek Masterton had somehow got wind of the fact that Mrs Gerard had hired Mr Ellis to look into his … Masterton’s … past?”
“Oh, you mean that Masterton might have been concerned that Mrs Gerard would learn that he was actually Cedric Masters, and a thief?” I said.
Holmes shook his head. “I mean that Derek Masterton might have been concerned lest Mrs Gerard should learn that he meant to kill his own wife,” he replied.
“Good Lord!”
Superintendent Ingham stood up. “You make out a convincing case against Derek Masterton,” he said.
“And yet there are objections,” said Holmes. “Many objections.”
“For all the objections, I think that another word with Mr Derek Masterton would not come amiss,” said Ingham, and led the way to the door.
We had gone perhaps halfway back towards the Masterton house, when something of a commotion attracted our attention. A door banged, there was an indistinct shout, followed by another bang of a door … and all this was pretty clearly emanating from the very house we were making for, the Masterton house. We each increased our pace.
Fisher, no longer quite as sedate as of old, emerged from the drive at a run, followed by a pretty young Chinese maidservant. Fisher stopped at the edge of the road, looked
round wildly at the crowd, spotted us, waved, shouted, and then – despite the heat, which was now noticeable – set off running towards us. We naturally ran to meet him, to see what might be wrong.
“Doctor!” he cried, as soon as he was close enough to be properly heard. “Doctor Watson, come quickly, sir, if you please.”
“What, then?”
“Mr Masterton, sir. He’s been poisoned.”
Chapter Twelve: Sherlock Holmes Explains
“Feeling better now?” I asked Derek Masterton. He nodded. “Yes, thanks to you, Doctor.”
We had, as you will have gathered, got there just in time. The poison was not corrosive, and I had managed to induce him to get rid of most of it. Now, very wan and shaken, he was propped up in bed in one of the guest rooms. Mrs Masterton, roused from her own fitful slumbers in the master bedroom by the commotion, stood in the doorway, wrapped in a dressing gown, and regarded the proceedings in a stunned silence.
Holmes tapped me on the shoulder. “Arsenic?” he asked.
“We should get Doctor Oong’s opinion, of course,” I answered, “but it certainly looks that way to me.”
“Just so. Mr Masterton,” Holmes said to my patient, “are you strong enough to tell us what happened?”
“Oh, I’m strong enough for anything,” replied Masterton with a valiant attempt at a smile. “But as for telling you what happened, I’m blessed if I know myself.”
“Well, tell us what happened after you threw … that is, after we left the house.”
Masterton nodded. “I stamped about the place for a while, generally cursing you, and this whole damnable affair. I looked in on Anya, and she seemed to be resting. Then I thought I’d buckle down to some work, so I got out some papers that I needed to examine. Only I couldn’t concentrate, this dreadful business has unsettled me, and shaken me more badly than I like to admit. I thought a drink might possibly help … I don’t usually, not at this time of day, but I thought it was justified under the circumstances. I poured myself a drink, then …”
“Of what?” asked Holmes. “Oh, whisky. I …”