by A S Croyle
“Not so poor,” I’d told him once, referencing the many important people who frequented Simpson’s. Charles Dickens used to go there, as did Disraeli, our prime minister, and Gladstone, whose political campaign and series of speeches were bringing him back into political power. It occurred to me, as I took a seat across from Sherlock, that he may have suggested lunch at the restaurant not to enjoy the food or the atmosphere of chess but to try to speak with the politicians to find out what they knew about the Royal Swan caper.
Sherlock ordered coffee and a roast beef sandwich, but he wandered away to watch some players engaged in a game. When he came back to the table, he said, “It is a nice set they have there. The pieces on the board are made of rosewood. But it’s not a Staunton. Like your Christmas present, the queen has a ball on top without a crown, and the pawns have a button top.”
I looked at him, puzzled. “Wait, what is a Staunton?”
“People from all over the world have come to play at this club, Poppy, including Howard Staunton, the world champion. He died just a few years ago. A man named Nathaniel Cooke improved the design of the chess set and called it the Staunton after Howard Staunton.
“I thought you did not care for trivia.”
“Oh, not trivial at all, Poppy. The new design is actually based on scientific principles and calculations. Pieces like the ones you have in your set are too tall, easily tip and are cumbersome during play. Some pieces are spindly or top heavy and fall over easily, and because they were so uniform, an initiate to the game, someone unfamiliar with the pieces, can make tragic errors. You see, most chess sets before the Staunton design were confusing because the pieces looked too similar, and that inevitably created mistakes during play, particularly for novices. So, pieces that are universally recognized are important. The Staunton pattern elevates the conventional form. The bases are larger, more stable, and more easily distinguished. The Staunton sets have been around since before I was born. Your chess set is obviously an antique and not nearly as practical to the players. You’ve really never heard of Staunton?”
“I am not an avid chess player, Sherlock. Just a beginner. As I thought you were.”
“Actually, I used to play often with my brothers. Brother Mycroft is quite good - and he never lets me forget it. In fact, although his rails are firmly set in Westminster and he rarely goes anywhere but the Diogenes Club, it wouldn’t surprise me if he came round to see the tournaments here. Anyway, some say that the knight in a Staunton set is patterned after the horses of the Elgin Marbles.”
“The Elgin Marbles in the British Museum?”
“The same. Some, as I said, believe that the Staunton knight represents the powerful ideas associated with the horses of the Elgin Marbles. Staunton was a Freemason. The sun-god’s chariot of On-Helios, as depicted in the Elgin Marbles, is linked to the Egyptian god of resurrection and rebirth, and this is of tantamount importance in Freemasonry.”
“So then there’s all sorts of Freemason imagery in a chess set?” I asked.
“Yes. For example, the compass on the board reminds us to circumscribe our desires and keep our passions within due bounds. And that is a very sound strategy for living, I should think.
“Did you know that the Freemasons have a volume of The Sacred Laws - the Bible - and the square and the compass symbolise the Ark of the Covenant, which contains laws made by God and agreed to by Man? These were originally kept in King Solomon’s Temple, which was9.14 meters wide and 27.4 meters feet long, and the Staunton pawn has the exact same proportions.”
“You amaze me, Sherlock. You really do.”
“Why?”
“Because just when I am certain of what you decide to keep and what you decide to purge from that brain of yours, suddenly some trivial fact you have stored comes to the fore.”
“Well, all the hours we spent learning about the Buddha and his teachings helped us to solve the British Museum Murders, did they not? This is just another interesting belief system which may come in handy in a case one day.”
“Sherlock, why can’t you just admit you find the spiritual aspects of Freemasonry and even biblical studies interesting? Why is it that you must always attempt to convince me that you believe in nothing?”
“Not in nothing, Poppy. I believe that it is my duty, like all good citizens, to uphold the law. Sometimes that requires the acquisition of trivial facts. It does clutter the brain. But in any event, my interest in Freemasonry is nothing more than something to store for future cases.”
“You must say that lest you be indicted for heresy, because you really do have a moral compass,” I laughed. “And have you forgotten that you told me that flowers are our highest assurance of the goodness of Providence? That our powers, desires, food, water and air - these are necessary to exist, but the flower, the rose, is an embellishment, something extra from which we have much hope to gain? Is that not why you brought me the flowers at Holme-Next-the Sea?”
“That again,” he scoffed. “A thousand times we could speak of that night in the cottage and still you will not put it into perspective. We were young; we were caught up in our first adventure together; we were inebriated. Yet you persist in it.”
I did not feel that way about our night together at the seaside cottage. It was a very special night to me and always would be. “It irritates you, doesn’t it? Your lapse in judgement. Or that’s how you see it. I suppose I am the thorn, not the rose?”
I was touched by his next gesture. He reached across the table and lightly pressed his fingertips to my wrist. “Never a thorn, Dr. Stamford. But you are, on occasion, as prickly as the thornapple, with its sharp teeth.”
I smiled. “And its rank, heavy, somewhat nauseating odour, I suppose, as well?”
Now he smiled. “You? Nauseating? Never. Narcotic perhaps,” he said, grinning. “And as I recall, a foetid odour arises from the flower only when it is bruised,” he added. “But generally, the flowers are sweet-scented, remember? They produce a stupor if their exhalations are breathed for any length of time.”
I grasped his hand in mine, the fact that we were in public be damned. “And this is why you have always run away from me. Because I do produce some kind of stupor in you. It’s why you fight to escape me, isn’t it?”
He withdrew his hand and lifted his menu. “I was thinking about religion today, that is all. About religion and about all sets of strong beliefs. Actually, deduction is quite necessary in religion. And the important thing is not to stop questioning. Somewhere out there in this vast world, maybe even within this Metropolis, some like-minded person has been born who, through the science of deduction, who, through being unafraid to ask the right questions, will unleash the great powers of the universe. A great mind, a physicist or the like. I do not believe I shall have that kind of impact on the world, but the science of deduction shall.”
I got an eerie feeling. He spoke, just momentarily, as Effie, my dear departed psychic friend, had so many times. She had predicted disasters as well as trivial events. I had never known anyone so prescient. Was Sherlock Holmes being prophetic? Hopeful? Or simply logical?
“Now, we are here to discuss swans,” he said, abruptly. “Not Freemasons or flowers or intoxicating scents. I have continued my investigation, of course.”
He proceeded to bring me up to date. When I said that Sherlock spoke with half of Her Majesty’s Royal Household, I did not exaggerate. He spoke first with the Keeper of the Swans, but he was not helpful. He had fallen ill and was rarely at work or competent to discuss his duties or the case at hand. But Sherlock persevered. By the end of March, he had spoken to over a hundred individuals, including members of the Privy Council; everyone in the Lord Steward’s Department; the Duke of Westminster, who was Master of the Horse; Mr. March, the Paymaster; the Earl of Cork, Master of the Buckhounds; the Duke of St. Albans, the Hereditary Grand Falconer; the pages of Honour
at the Royal Mews; everyone in the Department of the Mistress of the Robes and those serving with the Groom of the Robes... even John Brown, Prince Albert’s former ghillie, now the Queen’s servant and trusted friend.
But no one seemed to know who was slaughtering the swans or how or why they did it. Not even Sherlock Holmes.
Chapter 8
I glanced out the window. At times, it was still difficult to see the hansom cabs as they drove by and people moved like ghosts draped in black silk along the pavement. I looked back at Sherlock. “Swans, then. What have your inquiries revealed?”
“Precious little,” he sighed. “There are those in dispute with the Queen, of course. Probably thousands throughout England. There are always those who are bitter about the economy or wars or government decisions. But insofar as Her Majesty’s Royal Household is concerned, I found no one who had any particular disagreement with the Queen or the Keeper of the Swans. Except perhaps for Gladstone. He and Her Majesty do not get on well. I hear she calls him a Jesuit. His return to government has rather brought to a boil the long-simmering antipathy between the two.”
“Well, I hardly think Gladstone is slaughtering swans, Sherlock.”
“I agree.” He paused and sipped some coffee. “There was a boy I spoke with, though, who was able to enlighten me a bit. His name is Thomas Abnett. He’s sixteen or so. He said that they are quite short-handed since the Master and others swanherds have fallen ill.”
“And?”
“He mentioned one young man who was practically raised around the swans. His father had been a Deputy Swankeeper for some time but as he aged, he couldn’t do the work, so he was given some other menial task to make a living. When he died, the son stayed around for a while but then suddenly disappeared.”
“You think this young man might have something to do with all this?”
“Abnett said the boy was very distressed that his father was treated shabbily. But he also thought there was more to it. He’d heard rumours. Something to do with a member of Privy Council and the boy. But he really couldn’t tell me more than that.”
“You should have Mycroft sift around.”
“He is the one who has me sifting around. And I do have another matter to which I must attend.”
“A new case?”
“Quite so. I shouldn’t breathe a word of it, but it will likely be all over the newspapers shortly. It has to do with Wiggins.”
“Archie? What has he done?”
“Wiggins has been doing quite well for himself as an entrepreneur - I am told he robs the graves of the poor and sends the corpses to Oxford where dissection is conducted without permission at the medical school.”
My inclination was to let out with a wail. Then I remembered where we were and who I was with. But I had feared for some time that Wiggins would take a wrong turn. “Sherlock, did I not inquire about this a few months ago? You mentioned then that you thought Wiggins was traveling down this illegal path.”
“Did I?”
“You did. My God, assaults on the privacy of a quiet grave... it’s despicable.”
“Yes. And Wiggins has found himself in quite a quagmire. In the thick of something well beyond his anticipated endeavor. In the process of one of his nighttime ventures, he uncovered a body inside a coffin atop the first tenant. He soon realized that the grave was freshly unearthed and someone had dumped the corpse on top of the original occupant. It seems that someone has committed murder and tried to cover it up by placing body parts in an old grave.”
I swallowed hard. “Body parts?”
“Wiggins said it was a child’s grave, fairly fresh, into which the dismembered adult male was placed.”
“Surely Wiggins is not implicated in the murder, is he, Sherlock? He’s just a boy.”
“He was at first. But I believe I have convinced the authorities that young Wiggins rather did them a favor. Now we just need to find out who the deceased is - which won’t be easy, given he was, not unlike our swans, rather savagely mutilated. And then we need to find out who killed him and why.”
The waiter had just placed our plates before us. I pushed mine away. Suddenly, I had lost my appetite.
Chapter 9
Naturally, Sherlock asked me to accompany him to St. Bart’s to view the gruesome graveyard find, and he said he had someone he wanted me to meet. We walked because he did not trust a hansom cab in this foul weather - his mother had died in a peculiar and freakish cab accident.
According to Uncle Ormond, the number of cab accidents in the Metropolis had increased ten-fold during the never-ending fog. Uncle urged Bart’s to publish the number of injured patients brought to Bart’s door, which he estimated at three hundred each week. Sherlock had often said that cab and van drivers considered the roadway as their own property and the people who cross over it as trespassers. When I walked, it was not unusual for a cab driver to shout a ‘holloa’ at me to get out of the way, never thinking it his duty to avoid hitting a pedestrian by slackening his speed, lest the person be under the horse’s feet. Instead, every walker felt he needed to run in order to save his life. Prosecution of these cabmen for furious and reckless driving never seemed to be enforced.
Because of the fog, it took much longer than it should have, close to an hour, to get to Bart’s. Sherlock often grabbed my hand to be sure I was still next to him. It was an unexpected comfort. When we passed St. Paul’s and finally made our way to Giltspur Street, I breathed a sigh of relief.
“Poppy,” he said, “I’ve been meaning to ask. Have you been to the new wing of the hospital?”
“I’ve not had the chance, Sherlock. Uncle was at the opening ceremony in November, though. He said that the Prince and Princess of Wales dedicated the new building. But it isn’t finished yet, is it?”
“Not all of it, but much of the construction is completed and it should be done in time for the opening of the winter session on October 1st. I am looking forward to it - especially the new dissecting room.”
St. Bart’s had been serving the people of London since the twelfth century. It had, of course, changed a great deal over the years. But the new wing was the grandest and loftiest in its evolution.
The new wing would be comprised of a museum; classrooms; a physiological laboratory, a library, anatomical, pathological, and pharmaceutical laboratories, each two or three times larger than the old ones. The students already had been warned that the new library would not be a place for lounging, talking and letter writing. Its purpose was for study. No Punch, Graphic or Field magazines would be permitted within its walls. Strict silence was to be enforced, ‘just like Mycroft’s Diogenes Club,’ Sherlock told me, and only industrious students would be welcomed into its quiet recesses.
The basement floor would house two classrooms, a lavatory, a more commodious cloak room and locker rooms - so Uncle told me though I was sure I’d never see them. One classroom was for bone classes and the other for The Abernethian Society, whose members discussed new methods of treatment, presented papers on interesting subjects... and read Punch when no one was looking. A moveable wood partition would divide the physiological laboratory into a large room and a small one. My uncle’s good friend, Dr. Harris, had been appointed to Director of the physiological lab. The smaller of the rooms would be devoted to research by vivisection.
I was not surprised that the room that most excited Sherlock was the large dissection room. Situated on the site of the old museum and the old dissection room, it was to be fitted with the latest equipment for the study of anatomy and the osteological department of that study. Students would no longer need to repair from the dissection room to the museum for the purpose of grounding their knowledge of studying bones. The plans included a large gallery which would encircle the new dissection room and on each side of it would be mounted the most perfect osteological specimens available, affixed so that they
could be turned about in any direction without being handled or removed from their place. It would have its own special heating apparatus so that students could dissect during the winter months without having to wear coats or take time to visit the fireplace. A lavatory had been installed next to the dissecting room, as well as a special room for demonstrators and prosectors and two locker rooms. The anatomical theater would seat 520 men and the new medical theater had a capacity of nearly three hundred. It was modern and convenient for the students in every way. Even a covered walkway from the library to the new block was under construction.
When we arrived at the entrance to the new wing, Sherlock ushered me inside and we made our way to the shell of the gallery of the anatomical theater. He said, “The gentleman to whom I shall introduce you, Frederick Womack, is an acquaintance of mine, a brilliant young medical student. He has some fascinating ideas. Though he is only a third-year, he has received many high honours. He is experimenting with pin-pointing time of death. He believes that soon we shall be able to accurately report the time of death to the minute.”
“Temperature calculations?”