The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories - Part IX

by Marcum, David;

  I might have done best to stay where I was and shout for help, but I did not think of that. While some of my thoughts were clear enough, the logic which would make sense of them was tangled, broken by the melancholy conviction that I deserved the misery of my present condition. I would have to leave evidence, if I could, clear enough even for Scotland Yard to avenge me. But first, were I to preserve any dignity whatsoever, I would have to reach the water closet.

  Tangled logic, indeed, that had me dragging along the water pitcher as well as myself. Long past the point when my body had obviated any possibility of dignity, I kept on going, a few feet here before huddling against another convulsion. A few feet there, before resting my face against the smooth cool glass of the pitcher, in vague hope of penetrating the numbness which was obliterating my senses.

  I had achieved the desired door, but had not yet managed to open it, when the vibration of footsteps through the floorboards under my cheek advised me that I was not alone. Distantly I heard Watson’s cry of “Holmes! Good God!” and distantly I felt his hands upon me. But it was not until the pinprick against my arm and the warm sting of cocaine in my veins spread apart the veil of dismay that I could truly see him, crouched over me and gently tapping at my face. “Symptoms, Holmes. Tell me the symptoms.”

  He wished to know with what I’d been poisoned, of course. “Aconite,” I told him, for the answer was sitting already in my head. “Or something like it.”

  “Numbness? Tingling? I can see that you’re weak and purging.”

  I nodded confirmation.

  “All right then,” he said, stripping off his coat and rolling back his sleeves. “You’re not going to enjoy this.”

  According to Squires,[1] the antidotes for aconite poisoning are emetics, as well as stimulants both internal and external. I knew that, intellectually, but I was not prepared for the reality of having that advice applied to my own person. Mustard, applied both within and without, creating an aversion to the stuff which promised to persist. Water until I could drink no more, and then syrup of ipecacuanha to bring it all back again, alongside whatever traces of the poison might remain. Capsicum liniment countering the tingle of the poison with a tingle of its own upon my hands and feet. And Watson, dumping me into the tub for a much needed bath and then wrapping me into nightshirt and dressing gown with a brisk medical efficiency before forcing me to walk back and forth between further assaults with various stimulants until I ached with exhaustion.

  It was nearing midnight when he at last declared himself satisfied enough with my condition to prop me up on the settee and leave me alone for a few minutes. He returned with a mug of Mrs. Hudson’s soup for me, and a mop and a bucket for himself.

  “Can’t you leave that for Billy?” I asked, when Watson began to clean up the mess by the hearth, for he was limping and I could see his hands shaking when he went to turn up the gas for light.

  “It’s part of the job,” he answered absently. “Drink your soup, Holmes. You need some food inside you.”

  “Yes, if it will stay inside,” I grumbled, but without heat. The fatigue of the day had left me with little ambition, but at least I no longer felt as if I were trapped in a morass, and I had Watson to thank for that. “Oh, do sit down and rest, my dear fellow. You look as tired as I feel.”

  He shook his head. “I’ll finish this first. It will only smell worse if you leave it till morning.”

  I leaned back against the pillows he’d set around me and observed him at his work, knowing that further protest would be met with the same intransigence. Not since his marriage had I seen him in shirtsleeves, with patches of perspiration plain in the light and his hair rumpled from effort. It reminded me of summer nights, far too hot for comfort, when he and I had whiled away the sleepless hours with Bach and brandy and philosophical arguments of the most desultory sort. Watson had always grown cantankerous after two or three such nights in succession, and it was clear to me, now that I was truly looking at him, that he was suffering from a distinct deficit in the amount of sleep he required to thrive.

  I could surmise the reason why.

  “How is Mary?” I asked, and he startled like a fly-bitten horse, flinging up his head to stare at me.

  “Mary?” he echoed, before taking himself in hand and returning to his task. “Why do you ask?”

  “Mrs. Hudson told me.”

  “Ah.” A glint of reflected light at the corner of his eye warned me to keep my silence while he assembled what he wanted to say. “That explains where the booties went, I expect. Mary must have sent them back, since Mrs. Hudson’s niece is expecting a child any day now.” He was mopping very carefully, although the hearth by now was as clean as it was going to be without a scrubbing brush.

  “Today, actually,” I said. “That’s where she’s gone.”

  “Ah.” He gathered up the bucket and the mop. “I’d best go mop then.”

  “If you insist.”

  He vanished through the door and I closed my eyes, wondering how long it would be before he left Baker Street entirely. But when I opened them again he was still there, sleeping in the chair opposite with a book drooping from his fingers, although the clock on the mantelpiece was chiming three in the morning. The room had cooled and the fire was lit, as if to ward off the rumble of the thunder that had woken me. By its light, I could see threads of silver at Watson’s temples that I had not taken note of before, and the curl of his arm, meant to ease an aching shoulder. I didn’t wish to disturb him, but I was as stiff as if I’d taken a beating. The moment I tried to move, I couldn’t help but make a noise. Instantly he was awake and on his feet, coming to bend over me.

  His hand rested on my forehead. “No fever,” he said. “And you’re not too chilled. How do you feel?”

  “I need to move,” I told him.

  He made no demur, but helped me disentangle myself from blanket and pillow, offering his support when I came to my feet. I needed it, indeed, for the first few minutes, but as my equilibrium returned I ventured a short distance on my own. When I caught the corner of the table for balance and turned to look, Watson was watching me with the tolerant amusement he might, were fate ever kind, bestow upon a tiny child taking a few first daring steps. “Not bad, Holmes,” he said. “But you’d best avoid bending for a while longer.”

  Just the thought of changing the angle of my head made my gorge try to rise. “Yes, Doctor,” I agreed, not even nodding. “How long, do you think?”

  “A day or so.” He came to offer me his arm. “Without a sample of the poison, or a clear notion of the dose, I can’t be sure I’ve done everything I can to counteract it. Hence, I can’t be certain of the length of your recovery.”

  “If you analyse the cigarettes in my case, you might find your answers,” I replied. “I can’t think of when Camberwell had opportunity to adulterate them, but neither can I think of any other way he might have managed to poison me.”

  “‘When you have eliminated the impossible...’” he quoted at me, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth as he escorted me back to the settee. “I’ll have someone from Scotland Yard do the analysis. I’d prefer not to risk accidentally destroying whatever evidence remains of the man’s perfidy.”

  “Perfidy indeed,” I grumbled as I took my place again. “The Persian slipper needs restocking, and if I can’t smoke the cigarettes in my case, I shan’t be able to smoke anything at all until morning.”

  “Food would be better for you,” Watson said, mildly. “Or sleep. I should think you’d be off tobacco, after what’s happened.”

  I extended a tremulous hand, as much to study for itself as to display the symptom. “It’s tobacco I want, though. Or cocaine,” I said, “And I know how much you disapprove of the latter.”

  “Not as much as I did,” he admitted, tucking the blanket up around me. “The dose you took earlier today prob
ably did much to counter the poison. But I’d as soon you didn’t indulge in it at this time of night. Wait here a while and I’ll see what I can do.”

  He may have stayed away longer than necessary, hoping I would slip back into sleep - I’m not entirely certain, as I spent the duration of his absence in aimless contemplation - but it seemed a long while. I cannot say that I was thinking to any purpose at all. And yet, when Watson returned with a tray that, thankfully, had a box of cigars upon it as well as food, I looked up to him and asked, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He didn’t answer straight away, but made himself busy helping me sit up and resting the tray onto my knees. He uncovered my plate, revealing a coddled egg and a few slices of bread. “Eat that and I’ll give you one of these,” he said, reserving the cigars before retreating to the armchair with a plate of his own. We ate together, the silence broken by only the stuttering of our forks against our plates and the soft rataplan of rain against the windowpanes.

  At last he set aside his repast. “I haven’t told anyone. Well, Anstruther knows. He helped... he helped Mary, when it happened. I was away. With you, as it happens; it was the day we were sailing back from Uffa.” He didn’t look at me, but took up the box of cigars into his hands, tracing the design upon the cover.

  “Shouldn’t you be with her now?” I asked, gently.

  “She’s not at home. The specialist recommended that she make a complete change and rest until she’s properly recovered, so he’s sent her off to a convalescent hospital in Devon. The air’s better there than in London.” Watson shrugged, still not meeting my eyes. “The servants have been told that she’s gone to visit a relation for a few weeks.”

  As Mary Morstan Watson had no relations in the world other than the man sitting opposite me, I could see that the lie chafed him. What kind of hospital was it, I wondered, that required such discretion? Had Watson’s absence at the crisis precipitated a break in her mind as well as her health? It did not seem likely, given the lady’s strength of character, but even an admirable fortitude can crack under tremendous strain. Still, that was neither here nor there when it came to my obligations to my friend. “I’m very sorry to hear it, old fellow. Please, accept my hospitality here at Baker Street until she returns. Your old room is always at your command, and it would be churlish of me to send you out into the storm.”

  He made a sound that was neither laugh nor sob. “Holmes...” He ran a hand through his hair in exasperation and then held up the box of cigars, glaring at me with a smile quirking up the corner of his mustache. “Did you know that when I came here to return these to you, it was with the intention of never darkening your door again?”

  I raised an eyebrow at the melodramatic phrasing. “I knew you were angry with me,” I temporized.

  “Furious,” he said, a spark of that anger rising again to color his cheeks. “And I’ve come to a realization. I can either be your friend, or your physician, but not both. You’ll have to choose.”

  He was utterly serious, despite the smile, and I realized just how grievous had been my transgression. Never in my life had I more needed a clear head, and seldom had I felt so muddled. “Considering that as my physician you just saved my life,” I said, carefully, “the decision is not a light one. I don’t suppose you would allow exceptions in cases of emergency.”

  “It’s the cases of emergency that are the problem,” he said and got to his feet, going to look out the window. “I know you think I have no gift for acting. The Culverton Smith business proved that.”

  “You haven’t.” I had to agree. Watson’s honest face is one of his most admirable assets.

  He turned to one side, watching me from across the room, so that that face was more in shadow than light. “Then why on earth did you send for me this morning?” he asked. “You can’t have expected that I should carry on a deception in front of Camberwell if I can’t act. And yet, the moment I took your pulse you knew that I would be able to tell that you hadn’t been poisoned.”

  “Yet.” I amended ruefully, and earned a chuckle from him. I was grateful for it. It seemed I had not damaged our fellow feeling beyond all hope. But he had asked a valid question. “This morning I wasn’t hoping for a deception so much as any excuse at all to leave Camberwell’s house. Whether or not you could play the physician retrieving the patient or the friend rescuing a comrade-in-arms was immaterial. I needed you to hustle me out the door before Camberwell could work up enough nerve to fetch out his pistol and put paid to any future interference in his plans.”

  “Couldn’t you have told me as much?” Watson asked. “When young Simpson turned up on my patient’s doorstep, all out of breath from running, and told me that you’d been poisoned, I nearly broke my neck trying to reach you in time. And I abandoned my patient - a dying man, Holmes, who was in great pain - even if I did have Simpson go to fetch Anstruther for him.” Now he was angry again, and not only at me.

  “You gave him morphine before you left,” I said, when he fell silent. His shoulders fell, ever so slightly and told me the rest. “But he died, didn’t he? Before you returned.”

  “Yes.” Watson began to pace. “It was inevitable. Anstruther knew it as well as I, but still, neither of us was there. He died alone.”

  I let him pace as I thought. I couldn’t honestly regret having sent for Watson. His presence truly had saved my life, and preserved the case against Camberwell into the bargain. But I regretted the concern I had caused him as he rushed across London to be at my side. Given his recent loss, and the impending loss of his patient, the fear of having me imperilled as well must have been bitter indeed.

  It occurred to me that Watson was not the only compatriot I had affrighted. “You did tell Simpson that I was all right?” I inquired.

  Watson nodded. “Yes. Not that you were, as it turned out.”

  “Yes, well, it’s no more than I deserve, given the circumstances,” I said. “I did not think my investigation would require quite so much improvisation. In any case, I apologize for summoning you unnecessarily. It shan’t happen again.”

  “No?”

  “No.” I saw the thread of a compromise laid out before me. “If you will consider continuing to take care of such small matters concerning my health as happen to fall under your eye - I can hardly ask you to ignore them - then I shall impose upon another practitioner for any ailments which strike me in your absence.”

  “You won’t send for me if you’re ill?” he asked, and I heard uncertainty, and perhaps a bit of indignation in his voice. It seemed that he had not yet forgotten the way I had denigrated his skills during the Culverton Smith affair.

  “If I send for you directly, you may be certain that it is a ruse,” I said. “If a fellow physician sends for you, you may be certain that my condition is real. And I will have them send for you, my friend. I’d far rather trust your medical opinion than that of any dozen Harley Street quacksalvers.”

  He huffed his disbelief as he came over to collect my plate and set it aside. “That’s laying it on a bit thick, old chap,” he said, but I could see that he was pleased. He set his hand briefly against my forehead once again. “Still, I suppose, I could stay a few days at Baker Street to oversee your recovery. As a friend.”

  I patted his arm and lay back among the pillows, glad that his anger was dissipating once more. “Well, doctors are two-a-penny in London, you know. Besides, as my physician, you might feel it incumbent upon you to dissuade me from taking a cigar, but as my friend I think you might be willing to share.”

  He laughed and set about preparing a cigar for each of us. By the time we were settled and the soothing smoke was drifting about our ears, the lines had eased upon his face and his hands were no longer trembling. Cigars were more to Watson’s taste than mine, but I drew another puff into my grateful lungs. “Thank you, Watson,” I said. “These are excellent.”

  �
�You ought to know,” he said. “You purchased them.”

  “At least I’ve managed to do one thing right in all of this,” I said, thinking back over the past two days with dissatisfaction. Despite the comfort of the tobacco, my body ached as if I’d been trampled by angry horses. Camberwell had managed to poison me, despite my precautions. And I had come as close as I ever wished to driving an intractable wedge of misunderstanding between myself and my biographer. “Whatever reputation I might have for omniscience you may consider scattered to the winds, Watson. Remind me to never again take on a case for a man I suspect of being a murderer.”

  “Or a woman!” Watson agreed heartily. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, his eyes alight with curiosity. “Is that what happened? Camberwell hired you? Why on earth, if he had committed murder?”

  “Because the murder would do him no good without his Uncle Joseph’s last Will and Testament, and Camberwell hired me to locate it. Uncle Joseph had hidden the document somewhere in the house, leaving only a string of elaborate clues and ciphers. And I took the case, having underestimated both Camberwell’s cleverness and his ruthlessness.” Were it not that our positions were reversed, Watson in my chair and I upon the settee, we might be having the same sort of conversation we’d had a hundred times. Disastrous as the day had been, we had survived it with our friendship intact. Already I could see Watson’s free hand creeping toward the pocket where he kept his writing tools. “Would you like me to tell you about it? With the benefit of hindsight we might, the two of us, see where I went wrong.”

  “Were I your physician,” Watson said, glancing to the clock, “I would waste the next hour insisting that you ignore the case and try to get some sleep. But as I am your friend,” he set aside his cigar and took out his pencil and notebook, “I know better. Go on, Holmes. And start at the beginning.”

  1 Squire’s Companion to the Latest Edition of the British Pharmacopoeia, various editions.