by David Marcum
“It was not anything that could be heard, Watson. It had to be seen, and once seen, it had to be understood.” He packed some fresh shag into the pipe - the clay, I was happy to see, and not the disputatious cherrywood - and said, “She was lying, Watson. Although it certainly wouldn’t be the first time that a client has done that. The question is, why?” And he lapsed into silence.
I went about my own business for the next hour or so. I had planned to take a walk, but decided to remain, in case something of interest were soon to present itself.
It was approaching eleven o’clock when a ringing of the bell startled me. Holmes glanced up and met my gaze. “Are you expecting another visitor?” I asked.
He laughed. “Indeed, Watson. I am expecting a visitor later today, a rather important one, but not yet, and I doubt that Lord Carlington will ring the bell with such fervor when he arrives. No, this is undoubtedly something unexpected.”
This proved to be the case. A heavy tread climbed the stairs, and in a moment our door was opened to reveal a constable, bearing a missive. “From Inspector Lestrade,” the man rumbled. Holmes quickly read the note, and then moved to his desk, where he retrieved a sheet of his stationery from the drawer and proceeded to write a series of short sentences. Then, folding his reply, he handed it to the constable, with instructions to relay it to the inspector with all possible speed. With a touch to his helmet, the constable turned and departed, as solid as when he had arrived.
Only then, noticing my curiosity, did Holmes say, “It is murder, Watson. I must admit, that I did not expect anything to happen quite so soon.”
“Murder?” I repeated, half rising from my chair. “Who has been murdered? Should we have accompanied the constable?”
“I cannot leave at the moment,” said Holmes. “Lord Carlington is arriving with the documents that he stole from his father, the Duke. I must be here to receive them, and swap them for the documents that are now in my possession, or I may never get another chance. It’s been a pretty three day’s work to get all the pieces in place, and if I walk away now, the whole game might fall apart. And I may tell you,” he lowered his voice, “the fee that I have received from the Duke to manage this business will more than cover my share of the rent for both this month and the next, and I’m sure you wouldn’t want me to give up on that unnecessarily.”
“But murder, Holmes!” I cried. “Surely Lestrade needs you? Who has been killed?”
“Miss Porter’s fiancé,” he said blandly. “It seems that Miss Porter returned to find that her father had beaten Mr. Willis to death, and then in remorse over what he had done, turned a gun upon himself.”
I was aghast. “What else did Lestrade’s letter say?”
“Hmm? Here, read it for yourself. I will get the documents for Lord Carlington.” And he walked into his bedroom, while I glanced through Lestrade’s note.
The inspector wrote in choppy, succinct sentences that shortly after he had returned to the Yard, a message had arrived for him, sent by officers in Limehouse, and summoning him to Porter’s pawnshop. Upon arrival, he had discovered the police in possession of the premises, and Miss Porter in a faint at a neighbor’s house, being attended by a local doctor.
In the main shop area were the bodies of the two men in question. Willis had received a single terrible blow at the back of the skull, caving it in completely. The wound had bled profusely across much of the floor. The murder weapon, a heavy brass pot, had been dropped beside the body.
Nearby, lying behind the shop counter, was the girl’s dead father. He had been shot with a small-caliber bullet through the right temple. There were powder burns on the wound, and the man was right-handed. A pistol matching the size of the bullet rested beside him, partly gripped in his right hand. On the counter was a single sheet, a pencil lying beside it. The pencil had obviously been used to write the one word on the message: Sorry
According to Lestrade’s note, the girl had been returned by cab from Baker Street to the pawnshop. She had walked across the sidewalk and opened the shop door while the cab driver was still there. As soon as she had opened the door and observed the scene inside, she had begun to scream. The cab driver had jumped down to run to her assistance, and he was joined by several passers-by as well. At first they could not see what was causing her distress. Miss Porter had collapsed in the doorway, and the interior of the shop, with its cluttered windows facing north, was very dark. Eventually it became obvious what had caused the girl to react in so dramatic a fashion, and the police were summoned.
Lestrade concluded the note by stating that he knew Holmes would want to be informed, and asking if he would be joining the investigation in Limehouse. As I read those lines and looked up, imagining the scene that the girl had found, Holmes walked back into the room and sat down across from me. In his hand was a stack of letters, tied with a single red ribbon. Even from across the bearskin rug I could smell the perfume which was so liberally doused on the documents.
“I gave Lestrade a few questions to answer,” said Holmes, placing the packet on the table beside him. “I don’t believe that there is any need to go there right now, even if I had the time. But,” he added, standing back up again, “I suppose tying up another loose thread will help us to have a complete case by the time Lestrade comes back later this afternoon.”
Without seeming to notice my obvious confusion, Holmes threw open the door and bellowed for Mrs. Hudson. Then he sat down at his desk once again and dashed off a telegram. While he was in the midst of this activity, Mrs. Hudson climbed the stairs and entered, drying her hands on her apron, and wearing a barely concealed look of peeved irritation.
Holmes finished, and turned with a charming smile. As usual, Mrs. Hudson could not stay upset with him for very long, and she graciously took the telegram, promising that the boy in buttons would dispatch it immediately. Expressing thanks, Holmes followed her to the door, closing it behind her and then returning to his chair, where he picked up his pipe and resumed his silent considerations.
Lunch came and went, but I ate alone as my friend pondered. Finally, long after Mrs. Hudson had cleared the table, and much later in the afternoon, Holmes stood and began tidying, something that he did only irregularly, and usually when he expected a visitor.
He glanced at the clock on the mantel and said, “We still have a few minutes before our visitor arrives. Do you have any questions regarding the case?”
“All that I have are questions. Do you mean the matter of the murder and the suicide, or about those letters for Lord Carlington there beside you?”
“Oh, the deaths in Limehouse, of course. The affair of the letters must simply take its course. I can see that you are puzzled about my refusal to join Lestrade at the scene.”
“I am. You seem as if you already know what happened.”
“I fancy that I do, although I have asked Lestrade to obtain a few confirmatory facts before absolutely establishing the truth.”
“Speaking of truth,” I said, “I meant to ask earlier about when you said that Miss Porter had lied, but you clearly did not want to discuss it then. How did you know that?”
“Ha!” said Holmes with a grin and a slap on the arm of his chair. “Good old Watson! You have put your finger on the very heart of the matter!” He leaned forward, with his elbows on his knees. “Tell me a story, Watson,” he said, suddenly making no sense at all. “Tell me about the first time you were ever on a train!”
I looked at him in surprise, but he wiggled a finger and urged me to comply. I closed my eyes for a moment, casting back for the memory. Then, I opened them and looked up above the fireplace as the details emerged before me. “It was on a trip from my parents’ home to that of my grandmother. I was only a wee lad-”
“That’s enough,” he said, interrupting me. “And now, tell me what you would do if you found a wallet on the street containing a thousand
pounds?”
I thought to question these mad and random instructions, but I knew by now that Holmes had a purpose for this, although I could not fathom at all how it related to the deaths of the poor girl’s father and fiancé. I ordered my thoughts before replying, “I suppose that I would attempt to find the owner. Perhaps the wallet would contain some sort of-”
“That’s enough, Watson,” Holmes said, interrupting me once again. “Did you realize what you were doing?” he asked.
I laughed. “No,” was my simple reply, instead of elaborating on the fact that his requests had made no sense whatsoever. “I suppose you’ll explain to me how these questions are somehow relevant to the matter.”
“Quite.” He settled back in his chair, and - with another glance at the clock - said, “Years ago, I happened to notice a curious behavior in myself. Once aware of it, I could not ignore it. To explain it simply, whenever I thought about something that had happened before, an actual event that I had witnessed, I would cast my eyes up and to the left as I visualized it in my head. Even being aware of this trait did not stop me from doing it whenever I would consider a memory. Conversely, when I would picture something that was completely imaginary, such as what I would do if I found a wallet with a great deal of money inside, I would glance up and to the right.
“I found that something similar happened when thinking of sounds. Remembered sounds would make my eyes glance in a more lateral direction to the left, and if I were to construct or imagine a conversation, for instance, I would find that my eyes were resting in a lateral direction toward the right.
“Having noticed this trait in myself, I began to study if it was present in my fellow man. To my amazement, it was. Time and again, during a conversation, people would frequently glance up to the right or left while they told me something or other. Less rarely did I observe the lateral glances indicating remembered or fabricated sounds, but that happened as well.
“Oh, it doesn’t always work, mind you, and if a person is left-handed, it sometimes works in reverse. But on the whole I have found it quite reliable. Before long, I was able to tell with a fair degree of accuracy who was telling the truth and who was lying. I can assure you, such a skill, properly cultivated, is quite useful in my profession.”
I was amazed, and with a laugh, I replied, “I should think so.”
He smiled. “I suppose that, like a magician, I should not easily explain what is in my bag of tricks. When I asked you to recall our first train ride, you glanced without thought to your left, up toward the mantel. I asked about an imaginary situation, and you glanced to the right, above our dining table. As an indicator, it has proved itself useful time and again. It is not absolute, you understand, but as an overall compass needle, it is quite effective.”
“And you determined that today, based upon her reactions while telling her story, Miss Porter was lying about something.”
“More specifically, about nearly everything of importance,” said my friend. “When she was telling about her parents’ separation and the move to the seashore with her mother, she either made direct eye contact, or glanced up and to the left, indicating that she was seeing real memories. The same was true when describing her success at learning the pawnbroking business, and when and why Mr. Willis came to work at the shop. But I believe from her actions while describing it that her engagement to Mr. Willis was a fiction.”
A light dawned. “You made a point of looking at her ring.”
“I did. And her finger underneath it showed no signs whatsoever of long-term wear, as evidenced by a person who wears a ring daily for extensive periods. I suspect she simply picked up a ring from a tray in the shop to add credence to her story.
“Of course, when she reached the part of her tale regarding the threatening notes and the subsequent argument between her father and his assistant, she was - without fail - fabricating the entire business. I am certain of it.”
“But to what purpose?” I asked. “And how does that relate to the events in the pawnshop?”
“Ah, the knowledge that she was lying, as well as one or two other trifling observations made while she was here in our sitting room, made me suspicious of her. Although I suspected that something was going to happen at some point in the future, I had no idea that the crime would reveal itself so soon. The fact that the murders did happen almost immediately makes the whole thing quite clear to me.”
I felt some exasperation, as I did not yet see the greater picture that he was slowly revealing. But before I could ask any further questions, the bell rang, and within a few moments, Lord Carlington was shown into our presence.
There is no need to relate here the extensive and seamy details of the precise and final deconstruction of that man’s threadbare character on that day. The story has since played out in the press, to the great embarrassment of his father, the unfortunate Duke, and further picking at that wrecked man’s reputation will serve no useful purpose. Suffice it to say, the situation could have been much worse, especially for the Duke, and Holmes’s handling of the situation was masterful. When he showed Lord Carlington the documents that he possessed, the others that he had been hired to retrieve were quickly placed into his possession. At the conclusion of the matter, Lord Carlington rose to his feet, looking even more gaunt than when he had arrived, tottering on his feet as if he were being stretched too thin. He didn’t seem to notice the bell when it rang from the street, and he made no acknowledgement to either Lestrade, Miss Porter, or the accompanying constable when he passed them coming in as he bolted for the steps. Sadly, the man would be dead within a fortnight.
Lestrade and Miss Porter found the same seats as before, while the stolid constable placed himself with his back to the door. Almost immediately, however, a knock behind him caused him to step aside, revealing Mrs. Hudson, with a telegram in hand. She passed it to Holmes, glanced around at the room’s assembly, and departed. The constable resumed his post. Lestrade had arrived with a Gladstone bag, and he carefully placed it by his feet.
“Excellent,” murmured Holmes as he read the telegram, and then placed it without comment on the octagonal side table beside his chair, where the packet of letters had so recently rested. Looking at Lestrade, he asked, “Did you find it?”
Lestrade nodded, and Holmes glanced toward Miss Porter who appeared puzzled.
“This telegram,” he said, “is a reply to an inquiry that I set in motion not long ago. I had not expected an answer quite so soon, but sometimes things work out. I have an associate in Clacton-on-Sea, a man named Garren that I once helped out of a pesky little problem. I had thought that my question for him might need some extra time, in order for him to complete a more thorough investigation, but it seems that the answer is fairly common knowledge out that way. And after all, it is not a very large town, is it?”
“Clacton-on-Sea?” asked Miss Porter. “What did you want to know about that? I could have told you whatever you wished.”
“I suspect,” said Holmes, “that you would not have wanted to tell me this particular story. I wished to determine if you had left there for London for any reason other than the one that you told us.”
Without moving or changing expression in the slightest, Miss Porter appeared to go rigid for an instant. Perhaps it was an unconscious pause in her breathing, before she seemed to force herself to exhale. Then she said, “Whatever can you mean? I told you that I did not get along with my aunt, and I knew that my father would take me in if I came back to him.”
“Ah, but why did you not get along with your aunt?” He lowered his arm and tapped a long finger on the telegram. “There is the matter of your aunt’s younger brother, whom you influenced into robbing a manor house. He acted alone during the actual robbery, and was sadly wounded during the attempt. He later died without implicating you to the police, but not before he told the story to his sister, your aunt-by-marriage, of how you
pushed him into it. She has made it her business to make sure that your involvement, although unprosecuted, is common knowledge in those parts. It was no wonder that you felt the need to hie yourself to a place where you could start over.”
He steepled his fingers in front of his face. “That, in itself, is simply a minor confirmatory fact, helping to paint in the background of the picture. It is interesting, however, in that it shows you have a history of being someone who can manipulate others to your will.”
I saw Lestrade’s eyes widen fractionally with sudden understanding as he recalled the single word, written by Holmes, in the margin of his scrapbook in relation to Porter’s pawn shop, and the increased success of the business over the last couple of years. Since the time, in fact, that Miss Porter had moved to London to learn the trade.
“You probably did not realize that the pawnshop’s less legal activities have been known to the police for quite some time,” said Holmes. Again, the girl did not move, but now she suddenly seemed to look wary and dangerous without changing her expression at all.
“The police, and myself as well, I might add, already knew about the fencing that has been carried out there, in ever increasing amounts over the last couple of years. However, until you decided to put your plan in motion this morning, including a visit to the police, no one had ever suspected your complicity.”
Miss Porter still made no comment as Holmes continued. “More than complicity. I should say, your supervision. For it was your vision that changed your father’s small steady pawnbroking business into the leading place to fence stolen items in the East End. My only question is did your father knew from the start, or did he only learn of it recently.”
The girl’s eyes narrowed, and her nostrils flared, as if she were taking in extra oxygen in preparation for flight. She glanced at both the constable against the door, and the tall windows looking out over the street, as if weighing her chances at escape. Evidently she was not provoked to the point of leaping through the glass quite yet, as instead she said, “You are mad, Mr. Holmes. My father and I never did anything illegal. If there was something going on of that sort, it must have been done in secret by Floyd Willis, behind our backs. After all, he was obviously threatening Father.”