by Martin Daley
We stepped back into our lodgings as the quarter hour before seven struck on the town hall clock opposite. Upon our entrance Mr. Graham once again produced a second telegram addressed to Holmes, who opened it instantly.
My friend omitted a soft velvet “Ahhh; just as I suspected.”
“What is it?” I asked as we climbed the stairs. “Brother Mycroft!” was all Holmes would divulge.
“Mycroft?” I said, as we entered our suite, “What has Mycroft got to do with this?”
“He is rather slow and cumbersome,” he said, “but as ever, he is extremely reliable and his contacts are invaluable.” Stopping at the door of his bedroom he added, “I do believe all of the data I require is now available to me. I have now to analyse it.” With that cryptic comment, he was gone.
I resumed my reading of the papers for sometime before deciding to go downstairs for something to eat. Knowing the answer beforehand, but asking the question out of courtesy anyway, I shouted “Will you be joining me for dinner Holmes?”
“No, you carry on Watson, I have to formulate the data gathered,” came his reply.
As I left our rooms I virtually bumped into Captain Vaughan, who was just about to knock on our door. “Harry! What a pleasant surprise. What brings you here?”
“Good evening old man, I was just interested to see what the latest position was regarding the case,” said my former colleague, “the colonel is becoming increasingly concerned.”
“Well, perhaps you would like me to join me for dinner and we could discuss it,” I said. In making the offer I must confess that I was hoping more for a dining companion rather than the opportunity of analysing the theft of the Spanish Drums, for in my heart I knew I did not have much to discuss!
To my relief and genuine delight, Vaughan consented to my offer and we went down stairs to sample our hostess’ considerable culinary talents.
During our meal we discussed many issues starting almost inevitably with the weather. Vaughan explained how his colleague and erstwhile cousin of the Police Inspector, Sergeant Armstrong, was something of an amateur meteorological expert
“He can see a storm coming days in advance,” said the army officer, “which is very useful in the field. I sometimes think he would have been more suited to the navy than the army,” he added, laughing. “Told me earlier he expects a ‘belter’ tonight and he is very rarely incorrect in his meteorological predictions.”
From there our conversation drifted once more back to Afghanistan to the relative boredom of civilian life and even to his reminding me of his distant relationship with Lennard Stokes, my old rugby playing captain, who went on to play for England.
“Of course!” I cried, “dear old Stokes, what a player he was. How is he doing these days?”
“Sadly he passed away some years ago. His career ended through injury and from there his health gradually deteriorated.”
With the raising of the subject of Rugby Football, I was reminded of our adventure the previous evening, and I shared with Vaughan the series of events that culminated with my recreating my best centre three quarter’s tackle. We both laughed at the folly of my actions.
“We are getting too old for such activity, John,” said my friend.
Our laughter faded and I decided to broach the delicate issue that had been niggling at the back of my mind since Holmes’s interview with Sergeant Armstrong, “Tell me Harry, what do you make of the new RSM?”
“Former Northumberland Fusilier, like yourself!” was his jovial reply.
“Yes I know but how does the man strike you? He seems quite a strange type to me and everyone seems rather non committal when talking about him.”
“Be fair Watson, the man has only been with us a few weeks. I agree that he behaves rather unusually for one in his position but I just put it down to him finding his feet.”
“Perhaps you are right,” I said, admittedly unconvinced. As I had broken the ice however, in discussing some of the military personnel, I decided to press the matter further by risking the touching of a nerve with Vaughan by bringing up another of his colleagues; “And Major Young?”
“Clive? Oh he’s all right. Sometimes gets a little full of himself but I think he will make a decent Major in time.”
“Yes, Holmes and I experienced his rather haughty attitude the other day; made a bit of a fool of himself given that he was in charge of the depot while the theft occurred.” I was impressed at the magnanimity of my former colleague, having learned from Sergeant Armstrong that Young had beaten him to the promotion earlier in the year.
“Well, we all make mistakes, I suppose,” he said.
“Are you sorry for your colleague’s predicament or your failure to secure the promotion?”
“Perhaps a little bit of both,” he answered with a rueful smile.
As we enjoyed a cigar and a brandy after our most enjoyable meal, the thunderstorm that had been predicted by Vaughan’s NCO colleague, hit the county city.
“I had better make a dash for it, old fellow,” said my dining companion, draining his glass and reaching for his army issue raincoat. “Until tomorrow then,” he said reaching out a hand.
“Good night Harry, you had better be quick, it’s fairly building up out there.”
He made his hasty exit and I sat alone for a while and finished my drink, pondering the rather pleasant evening I had enjoyed with my old friend and the subjects we had covered during our conversation.
“Did you enjoy that sir?” I came back to life with a start as our hostess addressed me, whilst she cleared our table.
“I did indeed Mrs. Graham, another superb meal. Thank you. You are certainly kept busy,” I said continuing the conversation, “you must be worn out.”
“Yes, there’s no stopping in this job, Doctor. But ye get used to it, I suppose. Sleep well now,” she said as she left the table loaded down with dishes.
“Good night, and thank you again.”
It was ten thirty by the time I left my table and as I climbed the stairs of our diggings I was content with in the knowledge that I would be soon in our snug chamber and equally, that I did not have to venture out on such a night as this. As I reached our rooms the weather conditions had reached Wagnerian proportions. I entered to find our suite in darkness, save for the intermittent brilliance created by the flashes of light from the storm outside. I gave a start as I realised I was not alone in the room. Holmes – in his purple dressing gown – was perched on some pillows and cushions in one corner of the room with his eyes closed and his clay pipe between his lips. Although I had seen him in this pose before, the sudden realisation of his presence made my heart skip a beat. I walked over to the window to watch the storm. It was in itself like a fierce military assault, with loud cannonade of thunder, a fusillade of rain and hail on the window, whilst in the distance the medieval castle appeared to be under attack from the swords of lightning that erupted from the angry skies above.
I turned to look at my friend, who came into view every time the room was illuminated by the blue and yellow electric flashes. He sat there throughout, in eyrie silence, apparently oblivious to my presence and the violence outside. I knew it was futile to disturb him so I decided to turn in and try and get some sleep.
“Good night old fellow” I said, leaving him to what I knew would be an all night sitting.
Chapter Eleven - An Interview With The Harbourmaster
As I opened my bedroom window the following morning, I found the air to be far fresher than that of the previous day – obviously due to the thunderstorm that raged on, well into the night. I indulged in several deep breaths of this crisp air before making my way towards our sitting room. When I entered I was overcome by the dramatic change in atmosphere; the room was full of black acrid smoke! It immediately dawned on me that this was a legacy from Holmes’s all-nighter, and his smoking of endless pipe-fulls of his favourite dark shag tobacco. Before I could rebuke myself for having forgotten about how I had left my friend the previous
evening, and then for my subsequent lack of preparedness, I exploded into an uncontrollable coughing fit. Reaching for my handkerchief and placing it over my mouth, I made my way over to the window, waving the air with the other hand, in a futile effort to disperse the dense pollution.
I raised the sash and took some more deep breaths of the morning air, albeit it in a less relaxed manner than that of a few minutes earlier, when in my own room. I must have made a comical sight from the street outside, hanging out of the window gasping for air while smoke billowed out from behind me.
When I had regained a little more composure and the air had cleared somewhat I shouted, “Holmes? Holmes, are you awake?” admittedly part in retaliation for my companion catching me off guard. No reply was forthcoming from his room and at that moment an envelope on the mantle-piece caught my eye, simply marked ‘WATSON’. Upon opening the envelope, I found the contents to be equally brief; the note simply read:
Gone to Silloth!
SH
I assumed Holmes was continuing his investigation, but I must confess to being somewhat piqued at his ambiguous message and the fact that he had seen fit to apparently progress his enquiries without me. I went down for breakfast pondering over the vaguely familiar place-name.
Mr. Graham greeted me, and I asked him, “Who, or what is Silloth?”
“Silloth sir? That’s our local holiday resort, about twenty- five miles west of Carlisle. The beaches out there are lovely in the summer,” the local man added, enthusiastically.
I snapped my finger in sudden realisation, “Of course!” I said, as much to myself as to our host, ‘I remember now; Sergeant Armstrong mentioned it when we spoke with him on Friday.’
I spent the rest of my morning meal trying to follow Holmes’s thought process that led him to go to the seaside resort, without much success I must confess.
As my friend was away and had left me no instructions to carry out in his absence, I left the Inn that morning a little at a loss as to how to spend my time. I ambled aimlessly around the nearby cathedral grounds before ending up at the public library that was located further down Castle Street at its mid- point, between the two historic buildings.
Inside, my eye wandered toward the local history section and almost inevitably rested upon a book about the castle itself; its background, history and the various adventures it had experienced.
I removed my hat and coat, found an easy chair and read with fascination about the great red triangular fortress with its classic outlook; set as it is, on a hill facing north over the River Eden to confront the enemy, in the shape of the barbarous Picts and Scots.
Centuries earlier Roman soldiers had been sent to the area to augment their leaders’ boundaries. Indeed, only yards from where I was sitting – in the grounds of the library – there was evidence of a working aqueduct that had been built by the Romans. Legionnaires, who had come from far and wide to fight, will undoubtedly have cursed the bitter conditions, marooned, as they were on this key fortress adjacent to the Emperor Hadrian’s Great Wall. I chuckled to myself at the thought of a group of Roman soldiers, based in some beautifully warm Mediterranean province, being approached by their Centurion: “All right men, I’ve just been advised of a new posting for us …”
This was their Northwest Frontier.
When Rome fell, Dark Age chieftains, perhaps even King Arthur among them – the piece suggested that the nearby Isle of Man was his Avalon – used the remains and ruins of the castle for their own wars. The eleventh century then saw William II rebuilt the fortification, apparently incorporating mythical passageways and channels in the process, which alas, only resulted in the castle becoming the focus of over five hundred further years of bloody warfare between the English and the Scots. William Wallace, Robert the Bruce and the Jacobite army led by Bonnie Prince Charlie all viewed Carlisle Castle – vulnerable as it was, only eight miles from their own border – as England’s first great prize.
Kings of Scotland had been crowned there and legendary warriors executed there. Richard the Lionheart used the Northern Marshes as his training ground; the same marshes where, over eighty years later, Edward I died as he advanced to face Robert the Bruce.
I read with continued fascination about how – in the 16th century – the castle had witnessed the infamous Border Reivers; men from counties on both sides of the border whose circumstances constrained them to earn a living by robbing and plundering others. In reading about these men, I was intrigued to read of their family names – Armstrong, Graham, Scott, and Nixon among them – all characters whose descendants we had encountered during our visit. I was thrilled to learn that my own surname was also an associate Reiver name, although I am not sure if I would have been as thrilled to meet that certain branch of my family tree!
Not only had the stronghold acted as a backdrop to the adventures of the Reivers, but it was also a prison for Mary Queen of Scots, who was held in the very tower that was named after her; the same tower from which the drums were stolen.
I learned that the castle was also the subject of a siege during the civil war and for the last two hundred years it had been used as the depot from which the local regiment would leave to fight all over the Empire.
This was wonderful stuff! I thought to myself. I had spent a most enjoyable morning educating myself on the local subject and concluded that the perpetrators of the theft of the drums must have discovered one of William II’s passageways in the underbelly of the fortress and made their cunning escape into the blackness of the night. It was shortly before one o’clock when I left the library to walk the short distance to the Crown and Mitre. I could not wait to share my theory with Holmes upon his return. I had barely been in our rooms five minutes when my friend entered with a flourish.
“Good afternoon Watson, my boy! What a beautiful day!”
“Holmes, what have you been doing?”
“I have been breathing in over five hours of Cumberland’s finest coastal air this morning and I am famished!” was his infuriatingly ambiguous reply, “I will tell you all about it over lunch.”
At our table, before Holmes could resume his narrative, I ventured to put forward my theory after my morning’s education.
“Watson, you could not be further from the truth,” said my friend. “You are a romantic, my dear fellow and this, combined with a writer’s imagination has led you away from the facts.”
“What is your suggestion then?” I asked.
“I am already aware of how the crime was committed and, more importantly who committed it, but the capture of the criminals and recovery of stolen items is in the balance.”
Holmes then went through the series of events that led us to our current position.
“You left me last evening pondering the state of the case and the evidence that was available to us. I must say I found the combination of our relaxing Sunday afternoon and last night’s thunderstorm quite stimulating. I think the latter succeeded in finally hammering some sense into me!
“Our interview with Sergeant Armstrong on Friday morning was most informative and I decided that the best escape route for the criminals was by sea. This way they could flee, virtually at their own pace, while the authorities would almost certainly cover the road and rail outlets.”
“But what was the significance of the telegram you received from Mycroft?” I interrupted.
“The theft of the Arroyo Drums was so unusual,” answered Holmes, “that I believed the background to it would lay in the history of the trophies themselves. Until I received confirmation of this theory from Mycroft, I could not act upon it. Putting this information together with the other details we have received so far, it led me to the seaside town and industrial shipping outlet of Silloth. I sat for most of the night waiting for the early morning train.”
“Yes, I nearly choked on the room full of tobacco smoke you left behind,” I said.
“I caught the five thirty-two from Carlisle,” he continued, ignoring my comment, “and found m
yself by the seaside within the hour. I explained to the conductor on the way that I was looking for information concerning traffic in and out of the docks and he advised me to speak with Anderson, the Harbourmaster, who knows ‘everything there is to know about the comings and goings in this part of the world’. Upon our arrival, the railway official gave me directions to the docks and I set off in search of this nautical sage.
“Once at the harbour, I perceived a lone figure on the otherwise deserted quayside. Perched on one of the bollards that stood like soldiers along the docking area was a rotund figure, with a weathered complexion and a white beard that matched the hair protruding from under his seaman’s cap. He sat, looking out at the subject that, no doubt, had dominated his life, enjoying an early morning pipe.
“‘Mr. Anderson I presume,’ I called.
“‘Mornin’, bit early for you city types,’ replied the old man, eyeing me up and down.
“’Isle-o-Man Ferry doesn’t leave till ten o’clock’.”
Not only was Holmes a master of disguise, he had the ability to mimic most dialects after the briefest of meetings. Always a lover of the dramatic in such situations, he did not hesitate in adopting the Cumberland accent as he recited his tale to me.
“‘I am not here for the ferry Mr. Anderson. My name is Sherlock Holmes and I have been commissioned by the Border Regiment to look into a theft from Carlisle Castle’.
“‘That’s a new ‘un,’ Anderson said laughing, ‘how can I help?’
“‘I have reason to believe that the thieves made their getaway by sea. Given the direct access to Silloth and its closer proximity to Carlisle than, say, Whitehaven or Maryport, I suspect that they chose this location from which to leave the county’.
“‘If it’s the same blokes I’m thinking of, you’re right in thinking they chose Silloth, but I can tell ye that they ended up going by the railway’.
“I sat down with Anderson and shared a pipe with him. I enlightened him as to the details of the case and, more importantly, the various dates on which we believe each event took place.