Oscar Wilde and the Ring of Death

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Oscar Wilde and the Ring of Death Page 10

by Gyles Brandreth


  Sickert pulled up a chair from an adjacent table and sat astride it like a mounted hussar. (His absurd moustachios did give him the look of a comic-opera hero.) ‘I’ll stay a minute, but I mustn’t linger. I’m on my way to Eastbourne.‘

  ‘To Eastbourne?’ exclaimed Oscar. ‘Eastbourne-on-Sea? You’ll certainly need a drink.’

  A young waiter was now at our table. Oscar inspected the lad. ‘What is your name, young man?’

  ‘Dino,’ said the waiter.

  ‘Dino,’ said Oscar solemnly, ‘my friend has just told us that he is on his way to Eastbourne-on-Sea. This calls, I think, for something a little special. A bottle of your 1884 Scharzhofberger, perhaps?’

  ‘Right away, sir,’ said the boy. ‘And four hock glasses?’ Oscar nodded approvingly. The waiter smiled and turned smartly on his heels.

  Conan Doyle cleared his throat and tugged at his waistcoat. ‘I can’t linger, I’m afraid,’ he said.

  ‘Stay a moment,’ said Oscar. ‘Stay at least until we’ve discovered why Wat is on his way to Eastbourne.’

  ‘This is why,’ said Sickert, leaning forward over the back of his chair and waving in the air the envelope that a moment ago Oscar had taken for his bill. ‘This is why I’m here. This letter reached me this morning—from Eastbourne. I felt I should share it with you. I went to Tite Street and Constance told me that you were here, so here I am.’

  ‘Go on,’ said Oscar. ‘What is it?’

  Walter Sickert opened the small envelope and produced from it a single sheet of notepaper covered, on both sides, in an unruly scrawl. ‘It’s a note from Bradford Pearse—the actor. You recall: my guest on Sunday night.’

  ‘We recall,’ said Conan Doyle, eyeing Sickert carefully.

  ‘His was the fifth name on the list of murder victims,’ I added.

  ‘Thank you for reminding us, Robert,’ said Oscar, archly.

  ‘I liked him,’ said Conan Doyle.

  ‘Everyone does,’ said Sickert. ‘He’s the best of fellows.’

  ‘Well,’ said Oscar, ‘what does he say?’

  ‘It’s a “thank you” letter,’ explained Sickert, holding the note out in front of him, ‘But there’s something about it that perturbs me.’

  ‘Read it to us,’ said Conan Doyle. He smiled at Sickert. ‘If you don’t mind.’

  Sickert read the letter. He read it simply, without dramatic emphasis.

  Tuesday 3 May. Eastbourne

  My dear Wat,

  Sunday night was memorable—fine food, fine wines, fine friends. Thank you for your hospitality. Thank you for remembering me. I hope you always will! I shall not forget you or your kindness(es) to me—come what may. To be candid, I don’t know what the future holds for me. I’m being pursued and I’m fearful.

  I’m in Eastbourne this week. At the Devonshire Park. Come and see the piece— Wednesday night would suit. Bring Wilde. The play is so bad I think it might amuse him. It was an honour to meet him again, of course. He is wise as well as wonderful. Inspiring, in fact. I liked Conan Doyle too—and his shy young friend with the name no one will remember. Hornbeam was it? Chas. Brookfield was as obnoxious as ever. I neither like nor trust him. I never have. Who is to be trusted these days? You are, of course, old friend. Thank you for that.

  Come and see me if you can spare the time. I’m frightened, to be honest with you. Come and see me.

  Ever yours,

  Bradford Pearse

  Sickert passed the letter, and the envelope, to Conan Doyle.

  ‘What train are you catching?’ asked Oscar.

  ‘The three o’clock from Victoria,’ said Sickert.

  ‘We’ll come with you,’ said Oscar.

  ‘I cannot, I’m afraid,’ said Conan Doyle, pushing back his chair. ‘I have domestic obligations. The doctor is calling to see my wife this afternoon and I need to be on parade.’ He got to his feet. ‘But I think that you and Robert should definitely go, Oscar— and I think, too, that, with Wat’s permission, you should share this letter with Inspector Gilmour at Scotland Yard.’ He handed the note to Oscar.

  ‘You think Pearse may be in danger?’ I asked.

  ‘He clearly believes so,’ replied Conan Doyle. He looked quite grave. ‘I liked Mr Pearse—very much.’

  He glanced at his timepiece. ‘I must go—forgive me. Will you keep me informed, Oscar? Thank you for breakfast. Gentlemen.’ He bowed to us and went on his way.

  Oscar called after him: ‘Don’t forget your umbrella, Arthur—and don’t murder Holmes too soon!’

  Conan Doyle turned back and laughed and waved towards us genially. As he departed, he passed Dino, the boy waiter, arriving with our wine. He stopped the lad and spoke to him.

  ‘What did Mr Doyle say to you, Dino?’ Oscar asked when the young waiter reached us and was uncorking the bottle.

  ‘He told me to take good care of you, sir.’

  Oscar chuckled. ‘Did he indeed?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said the boy, sniffing the cork with the air of a seasoned sommelier. He can’t have been much older than the wine: he looked fifteen, sixteen at the most.

  ‘Tell me, Dino,’ said Oscar, taking a sip of the Scharzhofberger and rolling it around his mouth a little noisily. ‘What exactly did Mr Doyle say to you? What were his actual words, Dino?’

  ‘Since you ask, sir,’ said the boy, pulling a face as he filled our glasses, ‘His actual words was, “Only the one bottle—they’ve work to do.”‘

  Oscar banged the table with delight. ‘I knew it! ‘he cried. ‘You can depend on Arthur! And he is right, of course. We do indeed have work to do and I’m glad of it. As Arthur knows, work is the best antidote to sorrow.’

  ‘Are you feeling melancholy, Oscar?’ asked Sickert. ‘You don’t look it. You don’t seem it.’

  ‘We all have our secrets, Walter,’ said Oscar, emptying his glass in a single draught and handing the young waiter a second shiny shilling. ‘There are no exceptions to the rule …’ He swivelled in his chair and held his empty glass out in the direction of the doorway to the dining room. ‘Look at those two.’

  There, hovering at the entrance to the Langham Hotel Palm Court, stood Charles Brookfield and Bram Stoker. They were wearing outdoor coats and anxious faces. Stoker was shaking his head as Brookfield surveyed the room.

  ‘I agree: they do look furtive,’ chuckled Wat Sickert.

  ‘There’ll be a lady in the case, I warrant,’ exclaimed Oscar, waving his napkin in the direction of the door.

  The boy waiter was refilling our glasses. ‘Dino,’ said Oscar, ‘ask those two gentlemen to come and join us, would you?’

  The waiter brought Brookfield and Stoker to our table.

  ‘Good morning,’ said Stoker genially.

  ‘We can’t stay,’ said Brookfield. ‘We have an appointment.’

  ‘With a lady?’ Oscar conjectured, with a smile.

  ‘An actress,’ said Stoker. ‘Brookfield has an emergency on his hands. He’s lost his leading lady. I’ve agreed to help him find another. We’re due to meet Miss Tilvert at eleven.’

  ‘She’ll be late, I’m afraid,’ said Oscar. ‘Take off your coats, gentlemen. You’ve time for a glass, that’s certain.’

  ‘Do you know Miss Tilvert then?’ asked Brookfield, looking about the room.

  ‘No,’ replied Oscar smoothly, ‘but I know the type. Have some Scharzhofberger, Charles. It’ll settle your nerves.’

  ‘We’re not stopping long ourselves,’ added Sickert. ‘We’re off to Eastbourne.’

  ‘Eastbourne,’ echoed Stoker, pulling up a chair and smiling as Dino poured him a glass of the German wine. ‘I love Eastbourne. Eastbourne has style.’ He raised his glass towards Oscar. ‘The town’s entirely owned by the Duke of Devonshire, you know.’

  ‘It’s not His Grace we’re visiting,’ said Oscar. ‘It’s Bradford Pearse. He’s in a play at the Devonshire Park. We’re going to see it.’

  Brookfield, who remained standing, waved away the glass of win
e that Dino was offering him, and looked down at Oscar. ‘You’re going to Eastbourne to see a play? It must be frightfully good.’

  ‘On the contrary,’ answered Oscar, breathing out a long plume of grey-blue cigarette smoke as he spoke, ‘Bradford Pearse tells us that the play is frightfully bad—truly atrocious. It seems it could hardly be worse. That’s why I’m determined not to miss it. I do enjoy excess in everything.’

  ‘You’re very funny, Oscar,’ said Brookfield quietly.

  ‘Give Pearse my best,’ said Stoker with enthusiasm, savouring his wine. ‘He’s a fine fellow and a good actor—and the unlikeliest candidate for murder you could imagine. I don’t know why anyone picked him as a victim when we played that game of yours, Oscar. Bradford Pearse hasn’t an enemy in the world. I’d stake my life on it.’

  ‘What about his creditors?’ asked Charles Brookfield, with a little sniff, folding his arms across his chest.

  ‘I don’t know about his creditors,’ said Bram Stoker, holding out his glass for a refill, ‘but I happen to know his pawnbrokers and they speak very highly of him.’

  ‘I imagine they know him exceptionally well,’ said Brookfield, smiling.

  ‘There’s no truer friend than an honest pawnbroker,’ said Oscar.

  ‘Agreed!’ said Stoker. ‘I use Ashman in the Strand. Capital fellow. Who do you go to, Oscar?’

  ‘The same. A good man. Ten years ago, when I was in desperate straits, I took him my most prized possession—my Berkeley Gold Medal—and he gave me thirteen guineas for it. Thirteen guineas! I said, “Mr Ashman, I don’t think it’s worth five pounds.” He said, “Mr Wilde, I know about this medal. In my day, I was a Greek scholar, too. You won this when you were at Trinity College, Dublin, did you not? It is the college’s highest classical award. To you it must be beyond price. I have thirteen guineas in my safe this morning. I am happy to give you thirteen guineas for your medal.”‘

  ‘What a wonderful story,’ said Bram Stoker.

  ‘Ashman is a scholar and a gentleman,’ said Oscar.

  ‘And a Jew,’ added Charles Brookfield.

  ‘Indeed,’ said Oscar, smiling, ‘I find that so many of the best people are.’

  ‘Have you seen the paper this morning?’ asked Wat Sickert, deftly changing the subject. ‘There’s a paragraph about the Cadogan Hotel parrot. Apparently, the poor creature was done to death yesterday, in the hotel hallway, in broad daylight. Can you believe it?’

  ‘The parrot is dead?’ said Charles Brookfield. ‘I’d not heard that.’

  ‘How strange,’ said Bram Stoker. ‘Brookfield and I took breakfast there yesterday. The parrot was fine, as far as I recall.’

  ‘Who would do such a thing?’ asked Sickert. ‘It was a messy business, according to the paper— blood and feathers everywhere.’

  Charles Brookfield smiled. ‘Perhaps it was one of your vampires, Bram?’ he suggested. ‘Bram’s obsessed with vampires, aren’t you? I think it comes from working for Irving, the old blood-sucker.’

  ‘It could have been a vampire bat,’ suggested Oscar, lightly.

  ‘In Knightsbridge?’ exclaimed Brookfield.

  ‘Sloane Street,’ Oscar corrected him.

  ‘The notion’s ludicrous,’ said Brookfield scornfully.

  ‘Unlikely, I agree,’ said Oscar benignly, ‘but not beyond the realms of possibility. There’s a breed of South American bat—the desmodontidae—that subsists on blood, and preys on birds and beasts and humans.

  ‘How do you know this, Oscar?’ asked Stoker.

  ‘I went to Oxford as well as Trinity College, Dublin. Poor Captain Flint was a South American parrot. Perhaps he was ravaged by a South American vampire bat?’

  ‘Do you think that’s likely?’ asked Bram Stoker, draining his glass.

  ‘No,’ answered Oscar, shaking his head. ‘Frankly, [do not.’

  ‘Then who killed the parrot, Oscar?’ asked Charles Brookfield. ‘Do tell us.’

  ‘I can’t.’

  Brookfield looked about the table. ‘Oscar sees himself as something of an amateur sleuth—the Sherlock Holmes of Tite Street. Isn’t that right, Oscar?’

  ‘I don’t know about that,’ Oscar answered, widening his eyes and revealing his teeth, ‘but I’m certainly an admirer of Holmes’s powers of observation and deduction. Thanks to them, for what it’s worth, Charles, I can tell that you left home in something of a hurry this morning.’

  Brookfield raised an eyebrow. ‘And how can you tell that, Oscar?’

  ‘By looking at you, Charles. Your waistcoat’s done up with one button adrift, the underside of your chin is not thoroughly shaved and your boots are unevenly shined. You’re short of funds: your cuffs are frayed. You have no valet: you clean your own shoes and this morning you spent more time shining your left shoe than your right.’

  Charles Brookfield looked steadily at Oscar and clapped his hands together slowly in a show of mock-applause. ‘Very good, Oscar. Very good. So who killed the parrot?’

  Oscar returned Brookfield’s gaze, but said nothing.

  ‘Come on, Oscar,’ jeered Brookfield. ‘Rise to the challenge, old boy. Who killed the parrot? If, before my first night, you can prove beyond reasonable doubt who it was killed that parrot I’ll give you …’

  ‘What will you give me, Charles?’ asked Oscar.

  ‘I’ll give you …’ Brookfield hesitated and then leant forward and looked Oscar directly in the eye. ‘I’ll give you … thirteen guineas.’

  ‘Very well, Charles,’ said Oscar, smiling. ‘I accept your challenge.’

  CHAPTER TEN

  MURDER MOST FOUL

  We caught the three o’clock train to Eastbourne with only seconds to spare. Bustling along the platform, as whistles blew and steam swirled about us, we must have made a curious sight. Oscar, in a crimson cape and white fedora, led the way, striding forward, head held high, like a papal legate hurrying to an international conference. Wat Sickert paced anxiously beside him, the attendant major domo, in his black frock coat and pinstripe trousers, his waxed moustaches as shiny as his stove-pipe hat. I brought up the rear, the humble, bumbling clerk, scurrying breathlessly to catch up with my masters. I was only last, and out of breath, because, as we arrived at Victoria, Oscar had despatched me to buy all the newspapers.

  We travelled First Class, thanks to Lady Windermere; we had a compartment to ourselves; and exactly as we reached it and fell back into our seats, the final whistle blew and the train began to judder out of the station. ‘We made it!’ gasped Sickert, pushing his hat to the back of his head and wiping the perspiration from his forehead with a huge, crumpled, paint-stained handkerchief.

  ‘Did you doubt it?’ asked Oscar, carefully removing his own headpiece and caressing the felt fondly as he placed it on the empty seat beside him.

  ‘I most certainly did, Oscar. I thought you and Brookfield were all set to have a duel in Portland Place. What is the matter between you and Brookfield?’

  ‘He does not like me.’

  ‘That’s evident—but why?’

  ‘Envy,’ I chipped in, sitting forward and recovering my breath. ‘Brookfield envies Oscar.’

  Sickert laughed. ‘We all envy Oscar! I’ve envied Oscar since I was a little boy. Just because I envy him I don’t go about making snide remarks at his expense, do I? I don’t put on a play whose sole purpose is to lampoon and belittle him. I don’t issue preposterous challenges to him for no apparent reason. There’s more to it than common-or-garden envy, that’s for sure.’

  ‘Once upon a time,’ said Oscar, unclasping his cape and letting it fall from his shoulders, ‘I gave Charles Brookfield cause for offence.’

  ‘Ah!’ grunted Sickert, stuffing his handkerchief into his trouser pocket, ‘I thought so. What did you do?’

  ‘It was in New York, some years ago. I was on my lecture tour. He was appearing in a play. We met at a tea party. He was wearing gloves. It was an indoor tea party. A gentleman never wears gloves at tea. I told hi
m so—publicly. He has not forgiven me.’

  Oscar was reaching inside his jacket pocket for his cigarette case. We looked at him expectantly. He found a cigarette—one of his Turkish ones—and put it to his lips. He said nothing.

  ‘Is that it?’ asked Sickert.

  ‘It is enough, I think,’ he replied, lighting a match. ‘I wounded Brookfield’s pride. I humiliated him—in America, in front of strangers. I spoke without thinking. It was wrong of me and I regret it.’ He turned away from us and looked out of the carriage window as the railway cottages of south London flashed past. ‘Watch your thoughts, they become words,’ he said. ‘Watch your words, they become actions. Watch your actions, they become habits. Watch your habits, they become character. Watch your character, it becomes your destiny.’

  ‘Do you think you’ll discover who killed the parrot?’ I asked.

  Oscar turned round and grinned. ‘It’ll cost me thirteen guineas if I don’t! Hand round the newspapers, Robert. We’ve work to do.’

  I had perhaps a dozen newspapers in my bundle. I divided them up and handed them round. ‘What are we looking for?’ I asked.

  ‘Anything that’s relevant,’ said Oscar. ‘Further and better particulars of the fire in Cheyne Walk; statements from Inspector Gilmour of the Yard; obituaries of Lord Abergordon; reports of South American vampire bats having escaped from Regent’s Park zoo …’

  ‘You were not serious about the vampire bats, were you?’ asked Sickert, spreading out the Evening Chronicle on his knees.

  Oscar did not answer the question. His nose was buried deep in the pages of the Daily Graphic. ‘Look, gentlemen,’ he announced, with satisfaction. ‘We already have something … a photograph of the late Lord Abergordon, Under-Secretary of State for War, on his way to the Epsom Down races with his longstanding friend, the Marquess of Queensberry …’

  ‘Is this significant?’ asked Sickert.

  ‘Possibly … According to the Graphic’s graphic correspondent the two noble lords shared “a passionate interest” in all things sporting— ”racing, hunting, shooting, boxing, mountaineering …” And how about this?’ Oscar rustled the newspaper with delight. ‘It appears that their lordships first met as young men back in 1865, “at the time of the tragic death of Lord Queensberry’s younger brother, Francis … Lord Abergordon was a member of the same fateful Alpine expedition as Lord Francis Douglas, but happily survived the mountain-side catastrophe …”‘

 

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