We were met there by an attractive but modestly attired young woman who introduced herself to us.
“Good morning Mr. Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson. I am Grace-Taylor McClelland, the administrator of our London office, and we are honored by a visit from London’s famous detective and most popular author. Please gentlemen, be seated. Some tea? It just arrived all the way from China.”
In spite of her lack of years, she was impressively confident and composed, and we accepted her gracious offer.
“And would you,” I asked, “by chance, be the daughter of the founder of the Mission?”
“No, Doctor Watson. The Taylors did have a daughter named Grace, who died on the mission field when she was only eight years old. My parents named me in honor of her. Perhaps someday I will also travel to China, but for now my calling appears to be to recruit and prepare our new missionaries. So, you find me here and not on the field.
“Permit me,” she continued, “to admit to you that we were quite perplexed when we received your note yesterday, Mr. Holmes, requesting a meeting. At first we, being all too human, panicked and were fearful that we had made some grievous error somehow in our operations, but we searched our hearts, and our files, and could come up with nothing. And then we thought that the Lord was sending you to protect us from some impending calamity, but we could see nothing looming beyond the normal trials and tribulations that beset our work. So, quite frankly sir, we see only as through a glass, darkly. Please sir, enlighten us. What is Mr. Sherlock Holmes doing at the China Inland Mission on an otherwise pleasant spring morning?”
Her voice was warm and friendly, as was her smile. Holmes was moved to a brief flash of self-deprecating wit.
“Had it not occurred to you, Miss McClelland, that I might be applying to be a missionary?”
On that she let out a peal of spontaneous laughter.
“Pshaw, sir. Frankly, Mr. Holmes, that thought had not occurred to any of us and, may I say, speaking the truth in love, that it was for good reason. Somehow I cannot see that happening any time prior to the Rapture.” Holmes laughed pleasantly, an event which was all the more enjoyable for its very rare occurrence.
“No,” he continued, “I confess that you are absolutely right. The good Lord in His wisdom has seen fit to bless the work of the Mission by not calling me to China. My purpose this morning is to try to make contact with one of your wonderful servants of the Lord who, as far as I know, is on the field. I need to send a telegraph off, if it can be arranged, to a Miss Rosa Dartle. She is a nurse and serving with your mission. Are you familiar with her?”
A very brief shadow passed over the face of the young woman, betraying both surprise and concern. She immediately recovered her smile, but now it was a practiced one, not the natural one that I had admired just moments ago.
“Yes, Mr. Holmes. I am familiar with Rosa Dartle. I met with her on numerous occasions when she was going through her application and interview process two years ago. And I am very sorry sir, but no, it is not possible to contact her on the mission field, for the simple reason that she is not there.”
“Where is she?” I asked.
“Gentlemen, I have no idea.”
Here she paused and took a slow sip of the excellent tea, and then continued. “Rosa Dartle was an excellent candidate. We were thrilled to have a qualified nurse apply to serve with us, especially one who was unencumbered by children or any romantic connections. She had wonderful references from her minister and the deacons in her home church. She exhibited quite an aptitude for learning languages and had already begun to acquire the basics of the Mandarin tongue. And she was full of joy and enthusiasm and thanks to God for opening the door for her to be a missionary. And then, on the starting day of her training, she simply did not appear.
“It would not have been the first time that a new recruit was delayed by a day or two, but when there was no sign of her, and no word from her by the third day, we made inquiries. Her family was distraught. They had spoken with her only a few days earlier and confirmed that she was on her way to the training center. Her minister and friends from her home church could not understand it. We contacted her immediate past employer down in Winchester and he assured us that he had personally driven her, along with all of her belongings, to the station to catch her train to London a week earlier. He did say that he had noticed her chatting with a young man whilst on the platform, but that was to be expected as she was a very pretty young woman, and young men will always try to chat with such a one whilst waiting for a train.
“Two years have now passed, Mr. Holmes, since this took place, and we still have never had a word. It does happen from time to time that a young man or woman who has agreed to serve with us has second thoughts and, facing the hardships and deprivations of a life on the mission field, has reconsidered. But they have always let us know of their decision. We heard nothing at all from Rosa. We have prayed for her faithfully since then hoping that nothing untoward has befallen her. The fact that you are here inquiring about her does not bode well, and I confess that it is quite upsetting.”
“And I confess,” replied Holmes, “that you may be correct in your fears. Have you any thoughts at all as to what might have happened to her? Have you continued to make inquiries concerning her?”
“Miss Dartle had no legal status with us, sir, and would not until she had successfully completed the training program. As a result, the Mission has no authority to request action by the police. We have given her family our full support and cooperation and assisted in any way we can. As to her possible whereabouts, we are at a loss. We would want to believe that her heart remained true to the Lord, but it would not be the first time that a young woman, even one who is already serving on the mission field, met a young man, believed herself to have fallen in love, and departed from the straight and narrow. That is it in a nutshell, sir. For all we know she may have emigrated to Australia, or the Cape, or America.”
“Do you, by any chance, recall the nature of her financial affairs?”
The woman thought for a moment. “We are a faith mission, sir, and do not solicit funds for the support of our missionaries or the administrative staff. We do expect that anyone wishing to serve with us will seek financial fellowship from his or her church or parish, but no candidate is ever refused solely on the basis of their ability to obtain support. Rosa was singularly unconcerned about financial matters. There was some money in her family, and she went so far as to offer to remit her monthly stipend to the Mission.”
“And might you, by chance, remember how much that sum was?” asked Holmes.
She shook her head. “No. I was the one she discussed the matter with and I deliberately did not pursue the details. We choose, as one of our distinctive mission policies, to accept candidates irrespective of their financial situation, and so I assured her that should she make such an offering to the Mission, the decision would be between her and the Lord, and would remain a confidential matter.”
Holmes had hit an end of the road with his questions. “You have been most generous with your time, Miss, and I thank you. I will give you my word that should we solve the puzzle of Miss Dartle’s whereabouts, you will be fully informed.”
Chapter Five
How to Make a Puppy Happy
WE PARTED WITH MUTUAL THANKS and good wishes, and then Holmes and I hailed a cab and drove back to Baker Street. For the first part of the journey Holmes said nothing, his hat drawn down over his eyes and his chin resting on his chest. When we reached Marylebone Road he looked up.
“Something evil this way comes, Watson. This is not good.”
“True, but perhaps the days of great cases may not yet be over. I regret, Holmes, that I must leave you and attend to my patients, but if you need me to assist at any time, please inform me.”
“I will, my friend. I will and do forgive me if I fail to thank you as often and as I should for your invaluable assistance.”
I saw nothing of Holmes until Friday
at supper time. He had risen and departed early each morning from Baker Street and returned late in the evenings, after I had gone to sleep. I knew he would continue with this schedule until he had concluded this increasingly unusual case. When I returned to our rooms late on Friday afternoon, Holmes was seated by the fire, holding a file in one hand and a pencil in the other, and making short jabs at the file and leaving dark check marks, circles and underlines upon it. His brow was furrowed.
“Dare I ask,” I said, “if there is any news? I suspect that there is, and it is not good.”
He put down the file. “You are correct, my good doctor. Having been made aware of the disappearance of the nurse, Miss Dartle, I went to work immediately to find out what happened to the second nurse, Miss Lesperance, who only recently departed from service at the Copper Beeches.”
“By the look on your face, I suspect that what you discovered has been disconcerting.”
“Very. I had only her name and the information that she had returned to her native Haiti, and so I made inquiries at the major shipping lines that provide the Atlantic passage. Neither Cunard nor White Star had any record of anybody by that name. I traveled down to Southampton to ask at the Inman Line. Fortune favored me at that point, and the officer I spoke to was familiar with her name, even without having to review his passenger records.
“A Miss Marduchée Lesperance had, in early March, purchased a first-class ticket, one way from Southampton to America, on the ship The City of New York, with onward connections through Miami to Havana and ending in Port-au-Prince. It was quite an expensive ticket, valued at well over £200, and there were not many passengers who traveled in that level of luxury, and no more than a handful of those with dark-colored skin. A single woman, a mulatto, making such a booking was unique in his experience, and that was the reason for his immediate recall.”
“I am suspecting,” I said, “that she missed the boat. Might I be correct in that suspicion?”
“Precisely. The City of New York departed on the fifteenth of March and Miss Lesperance was not on board. Nor did she contact the line’s office to request a refund of her ticket. Mail sent to her address on file, which was the Copper Beeches, was returned, marked No longer at this address.”
“You have always cautioned,” I said, “against forming hypotheses before having sufficient data, but a fearful suspicion is forming in my mind that Mr. Toller’s profession—to borrow a word from G.B. Shaw—might be involved. Are you thinking along the same line?”
“It is certainly a possibility. I am aware of an informal criminal network that operates in England and on the Continent, that kidnaps young women, moves them to other countries, and forces them to engage in immoral activities. So yes, Watson, I share your fear, although it is still far too soon to posit that as a likely hypothesis.”
“Does your Professor Moriarty have his fingers in such activities?”
“Again, it is a possibility, but not a likely one. Moriarty has no moral scruples, but he does have his pride and desires respect from the world’s criminals for the reputed ingenuity and grand scale of his escapades. The enslavement of young English women is beneath his twisted sense of dignity, and engaged in by only low-lifes, such as Toller. It would be unworthy of Moriarty’s talents and imagination.”
“Are you worried that Miss Hunter might be in danger of such a fate?”
“I am, but again, the other two young women were engaged for many months before departing, and both terminated their employment of their own free will with other definite plans in mind. Miss Hunter does not fit that mold. However, much more data is needed before we can be assured that she is safe. I promised her that I would return and meet with her again on Sunday. Would you still be able to accompany me again, my friend?”
“Departing tomorrow?”
“Yes, if you are agreeable.”
“I am you man.”
“Your lovely fiancée would not object?”
“She would be happy for it. Both she and her mother would prefer that I not be involved in the plans for the wedding.”
“Please thank them for their consideration. And please bring along your Zeiss binoculars. A significant amount of spying may be called for.”
The following day we packed up and returned to Winchester. Shortly after our arrival, we again booked a dog-cart and, after a brief detour by Holmes into the hotel’s kitchen, we drove south to the Copper Beeches. We had the driver wait for us at a spot along the road some distance from the front gate. As we walked toward the entry Holmes suddenly stopped and peered in the woods to the right of the road. He turned and walked into the tress and I followed. He stopped, and I could see that he was looking at a bicycle, leaning against a tree and almost entirely hidden from view, except, of course, to the unique eye of Sherlock Holmes.
“This was not here a week ago,” said Holmes. “It seems we have some company.”
At the entry gate we had a reasonably clear view of the house, and we were not interrupted by the charging mastiff.
“You will recall,” Holmes reminded me, “that he is not let out until six o’clock. We have two full hours until then and should make the best of it. Your binoculars are in your satchel, are they not?”
They were and I extracted them. The main house and the surrounding lawns, gardens and woods came into clear focus. There was a tradesman’s wagon parked in front of the house, and I could see two painters on ladders leaning up against the wall and adding a coat of whitewash to the wall. A third was sitting in an open window and, with a small brush, trimming the outer part of the sash. That portion of the house that had a fresh coat of paint looked much more attractive than the section which had yet to be touched, and which was showing signs of years of neglect.
A second trade wagon stood by the corner of the house, and I observed four chaps coming and going between it and the gardens. Last week’s overgrown jungles had been cleared out and turned over, and the men were installing flowers and shrubs. The improvement in the entire setting was most promising.
“Nice to see,” I commented, “that these folks want to live in a more pleasant place. Always good to see people doing so.”
“I think not,” said Holmes.
“Oh come, Holmes. Nothing could be more obvious.”
“What could not be more obvious,” said he, “is that these people do not intend to continue to live here. For the past several years or more they have been here and allowed the building and grounds to deteriorate, and now they are suddenly making it attractive. They must be planning on selling the property, and if it has been in the family for over a century, then that is an indication of some significant event having taken place. But what, we do not know.”
Having been silenced one more time, I continued to watch the about-to-be-sold property through my Zeiss. On two occasions a prodigiously stout gentleman came out to inspect the work being done, and then returned.
“Mr. Rucastle?”
“Exactly,” replied Holmes.
Part way through his second inspection he was joined by a woman who was clearly younger and much more slender than he.
“Mrs. Rucastle?”
“The same.”
A small carriage appeared, coming out from the stable. There was another man and woman in it. The man I recognized immediately as the would-be panderer who had solicited us the week before.
“Mr. Toller and his wife,” said Holmes, “are coming our way. It is a good time to move on. There was some activity over by the pond, and if we follow the quickset hedge to the place we stood last week we shall have a decent view.” He moved on as he spoke.
A hundred yards further on we came to the place from which we had a decently clear view of the pond. Holmes was in front of me and suddenly stopped and held his arm out to prevent me from continuing forward. He was looking down at the ground and soon was on his knees, with his glass in his hand. He crawled several yards along the ground, apparently following a set of footprints.
When he sto
od up again he said, “A man has been standing here until very recently. He must have heard us coming and moved away. He appears by his prints to be fairly tall, about my height, but closer to your weight. The tobacco ash and the cigarette stubs he left are considerable, suggesting that he was standing here for at least an hour. The brand is a rare one, a Brazilian variety that is not widely available in England but said to be a favorite among sailors in both the merchant marine and the Royal Navy. We can be reasonably certain that he had no interest in merely observing the pond, but a keen interest in the individuals who are by the water.”
I raised my binoculars and observed that the boy, Edward, was sitting on the ground beside the water and, swimming just in front of him, identified by the rich chestnut head of hair, was our client, Miss Hunter. As I watched, the lad stood and ran and jumped into the pond and then, with a flailing and thrashing of his arms, swam toward the young woman. On reaching her, he threw his arms around her neck and stayed still, no doubt catching his breath. She then pushed him away, swam off a short distance, and he followed her. They repeated this activity several times before swimming back to the shore and getting out. In the late afternoon sun, they dried themselves with towels and sat down beside each other.
“I would say,” I said, “that our young nurse is getting along much better with her charge than a week ago.”
“Precisely.”
The warmth had fled the day and we watched as our two swimmers walked away from the pond and back toward the house. There was a nip in the air that sets one’s skin on edge. The boy put his arm around his nurse’s waist, and she responded with an arm around his shoulders.
Sherlock Holmes Never Dies - Collection Three: New Sherlock Holmes Mysteries - Second Edition (Boxed Sets Book 3) Page 31