Sherlock Holmes--The Vanishing Man

by Philip Purser-Hallard

  As the man continued with his fanciful and absurd account, I became conscious of a sensation of crawling horror that was as surprising as it was disagreeable. The disturbing familiarity of this man whom I had never seen before began to feel, not merely curious, but frightening, as if he was no man at all, but something wholly different that had taken the shape of one. Though two hours earlier I had been ready to dismiss the idea of visiting another world as the wildest fantasy, I now wondered whether there might not be some truth in it – and yet, if one were to believe such a thing, why one would stop at that. Who was to say that this man, who was so clearly not Kellway, was not indeed some substitute, some unnatural creature sent back by his extra-terrestrial abductors, to impersonate him?

  Such fancies are, as my regular readers will be well aware, quite outside my usual habits of mind, and I ordered myself firmly to keep them in check. Nevertheless, there was something about this false Kellway – for I remained certain that he was false – that made me feel he was something quite unlike a living man. Something like a living corpse…

  While I had been brooding in this morbid fashion, the impostor’s story had taken him to Venus, where he had already encountered some of the local wildlife. He was saying, ‘You see, the life of that planet has evolved far beyond the sophistication of our own world’s forms, and many of the animals and indeed some of the plants have reached a level of sapience not un-akin to some of the less developed of our human races. The intelligence of the Venusians themselves, of course—’

  ‘Was it warm there, or chill?’ asked Sherlock Holmes’s voice suddenly, in ringing tones which immediately held the attention of the room.

  The man paused and smiled. ‘I don’t understand your drift, my friend.’

  ‘Please allow Mr Kellway to continue, Mr Holmes,’ said Miss Casimir severely. The Countess sat forlornly alone across the room from me, and I began to wonder whether she had been entirely abandoned.

  ‘I merely wondered,’ Holmes was musing, ‘whether this mist you mention chills the flesh, like the pea-soupers we get here in London, or whether it warms it, like the sunlight you say it conducts. Venus is nearer to the sun, to be sure, but the fog you describe is unlike the meteorological phenomena of our own world.’

  ‘It was warm, my friend,’ the impostor said, ‘like a summer’s day or a mild bath of water.’

  ‘And the gravity?’ asked Holmes, his voice calm and curious still. ‘I wondered about the gravity. I believe that Venus is a smaller world than our own, which might mean that objects – and persons – feel lighter there.’

  ‘Now that you mention it, there was an unaccustomed spring in my step when I arrived, even before I began to regain my youth,’ the other replied. ‘But as to the nature of the human Venusians, their intelligence is far beyond anything anyone would encounter here, except in the most—’

  But Holmes had been making his way from the back of the room to stand in front of him. ‘So in a warmer world, and one where your body was lighter, you would I suppose have had little need of the jacket and cane you left behind. Here, allow me to give them back to you.’ He handed the man the cane he carried, and made to remove the jacket.

  I saw the false Kellway’s eyes widen in horror, and Holmes nodded in satisfaction. ‘Ah, of course,’ he said, shrugging the jacket back on, ‘how foolish of me. That cane is not the one that Thomas Kellway left behind him. I fear I have confused it with the one found in Frederick Garforth’s studio. The one you used to beat him to death with.’

  Miss Casimir recoiled violently, and Gideon Beech blanched as white as bone; and with the mention of Garforth I finally recognised the man, and knew why seeing him walk and talk had been the cause of such creeping unease in me.

  His age aside – for the other had undoubtedly been some thirty years older – he was the very image not of Thomas Kellway, whom I had never seen, but of Frederick Garforth, whom I had observed lying on a slab in the Scotland Yard mortuary.

  My shock prevented me from immediately reacting as, aghast, the young doppelganger turned in panic and ran for the door. Almost any of us in the room could have stopped him, but the rest were as paralysed as I by Holmes’s revelation. The man thrust aside Gregory the footman, who stood beside the door, and the servant staggered into the Reverend Small, knocking the cleric over. Whatever else this impersonator might be counterfeiting, his muscular bulk was no deception.

  ‘After him!’ Holmes cried. ‘That man is the murderer of Garforth and of Kellway!’

  The pretender tore open the door and passed through it, slamming it as those of us with sufficient presence of mind began finally to scramble after him. It was Major Bradbury who reached the doorway first, showing a surprising turn of speed. He wrested it open to reveal a laden coat-stand tipped across the doorway, and a second footman lying in the hallway beyond it, laid out by a heavy blow.

  By the time we had unblocked the door and struggled through it, there was no sign of the Yorkshireman. Anderton, who had just entered the hall from the servants’ wing, now hurried up to us and said, ‘It’s all done, Mr Holmes. I’ve sent for Inspector Lestrade, just as you asked. All the gates out to the street are locked, and I’ve stood servants everywhere he might climb over any walls. The beggar can’t escape from the grounds now.’

  ‘Excellent work, Anderton,’ Holmes replied, and turned to address the men and women of the Society who had followed us out. ‘Now listen to me, all of you. Your differences are unimportant now – a murderer is loose, and must be caught. Fortunately he is trapped within the grounds of Parapluvium House. He will be hiding, but we must flush him out. Sir Newnham will organise the search with Anderton – they know the grounds best.’ It suddenly occurred to me to wonder where Rhyne was – I had not seen him since Harrington’s.

  Holmes continued, ‘Watson – and Gregory, if you are quite recovered – come with me.’ He set off at a run towards one of the side-doors, and the winded footman and I followed him.

  Outside, however, rather than racing off into the grounds like a hound after a hare as I had expected, Holmes made for the iron staircase which led up to the roof.

  ‘Why, Holmes, whatever are you doing?’ I asked as he began to climb, though of course I followed him without hesitation. ‘Would not our efforts be better devoted to the search? Or do you suppose the fellow has made for the roof?’

  Was Garforth’s double mad enough to believe his own story? I had visions of him calling on the Venusians to snatch him once again from the house’s gables. Then, of course, I remembered what Speight had built between those gables, and Holmes’s intentions became clear.

  Once we had reached the rooftop, Holmes asked Gregory to wait outside as the two of us bundled into the camera obscura, and waited for our eyes to become accustomed to the total blackness within.

  Just as before, the outline of the house’s grounds came slowly into view, emerging from the dark like a dream. This time the image was a picture of activity, the grassy hinterlands between the house’s outbuildings thronging with uniformed servants and members of the Society in quest for our absconding fugitive. We stood and watched in silence for a few moments, and I began to pick out individuals: Beech, in his tweed suit; Sir Newnham, with his white hair left uncovered in his haste; the great bear-like bulk of the Norwegian. I even caught a glimpse of Miss Casimir’s dress as she joined in the search, doubtless hungry for retribution against the man who had so disappointed her.

  Again I experienced the vertiginous feeling that I was a god or a giant, looking down upon the antics of tiny people… or perhaps, just as disquietingly, a schoolboy watching a nest of ants busily at work.

  ‘What I would not give, Watson,’ murmured Holmes, ‘for a device such as this that could encapsulate the whole of London! Had I such a contraption I doubt that I would stir from it. I would solve crimes from my armchair and become the corpulent image of my brother.’

  For a few moments more, we watched. Though I strained my eyes trying to comprehend all
of the display at once, I saw nobody running, or trying to hide, or acting differently from those around them. Then Holmes’s finger shot out. ‘There!’ he said.

  I saw a figure wearing a footman’s livery, walking across the lawn from the summerhouse. ‘It is one of the footmen, I presume,’ I said. I thought I had seen him enter the outbuilding a minute or so previously, but I had neither Holmes’s needle-sharp eye for detail nor his comprehensive memory.

  ‘No, Watson. The footman who went into the summerhouse was slighter, and walked with a different gait. That is our man.’

  But by then the fellow had already passed between the workshops and the generator-house, and I could not tell which of the liveried figures milling about on the other side of them was him.

  Holmes rapped on the door. ‘Gregory!’ he said. ‘Have Anderton assemble all the footmen in the kitchen at once. And tell Dr Kingsley that there is a man in the summerhouse who requires his attention.’

  I said, ‘In the uniform he might pass at a distance, or in a crowd. But the servants will know he is not one of them.’

  ‘Exactly so. He will not join them in the kitchen, therefore, which means that anyone outside in footman’s livery will be our man. Watson, stay here and continue our watch. I fear I must rejoin the fray.’

  I had the sense to close my eyes against the blinding light of the door, then continued to watch the projection as Holmes’s instructions were relayed across the grounds. One by one I saw the uniformed figures of the footmen hurry towards the house, while the others – the Society men, the gardeners, even some of the maids – continued with the search. I saw the rotund figure of Anderton hurry towards the summerhouse along with a long-legged shape I recognised as that of Dr Kingsley; a couple of minutes later they emerged, carrying between them a recumbent figure wrapped in a blanket.

  A minute later I saw Holmes himself, his energetic stride unmistakeable even from this strange perspective, hurrying about directing the others, and it occurred to me how strange it was that at that moment I was the one who could see further than he. Remembering my experiences in Afghanistan, I thought I could perhaps imagine how it might feel to be a general, watching as battalions were moved around a map and forgetting that each represented men whose lives he might be sacrificing. It was a strange fancy, on a day which had been serving up an exceptional number of them.

  And then I saw our man – a bulky shape in footman’s livery making his way stealthily along the side of the flotation tanks. I glanced about for Holmes but he was several buildings away, directing a search of the greenhouses. The only figure in the fugitive’s vicinity was a lanky, clumsy figure who I recognised immediately as Constantine Skinner.

  I ran out onto the roof, reeling for a moment at the onslaught of late-afternoon daylight after that stygian darkness. It took a moment to orient myself, and then I located the occult detective on the lawn below. He had paused in a gap between two of the tanks to blow his nose.

  ‘Skinner!’ I cried, and he dropped his handkerchief with a start, before gaping around foolishly to see who was shouting. ‘Skinner, he’s just the other side of the tanks!’

  To his credit, the man stopped trying to guess whence I was directing him, and ran around the tanks instead. For all I knew, he often found himself following orders from unseen voices. Unfortunately the fugitive had heard me too, and had started running for shelter elsewhere.

  By now, though, Anderton had joined me on the roof, and I bade him stay put while I plunged back into the inky blackness of the camera obscura. I blinked desperately, willing my eyes to work, and once again the image swam into focus.

  I saw the man at once, running towards the Experimental Annexe and the greenhouses beyond – and now I saw where he was heading, for there was a coal-bunker on the very edge of the grounds, positioned so that the coalmen could fill it up from the street, and Sir Newnham’s people could then carry the coal across to the forge or the glassblowers’ kiln. It looked like an easy climb onto its roof, and from there onto the wall surrounding the property. Presumably it had been one of the places where Anderton had stationed a footman to keep watch, but all the footmen had been summoned to the kitchen.

  I rapped on the door. ‘Anderton!’ I cried. ‘Tell Holmes and the others that he’s coming their way!’

  I heard the butler relay the information, and the small knot of figures surrounding Holmes began to mill towards where the escapee would emerge. He saw them at once, and turned back, disappearing through the door into the Experimental Annexe. I remembered that it had been left unlocked after Holmes had completed his first inspection of the building.

  ‘The Annexe!’ I yelled, bursting out once more into the dazzling light. ‘Tell them he’s in the Experimental Annexe!’

  I hurtled down the stairs and into the house, through the hall and along the passageway into the chemistry laboratory before bursting into the Annexe, where I found the bald man struggling with Holmes and the Reverend Small. He was immensely strong, and bulky where Holmes was slim, and they were having difficulty containing him. I barrelled into the fray, and with my extra momentum the man was catapulted into Experiment Room A, whose door we had left open after the dinner at Sir Newnham’s two days before. He struggled to escape, but with the aid of a pair of gardeners who came to help us, we fought the door closed and jammed one of the chairs beneath the handle.

  And, as quickly as that, it was over. The man who had been impersonating Thomas Kellway had been imprisoned just as Kellway had – if indeed there ever had been a real Kellway – in Experiment Room A, while Holmes, Small, the gardeners and I stood by, all grinning with satisfaction at a job well done.

  While Sir Newnham was sent for, and various others trickled in from outside or the house to join us, I looked in through the distorting glass at the young man who had led us all such a merry chase. He looked far from serene or meditative; indeed, his face was contorted with fury as he banged against the glass. Remembering that it was supposedly unbreakable, I gave him a cheerful wave before turning away.

  ‘Well, he isn’t Kellway, obviously,’ I said over the thumping as the young man raged. ‘Who on earth is he?’

  Holmes smiled broadly. ‘A very apt question, Watson. Here on earth, it seems he is Simon Greendale, the nephew of the late Theodore Greendale.’

  I blinked at him, aware that I had heard those names in the past few days, but quite unable to remember where.

  Statement by Inspector Utterthwaite of the West Riding Constabulary

  The first I knew of it all was in the early afternoon of Friday the 5th of June in 1891. I was summoned to the Ridings Hotel in King Street to find the establishment’s concierge and manager in a right state of distress, with an elderly guest complaining fit to burst about some lost valuables, and other guests milling around them all in great alarm.

  It took me and my constables some time to quiet them all enough to take their statements, but we got there eventually. It turned out that this complaining guest, one Mr Elmet, had taken rooms at the hotel the previous day, and at this time he had deposited a case containing a quantity of jewellery, which he described as family heirlooms, in the hotel safe. Because it was the hotel’s usual practice in such cases, the manager, Mr Ridley, had itemised the gemstones individually, and had from Mr Elmet an estimation of their value, before putting them in the safe and locking it with his own hands.

  Mr Elmet had then spent the afternoon in the hotel lounge writing letters, eaten a very hearty supper and retired to bed.

  At eleven o’clock the next morning, a person who Harold Shawcross the concierge identified at the time as this same Mr Elmet came up to the desk and asked to check his items out of the safe deposit. The reason he gave was that he was taking them to an assayer in town to have them formally valued. Shawcross summoned Mr Ridley, who handed them over willingly enough, and the fellow took the case and left.

  An hour later, Mr Elmet came back to the desk and asked again if he could retrieve his valuables, this time becaus
e he intended to deposit them at the local branch of his bank, for more permanent safekeeping. Well, Harold Shawcross was right bewildered, and reminded Elmet that he had not returned them since checking them out earlier. Elmet insisted that he had not checked them out, and Harold begged to assure him that he had.

  Ridley was called for once again, and he confirmed his employee’s story. Elmet then flew into a towering rage, accusing the both of them of robbing him blind. That was when we were called in, and I arrived shortly afterward with my men. Elmet insisted he had been sitting right there in the morning room since breakfast, reading the papers, and that he had been nowhere near the desk, the safe or the jewellery; he also said a dozen other guests and waiters could attest to this; which, being called upon by us, every one of them proceeded to do.

  Meanwhile, however, Harold, Ridley and two guests who had passed through the lobby at the time confirmed the story that the valuables had been handed over to a man who appeared the spitting image of Mr Elmet.

  We came round to the view, then, that a robbery had indeed taken place; but that it was one where an impostor had disguised himself as Elmet so he could avail himself of the latter’s jewellery. Of course Ridley apologised to Elmet, and told him that the hotel would cover the loss as well as his hotel bill, though he told me afterwards that the value Elmet had assigned to the jewellery would be a shockingly heavy price to bear. He seemed very relieved when I reminded him he should be able to file a claim with the hotel’s insurance company.

  My men got nowhere with finding the thief. He had been seen in the street, hurrying away from the hotel clutching the case, and soon after that in the railway station, but it looked as if by the time his imposture was discovered he had already left town by train, and none of our enquiries could locate him after that. My view was that he had taken off his disguise and got rid of it the moment he was in private.

  From the start, though, there were a number of things about the case that didn’t sit right for me. This Elmet was a man of striking appearance, and although some of that was because of his white hair and whiskers, Harold Shawcross was adamant that he had recognised the thief’s facial features as being his. Both he and Ridley were quite clear that if they had had any doubt about the fellow’s identity, they never would have handed the jewellery to him. There was also the strange coincidence of the real Elmet, as we were supposed to call him, deciding to withdraw his valuables so soon after the impostor had already done so, after so clearly establishing his alibi for the morning.