“Paid for by his forgeries, I would think,” said my father.
“And planned well in advance,” Joanna reasoned. “You will note he booked under his true name, which indicates he was not yet on the run and wanted by Scotland Yard. Thus, the passage must have been purchased before Edmunds’s arrest, and that tells us Blackstone was already counting the fortune he and his partner would reap from the sale of the masterpiece.”
“I thought along those same lines,” Lestrade continued on. “The cabin reserved by Blackstone was used during the voyage, as attested to by the serving members of the crew. None unfortunately could give us a clear description of the individual who occupied that cabin.”
“What of the passengers who were listed in the nearby first-class cabins?” asked my father. “Perhaps they may have seen Blackstone.”
“We are attempting to track down those individuals, but without success thus far,” Lestrade replied. “In any event, after a long journey, the Queen Victoria docked in Sydney and seven hundred and ten passengers disembarked, none of whom were named James Blackstone.”
“He must have used an alias,” my father said at once.
“Spot-on, Dr. Watson,” Lestrade agreed. “So we requested the Australian authorities to check the manifest from the Queen Victoria against the list of those who disembarked and registered in Sydney. All of the names matched except for a gentleman named David Hughes who no one seems to remember. He gave a local hotel as his address while in Australia, but no such guest ever showed at that hotel. The authorities there are of course searching for the whereabouts of one David Hughes, but have no identifying features to go on. They have asked us for a recent photograph of Blackstone and we are currently searching for one.”
“They will never find him,” my father said. “Australia is such a vast country, with an outback of uncountable miles and tiny towns so remote they are rarely visited even by the natives.”
“The Australians did not sound very optimistic as well,” Lestrade remarked.
“Is it possible that David Hughes is a real person who purchased the passage from Blackstone at a reduced price and used the forger’s name to disguise his true identity at the time of boarding?” I conjectured.
“Why would he do such an act?” Lestrade questioned.
“To escape to Australia unnoticed where he could hide and begin a new life,” I responded.
“To escape from what, may I ask?”
“That is a query that Mr. David Hughes alone can answer. But I think it worthwhile for you to run that name through your criminal files and missing persons section to see if there is a match.”
“We shall indeed, but you must admit that is a rather long shot,” said Lestrade, then looked over to Joanna who was gazing out a side window. “You have been very quiet on this matter, madam. What say you as to the whereabouts of James Blackstone?”
“He remains in London,” Joanna replied.
“Even though our strongest evidence indicates he is in Australia?”
“Even though,” said Joanna as our car pulled up to the curb outside St. Bartholomew’s Hospital.
* * *
We gowned and masked ourselves before entering the autopsy room where the charred corpse awaited us. It lay on the dissection table and, under the bright light, had an even more disgusting appearance than before. The blackish-green body was now severely bloated as a result of enzymes and bacteria digesting the dead tissue and releasing noxious gases into all tissues. We quickly placed small dabs of menthol cream under our masks in an attempt to dampen the awful stench arising from the corpse. I decided against opening the abdomen or thorax, for at this stage of putrefaction their organs would be unrecognizable and little more than liquefied tissue.
“John, please describe the remarkable findings as you come across them,” Joanna requested.
“Let us begin with the body in general,” said I, snapping on rubber gloves. “The corpse is that of a male, as evidenced by the external genitalia, but none of his other features are recognizable because of the severe burns which have charred every inch of his skin. Putrefaction has bloated the body, most notably the abdomen, and added a greenish tint to its surface.”
“I take it these findings are consistent with a body that has been dead for three weeks,” Joanna inquired.
“Quite so,” I replied and moved to the corpse’s head. “The face is deeply burned, with charred tissue resting upon scorched bone. Most of the hair is gone, but I can still see stubbles beneath the nose and on the chin, indicating that a beard and moustache of some thickness were once present. The skull appears to be intact, but there is definite evidence of a healed fracture of the zygomatic arch on the left.” I clarified this finding for Lestrade. “Inspector, the zygomatic arch comprises most of the cheekbone, and here it is distorted, with irregular healing and dense deposits of calcium. So we can conclude it is from a long time ago and was quite disfiguring.”
“Easily noticeable, then,” Lestrade noted.
“And difficult to hide, even with a most thick beard,” I added. “It would have shown itself as an obvious indentation, with a covering scar.”
“Can you determine its origin?”
“Not with any degree of certainty, for no foreign bodies were present, but a fall or fight would be the most likely cause.”
Joanna interjected, “Inspector, you should be aware that Harry Edmunds had no such disfigurement, whilst his cellmate Derrick Wilson was so damaged.”
“Are you certain of this?” Lestrade asked.
“Beyond any doubt,” Joanna assured. “Derrick Wilson’s disfigured cheek was described to us by another inmate we interrogated during our visit to Wormwood Scrubs.”
“And Harry Edmunds had no similar facial damage?”
“Not according to the physician who performed a thorough physical examination on Edmunds upon his arrival at the prison.”
I next went to the neck where the cutaneous tissue had been completely burned away, exposing a melted and collapsed trachea. “His airway was completely blocked off by the intense flames, and he most likely died immediately of suffocation which is not unusual in severe burn cases. So, in addition to the agony of the burns, such patients literally choke to death.”
I moved past the bloated abdomen and charred genitalia to the lower extremities that showed more evidence of significant trauma. One of the kneecaps had been fractured, but had healed well and would cause no disfiguration. Then I arrived at the feet and saw the signature marking we expected to find. “All ten toes are present!” I announced. “This finding is of critical importance, Inspector, for Harry Edmunds had a missing small toe, whilst our charred corpse has no such defect.”
Joanna stepped in for a closer look and recounted the phalanges. “I must admit that I was concerned the intense fire together with the putrefaction process might have caused the digits to drop off, which would have presented quite a problem.”
“You raise a good point,” I stated. “But fortunately the fire did not burn through the ligaments that keep the toes attached to the foot, and in fact rarely does. The putrefaction process itself will not be a cause for worry, for the ligaments do not disappear until many months have passed. Had that occurred, we would be looking at a jumble of small, disjointed bones. So, when all is said and done, we have a charred corpse with a facial disfigurement and all ten toes, and thus can say good-bye to the plausibility that these remains belong to Harry Edmunds.”
“And we can say hello to Mr. Derrick Wilson.”
We quickly disrobed and walked out into the corridor to further discuss our findings, but were interrupted by a sergeant from Scotland Yard who urgently signaled Lestrade aside.
“Harry Edmunds is a most clever devil,” Joanna remarked whilst we waited for Lestrade. “It was an ingenious plan and he nearly got away with it.”
“Yet from the start, I had the feeling you never truly believed Edmunds died in that fire,” said my father. “Were there clues we overlooke
d?”
Joanna shook her head at the question. “You observed the same clues as I did. First, as you noted earlier, Edmunds was an experienced restorer who was very familiar with solvents and their flammability. He was far too smart to allow a lighted cigarette to be in the vicinity where a solvent was being prepared. And secondly, there was the incontrovertible evidence that Harry Edmunds, with his severe psoriasis and coal tar lotion, was the vandal who was committing crimes weeks after his reported death. Putting these two observations together, one can only conclude that Edmunds did not die in that fire, and thus someone else must have. And that someone else was his cellmate Derrick Wilson, with whom he shared a number of physical characteristics.”
“Edmunds picked the ideal subject to die for him,” my father noted.
“Except for the fact his ideal subject has ten toes,” said Joanna.
Lestrade hurried back to me with the newest developments. “The art vandal has struck again. This time at the Stewart and Son gallery in Kensington. But on this occasion he turned violent.”
“How so?” Joanna asked.
“He stabbed a security guard who attempted to intervene.”
“On the vandal’s way in or out?”
“Out, for he escaped with a framed painting securely tucked under his arm.”
“The masterpiece,” my father muttered in a whisper, as the very same thought echoed in all our minds.
17
The Stewart Gallery
On our ride to the Stewart and Son gallery, we had to face the disheartening fact that Harry Edmunds had won the battle. He now had the masterpiece in his grasp and would soon disappear once it was sold on the black market.
“He must have discovered which painting held the masterpiece,” Joanna surmised, raising her voice above the noise of the four-wheeler we had hired. “There was a marking of some sort that served as a clue.”
“Do you have any idea what this marking might be?” I inquired.
Joanna shrugged. “It could have been made in a dozen different ways. Perhaps there was a scratch on the corner of the frame that James Blackstone had mentioned. Or perhaps there was some irregularity in the varnish which was difficult to detect. But then again, it may not have been a marking that led to the masterpiece, but rather that Edmunds recalled the painting which was being restored when the treasured canvas came to light. Or even more likely, he narrowed down the possibilities by reviewing the list of restorations in the folder on Simon Hawke’s desk.”
“Whatever the clue, he knew it well beforehand,” my father said. “That is why he advertised on the black market that the masterpiece would soon be available.”
“Yet all may not be lost,” I thought aloud. “Could we not set a trap for him on the underground market?”
Joanna shook her head quickly. “To set a clever trap requires an irresistible bait, which we lack. And even if such bait was available, it might well prove useless since the auction we presume is taking place may be over and a deal struck. That being the case, any clever trap would be totally ignored.”
“The tide is now running entirely against us,” my father said unhappily. “And it appears to be reaching the stage where it cannot be reversed.”
“We have lost a battle, Watson, not the war,” said Joanna.
We arrived at the Stewart and Son gallery and hurried into a large, well-appointed display room that had every wall covered with eye-catching paintings, all of which seemed to come from a long gone past. The owner, Mr. Miles Stewart, was not available, for he was bedridden with severe bronchitis. However, his son Samuel was minding the gallery and greeted us with suspicion until we were formally introduced. He seemed most pleased to meet Joanna.
“Ah, the daughter of Sherlock Holmes whose exploits I have read about,” said he. “I would be forever grateful if you could somehow arrange for my painting to be returned, for it will be dearly missed.”
“Am I correct in assuming the painting is quite valuable?” Joanna asked.
“That is the strange part, madam,” Stewart replied. “It was surrounded by works far more precious, yet he chose the one of considerable less value. It is beyond me why he would do such a thing.”
“Was there anything unusual about the painting?”
“It is the artist who was unusual.”
“How so?”
“It was painted during the Italian Renaissance by a woman named Saint Catherine of Bologna, and depicts a nun at prayer in full habit,” Stewart described. “Saint Catherine was so revered as a religious personage that her body was exhumed shortly after death and preserved, and it remains on display to this very day. But I can assure you that feature does not add to its value. From an artistic standpoint, the work is not very impressive.”
“Yet you hang it in your very fine gallery,” Joanna noted.
“Only briefly, for the owners who requested the restoration will return from America tomorrow, and sadly find their treasured painting missing.”
Joanna’s brow went up. “Restoration, you say?”
“Limited, but nonetheless expensive,” Stewart replied. “The owners thought the faded, multicolored flowers in the background detracted from the portrait and were willing to pay a rather handsome fee to have it restored.”
“At Stewart’s?”
“Oh no, madam. The work was done at Hawke and Evans who have the finest restorers in all London.”
I nodded to myself, for here was yet another connection of the vandal to Hawke and Evans. I wondered which of the restorers performed the recoloring and asked, “Were you given the name of the restorer?”
“I was not,” Stewart answered. “The decision was left up to Simon Hawke whose judgment we trusted implicitly. The work was quite well done, but at a cost that nearly exceeded the value of the painting.”
“Do you have any idea why the owners were so attracted to an unimpressive portrait of a nun?” I asked.
“I did not ask, but perhaps they are of the Catholic persuasion,” Stewart replied. “Those are the ones who would show the most interest.”
We turned as the security guard, with his bandaged arm in a sling, came back into the gallery. A thin man, in his middle years, he appeared to be quite shaken by his ordeal. Taking slow steps, he walked over to a chair beneath a painting of St. Peter’s Square and sat down heavily.
“That is Armstrong, our security guard, who was injured in a scuffle with the thief,” Stewart told us. “We of course immediately sent him to a nearby surgery for medical attention, but asked that he return in the event Scotland Yard had further questions.”
“Most wise,” Joanna said and led the way over to the injured security guard who was gently rubbing at his bandaged arm. “I realize you have had a rough time of it, but we require more information and wonder if you could help us with that.”
“I shall try, madam,” the guard said.
“Very good,” Joanna went on. “Please describe every detail from the moment you became aware of the intruder until he fled carrying the portrait with him.”
“Well, madam, it was a calm and peaceful night as I made my rounds on each of the two floors and the loft,” the guard began. “I was in the loft when I heard a sound below that resembled a piece of furniture being moved. It did not recur, but I thought it best to have a look-see. I went down and shined my torch around the gallery and saw nothing amiss. Next I took the stairs to the bottom level that is used for storage and again saw nothing out of place. I then returned to the main floor, and that is when I noticed a moving shadow and called out a warning.”
“Were you armed?” Joanna asked.
“No, madam, I was not, but I do carry a whistle that can alert patrolling constables,” the guard continued. “I was reaching for my whistle when the bloody thief attacked me. In the struggle he stabbed me with a knife I did not see, and next came at me with a framed painting. He proceeded to crack me on the head and, as I went down, he bolted for the side door with the painting tucked under his arm. It req
uired some time for me to regain my senses and rise up, but by then he was long gone. It was at that moment I became aware of my wound and the blood coming from it.”
“How much time went by before you whistled for the constable?” Joanna inquired.
“I cannot be certain, for I was dazed by the blow to my head,” the guard replied and gently massaged the crown of his skull. “He must have given me quite a knock, for it continues to throb.”
“I take it you did not have a good look at him.”
“In the darkness, I saw only shadows.”
“During the scuffle, did you notice any peculiar odor about the thief?”
“No, madam, but then I was fighting for my life and just trying to survive.”
“As would anyone in that situation,” said Joanna, as the guard went back to rubbing his bandaged arm. “Is the wound painful?”
“A bit, madam.”
“Then perhaps you should retire to your home and rest,” Joanna suggested.
The guard glanced at Stewart for consent and, once given an approving nod, walked slowly to the front entrance, still unsteady on his feet.
Joanna said quietly to Stewart, “You may wish to hire a hansom to make certain your guard reaches home safely.”
“Of course,” Stewart agreed and hurried over to assist the security guard.
With the pair not yet out of hearing distance, I guided Joanna and my father to a nearby staircase and said, “I find it odd the vandal thought it necessary to carry out the entire painting. Why not just slash it open and grab the masterpiece?”
“I can think of several good reasons,” Joanna replied.
“Yet the vandal must have an irresistible impulse to snatch the masterpiece and be gone once and for all,” said my father.
Our voices must have carried, for Lestrade heard the end of our conversation as he ascended to the top of the staircase. “Masterpiece? What masterpiece?” asked he.
The Art of Deception Page 14
