‘Do you have an idea where he might be?’ No, Mr Barr kept to a strange time-table. Although he paid his rent on the dot, he was rarely on the premises.
‘You mean he only uses the place to sleep in?’
‘Fact is he hardly ever sleeps in here. If ever. Of course I wouldn’t know. I am not the inquisitive type, my dear sir. You know, he rents a room with facilities. I mean I don’t feed him nor do I do his laundry. There is a small kitchen attached to the flat, but to be honest, I have never smelt any cooking.’
As I was preparing to leave, she had another bombshell to explode. ‘The other gentleman was just as amazed as you when I told him.’
‘Told who? About what?’
‘About Mr Barr’s habits.’
‘Who was the other gentleman?’
‘Didn’t catch his name. I thought he was from the police, but he never said. I was too shy to ask.’ The Police had finally decided to act, I thought.
That elusive Barr was beginning to worry me. I had the feeling that mother and daughter hadn’t told me the whole story. I paid a visit to Brockwell & Co, where Mary worked and claimed that I was from the police. I asked about Melissa Brent, and they confirmed that she had moved to Newcastle.
Next morning, I was on the road shortly after breakfast. Unannounced I arrived in Frederica Close. Ethel Windibank looked surprise, as did Mary Sutherland, but the latter took less than ten seconds to express her delight at seeing me. That short interval did not stop me detecting an initial uneasiness. I marvelled at her speed and her capacity to repossess her emotions.
‘I know, you’ve found them. You’ve found my dear Rudy and my father. Where are they?
When can I see them?’ I shook my head wearily.
‘No, I’m afraid I’ve made but little progress.’ Mary pouted to show her disappointment.
Something in her expressions and movements confirmed my suspicion that there was some artificiality in her delight at what she thought was news of the safe return of the two missing men.
Nor had I been convinced by her look of disappointment when I disabused her. Mr Holmes had averred, in his tome, that his findings were not to be taken as bible truths. Often there were reasonable explanations for people to act strangely. An eye movement might be due to an infection, or a particle of dust. A sudden turn of the head might arise from a natural spasm. The signs he had described could, at best, provide some insight when other considerations are taken on board. I was still convinced that there was more to young Mary Sutherland than met the eye. Her initial woolliness contrasted strangely with her readiness to emit firm opinions later. She sometimes appeared to be completely dominated by her mother, but I sensed that she was in effect in complete command, with the older woman following invisible leads.
I was seated in their front room drinking tea. Between sips I said that I had one or two things I wanted to ask. Mrs Windibank demurred but put on a forced smile. Mary said, but of course, she did not expect that after the little that they told me I would go and solve the mystery within a couple of days.
‘I went to Mr Barr’s lodgings in Seven Sisters Road,’ I began. The older woman beamed a smile at me. I took it that she was grateful to me for doing something concrete, but as an afterthought she added, ‘I told you he has disappeared, obviously he wouldn’t be there.’
‘No, mother, Mr Lernière was quite right to go there. Mr Lernière is doing his job by wanting to talk to Mrs Bellingsby. Every detail helps, doesn’t it? So she told you that she’s not seen him in over a week?’ I nodded.
‘Did you find anything useful?’ Mary asked.
‘I am no nearer a resolution,’ I said. ‘If anything, I seem to have made a step or two backwards.’
‘How come?’ Mrs Windibank asked.
‘Mrs Bellingsby said something which baffled me completely. She said that to the best of her knowledge, Rudolph never slept in Seven Sisters Road. So where did he sleep?’ Mrs Windibank smiled uneasily. Mary laughed knowingly.
‘I told you, Mr Barr worked for the Secret Service and as such he has to cover his tracks.’
That was going to be a hard nut to crack. Where does one meet people from the Secret Service?
They don’t work from an office with a notice outside saying, SECRET SERVICE or SPIES & Co.
Perhaps Mr Holmes might find out. Mycroft would know, but would he reveal establishment secrets?
‘Do you know where he really lived? Why did he pay rent if he never used the accommodation?’ The mother looked duly perplexed, but not Mary.
‘He wanted to tell me, but I stopped him. No dearest, I told him, you mustn’t tell anybody.’ I supposed that made sense.
‘I don’t suppose you would have a likeness of Mr Barr? Perhaps a daguerreotype?
‘Oh no, Mr Barr would never allow this. It was his work, you see.’ said Mrs Windibank, casting a furtive glance at her daughter, as if seeking her approval for her intervention.
‘He agreed to a photograph of us two on our wedding day.’ Mary said, sniffing slightly.
‘That’s never to be now,’ said Mrs Windibank.
‘Oh, you never know Mama,’ Mary said. ‘Mr Holmes said he was hopeful-’
‘Mr Holmes?’
‘Mr Sherlock Holmes?’ I blurted out, unable to hide my surprise. What was he doing here?
‘We had to do everything we could,’ Mrs Windibank said. ‘Two heads are better than one.’
So, he must have been the fearsome gentleman who also visited Seven Sisters Road. Should I consult him? I asked myself.
‘Have you asked at the ballroom place we used to go to?’ asked Mary smiling, possibly at the thought of happy times spent in the arms of her beloved. I had not. First I had not thought that in a dance hall where hundreds of young people went dancing every night there would be any chance of anybody recognising a couple when I didn’t even have a likeness to show. Besides, I hadn’t thought that there was any interesting fact to be gleaned from such a visit. When I said this, Mary seemed disappointed.
‘If you think that I ought to, then I will. Can you give me a likeness of yourself?’ She was happy to do so. The photograph was in sharp contrast to the usual primness of the subject. On her lips was a coquettish smile. Her gown seemed made for the dance floor. It was more like a robe.
One imagined it swirling round her waist as she spun round dizzily, drunk on romance.
I visited Mr Holmes in Baker Street in the afternoon. He and I would never undermine each other in any way. The two women had approached him, and he had seen no reason to refuse. He obviously knew nothing of my role in the affair. As indeed I was in ignorance of his until the women revealed this. For all I knew, they might well have come to me after they had engaged Mr Holmes. I was still unable to keep a vestige of resentment under control.
‘I see no need for them to have the two of us working on their case. I shall send them word immediately to inform them that I am withdrawing my services and will not charge them for my time already spent on the case.’ He was clearly not resentful of me, but of the clients.
‘There is one thing, Mr Holmes. Mary Sutherland suggests that Barr worked for the Secret Services...’
‘Yes, she told me so. But I didn’t know whether to believe her or not.’
‘Same here. At first she said she thought that he did, but later the element of doubt vanished completely.’
‘I picked on that too. Do you have an explanation?’ I asked my mentor.
‘You know, sometimes people do not say exactly what they mean. I have heard people say the clock just struck twelve, I think it is noon. It’s just a speech form. Or, “I’m peckish, I could eat a horse.” Peckishness does not imply any great degree of famishedness.’ I nodded. ‘You’re right, Mr Holmes.’ He didn’t say it, but the faint smile showed what he was thinking, When am I ever wrong?
We compared note
s, and found that Mary had described Barr’s height as being, “five feet nine or ten.” Colour of his eyes? Between grey and blue. Curly hair. We decided that we would both keep working on the case.
That evening, I made my way to Tottenham Court Road with Bartola at my arms.
She leaned on me coquettishly as I paid the entrance fee to the Ballroom and we walked in. I thought I would begin by tackling the cloakroom attendant. She was a comely lady with too much face powder and rouge, who spoke with an assumed genteel accent. Retired actress, I deduced.
Many of us who have trod the planks at one time, eschew more lucrative positions in order to stay close to the profession we had loved. In my time, most cloakroom attendants, modistes, hairdressers, scene shifters, and auxiliary staff were actors and actresses who had not had any great success. They often took these jobs on a temporary basis in the hope that a big part would materialise some day soon. It rarely did.
‘I seem to remember seeing you on stage, don’t tell me you are...your name’s on the tip of my tongue.’ She opened wide her eyes, and a blissful expression appeared on her face.
‘Phyllida Bryant. Did you really recognise me? You made my day. Must tell Josh...my husband. He won’t believe it. Did you see me in The Confounding of Villainy?’ I nodded vigorously and opened my eyes wide.
‘Of course, don’t tell me, you were...’
‘Aunt Tilly. Not a topnotch part, I know.’
‘She was central to the denouement.’ I hazarded a guess. ‘And you played her so beautifully.’
‘Him actually.’ I must have looked perplexed.
‘You will recall that I was really Lord Basterton in the guise of his aunt.’
‘Oh, I know that. But you played Aunt Milly so well, I’ll always think of you as Aunt Milly.’
‘Tilly dear. Aunt Tilly. You’re so nice, sir. Thank you. Now the theatre is no longer what it used to be.’
‘Indeed not. A great shame.’ I pretended that I was going, but turned back.
‘It’s a long shot, Miss Bryant, but I am trying to find an old friend. I am told he used to come dancing here.’ And I showed her the photograph of Mary. She took it and frowned. ‘You said he.’
‘Oh I am sorry, this is not my friend, but his young lady. They used to come here together. I have no likeness of him.’ Phyllida fairly screamed with joy.
‘Yes. I know who you mean. I don’t know her name, but she used to come here with a gentleman. Always the same. They were such a lovely couple. When they danced, folks would stop to watch them. ‘Yes, so I was told.’ I asked if she could tell me anything she had heard or noticed about them. At first she demurred, but just as I was leaving, she added something. ‘The young man, he was handsome and well-built, I know, but I always chuckled to myself that he had a rather plump derrière. For a man, you know. I don’t think it’s useful, but you said anything.’ Probably not.
A week after I had embarked on my quest for the missing men, Mr Holmes asked me to meet him at the Parasol, where we sometimes share a cup of Mocha coffee and a macaroon.
Even before I sat down, he had communicated to me that Windibank had been found in Epping Forest. Dead. Killed. Stabbed with a bread knife.
‘Do the two ladies know?’
‘Lestrade asked if I would be the bearer of bad news.’ Holmes was a bit uneasy about this, and asked me to accompany him.
‘Oh,’ Lestrade had said, ‘tell them that we’re doing all we can to find and arrest Barr. It’s so obvious that he is the killer. Barr was obviously bent, a Uranian, don’t you know? He was using the daughter to get close to the rich old man. Lots of those perverts around, Mr Holmes, don’t you know?’ We did not dismiss this hypothesis, but thought we’d need some evidence before accepting it.
We wended our way to Frederica Close and the moment we knocked, Mary opened the door. She looked at us enquiringly. We asked if we could sit down first. And could Mrs Windibank join us? When the older woman arrived, Holmes said, ‘I am afraid we have some bad news for you.’
‘Why, has his body been found?’ Mary blurted out.
‘My poor husband,’ said Ethel. Mr Holmes looked at me with questioning eyes. No doubt that like me, he was thinking why did they both assume there was one body, when two men had gone missing.
‘Mother,’ remonstrated Mary, ‘Mr Holmes did not say it was father. He said a body had been found.’ He had not. He had only said that he had some bad news for them.
‘Yes. A body has indeed been found. Lestrade said that it was that of an elderly man.’
‘Are they going to charge Rudy?’ asked Mrs Windibank. Mary tut tutted. ‘Mother, you mustn’t assume that it was poor Rudy who stabbed him.’
‘They have to find him first. He’s obviously disappeared.’ I said.
‘With his work as a spy, he obviously knows a trick or two,’ Mary mused aloud.
‘How was he killed?’ asked Mary, as if to herself.
‘As you guessed. He was stabbed. By a bread knife,’ Holmes said. He looked at me pointedly.
‘Epping Forest is a dangerous place, a haunt of perverts and cutthroats. I told him many times. But he was fanatical about mushrooms. Not that we’d eat any of it.’ That was Mrs Windibank, providing us with another vital clue. Holmes threw me another glance. The two women were obviously not stupid, and had undoubtedly planned their action with great care, but crime writers are not wrong to suggest that however carefully elaborated the crime is, the perpetrator always falls in a trap of his or her own making. Usually over a minor detail. There are one thousand and one aspects involved, and the human mind, however lucid it may be, simply cannot cope with all of them at the same time. Perhaps nine hundred and ninety-nine. Here they had slipped three times in the space of five minutes. It is very much like a juggler. He can keep three balls in the air, perhaps four, but there is a limit. Mary started blinking. She was aware of the faux-pas and I could see her try hard to keep calm. Her hands were trembling and she was flushed. ‘I am sorry,’ she said, ‘I need to go to … eh … wash my hands. I’ve had a stomach upset since this morning.’ Then she looked at her mother. I could see that she was weighing the chances of Mrs Windibank digging the hole deeper, although she was too sharp not to have realised that the stable no longer housed its occupant. And she knew we knew. The observant reader will have noticed that neither Mr Holmes nor I had mentioned Epping or the method of the killing. The best clue was the fact that they both assumed that the body found was that of Mr Windibank.
Sherlock Holmes and I simultaneously decided to leave.
‘We were sorry to bring you bad news. The police will get in touch with you.’
‘Why?’ said Mrs Windibank in a panic.
‘Mother, there will be formalities, obviously.’
‘Absolutely,’ I said. ‘They will send you the body after the post-mortem and other formalities so you can arrange the funeral.’
‘When will that be?’ asked Mary. We said we did not know.
We took a Shillibeer to Baker Street. We were both buried in our own thoughts and exchanged nary a word. Mrs Obassanju greeted me as an old friend and immediately went to brew some Earl Grey, knowing my partiality to it. The housekeeper had seen me in both my guises, and as far as I knew had no idea that Irene Adler and Dai Lernière were one and same person.
‘Miss Adler, let us see how closely our ideas coincide,’ Holmes said after showing me to an armchair. We agreed on most things. Mother and daughter had planned the murder together, although it was Mary who had supplied the best lines. They had gone on a picnic in Epping Forest on the Saturday which happened to be a grey cold day when they knew there would be but few people there. Holmes thought the mother, physically much stronger, was most likely to have wielded the weapon, but I somehow leaned towards Mary. The determination in those cold eyes of hers could inject steel into her sinews. Not that a jury would find one less gu
ilty than the other.
About Rudolph Barr, Holmes was of opinion that there might well be a young accomplice, a young man, who albeit unwittingly, may have helped them in their nefarious plan, against monetary blandishment or sexual favours perhaps. Mary had mentioned visiting him there. The women had urged him to rent out the place in Seven Sisters Road. Mary had taken him to the Dance Hall in Tottenham Court Road.
Then I saw the truth in a flash. Just as I was putting my cup on the table. It came to me ready-formed, which is why such notions are called brain-waves. There was no young man either.
‘I can see that you don’t think there was a young man,’ the mind-reader Holmes said to me.
‘Mr Holmes, it was Mrs Windibank.’ He stared at me and grinned. ‘You’re right, but how did you guess?’
‘Guess? Mr Holmes? I was taught to never guess. I deduced. Ethel had been an actress. She had played male roles on the stage. I was reminded of this by Phyllida Bryant, the cloakroom attendant at the Dance Hall. She even provided me with an extra clue when she said that Mary’s young man had a rather large derrière. Whenever I pass myself for a man, I have a singular advantage in that I do not possess a large rear.’ Mr Holmes blushed with embarrassment and spluttered in his cup.
‘Yes, that would explain why he never slept in Seven Sisters. Windibank would have been perplexed, at the very least. How clever of Mary to have picked on the Secret Service.’
‘She was very clever indeed.’
Mr Holmes and I had been assailed by serious doubts about the two women almost from the beginning. They had clearly made the biggest mistake of their lives by hiring us. But then, Mary was a writer who imagined herself to be singularly gifted. I had managed to lay hands on one of the Cornhill magazines. It may have been romance, but the quality of the writing was amazing:
Two friends had fallen in love with a handsome young man. One had all the graces, intelligence, wit, money and looks. The other one was a frump, unendowed, gauche in the extreme and although not bad-looking, lacked charisma. Guess who won the swain? It demanded guile, but no real dishonesty was involved at any time.
The Adventures of Irene Adler : The Irene Adler Trilogy Page 10
