Analog SFF, January-February 2008

by Dell Magazine Authors

  “It appears so, Watson. Do you sail?”

  “Sail? Heavens, no. Do you?”

  “I'm ashamed to say I've never set foot on a sailboat. I suppose some day off we could take a lesson. Want to give it a try?”

  Watson settled deeply into his couch and concentrated on the Sky Rover's instruments. “River looks very deep there, Holmes. Probably quite cold, too.”

  “Nonsense, old fellow. You'd take to it like a duck to water.”

  “Very amusing. Those things don't look safe.”

  “Sailing is like working around bombs, Watson: It pays to know what you are doing.”

  “I suppose we know where you and I come down on working around bombs, Holmes: A bit here, a bit there—”

  “—A bit there, a bit here—”

  “—A teeny bit way over there—”

  “—And a great big gob or two down right here!”

  We finally allowed ourselves to have a thorough laugh over that dark episode at Hangingstone Hill that was, after all, over—at least until the next echo.

  * * * *

  Powderham Castle stood atop a slight rise in the well-tended and tastefully wooded deer park. We went once around it before touching down. The lake mentioned before stretched gracefully east and west just south of the castle giving that side of the building views of deer drinking from the reflections of ancient trees. The castle itself, although replete with crenelated walls, gates, and towers, looked to be more manor home than fortress. Still, it had seen its battles during the Civil War, fighting on the Royalist side. Norman towers, a mix of brickwork, cut gray stone, sandstone, carved beerstone casements, oak, and ivy made of it an architectural map of the centuries it had withstood since it came into the Courtenay family in the thirteen hundreds.

  The Courtenays were not only respected in the west country but well liked. I doubt if there had been anyone living within a hundred kilometers of Powderham who hadn't, at least once in their lifetimes, visited the castle. Val and I had been there several times on tours and at events: once on a tour of the castle, once on a tour of the gardens, once on a nature walk, once as guests at a wedding, twice we went to catch the fireworks on Guy Fawkes Day. Even Shad and Nadine had been there, as Watson had narrated. A big jewelry heist among the guests at a Powderham paid occasion wouldn't ruin the Courtenays and probably wouldn't break any of the guests so robbed. It was not, however, the sort of thing needed right then by Ian Collier and his family. In any event, it was very rude.

  Watson put us down in the skydock off Powderham Castle's North Drive. “Notice something about that castle as we came in, Holmes?”

  “Many things, old fellow. Which did you have in mind?”

  “Doesn't look a thing like Darlington in Remains of the Day."

  “Then perhaps we won't have Hannibal Lecter with which to contend. In any event, here comes the welcoming committee.”

  Since we arrived in an ABCD Sky Rover, one of Collier's off-duty constables advanced upon us from my side. He was a chunky fellow sporting a handsome gray handlebar mustache, a reflective silver and yellow traffic bib over his uniform. Since Shad had on his nineteenth-century Watson getup, complete with genuine houndstooth Sherlock Holmes deerstalker (a size too small) atop his head, a wedding party parking attendant advanced upon his side of the vehicle. This lad was also chunky, apparently from bench-pressing railroad rolling stock. He was wearing a midnight blue tuxedo with a candy-striped tie. Shad opened the windows, I showed my ID to the constable, but before I could ask for Collier's office, Watson asked of the attendant, “Grimpion-Meyer wedding party, please?”

  The guide pointed to a slot, I bit my tongue, put my ID away, and Shad moved the cruiser toward the slot. We both held it in as long as we could, but mere flesh can bear only so much. Just as we locked into the slot we collapsed into each other's arms choking off cries of, “Grimpion-Meyer!” as best we could. As we exited the cruiser, the parking attendant and the constable seemed to be arguing. Actually, the attendant was upset, and the constable was attempting to calm him.

  “What seems to be the problem, Constable?” I asked.

  “Nothing, Detective Inspector. The lad's mistaken about something, that's all. Heard you and your partner havin’ a laugh and he thought it might be at his expense.”

  “Not at all, my boy,” I said to the fellow in the candy-striped tie. “The name of the wedding party, Grimpion-Meyer, struck us funny because of our resemblance to some fictional detectives in some very old vids: Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson.” I took the deerstalker cap from Shad's head and placed it upon my own.

  “What's funny about that?” demanded the lad.

  “One of their cases, The Hound of the Baskervilles. Have you heard of it?”

  “Of course. I attend Cambridge, don't I?”

  “Cambridge College of Dry Cleaning,” muttered Watson.

  “What was that?” the lad demanded.

  "The Hound of the Baskervilles," said Watson loudly, “took place near the Great Grimpen Mire.”

  The lad stared at us for a moment, then smiled on one side of his mouth, then the other, then he said, “Grimpion-Meyer,” he laughed, and unpleasantness was averted. “One thing, though,” the lad said to me as Shad turned and began walking toward the castle's north gate entrance.

  “What is that?” I answered.

  “I understand that Sherlock Holmes—not the one in the movies, the one in the stories?”

  “Yes?”

  “I understand he never wore a deerstalker cap. That was just something they done up in the flicks.”

  “Ah,” I said placing an arm across his substantial shoulders. Solid fellow. “A popular myth that I am pleased to have an opportunity to dispel, lad. I believe you will find in Dr. Watson's account entitled ‘Silver Blaze’ the good doctor depicts Holmes's attire on their rail trip to Exeter. Watson describes his friend's face ‘framed in his ear-flapped traveling-cap.’ Now, among the available ear-flap caps in those times and later were any of the knitted, fur, and cloth winter affairs—Andes, Eskimo, aviator, Elmer Fudd, Omar Bradley, and so on. I'm certain you'll agree Sherlock Holmes would rather let Professor Moriarty make off with the crown jewels than appear in public in any one of them. Do you agree?”

  “I'm not sure.”

  “Can you see Sherlock Holmes with a shotgun sneaking through the woods saying, ‘Shhhh. I'm hunting a wabbit.'”

  “I cannot.”

  “Good lad.” I patted his back. “Sir, the rakish deerstalker is the only possible ear-flapped traveling cap sufficiently fashionable for Sherlock Holmes. Good day to you.”

  The constable nodded me toward the north entrance. By the time I had made my way through it into the courtyard, Watson was nowhere to be seen. I stood across from the castle's famous red door which, recalling the wedding Val and I had attended, was the main entrance for wedding participants and guests. I had a spine chilling moment thinking of Shad befuddled up as Dr. John Watson stumbling among the guests doing his best to solve the crime. Just before my blood turned to blueberry yogurt, I caught a movement out of the corner of my eye. It was a small door closing in a wall behind and to the right of the main tower. By the time I reached that door, it had closed altogether.

  “Shad,” I said in something between a shout and a whisper, “That's the wrong bloody door.” He was gone. I opened the door to a dark sort of vestibule and entered, the aromas of prepared foods blending agreeably with the scents of old wood and new wax. I crossed hallways, rushed down passageways, and generally worked myself into a panic. I peered into rooms gingerbreaded with Italian molding, hung with portraits of ancestors, and festooned with Chinese glazed pots large enough to make a rather comfortable maisonette with the proper plumbing. I peered down hallways polished until everything seemed dipped in honey, more portraits of ancestors, polished brass candlesticks, and hoary crude tables that wore their polished scars with beribboned honor as though inflicted by shielding the body of the Conqueror himself. Thinking of Shad
running loose in this movie set re-chilled my blood to hypothermic levels.

  * * * *

  By the time I managed to catch up with him, Shad was standing at the foot of a dark staircase covered with a blue runner, blue carpeting on the immediate landing, and more blue runner as the stairs continued up and to the right. On the back of the landing into the blue plaster of the wall was a hidden door to a set of servant's stairs. It strained memory but it appeared to be where the butler's father in Remains of the Day first showed that his squirrels were getting the better of him, as a duck I had once known might have put it.

  Nigel Bruce, thoughtfully cocking his head to one side and tugging at his bit of a mustache, could have been right out of any of the Rathbone-Bruce series of vids. He glanced at me. “Oh,” he said bluntly. “There you are, Holmes. Been looking all over for you. Where the deuce've you been?” He looked back at the stairs. “Look at this staircase. Not much of Remains was filmed here, you know. Never cared much for the character of Lord Darlington. Not a great role for Edward Fox, an actor I much admire, as you know.”

  “Yes.”

  “Much underrated in his time, Edward Fox. What a Nelson he would've made. Eh, Holmes?”

  “A role for which any self-respecting British actor would gladly give his right arm, Watson.”

  He looked at me for a stunned five seconds before he continued. “Holmes, remember Fox's remarkable performance in Day of the Jackal?"

  “Yes. Very exciting production.”

  “Was there anyone who saw that performance, Holmes, who at the conclusion wasn't rooting for the Jackal to shoot Charles de Gaulle?”

  “Very true, Watson, but that may have been for other reasons besides Fox's performance.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “As you may recall, Day of the Jackal was inspired by an actual plot to assassinate de Gaulle. It was said most Western leaders had his face on their dart boards.”

  “I see. Well then, how about Edward Fox's role as Leftenant Francis Farewell, the adventurer who came to South Africa to hoodwink a savage ruler and stayed to fall beneath the spell of the great Shaka, king of the Zulus?”

  I could almost hear the mourning and the dramatically mysterious musical score as Dr. Watson lowered himself to one knee before the staircase. He still had his multitrack sound system programs and databanks intact, if not his judgment. “As mournful chanting lows in the royal kraal, the reflections of the hearth flames flicker against the walls of Shaka's great house. Farewell kneels and listens as the great Zulu king bitterly throws the Englishman's deceptions back in Farewell's face. The leftenant tells Shaka that hating the English is not the solution, that they must search for the solution together. Shaka scorns the Englishman's words. He says that Farewell is a man with no nation, a shadow. The king tells him to go, that Shaka no longer has any need for him. Farewell answers:

  “Go?” Watson cried loudly, doing a remarkably good Edward Fox. “Go?” he inquired again of the Zulu king as I heard a squeak come from the stairs above. “Where?” he demanded loudly and angrily as I spied with my little eye a sharply dressed fellow wearing a black tux with silver tie descending the stairs. Between a loosely blown array of silver-gray hair and the tie was the smoothly shaved, only slightly jowly face of Charles Hugh Pepys Courtenay, Earl of Devon. He was heading straight down the stairs for Shad's performance of Nigel Bruce's performance of Dr. Watson's performance of Edward Fox's performance of Francis Farewell's farewell performance before Shaka, as Shad's and my pensions joined Pliopithecus and the Dodo in existence's dustbin.

  “Where can I go?” Farewell begged more humbly, a shaking hand extended toward the imaginary Zulu king. It was Oscar-winning stuff.

  “Where I have been,” answered Lord Devon in a deep, rich voice, doing a quite credible Henry Cele as Shaka.

  Shad looked up the stairs, his eyes bugged, his cheeks bulged, and he struggled to his feet, spluttering apologies. Lord Devon placed his well-manicured hands together and clapped genteelly. “Well done, sir. Shaka Zulu. Well done.” He nodded his gray mane at me. “Indeed, I am horribly late for the reception and I see the chief constable has sent England's most dynamic duo to track me down, wot? Holmes and Watson, wot? Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce?”

  Shad and I exchanged quick panic glances. “Chief constable?” Watson mouthed. Facing Lord Devon, Watson said, “Just a gentle reminder of the time, milord. Could you direct us to the castle's head of security so that we may report our mission accomplished?”

  The master of the house laughed, crinkled his eyes, and pointed down an ancestor-imaged hallway generally toward the south. “All of the way down there, doctor, last door on the right. Oh.”

  We both paused, frozen in mid getaway, giving Lord Devon our full attention. It was that kind of ‘oh.’ “Yes, milord?” I said.

  “Do you know if there has been any progress made concerning this dreadful jewelry matter?”

  “Yes there has, milord,” I said. “I am pleased to say it should all be cleared up before the conclusion of the reception.”

  “Not a theft, was it?” He pronounced “theft” as though its mere thought might endanger the very foundations of Powderham.

  “A mere misunderstanding, milord. Nothing more. Please put your mind at ease.”

  His eyebrows ascended. “Excellent!” He nodded, his face wreathed in very happy smiles. “Jolly good.” He looked at Watson, his face growing somewhat more serious. “Excellent actor, Edward Fox.” He shook his head gravely. "Remains of the Day. Hated that movie as a boy. Don't mind me baring the old soul, do you old fellow, one actor to another?”

  “Not at all, milord.”

  “Your excellent portrayal of Edward Fox reminded me of it. As a boy they told me a thousand times Remains of the Day was filmed here. Dreadful film. I even watched it once. Could hardly stay awake. I mean you practically stand up begging Emma Thompson to hop naked in Hopkins's tub, wot? Muss his hair a bit?”

  “Quite,” said Watson.

  Lord Devon looked into a glass and darkly. “Away at school you tell all your chums the bloody thing was filmed at Powderham. They don't care the ruddy film's boring. It's Hollywood. Movies! With Hannibal the cannibal. You sit before the tellymax screen all puffed up, the ruddy thing begins. There it goes, sir, with that bloody ride up a hilly lane you never saw before and you pull up to a townhouse with a Georgian roofline decorated with bloody old urns. ‘Where the hell is that?’ shouts out Jimmy Brown. ‘That's not Powderham,’ says Cyril Danforth. ‘Where's that, Charlie?’ yells out Tommy Welles. “Where are the battlements?”

  His lordship descended the remains of the stairs, clasped his hands behind his back, shook his head, and made his way toward the wedding party, still shaking his head. “Scarred me for life,” he muttered as he turned a corner. “Bloody movies.” Shad and I exited on tiptoe in the opposite direction.

  “Now, was that a good save or what?” said my partner as we reached Ian Collier's door.

  “Save? Save?"

  He gave me his hurt Watson expression. “Of course, Holmes. Where's the head of security? Mission accomplished?”

  “Shad, there is a built-in bumble factor in your Dr. Watson brain! It's the size of a casaba melon!”

  “Really, Holmes!”

  “You know what they call a firefighter who does a superb job of extinguishing fires he himself has ignited?”

  “What?”

  “An arsonist!" I knocked on the door and entered.

  * * * *

  The security officer on duty led us to an office, which led to an outer office and a secretary who led us to an inner office overlooking the deer park and lake. It was a well-lighted room, smallish, and tucked about with family photos, professional photos, and neat shelves of books. Ian Collier himself was older than I remembered, a testimony to the dozen years or more that had passed since I had last seen him. He was a pleasant-looking fellow of about Watson's height, brown hair thinning on top and graying on the sides. He rose
slowly behind his desk as we entered. He had a narrow face I hadn't remembered as mournful but which certainly rated such a description a moment before he caught a glimpse of the professional help he was getting from Exeter. The expression then became something between flabbergasted and crestfallen.

  “Blood and sand, Jaggs! What's become of you?”

  “I haven't time to explain, dear boy,” I said briskly. I nodded at Shad. “Former Assistant Chief Constable Ian Collier, this is my partner, Detective Sergeant Guy Shad. Watson, this is Mr. Ian Collier.”

  “Pleased to meet you, sir,” said Watson, extending his hand. They shook. Collier appeared to be waiting for an explanation I really had neither the time nor the heart to provide. Hence, I said, “Shad and I are traveling incognito.”

  “I shouldn't wonder,” he responded. He gestured at two red leather-covered captains chairs facing his desk. “Please. Be seated. Can I offer you some tea?”

  “Thank you. That would be most welcome,” I said, lowering myself into the chair to Shad's left. As we waited for Ian's secretary to bring tea and biscuits, Powderham Castle's head of security briefed us on the missing jewelry. I noticed while he was talking, family photo images randomly appeared in a screen on the shelf behind Ian's head. Wife and two young sons perhaps ten and seven respectively. There was a single still of a golden retriever hanging on the wall opposite the desk. It looked as though it had been taken on a sunny day in a field of wildflowers. The tea was poured and I took my cup. Excellent blend, by the way.