The streets were still almost deserted and very quiet when we left the house, a lone church bell ringing somewhere in the distance. At Paddington station, however, which we reached with just a few minutes to spare, there was already quite a crowd, and a general air of bustle. We had bought our tickets and were looking for our train when I observed a familiar figure hurrying on to the platform ahead of us.
‘Surely that is Inspector Lestrade,’ I said.
‘It certainly is,’ said Holmes. ‘Lestrade!’ he called, and the policeman turned in surprise.
‘Why, Mr Holmes and Dr Watson!’ he said. ‘I can’t stop to talk, I’m afraid. My train leaves in less than a minute.’
‘Where are you bound?’ asked Holmes.
‘Somewhere called Bourne End,’ replied Lestrade, resuming his hurried progress along the platform. ‘And you?’
‘Bourne End,’ said Holmes. ‘We can travel down together and see if our business bears any relation to yours. Here is a suitable compartment!’
In a moment we had climbed aboard. A few seconds later the guard blew his whistle and, with a hiss of steam, the train pulled slowly out of the station.
‘Now,’ said Holmes, as we picked up speed and were rattling along through the western suburbs, ‘this train doesn’t stop until Maidenhead, so we have plenty of time in which to compare notes.’ He gave Lestrade a sketch of what Julian Ashby had told us the previous day. ‘Are your inquiries related to any of that?’ he asked the policeman as he finished.
‘I’m not sure if they are or not,’ replied Lestrade with a frown. ‘What you’ve told me all seems fairly inconsequential, if I may say so. My own business is considerably more substantial. It’s a suspicious death,’ he continued, in answer to Holmes’s query, ‘probably murder.’
‘Murder?’
Lestrade nodded. ‘I don’t know the name of the victim, but it’s evidently not your client if he’s been able to send you a telegram. I was on early duty at Scotland Yard this morning when a message came through from the Buckinghamshire Constabulary, asking us to send a detective inspector as soon as possible to this Bourne End place. Apparently there’s been a bad fire there, but whether that’s connected to the murder or not, I have no idea. And that, I’m afraid, is all I know.’
I could see that Holmes was disappointed at this lack of information, but as there was nothing we could do about it, the conversation passed on to other subjects. The day had started brightly, but by the time we reached Maidenhead, heavy clouds were rolling in from the south-west and, as we alighted at our destination, the sky was overcast and grey. We were met outside the station by a uniformed police officer who introduced himself as Inspector Welch. Lestrade explained the reason for our presence, and Welch nodded his head.
‘Yes,’ said he. ‘It’s Challington House where it’s all happened. There were five young men staying there alone. They had been drinking, and we think that one of them must have left a candle burning downstairs, for a fire broke out after they’d all retired to bed. By a stroke of good fortune, the local constable was passing on his beat at that time, saw smoke pouring out of a window and at once took charge of the situation. After making sure that everyone was out of the house, he summoned the fire-brigade, but by the time they got there the house was a raging inferno and they haven’t been able to save it. It’s little more than a burnt-out shell now.’
‘How does the suspicious death fit into all this?’ asked Lestrade.
‘It’s not clear,’ said Welch. ‘The facts of the matter are a bit muddled at the moment. I think it best if you hear an account of it from the young men themselves. They’re all in the Black Bull at present.’
He led the way along the road to a large old inn. As we entered, a group of young men sitting round a table turned to look, their features expressing tiredness and anxiety. One stood up as he saw us, whom I recognised as Julian Ashby.
‘Mr Holmes,’ he cried, coming forward to meet us. ‘Thank the Lord you have come! The past twelve hours have been like a nightmare!’
At Holmes’s request he introduced us to his companions, Warnock, Xantopoulos and Loxton.
‘And Churchfield?’ queried Holmes. ‘Is he not here?’
‘I very much fear that he may have perished in the blaze,’ replied Ashby in a distraught tone. ‘He was going to rouse the fire-brigade, but said that there was something he wanted to save from the house first and that was the last time I saw him. He never reached the fire-station, and the constable, who arrived only a few minutes after Churchfield had spoken to me, said he had seen no one on the road.’
Holmes nodded. ‘Perhaps you had best start at the beginning. Tell us, as briefly as you can, all that has happened since you left us yesterday morning. I have given Inspector Lestrade a sketch of what you told us then, and I am sure he is as keen as we are to know what has happened.’
‘After leaving your chambers,’ said Ashby, ‘I went straight to my great-aunt’s house and was there nearly two hours. I then caught the next train from Paddington and got back here in the middle of the afternoon. I went directly to the football field, as Churchfield had suggested, where my friends were watching the local team play. When that finished, we returned to the house, lit a fire and made something to eat. Our evening passed pleasantly enough, in drinking, eating, playing skittles and cards and so on. We were all so tired in the end that we were not particularly late in retiring and were all in bed before midnight.
‘I suppose I had been in bed about an hour, but had probably only been asleep for half an hour, when I was awakened by the sudden opening of the door. Churchfield was standing in the doorway fully dressed, with a candle in his hand.
‘“Ashby!” he cried. “Get up, man! Quickly! There’s a fire! Throw your clothes on and wake the others, then get out of the house! Quickly now!” he repeated. “I’m going for the fire-brigade, but first there’s something I must try to save!”
‘With that he was gone. I sprang from my bed, flung on my dressing-gown and slippers, and went to wake the others. I remembered that the door to Warnock’s room was opposite mine, but was not sure where anyone else was sleeping. It’s a very big house, with an enormous lot of bedrooms, some of them off odd branches of the upstairs corridor, and I really wasn’t familiar with it. I woke Warnock first and gave him the alarm, then, after looking into an empty room next to his, found Xantopoulos’s room and shook him awake. I looked into another empty room and then tried the door of the room next to mine. The door was locked, so I felt sure it was Loxton’s room, although why he should have bothered to lock it, I couldn’t imagine. I banged on the door several times, but got no answer.
‘“Loxton!” I called. “Loxton! Wake up, you idiot!” Again I banged on the door without eliciting any response.
‘“Break the door down,” called Warnock from his bedroom. “You’ll never wake him otherwise!”
‘I threw all my weight against the door, but it did no good. I then kicked violently at the lock and, on the third attempt, with a splintering of wood, the door burst open. I dashed into the room, shouting as I did so. I could feel heat rising from the bare wooden floor.
‘“Loxton!” I cried. “Loxton! Wake up!”
‘I had bent to the figure on the bed and started to shake him by the shoulder when there came a loud voice from behind me.
‘“What the devil is all this racket, Ashby? And why are you bellowing my name over and over?”
‘I turned in astonishment. Loxton was standing in the doorway. “What is all this?” he asked. “What’s going on?”
‘“But if you’re there,” I said, “who on earth is this?” I pulled back the bed-cover and stepped back in horror at what was revealed: an older man, his mouth agape, his sightless eyes staring at the wall. “This man is dead,” I cried.
‘“Who is it?” cried the others, crowding into the room.
‘“I’ve no idea. I’ve never seen him before. We’ve got to get him out of here. This floor is hot. The fire must be
directly beneath it.”
‘I flung on my clothes in a trice, as did the others, and between us we carried the dead man out on to the lawn behind the house. Warnock took a look into a couple of the downstairs rooms and told us it was hopeless; the fire was blazing like a furnace. I told them that Churchfield had gone to rouse the fire-brigade, and as we were standing there on the lawn, wondering what on earth we should do, the local constable arrived in a great hurry and took charge of the situation. The rest I imagine you know.’
‘Has anyone identified the dead man yet?’ Holmes asked Inspector Welch, who shook his head. ‘Any sign of Churchfield – dead or alive?’
Again the policeman shook his head. ‘No one knows what it was that Churchfield wanted to get out of the house, but I think, as Mr Ashby says, that the poor devil may have been overcome by the smoke and heat. Once fires like that catch hold they can spread like lightning, and the constable says that it was already a raging inferno when he got here.’
Welch then suggested that Lestrade view the body of the dead man, which was at the police station, just a short walk away. Holmes went with them while I stayed with the young men in the Black Bull. They returned about five minutes later and I asked Holmes if he had learnt anything.
‘Death was undoubtedly caused by a severe blow to the back of the head, some time in the past twenty-four hours,’ said he, ‘but of course it’s impossible to say if the blow was the result of an accident or a deliberate attack. There’s nothing in his pockets which might serve to identify him, but I found a small name-tag just below the collar inside his shirt, which bears the name “T. Wilkinson”. There is also the return half of a ticket from Paddington to Bourne End in a pocket of his waistcoat. Inspector Lestrade has therefore sent a message to all London divisions, enquiring if anyone by the name of Wilkinson has been reported as missing there. And now,’ he continued, addressing the policemen, ‘I should like to examine the scene of this drama, at Challington House.’
‘You’ll not learn anything there,’ said Inspector Welch in a dismissive tone, ‘except how quickly a large house can be utterly destroyed by fire.’
‘Well, well. Let us not prejudge the matter,’ returned Holmes, as we left the inn, accompanied by young Ashby.
A walk of seven or eight minutes brought us to the gateway of Challington House. A broad drive swept up to the front door of what must have been a very large house, but was now just a blackened shell. Smoke still drifted up from somewhere within this ruin, but it appeared that the fire had all but burnt itself out.
‘You see?’ said Welch. ‘The house is completely destroyed. There is nothing to be seen here.’
‘It was not the house I wished to inspect,’ returned Holmes, leading the way along the side of the smouldering ruin and into the large rear gardens, which sloped down gently towards the river. There, after a swift glance round, he made his way down to the boathouse at the end of the garden, pushed open the door and we followed him inside. It was a gloomy, shaded building. Most of it was taken up with space for mooring boats, but there was a broad flagged area at the back, upon which ropes, spars and general clutter were heaped. Against the rear wall was a work-bench on which a painting of a young lady stood, as Ashby had described. Along the side-wall was a footway made of wooden boards which extended to the front of the building.
‘This, I take it, is your cousin’s boat,’ said Holmes to Ashby, indicating a small sailing-dinghy, moored to a ring on the footway. ‘When you arrived on Friday evening, there was, you said, another small boat here, but now there is not.’
‘Yes, that is strange,’ remarked Ashby. ‘Where can it have gone?’
Holmes did not reply, but walked to the very end of the footway and looked out on to the river. ‘You also mentioned that there was a very large houseboat anchored in midstream with which you collided in the dark. That, too, is no longer present. Do you know if it was here on Saturday morning?’
‘Yes, it was. I put my head in here briefly before setting off to catch the train to London, to make sure that my boat was tied up properly, and I remember noticing then that the houseboat was still there.’
‘That is as I suspected. You know something of boats?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do you believe that such a vessel as the houseboat might be able to venture out on to the high seas?’
‘I cannot be certain, but I think it might well be possible. It would depend on what sort of keel the boat has, and how rough the sea was, of course.’
‘When you clambered from your boat on Friday evening, you must have been standing about here,’ Holmes continued, ‘but there is nothing hanging up here on which you might have struck your head. What I believe happened is this: they probably heard you collide with the houseboat and the sound of your oars in the water. One of them walked to the end of this footway, to see what was happening. You would have passed him in the dark and had no idea he was there, so that when you tied up your boat and climbed out, he would have been standing behind you. When you struck the match and saw the young woman over there, near the back wall, the person behind you struck you on the head with something. It was probably this!’ Holmes added, as he bent down and picked up a short length of wood which was lying on the footway, by the wall.
‘But who were these people?’ asked Ashby in puzzlement.
‘The Churchfields. Surely that is apparent.’
‘The Churchfields? But they are travelling on the Continent.’
‘I very much doubt that they were doing so before, but I believe that that is their aim now. Do you know if they have any property abroad?’
‘Yes. I believe they have a house in the south of France.’
‘Then that is where they are probably making for. Their intention is no doubt to cross the channel in the houseboat and enter the French canal system, getting as far south as they can that way and completing their journey by train if necessary.’
‘This is absurd!’ cried Inspector Welch. ‘You make it sound as if they are running away!’
‘That, I believe, is precisely what they are doing.’
‘But the Churchfield family is one of the most respected in the district, one of the pillars of South Buckinghamshire society. Sir Lionel Churchfield is a local Justice of the Peace, and has been spoken of as a future Lord Mayor of London!’
‘I cannot comment on the family’s reputation here or anywhere else,’ said Holmes, ‘but only on what I learn with my own eyes and ears.’
‘And what, precisely, have you learnt?’ asked Lestrade.
Holmes hesitated a moment. ‘Do any of you gentlemen have an account at Churchfield’s Bank?’ he asked at length. ‘No? That is fortunate. What I am going to tell you is in the very strictest confidence. You must not breathe a word of it until these people have been apprehended. I have one or two very good sources of information in the City of London, and yesterday, after Mr Ashby had consulted me, I made some very detailed enquiries. It is common knowledge there that Churchfield’s bank has been in difficulty in recent months over some very large loans they made last year in Brazil and Uruguay. They themselves have stated that there is no problem and have taken out loans from other financial institutions to cover any possible defaults. My source informs me, however, that these latter loans are all specifically short-term and the time for their repayment or renewal is this coming week, which is also the time that Churchfield’s are due to announce their annual financial results. What will happen then, no one knows, but there are strong rumours circulating in the City that the bank will not be able to honour these loans and may collapse altogether. This, I believe, is the background to the little drama that has been played out here in the past two days.’
‘I do not understand,’ said Inspector Welch in a tone of perplexity. ‘What can these financial rumours have to do with the fire here, or the dead man?’
‘They must be related,’ returned Holmes with emphasis. ‘Mr Ashby saw Churchfield’s sister in this boathouse on Friday evening �
�� I don’t believe for a moment that he could really have mistaken an oil-painting for a live woman – which means that the story of the family’s travels on the Continent is a lie. But if they are not on the Continent, where are they? The fact that there has been a large houseboat moored here, which has vanished in the past twenty-four hours surely suggests the answer to that question.’
‘But why on earth should they hide in the houseboat?’ cried Lestrade in disbelief.
‘Because, I should say, they know the bank will collapse on Monday and thousands will lose every penny they possess. It is Sunday today, when every bank and business in the country is closed, which of course gives them their best chance of escape. I think that everything that has happened here has been planned with precision. Had it not been for Mr Ashby’s blundering into their meeting here on Friday evening, we should have had no idea what was afoot and they would probably have got clean away.’
‘What can they hope to achieve by running away?’ I asked.
‘A life of ease and luxury, in all probability, Watson. I imagine their intention is to drop completely out of sight, perhaps even change their names, and to be never heard of again.’
‘This all seems wild speculation,’ said Welch. ‘How does the dead man fit into your view of things? And what became of the Churchfield boy? Is he dead, too?’
‘I imagine he is on the boat with the rest of his family,’ said Holmes, shaking his head. ‘Something that struck me in my client’s account was that when Churchfield came to his room last night and asked him to give the alarm, Mr Ashby threw on his dressing-gown and hurried off to rouse the others, only returning to dress when he was sure they were all awake. He recognised instinctively, you see, that the preservation of life is far more important than being correctly dressed. But Mr Ashby said that when Churchfield appeared in his room he was fully dressed. This strongly suggests to me that Churchfield’s apparent air of alarm and urgency was completely false. If he had just discovered the fire as he said, would he really have stopped to get dressed and do up all his buttons before warning his friends? Of course not. In fact, I doubt if he ever got undressed at all last night. More likely, he just waited until he judged the others were all asleep, then set about making the fire, no doubt watching it carefully to make sure it had taken hold and was blazing strongly before going to wake Mr Ashby. Also, his talk of trying to save something from the house, and then going to fetch the fire-brigade, was, I’m sure, nothing but a tissue of lies. I strongly suspect that after he had spoken to Mr Ashby, he came straight down here to join his family. He would have expected the house to burn down and for the remains of the dead man – if they were ever found – to be taken for his own. It is significant that the centre of the fire seems to have been directly beneath the room in which the body of the dead man lay. Of course, Churchfield did not expect that anyone would break down the locked bedroom door. That was the second thing that went wrong with their plan, the first, of course, being my client’s surprise arrival in this boathouse on Friday evening. As to this poor fellow, Wilkinson, we cannot yet say who he is, but it would not surprise me if we learnt that he was an employee at Churchfield’s Bank – and probably a fairly senior one, too.’
The Mammoth Book of the New Chronicles of Sherlock Holmes Page 8
