‘I wrote the letter that night and the following day suggested to Miss Strensall that we walk down to the village post office together. As we were descending the steps of the house, Hardwick, who had evidently heard the door, hurried out after us and enquired if he could be of service.
‘“I do not think so,” said I, and informed him of our errand.
‘“If you wish, my lady,” said he, “you may give the letter to me and I will have Staples run down with it.”
‘“No, thank you,” I replied firmly. “It is a lovely day and I am sure we shall find the walk beneficial.”
‘As we crossed the bridge, I glanced back and saw that Hardwick was still standing in the open doorway of the house. I knew that he would dearly have loved to see the address upon my letter, and to read its contents, and I had, I confess, an odd sense of elation to know that for once I was the one with the secret, I was the one causing anxiety in others.’
‘Is there anything else?’ queried Holmes, raising his head, which had been sunk in contemplation upon his breast.
‘That day and the next were mercifully free of event,’ replied our companion with feeling. ‘But this morning’s discovery has quite remedied the deficiency.’ She spoke these words with slow emphasis and as she did so the colour passed visibly from her face. It was evident that in speaking to us, the consciousness of recent events had been for a short time banished from her mind, but now, as her narrative was brought up to date, the full horror of them returned to her.
‘What is it?’ said Holmes in a soft voice, evidently perceiving as well as I the abrupt change in Lady Davenoke’s features.
‘Oh, it is so horrible! So horrible and pointless!’
Holmes raised his eyebrows questioningly.
‘Someone,’ she said, with emotion throbbing in her voice; ‘someone has killed Bruno, Edward’s beloved sheepdog. We found him this morning, Edith and I. He lay just within the woods, near the ruined chapel. He had been struck a heavy blow and the side of his head was a mass of blood—’
Her words ended abruptly and with a terrible wail of grief she began to sob uncontrollably. I gave her my handkerchief and put my hand upon her arm, and she turned to me and wept upon my shoulder.
Somewhere in the distance a woman’s voice called. Holmes left us, but returned in a moment accompanied by a small blonde-haired young woman, whom I took to be Edith Strensall.
‘Oh, Amelia!’ she cried in distress, rushing forward to put her arm round her friend. ‘Do not weep so, my dear!’
‘What can we do, Mr Holmes?’ said the other, her sobs lessening a little. ‘Must I live forever in this nightmare?’
‘You have been very brave and sensible so far,’ returned my friend in an encouraging tone. ‘If you can be so for just a little longer, I promise you that I shall have some news for you by tomorrow.’
‘Do you mean it?’ said she, her reddened eyes opening wide with hope. ‘Do you really mean it, Mr Holmes?’
‘Most certainly, Lady Davenoke.’
‘My husband—?’
‘Twenty-four hours, Lady Davenoke, twenty-four hours. For the present you ladies may return to the needlework which our visit has interrupted – there is no mystery, madam; I observed the unmistakable mark of a thimble upon your finger when first you greeted us. Until tomorrow, then!’
The sun broke through the patchy clouds as we left the wood and cast long shadows across the lawn. A warm smell of wet vegetation filled the air and all nature seemed refreshed by the recent rain. Our way to the bridge across the stream took us close by the ruined chapel. Holmes paused there a moment, a thoughtful expression upon his face; then, indicating that I should wait at the edge of the ruins, he stepped over a few loose stones and proceeded to examine the whole area with minute care. Back and forth he went, now standing, now stooping, now down upon his hands and knees, his nose barely an inch above the flagstones. Then he took from his pocket a small, powerful lens, with which he inspected more closely certain marks upon the crumbling walls and floor. From time to time he frowned and muttered to himself, whether in puzzlement or satisfaction I could not tell, until at length, pocketing his lens once more, he rejoined me upon the lawn.
‘Come,’ said he. ‘There is an inn in the last village we passed, about a mile down the road. Perhaps we can get a little sustenance there.’
A pleasant walk of some twenty minutes brought us to the Black Lion, where Mr Jelks, the genial, soft-spoken landlord, produced an excellent meal for us of cold meat and pickles, and a pot of tea.
Afterwards, having booked rooms for the night, we repaired to the private sitting-room upstairs.
‘You are no doubt wondering what I intend to do,’ said Sherlock Holmes, when he had lit his pipe and we had smoked in silence for some time.
‘I confess that I am quite in the dark, both as to what has gone before and what is to come,’ I replied. ‘But what puzzles me most is why, if you are so certain that Davenoke is at Shoreswood, you did not apprise his wife of the fact.’
‘Our locus standi is a delicate one,’ replied my friend after a moment. ‘Words of explanation were better coming from Davenoke’s own lips than from mine.’
‘But if such words of explanation are not forthcoming?’
‘Then we must act as we see fit. Lady Davenoke certainly deserves an explanation from someone.’
‘I cannot imagine what that explanation could be,’ I remarked. ‘The whole affair is nothing but darkness and confusion!’
‘Not entirely,’ returned Holmes. ‘You must bear in mind that Edward Davenoke’s disappearance was abrupt; his wife had had no indication that anything of the sort might occur and such a desertion of his new bride seems out of character for the man. We must suppose, then, that it was as a result of something which took place after his return from abroad. Is there anything we know of which took place then and which might fit the part?’
‘All we know,’ I suggested, ‘is that Davenoke’s father died and was buried two or three days later.’
‘Anything else?’
‘Nothing of significance. He called in to see the solicitor over some trivial matter, just after his father’s death.’
‘Precisely, Watson! Precisely! There, if you will recall, the solicitor gave him a bundle of old documents, thereby fulfilling the instruction he had been given many years before, by Edward Davenoke’s father.’
‘The solicitor did not believe the papers to be of any importance.’
‘In his eyes, perhaps not. But he was only guessing, from their ancient appearance and from the fact that Sir John had deposited them with him nearly twenty years ago. He had not, as he admitted to Lady Davenoke, actually read the documents. Let us suppose that they pertain to the family legend.’
‘Why should they?’
‘Well, what else do you suggest? They are evidently historical and equally evidently of value to the family; otherwise, why deposit them with the solicitor in that way? Moreover, they are sealed personally by Sir John, so that even his trusted solicitor is not privy to their content – a suggestive point, do you not agree?’
I nodded, and he continued.
‘Now, we know from tradition that it is only when the heir takes possession of the estate that he learns the family secrets, which are known to no one else: Edward Davenoke said something of the sort himself. But we also know that, according to his father, who seemed to take the matter most seriously, “the Lord of the Manor of Shoreswood never speaks of the legend”, or something of the sort – and that prohibition seemed to include his own son. It is therefore apparent that the only way the heir can possibly learn anything of the matter is from documents passed on to him when he comes into his inheritance, documents which are at all other times locked away from human gaze. It seems certain beyond peradventure, then, that the documents which the solicitor passed to young Davenoke, whatever else they may have dealt with, contained details of the legend of the Beast of Shoreswood, the secret chamber and all the rest of
it.’
‘I see that you must be right,’ I remarked. ‘Indeed, it seems perfectly obvious, the way you describe it. But if we assume that it is so, where does that get us?’
‘It gets us to the point where we must penetrate to the secret chamber tonight,’ said Holmes. ‘Yes, Watson, we must. For therein lies the source of all that has occurred to so distress our client.’
‘But no one knows where it is!’
‘It is not the location of the chamber which presents the problem, but its entrance. He who knows the entrance can scarcely fail to find the chamber itself. So our position is not so hopeless as you suppose.’
‘You know the entrance, then?’ I cried in surprise.
‘One of them, at least. There will almost certainly be an entrance to the chamber in the house itself, but we might look for a year and not find it. Fortunately, however, there is also an entrance in the ruined chapel, which has proved somewhat easier of discovery. I had suspected already that there would be an entrance there – Lady Davenoke’s account of the noises she had heard there, and the lights and the dark figure she had seen, indicated as much – and my close examination of the chapel this afternoon confirmed all my suspicions. The secret entrance is beneath one of the flagstones. It was simplicity itself to identify, for it was the only one which did not have thick grass growing in the cracks around it. The grass had evidently been cleared away, quite recently, presumably to facilitate the opening of the stone, which must hinge up in some way.
‘I was also able to discover,’ Holmes continued after a moment, as he refilled his pipe, ‘that the man who has been using that entrance and exit is around five foot six inches tall, wears size eight boots with steel tips, smokes a Latakia mixture and wears a very long plaid coat or ulster. So our midnight prowler begins to sound somewhat more like Edward Davenoke and somewhat less like a monster from the deep!’
‘How can you tell all these things?’
‘His boots had chipped away the stones in no fewer than seven places and left clear impressions in the rain-softened ground at the edge of the ruins. His height I gauge from his stride, a piece of elementary reasoning with which you are no doubt familiar. He had knocked his pipe out against a corner, and some of the unmistakable dark tobacco had remained unburnt. Woollen fibres were caught on the rough edge of a stone, and similar traces where he must have stepped over a raised row of stones at the edge of the ruins indicated clearly that his overcoat must reach almost to the ground. The dog was killed in the chapel, by the way, and dragged to where Lady Davenoke found it. But, come! We must now turn our minds to tonight’s enterprise. I have informed the landlord that we shall be out this evening and may be late in returning, and he has agreed to leave a back door open for us. I also took the opportunity when downstairs to locate a stout iron rod in the courtyard. Its usual employment is in the manipulation of refractory cart-wheels, but it should serve us well when we come to lever up the secret door. Incidentally,’ he added after a moment; ‘I should be obliged if you would fill your brandy flask before we leave. The sky is clear and the night may be a cold one. Now let us rest a little while, and compose our minds in silence, for later we shall need to be alert.’
The sun had already set when we left the inn and, away to the west, where a dark line of trees stood on the horizon, the sky met the land in a band of dull orange. High above us a noisy rabble of crows flew steadily westwards, home to their roost. By the time we reached the Shoreswood gateway, the sky was quite dark and the tree-lined drive ahead of us presented an impenetrable wall of blackness to our view. Down this dark alley we walked, and as we did so there came from time to time slight rustling noises in the undergrowth beside us, as some nocturnal creature scurried away at the sound of our footsteps. Once I was startled as an owl hooted loudly, directly over our heads. It wanted no great imagination to understand the fear and superstition with which primitive man had regarded the long hours of the night, and the unseen creatures which move abroad then. Beside me, my friend walked on steadily in silence. If he were entertaining thoughts like those that filled my own mind he gave no sign of it.
Presently there came to our ears the soft silvery babbling of water, and I knew we were approaching the small river which skirted the house and the chapel. Moments later we reached the bridge. Ahead of us in the darkness lay the yet darker mass of Shoreswood Hall. A single candle shone weakly in an upstairs window.
In silence Holmes motioned me to follow him, as he left the path and crossed the wet turf to the ruined chapel; in silence we sat for perhaps forty minutes, each on our block of stone, like a bizarre pair of statues. The night was indeed a chill one, and when I felt Holmes’s hand tap my arm lightly I passed him the brandy flask without query. Shortly afterwards, the candle in the window was extinguished and the blackness of the Hall was complete. Turning, so that his heavy cloak shielded the light from the house, he struck a match and lit a small pocket-lantern, then immediately closed the shutter. ‘Come,’ said he, rising to his feet.
It was chiefly by the sense of touch that we found the flagstone we sought, and I was able to confirm with my fingers my friend’s earlier observation that the grass had been cleared away from its edge. In its place, I felt a narrow space all around, from which a faint whisper of cold, dank air seemed to rise to my finger-ends. He handed me the lantern, and by the tiny slit of light which escaped from it I saw him push the narrower end of his makeshift lever into the crack and press down upon it. There came a scraping noise, as of stone upon stone and the flag lifted an inch or two. I took the weight and, together, with as little noise as possible, we turned the slab right back until it rested upon a block behind it. Lying flat on his stomach, Holmes plunged the lantern into the black hole which had opened before us and from which a foul, mephitic odour now arose. The yellow light of the lantern showed the earth floor below the hole to be some six or seven feet down. An old rotten-looking chest stood immediately beneath us, and had evidently been placed there to provide a step, for its edge was splintered and caked with mud. To one side of this sinister pit, a dark opening indicated where a low-roofed tunnel led away in the direction of the house.
Without a word, Holmes lowered himself into the darkness. ‘Be careful of your footing!’ he whispered sharply as I made to follow him. ‘The lid of this chest has no more strength than a rotten apple!’
In a moment I had joined him and, stooping, we entered the tunnel. Like the pit before it, the walls were clad in crumbling and ancient-looking brickwork, which narrowed to an arch at the top, the whole blotched all over, and covered with slime and the revolting excrescences of mould. In one or two places the brickwork had crumbled to dust and loose earth had fallen in and lay in heaps upon the floor. From these heaps, foul insects scurried and slithered as we passed, like figments of some evil dream. The smell of the damp earth was thick and unpleasant now, and mingled with the more penetrating smell of rot and decay in an almost overpowering stench.
For perhaps thirty yards this vile corridor led us on, now rising slightly, now falling a little, and all the time our backs were bent, for the roof was scarce four foot in height. Glad I was when my companion paused and held out his arm as a warning and I knew that we must be approaching the end. He closed his lantern down to the narrowest of slits and we proceeded then with great caution, our footsteps making no sound upon the earth floor. Presently the tunnel opened out slightly and the roof sloped up to about six feet, and we found ourselves before a stout, ancient-looking oak door. Its hinges were rusted and frail, but appeared from the sheen upon them to have been recently oiled. Through the crack beneath the door came a thin line of light. Holmes motioned me to silence and placed his hand upon the latch.
Quite what I expected to see as the door swung open, I do not know; but it could not have been the strange scene that now met our gaze. Before us was a narrow chamber, its walls formed of large blocks of stone, which glistened green with the damp. There was no window, but immediately opposite stood another iden
tical oak door, and high in the wall to our right was what appeared to be some kind of ventilation-grille. In the centre of the flagged floor stood an old mildewed table upon which were several piles of old documents done up in tape, and a few loose sheets. Beside these stood two bottles of ink, a box of quill pens and a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles, neatly folded. On the floor to the side of the table was a stack of massive old books, bound in wood and leather, atop which stood a low-burning lamp, whose glimmer we had seen beneath the door. To the right of the table stood a simple wooden chair; to its left, against the damp wall, a crude cot bed, upon which lay a man, fully dressed, face down and asleep.
For several minutes we stood there in silence and might have stood there several more; but all at once, as if he sensed our presence – for we made no noise that could have roused him – the figure on the bed stirred, rolled over and sat up, rubbing his eyes as he did so.
He was a slim, pale-faced young man, with a look of studious perplexity upon his features. His dark hair was unkempt, his clothes dishevelled; but, even so, there was something civilised and sensitive about his appearance. No bank-clerk puzzling over an unbalanced ledger, no country parson pondering his next sermon could have seemed less like a denizen of a strange underground lair than this young man we now saw before us. Absent-mindedly, without turning his head, he reached out his hand for his spectacles.
‘Sir Edward Davenoke?’ said Sherlock Holmes softly. The young man before us started up as if shot, his eyes wide with terror. He sprang unsteadily to his feet, his face as white as a sheet. For a moment I was certain he would faint with the shock of our sudden appearance, but he clutched the edge of the table to steady himself and spoke suddenly and abruptly, in a nervous, breathless manner.
‘What! – who are you?’ he cried, his eyes roaming wildly from Holmes to me and back again, as if he could not control their movement. ‘What are you doing? How came you here? – How dare you!’
‘My name is Sherlock Holmes,’ said my friend in a calm voice. ‘This is my friend, Dr Watson. I have been retained by your wife to find you.’
The Mammoth Book of the New Chronicles of Sherlock Holmes Page 43
