by Petr Macek
“Such strong words from such delicate lips,” said the detective. “Come come now.”
“My brother and that pastor are idiots for not seeing through you,” she continued. “One is always better off doing something oneself. And you know what? I strangled Bollinger with my own hands! His Adam’s apple just crunched! The doctor knows how dextrous I am with my fingers.”
Her confession, uttered with such coldblooded cruelty, and addressed to my ears, threw me into despair. I remembered how her hands had caressed my neck. What would have happened had my friend not intervened?
“Enough talk,” said Holmes, defending me. “You can tell this to the police and the judge. I hope you show enough remorse to avoid being sent straight to the gallows!”
But she did not falter.
“You pathetic fool! You have no idea who I am and what is waiting for all of you! You will burn in hell!”
Laughing contemptuously she lunged towards the bookshelf before the detective could stop her.
From behind two volumes she pulled something that looked like a stick of dynamite and waved it in front of us. We covered our heads expecting an explosion, but she just cackled as she broke the stick and tossed it in front of us. A cloud of pungent smoke rose up, filling the room and blinding us.
We heard the doors close behind her, the key clicking in the lock, and her surprisingly rapid footsteps as she ran cackling down the hallway. Holmes groped through the smoke and tried in vain to open the door.
“Did she lock us in?” I called to him.
“Yes,” he answered from behind the veil of smoke, which was gradually beginning to dissipate.
But in those few second she had succeeded in getting away.
When the smoke faded I looked across the room and saw Holmes silently staring at the door through which she had disappeared with a sad expression on his face.
“Cosi fan tutte,”[21] he sighed.
21 Italian: “Thus do they all.” Also the name of an opera by Mozart. Holmes is no doubt referring to the fact that the incomparable Irene Adler also ran away from him in A Scandal in Bohemia.
XI: Intermezzo
The black cloud of smoke in Lady Darringford’s study had dissipated. But in that short time it had paralysed not only our vision but also our ability to move. As soon as Holmes understood that we were imprisoned inside the room he lunged towards the window, opened it and from his jacket pocket pulled out a whistle. The sound alarmed the policemen, who were pulling up shrubs and turf from the beech grove and digging with their shovels in the dirt. Now they looked up at the window from which smoke was billowing.
“She got away!” he shouted. “Search the house! She must not escape!”
The sergeant bellowed orders. He left two men at the pit while the rest ran towards the house. I feared that they would not be able to surround the villa in time. Then I was overcome by a fit of coughing and had to again prop myself up against the parapet.
Mycroft, alarmed by the smoke and the whistling, also ran into the garden. A glance at the garden and the two of us standing helplessly at the window told him everything he needed to know.
“Are you all right?” he called.
“She has only injured our pride,” said Holmes.
“What happened?”
“She locked us in the study and escaped. I have already issued instructions.”
“Very well. Wait there, I am coming for you!”
As we did not know how to walk on walls this command was rather unnecessary.
In a few minutes we heard Mycroft’s heavy footsteps behind the door.
“Brother, are you still there?”
We assured him that indeed we were and he called two men over to break down the door. After the second strike the wood gave way and we were free.
The hallway was full of policemen running from room to room, shaking their heads.
The news was bad.
“Lady Darringford has disappeared without a trace,” said Mycroft gloomily.
“How is that possible?”
“My men were only watching the main entrance. We did not anticipate that she would resist arrest, especially since the garden was full of police. The Lady escaped through the cellar and servants’ entrance together with the housekeeper and other domestics. The house is completely empty.”
Indeed, the vestibule beneath the staircase contained only two despondent agents in civilian dress.
Holmes fixed them with his penetrating gaze. But there was no point upbraiding them.
“Back to work,” he said. “Whatever direction she has headed she has no doubt left clues.”
“Now it’s just a matter of finding them,” Mycroft sighed.
“Do not fear. We have come very far and I still have strength enough to continue the chase,” said my companion.
We returned to Alice’s study, which had been aired out. How many clues did it hide?
Books, letters in the desk, all could contain valuable information.
On the desk lay the letter which Lady Alice had been writing when we interrupted her. Holmes headed straight for it.
He read the first lines and smiled softly.
“It is a kind of written confession,” he said. “A letter to a certain Jacques in which the Lady discusses plans for their upcoming nuptials.”
“Alice wants to get married?”
“So it seems. According to this letter the wedding is planned for this autumn.”
“But I thought she never wanted to marry!”
“No doubt it is merely a marriage of convenience, Watson,” he said, rummaging through the other papers on the desk until he found the envelope. “Yes, I was right. The addressee is Jacques Picard, a leading French industrialist.”
“May I hazard a guess that he manufactures weapons?” I said.
“Precisely,” replied Holmes. “Lady Alice was acquiring control over the war machinery very meticulously. She planned to marry this arms manufacturer, but I do not expect that the marriage was meant to last long. The poor fellow would have been a mere instrument serving her aims; our praying mantis would have disposed of him just as she did the others. Most ingenious and cruel!”
“We should warn him,” said Mycroft, taking the envelope from Holmes.
“I will leave that to you, brother. Nevertheless, now that we have uncovered her plans, Lady Darringford will have much less room to operate. I do not think that Mr Picard will be hearing from his fiancée in the near future. I suppose that you will issue an immediate warrant for her arrest. And as for Bollinger and Pascuale, sans her they are just like empty cartridges without a detonator.”
“But as long as she is free she will surely continue to plot and intrigue,” said Mycroft. “She knows our strategic plans and secret materials, for which Kaiser Wilhelm would give anything, and can blackmail us. That woman will not give up so easily. She must be rendered toothless!”
As I listened to them the whole truth finally sunk in. Alice had been revealed as a radical feminist who would stop at nothing and who was ready to sacrifice human lives for her twisted ideals. Her behaviour gave the term suffragette a completely different meaning.
After all, the suffragettes were originally middleclass women, for the most part unmarried, frustrated by their social situation and economic condition. In their radical actions they sought a path to change. Their feeling of powerlessness led to a movement that inspired thousands of women to fight for the right to vote.
Soon they took direct action, tying themselves to railway tracks, starting fires in post boxes and trash bins, and breaking windows and display cases. They even set off bombs. Many went on hunger strikes and had to be fed by force. But they certainly would not condone what Alice had done.
Which was another reason why Lady Darr
ingford did not seem to fit into this group. She was born wealthy and had an excellent position in society. Hence her motives remained a mystery.
While I pondered thus my companions were examining the bookshelf.
Just as I had expected Holmes found much of interest in it. In particular he was intrigued by a peculiar family album, resembling a book, which he pulled out of the shelf and began to leaf through.
As we could see by the date indicated in gold letters in the blood red leather of the cover, the album was put together about a year ago. Instead of photographs, Alice had filled it with articles and news clippings, probably from stories in which she had played a large part. There were short notices about various accidents that had befallen people whose names were unfamiliar to me. But the detective recognised the names of important figures in European industry. Other pages were devoted to a fire in Manchester about a year ago that had burned down a factory belonging to Sir Curry. In the aftermath, the unfortunate entrepreneur went bankrupt and hung himself.
Although it was unclear whether the fires had been caused by an arsonist or by circumstances, in each case the most important British armouries were destroyed. This led to the rise of Bollinger’s factory.
“Again we see how naive we were,” said Holmes as he read the clippings. “She planned each move well in advance, to the smallest detail, and with extraordinary callousness. She prepared the affair with Bollinger for more than a year. The burning of the Curry factory was her first step on the road to power.”
The detective turned the pages.
We learned that her crimes were even more far-reaching and monstrous than we had imagined. The Darringfords’ murders and power games were only the tip of the iceberg. In the album, a sort of diary of crime, we uncovered the rotten foundations.
Anyone unfortunate enough to be lured into their web of extortion, bribery or money was eventually eliminated from the game without mercy. They abducted children, murdered, burned houses and factories. In addition to the Curry factory they were responsible for the destruction of at least two other factories in France and one in Italy. This served to increase the influence of the companies that they already controlled. A competitive advantage par excellence.
Yes, the suffragettes sometimes lit fires; but Alice’s pyromania and profiteering were monstrous. It was only a matter of time before the suffragettes turned their backs on her.
The last pages of the album were devoted to Holmes’s funeral.
Here the lady exercised a care approaching fetishism. The clippings were surrounded by childish drawings depicting Holmes’ death and were framed with black flowers and decorative ornaments.
The detective cast aside the album. It had ceased to interest him.
We found a few more smoke bombs behind the books, but otherwise there was nothing. When we reunited with the police officers in the hallway, we learned that similar caches of bombs had been prepared throughout the house. Lady Alice had been ready to escape at a moment’s notice.
Mycroft told us that his patrol would remain in the villa a while longer and would be joined by professional criminal investigators for a more thorough inspection.
“I would wager that this house still has not revealed all of its secrets,” said Holmes.
We made our way to the spacious cellar, which we entered through a door hidden in an alcove behind the stairs. In addition to old bric-a-brac, metal stoves, chests, furniture and similar things, there was nothing unusual or striking, except for the marks in the dust left behind by the retreating lady and her retinue. In the upper half of the sloping rear wall there was an open casement window, through which the lady and her people had disappeared. Streaks of morning light now shone through it.
Mycroft returned upstairs, as he was not inclined to exert himself physically, but Holmes took off his jacket and used an overturned stool to lift himself through the casement to the garden. I followed him, surprised by just how arduous it was. Alice must have been tremendously agile.
We found ourselves on the lawn in front of the garage, near the inconspicuous side gate.
The detective explored the plot thoroughly, but there were not many clues to be found.
“Three pairs of women’s shoes, one man’s,” he said, counting the footprints. “The man’s shoeprints are deeper; he appears to have been carrying something heavy. Everything that the lady considered absolutely necessary and that she managed in her haste to collect.”
“In particular anything that would reveal where she has escaped to...”
“Precisely. Look, he laid down the duffle bag here; the grass is flattened and the dew has been displaced. The footsteps of course lead to the gate.”
The heather-covered gate led out to a dirt road, around the corner from the main access routes. The view of it was blocked by hedges and trees, hence the police officer had not seen them flee.
“A car was waiting for them here,” said Holmes, stroking his chin. “No doubt she had it parked here at the ready. The footsteps go no further. According to the tire tracks in the soil it is a common Model T Ford. And the trail is lost on the main road.”
Even my friend’s genius could no longer follow the trail.
“My man no doubt noticed the car turning from the dirt road,” said Mycroft, who had again joined us. “Evidently he did not attach any significance to it. He did not see the lady and assumed the car was just driving past.”
“Yes, he assumed,” said Holmes, “a common problem among policemen.”
“She cleaned up after herself thoroughly,” I said, sighing.
“Not as well as she thinks,” said Holmes.
He walked across the garden to the main entrance of the villa and its marble staircase. I locked the gate behind us and ran after him and Mycroft. I had my work cut out to catch up to them, they had such long strides.
We rushed into the drawing room where we had first met Alice and where she had received us a few days earlier. The detective went straight to the display of family photographs. He stopped before the photograph depicting the lady with her brother and the Silver Ghost.
“She left the most important thing behind,” the detective exclaimed.
“What is that?”
“A map to her hideout!”
He removed the photograph from the frame and pointed to the castle in the background.
“Where else would she escape to? I presume it will not be hard to find.”
“I thought that was Darringford!”
“No, Darringford is an old manor house,” said Holmes, placing the photograph in his breast pocket. “It does not correspond to the description, location, architectural style or size of this place. Nor is she foolish enough to run home. After all, Scotland is full of potential hideouts.”
He looked around once more and then headed back to the garden, where most of the policemen had returned to their work.
The bushes they had pulled up lay in a heap behind the gazebo, above which buzzed angry bees, as though attempting to gather as much pollen as possible before the flowers dried out. At the edge of the beech grove was a mound of earth and the men were taking turns digging and shovelling the soil.
The hole was already quite deep.
“Nothing yet, sir!” the sergeant said to Mycroft.
“Please continue, the body must be there,” said the detective’s brother.
“How is the work proceeding?” Holmes asked.
“Quite well,” answered the sergeant. “The soil is loose and not overgrown with roots.”
He was not accustomed to manual labour and was sweating.
“Excellent!” said the detective happily. “That means someone was digging here recently.”
He sat down with us in the gazebo. From there we eagerly watched how the dig progressed. The work indeed was going well. With each str
ike of the shovel we became tenser with excitement.
After a while Holmes could no longer stand idly by. He borrowed a spade from an old corporal and started digging. Presently, whether by luck or fate, his spade hit a solid wooden board.
Those of us sitting in the gazebo could easily distinguish the dull sound.
We ran over and peered into the six-foot pit at the bottom of which Holmes was clearing away the last layer of dark, wet clay with his bare hands. Finally, under the layers of soil, a cracked lid appeared.
Holmes felt for the edge of the board and with the help of one of the officers gave it a mighty yank and threw it aside. Below us lay something wrapped in a canvas. Based on the shape it was not hard to guess what it was.
“A knife!” the detective cried, extending his hand without taking his eyes off his find. His nails were filthy and the tips of his fingers were raw from the digging.
The sergeant handed him a knife. Holmes plunged the blade into the canvas and we heard a ripping sound.
I crossed myself.
There was no doubt that we were standing over the grave of Lord Bollinger, although it was impossible to distinguish any specific features from the remains. They had remained hidden in Lady Darringford’s garden for too long and the body had begun to decompose.
The canvas and the dead man’s clothes were stuck together, and when the detective pulled them back we could see the worms swarming and feasting on the body. Some of the men immediately turned away from the pit. The rest of us took off our hats.
“His watch,” whispered Mycroft hoarsely. “Give me his watch.”
The detective obediently slid his hand under the rotting wet jacket and pulled out the dead man’s watch chain. His brother leaned over and grasped it in his handkerchief.
“There is no longer any doubt,” he said. “The coat of arms belongs to the royal family. Gentlemen, pay your respects to Lord Bollinger.”
