The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories, Part VI

by David Marcum

  I rose early the following morning and, though my wife was due back from the country, I hastily scrawled a note explaining my absence and rushed off to Baker Street to meet Holmes. I arrived in time to find Holmes spreading marmalade onto a piece of toast as he partook in his breakfast. We ate in silence and, following his repast, I joined Holmes as he hailed a cab and gave our cabbie directions to the Colonel’s house.

  We found a police wagon had drawn up outside, and Lestrade stood beside of the vehicle, a hand clasped on Mathews’ shoulder.

  “I don’t know how you do it, Mr. Holmes,” the inspector said as our odd group made it way to the door.

  “On the whole, this case was a rather simple one,” my friend replied as he rang the bell. “For all of the murderer’s attempts to disguise the thing, it was fairly easy to unravel.”

  The door was answered by Mrs. Cunningham, and I daresay I saw a look of surprise cross her face as she came face-to-face with her butler, who was still manacled and in the custody of an arm of the law. She nevertheless showed us inside and graciously relieved us of our hats and coats. Holmes then made his way into the formal sitting room and instructed for us all to take seats.

  “Now,” he began standing in the middle of the room, his long arms clasped behind his back, “I find it best to present the facts in the case of the death of Colonel Walter Cunningham to you in this way, in the order to which they were presented to me. On Friday evening, my friend and colleague, Dr. Watson, were approached by a woman named Mrs. Louisa McGinty, a resident of Birmingham and a stranger to the city of London. Arriving with the intent of visiting her children, she was making her way to Piccadilly Circus when she happened to get lost and stumbled upon a scene of singular grotesqueness. Watching from afar, she saw two men carry the body of a third out of a house and into a hansom cab, which then vanished into the night.

  “Beginning the investigation, I knew that the key to solving the case would be to identify the dead man. In all probability, whoever was responsible for his murder would be associated with him in some way and give me suspects through whom I could begin searching for the killer. I landed upon Colonel Cunningham as the most probable candidate. Having disappeared the night before Mrs. McGinty witnessed what she did, it seemed very likely that the case of the Colonel’s disappearance and the murder she witnessed were connected. Investigating here for clues, I came upon a small box which was stowed in the Colonel’s desk - a desk which contained a hypodermic syringe and a bottle of cocaine. Even more curious was the note which I found in the Colonel’s desk, which simply had the address 12 Taviton Street written upon it.

  “Figuring that Taviton Street was the most likely scene of the crime - and the street on which Mrs. McGinty found herself on Friday evening, I found the piece which joined the two cases together. The last piece of the puzzle which I needed to sort out was the cabbie. Per Mrs. McGinty’s story, one of the men who was assisting with the carrying of the body scrambled to the top of the hansom and drove off. A cabbie was therefore imperative in the murderer’s scheme, for he would be the perfect person to expertly weave a hansom conveying a dead man across the city to its final destination.

  “So, as it stands, Colonel Cunningham returned home from his club on Thursday evening, went into his study with the intent of using the drugs which were hidden in his desk. However, as his rendezvous at No. 12 Taviton Street was more important to the Colonel at the time, he left, arrived at the address given to him where he was murdered in the vacant house, and was then carted across town by his murderer and the cabbie. This scenario produces two curious questions namely: Why did the Colonel suddenly change his mind and leave his study if his drug habit was so intense, and why should the murderer risk exposure by placing the Colonel’s body inside a hansom cab, when he could just as easily have left it inside the vacant house at No.12?

  “To answer one of these questions, I defer to Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard. Inspector, when you looked the body over at the morgue, did you see any signs of drug use - perhaps more specifically, intravenous drug use of the sort which might be suggested by the Colonel having in his possession a bottle of cocaine and a syringe?”

  “No, Mr. Holmes,” Lestrade replied. “I checked myself, and that fact can be verified by the coroner.”

  “I am not entirely unfamiliar with drug use of that sort,” Holmes said, and I swore I detected a waver in his tone, “and users of the drug are marked by marks on their arms - the most common point of injection. So I came to the conjecture that Colonel Cunningham was not a drug user at all. The box which was in his desk and the opium den in which he was discovered were simply used to throw us off the scent and, I believe, to do something far worse. You see, with the news of his supposed drug habit becoming public, the Colonel’s reputation would be tarnished forever. Whoever murdered the Colonel wished to ruin him - even after death.

  “This does point the finger of suspicion at Mathews, the butler. We have, of course, since learned that Mathews was the Colonel’s illegitimate son, who confessed quite openly that he would have gladly bruised the status of the man who drove his mother to suicide. However, Mathews was indebted to the man he hated so. The Colonel took Mathews on as his military batman and then opened up his home to him. Needless to say, the Colonel did this to save himself from scandal, but Mathews had a means of living. Should he kill the Colonel - even if he did receive a portion of the Colonel’s wealth - he would be forced to find employment elsewhere. Therefore, I ruled out Mathews. That left only one person who could have any reason to murder Colonel Cunningham.”

  Holmes turned to face Mrs. Cunningham, his dark grey eyes boring into her being with the intensity of a wild conflagration.

  “Mr. Holmes,” the woman said, “you must be joking.”

  “I very much wish that this were a jest, Mrs. Cunningham,” Holmes said. “However, the evidence against you is rather strong. It may not, perhaps, convince a judge and jury but, for the moment, I think that I can win over the officer of the law who is present in this room.

  “You see, Mrs. Cunningham, I am certain that you saw a resemblance between your Colonel and Mathews. You were hurt. The Colonel had had a child out of wedlock and had instituted that child into your home. His lying was the turning point for you. I daresay that the rumors which circulated suggesting that you were only interested in the Colonel’s wealth may be rooted in truth, and the Colonel’s long-ago infidelity put you over the edge. You then willing to do anything to get at the man’s money, and you concocted a scheme to murder him and then claim his inheritance.

  “You were conveniently upstairs, away from your husband when he returned home on Thursday evening. The note which you had written was on his desk and, though he may have recognized your handwriting, he did not go to confront you. Instead he left, playing into your hands at once. You then changed into different clothing and left, perhaps departing by a second exit so as to not elicit suspicion from Mathews downstairs. At Taviton Street, you met with your unwilling compatriot, Paul Ryder, a cabbie.

  “I confess, Mrs. Cunningham, that you did have me fooled for some time with that simple disguise. I have fallen for the ploy before, but it was with utmost sincerity that Mrs. Louisa McGinty told us of the two men who carried the body into the hansom cab, and I believed her. However, when I visited Taviton Street for myself, I became aware of the fact that the street has very few streetlamps. In the darkness and wearing a set of men’s clothes, it is quiet understandable how Mrs. Taviton may have mistaken you for one of the male sex. My suspicions were confirmed when I remembered that you were an actress who would have no doubt been quite used to wearing men’s clothing, and when Mr. Ryder visited my rooms last evening, he described a petite, almost feminine man as the mastermind of the scheme.

  “To ruin your late husband, you dumped the body unceremoniously inside the opium den. The proprietor of that shop is an acquaintance of mine, and he confessed
to being won over by the money which you offered him to turn a blind eye while you deposited the Colonel’s body. Then, returning home, you entered the way you had left, rid yourself of the garb which you had adopted, and then stole down into the Colonel’s study, where you placed that box with the syringe and bottle in his desk. Though the box was kept in the bottom-most drawer, it was hardly hidden. A man like the Colonel should certainly wish to keep his vice as inconspicuous as possible, and leaving it out atop the other papers in that drawer was noticeable in the extreme. What’s more, the case was clean and neat as though it were new. The Colonel could hardly have been the regular drug user which you wished to portray if the box were that way.”

  Sherlock Holmes concluded his oration. He moved away from the center of the room, withdrew his cigarette case from his inner pocket, and lit a cigarette.

  “You are correct,” Mrs. Cunningham said at length. “You are correct on all counts. I have no need to hide from the truth and, though I am sure that you are about to tell me that anything I have to say may be used in evidence against me, Inspector, I have no need to fear the hangman’s rope. I acted my part rather well, wouldn’t you say? If I fooled the great Sherlock Holmes - even for an instant - then I should say that I played my part well.”

  Mrs. Cunningham was escorted out of the house by Lestrade, whom I have never in my life seen look quite so crestfallen and on edge. Finishing his cigarette, Holmes tossed it into the empty hearth and moved into the foyer to collect our hats and coats.

  “Well, Mathews,” he said turning to the butler who had come to help us with our garments, “I rather think you shall have a sizeable fortune coming to you now.”

  As I eased my sleeve into my coat, Mathews stared Holmes squarely in the eye.

  “I don’t want it, Mr. Holmes,” he said. “Colonel Cunningham did nothing for me, and I have only stayed with him out of sheer necessity. Now that he is gone, I shall endeavor to find work elsewhere. I believe that I have come to be quite a good butler, and with any luck I shall be welcomed by some of this city’s nobility.”

  “I rather think that you shall, Mathews,” Holmes replied. “If employment as a butler does not suit you, might I suggest a life as a bareknuckle boxer? Seldom have I seen an uppercut executed so beautifully in my life.”

  Holmes flashed a grin exposing his false canine. I swore that I saw the ghost of a smile cross Mathews’ face.

  “Well now, Watson,” said Holmes clasping me on the shoulder, “I am sure that you wish to return to that wife of yours. However, could I possibly persuade you to accompany me to luncheon, and from there to Piccadilly Circus? I rather think that Mrs. Louisa McGinty deserves to hear this tale told.”

  The Adventure of the Apothecary’s Prescription

  by Roger Riccard

  Chapter One

  Over the course of my long friendship with the consulting detective, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, there have been some few cases where it was I who was the instrument of bringing a situation before him. “The Adventure of the Naval Treaty” with my old school chum Percy Phelps comes to mind, as does The Case of the Poisoned Lilly, which involved my wife’s old roommate, Lillian Fields.

  In this instance which I am about to relate, it was a perfect stranger who contacted me, in a most unusual manner, imploring my intercession on his behalf with my friend.

  It was not long after my marriage to the former Miss Mary Morstan and the setting up of my practice and household in Paddington, when I received a most unusual package by way of a delivery boy.

  I happened to be passing by the front door en route to the kitchen, where I was in search of sustenance, when the bell rang. I naturally opened it myself to find a young lad of about twelve. He was cleanly dressed, unlike the ragamuffins whom Holmes used as his “irregular” detective force. Those young street urchins acted as my friend’s spies and bloodhounds in tracking down persons and information to assist him in some of his cases.

  This neat boy doffed his cap politely and inquired as to whether I was Dr. John Watson. Upon my affirmation, he handed me a package.

  “It’s for your emergency patient,” he said.

  As I had no emergency patient at present, I took care to note the address to my own name. Seeing it so, I reached into my pocket and handed the boy sixpence for his trouble. He accepted it most anxiously and with a, “Thank you kindly, sir”, was off like a shot.

  I proceeded on to the kitchen where Mary was preparing our midday meal.

  “Good afternoon, Darling,” I greeted her as I kissed her cheek. “Mmm, that looks good,” I continued, nodding toward the plate of sliced beef, cheeses, and bread.

  “Thank you, Love,” she replied. “What have you got there?”

  I set the package on the kitchen table. “A boy just delivered this, saying it was for my emergency patient.”

  “But you have no emergency patients, do you?” she asked.

  “No, and that is puzzling,” I replied, reaching for a knife to cut the strings.

  “Perhaps you should treat it like a puzzle, as Mr. Holmes would,” she suggested.

  I agreed that this would be a wise precaution and proceeded to examine the box thoroughly. The string was ordinary twine and the knot was a simple bow. Still, I kept it intact and cut the string some distance from it.

  The box was wrapped in ordinary brown paper, which was surprisingly wrinkled a great deal, as if it had been re-used. The handwriting seemed to be done with a fine J-pen. The slant appeared to indicate a right-handed person, and the writing was quite masculine, fitting with the name on the return address, which was Hector Burbage, LSA[1] 138 King’s Road. Markham Square, Chelsea.

  “You do not recognize the name?” inquired Mary.

  “No,” I replied. “He is not my usual supplier of medicines.”

  Removing the paper, I set it neatly aside and discovered a small cardboard box, roughly four inches square and two inches deep. It was a plain grey color with no printing of any sort to indicate its contents. I lifted it and shook it slightly. There was a rattle that indicated it was just what the boy purported it to be, a box of pills. I carefully lifted the lid, watchful for signs of any danger, and found a note and a quantity of about thirty white pills.

  The note was imprinted with the medication by its Latin designation, and I recognized it as a precarious substance which was to be used only in life-or-death situations, due to its dangerous side effects. In the same handwriting as the address on the wrapping were further instructions stating the following:

  For the exclusive use of the patient of Dr. John Watson, residing with Mrs. Hudson of Baker Street.

  Mary, who had been reading over my shoulder, offered, “It appears you have a puzzle for Mr. Holmes after all. If it’s truly an emergency, you should go to him at once.”

  I agreed and went to fetch my hat and coat. Before exiting, Mary handed me a wrapped sandwich and a flask. “Knowing Mr. Holmes, it could be some time before you get to eat again. Take this and send me word when you can.”

  I kissed her and stepped out to hail a cab, with the box and it’s wrapping in one pocket of my overcoat and the sandwich and flask in the other.

  The day was slightly overcast, keeping the temperature down, thus causing a need for my overcoat and gloves. The brisk air stirred my desire for a warm drink and so I ate my sandwich and washed it down with the brandy in the flask so thoughtfully provided by my wife.

  I had completed this abbreviated meal just before arriving at the Baker Street dwelling of Mrs. Hudson, where my friend resided.

  Our gracious landlady had allowed me to keep a key, knowing that my association with Holmes would not end with my marriage. I entered the front hall and called out.

  “Mrs. Hudson! It’s John Watson.”

  I removed my hat and was quickly greeted by the good Scotswoman, bustling in from her kitche
n and wiping her hands upon her apron. In the nearly ten years since Holmes and I had first taken up rooms from her, it seemed that she had barely aged, being a stout but handsome middle-aged widow. This was remarkable, considering the many trials Holmes’s personal habits and wide assortment of clientele had put her through.

  “Is he in?” I asked as she took my bowler.

  “Aye, Doctor, that he is,” she replied in her Scot’s accent, reaching to help me out of my overcoat. As she hung it and my hat on the hall tree she continued.

  “He’s in one of his moods, he is. Not eating enough to keep a sparrow alive. Complaining about the lack of imagination of the London criminal class. I can barely breathe when I go in there, for all the smoke from the pipes he’s gone through.”

  I smiled, for these were hardly new complaints, nor odd behavior from my old friend.

  “Well, I believe I have a little puzzle for him,” I said, holding up the package I had received. “I’ll go on up and see if I cannot break his mood for you.”

  Chapter Two

  I gave the door a knock as I walked in, knowing that Holmes’s mind can become so occupied that he does not always notice the mere silent opening of a door. I found him at his chemistry table, making notes of reactions within the retorts he had set before him in various stages of mixtures and heating. He did not look in my direction through the protective goggles he wore. But he did acknowledge my presence.

  “Watson, have a seat by the fire. I will be with you momentarily.”

  I did as he suggested and took up a place on the sofa, setting my package on the table before me. His appearance was no surprise, for I had often seen him in this state of near malnutrition, and I noticed that he had even neglected his razor for at least two days. Noting no serious signs of his old habit of cocaine use, I satisfied myself with watching in fascination as he adjusted the flame of his Bunsen burner and added some few drops of another chemical to a clear liquid, which was just beginning to simmer in its large Erlenmeyer flask.