“And these two men?” she asked, motioning toward us.
“This is Mr. Sherlock Holmes, the renowned private inquiry agent, and Dr. Watson. They were instrumental in locating you.”
“Did you ever consider that I might not wish to be located, Mr. Wilson?”
“Your novel that we published at Christmas time engendered a good bit of praise, Miss Crider. A leading London publisher, John Milne is offering to bring it out in book form for a generous sum of money.”
“But only if I allow it to be published under my own name.”
“What’s so wrong with that? Catherine Crider is a perfectly good name.”
“So is Catherine Birlstone. If you insist on a name, use that one. Or let them publish it anonymously, as you did in the Strand.”
“I can tell you that the publisher would prefer a real person who might be interviewed in the press. They have high expectations for your novel.”
“I’m sorry, no.”
Rutherford Wilson sighed. “Do you fear repercussions from the school where you teach?”
Her expression hardened. “You have learned a great deal about me, Mr. Wilson. I simply do not want my name on it, or my name made public in any manner.”
Her sister Jenny came into the room then, carrying a textbook of English grammar. I guessed her age at about fourteen, with long blond hair and pretty blue eyes, like her sister. “Cathy, can you help me with this?”
“Not now, Jenny. After our company has left.”
“It must be quite a task looking after a growing sister,” Holmes commented, as the girl returned to the next room.
“Indeed it is! Our parents died when I was eleven and Jenny was but a year old. I have looked after her ever since.”
“How long have you been teaching?”
“Three years. I try to help Jenny with her studies at home, too.”
“How old is she now? About fourteen?”
“She has just turned fifteen, a difficult age for any girl. I have tried to instill in her a love of music.” She stood up and motioned for us to follow. In the parlor where Jenny studied, there was an upright piano, its finish scarred and dented with use. “Will you play something for our guests?” she asked her sister.
Jenny smiled and went to the piano. She played a selection from the opera Carmen with surprising skill and when she’d finished, we applauded.
“That’s very good!” I congratulated her.
Catherine Crider was pleased. “When I was very young, my father took me to a concert by Bizet, the composer of Carmen. I never forgot it. But I do not have the gift for music that Jenny has.”
When we returned to the sitting room, Rutherford Wilson again urged her to permit book publication of her story. “The money you earn could be used for your sister’s music education,” he argued.
For the first time, his words seemed to have an effect on the woman. Perhaps she was considering her sister’s future, rather than her own.
“I promise to give it some thought,” she said at last. “If I decide to do it, there is something I would have to attend to first.”
Holmes studied her with hawk-like eyes. “Could I ask you one question, Miss Crider? How did it happen that you chose the name of Birlstone as a pseudonym? Might it have any connection with Birlstone Manor House or Birlstone Village in Sussex?”
“I was a governess at the Manor House a few years back,” she admitted, “before assuming my present teaching position. The name came into my head and I thought to use it.”
“Were you acquainted with the late Mr. John Douglas, owner of the house?”
“No. He had sold it to a younger couple with two small children.”
“You must have been quite young yourself.”
She flushed slightly. “I was just out of school.”
We departed soon after, and I could see that Wilson was encouraged by her words.
“You have been a great help, Mr. Holmes,” he said on the ride back to the central city.
“I did nothing,” Holmes replied modestly. But I could see that something was troubling him.
The middle of the following week brought us startling and unexpected news. We’d had a telephone for some four years and Baker Street even had its own telephone directory that I found useful at times. Holmes himself rarely used it and, on this day, the ringing of the phone startled us both. Holmes answered it with some irritation, which gradually gave way to a concern that furrowed his brows.
“That was Rutherford Wilson at the Strand, Watson. There has been an unforeseen development. A man has been found murdered in the cemetery adjoining Miss Crider’s house. She telephoned him from the post office and seemed quite disturbed. He’s going out there now and requests that we join him.”
“What can this mean, Holmes?”
“Perhaps nothing; an unrelated event.” But he was already getting out his coat, and I knew that he meant to pursue it.
We were back in Croydon within the hour. It had rained earlier and a morning mist still hung over the graveyard.
“I feared something like this, Watson,” Holmes said, more to himself than to me, as we walked among the gravestones toward a small circle of uniformed bobbies and Scotland Yard men.
We found one of the Yard men, Tobias Gregson, conducting the investigation. Holmes had always admired him, considering him the smartest of the Yarders. Gregson, a tall, white-faced man with flaxen hair now turning white, seemed surprised to see us.
“It’s Mr. Holmes and Dr. Watson, isn’t it? Been some years since you helped me on an investigation. Are you involved with this one?”
Holmes glanced toward the man’s body. “I may be. Who is the victim?”
Gregson consulted his notebook. “Identification in his pocket says his name is William Knox. He played in the orchestra at the Gaiety Music Hall, lived up in Islington.”
“Far from home,” my friend commented. “How did he die?”
“Knife wound to the stomach. It wasn’t deep, but he seemed to have collapsed here and bled to death. He’d been dead for hours before a postman spotted the body back here.”
Then I noticed Rutherford Wilson making his way in our direction from the street. The Strand editor had his arm around Catherine Crider’s shoulders as if protecting her from the chill in the air. Holmes hurried over to intercept them before they reached the body.
“What can you tell us about this, Miss Crider?” he asked.
Her face was pale and I could see now that she was trembling.
“It…it happened just outside my house. The killer might still be in the neighborhood. The police said he stabbed that man. I felt I had to call someone.”
“I’m glad you phoned me,” Wilson said. “What do you think, Mr. Holmes?”
“I think we should get Miss Crider, and tell us what you know.”
“I know nothing,” she insisted.
“Does the name William Knox mean anything to you?”
“No.”
Before she could move, Holmes shot out his hand and gripped her wrist, pushing back the sleeve of dress to reveal a purple bruise. “Are there more bruises besides this one?”
“What is this, Holmes?” Wilson asked. “What are you getting at?”
“Tell him, Miss Crider, or I shall.”
But she was sobbing uncontrollably now. “I didn’t…” she managed. And then, “I didn’t mean to kill him!”
“Kill him!” The color drained from Wilson’s face. “You mean she stabbed a man she didn’t even know?”
“Oh, she knew him, all right. William Knox was the father of her daughter, Jenny.”
“There is no way you could have known that,” I insisted to Holmes later, after Catherine Crider had told her story to the authorities. “There is no way you could have even guessed it.”
“You are wrong, Watson.” He filled his pipe and lit it in preparation for explaining the logic of his reasoning. “It seemed obvious from the beginning that Catherine Crider’s insistence
on a pseudonym or anonymity implied she was hiding from someone—the police, her parents, a lover. In any event, it had to be someone whom she feared may harm her, or separate her from Jenny.”
“Jenny is her daughter?”
Holmes nodded. “Consider the mathematics, Watson. Jenny has just turned fifteen, and Catherine told us she had cared for her little sister since she was eleven and Jenny was one. If Jenny is fifteen, Catherine must be about twenty-five, born around 1876 or ’77. She seemed older than that when seen close up, and I remembered her telling us her father took her to a concert by Bizet when she was a child. But Bizet died in 1875, at least a year before she claimed to have been born. There would be no point in her making up such a story, so we are left with the likelihood that she is lying about her age. Instead of being about twenty-five, it seems she is closer to thirty-five. Her employment as a governess at Birlstone Manor came not when she was just out of school, but when she was a woman approaching thirty, which seems far more likely.”
“But why would she lie?”
“Exactly, Watson! Why? She is not an actress wanting to prolong her career, nor an heiress who must marry by a certain age. She is a middle-class teacher raising a younger sister. However, if the truth of their age difference became known, that younger sister could easily be seen as her daughter. Our Victorian era did not pass with the death of Her Majesty, Watson. An unmarried woman with a child to raise is still an object of scorn.”
“I understand it now, Holmes. She could not use her real name on her writings because the truth of her age might come out.”
“It had to be more than that. Why would she go to such lengths, keeping even her address a secret? It had to be a person that she feared, someone who might harm her or pose a threat to Jenny. Who else but the girl’s father? My deduction made me fearful for Miss Crider’s safety, yet I had no hard evidence until this morning. The murder victim was a musician, playing in a London orchestra. He was killed here, several miles from his home or workplace. I made the connection at once. Jenny’s musical talent came from her father, not her mother, and he had come here to confront them both.”
“But how did he locate them?” I asked.
“Catherine made a terrible mistake. She must have always known where William Knox was, because he played in an orchestra whose bookings would be listed in the daily press. Over the weekend, she decided to allow publication of The Extra Passenger under her own name and, rather than fret about Knox tracking her down, she must have telephoned him at the Gaiety Music Hall and told him of her plans and where she was. Remember, she told us last Saturday that if she decided to use her own name on the novel, there was something she would have to attend to first. She never imagined Knox would turn up after the Music Hall closed, half drunk on cheap wine and demand the child he’d never seen. I believe they fought while Jenny slept in the room above. That caused the fresh bruise I noticed on her arm. Knox hit her and she fought him off with a kitchen knife. He stumbled out of the house without Catherine realizing the seriousness of his wound. He wandered into the graveyard, where he passed out and later died from loss of blood. She was horrified this morning when the body was discovered and immediately called Rutherford Wilson for help. I believe she would have told the truth even if I hadn’t deduced it.”
“What will become of her now?” I asked.
“Wilson is arranging for a leading barrister to handle her defense. It seems likely the law will be lenient when the full facts are known, if only for Jenny’s sake.”
“Is there no one to pay you for your efforts, Holmes?”
He waved away my question with a smile. “It was more a diversion than an effort. I only wish we could have arrived at a happier conclusion, before the untimely death of Mr. William Knox.”
A SCANDAL IN MONTREAL
I. The Crime
MY OLD COMPANION SHERLOCK Holmes had been in retirement for some years when I had reason to visit him at his little Sussex villa with its breathtaking view of the English Channel. It was August of 1911 and the air was so still I could make out a familiar humming. “Are the bees enough to keep you busy?” I asked as we settled down at a little table in his garden.
“More than enough, Watson,” he assured me, pouring us a bit of wine. “And it is peaceful here. I see you have walked from the station.”
“How so, Holmes?”
“You know my methods. Your face is red from the sun, and there is dust from the road on your shoes.”
“You never change,” I marveled. “Are you alone here or do you see your neighbors?”
“As little as possible. They are some distance away, but I know they look out their windows each morning for signs of a German invasion. I fear they have been taking Erskine Childers too seriously.”
It was eight years since publication of The Riddle of the Sands, but people still read it. “Do you fear war too?”
“Not for a few years. Then we shall see what happens. But tell me what brings you here on a lovely summer’s day. It has been some time since you spent a weekend with me.”
“A telegram was sent to you at our old Baker Street lodgings, all the way from Canada. Mrs. Hudson couldn’t find your address so she brought it to me.”
“How is she these days?”
“Infirm, but in good spirits.”
“I have a housekeeper here who tends to my needs. But she is off today. If you wish to stay for dinner I can offer you only a slice of beef and bread.”
“There is no need, Holmes. I came only to deliver this telegram.”
“Which could have been delivered more easily by the postal service.”
“It seemed important,” I told him, “and I have little enough to do in my own retirement. Not even bees!”
“Well then, let us see about this urgent message.”
He opened the envelope and we read it together. “Mr. Sherlock Holmes, 221B Baker Street, London. Dear Mr. Holmes, Excuse intrusion on your time, but am in urgent need of help. My son Ralph Norton gone from McGill University. Police suspect him of murder. Please come! I beg you!” It was signed simply, Irene.
“What is this, Holmes?” I asked. “Do you know the meaning of it?”
“All too well,” he answered with a sigh.
“What Irene is this? Certainly not Irene Adler. She has been dead some twenty years.”
“She was reported to have died, but I always doubted it. Irene was born in New Jersey and after her marriage here to Godfrey Norton I suspected they might have fled to America to escape questions about the Bohemian affair. If this is truly from her, she would be 53 now, four years younger than me and not an old woman by any means. She might well have a son of university age.”
“But what can you do from here, Holmes?”
“From here, nothing.” He pondered the problem for several minutes, staring at her address at the bottom of the telegram. “I must respond to her at once,” he decided. “This telegram was sent four days ago, on the 12th.”
“What will you tell her?”
“She begs my help, Watson. How can I refuse her?”
“You mean you would travel to Canada?” I asked in astonishment.
“I would, and I shall be immensely grateful if you are able to accompany me.”
Within a week’s time we were at sea, approaching the mouth of the St. Lawrence River. I wondered how Holmes ever persuaded me to accompany him on such a lengthy journey, and yet I knew the answer. I had to be present when he met Irene Adler one more time. I had to see her for myself, after all these years.
Our ship docked at one of the quays adjacent to the center of Montreal and we took a carriage to our hotel. I was surprised at the number of motor cars in the streets, and astounded at the sumptuous mansions in the city’s center—the sort of homes that would be far removed from London back home. Our driver informed us that these were the homes of the city’s financial and industrial magnates, an area known as the Golden Square Mile.
We checked into a small hotel acros
s the street from the site of a new Ritz-Carlton Hotel under construction. It was on Rue Sherbrooke Ouest, close to the University, and after a telephone call to her Irene said she would join us at the hotel. I could see that Holmes was a bit fidgety at the prospect of the meeting. “I trust I will be able to help the woman with her problem,” he confided. “I have never forgotten her, over all these years.”
Presently the desk clerk telephoned to say that Mrs. Irene Norton was downstairs. Holmes and I went down to find her waiting in a secluded corner of the lobby, seated alone on a sofa wearing a long skirt and flowered blouse and hat. I recognized her at once from the photograph Holmes kept of her. She was still as slim and dainty as she had been on the opera stage, with a face as lovely as ever. Only a few gray hairs hinted at the passing years. “Good day, Mr. Sherlock Holmes,” she said by way of greeting, almost duplicating her words when once she had followed him disguised as a boy. “And Dr. Watson. I must say both of you have changed very little since our London days.”
“You are most kind, Madam,” Holmes said with a little bow. “I am sorry we cannot be meeting under more pleasant circumstances.”
She bid us be seated with her on the sofa. “These have been terrible weeks for me. I was at my wit’s end when I telegraphed you, not even knowing if you were still available as a private consultant.”
“I am retired,” he told her, “but always available if you need me.
She smiled slightly. “I am honored that you both should travel across an ocean for me.”
“Have you lived in Montreal long?”
She nodded. “After our wedding Godfrey felt we should leave England. Following a brief time on the Continent he established quite a successful law practice here and we had a wonderful son, Ralph.”
“I remember Godfrey as a remarkably handsome man,” Holmes said.
“Sadly, he passed away three years ago. If he was with me now perhaps I would not have summoned you across an ocean.”
The Sherlock Holmes Stories of Edward D. Hoch Page 14
