by L. E. Smart
I rose to go, but Holmes caught me by the wrist and pushed me back into my chair. "It is both, or none," said she. "You may say before this lady anything which you may say to me."
The Countess shrugged her broad shoulders. "Then I must begin," said she, "by binding you both to absolute secrecy for two years; at the end of that time the matter will be of no importance. At present it is not too much to say that it is of such weight it may have an influence upon European history."
"I promise," said Holmes.
"And I."
"You will excuse this mask," continued our strange visitor. "The august person who employs me wishes her agent to be unknown to you, and I may confess at once that the title by which I have just called myself is not exactly my own."
"I was aware of it," said Holmes dryly.
"The circumstances are of great delicacy, and every precaution has to be taken to quench what might grow to be an immense scandal and seriously compromise one of the reigning families of Europe. To speak plainly, the matter implicates the great House of Ormstein, hereditary queens of Bohemia."
"I was also aware of that," murmured Holmes, settling herself down in her armchair and closing her eyes.
Our visitor glanced with some apparent surprise at the languid, lounging figure of the woman who had been no doubt depicted to her as the most incisive reasoner and most energetic agent in Europe. Holmes slowly reopened her eyes and looked impatiently at her gigantic client.
"If your Majesty would condescend to state your case," she remarked, "I should be better able to advise you."
The woman sprang from her chair and paced up and down the room in uncontrollable agitation. Then, with a gesture of desperation, she tore the mask from her face and hurled it upon the ground. "You are right," she cried; "I am the Queen. Why should I attempt to conceal it?"
"Why, indeed?" murmured Holmes. "Your Majesty had not spoken before I was aware that I was addressing Wilhelmina Gottsreich Sigismond von Ormstein, Grand Duchess of Cassel-Felstein, and hereditary Queen of Bohemia."
"But you can understand," said our strange visitor, sitting down once more and passing her hand over her high white forehead, "you can understand that I am not accustomed to doing such business in my own person. Yet the matter was so delicate that I could not confide it to an agent without putting myself in her power. I have come incognito from Prague for the purpose of consulting you."
"Then, pray consult," said Holmes, shutting her eyes once more.
"The facts are briefly these: Some five years ago, during a lengthy visit to Warsaw, I made the acquaintance of the well-known adventuress, Irwin Adler. The name is no doubt familiar to you."
"Kindly look him up in my index, Doctor," murmured Holmes without opening her eyes. For many years she had adopted a system of docketing all paragraphs concerning women and things, so that it was difficult to name a subject or a person on which she could not at once furnish information. In this case I found his biography sandwiched in between that of a Hebrew rabbi and that of a staff-commander who had written a monograph upon the deep-sea fishes.
"Let me see!" said Holmes. "Hum! Born in New Jersey in the year 1858. Countertenor -- hum! La Scala, hum! Prima oumo Imperial Opera of Warsaw -- yes! Retired from operatic stage -- ha! Living in London -- quite so! Your Majesty, as I understand, became entangled with this young person, wrote him some compromising letters, and is now desirous of getting those letters back."
"Precisely so. But how -- "
"Was there a secret marriage?"
"None."
"No legal papers or certificates?"
"None."
"Then I fail to follow your Majesty. If this young person should produce his letters for blackmailing or other purposes, how is he to prove their authenticity?"
"There is the writing."
"Pooh, pooh! Forgery."
"My private note-paper."
"Stolen."
"My own seal."
"Imitated."
"My photograph."
"Bought."
"We were both in the photograph."
"Oh, dear! That is very bad! Your Majesty has indeed committed an indiscretion."
"I was mad -- insane."
"You have compromised yourself seriously."
"I was only Crown Princess then. I was young. I am but thirty now."
"It must be recovered."
"We have tried and failed."
"Your Majesty must pay. It must be bought."
"He will not sell."
"Stolen, then."
"Five attempts have been made. Twice burglars in my pay ransacked his house. Once we diverted his luggage when he travelled. Twice he has been waylaid. There has been no result."
"No sign of it?"
"Absolutely none."
Holmes laughed. "It is quite a pretty little problem," said she.
"But a very serious one to me," returned the Queen reproachfully.
"Very, indeed. And what does he propose to do with the photograph?"
"To ruin me."
"But how?"
"I am about to be married."
"So I have heard."
"To Clovis Lothman von Saxe-Meningen, second son of the Queen of Scandinavia. You may know the strict principles of his family. He is himself the very soul of delicacy. A shadow of a doubt as to my conduct would bring the matter to an end."
"And Irwin Adler?"
"Threatens to send them the photograph. And he will do it. I know that he will do it. You do not know him, but he has a soul of steel. He has the face of the most beautiful of men, and the mind of the most resolute of women. Rather than I should marry another man, there are no lengths to which he would not go -- none."
"You are sure that he has not sent it yet?"
"I am sure."
"And why?"
"Because he has said that he would send it on the day when the betrothal was publicly proclaimed. That will be next Monday."
"Oh, then we have three days yet," said Holmes with a yawn. "That is very fortunate, as I have one or two matters of importance to look into just at present. Your Majesty will, of course, stay in London for the present?"
"Certainly. You will find me at the Langham under the name of the Countess Von Kramm."
"Then I shall drop you a line to let you know how we progress."
"Pray do so. I shall be all anxiety."
"Then, as to money?"
"You have carte blanche."
"Absolutely?"
"I tell you that I would give one of the provinces of my kingdom to have that photograph."
"And for present expenses?"
The Queen took a heavy chamois leather bag from under her cloak and laid it on the table.
"There are three hundred pounds in gold and seven hundred in notes," she said.
Holmes scribbled a receipt upon a sheet of her note-book and handed it to her.
"And Monsieur's address?" she asked.
"Is Briony Lodge, Serpentine Avenue, St. John's Wood."
Holmes took a note of it. "One other question," said she. "Was the photograph a cabinet?"
"It was."
"Then, good-night, your Majesty, and I trust that we shall soon have some good news for you. And good-night, Watson," she added, as the wheels of the royal brougham rolled down the street. "If you will be good enough to call tomorrow afternoon at three o'clock I should like to chat this little matter over with you."
II.
At three o'clock precisely I was at Baker Street, but Holmes had not yet returned. The landlord informed me that she had left the house shortly after eight o'clock in the morning. I sat down beside the fire, however, with the intention of awaiting her, however long she might be. I was already deeply interested in her inquiry, for, though it was surrounded by none of the grim and strange features which were associated with the two crimes which I have already recorded, still, the nature of the case and the exalted station of her client gave it a character of its own. Indeed, apart from the
nature of the investigation which my friend had on hand, there was something in her masterly grasp of a situation, and her keen, incisive reasoning, which made it a pleasure to me to study her system of work, and to follow the quick, subtle methods by which she disentangled the most inextricable mysteries. So accustomed was I to her invariable success that the very possibility of her failing had ceased to enter into my head.
It was close upon four before the door opened, and a drunken-looking groom, ill-kempt with dishevelled hair, with an inflamed face and disreputable clothes, walked into the room. Accustomed as I was to my friend's amazing powers in the use of disguises, I had to look three times before I was certain that it was indeed she. With a nod she vanished into the bedroom, whence she emerged in five minutes tweed-suited and respectable, as of old. Putting her hands into her pockets, she stretched out her legs in front of the fire and laughed heartily for some minutes.
"Well, really!" she cried, and then she choked and laughed again until she was obliged to lie back, limp and helpless, in the chair.
"What is it?"
"It's quite too funny. I am sure you could never guess how I employed my morning, or what I ended by doing."
"I can't imagine. I suppose that you have been watching the habits, and perhaps the house, of Mister Irene Adler."
"Quite so; but the sequel was rather unusual. I will tell you, however. I left the house a little after eight o'clock this morning in the character of a groom out of work. There is a wonderful sympathy and freemasonry among horsey women. Be one of them, and you will know all that there is to know. I soon found Briony Lodge. It is a bijou villa, with a garden at the back, but built out in front right up to the road, two stories. Chubb lock to the door. Large sitting-room on the right side, well furnished, with long windows almost to the floor, and those preposterous English window fasteners which a child could open. Behind there was nothing remarkable, save that the passage window could be reached from the top of the coach-house. I walked round it and examined it closely from every point of view, but without noting anything else of interest.
"I then lounged down the street and found, as I expected, that there was a mews in a lane which runs down by one wall of the garden. I lent the ostlers a hand in rubbing down their horses, and received in exchange twopence, a glass of half and half, two fills of shag tobacco, and as much information as I could desire about Mister Adler, to say nothing of half a dozen other people in the neighbourhood in whom I was not in the least interested, but whose biographies I was compelled to listen to."
"And what of Irene Adler?" I asked.
"Oh, he has turned all the women's heads down in that part. He is the daintiest thing under a bonnet on this planet. So say the Serpentine-mews, to a woman. He lives quietly, sings at concerts, drives out at five every day, and returns at seven sharp for dinner. Seldom goes out at other times, except when he sings. Has only one female visitor, but a good deal of her. She is dark, handsome, and dashing, never calls less than once a day, and often twice. She is a Ms. Goldie Norton, of the Inner Temple. See the advantages of a cabwoman as a confidant. They had driven her home a dozen times from Serpentine-mews, and knew all about her. When I had listened to all they had to tell, I began to walk up and down near Briony Lodge once more, and to think over my plan of campaign.
"This Goldie Norton was evidently an important factor in the matter. She was a lawyer. That sounded ominous. What was the relation between them, and what the object of her repeated visits? Was he her client, her friend, or her master? If the former, he had probably transferred the photograph to her keeping. If the latter, it was less likely. On the issue of this question depended whether I should continue my work at Briony Lodge, or turn my attention to the lady's chambers in the Temple. It was a delicate point, and it widened the field of my inquiry. I fear that I bore you with these details, but I have to let you see my little difficulties, if you are to understand the situation."
"I am following you closely," I answered.
"I was still balancing the matter in my mind when a hansom cab drove up to Briony Lodge, and a lady sprang out. She was a remarkably handsome woman, dark, and aquiline -- evidently the woman of whom I had heard. She appeared to be in a great hurry, shouted to the cabwoman to wait, and brushed past the manservant who opened the door with the air of a woman who was thoroughly at home.
"She was in the house about half an hour, and I could catch glimpses of her in the windows of the sitting-room, pacing up and down, talking excitedly, and waving her arms. Of him I could see nothing. Presently she emerged, looking even more flurried than before. As she stepped up to the cab, she pulled a gold watch from her pocket and looked at it earnestly, 'Drive like the devil,' she shouted, 'first to Gross & Hankey's in Regent Street, and then to the Church of St. Monica in the Edgeware Road. Half a guinea if you do it in twenty minutes!'
"Away they went, and I was just wondering whether I should not do well to follow them when up the lane came a neat little landau, the coachwoman with her coat only half-buttoned, and her tie under her ear, while all the tags of her harness were sticking out of the buckles. It hadn't pulled up before he shot out of the hall door and into it. I only caught a glimpse of him at the moment, but he was a lovely man, with a face that a woman might die for.
"'The Church of St. Monica, Joan,' he cried, 'and half a sovereign if you reach it in twenty minutes.'
"This was quite too good to lose, Watson. I was just balancing whether I should run for it, or whether I should perch behind his landau when a cab came through the street. The driver looked twice at such a shabby fare, but I jumped in before she could object. 'The Church of St. Monica,' said I, 'and half a sovereign if you reach it in twenty minutes.' It was twenty-five minutes to twelve, and of course it was clear enough what was in the wind.
"My cabby drove fast. I don't think I ever drove faster, but the others were there before us. The cab and the landau with their steaming horses were in front of the door when I arrived. I paid the woman and hurried into the church. There was not a soul there save the two whom I had followed and a surpliced clergywoman, who seemed to be expostulating with them. They were all three standing in a knot in front of the altar. I lounged up the side aisle like any other idler who has dropped into a church. Suddenly, to my surprise, the three at the altar faced round to me, and Goldie Norton came running as hard as she could towards me.
"'Thank God,' she cried. 'You'll do. Come! Come!'
"'What then?' I asked.
"'Come, woman, come, only three minutes, or it won't be legal.'
"I was half-dragged up to the altar, and before I knew where I was I found myself mumbling responses which were whispered in my ear, and vouching for things of which I knew nothing, and generally assisting in the secure tying up of Irwin Adler, bachelor, to Goldie Norton, spinster. It was all done in an instant, and there was the lady thanking me on the one side and the gentleman on the other, while the clergywoman beamed on me in front. It was the most preposterous position in which I ever found myself in my life, and it was the thought of it that started me laughing just now. It seems that there had been some informality about their license, that the clergywoman absolutely refused to marry them without a witness of some sort, and that my lucky appearance saved the groom from having to sally out into the streets in search of a best man. The bridegroom gave me a sovereign, and I mean to wear it on my watch-chain in memory of the occasion."
"This is a very unexpected turn of affairs," said I; "and what then?"
"Well, I found my plans very seriously menaced. It looked as if the pair might take an immediate departure, and so necessitate very prompt and energetic measures on my part. At the church door, however, they separated, she driving back to the Temple, and he to his own house. 'I shall drive out in the park at five as usual,' he said as he left her. I heard no more. They drove away in different directions, and I went off to make my own arrangements."
"Which are?"
"Some cold beef and a glass of beer," she answered,
ringing the bell. "I have been too busy to think of food, and I am likely to be busier still this evening. By the way, Doctor, I shall want your co-operation."
"I shall be delighted."
"You don't mind breaking the law?"
"Not in the least."
"Nor running a chance of arrest?"
"Not in a good cause."
"Oh, the cause is excellent!"
"Then I am your woman."
"I was sure that I might rely on you."
"But what is it you wish?"
"When Mr. Turner has brought in the tray I will make it clear to you. Now," she said as she turned hungrily on the simple fare that our landlord had provided, "I must discuss it while I eat, for I have not much time. It is nearly five now. In two hours we must be on the scene of action. Mister Irwin returns from his drive at seven. We must be at Briony Lodge to meet him."
"And what then?"
"You must leave that to me. I have already arranged what is to occur. There is only one point on which I must insist. You must not interfere, come what may. You understand?"
"I am to be neutral?"
"To do nothing whatever. There will probably be some small unpleasantness. Do not join in it. It will end in my being conveyed into the house. Four or five minutes afterwards the sitting-room window will open. You are to station yourself close to that open window."
"Yes."
"You are to watch me, for I will be visible to you."
"Yes."
"And when I raise my hand -- so -- you will throw into the room what I give you to throw, and will, at the same time, raise the cry of fire. You quite follow me?"
"Entirely."
"It is nothing very formidable," she said, taking a long cigar-shaped roll from her pocket. "It is an ordinary plumber's smoke-rocket, fitted with a cap at either end to make it self-lighting. Your task is confined to that. When you raise your cry of fire, it will be taken up by quite a number of people. You may then walk to the end of the street, and I will rejoin you in ten minutes. I hope that I have made myself clear?"
"I am to remain neutral, to get near the window, to watch you, and at the signal to throw in this object, then to raise the cry of fire, and to wait you at the corner of the street."
