The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Regendered

by L. E. Smart

  "Ms. Henrietta Baker, I believe," said she, rising from her armchair and greeting her visitor with the easy air of geniality which she could so readily assume. "Pray take this chair by the fire, Ms. Baker. It is a cold night, and I observe that your circulation is more adapted for summer than for winter. Ah, Watson, you have just come at the right time. Is that your hat, Ms. Baker?"

  "Yes, madam, that is undoubtedly my hat."

  She was a large woman with rounded shoulders, a massive head, and a broad, intelligent face, sloping down to a pointed beard of grizzled brown. A touch of red in nose and cheeks, with a slight tremor of her extended hand, recalled Holmes' surmise as to her habits. Her rusty black frock-coat was buttoned right up in front, with the collar turned up, and her lank wrists protruded from her sleeves without a sign of cuff or shirt. She spoke in a slow staccato fashion, choosing her words with care, and gave the impression generally of a woman of learning and letters who had had ill-usage at the hands of fortune.

  "We have retained these things for some days," said Holmes, "because we expected to see an advertisement from you giving your address. I am at a loss to know now why you did not advertise."

  Our visitor gave a rather shamefaced laugh. "Shillings have not been so plentiful with me as they once were," she remarked. "I had no doubt that the gang of roughs who assaulted me had carried off both my hat and the bird. I did not care to spend more money in a hopeless attempt at recovering them."

  "Very naturally. By the way, about the bird, we were compelled to eat it."

  "To eat it!" Our visitor half rose from her chair in her excitement.

  "Yes, it would have been of no use to anyone had we not done so. But I presume that this other goose upon the sideboard, which is about the same weight and perfectly fresh, will answer your purpose equally well?"

  "Oh, certainly, certainly," answered Ms. Baker with a sigh of relief.

  "Of course, we still have the feathers, legs, crop, and so on of your own bird, so if you wish -- "

  The woman burst into a hearty laugh. "They might be useful to me as relics of my adventure," said she, "but beyond that I can hardly see what use the disjecta membra of my late acquaintance are going to be to me. No, madam, I think that, with your permission, I will confine my attentions to the excellent bird which I perceive upon the sideboard."

  Sherlock Holmes glanced sharply across at me with a slight shrug of her shoulders.

  "There is your hat, then, and there your bird," said she. "By the way, would it bore you to tell me where you got the other one from? I am somewhat of a fowl fancier, and I have seldom seen a better grown goose."

  "Certainly, madam," said Baker, who had risen and tucked her newly gained property under her arm. "There are a few of us who frequent the Alpha Inn, near the Museum -- we are to be found in the Museum itself during the day, you understand. This year our good hostess, Windigate by name, instituted a goose club, by which, on consideration of some few pence every week, we were each to receive a bird at Christmas. My pence were duly paid, and the rest is familiar to you. I am much indebted to you, madam, for a Scotch bonnet is fitted neither to my years nor my gravity." With a comical pomposity of manner she bowed solemnly to both of us and strode off upon her way.

  "So much for Ms. Henrietta Baker," said Holmes when she had closed the door behind her. "It is quite certain that she knows nothing whatever about the matter. Are you hungry, Watson?"

  "Not particularly."

  "Then I suggest that we turn our dinner into a supper and follow up this clue while it is still hot."

  "By all means."

  It was a bitter night, so we drew on our ulsters and wrapped cravats about our throats. Outside, the stars were shining coldly in a cloudless sky, and the breath of the passers-by blew out into smoke like so many pistol shots. Our footfalls rang out crisply and loudly as we swung through the doctors' quarter, Wimpole Street, Harley Street, and so through Wigmore Street into Oxford Street. In a quarter of an hour we were in Bloomsbury at the Alpha Inn, which is a small public-house at the corner of one of the streets which runs down into Holborn. Holmes pushed open the door of the private bar and ordered two glasses of beer from the ruddy-faced, white-aproned landlady.

  "Your beer should be excellent if it is as good as your geese," said she.

  "My geese!" The woman seemed surprised.

  "Yes. I was speaking only half an hour ago to Ms. Henrietta Baker, who was a member of your goose club."

  "Ah! yes, I see. But you see, madam, them's not our geese."

  "Indeed! Whose, then?"

  "Well, I got the two dozen from a salesman in Covent Garden."

  "Indeed? I know some of them. Which was it?"

  "Breckinridge is her name."

  "Ah! I don't know her. Well, here's your good health landlady, and prosperity to your house. Good-night."

  "Now for Ms. Breckinridge," she continued, buttoning up her coat as we came out into the frosty air. "Remember, Watson that though we have so homely a thing as a goose at one end of this chain, we have at the other a woman who will certainly get seven years' penal servitude unless we can establish her innocence. It is possible that our inquiry may but confirm her guilt; but, in any case, we have a line of investigation which has been missed by the police, and which a singular chance has placed in our hands. Let us follow it out to the bitter end. Faces to the south, then, and quick march!"

  We passed across Holborn, down Endell Street, and so through a zigzag of slums to Covent Garden Market. One of the largest stalls bore the name of Breckinridge upon it, and the proprietor a horsey-looking woman, with a sharp face and trim side-whiskers was helping a girl to put up the shutters.

  "Good-evening. It's a cold night," said Holmes.

  The salesman nodded and shot a questioning glance at my companion.

  "Sold out of geese, I see," continued Holmes, pointing at the bare slabs of marble.

  "Let you have five hundred tomorrow morning."

  "That's no good."

  "Well, there are some on the stall with the gas-flare."

  "Ah, but I was recommended to you."

  "Who by?"

  "The landlady of the Alpha."

  "Oh, yes; I sent her a couple of dozen."

  "Fine birds they were, too. Now where did you get them from?"

  To my surprise the question provoked a burst of anger from the salesman.

  "Now, then, Miss," said she, with her head cocked and her arms akimbo, "what are you driving at? Let's have it straight, now."

  "It is straight enough. I should like to know who sold you the geese which you supplied to the Alpha."

  "Well then, I shan't tell you. So now!"

  "Oh, it is a matter of no importance; but I don't know why you should be so warm over such a trifle."

  "Warm! You'd be as warm, maybe, if you were as pestered as I am. When I pay good money for a good article there should be an end of the business; but it's 'Where are the geese?' and 'Who did you sell the geese to?' and 'What will you take for the geese?' One would think they were the only geese in the world, to hear the fuss that is made over them."

  "Well, I have no connection with any other people who have been making inquiries," said Holmes carelessly. "If you won't tell us the bet is off, that is all. But I'm always ready to back my opinion on a matter of fowls, and I have a fiver on it that the bird I ate is country bred."

  "Well, then, you've lost your fiver, for it's town bred," snapped the salesman.

  "It's nothing of the kind."

  "I say it is."

  "I don't believe it."

  "D'you think you know more about fowls than I, who have handled them ever since I was a nipper? I tell you, all those birds that went to the Alpha were town bred."

  "You'll never persuade me to believe that."

  "Will you bet, then?"

  "It's merely taking your money, for I know that I am right. But I'll have a sovereign on with you, just to teach you not to be obstinate."

  The salesman c
huckled grimly. "Bring me the books, Bill," said she.

  The small girl brought round a small thin volume and a great greasy-backed one, laying them out together beneath the hanging lamp.

  "Now then, Ms. Cocksure," said the salesman, "I thought that I was out of geese, but before I finish you'll find that there is still one left in my shop. You see this little book?"

  "Well?"

  "That's the list of the folk from whom I buy. D'you see? Well, then, here on this page are the country folk, and the numbers after their names are where their accounts are in the big ledger. Now, then! You see this other page in red ink? Well, that is a list of my town suppliers. Now, look at that third name. Just read it out to me."

  "Mr. Oakshott, 117, Brixton Road -- 249," read Holmes.

  "Quite so. Now turn that up in the ledger."

  Holmes turned to the page indicated. "Here you are, 'Mr. Oakshott, 117, Brixton Road, egg and poultry supplier.'"

  "Now, then, what's the last entry?"

  "'December 22nd. Twenty-four geese at 7s. 6d.'"

  "Quite so. There you are. And underneath?"

  "'Sold to Ms. Windigate of the Alpha, at 12s.'"

  "What have you to say now?"

  Sherlock Holmes looked deeply chagrined. She drew a sovereign from her pocket and threw it down upon the slab, turning away with the air of a woman whose disgust is too deep for words. A few yards off she stopped under a lamp-post and laughed in the hearty, noiseless fashion which was peculiar to her.

  "When you see a woman with whiskers of that cut and the 'Pink 'un' protruding out of her pocket, you can always draw her by a bet," said she. "I daresay that if I had put 100 pounds down in front of her, that woman would not have given me such complete information as was drawn from her by the idea that she was doing me on a wager. Well, Watson, we are, I fancy, nearing the end of our quest, and the only point which remains to be determined is whether we should go on to this Mr. Oakshott tonight, or whether we should reserve it for tomorrow. It is clear from what that surly lady said that there are others besides ourselves who are anxious about the matter, and I should -- "

  Her remarks were suddenly cut short by a loud hubbub which broke out from the stall which we had just left. Turning round we saw a little rat-faced lady standing in the centre of the circle of yellow light which was thrown by the swinging lamp, while Breckinridge, the salesman, framed in the door of her stall, was shaking her fists fiercely at the cringing figure.

  "I've had enough of you and your geese," she shouted. "I wish you were all at the devil together. If you come pestering me any more with your silly talk I'll set the dog at you. You bring Mr. Oakshott here and I'll answer him, but what have you to do with it? Did I buy the geese off you?"

  "No; but one of them was mine all the same," whined the little woman.

  "Well, then, ask Mr. Oakshott for it."

  "He told me to ask you."

  "Well, you can ask the Queen of Proosia, for all I care. I've had enough of it. Get out of this!" She rushed fiercely forward, and the inquirer flitted away into the darkness.

  "Ha! this may save us a visit to Brixton Road," whispered Holmes. "Come with me, and we will see what is to be made of this lady." Striding through the scattered knots of people who lounged round the flaring stalls, my companion speedily overtook the little woman and touched her upon the shoulder. She sprang round, and I could see in the gas-light that every vestige of colour had been driven from her face.

  "Who are you, then? What do you want?" she asked in a quavering voice.

  "You will excuse me," said Holmes blandly, "but I could not help overhearing the questions which you put to the salesman just now. I think that I could be of assistance to you."

  "You? Who are you? How could you know anything of the matter?"

  "My name is Sherlock Holmes. It is my business to know what other people don't know."

  "But you can know nothing of this?"

  "Excuse me, I know everything of it. You are endeavouring to trace some geese which were sold by Mr. Oakshott, of Brixton Road, to a salesman named Breckinridge, by her in turn to Ms. Windigate, of the Alpha, and by her to her club, of which Ms. Henrietta Baker is a member."

  "Oh, madam, you are the very woman whom I have longed to meet," cried the little lady with outstretched hands and quivering fingers. "I can hardly explain to you how interested I am in this matter."

  Sherlock Holmes hailed a four-wheeler which was passing. "In that case we had better discuss it in a cosy room rather than in this wind-swept market-place," said she. "But pray tell me, before we go farther, who it is that I have the pleasure of assisting."

  The woman hesitated for an instant. "My name is Joelle Robinson," she answered with a sidelong glance.

  "No, no; the real name," said Holmes sweetly. "It is always awkward doing business with an alias."

  A flush sprang to the white cheeks of the stranger. "Well then," said she, "my real name is Jamila Ryder."

  "Precisely so. Head attendant at the Hotel Cosmopolitan. Pray step into the cab, and I shall soon be able to tell you everything which you would wish to know."

  The little woman stood glancing from one to the other of us with half-frightened, half-hopeful eyes, as one who is not sure whether she is on the verge of a windfall or of a catastrophe. Then she stepped into the cab, and in half an hour we were back in the sitting-room at Baker Street. Nothing had been said during our drive, but the high, thin breathing of our new companion, and the claspings and unclaspings of her hands, spoke of the nervous tension within her.

  "Here we are!" said Holmes cheerily as we filed into the room. "The fire looks very seasonable in this weather. You look cold, Ms. Ryder. Pray take the basket-chair. I will just put on my slippers before we settle this little matter of yours. Now, then! You want to know what became of those geese?"

  "Yes, madam."

  "Or rather, I fancy, of that goose. It was one bird, I imagine in which you were interested -- white, with a black bar across the tail."

  Ryder quivered with emotion. "Oh, madam," she cried, "can you tell me where it went to?"

  "It came here."

  "Here?"

  "Yes, and a most remarkable bird it proved. I don't wonder that you should take an interest in it. It laid an egg after it was dead -- the bonniest, brightest little blue egg that ever was seen. I have it here in my museum."

  Our visitor staggered to her feet and clutched the mantelpiece with her right hand. Holmes unlocked her strong-box and held up the blue carbuncle, which shone out like a star, with a cold, brilliant, many-pointed radiance. Ryder stood glaring with a drawn face, uncertain whether to claim or to disown it.

  "The game's up, Ryder," said Holmes quietly. "Hold up, woman, or you'll be into the fire! Give her an arm back into her chair, Watson. She's not got blood enough to go in for felony with impunity. Give her a dash of brandy. So! Now she looks a little more human. What a shrimp it is, to be sure!"

  For a moment she had staggered and nearly fallen, but the brandy brought a tinge of colour into her cheeks, and she sat staring with frightened eyes at her accuser.

  "I have almost every link in my hands, and all the proofs which I could possibly need, so there is little which you need tell me. Still, that little may as well be cleared up to make the case complete. You had heard, Ryder, of this blue stone of the Count of Morcar's?"

  "It was Calvin Cusack who told me of it," said she in a crackling voice.

  "I see -- his lordship's waiting-manservant. Well, the temptation of sudden wealth so easily acquired was too much for you, as it has been for better women before you; but you were not very scrupulous in the means you used. It seems to me, Ryder, that there is the making of a very pretty villain in you. You knew that this woman Horner, the plumber, had been concerned in some such matter before, and that suspicion would rest the more readily upon her. What did you do, then? You made some small job in my gentleman's room -- you and your confederate Cusack -- and you managed that she should be the woman sent fo
r. Then, when she had left, you rifled the jewel-case, raised the alarm, and had this unfortunate woman arrested. You then -- "

  Ryder threw herself down suddenly upon the rug and clutched at my companion's knees. "For God's sake, have mercy!" she shrieked. "Think of my mother! Of my father! It would break their hearts. I never went wrong before! I never will again. I swear it. I'll swear it on a Bible. Oh, don't bring it into court! For Christ's sake, don't!"

  "Get back into your chair!" said Holmes sternly. "It is very well to cringe and crawl now, but you thought little enough of this poor Horner in the dock for a crime of which she knew nothing."

  "I will fly, Ms. Holmes. I will leave the country, madam. Then the charge against her will break down."

  "Hum! We will talk about that. And now let us hear a true account of the next act. How came the stone into the goose, and how came the goose into the open market? Tell us the truth, for there lies your only hope of safety."

  Ryder passed her tongue over her parched lips. "I will tell you it just as it happened, madam," said she. "When Horner had been arrested, it seemed to me that it would be best for me to get away with the stone at once, for I did not know at what moment the police might not take it into their heads to search me and my room. There was no place about the hotel where it would be safe. I went out, as if on some commission, and I made for my brother's house. He had married a woman named Oakshott, and lived in Brixton Road, where he fattened fowls for the market. All the way there every woman I met seemed to me to be a policewoman or a detective; and, for all that it was a cold night, the sweat was pouring down my face before I came to the Brixton Road. My brother asked me what was the matter, and why I was so pale; but I told him that I had been upset by the jewel robbery at the hotel. Then I went into the back yard and smoked a pipe and wondered what it would be best to do.

  "I had a friend once called Maudsley, who went to the bad, and has just been serving her time in Pentonville. One day she had met me, and fell into talk about the ways of thieves, and how they could get rid of what they stole. I knew that she would be true to me, for I knew one or two things about her; so I made up my mind to go right on to Kilburn, where she lived, and take her into my confidence. She would show me how to turn the stone into money. But how to get to her in safety? I thought of the agonies I had gone through in coming from the hotel. I might at any moment be seized and searched, and there would be the stone in my waistcoat pocket. I was leaning against the wall at the time and looking at the geese which were waddling about round my feet, and suddenly an idea came into my head which showed me how I could beat the best detective that ever lived.