by Otto Penzler
“For some years, now, I have been at work upon my greatest book—my magnum opus. It was to be my last book also embodying the results of a lifetime of study and research. Sir, I know Elizabethan London better than any man alive; better than any man who ever lived, I think——.” He burst suddenly into tears.
“There, there,” said Sherlock Holmes gently. “Do not be distressed. Pray continue with your interesting narrative. What was this book—which, I take it, in some manner has disappeared? You borrowed it from your friend?”
“That is what I am coming to,” said Mr. Harrington Edwards, drying his tears, “but as for help, Mr. Holmes, I fear that is beyond even you. As you surmise, I needed this book. Knowing its value, which could not be fixed, for the book is priceless, and knowing Sir Nathaniel’s idolatry of it, I hesitated before asking for the loan of it. But I had to have it, for without it my work could not have been completed, and at length I made my request. I suggested that I visit him and go through the volume under his eyes, he sitting at my side throughout my entire examination, and servants stationed at every door and window, with fowling pieces in their hands.
“You can imagine my astonishment when Sir Nathaniel laughed at my precautions. ‘My dear Edwards,’ he said, ‘that would be all very well were you Arthur Rambidge or Sir Homer Nantes (mentioning the two great men of the British Museum), or were you Mr. Henry Hutterson, the American railway magnate; but you are my friend Harrington Edwards, and you shall take the book home with you for as long as you like.’ I protested vigorously, I can assure you; but he would have it so, and as I was touched by this mark of his esteem, at length I permitted him to have his way. My God! If I had remained adamant! If I had only——.”
He broke off and for a moment stared blindly into space. His eyes were directed at the Persian slipper on the wall, in the toe of which Holmes kept his tobacco, but we could see that his thoughts were far away.
“Come, Mr. Edwards,” said Holmes firmly. “You are agitating yourself unduly. And you are unreasonably prolonging our curiosity. You have not yet told us what this book is.”
Mr. Harrington Edwards gripped the arm of the chair in which he sat. Then he spoke, and his voice was low and thrilling.
“The book was a Hamlet quarto, dated 1602, presented by Shakespeare to his friend Drayton, with an inscription four lines in length, written and signed by the Master, himself!”
“My dear sir!” I exclaimed. Holmes blew a long, slow whistle of astonishment.
“It is true,” cried the collector. “That is the book I borrowed, and that is the book I lost! The long-sought quarto of 1602, actually inscribed in Shakespeare’s own hand! His greatest drama, in an edition dated a year earlier than any that is known; a perfect copy, and with four lines in his own handwriting! Unique! Extraordinary! Amazing! Astounding! Colossal! Incredible! Un——.”
He seemed wound up to continue indefinitely; but Holmes, who had sat quite still at first, shocked by the importance of the loss, interrupted the flow of adjectives.
“I appreciate your emotion, Mr. Edwards,” he said, “and the book is indeed all that you say it is. Indeed, it is so important that we must at once attack the problem of rediscovering it. The book, I take it, is readily indentifiable?”
“Mr. Holmes,” said our client, earnestly, “it would be impossible to hide it. It is so important a volume that, upon coming into its possession, Sir Nathaniel Brooke-Bannerman called a consultation of the great binders of the Empire, at which were present Mr. Riviere, Messrs. Sangorski and Sutcliffe, Mr. Zaehnsdorf, and certain others. They and myself, with two others, alone know of the book’s existence. When I tell you that it is bound in brown levant morocco, with leather joints and brown levant doublures and flyleaves, the whole elaborately gold-tooled, inlaid with seven hundred and fifty separate pieces of various colored leathers, and enriched by the insertion of eighty-seven precious stones, I need not add that it is a design that never will be duplicated, and I mention only a few of its glories. The binding was personally done by Messrs. Riviere, Sangorski, Sutcliffe, and Zaehnsdorf, working alternately, and is a work of such enchantment that any man might gladly die a thousand deaths for the privilege of owning it for twenty minutes.”
“Dear me,” quoth Sherlock Holmes, “it must indeed be a handsome volume, and from your description, together with a realization of its importance by reason of its association, I gather that it is something beyond what might be termed a valuable book.”
“Priceless!” cried Mr. Harrington Edwards. “The combined wealth of India, Mexico, and Wall Street would be all too little for its purchase.”
“You are anxious to recover this book?” asked Sherlock Holmes, looking at him keenly.
“My God!” shrieked the collector, rolling up his eyes and clawing at the air with his hands. “Do you suppose——?”
“Tut, tut!” Holmes interrupted. “I was only teasing you. It is a book that might move even you, Mr. Harrington Edwards, to theft—but we may put aside that notion. Your emotion is too sincere, and besides you know too well the difficulties of hiding such a volume as you describe. Indeed, only a very daring man would purloin it and keep it long in his possession. Pray tell us how you came to lose it.”
Mr. Harrington Edwards seized the brandy flask, which stood at his elbow, and drained it at a gulp. With the renewed strength thus obtained, he continued his story:
“As I have said, Sir Nathaniel forced me to accept the loan of the book, much against my wishes. On the evening that I called for it, he told me that two of his servants, heavily armed, would accompany me across the grounds to my home. ‘There is no danger,’ he said, ‘but you will feel better’; and I heartily agreed with him. How shall I tell you what happened? Mr. Holmes, it was those very servants who assailed me and robbed me of my priceless borrowing!”
Sherlock Holmes rubbed his lean hands with satisfaction. “Splendid!” he murmured. “This is a case after my own heart. Watson, these are deep waters in which we are adventuring. But you are rather lengthy about this, Mr. Edwards. Perhaps it will help matters if I ask you a few questions. By what road did you go to your home?”
“By the main road, a good highway which lies in front of our estates. I preferred it to the shadows of the wood.”
“And there were some two hundred yards between your doors. At what point did the assault occur?”
“Almost midway between the two entrance drives, I should say.”
“There was no light?”
“That of the moon only.”
“Did you know these servants who accompanied you?”
“One I knew slightly; the other I had not seen before.”
“Describe them to me, please.”
“The man who is known to me is called Miles. He is clean-shaven, short and powerful, although somewhat elderly. He was known, I believe, as Sir Nathaniel’s most trusted servant; he had been with Sir Nathaniel for years. I cannot describe him minutely for, of course, I never paid much attention to him. The other was tall and thickset, and wore a heavy beard. He was a silent fellow; I do not believe that he spoke a word during the journey.”
“Miles was more communicative?”
“Oh yes—even garrulous, perhaps. He talked about the weather and the moon, and I forget what else.”
“Never about books?”
“There was no mention of books between any of us.”
“Just how did the attack occur?”
“It was very sudden. We had reached, as I say, about the halfway point, when the big man seized me by the throat—to prevent outcry, I suppose—and on the instant, Miles snatched the volume from my grasp and was off. In a moment his companion followed him. I had been half throttled and could not immediately cry out; but when I could articulate, I made the countryside ring with my cries. I ran after them, but failed even to catch another sight of them. They had disappeared completely.”
“Did you all leave the house together?”
“Miles and I left together;
the second man joined us at the porter’s lodge. He had been attending to some of his duties.”
“And Sir Nathaniel—where was he?”
“He said good-night on the threshold.”
“What has he had to say about all this?”
“I have not told him.”
“You have not told him?” echoed Sherlock Holmes, in astonishment.
“I have not dared,” confessed our client miserably. “It will kill him. That book was the breath of his life.”
“When did all this occur?” I put in, with a glance at Holmes.
“Excellent, Watson,” said my friend, answering my glance. “I was just about to ask the same question.”
“Just last night,” was Mr. Harrington Edwards’ reply. “I was crazy most of the night, and didn’t sleep a wink. I came to you the first thing this morning. Indeed, I tried to raise you on the telephone, last night, but could not establish a connection.”
“Yes,” said Holmes, reminiscently, “we were attending Mme. Trentini’s first night. We dined later at Albani’s.”
“Oh, Mr. Holmes, do you think you can help me?” cried the abject collector.
“I trust so,” answered my friend, cheerfully. “Indeed, I am certain I can. Such a book, as you remark, is not easily hidden. What say you, Watson, to a run down to Walton-on-Walton?”
“There is a train in half an hour,” said Mr. Harrington Edwards, looking at his watch. “Will you return with me?”
“No, no,” laughed Holmes, “that would never do. We must not be seen together just yet, Mr. Edwards. Go back yourself on the first train, by all means, unless you have further business in London. My friend and I will go together. There is another train this morning?”
“An hour later.”
“Excellent. Until we meet, then!”
2
We took the train from Paddington Station an hour later, as we had promised, and began our journey to Walton-on-Walton, a pleasant, aristocratic little village and the scene of the curious accident to our friend of Poke Stogis Manor. Sherlock Holmes, lying back in his seat, blew earnest smoke rings at the ceiling of our compartment, which fortunately was empty, while I devoted myself to the morning paper. After a bit I tired of this occupation and turned to Holmes to find him looking out of the window, wreathed in smiles, and quoting Horace softly under his breath.
“You have a theory?” I asked, in surprise.
“It is a capital mistake to theorize in advance of the evidence,” he replied. “Still, I have given some thought to the interesting problem of our friend, Mr. Harrington Edwards, and there are several indications which can point to only one conclusion.”
“And whom do you believe to be the thief?”
“My dear fellow,” said Sherlock Holmes, “you forget we already know the thief. Edwards has testified quite clearly that it was Miles who snatched the volume.”
“True,” I admitted, abashed. “I had forgotten. All we must do then, is to find Miles.”
“And a motive,” added my friend, chuckling. “What would you say, Watson, was the motive in this case?”
“Jealousy,” I replied.
“You surprise me!”
“Miles had been bribed by a rival collector, who in some manner had learned about this remarkable volume. You remember Edwards told us this second man joined them at the lodge. That would give an excellent opportunity for the substitution of a man other than the servant intended by Sir Nathaniel. Is not that good reasoning?”
“You surpass yourself, my dear Watson,” murmured Holmes. “It is excellently reasoned, and as you justly observe, the opportunity for a substitution was perfect.”
“Do you not agree with me?”
“Hardly, Watson. A rival collector, in order to accomplish this remarkable coup, first would have to have known of the volume, as you suggest, but also he must have known upon what night Mr. Harrington Edwards would go to Sir Nathaniel’s to get it, which would point to collaboration on the part of our client. As a matter of fact, however, Mr. Edwards’s decision to accept the loan was, I believe, sudden and without previous determination.”
“I do not recall his saying so.”
“He did not say so, but it is a simple deduction. A book collector is mad enough to begin with, Watson; but tempt him with some such bait as this Shakespeare quarto and he is bereft of all sanity. Mr. Edwards would not have been able to wait. It was just the night before that Sir Nathaniel promised him the book, and it was just last night that he flew to accept the offer—flying, incidentally, to disaster also. The miracle is that he was able to wait an entire day.”
“Wonderful!” I cried.
“Elementary,” said Holmes. “If you are interested, you will do well to read Harley Graham on Transcendental Emotion; while I have myself been guilty of a small brochure in which I catalogue some twelve hundred professions and the emotional effect upon their members of unusual tidings, good and bad.”
We were the only passengers to alight at Walton-on-Walton, but rapid inquiry developed that Mr. Harrington Edwards had returned on the previous train. Holmes, who had disguised himself before leaving the coach, did all the talking. He wore his cap peak backward, carried a pencil behind his ear, and had turned up the bottoms of his trousers; while from one pocket dangled the end of a linen tape measure. He was a municipal surveyor to the life, and I could not but think that, meeting him suddenly in the highway I should not myself have known him. At his suggestion, I dented the crown of my hat and turned my jacket inside out. Then he gave me an end of the tape measure, while he, carrying the other, went on ahead. In this fashion, stopping from time to time to kneel in the dust and ostensibly to measure sections of the roadway, we proceeded toward Poke Stogis Manor. The occasional villagers whom we encountered on their way to the station paid us no more attention than if we had been rabbits.
Shortly we came in sight of our friend’s dwelling, a picturesque and rambling abode, sitting far back in its own grounds and bordered by a square of sentinel oaks. A gravel pathway led from the roadway to the house entrance and, as we passed, the sunlight struck fire from an antique brass knocker on the door. The whole picture, with its background of gleaming countryside, was one of rural calm and comfort; we could with difficulty believe it the scene of the curious problem we had come to investigate.
“We shall not enter yet,” said Sherlock Holmes, passing the gate leading into our client’s acreage; “but we shall endeavor to be back in time for luncheon.”
From this point the road progressed downward in a gentle decline and the vegetation grew more thickly on either side of the road. Sherlock Holmes kept his eyes stolidly on the path before us, and when we had covered about a hundred yards he stopped. “Here,” he said, pointing, “the assault occurred.”
I looked closely at the earth, but could see no sign of struggle.
“You recall it was midway between the two houses that it happened,” he continued. “No, there are few signs; there was no violent tussle. Fortunately, however, we had our proverbial fall of rain last evening and the earth has retained impressions nicely.” He indicated the faint imprint of a foot, then another, and still another. Kneeling down, I was able to see that, indeed, many feet had passed along the road.
Holmes flung himself at full length in the dirt and wriggled swiftly about, his nose to the earth, muttering rapidly in French. Then he whipped out a glass, the better to examine something that had caught his eye; but in a moment he shook his head in disappointment and continued with his exploration. I was irresistibly reminded of a noble hound, at fault, sniffing in circles in an effort to re-establish a lost scent. In a moment, however, he had it, for with a little cry of pleasure he rose to his feet, zigzagged curiously across the road and paused before a bridge, a lean finger pointing accusingly at a break in the thicket.
“No wonder they disappeared,” he smiled as I came up. “Edwards thought they continued up the road, but here is where they broke through.” Then stepping back a little
distance, he ran forward lightly and cleared the hedge at a bound.
“Follow me carefully,” he warned, “for we must not allow our own footprints to confuse us.” I fell more heavily than my companion, but in a moment he had me up and helped me to steady myself. “See,” he cried, examining the earth; and deep in the mud and grass I saw the prints of two pairs of feet.
“The small man broke through,” said Sherlock Holmes, exultantly, “but the larger rascal leaped over the hedge. See how deeply his prints are marked; he landed heavily here in the soft ooze. It is significant, Watson, that they came this way. Does it suggest nothing to you?”
“That they were men who knew Edwards’s grounds as well as the Brooke-Bannerman estate,” I answered; and thrilled with pleasure at my friend’s nod of approbation.
He flung himself upon the ground without further conversation, and for some moments we both crawled painfully across the grass. Then a shocking thought occurred to me.
“Holmes,” I whispered in dismay, “do you see where these footprints tend? They are directed toward the home of our client, Mr. Harrington Edwards!”
He nodded his head slowly, and his lips were tight and thin. The double line of impressions ended abruptly at the back door of Poke Stogis Manor!
Sherlock Holmes rose to his feet and looked at his watch.
“We are just in time for luncheon,” he announced, and brushed off his garments. Then, deliberately, he knocked upon the door. In a few moments we were in the presence of our client.
“We have been roaming about in the neighborhood,” apologized the detective, “and took the liberty of coming to your rear door.”
“You have a clue?” asked Mr. Harrington Edwards eagerly.
