Some nights, I go to the window and look out over the moor. The wisps are practically epidemic. They come particularly on foggy nights, seeming to exult in obfuscation. They never show themselves plainly, fading and flickering with a frustrating lack of constancy. Sir Henry leaves a hunting rifle by the window in case the hound or the Notting Hill Murderer is espied. If I claimed never to have snatched up that rifle and blazed away at some wisp that had suddenly come to look like a pair of luminous canine eyes or a torch in the hand of a creeping man, I would be guilty of a falsehood.
I wish you would come to Dartmoor, Holmes. Or at least write and give me some direction. No plot has manifested against Sir Henry. Still, an overwhelming sense of evil pervades this place. When I think of your warning to me that Sir Henry is almost certainly doomed, I am overcome by a feeling of helplessness. Why can I not find the root of it, Holmes? Why can I not spy it out?
* * *
Yours in frustration and abject failure,
John H. Watson
7
ON THURSDAY MORNING, JOHN BARRYMORE DEVELOPED a limp. He tried to hide it—tried to continue his duties as if nothing were amiss—but he was pale and weak. By Friday evening, he had a fever. As Sir Henry prepared for sleep, he was surprised to find that it was Eliza Barrymore who arrived with his traditional nightcap. She said her husband was indisposed. Sir Henry well believed it.
Well enough, in fact, to step two doors over and enlist my aid. Despite Eliza Barrymore’s repeated protests, Sir Henry and I went to the Barrymores’ quarters and knocked. John Barrymore was surprised to see us and more than a little afraid. He tried to shoo us away, claiming, “Oh, it is nothing, sirs. Just a small injury. I shall be better presently, I know it.”
“Nonsense, Barrymore,” I said. “You’ve got an underemployed doctor, right here in the house. I’m surprised you didn’t have the sense to come to me right away.”
Barrymore had clumsily wrapped his leg with strips torn from an old nightshirt. Scarcely had I uncovered the wound before its exact nature occurred to me.
“Barrymore… this is a graze from a bullet. You’ve been shot!”
“What? No, sir. No. It is a scratch. Down near the stables, there is an old nail, protruding from the fence. I caught myself on it; that is all.”
I could not help but wonder what an indoor worker such as a butler might be doing, charging up and down along the stable fence with enough vigor for a simple nail to cause a wound like this. I almost confronted him, but held my tongue. What would be the point? I knew he would lie to me. Yet, an army doctor knows a bullet wound when he sees one. I cleaned, stitched and bound it, gave him a belt of Sir Henry’s brandy and sent him to bed.
Over breakfast the next morning, I told Sir Henry exactly what I thought of Barrymore’s wound and his corresponding level of truthfulness.
“That’s not all, Watson,” Sir Henry said. “Did you know he was sneaking around outside our rooms last night?”
“He was what?”
“Yeah. I’ve suspected it for some time. I can hear someone in the corridor outside my room some nights. I’ve peeked out to see who it is a few times, but never caught the man. But now Barrymore’s got that limp, hasn’t he? Heh. The way that fellow was bumpin’ around out there, last night… had to be Barrymore.”
“Sir Henry, you… you ninnymuffin! I am here to protect you, Sir Henry. This is exactly the sort of thing you are to bring to my attention, don’t you see?”
“Well, yeah, I guess,” he mumbled. “But I wasn’t certain of anything until last night. Could have just been my mind playin’ tricks, you know?”
“Or it could have been your murderer.”
“Okay, but it wasn’t. I don’t know what he’s doing out there, but I don’t think he’s trying to kill me.”
“Oh, after tonight we’ll know,” I told him. “Have a nap today, Sir Henry, and be ready for a late night. You and I are going butler hunting, I think.”
That night was… just… fun.
Sir Henry let himself be put to bed by Barrymore as usual, then dismissed him for the night. I heard Barrymore scuffle by in the hallway and smiled. Not two minutes later, the grinning Sir Henry burst into my room.
“Hush!” I told him, in a harsh whisper. “You were supposed to wait half an hour! What if Barrymore had seen you?”
“Calm down,” said Sir Henry. “You worry too much. It’s done. He’s downstairs and I’m here, safe and sound.”
“And what of our decoy?”
“I stuck all the pillows under my covers and pulled the blankets up. I put the candle on the far bedpost, so if anybody peeps in at the keyhole or cracks open the door, it’ll look like I’m sleepin’, with my back to ’em. It’s pretty clever. Go and see.”
“I will not!” I scolded him. “We must stay here and keep as quiet as we can, lest we alert Barrymore to our plan.”
“Come on! He’s nearly deaf,” Sir Henry laughed.
“Nevertheless, it is unwise to invite more risk than is necessary. You must trust me, Sir Henry, this is the sort of business I get wrapped up in all the time.”
“Well, it’s a hell of a thrill,” Sir Henry said.
“Of course, but it is also… well… yes it is. It’s a great job.”
Though I continually urged caution, Sir Henry paid my words no mind and, I must admit, neither did I. Shortly before midnight, we crept into the hallway and mounted a covert raid on Sir Henry’s vacant room. We returned laden with brandy, cigars, and pride in our successful mission. Now we were properly outfitted for the evening’s work and we began it in earnest. My room filled with smoke, laughter, the clink of glasses and the most shocking tales Sir Henry and I could relate to one another.
If Barrymore had not tripped on the second-floor steps, landed with a loud thump and cursed his injury, we would have been discovered. Even so, it was well for us that this mistake came during one of the lulls in our laughter, or we should not have heard it. I have been present at struggles where two impossibly powerful forces collide to determine which is stronger, but that night the contest was to see which party was slightly less inept.
Sir Henry and I fell silent and listened for Barrymore’s step. As soon as I was sure our target had turned the corner at the end of the corridor, I ushered Sir Henry out and we began our pursuit.
Barrymore’s capacity for stealth did, indeed, seem to have been hampered by his leg injury. We had no trouble tracking him as he passed Sir Henry’s room, turned the corner and made up the stairway to the next floor. He went all the way down the upstairs corridor until, at last, he selected one of the many doors and slipped inside. His mistake was to leave it slightly ajar. Sir Henry and I had no great challenge creeping up behind him and pushing it open a few inches more, so we might spy him. He’d stopped in front of one of the windows and lit a candle. He squinted out through the glass for a moment, then waved the candle slowly back and forth in front of it.
“What’s he doing?” Sir Henry whispered.
“I have no idea.”
“How do we find out?”
I shrugged—the wrong thing to do, I now realize—for when Sir Henry found himself in the absence of a plan, he was the sort of gentleman who always opted for the direct route. He put his foot to the door and kicked it open with sudden violence, shouting, “Barrymore! What are you doing?”
Barrymore cried out in surprise. “What? Sir Henry? Nothing! I’m not doing anything, sir.”
Sir Henry leveled his finger at his terrified butler’s chest and growled, “Someone killed my uncle! Now they’re prob’ly after me! And we find you sneaking around, plottin’ against me?”
“Not against you, sir. Never against you.”
“What then? What are you at? You better spill the beans, Barrymore!”
“I… well… beans?” Barrymore stammered.
“He means he’d like you to tell us your secret now, please,” I said.
Barrymore’s tremble increased. “But, it isn’t my
secret to tell.” His hands were shaking so badly, the candle flame was a lengthwise smear of light.
“I don’t care!” Sir Henry roared. “You tell me what’s goin’ on or you and your wife can just get out! Tonight!”
“But, sir, the baby—”
“Is gonna have a pretty cold night, unless his father smarts up!”
Barrymore hesitated for a moment, clearly in agony, considering his position. Finally he shook his head and said, “I cannot, sir. I am sorry. But you must believe me: we never did anything to bring you harm, nor your uncle neither, God rest him.”
It looked as if Barrymore were about to have a rather ungentle answer to that, but Sir Henry was interrupted by a terrible shriek from the corridor outside and the sound of rushing feet. I whirled back towards the door, cursing that I’d left my service revolver back in my room, sure that Sir Henry’s hidden murderer was about to burst in upon us.
It was Eliza Barrymore, reprising the midnight weeping performance that had so surprised Sir Henry and me that first night. She charged past us and threw her arms around her husband, crying, “No! ’Tisn’t John’s fault, Sir Henry! ’Tis mine! You mustn’t blame John, please!”
“What isn’t his fault? What have you done? What is going on here?” Sir Henry demanded, but any response the Barrymores might have given would have to wait. Just behind them, through the darkened window, I saw a light—a tiny flickering flame. I might have thought it were a wisp, but it was too clear, too cohesive. It was a candle. Someone outside Baskerville Hall was answering Barrymore’s signal, slowly waving a candle back and forth.
“Sir Henry! Look!” I said, pointing into the darkness.
My host gazed, steely-eyed, out the window and grunted, “I see him,” then turned to Barrymore and said, “Who is that you’ve got out there and what are you plotting?”
“It isn’t a plot, sir,” Barrymore wailed. “We’re just… just helping him.”
Eliza gave his hand a warning squeeze and shook her head almost imperceptibly to indicate that he should say no more. But he didn’t have to. My eyes fell to Eliza. She’d said it was her fault. Her secret. By the combination of good deduction and great fortune, I happened upon the solution.
“Barrymore is not your original name…” I said. “What was your maiden name?”
She shook her head and refused to answer.
“Come now, it is a matter of public record. It won’t take me long to find out. Why, I’ll bet I could ask Perkins and he’d tell me. But I might save myself the trouble. It’s Selden, isn’t it?”
She hid her eyes and I knew I’d guessed it right.
“Selden?” wondered Sir Henry. “I’ve heard that name before…”
“The Notting Hill Murderer,” I told him. “Let us recall that he’s been loose upon the moor for some weeks now. Yet none of the local houses have been burgled for food, clothing or tools. The roads and the railway station are constantly watched; it is not thought he could have escaped the moor. It therefore stands to reason, either he has died or someone has been supplying him.”
Barrymore’s face went white as a sheet. “Why would you… why would you think a thing like that, Dr. Watson?”
“Why? Your leg! I will confess, in moments of weakness, I have been known to let off with that old rifle at lights that I momentarily believed to be not wisps, but torches. It seems that—at least once—I was correct. I hit you, didn’t I?”
Anger lit Barrymore’s face, but, like the quintessential English butler he was, he mastered it in an instant and said, “I have often heard you denigrate your own skill as a marksman, Dr. Watson. I really feel you ought to extend yourself more credit in the matter.”
“No, Barrymore. You don’t have to compliment me. It’s all right to be upset. I have, after all, shot you.”
“You are too kind, Dr. Watson.”
Sir Henry shook his head and said, “But why did you guys help out the Notting Hill Murderer? He’s a damn monster!”
“So he is, but he’s not only that. I suspect he is Eliza’s brother.”
Eliza Barrymore turned tearful but defiant eyes up at me and shouted, “Oh yes! To you, he’s a monster! To you, he’s nothing more than the things he’s done! But to me? Why, he’s still just Little Freddy—that tousle-headed boy what used to fill Mummy’s bed up with all them knives! I couldn’t turn my back on my own brother, no matter what he done!”
“Little Freddy?” I gasped. “If I recall from the papers, your Little Freddy murdered four families in their sleep, then killed three constables with the same butter knife before they brought him down.”
“That he did, sir, and no denying,” Eliza admitted.
“And they didn’t hang him?” wondered Sir Henry.
“Because he said they ought to do Queen Victoria first as he had only killed about forty folk, whereas she’d got half of China hooked on opium. He said she was the only living human to cause more misery and death than he had. He said he’d turn her in if only they’d be lenient with him. Said he knew where to find her,” Eliza sobbed. “That’s how we knew him to be mad!”
I leapt to the defense of my realm. “But everyone knows the Chinese love that opium! It’s the greatest kindness Britain ever did for them!”
“Aye,” John Barrymore agreed. “But there was no doctor who could convince young Freddy of that and, in the end, they declared him insane. Said he wasn’t mentally fit to hang for all those murders.”
“So he knocked off forty people and they just sent him t’ jail for it?” asked Sir Henry.
“Oh no,” said Eliza. “Can’t blame a crazy murderer for killing folks, can you? No, not any more than you can blame a bird for flyin’. He went in for treason, for that… for that… horrible stuff he said about our queen!”
Eliza once more renewed her sobs. Her husband put his arm around her shoulders and comfortingly said, “God save the Queen.”
“God save the Queen,” we all agreed and shared a quiet moment.
The Barrymores’ actions were monstrous, of course, but to watch Eliza weep at her brother’s fate would melt the stoniest heart. Sir Henry and I stood and traded glances with each other, silently wondering what must come next. Finally I spoke. “We cannot leave a man such as that free. Imagine the mischief he might do. I’m going out after him.”
“No!” cried Eliza. “Please, have mercy, Dr. Watson! I know what he did was wrong, but… I still… every time I think of him, I still see that golden little boy, playin’ with his cat’s paw collection. Before he… before he said all them terrible things.”
“Yet, he did say them,” I reminded her, sternly, “and if I should stay my hand this night, why then, I will be partly to blame for all the things he might say in the future. No. For the realm, I must go.”
“I’m goin’ too!” Sir Henry decided.
“No,” I told him. “It cannot be. You are the last Baskerville. It may be death to you to go upon the moor in the hours of darkness—even without you confronting a murderer.”
“I know you don’t think of me as an Englishman, Watson, and I guess there’s still a bit too much of the logging camp in me. But I am one of you. I owe Her Majesty my title, so… she’s my queen, too.”
What could I say, against that? What could any true Englishman say against that?
We made ourselves ready as quickly as we could, pulling on our boots and coats. I thrust my Webley in my coat pocket and we set out. The moon shone down with particular luminosity that night and I prayed it would not betray us. At least we had two advantages over Selden: we had seen his position and he didn’t know we were coming. Inwardly, I cursed myself that I had allowed Sir Henry’s excellent brandy to dull my senses; I needed to stay sharp.
As we neared the rocky outcropping where I had seen the light, I glanced at Sir Henry. He walked close beside me, clutching his silver hound’s-head walking stick. Finally, it occurred to me to ask, “Sir Henry, are you armed?”
“Sure am,” he whispered and bran
dished the stick at me.
I almost shouted at him. Then again, the urge to consider a walking stick to be a deadly melee weapon is one of the strangest fixations of the English people. In our collective conscious, one rich white gentleman armed with such an ambulatory aid is sufficient to defeat an army of Zulu warriors. I cannot say what has caused this shared delusion. Yet, if I was eager for Sir Henry to embrace our national identity, did I not owe him a certain admiration for embracing our national cognitive deficiencies, as well? When one reflects that he would have worn dungarees and taken an axe only a few short days before, I suppose his progress was amazing.
I pulled him low to the ground and hissed, “A walking stick? You came out to face a murderer and perhaps a hell-hound, carrying only that? Why didn’t you take one of the shotguns from the hall?”
“Nah,” he said. “Too bulky.”
“Funny you should say that because, if we do come to blows with the Notting Hill Murderer, you may find yourself wishing you had something ‘bulky’ to hit him with!”
“This is all I need,” Sir Henry said. “If he gets near us, I’ll make him wish he’d never been born!”
Sir Henry raised the stick up above his head for a fearsome brandish. Exposed in the moonlight, the little silver hound’s head let loose the reflective brilliance only polished silver can provide. In response to this signal, the air was broken by the two voices I had most hoped not to hear.
First came the terrible howling I had heard on my walk with Stapleton—hollow and haunting—but closer now.
Just after, we heard a rough voice not ten feet behind us complain, “Hey! You idiots woke the hound!”
I sighed, dropped my head and uttered, “Frederick Selden, I presume?”
“Freddy!” he insisted, then pounced on Sir Henry, delivering a two-footed mule kick to the center of the chest that sent my friend sprawling.
Our attacker was shabby and haggard, almost feral. I went for my revolver and had him nearly in my sights, when I heard a strange noise—a metallic high-pitched fiiiiing. For a moment I could not guess what might make such a sound.
The Hell-Hound of the Baskervilles Page 18
