Sherlock Academy

by F. C. Shaw

  “I suppose you’d like to know the rest of the mystery, am I right?”

  Rollie nodded. “I have some of the mystery solved, but I don’t know who Mr. Crenshaw and Enches really are and what they were after in the Rearranging Library.”

  “How did you know Enches was the library thief?”

  Rollie told him about his plan to swipe Mr. Crenshaw’s letter because he believed it was evidence that Enches was the culprit. He related his confrontation with the professor, which had led to Enches’ confession and arrest.

  “Why are our Holmes books hidden in the secret library?” asked Rollie.

  “A profile of each student is kept in his or her personal volume. That profile includes personal information like home address and IQ scores. More importantly, we hold profiles on past students who are currently serving their country as policemen, detectives, and spies. That’s the reason we hide the books in the secret shelves. We use the Rearranging Library as a decoy. Remember, appearances can be deceiving.” He beamed, and added, “Honestly, it’s great fun watching students pull their hair out over the Rearranging Library!”

  Rollie chuckled. “It’s a good decoy. So Enches wanted my profile hidden in my Holmes book.” He didn’t want to mention his telegram. “What was he going to do with it?”

  “He was going to give it to the man he was working for.”

  “Mr. Crenshaw,” said Rollie. “Who’s not a Yard agent after all, right? Who’s he really?”

  “That answer was in the letter you delivered from Mr. Crenshaw to Enches. My sister—er, Ms. Yardsly worked hard to decode it. It turns out that your neighbor Mr. Crenshaw has been disguising himself as an elderly gentleman. But he is actually Herr Zilch.”

  Rollie gasped. “The Herr Zilch? The Herr Zilch constantly in the papers?”

  “THE SAME! The same Herr Zilch who has been untraceable for years. Apparently he took on the name Mr. Crenshaw, and was living in disguise next door to you.”

  “I can’t believe it!” Rollie nearly laughed. “Wait till Auntie Ei hears about this.”

  Yardsly smiled. “INDEED! Herr Zilch is the leader of a secret organization known as M.U.S., which stands for Moriarty’s Underground Society. Professor Moriarty founded this secret society long ago. I assume you’re familiar with him.”

  “Of course, sir! He was Holmes’ greatest enemy. He was called the Napoleon of crime. Holmes actually respected him because he was so brilliant.”

  “EXACTLY! He was Holmes’ ultimate nemesis. M.U.S. continues as a crime league under Zilch’s leadership.”

  “And Enches is a member of M.U.S,” said Rollie.

  Headmaster Yardsly nodded. “It turns out that Ichabod was Herr Zilch’s spy planted here at the Academy. We monitor all mail, telegrams, and telephone calls here—we’re always on guard against Herr Zilch. So they communicated through letters delivered by a private courier. ”

  Rollie felt horrified. “Me! I was helping them all along!”

  “Calm yourself, lad. You had no idea. They were using you, yes, but that turned out to be their undoing,” said Headmaster Yardsly.

  Rollie got excited by a sudden thought. “You know where Zilch is now! Next door to me. You can arrest him!”

  The headmaster rubbed his temples wearily. “Yet again he evades us. By the time Scotland Yard got to his house this afternoon, Herr Zilch was gone. Scotland Yard is searching his house for fingerprints and clues, and will put it under acute surveillance in case Zilch returns.”

  “He won’t return though,” Rollie said.

  “Most likely not,” muttered Yardsly. “For now, what matters is that the secret library is safe, and you are the school hero.”

  “Hero?”

  Headmaster Yardsly reached down beside his chair and brought up a box that he dropped on Rollie’s lap. “For you, in appreciation for your services and to remind you that you’re a fine detective.”

  Rollie pried the lid off and grinned. He took out a plaid felt hat with earflaps tied on the top. It was a deerstalker hat like the one that Sherlock Holmes always wore in the illustrations of him. He put it on.

  “Usually we award these deerstalker hats to upperclassmen who solve fieldwork cases, but you’ve earned it,” Headmaster Yardsly commented with a wink.

  “Thank you, sir, thank you very much.”

  “One thing, Rollie, and I am sorry to require this of you. Our conversation here today must be kept a secret.”

  “May I tell my friend Cecily? She helped me get the letter, and she knows everything up to this point. She’s my Watson, after all.”

  Headmaster Yardsly considered. “VERY WELL. Only your Watson, no one else.”

  “I have a question, sir.” Rollie adjusted the hat on his head. “What did Mr. Crenshaw’s letter say?”

  “I’d like to tell you, Rollie, but I must meet with my staff first. There are a few things we need to discuss before I share that with you.”

  “Yes, sir.” Smiling, Rollie jumped to his feet and bounded to the door. He paused and turned. “Did you find my book and my marmalade jar yet?”

  “No need to worry. We recovered them from his desk. Your book is safe and sound in the secret library again. I’ve also taken the liberty of locking up your marmalade jar with mine. Better safe than sorry.”

  Rollie heaved a sigh of relief. “Good. I was worried about my book.”

  Headmaster Yardsly pursed his thin lips. “I suppose you know there was another reason Enches stole your book, right?”

  Rollie eyed his headmaster. “Yeah—I kept something valuable in my book. I don’t know how Enches knew about it or why Herr Zilch would want it.”

  Yardsly studied his student closely. Hesitantly he asked, “What did you keep in there?”

  At first Rollie wasn’t going to tell him, but he remembered how Auntie Ei had vouched for Yardsly and trusted him completely. Rollie relented. “I have an original telegram from Holmes to Watson that Auntie Ei bought for me at an antiques auction. I use it as my bookmark. It’s worth some money.”

  Yardsly’s face relaxed and he chuckled. “So that’s the secret in your book, eh? A good thing we recovered it.”

  “But how did Enches and Zilch know about it? And why would they care about it?”

  Yardsly hesitated before saying, “I’m not entirely sure, but apparently you’re someone worth keeping an eye on.”

  Ring-ring!

  Yardsly answered his telephone. Rollie was about to leave the office when Yardsly stopped him.

  “It’s your father. Your aunt Eileen is very sick,” Yardsly told him, covering the mouth piece as he spoke. “Some sort of stomach problem.”

  “She hasn’t been feeling well. She needs to stop eating those chocolates Mr. Crenshaw sent . . .” Rollie trailed off.

  Yardsly listened on the telephone, then covered the mouth piece again and said to Rollie, “Your father says to head home. They may need to take her to the hospital.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Rollie left the office, and ran into Cecily near the front door. He quickly told her about Auntie Ei, and as he did, a thought struck his brain, which morphed into a pit that weighted his stomach.

  “It’s probably just a stomach bug,” Cecily assured him.

  “No.” Rollie shook his head. “She’s been poisoned.”

  “Poisoned?” Cecily gaped at him.

  “Zilch has been poisoning her!” exclaimed Rollie. With that, he ran outside and jumped into the first hansom he saw.

  Elementary

  “Can you go any faster?” Rollie yelled up at the driver.

  The driver flicked his reins, and the horse pulling the hansom picked up his pace.

  Rollie’s stomach had never fluttered so badly, and he kept taking deep breaths to try to calm himself. It wasn’t working. The drive home seemed to take an eternity, but eventually
the hansom pulled up in front of the Wilson manor.

  Rollie forgot to thank the driver as he bolted out of the hansom and dashed up the front walkway to his house. He met his father on the stairs.

  “Dad! How is Auntie Ei?” Rollie panted as he ran past his father up to the second floor.

  “Fact: she’s not doing too well. She’s eighty-something years old, and we may need to face the fact that her time to go may—”

  “No, Dad! She’s been poisoned! She needs to go to the hospital!” Rollie hurried into Auntie Ei’s bedroom without knocking.

  He found his great-aunt lying in bed. By the dim light of her bedside lamp, she looked very pale. He padded over to her and rested a hand on her cold wrinkled one.

  Her eyelids fluttered open. “Rollin, what are you doing here?” she croaked.

  Rollie quickly told her about Mr. Crenshaw being Herr Zilch, and how he was sure Zilch had poisoned those chocolates. He expected her to argue with him, or even scoff at his theory.

  Instead she gripped his hand and said, “Listen to me very carefully and do exactly as I say.” She took a shallow breath. “In that cabinet you will find a collection of substances.”

  Rollie looked across the room where she was pointing.

  “For heaven’s sake, go open it!” Even in her weakened condition Auntie Ei could snap at him.

  Rollie scurried over to the small cabinet hanging next to the fireplace. He opened it, and found its shelves crammed with little bottles full of different colored liquids.

  “What do you need?” he called to her.

  “The bottle of green liquid marked with the number ten.” Auntie Ei took another breath. “And the bottle of pink liquid marked with a seven. And the bottle marked with fourteen that looks like it is full of black sand. Do you see them? Ten, seven—”

  “I got them!” Rollie snapped back as he carried the three bottles back to her bedside. “What’ll I do with them?”

  Auntie Ei closed her eyes, and her breathing became very shallow. Rollie panicked and shook her shoulder.

  She jolted and opened her eyes. She looked slightly annoyed, but was too weak to chide him. “Mix the three together. Use my tea cup.” Her words came out in wheezy gasps.

  Rollie grabbed her tea cup off the end table. He pulled out the stoppers from all three bottles. He was about to ask her how much to mix from each bottle, but when he glanced at her he knew there wasn’t much time left for questions like that. She was fading quickly. He poured all the green and pink liquids and black sand into the tea cup. He used his finger to stir the substances together, then lifted the tea cup to her face.

  “Auntie Ei! Open your mouth! You’ve got to drink this right now!” His voice sounded high.

  She opened her mouth a little. He brought the tea cup to her thin lips and tipped the antidote into her mouth. She drank, choked, coughed, and drank some more. Once she drained the cup, she sighed.

  Rollie watched her intently. He wanted her to open her eyes, or take a deep, healthy breath, or snap at him—anything to show that she was out of danger and that she would be fine and go on to live forever so he wouldn’t be alone and—

  “Rollin,” she croaked.

  “Did it work? Are you alright?”

  Auntie Ei smiled slightly. “I believe so.”

  “How did you know which antidote to use?” Rollie shook his head in awe.

  “This is the not first time I have been poisoned, and I daresay it won’t be the last.” Auntie Ei smiled a little wider. “I know a thing or two about Frederick Zilch, such as his poison of choice. He should know that two can play at this game.”

  * * * *

  Once Auntie Ei was fully recovered, she made Rollie tell her all about the burglary at the Academy, about Enches, and about Mr. Crenshaw. She scolded herself for not seeing through his disguise and figuring out that he was Herr Zilch. She hated that he had been living right next door to her all along, and no one was the wiser. Rollie was too relieved that she had not succumbed to the poison to be upset about it.

  Rollie found himself quite the celebrity when he returned to Sherlock Academy the next week. When Headmaster Yardsly had given that deerstalker hat to Rollie, he did not make life easier for the boy. The upperclassmen were amazed that a first year had received such an honorable award. Wesley Livingston mentioned that Rollie was the youngest student ever to have earned one. Naturally everyone wanted to know why Rollie had been given the hat. The short answer he gave was “It was a thank-you gift for helping him with a problem.” That answer only led to more questions, usually ending with why Ichabod Enches had left the Sherlock Academy. As the week wore on, however, the students grew bored with the whole thing and gave up pestering Rollie. Except for Eliot.

  “Can you get me one of those hats, ol’ bean?” he asked while the two boys finished their math homework after supper on Thursday evening. Eliot consented to studying with Rollie in the evenings since he kept falling asleep at dawn.

  Ignoring his roommate, Rollie finished his long division.

  “Did you hear me?” Eliot persisted.

  “Yes, but the answer is no.”

  “Then tell me how to get one. What kind of problem do I need to help with?”

  Rollie erased his answer. He had divided wrong. “I’m not sure. Just keep your eyes open for problems, I guess.”

  “I need more details, you know? Personal problems with the headmaster? Or maintenance problems with the building? Which reminds me. Our faucet is dripping. If there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s a dripping faucet. All I hear is drip, drip, drip, drip, drip—”

  “And all I can hear is yack, yack, yack from my roomie.”

  “Sorry, chum, but it really annoys me. And I won’t rest till it’s fixed, or till I get one of those—”

  Rollie tossed the hat to him. “You can borrow it.”

  “Thanks!” Eliot adjusted it on his head and went to the bathroom to admire it in the mirror. “I think it suits me better.”

  “Of course you do,” Rollie muttered with a smile. He did not mind sharing his hat with Eliot. Rollie figured it kept himself from getting too stuck up. There had been moments during the week when he felt a little proud of himself. Everyone else was proud of him, even his family. When the school had notified the family of his heroic deeds, they had sent a congratulatory reply. Rollie’s confidence as a detective had boosted.

  Rollie made a point to apologize to Mr. Chad for turning him in. After Disguise class one afternoon he lingered behind until the classroom emptied.

  “Hey, detective, something on your mind?” Mr. Chad asked as he combed out the wigs the class had tried on as part of their lesson earlier.

  “I just wanted to say sorry,” Rollie swallowed, “for getting you arrested.”

  Mr. Chad waved a hand at him and shrugged. “You thought you were doing the right thing—and it would’ve been the right thing if I’d been the bad guy. I’m just glad you cleared me!”

  “Thanks for catching Enches,” said Rollie. “And again, I’m sorry you had to be interrogated by Scotland Yard and all.”

  “No harm done. And hey, I got a tan from those interrogation lamps, so it wasn’t a complete waste of time!”

  Rollie laughed. He was so glad to have his favorite teacher back in the clear and back in the classroom teaching.

  Eventually Headmaster Yardsly summoned Rollie to his office. On his way downstairs, Rollie bumped into Cecily.

  “I was just coming to see what you’re up to,” she said.

  “Headmaster Yardsly wants to see me. I hope he’s going to tell me what’s in that letter.”

  “Ooo, me too! Meet me in the Rearranging Library when you’re done.” Cecily headed downstairs with him.

  When he got to the office, Rollie found not only Headmaster Yardsly waiting for him behind his desk, but also Ms. Yardsly. O
ne chair remained empty next to her. Rollie assumed the chair was for him and sat down.

  “GOOD EVENING, Rollin,” the headmaster boomed in his familiar but alarming way. (He always made Rollie jump.) “We want to share something with you. You’ve proven yourself very helpful with this case. We’d like you to continue developing your detective skills by assisting us with a new mystery.”

  “I’ll help you with whatever you need, sir,” Rollie nodded.

  Ms. Katherine E. Yardsly nodded back curtly.

  “WELL THEN! We searched Enches’ desk and found the other letters you delivered from Mr. Crenshaw. Based on clues we pieced together from the other letters, we learned Herr Zilch still has plans for Sherlock Academy.”

  “What plans?” asked Rollie.

  “Who knows at this point?” The headmaster threw up his hands in clear frustration. “We’d like you to help us watch over the Academy and discover Herr Zilch’s next plan.”

  “Be on your guard, Rollin E. Wilson,” Ms. Yardsly drilled in her commanding voice.

  “I will.” Rollie thought of something. “Have you interrogated Professor Enches? I’m sure he knows where Herr Zilch has escaped to.”

  Yardsly exchanged a look with his sister. “If you must know, Enches took his own life hours after being arrested. He drank a dose of poison he had smuggled on himself. I’m afraid he’s a dead end.”

  Rollie slumped slightly in his chair.

  “Not to worry, Rollin, we’ll get another lead on Herr Zilch. But I must issue a word of caution: Zilch and his society are extremely dangerous and devious. You could have been kidnapped or even killed during your confrontation with Enches. While we want you to help keep an eye on things here at school, it would be best to leave the actual chasing of Zilch to Scotland Yard.” Headmaster Yardsly shook hands with the boy before he left.

  “So? What was in the letter?” Cecily asked as soon as Rollie entered the Rearranging Library.

  He joined her by the now-repaired window. “Cecily, this is top secret.”

  “I’ll keep your secret.”

  Rollie lowered his voice to a whisper. Cecily had to lean in when he said, “Headmaster didn’t read me the letter, but he said they’ve been investigating all the other letters to Professor Enches. Herr Zilch still has plans for Sherlock Academy.”