Sherlock Holmes and the Lady in Black

by June Thomson

  There were several more guests whom I took to be the other members of Stackhurst’s staff including his housekeeper, Mrs Dobson, who had answered the doorbell and ushered us into the room. Among the others were two complete strangers whom I had never met before and whose presence there I could not account for. Both of them were men, both strongly built, both red-haired, whom I took to be father and son, the older of whom sported a beard, the younger clean-shaven. Although smartly dressed in well-cut suits, they looked ill at ease, as if unused to such formal attire or such a social occasion.

  I also searched hurriedly for any ladies present who might be Stackhurst’s bride-to-be but could find no one who seemed at all a likely choice. There was Mrs Dobson, of course, a pleasant enough lady but rather heavy about the hips, and another member of staff who, I had been told, dealt with the secretarial duties at the academy but who could not be a candidate being in her late fifties, and, more to the point, married to the owner of the post office in Fulworth.

  So who on earth could she be?

  At this moment, Harold Stackhurst saw us standing in the doorway and, setting aside his glass, hurried across the room to greet us.

  ‘I am so sorry we are late,’ Holmes said as the three of us shook hands all round.

  ‘The car wouldn’t start,’ I added in explanation.

  ‘But you are here now and that is all that matters. And now,’ he continued, turning his head to address someone who had approached him from behind, ‘let me introduce you to my wife-to-be, although you already know her.’

  Holmes and I looked beyond him and we both gaped in astonishment; at least I did. For standing behind him, a smile on her lips and her hand held out in greeting was Maud Bellamy.

  For a moment, I could not believe my eyes. Maud Bellamy! That beautiful young woman! My astonishment quickly changed to delight and relief.

  Holmes, who was in better control of the situation than I was, stepped forward and lifted her hand to his lips in a chivalrous salutation such as a courtier might bestow on his queen.

  ‘Congratulations!’ he exclaimed. ‘What wonderful news!’

  I repeated his words but not the gesture, feeling I did not know her as personally as Holmes and aware that I lacked his ability to be charming to women when he wished.

  She gave us both a smile that I can only describe as radiant, lighting up her features as the dazzle from a ray of sunlight can illuminate a room. Harold Stackhurst’s happiness was also evident but, as a man whom I suspected was not used to displaying his emotions, his was a steady glow at which I felt one could warm one’s hands as well as one’s heart.

  Maud Bellamy was saying, ‘Thank you so much for the beautiful bouquet. Red roses! Did you know they are the symbol of love in the language of flowers?’

  I did, in fact, know it. My own wife had taught me that when I had given her the same flowers on our engagement.

  ‘And thank you also for the champagne,’ Stackhurst was adding. ‘We shall drink to the health of both of you. And now,’ he continued, leading the way across the room towards the two red-haired men I had noticed when we first arrived, ‘allow me to introduce Tom Bellamy, Maud’s father, and her brother, William. Of course,’ he continued, turning to them, ‘you have both met Sherlock Holmes but not Dr John Watson, a friend of his who is at present visiting Fulworth.’

  There followed communal shaking of hands and exchange of comments about the wedding-to-be, congratulations on the part of Holmes and myself for their being related to the prospective bride and thanks from the Bellamys, which I thought were not as hearty as they might have been, before we moved on to one of those conversations that tend to occur on such occasions with the participants doing their best to find a topic that suited everyone, like trying on hats, I always think, hoping to find one that fits. In this case, it was the beauty of the area, particularly the coast with its magnificent cliffs before we moved away to speak to other guests in the room.

  It was a very pleasant evening that everyone seemed to enjoy, even Ian Murdoch whose possible reactions to the engagement had caused me some concern. Yet speaking to him later after an excellent buffet supper, he seemed quite reconciled to the situation, much to my relief.

  I raised the subject with Holmes on the drive back from The Gables but he seemed quite sanguine about it.

  ‘You fret too much about other people,’ he told me.

  ‘Perhaps I do,’ I agreed. ‘I am afraid it is in my nature.’

  ‘Then learn to conquer it,’ he advised, easy enough for him to say as he had a much more objective attitude to life than I possessed.

  ‘I shall try,’ I promised but could not resist adding, ‘What about the Bellamys? They did not seem too pleased about the engagement.’

  ‘There you go again, my dear fellow! Taking other people’s troubles onto your own shoulders. They, too, will have to learn, which will be difficult for them, I imagine. They are both so positively male with a predilection for controlling others. But I think they will have met their match in Maud Bellamy and Harold. Neither of them will submit to any form of bullying; you can take my word for that.

  ‘All the same, they are a very interesting couple: the Bellamys, I mean, and one can’t help admiring them. Tom Bellamy in particular. He started off as an ordinary fisherman renting one of those small cottages by the harbour in Fulworth. Then, as I think I have already told you, the fishing trade began to die out due to the railway failing to extend this far. As a result, the whole community declined and many of its members left, literally to fish in more productive waters, such as Brighton. But Tom Bellamy stayed on and built up a little business of his own, very modest to begin with, such as taking holiday visitors for trips around the bay. And it worked. Soon he was renting out boats and bathing huts. Later, he took on his son as a partner in the business. Between them, they have made a small fortune, enough for Tom Bellamy to afford to build his own house on that slope of rising ground behind the village, the one with the tower on its corner called The Haven. You may have noticed it.’

  ‘Indeed I have. It’s quite imposing.’

  ‘A touch pretentious perhaps,’ Holmes suggested. ‘But I suppose Bellamy has every right to advertise his success. He has worked hard enough for it.’

  ‘I wonder when the wedding will take place,’ I remarked.

  ‘They seem not to have fixed a date yet. But if Tom Bellamy has anything to do with it, you can be certain it will be a splendid event with no expense spared,’ Holmes prophesied.

  He was proved to be right.

  To jump forward in time, the ceremony took place on the fifth of May in the following summer at St Botolph’s, a more magnificent setting than the smaller, brick-and-tile church that had replaced it in the village.

  My wife and I were both invited to the wedding but unfortunately, one of my patients fell seriously ill at the time and I could not attend. My wife, however, was there and gave me a full account of the event that same evening over the telephone.

  St Botolph’s was packed, she told me, with a large congregation and was beautifully decorated with lilies and red roses, a detail that pleased me greatly, while the ceremony itself was quite simple. Her father gave her away, her brother William acting as best man. Holmes was one of the ushers together with Ian Murdoch.

  ‘Did the church smell damp?’ I asked, remembering the unpleasant odour of rotting plaster that had tainted the air when Holmes and I had last visited the place.

  ‘Damp!’ my wife replied, as if astonished by my remark. ‘Not at all. It smelt of flowers; quite delicious.’

  It crossed my mind that the presence of people within the building was all the church needed to dispel that miasma of decay, as if the stones themselves responded to their warmth and admiration.

  But before I could carry this rather bizarre thought any further, my wife was continuing with her own more conventional account.

  There were no bridesmaids, however, she added. An omission she seemed sorry to have to report. I g
uessed Maud herself may have made this decision, overriding her father’s more lavish desire for a bevy of overdressed maids-in-waiting.

  The bride’s gown, however, had delighted her and, like most women, she felt it necessary to describe the garment in detail. It was white silk, beautifully fitted, with a small train, and she also wore a lace veil over her hair, held in place by a coronet of lilies of the valley, the same flower that composed her bouquet.

  The reception was held in the drawing room of The Gables together with a marquee in the garden.

  But what delighted me most was her account of Holmes’ part in the event, an aspect of the occasion that, remembering his reaction to my second marriage, had caused me some uneasiness. However, it seemed Holmes could not have been more kind and amiable to her. He had arranged for a hired car to take her not only from the station in Brighton but also to the hotel in Lewes where he had booked a room for her for the night and, as my wife added, he had acted as her escort throughout the whole day.

  So there were two happy endings, I told myself.

  However, no such conclusion, happy or otherwise, occurred to bring the Lady in Black inquiry to a satisfactory conclusion, much to Holmes’ displeasure, and to mine as well.

  The days were passing and the supposed week’s holiday had extended itself to a longer and longer period of absenteeism. I felt it was time to go home, not just for my patients’ sake and my wife’s but for mine as well. Nevertheless, I hesitated to break the news to Holmes.

  He, too, was having a difficult time. The lack of success over the Lady in Black investigation had set him back, plunging him into one of those dark moods that had in the past overwhelmed him on occasions and I was loath to leave him in such a low state of mind.

  ‘I feel I have reached a dead end,’ he confided in me over breakfast one morning. ‘Perhaps I ought to admit defeat and give the whole business up.’

  ‘Oh, not yet, Holmes,’ I protested, knowing how much it meant to him. ‘Your luck may change.’

  ‘Luck!’ he retorted. ‘You are beginning to sound like Mrs B chattering on about silver linings and guardian angels. No, Watson! Life isn’t like that. As we both know only too well, what we need for this case is proof and I have not found it. So I have failed. There is no avoiding the issue. I will have to learn to accept it. Please leave the matter there, my dear fellow. There is no point in discussing it any further.’

  And that, I knew, was that. Holmes had made up his mind and I would have to accept his decision. It seemed the case of the Lady in Black was over and done with.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  But I was to be proved wrong, thank goodness. There was an end to it after all but whether guardian angels or silver linings had anything to do with it, I do not know.

  It happened three days later quite unexpectedly and not at all as either of us might have expected.

  At about nine o’clock on the Tuesday evening following Maud Bellamy’s and Harold Stackhurst’s engagement party, there came a loud knocking at the front door. As Holmes rose from his chair to answer it, he lifted an inquiring eyebrow at me. We expected no one and it was quite late at night for visitors to call.

  I heard voices in the hall, that of Holmes and of another man who spoke with a north-country accent, which I did not recognise but who evidently had some urgent business with my old friend, judging by his tone of voice and the speed with which Holmes ushered him into the room.

  He was a stockily built, grey-haired man, elderly but still strong about the chest and shoulders, wearing a shabby tweed jacket and carrying a flat cap, also well worn. I thought I had seen him before but for a moment I could not remember where or when I might have met him. He certainly did not recognise me for no sooner had he entered than he turned immediately to Holmes.

  ‘You must come at once, Doctor!’ he exclaimed, his weather-beaten features distorted with distress.

  ‘I am not the doctor,’ Holmes told him, adding as he indicated me, ‘but my friend Dr Watson is. And you are?’

  ‘Neave,’ the man replied. ‘Bill Neave.’

  He spoke hurriedly as if the business of exchanging names was of no importance. Turning to address me, he continued. ‘She’s ill, doctor! Very ill. I think she’s dying. Please, you’ve got to come at once! Please!’

  The words came tumbling out, his voice becoming more hoarse and broken with each disjointed sentence. As he repeated the last word, he began to weep, dashing away the tears with the back of his hand.

  I find it distressing enough to see a woman cry but to witness a man, and an elderly man at that, weeping is far, far worse.

  ‘I’ll come at once,’ I assured him while Holmes added for my benefit, ‘Mr Neave came here by car, Watson. Is he fit to drive back or shall we take him?’

  ‘We’ll see,’ I replied. ‘Let me get my medical bag first.’

  As I hurried up the stairs to collect it from my bedroom, I heard the man, Bill Neave, address Holmes, his voice still husky but a little less tremulous.

  ‘No, sir. I’d rather drive back myself. The car might be needed.’

  It was a sensible response and showed to my relief that the man was recovering a little from his earlier breakdown.

  ‘How did you find out there was a doctor here?’ Holmes was asking.

  ‘I went to the Fisherman’s Arms,’ Neave continued. ‘I didn’t dare drive into Lewes – it’s too far – and I thought the landlord at the pub might know of a local doctor or have a phone I could use.’

  The conversation continued as I found my bag and the car keys. Holmes was asking, ‘Where do you live, Mr Neave?’

  It was said in an offhand manner, as if Holmes was merely filling in time while I collected up my equipment.

  ‘Fulworth Hall,’ I heard Neave reply.

  I was too concerned with the lack of medication in my bag to take in Neave’s reply and it was only after I rejoined Holmes and Neave downstairs and we had left the house to drive in the two separate cars that the full significance of Bill Neave’s reply struck home.

  ‘Fulworth Hall!’ I repeated.

  I suddenly realised where I had seen the man before. He had opened the door at Fulworth Hall when Holmes and I had called there in disguise but he had stood so far back that I had only glimpsed his features.

  Holmes, who had remained silent until that moment, more concerned with watching through the windscreen for Neave’s car to reverse safely from the gateway and turn into the road, looked across at me.

  ‘Yes, Fulworth Hall, Watson. But that was all. The patient’s name was not mentioned so we are not quite there yet. We must wait a little longer for that final piece to fall into place and then I think we can safely say the puzzle is solved. And I don’t think we shall discover that Neave’s wife, if he has one, is the piece we are looking for.’

  As we drove up to Fulworth Hall it became clear that Neave had left in a hurry. The gate to the driveway was set wide open, as was the front door. A light was burning, too, in the hall. But Neave allowed us little time to observe these details. He was out of his car in a flash and up the steps to the door, in his haste leaving the lights of his car on as well. I stopped briefly to lean over the driver’s seat to switch them off before following the others inside the house.

  As he ran, Neave kept calling out a woman’s name, ‘Mary! Mary!’ in a hoarse, urgent voice that continued as he reached the entrance hall, and it crossed my mind, despite the scrambling impetuousness of our arrival, that Neave would hardly address his employer, the Lady in Black, I assumed, in such a manner.

  There was an oil lamp burning on a table that was standing at the foot of the stairs, the only illumination to our surroundings, which Neave picked up as he began to mount the steps, and by its uncertain light I looked about me as I followed. It cast long, trembling shadows on the wall, giving me only a vague impression of shabby wallpaper on which lighter squares and oblongs indicated where once paintings must have hung.

  As we reached the upper landing, the
door facing us opened and the figure of a woman appeared, holding up another lamp. She was dressed in black and for a confused moment I thought she must be our Lady in Black until I noticed she was wearing a white apron, suggesting she was not the owner of the house but a servant.

  She was a tiny woman, her head barely reaching to Neave’s shoulder, but despite her lack of inches there was a positive, almost authoritative, air about her. She reminded me of a mouse I had once seen peering out from a hole in a skirting board, unaware of my presence: shrewd, bright-eyed, and quick-witted.

  ‘Which of you two is the doctor?’ she asked in a low voice.

  ‘I am,’ I replied, adding, as I felt Holmes stiffen beside me, ‘and this is Mr Holmes, my colleague.’

  It was not entirely untrue, I told myself. Holmes had indeed been my colleague for many years and I owed him some return for his loyalty and friendship especially under the present circumstances. He had earned the right to be present when the identity of the Lady in Black was finally solved. Besides, he might be useful in helping to lift the patient if need be or to carry any necessities such as bowls of hot water up and down the stairs.

  The woman, Mrs Neave, I assumed, accepted his presence with a nod of her head and he fell in beside me as she opened the door through which she had appeared standing aside to let us enter the room that lay beyond.