“Of course, sir,” he said with irritation. “I never claimed to be a stranger to the lady. We had the two of them over for bridge and the like on several occasions.”
“Who exactly do you mean when you say ‘we’ had them over? Your wife and yourself, I suppose.”
“No, Mr. Holmes, I am a widower. My household consists of my son David and his wife Sylvia. The young people were all of the same approximate age, so it was natural to have the Bentons over from time to time.”
“I am surprised that your son and daughter-in-law did not socialize more with the deceased and her brother,” ventured Holmes.
“Well, in fact, they did,” conceded Harold Highlander. “David and William have gone riding together, and I believe that Sylvia was in the habit of coming over for tea occasionally.”
“So, in fact, they were closer to the Bentons than yourself?”
Highlander merely shrugged his shoulders in response.
“And if that is true, then the note could have been meant for either your son or his wife, and not you,” said Holmes.
Highlander reacted as if that thought had not occurred to him.
“I suppose that is possible,” he said reluctantly. “I just took it for granted that it was meant for me.”
“Just so,” said Holmes. “When precisely did you first notice the note?”
“It was just past five. I remember because I heard the clock chime, and it reminded me to check the mail.”
“What did you do then?”
“At first I did nothing,” he said slowly. “I thought it was a joke, and a damned poor one, but as I reflected upon it I began to grow uneasy. I decided to see the lady and satisfy myself that nothing untoward had happened.”
You left your home when, would you say?”
“It must have been only a few minutes past five. I hurried along the lane-”
“Do you mean to say that you came on foot?” interrupted Holmes. “Surely if you were worried, you would have ridden.”
“I have not been astride a horse in many years, Mr. Holmes. A man of my age must yield to the passing years.”
“Yet a brisk walk was not out of the question.”
“It is only a mile, or so, as I say. I can certainly manage that distance on foot,” replied the man with some dignity.
“But if you were alarmed, surely you could have sent your son or a servant.”
“I was not alarmed, Mr. Holmes. I merely wanted to satisfy my own curiosity. I did not want to rouse the entire house because of an anonymous note among the mail.”
I thought that the man’s attitude was quite in keeping with the character of the stolid Englishman of his class. Holmes must have felt the same way as he waited for the man to continue.
“As I was saying,” Highlander went on, with a bit of reproach in his voice. “When I arrived I came up the walk and knocked upon the door. When it was not answered, I fear that I did allow the wind to get up into me a bit. I knocked louder and louder until Miss Woodbury came over to see what all the fuss was about.”
“That is so,” said the lady. “Mr. Highlander was very agitated by the time I arrived.”
“Were you acquainted with Mr. Highlander before this episode?” asked Holmes.
“Oh, indeed yes. Father and he knew each other a bit. We both use the same bank, and, after all, he has owned the cottage next door for many years.”
“Then you must know the son as well,” said Holmes.
The lady nodded and I thought I detected some color come into her cheeks despite the powder on them. I sensed a possible romantic attachment between her and the son, perhaps in years past. I made a note to myself to mention the possibility to Holmes in case it might prove pertinent to the crime.
“At any rate,” continued Highlander. “I tried the door and found it was bolted. Miss Woodbury suggested we try the side door.”
“Why did you do that, Miss Woodbury? Mr. Highlander had a reason to worry about the lady, but she may have merely been out. Why did you suggest trying other doors? Had you been told by Mr. Highlander about the note?”
“At that point I knew nothing of the note, sir. The reason I became worried is that I knew that Anne was home. She had been out in the yard earlier. I had spoken to her, and I had not seen her leave.”
“Quite rightly so,” said Highlander as he patted her on the forearm. “We found that the door opened, and we entered the house. There were no lights, but the fire had been lit, and it illuminated the room enough for us to see the body.”
“Oh, yes, it was obvious that she had passed, the poor dear.”
Elizabeth Woodbury began to sniffle at her own words, and I feared that she would collapse in a fit. I reached to my sleeve for a handkerchief, but she gathered herself, bravely I thought, and continued.
“Mr. Highlander, bless him, took control of matters at that point,” she said. “I am afraid I was quite insensible with shock at the time.”
“That is so,” said Harold Highlander somewhat importantly. “I looked around the cottage to see if anyone was still lurking about, but I found nothing. I then ran into the lane with the intention of finding help. Mr. Langston was just coming out of his front door at the time. I was about to inform him of events, when I spied a constable some hundred yards down the lane. It was Providence that put him there. I hallooed at him, and he came on a run. He took charge of the matter and began blowing his whistle. Within what seemed like minutes, several more constables answered the call, and then the Inspector was called for. I must say that London has the finest police in the island. Even here on the outskirts, an officer is only a call away.”
“That is told in a very straightforward manner,” said Holmes. “Now, Mr. Langston, how do you come into this tale?”
The grizzled, retired gentleman rubbed his chin with one grimy hand.
“It is as Highlander has said, Mr. Holmes. I have already told all of this to the Inspector.”
“Indulge me, Mr. Langston,” said Holmes with a smile. “I wish to hear it from you directly, if you do not mind.”
“I suppose I get your meaning,” he said. “I rather like getting it from the horse’s mouth myself.”
The old man had a good laugh at his joke, and it was some few moments before he mastered himself enough to continue.
“I was in my sitting room reading until about four o’clock today, when I must have fallen asleep in my chair. When you’re of my age it will happen to you too, my lads. But, anyway, I was awoken at sometime after five by someone pounding on the door of the Benton cottage. My sitting room has windows that face the lane, and I saw a person I later found to be Highlander knocking on the door very persistently. Presently Miss Woodbury came over, and I watched as they went around to the side. After a few minutes I saw lamps being lit, and then Highlander dashed into the lane. I came out to find what all the fuss was about.”
“How long have you been retired, Mr. Langston?” asked Holmes.
Langston seemed surprised by the question.
“It has been almost six years now.”
“I suppose you spend much of your time in your sitting room, observing life. As a tradesman, you know the nature of people better than most, I would wager.”
“You look to flatter me and insult me at the same time, Mr. Holmes,” said the old man with a grin. “You imagine that an old man, such as myself, is the neighborhood snoop. Is that it?”
“Nothing of the sort,” said Holmes in protest. “But still, I think little gets by you.”
Simon Langston made no response, but I saw again a shrewd flash loom in his eyes. Simon Langston was no one’s fool, I thought.
Holmes had wandered over by the fire, and I saw him gazing into it intently. The fire had largely died out by this point in the evening. The lamps were all lit now so the light from the fire was not needed. I watched as my friend walked over to the nearly dead fire. I watched him as he crouched down without saying a word to anyone else. He grabbed a set of tongs sitting nex
t to the hearth and reached into the ashes. He poked around for some moments and then withdrew the tongs. He held them in front of him and blew on the end. Presently he dropped something into his hands and walked back to the group.
“What is it that you have found?” asked Hopkins.
In answer Holmes showed all of us a small brass button.
“Why, that is odd!” exclaimed Hopkins. “Dashed lucky that you should have spied out such a thing.”
“It was not luck,” answered the great detective. “You see, Hopkins, I was looking for it.”
Chapter Five
“What?” cried Inspector Hopkins. “How could you know such a thing, sir?”
“It was an obvious deduction,” said Holmes blandly. “In point of fact, I believe you will find more such buttons remaining in the ashes.”
“How did they come to be in the ashes?” asked Hopkins.
“They are in the ashes for the simple reason that the fireplace does not achieve a high enough temperature to reach the melting point of brass. On the other hand, cloth burns easily.”
“Do you mean to say, Holmes, that a piece of clothing has been placed in the fire and the buttons are all that remain of the garment?” asked I.
“That is precisely what I mean, Doctor. Miss Woodbury and Mr. Highlander both testified that the fire was burning brightly when they came in the side door. Brightly enough in fact, that it illuminated the room. This can only mean that the fire was built a short time prior to their entrance. Otherwise it would have died down before they came in.”
Holmes never failed to amaze me with his powers of observation. I was frankly proud of my friend for yet another demonstration of his abilities, but I saw doubt upon the face of Inspector Stanley Hopkins. The Inspector, of course, greatly admired Holmes, but it was obvious that he had difficulty in subscribing to Holmes’s view.
“I see several problems with your theory, Mr. Holmes,” he said finally.
“Indeed,” said Holmes. “Pray unburden yourself, Hopkins.”
“I hesitate to gainsay you, sir, but I can advance several problems with your thinking. Firstly, the fire could be complete happenstance. It may have been the lady herself who felt a chill and built the fire for warmth. Secondly, these buttons you have found may have been in the ash heap for days, even weeks, before today. They may have nothing to do with the crime.”
As Hopkins was speaking, I saw that one of the sergeants was sifting through the still-hot ashes. He had found, as Homes had predicted, another dozen or so of the same style brass buttons. The man brought them over and silently set them upon a table in front of the Inspector.
“I believe that I can set your thinking straight,” said Holmes. “In the case of your first objection, I believe that it is highly unlikely that the lady built the fire herself, although it is possible. The day had been unseasonably warm. Indeed, even into the evening it is still quite comfortable. Therefore, I think that the killer was the person who laid in the fire for a purpose. As to your second point, I must accuse you of sloppy logic and observation, Hopkins. Look about the room. This is a well-cared-for home and Miss Benton was not the sort of person to let ashes pile up in the grate. Look at the fireplace. The ashes that are there are obviously the ashes of a single fire only. The idea that several fires were built and that the buttons have been among the ashes for an indeterminate length of time is pure folly.”
I could see Hopkins visibly wilt and wince at the harsh words of Sherlock Holmes. Langston smirked at what I thought was his endorsement of the older man, Holmes, giving the younger man a stern lesson. Hopkins took in the tongue-lashing and set a firm chin.
“Only a fool would argue the point with you any longer, Mr. Holmes,” he said. “That being the case, I must accept your theory. I believe that I can, with your permission, flesh it out a bit further.”
“By all means,” said Holmes with a nod.
“As I see it, the murderer must have splashed blood upon his, or her, shirt during the murder. The killer panics. The bloody shirt is tantamount to a confession to a capital crime. Then the idea hits. The household consists of both a man and a woman, so no matter what the gender of the killer, extra clothing is available. The killer changes and thrusts the bloody, incriminating, garment into the fire leaving only the buttons, which will likely be overlooked.”
“Indeed would have been overlooked, save for Holmes,” said I.
“Agreed, Doctor,” said Hopkins with a rueful smile. “Though I believe that I, at the very least, demonstrated acumen in calling for the assistance of him. What say you, Mr. Holmes? Do you agree with my thinking?”
“It is certainly one possibility, but the most likely one, well…”
Holmes trailed off and walked over to a desk that stood in the corner of the sitting room. I followed him with my eyes, as he seemed to take great interest in the area. Hopkins had seized upon his extension of Holmes’s theory and continued, oblivious to the wanderings of my friend.
“This is actually quite marvelous,” said he. “Once Mr. William Benton returns, we may be able to narrow the field a good deal.”
“How is that, Inspector?” I asked with genuine curiosity.
“It is simplicity itself, Doctor,” he returned, borrowing one of Holmes’s pet phrases. “It is obvious that we cannot question Miss Benton as to whether one of her blouses is missing, but we can question Mr. Benton as to any missing items from his wardrobe.”
“I see,” said I. “And if he has a missing shirt, then the killer is a man; and if not, then the killer must be a woman. That is well thought out, Inspector.”
“I merely apply the methods of Mr. Holmes. Once we establish the gender of the killer, we can begin to identify suspects. Is that not the next logical step, Mr. Holmes?”
“What’s that?” asked Holmes as he looked up from the desk. “Oh, yes. I suppose that is a useful endeavor.”
Elizabeth Woodbury had been growing increasingly agitated during this particular discussion and could finally no longer restrain herself.
“Are you actually suggesting that some man killed poor Anne, and while she lay dead upon the floor, he coolly went into William’s bedchamber and took one of his shirts, and then built a fire and cast the bloody one into it? Why, Macbeth was never half so cruel as that. What kind of man would do such a thing?”
“I’ve seen many more years than you have, Miss Woodbury,” stated Simon Langston. “I speak to you now as a Dutch uncle, when I say that the cruelty of man to his fellow being is unbounded by nature or religion.”
These were sage words, but I must confess that I wondered where a mere tailor, a respectable trade to be certain, might have come across such acts of cruelty as to be such a harsh judge of the human condition.
“Are you quite alone in the world, Mr. Langston?” asked Holmes from the desk.
The question seemed to come from nowhere in particular, but the old man replied readily enough.
“I had one son, sir. Jacob was his name.”
“And what became of him?” asked Holmes gently.
“He served the Crown faithfully in the army, Mr. Holmes, he did. He gave his life in the awful fight with the Boers in South Africa.”
“Killed in action, then,” said Holmes.
“Yes, he was killed in the Transvaal by one of their damn commando raiders. Will-o-the-wisps they were, sir. They had mutilated his body by the time it was recovered. That is what men are capable of, you see.”
“I never knew that, Mr. Langston,” said Miss Woodbury. “I am so sorry for you. That is a lot of pain to carry.”
“You are very kind, Miss Woodbury. I would never have told such a story in mixed company were it not for the horrible circumstances. It is a story I share with few people. Now, Mr. William Benton being a soldier himself, I did unburden to once. He was a sympathetic ear for an old man.”
“This will be a heavy burden on him when he is told,” observed Elizabeth Woodbury. “It is all such a nightmare.”
&
nbsp; “Not a nightmare, Miss Woodbury,” said Holmes. “This is all too real. And to return to your point about a man doing all this in cold blood, I remind you that there is another alternative.”
“What is that, Mr. Holmes?”
“Why, simply that the killer may have been a woman. Any woman of the same approximate size as Miss Benton might have donned one of her blouses with no one the wiser. Why, someone your size for instance.”
“If you are attempting to bait me, Mr. Holmes, you will not succeed,” said the lady with a grim smile. “My own father died in my arms from illness just last year, so I have seen something of death before. However, if you are insinuating that I stabbed Anne and then put on the clothing of a dead woman, you are mistaken.”
“I insinuate nothing, but I want everyone here to understand the gravity of the situation,” said Holmes. “There has been murder done here today, and it was a most cruel murder at that, if such a thing can be measured. Everyone with even the most tangential connection with the woman is under suspicion. Is that not right, Hopkins?”
“You speak the truth, sir.”
“I draw your attention to the fact that both Miss Woodbury and Mr. Langston were alone all afternoon and have no one to vouchsafe for their innocence.”
“Now see here, young man,” began Simon Langston, but Holmes waved him away.
“And, Mr. Highlander, I believe that you claim to have been alone in your study for most of the time in question before you found the note.”
“That is so,” said Highlander. “I claim no special alibi. I was alone.”
“Precisely. And your son and his wife are intimates of the Bentons. Where are they, and where have they been, to your knowledge?”
“I think you can safely put them out of this, Mr. Holmes. My son, David, went riding earlier in the day.”
“Alone?” asked Holmes.
“Yes, alone, but he must have been seen by many people.”
“Quite possibly. And what of your daughter-in-law?”
“Sylvia was shopping in the West End. She was alone as well, but, my goodness, many people must have observed her as well and can attest to her absence from this district.”
The Lambs Lane Affair (A Sherlock Holmes Uncovered Tale Book 5) Page 3
