by william Todd
There was a three-foot parapet around the perimeter of the building. Holmes, with his usual, focused observation, studied the roof in all directions, as he made his way to the front. We followed behind waiting for any revelations.
“One set of footprints from the door to the ledge and back; he was alone.”
Holmes then looked over the edge. “Just above and to the right of Erdley’s balcony two floors down. Judging by the cigarette remnants, this is where Archer spent most of his time.”
He then pointed to more prints along the wall. “This is where he paced, several sets, overlapping.” He then followed them. Near the end of the building, he stopped. “It seems constable Archer spent some time here, as well. The track is muddled from standing for some period, and there are several more cigarette butts in this location.”
Holmes looked up and scanned the area around, and something across the street caught his eye. “Hullo, what is this? Do you not see the window across the way with its curtains open? And all others are drawn?”
“I do,” Mear said. “I fail to see—”
“But I do not,” Holmes cut in. “There is more up here than meets the eye.”
Holmes then followed the steps back to their place above Erdley’s room. “I counted my footsteps, and based on my stride, it is roughly one-hundred seventy feet from here to where Archer turned and came back.”
“Is that significant?” Mear asked.
“It could be. We shall see if and where that bit of data fits at a later time. And it seems here,” Holmes then added, pointing to a disturbed area on the ground, “that Archer got bored with his duty and sat down, back against the wall, and fell asleep.”
“How could you know he fell asleep?” I asked.
“Because, Watson, there are no cigarette butts here. If he remained awake, based on his previous actions, he would have continued to smoke.”
Mear scratched his head, dumbfounded. “But Mr. Holmes, I just don’t understand where this is all leading.”
“Nor do I,” my friend replied. “Not yet, though there is an intriguing theory that I feel I must test.”
I could almost see those great wheels turning in his mind, as he then turned and hurried to the roof door. “Come, Watson, I must speak to the desk clerk at the hotel across the street briefly then see Mr. Hughes. Mear, if you would be so kind, gather the two constables and the two sons and have them wait outside Erdley’s room. I shan’t be but a moment, then I wish to talk to them individually. I would also like you standing by with a few of your men. You may be needed shortly.”
We rushed across the street to the Wurthing Park Hotel. Upon entering, Holmes spotted the reception area and strolled up to the clerk. “Excuse me, could you tell me if anyone is staying in Room 548?”
The clerk, a young, clean-cut man checked his ledger. “No sir, no one is currently staying in that room. In fact, all rooms in that wing are empty. A bit slow, we are, at the moment. Would you fancy it? It is quite a nice accommodation.”
Holmes smiled cordially, “No. Thank you. Could you give me the room number to Mr. Hughes? He is expecting us. I am Sherlock Holmes, and this is my associate, Dr. Watson.”
“Ah yes, he did mention you might be over. Room 428, gentlemen.”
We were off again. I could tell Holmes was onto something. He was like a hound on the track of a soon-to-be-caught fox.
As we ascended the stairs, I asked, “What was that all about?”
“I wanted to know if anyone was staying in the room with the open curtains.”
“But how could you know it was room 548?”
“These hotels are mirror images of each other in every respect—the balconies on the fourth floor of each, same windows and the spacing between them, same length, same six-story height. I daresay the only difference between them is their respective coats of paint. Knowing that, Watson, means that simple math and knowing that even-numbered rooms are on the right side of the corridor and odd-numbered on the left will tell me the number to that room.”
We finally found our destination marked with a large, gold placard that read Mr. Milton Hughes, Proprietor. Holmes knocked.
There was a brief silence then came the call from inside, “Come in.”
Milton Hughes was sitting behind a large mahogany desk at the far end of the room with French doors leading to the balcony directly at his back, open, letting in the warmth of the day. He rose from his desk and gestured to the seats in front of the desk. “Come, sit. I hope you have good news to tell me regarding this ugly affair.”
We sat, and I could not help but notice the piles of stationery, envelopes, and letters alike, strewn about his desk, a long, gold letter opener on top of it all. A spent pipe lay at the other end. His workspace was an antithesis to his dapper, perfectly groomed attire.
“I am still a bit in the dark on the matter,” Holmes said, “but I am making some headway. I shall resume my investigation shortly but came to inform you that you have, or should say had, an interloper in room 548.”
“Does this somehow tie into Mr. Erdley’s murder?” he asked.
“I do not believe in coincidences, Mr. Hughes. I believe someone in that room distracted the guard on the roof, and I believe the distraction was intentional.”
He looked from one to the other of us. “Distraction? I apologize Mr. Holmes, but your thinking in this has far out-paced mine. I am in the dark as to what you mean.”
“Sometime during Constable Archer’s sentry on the rooftop, he happened upon someone in a room across the street and one floor down at the far end, which your desk clerk was kind enough to divulge was an area of Wurthing Park currently unoccupied. Archer noticed this person because the window curtains were open. I surmise this person to be a woman, for who else but the fairer sex would a man stop in his normal course of duties to watch?”
Hughes began to rise, “Well, we shall put a stop to that. Come, let’s see if the freeloader is still using the room.”
Holmes put up a hand and motioned for Hughes to sit back down. “I do not think you will find anyone there at present, so the effort would be a wasted one, and my efforts are too precious to waste. That was only part of the reason I came over. I wanted to see if you would allow me a different view of Erdley’s balcony. I need a wider view than that which I am getting currently with my feet on the crime scene.”
Holmes rose from his seat and gestured toward the balcony doors. “May I?”
Hughes and I got up from our chairs simultaneously as he said, “Of course, of course. Please do.”
We all went outside.
Holmes said, “Yours is the perfect vantage point for what I want to see, being directly across the street from his balcony.” He scanned the top of the building across the street then leaned over the railing and looked at the street below and in both directions, taking in everything in long, intense gazes.
Hughes whispered to me as Holmes studied his canvas, “What do you think he is looking for?”
I replied quietly, “With Sherlock Holmes, every bit of minutia is but a piece to a puzzle no one else seems to know how to put together…In other words, I have no idea.”
When Holmes was done, he turned and walked back inside, remarking to Hughes as he passed, “Your railing is slightly bent. I would have that repaired before it becomes a hazard.”
“Oh yes,” Hughes replied as we followed Holmes back into the office. “Already noted—that one and a few others, I must admit. I bought these hotels at a bargain, but the consternation of it all is the amount of money needed to bring them back to respectability.”
As Holmes passed the disheveled desk, some bit of stationary caught his eye. “I see an envelope with a French postmark.”
“Ah, yes, you would notice that, wouldn’t you? Well, at present, I am in negotiations with a small hotel in Dunkirk. No resting on any laurels for this hotelier.”
“Going international, I see,” said I.
He smiled weakly. “Trying to. It is a sobe
ring affair, to say the least. I have been told that I am a bit, shall we say, excitable. My wife says I do not have the fortitude to take on such endeavors. However, the more she says it, the more I try to prove her wrong. But I fear she may be right. They are hard negotiators, the French. They want well more than I think it’s worth, and I am deciding now on my next move. Or I was until this morning.”
“Well, I wish you luck in your endeavor,” I replied.
Holmes spoke up. “I am preparing to interview the constables and Mr. Erdley’s sons, with another person of interest possibly afterward. I would like for you to come over, if you would, in one hour, and I will apprise you on what I’ve found thus far.”
“Another person?” Hughes asked.
“Yes, another suspect was brought up when Mear apprised us of the situation on the trip from Oxford.”
“May I ask who this person is?”
“You may not,” was Holmes’ curt reply. “One hour. If you are needed sooner, I shall send for you, if that is alright.”
“Of course,” Hughes nodded in that frazzled way of his, and we took our leave.
. . . .
Holmes spoke to Chief Constable Mear down on the street, momentarily, while I set up Mr. Erdley’s room for interviews. When he finally arrived, Holmes sat in a large, leather wingback in the middle of the room, and I had pulled out an armless chair from the writing desk and placed it in front of him. When he was seated, he nodded, and I let the first of the four men inside. It was Archer, the constable from the roof, a fair-haired, balding young man who tried to make up for his sparse top by growing out large tufts of side whiskers. His nervousness was palpable as he sat in the chair in front of Holmes, while I leaned against the writing desk taking in the interrogation.
“Let us cut to the chase, constable. I shall tell you what I know, and you shall fill in the gaps.”
“I shall, Mr. Holmes,” he said shakily.
“I know you spent some time watching someone through their window across the street. A woman, yes?
The man nodded.
“Did you recognize her?”
“No sir, Mr. Holmes, though she had her back to me the whole time.”
“You never saw her face?”
“No, sir.”
“Relay the incident, if you would.”
Archer cleared his throat. “Well, I had paced the top of the roof for some time, going over to the far edge and back ‘bout every half-hour or so. ‘Bout two hours into my watch, that would have been ‘round midnight or so, as I made my way over to the far end of the building, this light comes on ‘cross the way there. Naturally, I’m curious.”
“Naturally,” my friend repeated with deprecation.
“Well, this woman proceeds to—undress with her back to the window.”
An uncomfortable silence followed. The man seemed embarrassed at the last statement. Holmes bit into the silence with a bit of exasperation, “What was she wearing? What color was her hair? Was she alone? This would be helpful information.”
Archer said, clearing his throat once more. “She was wearing a long dress, a nice one too, like she’d been out to a fancy dinner or some such. She had blonde hair, and she was alone as far as I could tell. I saw no one else in the room. After about twenty minutes or so, as she came and went from view in front of the window, the light went out, and I resumed my watch.”
He then looked from one to the other of us pleadingly. “It was just a bit of harmless looking. She was right there in front of the window. What was a man supposed to do?
I said, “A gentleman would have looked away.”
“And you will swear that this all transpired in roughly twenty-minutes’ time?” asked Holmes.
“Maybe five-minutes either side of that, sir, but certainly less than a half-hour.”
“And how long were you asleep?”
The man seemed astounded as he looked upon us. “How could you know that?”
Holmes replied, “It is easier for me to just know than it is to explain how I know. Please, answer the question.”
“I admit I knocked off for another half hour. When I woke, I checked my pocket watch, and it read a hair past one. I got up and resumed my watch.”
“So, there was slightly less than an hour where you were negligent in your duties?”
The man shook his head in protest. “If that’s how you want to look at it, but let’s be honest, Mr. Holmes, no one was on the roof but me, and the prints in the dirt and muck up there prove that. In whatever manner Mr. Erdley met his end, it did not come by the roof.”
“One last question, if I may. Did you happen at any point see Mr. Erdley the younger on his similar patrol on the street below?”
“I saw him once or twice, each time it was in the same place. He was ‘bout halfway down the street from the front entrance, leaning up against a gaslight reading.”
“Letter or book?”
Archer thought a moment. “Couldn’t say for certain because I really wasn’t paying much attention to him, but if I was forced to guess I’d say it looked like a letter.”
“Thank you, that will be all. Could you please have the older Erdley brother come in next?”
Archer nodded, rose from his seat, and left the room in quickstep, a mixture of fear and relief awash on his face.
“What do you make of him?” I asked in a hushed tone in the interim.
“Incompetent. That is all I will say at present, but the list of adjectives may yet grow.”
Next was Jack Erdley. He was a tall, muscular young man with short brown hair and a mustache. He looked tired and forlorn with thick red welts about both eyes. He took his seat across from Holmes and sighed heavily.
Holmes started things off. “I won’t take up too much of your time, Mr. Erdley. I am sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you,” he replied with a sniffle.
“You are the one who found your father, is that correct?”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Holmes. When my father would not rouse and unlock the door, I went and fetched another key from the desk clerk.”
The man had a crisp, baritone voice with no French roll of the R’s; he had a distinctly British tone. For one born and raised in France, I would have expected a more French dialect. I relayed that thought aloud.
“My mother,” he replied, “was from Birmingham and didn’t care much for the French language or lifestyle. We only spoke it when we had to and never at home. Though not fluent, I do speak it well when the need arises.”
Shooting me an agitated look, Holmes regained his foothold in the questioning and went on, “So you knew where to find the extra key?”
“I knew to whom I should go for the extra key, not where it was located.”
“I have been told that your father could be rather—short with you. Is that a correct assessment of your relationship?”
“If you are asking if my father could be cross with me, the answer would be yes. What good father wouldn’t be? I am in line to take over a rather large company with many people relying on its proper running for their livelihood, and there have been times where my immaturity has gotten the better of me. I am grateful that I had a father who corrected my errors. I am a better man for it. But let me say this, Mr. Holmes, it was never done maliciously, and I never took it as such. He was a good man and a good father. Better than most.”
Holmes bowed his head slightly. “I apologize for the unintended implication.” Then, with brow askew, Holmes added, “Would your younger brother feel the same way?”
Jack Erdley squirmed uncomfortably in his seat. “You will have to ask him that question yourself. I am not my brother’s keeper.”
“And I shall, shortly. That is all for now. Thank you. Could you ask the constable who was on duty before you to come in next, please?”
“He seemed very upset about his father,” said I. “Despite the public remonstrations of the lad, I would wager they were very close. I highly doubt it was him.”
He gave me a
wry smile and said, “That is why I like having you with me, Watson. “You always point me to the right path by your wrong deductions.”
“Do you honestly think it was him?”
“I think I shall keep my intimations to myself at present. I haven’t yet spoken to all who need spoken to. It is possible my theory may change between now and then.”
The next man in was Constable Jones. He was a middle-aged, barrel-chested man with a close-shaved head and whiskers. His blue eyes and wide smile made him out to be a cheerful fellow as he greeted us and sat in the chair across from Holmes.
Holmes started, “Constable, you had the first shift which began about ten last evening, correct?”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Holmes. It was 10:12 by my pocket watch. Mr. Erdley, after some mumblings about a big waste of time, closed and locked the door. I even checked it after I heard the lock engage.” He looked over at me and with a stern nod said, “I take my job seriously, I do.”
“Not serious—"
“And your help in this matter is greatly appreciated, both in your duty last night and now,” I remarked loudly, cutting off what was sure to be a sarcastic rebuttal by Holmes.
I scowled at Holmes when the constable looked away.
My friend proceeded. “You stayed for only part of your shift before being replaced by the older Erdley brother, yet everyone else had an all-night shift. Why would that be?”
“I was asked to stay the whole night, but the older Erdley boy offered to split the night with me, as my wife is expecting our first, and she is due soon. I know what you must be thinking with me at my age being a father for the first time, but my wife is a bit younger than me, and we’ve been trying with no luck for a long time. God finally smiled on us, and I’ll take a son at any age.” He then knocked on the wood of the chair, I assumed for luck. He continued, “Little George Erdley, who’d been walking up and down the street, came up and told me that he stopped a man on the street who was coming to get me, for my wife was in labor. He told me he would fetch his brother to finish the watch, and I was to go.”
