Stone Cold

by Andrew Lane

  ‘Ah, Russia. I too have been there. A fascinating country, but the local population seems to have so little imagination. All of their books are t-t-turgidly long t-t-tomes about what people do and say from day to day.’ He shrugged. ‘It is interesting to compare their literature with their folklore. Look at the legend of Baba Yaga, for instance. An old witch who lives in a hut that stands on chicken legs! What whimsy! Why do we not have anything like that in British folklore?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Sherlock thought for a moment. ‘Perhaps there is a correlation between the harshness of people’s lives and the stories they tell each other at night. In Britain our lives are generally pretty pleasant, but in Russia the winters can be harsh and the food scarce.’ He had said all that off the top of his head, without thinking it through, but he made a mental note to come back to that thought. Perhaps he could write an essay about it, or something similar.

  ‘An interesting point, and possibly a valid one,’ Dodgson said. ‘But we digress from the point of your visit. You wish to study m-m-mathematics here at Cambridge.’ It was more of a statement than a question.

  ‘Ye-es,’ Sherlock said, hoping that Dodgson had not noticed the hesitation.

  ‘And you have missed some schooling recently, for reasons that your brother is hesitant to describe.’

  ‘That is so.’

  ‘And, given those two postulates, the conclusion is that your brother wishes me to prepare you for the rigours of university life by tutoring you privately for a period of time, until I feel you are ready.’

  ‘That,’ Sherlock said carefully, ‘is, I believe, my brother’s intent.’

  ‘Very well. Can I presume that you have studied at least a little m-m-mathematics during your incomplete schooling?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘What can you remember? Did you, for instance, study Euclid’s Elements? Can you tell me what Euclid’s five basic n-n-notions are?’

  Sherlock thought for a moment. ‘Firstly, that things which are equal to the same thing are also equal to one another.’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘Secondly, that if equals are added to equals, then the wholes are equal.’

  ‘Also correct.’

  ‘Thirdly, if equals are subtracted from equals, then the remainders are equal.’

  ‘Without doubt.’

  ‘Fourthly, that things which coincide with one another are equal to one another.’

  ‘Spot on!’

  ‘And fifthly, that the whole is greater than the part.’

  Dodgson clapped his hands together. ‘Ideal. You have them in a n-n-nutshell. From Euclid’s basic propositions and notions, of course, the whole of m-m-mathematics can be constructed, theorem by painstaking theorem.’ He threw his head back and stared at the ceiling. ‘It is a fine subject, m-m-mathematics. God’s universe is described in the language of numbers, just as Rembrandt’s universe is described by the colours of the oil paints on his palette and Mozart’s by the vibrations of air that we call musical notes.’ He paused, thin fingers steepled beneath his chin. ‘Let us see how far your mathematical knowledge extends. Tell me, young Sherlock, what is the next n-n-number in this sequence: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16 . . . ?’

  ‘32,’ Sherlock said immediately. ‘Each number is double the one before it.’

  ‘Of course. Elementary, in fact. What, then, is the next number in this sequence: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 . . . ?’

  Sherlock thought for a moment.

  ‘There is p-p-paper and a pen on the table beside you, should you require them.’

  ‘No need.’ Sherlock considered the numbers, both in relation to the ones before them and the ones after them. The numbers increased each time, suggesting some kind of additive process, and –

  ‘Each number is the sum of the two numbers that precede it,’ he said triumphantly, the words coming out of his mouth a split second after the answer had arrived in his brain.

  ‘Just so. That is a very interesting set of numbers known as the Fibonacci sequence. It was first described by the mathematician Leonardo of Pisa, also known as Fibonacci, over five hundred and fifty years ago, although an Indian student of mine here at Christ College tells me that the sequence has been known in Indian mathematics for a great deal longer.’ He appeared to be talking to himself now, more than to Sherlock, and his stammer had disappeared. ‘I must try and find out as much as I can about the Indian poets and philosophers Pingala, Virahanka and Gopala. I suspect I may have to learn Sanskrit, although this college is probably as good a place to do that as anywhere else.’

  ‘That Indian student – is his name Mathukumal Vijayaraghavan, by any chance?’

  ‘You k-k-know him?’

  ‘We are boarding at the same establishment.’

  ‘Ah.’ Dodgson thought for a moment. ‘What about the following sequence: 1, 5, 12, 22, 35, 51, 70, 92, 117, 145 . . . ?’

  Sherlock mulled the numbers over in his head for a few moments. There was no obvious link – the numbers weren’t squares, or cubes, or multiples, or anything simple. Eventually, and with a looming sense of impending defeat, he took the paper and pencil from the table and scrawled the numbers down, then scribbled various possibilities around. Eventually, however, he had to admit defeat.

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t work it out.’

  ‘No shame in that. What if I t-t-told you that the fact the second number is a 5 is important?’

  Sherlock considered for a moment, then shook his head. ‘Still no.’

  ‘Very well. I will see you . . .’ he considered for a moment, ‘every Monday, Wednesday and Friday between the hours of ten o’clock and twelve o’clock. Tea and b-b-biscuits to be provided by you.’

  ‘That would be . . . fine.’ Sherlock stared at Dodgson for a moment. ‘What is the next number in the sequence?’

  ‘I will let you tell me. It will give you something to think about between now and the next time we meet.’

  Sherlock sensed that the discussion was at an end. He was about to get up and make his farewell when Dodgson said, ‘Your brother – I haven’t seen him for a good few years now. Well, they have been a good few years for me. I trust they have been good for him as well. How is his character nowadays? Does he still take offence easily? Does he hate to be teased?’

  ‘He can be rather . . . prickly,’ Sherlock conceded.

  ‘Yes, I was afraid of that.’ He frowned.

  Sherlock wondered what exactly Dodgson’s question was about. It seemed to be bothering the mathematician quite a bit. Suddenly he remembered what his brother had told him, about Dodgson writing children’s books under the pen name Lewis Carroll. ‘Are you proposing to put my brother in one of your books as a character?’ he said, feeling a sudden elation. ‘What a marvellous idea!’

  Dodgson looked guilty. ‘I have been thinking about it,’ he confessed. ‘Obviously your brother told you about my first book – Alice’s Adventures Under Ground. It has done tolerably well, and I am considering a sequel, of sorts. Alice’s c-c-continuing adventures, as it were. I have been telling the story piecemeal to the daughters of some friends, and the character of Humpty Dumpty has appeared in it – from where I do not know. You are familiar with the nursery rhyme?’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘It was only when I received your brother’s letter asking me to take you under my wing that I suddenly realized, to my eternal shame and horror, that I appeared to have put M-M-Mycroft into my story as Humpty Dumpty!’

  Sherlock had to stifle a laugh. ‘Based on his . . . size?’ he asked.

  Dodgson nodded. ‘Is he still . . . ?’

  ‘More than ever,’ Sherlock confirmed.

  ‘That is not the whole of it,’ Dodgson admitted. ‘The character of Humpty Dumpty – haughty, rather argumentative, a pedant – that is how I remember your brother being.’ He smiled. ‘Not that it was a problem when he was here. I had, and always will have, the greatest respect for Mycroft. I am not, however, blind to his foibles.’ A pause. ‘Do you think he will
mind?’ he asked plaintively.

  Sherlock thought for a moment. ‘As long as the character is not obviously him,’ he said eventually, ‘I think he would be flattered. He would not, however, wish to be recognized, especially by those who do not know him very well.’

  ‘Then I will plough on with the telling, and the writing, and send him a copy when it is finished, inscribed to the man who inspired the most majestic character in the whole book.’

  ‘I think he would like that.’

  ‘Then I think our business here is done, young man,’ Dodgson said, clapping his hands together and springing to his feet. ‘Now, if you will forgive me, I have a rook to bead, and you must be going. I will see you in two days at the appointed time. Don’t forget the tea and biscuits.’

  Sherlock stared at him for a few moments. Was Dodgson serious or not? ‘If I bring the tea as leaves,’ he asked, as if this was the most ordinary conversation in the world, ‘and the biscuits in a bag, would you be able to work with them? It’s just I’m not sure I can carry a tray with a pot and a plate all the way here, and the tea would probably get cold.’

  ‘By all means bring the elements,’ Dodgson replied, ‘and we shall construct the final proposition together.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Sherlock said, baffled but also intrigued about what lay in store during his course in mathematics. He had a feeling that, at the very least, he wasn’t going to be bored.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Sherlock spent the rest of the day walking around Oxford and its environs, familiarizing himself with the town. The sun was shining, making the light-coloured stone from which the various colleges were constructed seem to glow in the ruddy afternoon light.

  Sherlock never liked being in a place where he didn’t know what was down the street or around the corner. Wherever he went, he had to know the local geography. He even bought a street map from a shop in the town and checked it as he walked, so that he learned the names of the areas through which he was passing.

  While he wandered, he turned over and over in his mind the conversation he had engaged in with Charles Dodgson. The man had a very eccentric mind – that much was clear – but he had to be an able mathematician and logician, otherwise the University authorities would not let him lecture. They obviously turned a blind eye to the odder side of his personality. Sherlock wondered how much of that odder side was deliberate affectation.

  It occurred to him that there were other things that he wanted to talk to Dodgson about, but that he had forgotten to mention. There was the question of how Dodgson could balance his serious mathematical work with his writing of books for children, for a start. There were a lot of things Sherlock wanted to know about his brother’s early life too, when he was at Oxford. There was also the question of the thefts of body parts that had come up over dinner the previous night. Sherlock remembered Reginald Musgrave saying that Dodgson had been questioned about the matter, and he desperately wanted to get more facts from the man. Why body parts? How had they been stolen? Where had they gone? Sherlock found that, as he walked, his brain was turning more and more to these unanswered questions.

  He knew what he was doing, of course. He was looking for a mystery. Over the past two years he had been confronted by several of them, seemingly insoluble ones, and he was getting a taste for thinking his way through a maze of conflicting evidence and impossibilities to find the truth within. Maybe this was another one.

  Acting on the thought, Sherlock asked a couple of passing locals where the mortuary was. He wasn’t sure why – he had no actual plans of going there – but he was interested to know. The first two people he asked – ladies doing their shopping – looked at him strangely and just carried on walking. Perhaps they thought it strange that a boy was asking about something as macabre as a place where bodies were stored. The third person – a burly, whiskered man in a waistcoat that was too small for him, muttered, ‘Students!’ and walked away. Fortunately the fourth person – a businessman in bowler hat and suit – told him. It wasn’t far away – part of the local hospital. He filed the location in his brain in case he ever needed it and continued on with his explorations of the town.

  At one point he passed by a building that, according to the sign outside, was the place where the local newspaper was compiled, printed and distributed. He had discovered before that local newspapers were valuable resources of information, and equally valuable ways of getting messages out quickly to a large number of people. He had no intention of ever having to do that again, but then, he had never had any intention of doing it before, but that hadn’t stopped it from being necessary in the past.

  He grabbed lunch from a stall outside a tavern and kept on going, hitching lifts on hay-wains and carts so that he could get farther out into the surrounding countryside. By dinnertime he had seen outlying villages such as Jericho and Sunnymede, Wolvercote and Cowley, and in his head he had a more or less complete map of the whole area.

  Towards dusk, as he was thinking of getting back to Mrs McCrery’s lodging house to be ready for dinner, he found himself walking past a long brick wall. He was somewhere near the canal: he could smell the water and hear the voices of the bargemen as they called to one another. The wall was about ten feet high, and halfway along it was a set of gates. He was walking at this point, waiting for a passing cart that could take him back to the centre of Oxford, and he slowed down momentarily to look through the gates.

  He saw something that he had seen before, but from a different direction.

  It was the house that he and Matty had seen when they were on Matty’s barge, heading into Oxford. He could only see a corner of it from the gate, but he knew instantly, instinctively, that it was the same place. His heart felt as if it lurched inside his chest as he looked at it, and he had the oddest urge to put his head on one side and squint in order to make sense of the construction of the house.

  Even though he could only see a fraction of the place, it still appeared as if the various lines and angles that made it up didn’t make any sense. He was reminded of the conversation he’d had with Charles Dodgson about the elements of Euclid. According to Euclidian geometry the interior angles of a triangle always added up to 180 degrees, but looking at the house Sherlock wondered if there was another kind of geometry entirely, one in which the angles of a triangle added up to less than, or more than, that, and in which parallel lines could actually meet at some distant point. The house gave the impression of being skewed, as if a giant hand had taken it and twisted it slightly, so that everything was out of true.

  Despite the warmth of the day, he suddenly felt cold. He shivered. This was not logical. This was not right. Buildings couldn’t inspire feelings like this, surely. They were just stone and brick and plaster and lathe. They couldn’t inspire dread in the way that this building did. He was obviously hungry, and this was making him dizzy. Either that or the sun had caused a slight case of sunstroke.

  A clattering behind him made him turn expectantly. If this was a cart heading for Oxford then he could ask for a ride. He could lie back and rest, and hopefully be more like himself when he got back to Mrs McCrery’s. Once he had some food inside him, he would be fine.

  It wasn’t a cart; it was a carriage, constructed from black-painted wood and pulled by two entirely black horses. The driver was dressed in black as well: not just his clothes, but his broad-brimmed hat and the kerchief which was tied over the lower part of his face. Only his eyes could be seen, and in the late-afternoon sun they looked black too.

  The carriage slowed as it approached the gates. Sherlock stepped out of the way, on to the grass verge. The gates opened, apparently by themselves, as Sherlock couldn’t see any evidence of anyone pulling them. The horses turned into the gateway, and the carriage began to follow. Sherlock looked up into the window, and froze.

  All he could see inside the carriage was a hand, resting on the lower part of the window frame. The hand was large and pale, and a crimson scar ran around its wrist. Other scars, also a livid
red, ran around the bases of the fingers, where they joined the palm. A further scar ran up the arm, away from the wrist and into the darkness inside the carriage. All of the scars bore evidence of having been stitched at some time in the past.

  And somehow Sherlock knew that he was being watched from inside the carriage by eyes that regarded him with interest but no emotion. Cold, empty eyes.

  The whole incident took just a moment to play out, and then the carriage had passed him by and the gates were closing again. Sherlock stared after it, trying to work out what had just happened. The house might cause strange feelings of panic within him, and whoever lived there seemed to have the same effect. The owner and the property were perfectly matched.

  He half walked and half ran along the wall to the corner, where the road went one way and the wall went off at a right angle – or maybe something that was close to a right angle but not exact. Sherlock headed away from the house, along the road, and felt a weight gradually lift from his mind.

  What was that place?

  Twenty minutes later a cart came along, and he hitched a lift back to Oxford with the farmer who was driving. Several times along the way Sherlock tried to ask the man about the house that he must have passed, but each time the words caught in his throat. He just didn’t want to raise the subject.

  After twenty minutes of silence, it was the driver himself who spoke first. ‘You ought to be careful, wandering around them woods.’

  ‘Why is that?’ Sherlock asked, thinking that the man was going to raise the subject of the strange house himself. Instead he said, ‘Folks are saying there’s some kind of creature wandering around. I don’t give it much credence myself, but other people say they’ve seen it – some godless thing that’s been made out of bits of dead bodies, all sewn together. They even wrote to the local newspaper about it, but nothing happened. Like I say, I’ve never seen anything, but I still wouldn’t wander around them woods by myself. You never know.’

  ‘I’ll be careful,’ Sherlock said. He remembered the man he’d seen in the carriage that had driven into the strange house. His wrists had been marked with scars. Had someone glimpsed him in the shadows and drawn the wrong conclusion? ‘Thanks for the warning.’