In reply, Hedley swung himself up and onto the seat of his cab. He turned the vehicle and touched the horse with his whip. “Gib nowt... gan on,” he called and the animal drew the hansom out into the lane and rapidly away from us.
Miss Nugent and I turned and made our way back to Holmes’s hansom. I helped her into her seat just as Holmes came back.
“Surely you noticed his use of Northumbrian words, Mr. Holmes,” Miss Nugent said, quietly. “I’ve lived and worked in Northumberland for the past four years, and I’m fairly certain that man is a native speaker. He told his horse not to be shy of the traffic, but go straight into it.”
“I noted his use of the language,” Holmes replied. “But I hadn’t understood it.” Ordinarily he maintained a doubtful opinion of women in general, but this one he regarded with something approaching approval. “There are possibilities about you, my dear Miss Nugent. I’m in your debt.” Holmes, closed the door and climbed back on the sprung, then turned the hansom toward Baker Street. Only once did we slow, as we crossed the Holland Road. Looking along it, I could see Lestrade with four or five of his men. They appeared to be inspecting ditches. I heard Sherlock Holmes chortle.
* * *
I never learned where Holmes had obtained the hansom and the driver’s clothes, or to whom he returned them. Forty minutes after he dropped us off at 221b Baker Street, he came back on foot. Miss Nugent was by this time resting in Mrs. Hudson’s rooms downstairs, so I seized the opportunity to speak with my friend privately. “Where does the investigation go from here?” I asked him. “And please do not say ‘to Northumberland’. I’ve no desire to travel any more to-day.”
“I’ve no desire to go there either,” he replied with a smile. Holmes settled himself before the test tubes and retorts that lay neglected on the deal table. It was his habit to dabble in chemical experiments in order to concentrate not just compounds, but his thoughts, as well. “I haven’t been further than Yorkshire in this matter, and I don’t care a plug about Northumberland. Still, it’s curious, isn’t it? Two amateurs produce a remarkable expansion to previous dictionaries of Northumbrian words. The man to whom they offer it admits he is ‘desperate’ to have their manuscript and ‘angry’ when they withhold it. The fellow they engage to drive the manuscript through London’s streets seemingly originates from that same remote district - or at least speaks the Northumbrian language. And a young woman under our very roof is recently arrived from the area, where she’s acquired at least some familiarity with the native tongue.”
“Surely you aren’t suggesting that Miss Nugent - ?”
“Of course not,” he cut in. “She is one of the most delightful young ladies I ever met. And she’s proven herself useful. Witness her prompt assistance at the station.”
“Quick intelligence is one of her several attractions,” I admitted. I saw him regarding me over a beaker half-full of some dark, noxious fluid. “It’s too soon for me to form another attachment,” I replied to his unspoken question.
“It’s been almost a year since Mary died.”
“As I said, it’s too soon.” I sought to steer the conversation back to the missing book. “What will you do next? Pay a visit to our elderly clients? Talk with Lestrade?” It was at this moment that his experiment produced a muffled report, followed by a cloud of thick gray smoke that filled the corner of our sitting room.
“Next?” his voice emerged from the hazy fumes. “Next I suppose I must clean this table, before Mrs. Hudson sees it.”
An hour later he was out the door. I joined Mrs. Hudson and Miss Nugent for a late luncheon, then left on a few errands of my own. Outside a tobacconist in Portland Street, I was greeted by an old patient who invited me to come round for dinner the next week. Near the telegraph office in Plymouth Road, I bought an afternoon newspaper. On attaining the Marylebone Road, I looked in at a bakery, where I arranged for a box of small cakes to be sent round to Mrs. Hudson. I had just stepped into a break in the traffic to cross the street and go home when a hansom cab, hurtling past, nearly knocked me down! I could not swear to it, but the cabbie bore more than a passing resemblance to Hedley, the driver of the manuscript! Had I not been so shaken by this encounter, I might have had the wits to hire a second cab and follow him. As it was, he took advantage of my unsettled state and disappeared around a corner.
Holmes came back in the late afternoon, and I could see by his set features that the mission he’d undertaken was not fruitful. “I called at Earls Court, and then in Bayswater,” he told me. “Neither Bourne Forster nor Dyvelstone was at home. Their landladies report they are in and out of London with some regularity, which supports the notion that their work requires travel.” Bourne Forster’s landlady provided dates when her lodger was away, and she gave Holmes the document box, which he brought to show me. It was polished mahogany, with a simple swing-hook clasp that appeared to fit snugly. He opened it to reveal a plain lining of purple cloth. To our regret, there was no false bottom, nor any other secret compartment where the manuscript might have lain overlooked.
I told Holmes of my experience with the hansom, and my suspicions that it was Hedley who’d held the reins. My friend settled into his chair with a whisky in hand and gazed long into our cheerful little fire. “What a very singular case this is, Watson,” he commented. “It has attributes in common with other criminal adventures, notably that of Baron Tischler’s distinctive traveling trunk some five or six years past. There are some crucial distinctions, naturally. Yet it’s instructive to recall that misdeeds sometimes have a family resemblance.” He stretched his long legs toward the dancing flames. “I expect to have a solution for you and your eager readers after breakfast tomorrow.”
“After breakfast?”
“Anyway, I’ve left word for our distinguished ‘dictionareers’ to call on us then.”
* * *
At precisely 9:55 the next morning, Holmes and I awaited our guests. Presently we heard the bell downstairs. Mrs. Hudson brought Dyvelstone and Bourne Forster into our sitting room. As we exchanged greetings with the two aggrieved scholars, the bell sounded again. Our friend Lestrade joined the little party, still holding Holmes’s telegram summoning him to Baker Street. “I have better things to do,” the inspector objected, “without sitting in your audience applauding on command.”
“I’m glad you’ve arrived,” Holmes told him. “Perhaps you’ll entertain us with a report of the state of ditches along the Holland Road, hmm?” The little inspector reddened. A moment later, Miss Nugent slipped in and I offered her my chair. We heard the bell again, and Professor Skeat was shown in. The last to enter was Hedley, his hat in his hands and a look of unease on his face. Sherlock Holmes assumed a position in the center of the room.
“The facts of the case are simple, though sprightly,” he began. “A manuscript box travels from Earls Court to Bayswater by hansom. Two days later, it is returned by means of the same hansom from Bayswater to Earls Court. When opened in Earls Court, the box is empty. A valuable, handwritten dictionary - coveted by an admittedly ‘desperate’ expert in philology - an authority who had beleaguered the book’s compilers to the point of their severing ties with him - is missing. The English Dialect Society’s national dictionary project is idled.
“Attention next centers on the hansom driver, Tom Hedley. In all London, how many cabbies do you suppose are Geordies who command their horses in the Northumbrian dialect? For her assistance, I owe thanks to Miss Jane Nugent.” The lady smiled in acknowledgement.
“Yet desperation and dialect do not criminals make,” Holmes continued. “Isn’t that right, Lestrade?”
“I know that,” the little inspector agreed, testily. “I represent the professional police force. That’s why these men consulted me in the first place.”
“Yes, they gave you the benefit of the doubt,” Holmes replied with a bow. “Then they came to see me.” Lestrade bri
stled at this, but said nothing.
“Professor Skeat was exceedingly anxious to obtain the manuscript,” Holmes continued, turning to the venerable old man. “You described for Watson and me your determination to complete your Society’s county-by-county survey of British languages, a series that lacks only the Northumbrian word book. You spoke of your own ties to Northumberland, and of your ‘black’ desperation when Dyvelstone and Bourne Forster would not agree to terms. You were quite angry. While their book would certainly reflect well on the Society, in truth its publication would be the final diamond in the crown of your own career. You have a motive.”
“What are you insinuating?” Skeat’s face was flushed with irritation. “I am a gentleman and a scholar, not a thief!”
Holmes exchanged a long stare with the professor while I held my breath. I freely admit I was very much in the dark. Abruptly, Holmes swung to face another man.
“You, Tom Hedley!” he ejaculated, and Hedley jumped in his seat. “There is this fact: No one had more opportunity than you to make off with the manuscript. You were alone with the thing on two occasions.”
Hedley stood uncertainly and faced Holmes. He responded in English, but with an accent that was at times impenetrable, often slipping into the fulsome Northumbrian vernacular. Fortunately, there were decipherers in our midst. Miss Nugent translated, and we were able to understand the cabbie’s statement. “I only did as I was told,” he informed us. “I took the box to Mr. Dyvelstone, and two days later I brought it back to Mr. Bourne Forster. I never touched it; these gentlemen did that themselves.” He maintained he’d never seen a manuscript, and even if he had, he could never understand it. “I don’t know how to read, sir,” he told Holmes with simple dignity.
Holmes patted Hedley’s shoulder. “Despite your having a chance to take the thing, you were never really a suspect. Other cabbies have vouched for your honesty, and Bourne Forster and Dyvelstone both told me, the first time they were here, that you were to be trusted.”
“Just a minute!” Indignation overpowered any civility I could lay claim to. I pointed at Hedley. “He tried to run me down in the street!”
“No, Dr. Watson,” Hedley said, this time courtesy of Professor Skeat’s translation. “It may have appeared so, but I only moved my hansom between you and a thug who was about to lob a cobblestone at your head.”
“At my head?” This was unexpected.
“That’s right,” said Holmes. “Thrown by someone who worried I was getting uncomfortably close to unmasking him. He sought to warn me off the problem by attacking my biographer.”
“Then I can only apologize,” I mumbled, “and thank you very sincerely, Tom.”
“Had they hurt you, Watson, they would have got out of London only after a long stay in jail,” Holmes said quietly. Most people know him for his great brain; I have the privilege of also being acquainted with Holmes’s great heart. I’d have risked any injury to live up to the words - and the esteem - of my friend.
“We play with the last pieces of the puzzle.” Holmes continued. “For if Tom Hedley didn’t steal it... if Professor Skeat remains very eager to have it... if Lestrade couldn’t find it... where is the manuscript? And who would attack Watson to warn me to step down from the case?”
He stood and slowly walked to his desk, where the mahogany box lay. “Consider the manuscript, that rare and irreplaceable book which would greatly expand our knowledge of Northumberland’s distinctive dialect,” he said. “The dictionary represented the fruit of many years’ labour for Mr. Dyvelstone and Mr. Bourne Forster. As Professor Skeat told me, such effort is urgent and sorely needed. How did the dictionary disappear from the hansom?”
“Well, how?” the impatient Lestrade wondered aloud.
“Elementary, my dear inspector. It never was in the hansom in the first place.”
“But Mr. Holmes,” Hedley protested, with the assistance of Miss Nugent. “That is the box I took back and forth between these two men. I recognize it.”
Holmes shrugged. “This box was your passenger, yes, but I’m certain you neither saw, nor conveyed, a dictionary. The box was empty. Dyvelstone and Bourne Forster effected a hoax.”
Disbelief rippled through the room. Dyvelstone struggled to his feet, then, to our astonishment, he fainted. Bourne Forster, pale and shaken, looked as though he might slump beside his friend. Miss Nugent and I looked after them. When they were sensible once more, Holmes went on.
“I can say with some degree of certainty that my clients did not intend malice,” he began. “I don’t doubt they traveled to Northumberland on some dozen or more occasions. Their landladies confirm they were away for extended periods with some regularity. Those trips coincided with letters they sent to Professor Skeat. I examined the envelopes, noted the postmarked dates, and saw for myself they were mailed from villages throughout Northumberland. Dyvelstone and Bourne Forster maintained a correspondence with the professor for several years as they collected local words. They have a demonstrable familiarity with the Northumbrian dialect. Watson and I heard them scolding Lestrade with Northumbrian words a few days ago. Furthermore, when Professor Skeat tried out some of his childhood Northumbrian on them, he reported they were ‘thunderstruck’. In order for that to be so, they must first comprehend what he’s said.
“The figure of twelve-hundred words that were overlooked by everyone else - including the eminent Brockett - strikes me as being overly hopeful... one might even say far-fetched,” Holmes continued “As I said at the outset, I am quite certain my clients didn’t plan any harm. It is my belief they were swept along by their own enthusiasm for their hobby. It was only when they began to brag and boast that they found themselves dangerously exposed. Shame and ridicule lay ahead. While they no doubt collected some words, the total fell short of the figure they gave Skeat. No one has actually seen their dictionary, though the new words will likely be found scribbled in a notebook in one of their rooms.”
“I fear it’s true,” a now downcast Dyvelstone said. “We hoped to add to Brockett’s work, and we did, in one sense. We found some words he missed. But we never approached anything to match our claims. When Professor Skeat pressed us for the dictionary, we panicked. I dreamt up hiring Tom to carry the empty box.”
“If we could convince the Society that our dictionary was lost or stolen, we would be sympathetic figures, never connected to fraud,” Bourne Forster admitted, sadly.
“When you engaged Lestrade, he hesitated. You decided to consult a second detective, one who, like yourselves, is an amateur. And so you came to me,” Holmes said. “Then you did something really wrong. Lestrade will determine whether it is actionable or not, though I suspect it must be. You implicated two innocent men, suggesting that Professor Skeat, or Tom Hedley, was behind the dictionary’s disappearance.”
“I am sorry,” Dyvelstone said.
“Which one of you tried to throw the cobblestone at Watson?”
Bourne Forster half-raised his hand. “I’m sorry, too, Mr. Holmes, and I am very sorry, Dr. Watson.”
“Well... I knew it all along,” Lestrade assured us in a bored tone.
“Of course you did,” Holmes said with an indulgent smile. “After all, you represent the official force.”
* * *
That evening, Jane Nugent returned by train to her elderly employer near Newcastle. She was happy there, she told me, and couldn’t imagine any other life for herself. She assured me, however, that she very much enjoyed the excitement she found in London, and she thanked Holmes and me for including her in this latest case. I wished her well. Once we’d said our good-byes, I decided that Mrs. Hudson was right. I’m nearly ready to contemplate my future.
Lestrade arrested the hoaxers, then released them the next day. He informed us that Dyvelstone and Bourne Forster ought to have seen a few weeks’ hard labour for the trouble to which they’d
put everyone, but for the intervention of Professor Skeat. The old linguist was finally allowed to look over the notes our clients had compiled on their trips to the North. Though not nearly the twelve hundred they’d bragged about, there were still almost three hundred previously uncollected words and phrases. If this seemingly fell short, it was still deemed an accomplishment. The would-be wordsmen quickly agreed to terms with the English Dialect Society, whose committee published their dictionary in the form of a supplement to Brockett’s earlier work. Publication of this volume concluded its mission, and the Society disbanded. A week later, Skeat announced his retirement.
The bit of brainwork completed, Sherlock Holmes fell into his timeworn pattern, vacillating between the violin and the threat of the hypodermic syringe. “Bring me problems, bring me work, bring me mental exaltation,” was his cry. “I’m through with lighter amusements.” His pleas would soon be answered. I am always ready to help him and to bring his exploits - amusing or otherwise - before the public, no matter how “regrettable” my friend considers these “stories” to be.
The Fairy Hills Horror
by Geri Schear
Of all the cases my friend Mr. Sherlock Holmes handled, the one that caused me the greatest distress was the Addleton tragedy. For many years, I could not write about it, and I find my notes on those events singularly sparse. However, I think it will continue to haunt me until I set it down.
It was an unseasonably cold and damp August morning a few months after my friend had returned to London after his long absence. I had moved back into our Baker Street apartments and we two old campaigners had once again settled into the comfort of our former friendship. I came down to breakfast that morning to see my friend scouring the newspapers. An assortment of broadsheets lay strewn around the room with Sherlock Holmes sitting in their midst.
The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories - Part IX Page 37
