Murder Most Merry

by ed. Abigail Browining

  Sure, thought Charlie. “It’s not the end of the world, J,” he said. “Maybe next year.”

  “No, Charlie, that’s not all. With our losses and the cost of moving—I don’t know how to tell you this, but we’re doing something else. We’re cutting back—some of our best people. I’ve never had to do anything like that in my life.”

  You bastard, Charlie thought. “Go on, J,” he said. “I think I know what you’re going to say.”

  J looked at him miserably. “You’re one of the people we’ll have to lose, Charlie. Wait a minute, please hear me out—it’s nothing personal. I wanted to save you. After all, we’ve been together fifteen years. I talked and talked. I even threatened to resign myself. But no one wanted to listen.”

  Sure, Charlie thought.

  “They said you hadn’t produced anything worthwhile in years. And there was the business of those two crazies you hired. And—”

  “Is that it?” Charlie asked.

  “Don’t get me wrong, Charlie. Please, let’s do the Christmas party as we planned, just as if nothing happened. As for leaving, take your time. I got you a year’s severance. And you can use your office to make calls, look around, and—”

  “No problem, J.” Charlie was moving to the door. “I understand. And don’t worry about the party. Everything’s all taken care of.”

  Not even a handshake.

  Many people at some time or other have fantasized about killing the boss. In Charlie’s case, it was different. From the minute he heard the bad news from J, he became a changed man. Not outwardly, of course. He wasn’t about to become an overnight monster, buy a gun, make a bomb, sharpen an axe. No, he would be the same Charlie Evanston. Friendly. Smiling. Efficient. But now that he knew the worst, he began piling up all the long-suppressed injustices he had collected from J for fifteen years. The conversations that stopped abruptly when he entered an executive meeting. The intimate dinners at J’s that he and his wife were never invited to. The countless other little slights. And. finally, this.

  December 20. Party time! Everyone agreed it was the best bash French & Saunders had ever thrown.

  The day was fair and warm. The milling crowds that drifted from the well stocked bars and refreshment tables didn’t even notice there wasn’t a heating system. The lack of carpets, the wide-open window spaces, the empty offices—it all added to the fun.

  Carefully groomed waiters in white gloves and hard hats pressed their way from room to room, carrying silver trays laden with drinks and hors d’oeuvres. A heavy metal band blared somewhere. A troupe of strolling violinists pressed in and out. From the happy faces, laughter, and noise, you’d never know the agency had a care in the world.

  But Charlie Evanston knew. He pushed his way over to a small crowd pressing around J. All of them were drunk, or on the way, and J. drink in hand, was swaying slightly. His laugh was louder than anybody’s whenever one of the clients told a funny story. He spotted Charlie and shouted to him. “Charlie, c’mere a minute! Folks, you all know my old pal Charlie Evanston. We’ve been together since this place opened its doors. He’s the guy who put this whole great party together.”

  There were murmurs of approval as J drew Charlie into his embrace.

  “J.” Charlie said, “I just came to ask you to come over here and let me show you something.”

  “Oh, Charlie, always business. Can’t it wait till next week? After the holidays?”

  “No, I think it’s important. Please come over here. Let me show you.”

  “Oh, for Chrissakes, Charlie. What is it?”

  “Just follow me. Won’t take long.”

  J pulled away from the group with a back-in-a-minute wave of his hand and followed Charlie down a narrow hall to a room that would one day become the heart of the agency’s computer operation.

  It was empty. Even the floors hadn’t been finished. Just some wooden planks, a few steel beams—and the sidewalk below. J glanced around the room and turned to Charlie. “So? What’s the problem?”

  “Don’t you get it, J? There isn’t a single Keep Out sign on that outside door. The workmen even forgot to lock it. Someone could walk in here and fall straight down to Broadway!”

  “Oh, come on, Charlie, this place is off the beaten path—no one’s going to be coming this way. Stop worrying.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “No buts, Charlie. Just tell one of the security guards. My God, you drag me all the way out here just to see this. Jesus Christ, I’ll bet I could even walk across one of these steel beams. The workmen do it every day.”

  It was uncanny. Charlie knew that was exactly what J would say. It was part of the macho, daredevil reputation he had cultivated so carefully. “Hey, wait a minute, J,” he said.

  “No. Serious. Watch me walk across this beam right here. It can’t be more than twenty feet long. And I’ll do it with a drink in each hand.”

  “Come on, J, don’t be crazy.”

  But J had already taken his first tentative step on the beam—with Charlie directly behind him.

  It was all so simple. Now all Charlie had to do was give J the tiniest of shoves in the back, watch him stagger and plunge over the side, and it would be all over.

  As J continued to move along the beam, he seemed to grow more confident. Charlie continued to follow a few steps behind, his right arm outstretched. It was now or never. Suddenly he made his move. But J moved a couple of quick steps faster and Charlie missed J’s back by an inch. Instead, he felt himself slipping over the side. He gasped. Then all he remembered was falling.

  The hospital room was so quiet you could barely hear a murmur from the corridor outside.

  On the single bed there lay what looked like a dead body. Every inch was covered in a rubbery casing and yards and yards of white gauze. All you could see of what was underneath was a little round hole where the mouth was supposed to be and another opening where a blood-shot blue eye stared up at the ceiling. Charlie Evanston.

  The door opened slightly, admitting J, followed by one of Charlie’s doctors.

  J shuddered. He always did, every time he’d visited over the past six months. He turned to the doctor. “How’s he doing today?”

  “About the same. He tries to talk a little now and then.”

  “Can he hear me yet? Can he understand?”

  “We think so. But don’t try and get anything out of him.”

  “Yes. I know.” He bent over the bed. “Charlie. Charlie. It’s me, J. I just wanted you to know I’m here. And I want to thank you again—I guess I’ll be thanking you for the rest of my life—for reaching out and trying to save me at that damn Christmas party.”

  The blue eye blinked. A tear began to tremble on the edge.

  “I was a fool. Only a fool would have tried to do what I did. And you tried to stop me. I felt you grab my jacket and try to hold me back. Then you took the fall for me.”

  The blue eye stared.

  “So what I came to say—what I hope you can understand—is that no matter how long it takes you’re going to get the best care we can find. Just get well. Everything’s going to be okay.”

  The blue eye continued to look at J without blinking.

  “And, Charlie, here’s the best news of all. The agency’s just picked up three big accounts. Over a hundred million.”

  A light breeze blew the curtains from the window.

  “So today the Board asked me to come up here and give you a special bonus. Not a Christmas bonus—more like Purple Heart. You deserve it, Charlie. You saved the old man’s life, you bastard!”

  Charlie tried to nod, but it was impossible.

  “And just wait till you come back,” J said enthusiastically. “You’re a hero, Charlie! We’ve got all kinds of great things waiting for you. All kinds of plans. It’s going to be a whole new ballgame, Charlie! Imagine!”

  Yeah, thought Charlie. Imagine.

  THE ADVENTURE OF THE BLUE CARBUNCLE – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

  I had called up
on my friend Sherlock Holmes upon the second morning after Christmas, with the intention of wishing him the compliments of the season. He was lounging upon the sofa in a purple dressing-gown, a pipe-rack within his reach upon the right, and a pile of crumpled morning papers, evidently newly studied, near at hand. Beside the couch was a wooden chair, and on the angle of the back hung a very seedy and disreputable hard-felt hat, much the worse for wear, and cracked in several places. A lens and a forceps lying upon the seat of the chair suggested that the hat had been suspended in this manner for the purpose of examination.

  “You are engaged,” said I; “perhaps I interrupt you.”

  “Not at all. I am glad to have a friend with whom I can discuss my results. The matter is a perfectly trivial one”—he jerked his thumb in the direction of the old hat—”but there are points in connection with it which are not entirely devoid of interest and even of instruction.”

  I seated myself in his armchair and warmed my hands before his crackling fire, for a sharp frost had set in, and the windows were thick with the ice crystals. “I suppose,” I remarked, “that, homely as it looks, this thing has some deadly story linked on to it—that it is the clue which will guide you in the solution of some mystery and the punishment of some crime.”

  “No. no. No crime,” said Sherlock Holmes, laughing. “Only one of those whimsical little incidents which will happen when you have four million human beings all jostling each other within the space of a few square miles. Amid the action and reaction of so dense a swarm of humanity, every possible combination of events may be expected to take place, and many a little problem will be presented which may be striking and bizarre without being criminal. We have already had experience of such.”

  “So much so,” I remarked, “that of the last six cases which I have added to my notes, three have been entirely free of any legal crime.”

  “Precisely. You allude to my attempt to recover the Irene Adler papers,

  to the singular case of Miss Mary Sutherland, and to the adventure of the man with the twisted lip. Well, I have no doubt that this small matter will fall into the same innocent category. You know Peterson, the commissionaire?”

  “Yes.”

  “It is to him that this trophy belongs.”

  “It is his hat.”

  “No, no; he found it. Its owner is unknown. I beg that you will look upon it not as a battered billycock but as an intellectual problem. And, first, as to how it came here. It arrived upon Christmas morning, in company with a good fat goose, which is, I have no doubt, roasting at this moment in front of Peterson’s fire. The facts are these: about four o’clock on Christmas morning, Peterson, who, as you know, is a very honest fellow, was returning from some small jollification and was making his way homeward down Tottenham Court Road. In front of him he saw, in the gaslight, a tallish man, walking with a slight stagger, and carrying a white goose slung over his shoulder. As he reached the corner of Goodge Street, a row broke out between this stranger and a little knot of roughs. One of the latter knocked off the man’s hat, on which he raised his stick to defend himself, and swinging it over his head, smashed the shop window behind him. Peterson had rushed forward to protect the stranger from his assailants; but the man, shocked at having broken the window, and seeing an official-looking person in uniform rushing towards him, dropped his goose, took to his heels, and vanished amid the labyrinth of small streets which lie at the back of Tottenham Court Road. The roughs had also fled at the appearance of Peterson, so that he was left in possession of the field of battle, and also of the spoils of victory in the shape of this battered hat and a most unimpeachable Christmas goose.”

  “Which surely he restored to their owner?”

  “My dear fellow, there lies the problem. It is true that ‘For Mrs. Henry Baker’ was printed upon a small card which was tied to the bird’s left leg, and it is also true that the initials ‘H. B.‘ are legible upon the lining of this hat; but as there are some thousands of Bakers, and some hundreds of Henry Bakers in this city of ours, it is not easy to restore lost property to any of them.”

  “What, then, did Peterson do?”

  “He brought round both hat and goose to me on Christmas morning, knowing that even the smallest problems are of interest to me. The goose we retained until this morning, when there were signs that, in spite of the slight frost, it would be well that it should be eaten without unnecessary delay. Its finder has carried it off, therefore, to fulfil the ultimate destiny of a goose, while I continue to retain the hat of the unknown gentleman who lost his Christmas dinner.”

  “Did he not advertise?”

  “No.”

  “Then, what clue could you have as to his identity?”

  “Only as much as we can deduce.”

  “From his hat?”

  “Precisely.”

  “But you are joking. What can you gather from this old battered felt?”

  “Here is my lens. You know my methods. What can you gather yourself as to the individuality of the man who has worn this article?”

  I took the tattered object in my hands and turned it over rather ruefully. It was a very ordinary black hat of the usual round shape, hard and much the worse for wear. The lining had been of red silk, but was a good deal discoloured. There was no maker’s name; but. as Holmes had remarked, the initials “H. B.” were scrawled upon one side. It was pierced in the brim for a hat-securer, but the elastic was missing. For the rest, it was cracked, exceedingly dusty, and spotted in several places, although there seemed to have been some attempt to hide the discoloured patches by smearing them with ink.

  “I can see nothing,” said I, handing it back to my friend.

  “On the contrary, Watson, you can see everything. You fail, however, to reason from what you see. You are too timid in drawing your inferences.”

  “Then, pray tell me what it is that you can infer from this hat?”

  He picked it up and gazed at it in the peculiar introspective fashion which was characteristic of him. “It is perhaps less suggestive than it might have been,” he remarked, “and yet there are a few inferences which are very distinct, and a few others which represent at least a strong balance of probability. That the man was highly intellectual is of course obvious upon the face of it, and also that he was fairly well-to-do within the last three years, although he has now fallen upon evil days. He had foresight, but has less now than formerly, pointing to a moral retrogression, which, when taken with the decline of his fortunes, seems to indicate some evil influence, probably drink, at work upon him. This may account also for the obvious fact that his wife has ceased to love him.”

  “My dear Holmes!”

  “He has, however, retained some degree of self-respect,” he continued, disregarding my remonstrance. “He is a man who leads a sedentary life, goes out little, is out of training entirely, is middle-aged, has grizzled hair which he has had cut within the last few days, and which he anoints with lime-cream. These are the more patent facts which are to be deduced from his hat. Also, by the way, that it is extremely improbable that he has gas laid on in his house.”

  “You are certainly joking. Holmes.”

  “Not in the least. Is it possible that even now, when I give you these results, you are unable to see how they are attained?”

  “I have no doubt that I am very stupid, but I must confess that I am unable to follow you. For example, how did you deduce that this man was intellectual?”

  For answer Holmes clapped the hat upon his head. It came right over the forehead and settled upon the bridge of his nose. “It is a question of cubic capacity,” said he; “a man with so large a brain must have something in it.”

  “The decline of his fortunes, then?”

  “This hat is three years old. These flat brims curled at the edge came in then. It is a hat of the very best quality. Look at the band of ribbed silk and the excellent lining. If this man could afford to buy so expensive a hat three years ago, and has had no hat since, then he has
assuredly gone down in the world.”

  “Well, that is clear enough, certainly. But how about the foresight and the moral retrogression?”

  Sherlock Holmes laughed. “Here is the foresight,” said he. putting his finger upon the little disc and loop of the hat-securer. “They are never sold upon hats. If this man ordered one. it is a sign of a certain amount of foresight, since he went out of his way to take this precaution against the wind. But since we see that he has broken the elastic and has not troubled to replace it. it is obvious that he has less foresight now than formerly, which is a distinct proof of a weakening nature. On the other hand, he has endeavored to conceal some of these stains upon the felt by daubing them with ink, which is a sign that he has not entirely lost his self-respect.”

  “Your reasoning is certainly plausible.”

  “The further points, that he is middle-aged, that his hair is grizzled, that it has been recently cut, and that he uses lime-cream, are all to be gathered from a close examination of the lower part of the lining. The lens discloses a large number of hair-ends, clean cut by the scissors of the barber. They all appear to be adhesive, and there is a distinct odour of lime-cream. This dust, you will observe, is not the gritty, gray dust of the street but the fluffy brown dust of the house, showing that it has been hung up indoors most of the time; while the marks of moisture upon the inside are proof positive that the wearer perspired very freely, and could therefore, hardly be in the best of training.”

  “But his wife—you said that she had ceased to love him.”

  “This hat has not been brushed for weeks. When I see you, my dear Watson, with a week’s accumulation of dust upon your hat, and when your wife allows you to go out in such a state, I shall fear that you also have been unfortunate enough to lose your wife’s affection.”

  “But he might be a bachelor.”

  “Nay, he was bringing home the goose as a peace-offering to his wife. Remember the card upon the bird’s leg.”