Secret Archives of Sherlock Holmes, The, The

by Thomson, June

  While he had been speaking, he had turned the pony into the gateway of Plas Y Coed and had drawn up at the farmhouse door, which on this occasion was standing open. Even before Dr Parry had time to climb down from the trap, a woman, Rhian Madoc, I assumed, appeared on the threshold where she stood regarding us with a suspicious air.

  She was in her thirties, as Dr Parry had described her, but looked older, her black hair, which was speckled with grey, drawn back tightly from her forehead, giving her features a gaunt, hungry look. The shabby brown dress she was wearing, together with the coarse apron that looked suspiciously like a piece of sacking, did nothing to enhance her appearance, although she might once have looked handsome in a dark, Romany fashion.

  Although she and Dr Parry spoke to one another in Welsh – she in short, reluctant sentences, he more volubly – it was possible from their gestures and expressions to follow a little of their conversation. He was evidently explaining who we were and asking where her father was, for she pointed across the farmyard to one of the outbuildings before setting off herself in that direction, presumably to fetch him, as Dr Parry’s subsequent remarks verified.

  ‘She said we are to wait in the house while she calls her father,’ he explained, leading the way into a stone-paved passageway and opening a door on the right that led into a parlour overlooking the yard, that was furnished with a horsehair sofa and matching armchairs. A huge dresser of dark oak together with a white-faced clock framed in the same sombre wood and wallpaper patterned with sepia leaves gave the room a cheerless, funereal air. A more sinister note was struck by the presence of a double-barrelled shotgun propped up by the fireplace.

  ‘By the way,’ Dr Parry continued, ‘I’ve told her you are friends of mine from London and I’m taking you on a little tour of the area so I thought I’d call in as I was passing and see how her father is. He’s had a bad chest for the past three weeks.’ Seeing Holmes’ attention had been drawn to two large photographs in oval frames which were hanging side by side over the fireplace, he added, ‘Those are of Dai and Hywel.’

  The family likeness was immediately apparent. Apart from similar self-conscious expressions at having to face a camera, both had the same firm chin and frank, open features, although the older man had a stubborn set to his mouth and, noticing this, the thought occurred to me that I would not care to cross him in any way. I was reminded of the account Dr Parry had given us the previous day on the drive back to Pentre Mawr concerning the quarrel between the two men about Dai Morgan’s relationship with the widow Carys Williams and I could understand how it might have arisen.

  I was about to ask Dr Parry about this aspect of the case when I heard footsteps approaching the house and, glancing through the window, I saw Rhian Madoc crossing the yard in the company of a man in his fifties who had grizzled hair and beard and was wearing a collarless flannel shirt and a pair of old corduroy trousers well worn about the knees.

  Like the Morgans, father and son, there was a strong family likeness between the Madocs. Both were tall and dark and gave the impression of physical strength about the arms and upper body. Like Rhian, her father was also taciturn to an embarrassing degree. When Dr Parry introduced Holmes and myself, our presence was acknowledged with nothing more than a curt nod of the head, while Parry’s explanation in Welsh of the reason for our visit there was heard in complete silence, although at the end of this soliloquy Owen Madoc made some dismissive remark which I took to be the equivalent of ‘Is that all?’, before he turned as if to leave the room.

  I could tell Holmes was exasperated by the difficulty of communicating with the man, not simply because of the language barrier but by Madoc’s reticence. Just before he reached the door, Holmes said unexpectedly, addressing Dr Parry, ‘Would you convey to Mr Madoc and his daughter our condolences on the death of Mr Morgan? It must have come as a great shock to both of them.’

  The comment was obviously made with the intention of rousing a response and it succeeded, although perhaps not as dramatically as Holmes might have wished. Owen Madoc stood for a long moment in silence, his face as hard and as expressionless as a rock, before, muttering something in reply, he turned rapidly on his heel and left the room. His daughter’s reaction was more positive. One hand flew up to her mouth and a little cry escaped her lips. The next moment, she had run out of the room after her father and, catching up with him on the far side of the yard, they stood facing each other, Rhian talking animatedly, her father listening in silence. The next moment they had disappeared from view into the outbuilding from which they had first emerged.

  ‘She has taken Dai’s death badly,’ Dr Parry remarked, looking embarrassed at the little drama which had just taken place. ‘I think she looked on him as a father figure. And then Hywel’s arrest …’

  He broke off, as if he could say no more.

  ‘Yes, of course; I understand,’ Holmes replied. ‘Well, Dr Parry, shall we go on that little excursion you promised?’

  ‘Indeed we shall,’ Dr Parry said heartily, clearly relieved at the change of subject and the prospect of a jaunt into the countryside. Leading the way, he started off across the yard towards the barn where the pony and trap were standing, Holmes and I at his heels.

  We set off towards the mountains this time, away from the village, along an increasingly steep, stony lane which grew narrower the further we went until it dwindled to a mere track, passing on the way a small cottage which crouched low in a hollow between sloping pastures. Dr Parry flourished his whip at this nondescript building.

  ‘Cartref,’ he announced. ‘Where the Madocs live.’

  It was indeed isolated as he had described it earlier and, apart from the sheep grazing on the coarse grass and a few black-winged birds – ravens, perhaps – wheeling overhead, the place seemed empty of all life and I wondered, as we clattered past it, how Owen Madoc, and Rhian in particular, could survive the bleak loneliness, especially in winter.

  Even so, there was a beauty about the scene which grew more majestic as we progressed up the hill and the mountains began to dominate over the lower pastures. Rock outcrops thrust themselves upwards, like the bones of some huge prehistoric monster, stripped bare of the soft, grassy flesh of the meadows below and, as the crags grew higher, the landscape dropped away, revealing a magnificent view of distant fields and farms, the houses as tiny as children’s toys, the roads mere brown ribbons curling their way round the patches of green pasture scattered with the pale forms of sheep, reduced by the distance to nothing more than moving dots.

  The layout of Plas Y Coed was also revealed, not as we had seen it before at ground level as a huddle of outhouses gathered indiscriminately, it seemed, round the yard and the great barn, but as a series of separate buildings fanning out from this central point and each one distinct from its neighbour. Even at that distance, it was possible to differentiate their separate uses, from a row of pig sties, each with its own little yard, to a much larger construction, evidently the cowshed, with a separate lane leading to the adjoining field where some black and white cows were grazing. I could even distinguish a tiny brown heap like a miniature pyramid in one corner which I took to be the dungheap and from the top of which the handle of some farm implement was protruding. Amazed at seeing so much detail at such a distance, I drew Holmes’ attention to it but he merely shrugged his shoulders indifferently.

  As we progressed, the hill grew steeper until, at Dr Parry’s suggestion, we dismounted from the trap to ease the pony and proceeded on foot to a large, flat rock at the side of the track, clearly a favourite lookout post for the little doctor, for he sat himself down with a sigh of satisfaction.

  ‘There now, gentlemen!’ he declared proudly, extending an arm towards the distant view. ‘Have you ever seen anything as beautiful as that!’

  Indeed, I had not, and I suspected Holmes had not either, for he perched himself on the edge of the rock, arms crooked about his knees, where he remained in silence contemplating the view, his keen profile looking even m
ore like an eagle’s surveying its kingdom from its lofty eyrie.

  We stayed there entranced for at least half an hour, held by the magic of the place, Holmes silent and so totally absorbed that I dared not interrupt whatever train of thought he was following with such close attention.

  He did not even rouse himself on the return journey except, when we passed Plas Y Coed, the Place of Trees, and the site of Dai Morgan’s murder, he twisted his head round to catch a last glimpse of it before the trap moved on and the house and outbuildings disappeared from view round a bend in the road.

  In fact, he said nothing until we reached the village of Pentre Mawr, when he turned to Dr Parry and said abruptly, ‘May I speak to you in private about the case?’

  ‘Of course!’ Dr Parry replied, looking a little puzzled at this sudden request.

  ‘Not at your house,’ Holmes continued. ‘I should not wish to inconvenience your wife. The inn has a private room in which we have taken our meals. Could it be made available for our use if the landlord agrees?’

  ‘I’m sure Emrys won’t object. I shall ask him straight away.’

  The little doctor wasted no time on arranging the matter. Two minutes later, the three of us were ushered into the small room opening off the main bar that in an English public house would be referred to as ‘the snug’.

  Here we seated ourselves at the table and Holmes, after a moment’s hesitation, opened the discourse with a declaration that astonished me and, judging by his expression, astonished Dr Parry as well.

  For without any preamble, Holmes announced, ‘Gentlemen, I know who murdered Dai Morgan and the method used to kill him. But I shall need your cooperation to bring the murderer to justice.’

  As no doubt he had intended, his words provoked gasps of amazement from Dr Parry and myself, although, knowing Holmes’ love of the dramatic2 as well as I did after all the years of close acquaintanceship with him, I suspected he found a great deal of satisfaction in the situation and so I sat back, letting Dr Parry ask the inevitable questions.

  ‘How on earth did you come to that conclusion, Mr Holmes?’

  ‘From the evidence, of course,’ Holmes replied coolly.

  ‘But where was this evidence?’

  ‘In the barn and its vicinity.’

  I took ‘vicinity’ to mean the yard and its surrounding buildings, but quite where the evidence had been found, I had no idea. As for Dr Parry, he merely shook his head in bewilderment. It was Holmes who broke the silence.

  ‘Well, gentlemen,’ said he, ‘as the case has been satisfactorily solved, I suggest we turn our attention to the final stage of the investigation – that of bringing the guilty person to justice – and for that I have devised a plan for which I shall need your assistance. This is what I propose.’

  Leaning forward across the table, he explained his plan, or ‘little drama’, as he described it, in detail.

  That following afternoon, we returned to Plas Y Coed, leaving the pony and trap in the yard as we had on the two previous occasions we had called at the farm. Once more, Dr Parry entered the house to collect the key to the barn, only this time, when he emerged, he was accompanied by Rhian who, instead of joining us, set off up the yard to the gate that led into the fields to fetch her father who was attending to a sheep that had injured its foot, as Dr Parry explained in English for our benefit. Holmes also set off on his own mission, an action which he had warned us he would make but the purpose of which he had so far refused to explain. Meanwhile, Dr Parry had unfastened the padlock on the barn doors and had swung them open.

  The interior of the barn was just as we had left it on the first day we had examined it. The ladder to the loft was still lying on the floor among the scattered hay, the farm implements arranged against the left-hand wall.

  Following Holmes’ instructions, I set the ladder up against the edge of the loft. No sooner had I done so than we were joined by the other participants in what Holmes had referred to as the ‘little drama’ he had devised and for which he had carefully instructed the players.

  First to arrive was Inspector Rees, a tall, lugubrious man who had been summoned by telegram from Abergavenny the previous day and who had arrived that very morning in a wagon, hired for the occasion from the station, accompanied by a sergeant and a constable. The three of them had then followed us to Plas Y Coed at a discreet distance. Now obeying, albeit reluctantly,

  Holmes’ orders, they took up their allotted positions at the rear of the barn where their presence would not be obvious to anyone entering through the double doors. Holmes entered next, returning from his mysterious errand carrying something that surprised me greatly, although I hardly had time to consider its relevance before, having nimbly climbed the ladder, he was standing on the edge of the loft as if on the stage of a theatre. And the scene was indeed theatrical, with the figure of Holmes towering over us like a celebrated actor while Dr Parry and myself, together with the policemen, stood below forming the audience, much like the groundlings in Shakespeare’s Globe gathered to watch a performance of one of the great tragedies. Long shafts of dusty sunlight slanted down from the window on to the scene with a strange, shifting luminosity.

  By some unspoken agreement we waited in silence for the two missing participants in the play and their arrival, heralded by the heavy creaking of the barn doors as they were swung open, had all the dramatic impact of the knocking on the gate in Macbeth.

  They came in hesitantly, Owen Madoc first, followed by his daughter Rhian, and for a moment they stood without moving just inside the barn, their faces lifted up towards the figure of Holmes posed there above them on the edge of the hayloft, as motionless as they were.

  And then slowly and deliberately, like a warrior lifting his javelin, Holmes seized the pitchfork he was carrying that he had retrieved on our arrival from some unknown location, and, raising it to shoulder height, held it there, quivering in his clenched fist and aimed at the two of them standing there below him.

  Rhian broke first. With an inhuman scream, like an animal in pain, she covered her face with her hands. Madoc remained silent but on his face was stamped the same agonised horror.

  We remained motionless, holding our positions as if in a tableau at the end of a melodrama, waiting for the curtain to descend.

  And then suddenly the scene disintegrated, its participants scattering in every direction, Madoc leading the way towards the barn door, which he tore open like a madman before setting off at a run across the yard to the house. By the time the rest of us had reached it, the door to the hall was shut and bolted. Rhian threw herself against it, banging on it with her fists and shouting, ‘Dada! Dada!’

  While Dr Parry and I stood dumb and motionless, Holmes had darted forward. Tearing off his ulster, he wrapped it about his arm before punching out the glass in the parlour window beside the door. Reaching in, he unfastened the latch and a moment later was scrambling through the open casement. The next thing we heard was the sound of his feet on the stone floor of the hallway and the muffled and discordant noise of a struggle accompanied by raised voices.

  I could distinguish Holmes’ voice, very loud and clear and carrying with it a note of masterful command that, like the accompaniment of a bass to a tenor in an operatic duo, served to heighten the emotional content of the exchange.

  He was shouting, ‘Don’t be a fool, Madoc! Put the gun down!’ and then Madoc’s voice, high-pitched and hysterical, screamed out a reply in Welsh that I could not understand.

  The next moment, his voice was cut short and there followed the thunderous explosion of a gun being discharged.

  By this time Inspector Rees and I, closely followed by the two policemen, had crossed the yard and reached the door. In the turmoil that followed, none of us thought to make entrance, like Holmes, through the parlour window that was standing open. Instead, we threw ourselves futilely against the solid oak of the front door, on which not even the sturdy bulk of the two policemen had the slightest effect, and we might have
gone on with our pointless efforts had not the door suddenly opened, nearly precipitating the four of us headlong into the hall. Much to my fervent relief, Holmes appeared on the threshold, looking calm and uninjured, and with a little ironic bow, he stood aside to let us in.

  It was the sprawled figure of Owen Madoc that first met our gaze. He was lying on his back on the flagstones, a double-barrelled shotgun at his side, blood running from one corner of his mouth and a quantity of broken plaster lying scattered about him.

  As I ran forward to feel for the carotid artery in his neck, Holmes remarked in a dismissive manner, ‘Oh, do not distress yourself, my dear Watson. He is not dead. He is merely knocked out by an uppercut to the jaw.3 If anyone needs medical attention, it is myself. The blow has split the skin on my knuckles, but no doubt I shall survive.’

  ‘But I heard the gun go off!’ I protested.

  ‘It did indeed. In fact, it nearly deafened me. But by that time, I had managed to wrench the weapon sideways in Madoc’s grasp so that when he pulled the trigger, the barrel was pointing upwards, hence the hole in the ceiling and the broken plaster.’ Turning to Rees, he continued, ‘I suggest you handcuff him now, Inspector, in case he decides to continue the struggle after he comes round. He is a very powerful, and more to the point, desperate man.’

  But Holmes had misjudged him for, when Madoc regained consciousness, he was subdued and contrite rather than aggressive and he put up no further resistance when he was led out of the house to the station wagon that was waiting in the yard. Accompanied by Inspector Rees and the two policemen, he was driven away to Abergavenny gaol, there to await trial for the murder of Dai Morgan.

  As for the rest of us, we too dispersed, Holmes and I to walk to the Golden Harp to await for the arrival of Dr Parry who, in the meantime, drove Rhian Madoc to a neighbour’s house to be cared for there.

  By a common unspoken agreement, neither Holmes nor I discussed the morning’s events until Dr Parry returned and the three of us retired to the snug, where I was able at last to ask my old friend the questions that had been foremost in my mind since the previous day.