Elementary, She Read: A Sherlock Holmes Bookshop Mystery

by Vicki Delany

  Still, speculation is what fortunes are made—and lost—on.

  Grant had seen the magazine. Yes, he said he’d not opened the cover. Was that true? Had the police momentarily turned their backs, and had Grant taken advantage of the opportunity?

  I swung back to my computer. I pulled up several of the unread emails from the deleted folder and skimmed them quickly. Not one of them said the name of the magazine I supposedly owned. They all alluded to “an item” of interest that I might be wanting to sell, and one of the men from New York told me he collected copies of The Strand magazine.

  They didn’t know it was Beeton’s Christmas Annual of 1887. Irene’s police department source (and thus probably the source of all the rumors) hadn’t named it, and he hadn’t known its value. Thousands he’d said, thinking that was a lot of money. And it was. But not compared to the upper limit that the Beeton’s could potentially fetch.

  Only Grant Thompson knew exactly what was in police possession.

  Had he decided to make a deal, right now, with the Kents for the magazine? Offer them a reduced sum, but cash in hand, rather than waiting, maybe years, for it to possibly go to auction. Upon hearing that I was going to Boston later, had Grant Thompson assumed I wanted to be the first to make a deal and decided to beat me to it?

  Had he gone to the Kent estate and . . . ?

  I was getting way ahead of myself. I had no reason to suspect Grant of anything of the sort.

  Except that I had told him I was going to Boston today. I knew nothing about him other than what he’d told me and the few things I’d observed. I’d only met the man once and talked to him on the phone a couple of times.

  Once again I swung around to the computer and did a Google search. I found a web page for his rare book business. It looked legitimate, including testimonials from satisfied clients.

  Now that I was on Google, I searched the online Boston news. Yup, there it was. Top of the page. At approximately three thirty this afternoon, police had been called to the home of the late reclusive multimillionaire Kurt Kent Jr., where they found a female, recently deceased. Police were not revealing the cause of death, but the intense official activity around the mansion indicated they were treating it as a possible homicide.

  I read on. Acting on an anonymous tip, police had arrived at the Kent home where they found Mrs. Elaine Kent, wife of the CEO of Kent Enterprises, dead next to the pool. The woman’s daughter, Sapphire Kent, arrived home after a brief vacation in New York City to find police stopping anyone from entering the property. She became hysterical and had been whisked quickly away from the gathering press and into the house.

  I let out a long breath: I’d done the right thing. If I hadn’t called the cops, Sapphire would have been the one to find her mother lying dead at the side of the pool. A photo of Sapphire, once again flashing a lot of skin as she got out of a limo, graced the article. The killing was getting a lot of media attention already, no doubt due to the wealth and reputation of the Kents, the ongoing battle over the will, and Sapphire herself. The less respectable papers would want a shot of her weeping inconsolably. Preferably with several shirt buttons undone.

  I then looked up Boston Home Protection Services, the name on the security guard’s uniform. They had a web presence, but it was sloppily done, and the most recent update had been almost a year ago. A couple of testimonials from grateful clients, which may or may not have been paid for, and a few pictures of highly attractive and professionally groomed men and women, almost certainly models, shining flashlights into dark corners. Otherwise, the web page gave me little other than a phone number and address and a statement that if I called today, they would provide me with a “free estimate to best determine your security needs.”

  Boston Home Protection Services was either a fly-by-night operation or a front for organized crime or the intelligence services. I decided on the former.

  I next headed for the muckraking websites. To my infinite relief, I read that, unofficially, the police were giving the time of Elaine Kent’s death as early morning. The security guard we’d encountered said no one had called at the home, except for a “pretty little blonde in a fancy red sports car” who he’d turned away. The “pretty little blonde” had not argued with him.

  Hey, I thought. I was there too! What was I? The Invisible Woman?

  Once I got over being offended, I was quite pleased. The blonde was probably, he added, calling on Sapphire. Not a very good witness, if it came to that. I’d specifically told him I was there to see Mrs. Kent. If the guard was telling the Boston cops that one blonde woman had stopped by wanting Sapphire, they’d be highly unlikely to come in search of me. When we’d been stopped on the highway, I’d told Ryan and Estrada we were going to the Kents’, and later I’d told Ryan we’d been turned away.

  Maybe the Boston police wouldn’t connect the killing to the recent goings on in West London, and Estrada wouldn’t hear about it.

  A girl can hope, can’t she?

  I considered erasing all traces of my search for information on the Kent murder from my computer, in case the police came looking, but I decided to leave it. Natural enough for me to be interested in the family. When the first hit brought up the death of Elaine Kent, I searched for more. Wouldn’t anyone?

  I didn’t want to have to evade, if Estrada did ask, any knowledge of Mrs. Kent’s death. Which would be a moot point anyway if the police traced the 9-1-1 call to me. Even now, they’d probably be swooping down on two unwitting teenage boys. I hoped the boys would get a kick out of being the object of a homicide investigation. I’d done all I could to disguise myself in the boys’ presence, and I’d wiped my fingerprints off the phone. But it was still possible they’d trace it to me. I’d parked the Miata out of sight of the boys, but all that was needed was for someone to take a picture of it, license plate and all, or a security camera to catch it, and the police would have me. That didn’t bother me terribly much. It was no secret we’d been to the Kent house, and the most I could be charged with was trespassing and leaving the scene. I had an alibi for the time of the murder. I’d been seen around West London, in the tea room and the Emporium.

  A burst of noise from the shop pulled my head out of deep, perilous thoughts. Time to remember I had a business to run.

  A group of women were gathered around the table containing Sherlock knickknacks, laughing uproariously. “I know exactly who to give this to for Christmas,” one of them said. She picked up a three-inch-tall china statue of the Great Detective, hatted and clamping on his pipe. “Eddie’s mom.”

  “Is she a Holmes fan?” I asked.

  “She absolutely hates the whole thing. She wants to be a writer, you see, but for some reason, she can’t convince a publisher of her genius. Therefore anyone who’s had any success is just a hack. My mother-in-law hates popular culture, almost as much as I hate her. The perfect gift. She’ll have to put it out when I’m around. Wouldn’t be proper not to. I’ll also take Doctor Watson and any other characters you have.”

  “Excellent,” I said. Now there’s a house I don’t want to be invited to for Christmas dinner. I went up to the storage room and found a box containing the full set. As well as Holmes and Watson, it came with a stout woman representing Mrs. Hudson, a scowling Detective Lestrade, a snarling dog, presumably the Hound of the Baskervilles, and assorted other characters, both male and female. I never cease to be amazed at what some people will buy.

  Ruby rang up the set while I packed it all into an Emporium bag.

  A family group came into the shop, and the children immediately headed for the kids’ book section. They’d raised their children to be booklovers. I heartily approved.

  “Unlike Mary’s mother-in-law, my husband adores Holmes,” one of the women said. “I can’t wait to tell him about this store.” She placed a deerstalker hat on the counter along with a jigsaw puzzle. “You and he would get along so well.”

  “We would?” I said.

  “He can talk about Sherl
ock Holmes for hours. He tries to talk to me, and I try to act as though I’m interested. I like the books just fine, although they’re a bit old-fashioned for my taste, but really, how much detail do I need in my life? You must just love Holmes to want to work here.”

  “He’s far too stodgy for me,” one of her friends said, putting Treachery at Lancaster Gate by Anne Perry on the sales counter. “You can’t trust a man who doesn’t like women.”

  “He liked that opera singer well enough. The one who outwitted him. What was her name?”

  “Irene Adler,” I said.

  “I meant women as a group. Now that”—the friend pointed at the cover of Lancaster Gate—“is more like it.”

  “I loved what the new show did with Irene Adler,” another woman said, handing me a Benedict Cumberbatch wall calendar. “Showing up naked. Martin Freeman was so uncomfortable. It was hilarious.”

  Others of their group bought books, and they all left, still laughing.

  I ran my eyes around the shop. “Looks like you’ve had a good day.”

  “Pretty busy all around,” Ruby said. “It’s amazing what junk some people will buy.”

  The parents were browsing while their children flicked through the books. “Hey,” I said. “Watch what you’re saying there.” I might think the same, but I would never say it out loud.

  “Sorry,” she muttered. “I get sick of all this stuff sometimes.”

  “Then you might want to consider handing me your resignation.” I wasn’t joking. I couldn’t care less what Ruby thought of Sherlock Holmes and all the assorted offshoots (I sometimes find it all a mite excessive myself) but I didn’t need an attitude like that being expressed in front of my customers.

  “Sorry. You’re an intelligent woman. What appeals to you about this”—she waved her hand toward the Sherlock dish towels—“stuff?”

  The family placed their selections on the counter, saving me from having to answer.

  Hadn’t Ruby told me at her interview that she’d gotten her love of Sherlock from her father? She might as well ask her dad that question.

  Quite a lot appealed to me about Sherlock Holmes. Not the least his intellect and the way people didn’t always understand him. I loved the Arthur Conan Doyle books; I liked some of the TV or movie adaptions, particularly Jeremy Brett as Holmes and the BBC’s Sherlock with Benedict Cumberbatch, and I enjoyed the Mary Russell books. I didn’t pore over every bit of minutiae or debate with fellow Sherlockians about whether Sherlock was a woman in disguise or why Watson’s leg injury, suffered during the Second Afghan War, mysteriously moved between his leg and his shoulder. I didn’t fill my house with trinkets; I didn’t collect Holmes memorabilia at all. But I didn’t look down on anyone who did. No doubt Ruby’s dad was the same.

  “We’re looking for a nice place for dinner,” the woman asked as her husband passed Ruby his credit card. “Can you make any recommendations?”

  “If you go early, the kids will enjoy watching boats returning to the harbor from the deck of the Blue Water Café,” I said. “If you and your husband are dining alone later, it’s a very romantic setting. Good food any time of the day.”

  She touched her husband’s arm, and they gazed adoringly at each other.

  Late dinner it would be.

  They left, passing Donald Morris on their way out.

  Donald headed directly for the magazine display. He picked up the most recent copy of Strand and flicked idly through it. If Donald hadn’t already read the current issue, and memorized most of the lines, I’d eat the last remaining deerstalker hat. (Note to self: Order more hats.)

  “Looking for anything in particular, Donald?” I asked.

  “No. Nothing,” he squeaked. Today’s T-shirt said, “You Know My Methods.”

  I took a step closer, lowered my voice. “Are you still interested in a particular magazine?”

  Beneath his coke-bottle lenses, his eyes widened. “I might be, Gemma, my dear. What have you heard?”

  “That a certain estate might be desperate to sell off its collection.”

  “That’s what I’ve heard too,” he whispered. “The community is on high alert, Gemma. A few pieces have been said to be making their way onto the market under the table.”

  “Avoiding pesky legal complications.”

  “Exactly! Such a bother. Kurt Kent’s collection is one of the most comprehensive in private hands in the world today. His heirs appear to have little interest in keeping it.” He tapped the side of his nose. “They’ve been making a few discreet, very discreet, inquiries.”

  The best way to extract information is always to simply pretend you know all about it. People love to share their knowledge, the more secret the better, and they’ll grab any excuse to do so.

  I winked at him. “Inquiries, yes.”

  “You’ve heard of something, Gemma!” he shouted and then, realizing what he’d done, made an apologetic face and lowered his voice again. “What are they offering you? You can tell me. The price is sure to be well under what it would get on the open market. I’ve been told that before Mr. Kent died, some of his less scrupulous relatives snatched parts of the collection fearing, as happened, it would get tied up in court and they might end up with nothing. A bird in the hand and all that, right, Gemma?”

  “Right.” A copy of The Strand from August 1891, which contained “The Red-Headed League,” was on display. Not a rare issue, and not in good condition, I was selling it for fifteen dollars. I ran my fingers lightly over the plastic wrapping. Donald gasped. “You don’t mean . . .”

  “Shush,” I said.

  “Of course.” He glanced furtively around the shop. No customers were in at the moment. Ruby watched us from behind the counter.

  “Have you met recently with some of your fellow collectors?” I asked.

  “We’ve talked by e-mail. No one’s revealing too much. Naturally.”

  “Naturally.” I could imagine them hunched over their collections, rubbing their hands together and scheming how to get the better of their colleagues. For objects that no one had seen but everyone thought everyone else had.

  “I’ve also heard that you’re the rightful heir of a magazine of some significance,” Donald said. I was about to repute it, when he sniffed. “Don’t get your hopes up on that, my dear.”

  “I have no hopes at all. But why are you so sure?”

  “I didn’t spend twenty years as a family law attorney to think the nurse has any case at all. And her heirs have even less.”

  “Of which I am not one. I didn’t know you’d been a lawyer.”

  “Hated every minute of it,” he said. “When my father died he left me an ample enough—albeit small—inheritance that if I lived simply, I could quit my practice, move to Cape Cod, and devote myself to Sherlock Holmes, Doctor John Watson, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, as had long been my dream.”

  “If you’re talking to any of your fellow enthusiasts, be sure and mention that I have no legal claim to anything of Mr. Kent’s, will you?”

  He nodded.

  “When the items in the collection do become available, I suppose Boston will be the place to be,” I said.

  “So that’s where he is.”

  I was baffled at that one and had to drop my pretext of knowing all. “Where who is?”

  “Why, Arthur, of course.”

  “Why would Uncle Arthur be in Boston?”

  He gave me a sly glance. “You sent him on a buying trip, of course. You can’t fool me, Gemma.”

  Now it was my turn to tap the side of my nose.

  “Too bad I didn’t know he was there,” Donald said. “We could have met for dinner last night.”

  Chapter 12

  “You will keep me informed, won’t you, Gemma, dear?” Donald Morris asked.

  “You can count on it,” I lied.

  “I like to think that our long years of friendship and mutual love of Sir Arthur and his greatest creation mean we can dispense with formalities such as hagglin
g over value.”

  “Consider it dispensed.”

  He waved to Ruby and almost skipped out of the shop.

  Hadn’t that been a highly productive conversation? I’d wanted to learn something about what was happening with the artifacts of the Kent estate. Instead I’d learned something even more interesting: Donald Morris had been in Boston last night.

  Anything of substantial value owned by the Kent family would be far beyond Donald’s means, but most collections include minor objects as well as the valuable ones. Had he gone to the Kent home hoping to buy some of the lesser items that weren’t currently under legal lock and key? Anyone who’d been to that house would come to the same conclusions as I had. The family needed money. Badly.

  Had Donald, realizing that, attempted to haggle to cut a deal for something more valuable? Had Elaine laughed at him, and so he killed her?

  With a pang of disappointment, I had to admit I couldn’t see it. Inoffensive, mild-mannered Donald Morris killing someone? They say anyone’s capable of murder if provoked enough, but what distinguishes one person from another is how they react to what they’ve done. If Donald had killed her, I’d have found him weeping over the corpse and telling me he didn’t mean it. No doubt he would have had a Holmes quote at the ready. I’m not well enough versed in the canon to know if there’s an appropriate one, but I was sure he’d be able to come up with something.