“A week later, as I sat at tea, Mrs. Hudson announced a caller—a woman—who insisted on seeing me immediately. I had heard the carriage stop, and was prepared for a visitor. With the priors I have given, you will be unsurprised to hear that it was the youngest of the late Earl of Carfax’s daughters, Lady Edith Pelham-Howard.
“‘Mr. Holmes,’ she said without preamble, ‘I am assured by certain people of my acquaintance that you are to be absolutely trusted, even in cases of extraordinary nature and sensitivity.’
“‘It is essential to my profession that I am completely discreet and reliable,’ I returned. ‘I solve cases which the police may not, and this often involves me in events of most peculiar and singular nature.’
“‘This is most assuredly such an event, and one of great horror as well,’ she said, and the way in which her voice nearly broke conveyed the stress she labored under.
“I then assured her that I was entirely at her disposal and encouraged her to speak.
“She had returned to the estate following her father’s death, and had remained as details of the inheritance, which was divided among the three daughters, were worked out. There were apparently some irregularities with the accounts that drew out the proceedings.
“However, that was not what brought Lady Edith to my door. Rather, it was a series of disquieting and even inexplicable events—objects moved when there seemed no agent available to move them, sounds heard in deserted rooms—culminating in Lady Edith seeing her departed father’s visage peering at her through her own bedroom window.
“‘I am not a woman prone to fantastic notions, Mr. Holmes,’ she said to me, and she was quite noticeably paler than when she had begun her account, ‘yet I tell you, I saw my father’s face as clearly as I see yours, not over five paces distant.’”
Holmes gave a wan smile. “As you might imagine, Watson, I did find this an intriguing opening. Even in this initial narrative there were certain suggestive indications, but the fantastical flourishes were novel. Perhaps you, familiar with my processes, can follow my initial lines of surmise?”
I thought on the tale for a moment, then nodded. “The sudden and unexplained death of the master of the house, irregularities in the inheritance, and such, certainly point to some sordid matter—perhaps blackmail, which became murder when the blackmailer realized no more money was forthcoming and that the earl might be considering risking exposure of whatever secret was being held?”
“Capital, Watson. You really have progressed marvelously since first we began our researches. While I have often inveighed against excess theorizing prior to full acquisition of the facts, it is still inevitable that one will attempt to make sense of a case as it is presented; indeed, such a process is necessary for me to decide whether or not a case presents sufficient points of interest to make it worth my attention. And indeed, my initial thoughts ran along almost precisely those lines, with a bit more detail as to the likely culprit, though I attached no weight to the latter as it did cross the border from deduction to speculation. Still, I was mystified by the sequelae to the murder, if murder it was. It would have been simplicity itself to explain such apparitions prior to the death; we have seen such attempts to convince others that some supernatural agency was responsible for deaths.”
“Surely—the Baskervilles horror, and that of the Devil’s Foot.”
“Exactly. But nothing happens without a cause, without a reason, and thus I accepted the case that I might have a chance to discern that reason.” His hands shook again, and not entirely, as I would have hoped, from his current bout with cocaine; it was strong emotion that seized him in that instant, and for a few moments I wondered if he would continue.
After a time, Holmes shook his head. “And now, Watson, knowing what brought you here, what I have said, and the initial particulars of the case that precipitated my current admittedly distressing condition, tell me what I found.”
I was, I confess, somewhat taken aback. It seemed to me that there was entirely too little information upon which anyone, even Holmes himself, could base a conclusion.
Yet my friend never set me insoluble problems, even though it was quite frequently true that I, personally, found them impossible to penetrate. Looking at Holmes, I sensed that he truly wanted me to answer this question myself—that, perhaps, he feared stating it himself. It was such a strange, even frightening impression that I became determined to prove myself capable of unraveling this riddle, if only for Holmes’s own peace of mind.
“You will allow me to speak my thoughts aloud as I examine the evidence, Holmes?”
“I would like nothing better, Watson; to observe the way in which you approach the problem will be something worthwhile in its own right, as our adventures are usually focused on rather the opposite, with me providing insight into my processes.”
I stood, and—perhaps in an unconscious mimicry of Holmes himself—filled my own pipe with a quantity of shag tobacco and lit it. “So. We begin with the most singular fact of the most celebrated and original consulting detective, Sherlock Holmes, having retreated to his rooms in what he admits is an attempt to hide from something he finds most disquieting; furthermore, the confirmation of his friend Dr. Watson’s assertion that Holmes must have encountered something he found to be impossible.
“To this we add the unexpected death of the Earl of Carfax, the arrival of his youngest daughter at Sherlock Holmes’s doorstep, and her description of her problem, including an apparition of her father at her window, and the financial irregularities of the inheritance.” Holmes nodded.
I paused, thinking. Then I realized the only possible conclusion, one so mad that I hesitated to even speak it. Yet what else, besides something that made the world seem utterly mad, could possibly have brought my friend to this state? I steeled myself for his possible mockery, for if I were wrong I would be completely, ludicrously, and laughably wrong. “A question, then. Can we be reasonably certain that the Earl of Carfax himself did not have a twin or other double in the world who could have presented themselves as the purported shade?”
Holmes nodded slowly. “You may take that as given, Watson; I encountered no reason to believe that there was any other person who could have presented himself as the earl to one of his daughters and have carried off the imposture. Continue.”
Still, I hesitated. “I ask you only one further question, Holmes: Does Lady Edith believe the case concluded?”
Holmes considered, the calm demeanor spoiled by the still-shaking hands. “Yes. She believes all was brought to a satisfactory conclusion.”
“I see.” I drew a long breath. “Then this is my conclusion: You have found clear evidence of some malfeasance within the earl’s household, which you were able to prove led to a poisoning or perhaps deliberate infection with some tropical malady of the earl when the perpetrator realized that the earl was close to discovering him, or turning him in. This you have used to solve the murder of the earl, and the other phenomena have ceased; you have perhaps explained them in some manner to the satisfaction of Lady Edith.”
Holmes was immobile, silent.
“But,” I continued, barely able to credit what I was about to say, “for you, there was no explanation, save the one you consider impossible.
“You yourself confronted the apparition, and found you were facing the ghost of the Earl of Carfax.”
For a moment I thought I had been entirely wrong, for Holmes’s face became immobile, as though set in stone. But then his eyes closed, an uneven breath emerged from his lips, and he then looked up at me directly. “Well done, Watson. Stellar, in fact, although you miss various details which would not be evident to you from the brief précis I supplied.”
“Good Lord, Holmes.” Despite my deductions, despite his acquiescence, I could scarcely credit what I was hearing. “You mean to say that you did indeed—”
“Watson, I am not accustomed to being questioned in this manner!”
I was so startled, not to say hurt, by this s
harp and unreasonable retort that I could do nothing but stare at my friend.
Almost instantly Holmes was up, shaking his head, extending a hand. “Oh, Watson…I must apologize most profusely, old friend. I must not allow my current state to drive me to such rash and, if I be honest with myself, completely false statements. Of course I am accustomed to being questioned in this manner; it is not uncommon for my deductions to be met with confusion, disbelief, and—as you recall from various cases—even ridicule.”
I clasped his hand. “It is forgotten, Holmes. Surely you can understand my own disbelief.”
“Only too well.”
I went to the sideboard and, finding the siphon charged, made myself a drink; the occasion seemed to demand something stronger than tea. I returned and seated myself across from Holmes, who had sunk into a brown study.
After a few moments, I broke the silence. “Well then, Holmes, what do you intend to do?”
The silence returned, but I waited. Finally he replied.
“I do not know, Watson,” he said. “My profession is founded on reason, on the rational order of the universe. You know it has always been a basic principle of mine that the supernatural cannot exist. Yet—”
“Yet you are making a grave error, Holmes,” I said.
His gaze immediately snapped up to meet mine. “An error?”
“An understandable one, given your priors, Holmes. You’ve lived your life with, and by, one set of beliefs. Having those upset surely excuses a bit of unclear thinking. But you’ve taught me enough of your methods that I believe I see the flaw in your reasoning.”
Holmes regarded me with mild astonishment, but said nothing. Slowly his expression shifted to the contemplative, and—at last—a faint but genuine smile appeared on his lips. “Ah, Watson. Once more you are the unchangeable rock to which I can anchor. If a ghost exists—and I have been given inarguable proof of this, before my own eyes, under conditions that I do not believe admit of any trickery—then it is—must be—natural for it to exist. Things that are real are, by that very fact, natural. They may not be what we desire to be real, but the fact that our desires cannot change them is what shows them to be true and real.”
I breathed a sigh of relief. I heard animation returning to formerly dead tones, saw the old spark returning to his eye.
Without warning he shot to his feet. “Enough of this! It is intolerable that I’ve allowed myself to wallow in this denial of reality. There is only one remedy for it: I must discover why I have never encountered such an event before.”
I was puzzled. “Well, Holmes, one must presume that real hauntings are vastly more rare than—”
He waved that away impatiently. “Watson, if we accept even for a moment that it is possible for a human…spirit, soul, what have you, to linger after death due to a need to see justice done, to protect those that they leave behind, or any other such motive, then how can we blithely accept that those motives were insufficiently strong in any and all of the cases we have seen throughout the years, and yet were somehow strong enough in this? No, no, Watson, it will not do. We are missing something, some key element that requires considerable investigation.”
I said nothing immediately, for I saw his point. Many had been the foul murders and seemingly inexplicable crimes we had encountered, with great innocence wronged and endangered. However, in none of them had there been a hint of the spiritual, of the victims reaching out from beyond the veil to speak to us or others of what had become of them. “Yet in this case you did see such an apparition.”
“As clearly as I see you now, Watson.” His voice was clear, his eyes sharp, and I could see the brow wrinkling in its accustomed way, showing the beginning of great concentration. “There are, of course, multiple possibilities. One, which I discount, is that in none of the prior cases was there sufficient motive to cause a shade or other manifestation to present itself. A second is that there was something extremely unusual about the earl and his family, or the very specific circumstances surrounding them, which made such a manifestation occur, and would explain the absence of such phenomena in other situations. And a third…” He raised an eyebrow at me.
I frowned, for I could not think of a third alternative. Finally I shrugged. “I confess to being at a loss.”
“Well, one third alternative, Watson, is that something about the world has changed, to make what was not possible now possible.”
“Good Lord, Holmes!” I was speechless.
He smiled narrowly. “A rather disquieting thought, I admit. And at the moment I incline to the second explanation; it is far simpler to assume that the legends of ghosts and such are founded on rare, yet real, events that require truly extraordinary confluences of events or people. But if they are truly extraordinary, I feel confident that I should be able to determine with some reasonable certainty what the key elements of such an event must be.” He chuckled, rubbing his hands as he sometimes did when the fascination of a case began to make itself felt. “There are of course many other possibilities—I, for instance, may be the one who has changed, become a medium, as the spiritualists call it, who can see the dead. Or perhaps I was, after all, gulled.”
“Surely not, Holmes.”
“Oh, I must admit of the possibility. I am not infinite of capacity or capability, and though I have proven myself the equal of virtually all I have encountered, it would be the height of arrogance to insist that I could not be fooled. The circumstances under which I witnessed the apparition certainly convinced me of its reality, but one can easily imagine that a genius with sufficient skill, motivation, and resources could devise some mechanism to project an illusion convincing even to me.”
He nodded again. “An investigation is definitely in order, Watson. But first…ring Mrs. Hudson to prepare a supper for us both, while I tend to my ablutions, which have been most sadly neglected for some time.”
“I will go myself, rather than merely ring; Mrs. Hudson was quite concerned.”
“Of course, Watson; tender my apologies, which I will also do in person later. I am not, I fear, in a fit state to do so at the moment.”
I made my way downstairs, filled with relief, anticipation, and—I confess—a touch of foreboding. Holmes was now more himself, but I knew how to read him better than anyone; and I was certain of one thing: it was the third possibility, not the second, that he was considering.
• • •
As events would have it, prolonged investigation was not required to demonstrate that the third of Holmes’s possibilities was, in fact, the correct explanation. For over the next fortnight, Holmes was approached by no fewer than six people of respectable, even lofty, backgrounds, all six of which wished to consult the renowned Sherlock Holmes’s opinion on events that seemed supernatural.
“This,” Holmes said, the morning after the sixth of these petitioners had departed, “is a greater number of purported supernatural cases than I have faced in my entire prior career. Simply this fact would, I am afraid, argue strongly in favor of my third hypothesis.”
“But it is more than the simple fact of numbers,” I said, pouring myself another cup of tea. “While I am sure I am missing many details, it seemed to me that of the six, at least four feature too many suggestive and peculiar points to be easily dismissed as charlatanry or misperception.”
“Indeed.” Despite the confirmation of his most disquieting theory, Holmes was much more himself. His determination to accept that the very existence of these phenomena made them a priori part of the natural world had alleviated his existential fears to a great extent, and he was now devoting many hours to studying the lore of the supernatural so that he might use it, and compare it, to the actuality of these phenomena which it appeared we might be confronting on a far more regular basis. “I would judge that the problem of the Oxford professor is actually due to some clever student pranks, but the other five have very suggestive points about them.”
“Will you be taking those cases, then?”
Ho
lmes’s smile was thin. “At least one or two I must, for there is a distinct aura of menace in both the story of the Right Honorable Hastings and of the Savile Row tailor. The others…they have definite points of interest for our researches. Still, our time is limited; I will reserve the decision on those until after we have dealt with the first two.”
His head came up. “And I believe we have another caller.”
After a moment I was able to follow his reasoning, recalling that there had been the characteristic faint creak and jingle of a carriage—probably a hansom—stopping before our residence. The subsequent ringing of the bell confirmed this deduction, and Mrs. Hudson brought up a card. Holmes glanced at it. “Hm. Miss Anne LeChance, of Kimberley. Send her up, Mrs. Hudson.”
Miss LeChance did not step into the room; she strode into our room and stopped, relaxed in posture and with a glance that was startlingly direct, almost challenging, from eyes an equally surprising shade of green. Her other remarkable feature was her hair, of such a brilliant red that I could not help but recall our earlier case of the Red-Headed League, clearly of some length but piled upon her head beneath a hat decorated with flowers. She was, if anything, above average height for a woman, neatly dressed but sans gloves, and despite her relaxed posture something about her seemed stiff or tense.
Holmes and I had of course risen to greet her. She extended her hand to Holmes, and shook mine as well. “I have heard a great deal about you from mutual acquaintances, Mr. Holmes,” she said, “and I hope that you can assist me, as it seems no one else is able or willing to do so.” Her voice was light but penetrating, the voice of someone accustomed to being listened to.
“I am certainly most intrigued, Miss LeChance,” he said, and I glanced at him; her opening words had been little different from those of many others, so any interest could not be attributed to them. As I suspected, I saw his eyes studying her with keen interest, and knew he must have already deduced something which I had not. “Pray, sit and tell us what brings you here in such haste from your rooms at the Savoy.”
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