‘You realise, I hope, that I have no interest in or sympathy with the abject and self-destructive tenets of the Christian religion,’ Beech said, ‘but my parents were so wantonly irresponsible as to bring me up in the Church, and I have since made a certain study of its superfluous rituals. That pastor was chanting under his breath outside Kellway’s room in the dead of night, and it was like no Christian prayer that I have ever heard.’
Excerpt from The Brotherhood of Motley Men, and Other True Accounts of Experiences with the Paranormal (1909) by Athanasius Larkin
It was during my first meeting with the man who would become my brother-in-law that the topic of the occult was first raised between us; a subject to which our discourse would return on many an occasion during our acquaintance, and which would become a very practical preoccupation of my own during our later adventures together.
‘I say, Larkin,’ he asked me that day, ‘do you ever give any thought to matters of the supernatural?’
‘Not overmuch,’ I admitted, ‘except when I am in church. Pray, why do you ask?’
‘Well, it’s rather in my line,’ he replied, with a modest air. ‘I thought you should know that, if you’re to marry my sister.’
‘Well, that isn’t altogether settled, you know,’ I responded, rather affronted. ‘What do you mean, “your line”? Are you training to be a priest, Skinner?’
‘No, nothing so responsible, I’m afraid,’ Constantine Skinner replied, with a self-deprecating chuckle. ‘I’m an occult detective.’
I stared. ‘And what, if I may ask, does an occult detective do?’
‘Oh, well as to that,’ he said airily, ‘I solve occult crimes, of course. Did you hear of the case of the St Pancras Hauntings?’
‘I do recall reading about the matter.’ If I remembered correctly, it had rendered an entire platform of the railway station unusable for weeks as luggage and, occasionally, passengers were placed in great danger of being propelled onto the tracks, supposedly kicked by unseen feet.
He smiled modestly. ‘I laid the ghost there. It turned out to be a workman who had been run over by a faulty engine before the station was even opened. He was cut quite in half, poor fellow, and due to a terrific mix-up at the mortuary his head and chest were buried in a different grave from his legs and middle. It was his lower half that was besetting the platform, you see – the rest of him haunted the engine that ran him over, but as it had been put out of use nobody had noticed. He soon calmed down once I had his parts exhumed and reburied together.’
‘What an extraordinary story!’ I exclaimed.
He gave a self-deprecating smile. ‘There are others where that came from. You may remember reading in the spring of a man savaged to death by a wild animal in Regent’s Park? Nobody could determine what it was that killed him, until I realised that one of the tigers at the zoo had been sending out its spirit body at nights – it turned out to be the reincarnation of a Buddhist monk, and had inherited the extraordinary ability from him.
‘And then there was the Perfidious Tower at Carrefour Castle, which drove thirteen servants to suicide, and the river-monster that attacked the Hampton Ferry… Oh yes, I’ve had a few encounters with the Other Side in my time.’
It would not be very much later in our acquaintance that I had the first of my own such stories to tell, as Constantine Skinner enlisted me to help him in the terrifying case of the Motley Men…
It seems there is an entire series of these yarns about Skinner’s exploits – it is quite extraordinary. Frankly, Watson, I blame the influence of your own writings. – S.H.
CHAPTER FIVE
Smirking at our discomfiture, Gideon Beech left us to contemplate his disconcerting suggestion that the Reverend Vortigern Small had performed some occult ritual which had resulted in the destruction of the unfortunate Mr Kellway.
Naturally Holmes dismissed it the moment we were alone as mere malicious troublemaking on Beech’s part, but I was surprised to find that I was less sanguine. I admit that the possibilities presented by this extraordinary case were beginning to trouble me.
Though I lack Holmes’s exceptional skill in ratiocination, I pride myself that I am nevertheless a man of reason. Like any medical man I am familiar with the principles of scientific philosophy as they apply to my profession, and aware of the great benefits they have brought to that profession’s practices. Normally I would expect that such a stance would insulate me from the excesses of superstition. Yet I found that the proximity of serious scientists like Speight and Rhyne, who not only entertained but embraced the idea of the transcendental as a branch of science itself, was having an unsettling effect on my prior certainties.
The idea of a respectable minister of the Church making a man vanish with some kind of malediction was of course ludicrous. Yet Kellway’s disappearance was, after all, inexplicable except either by a deception that flew in the face of human nature, at least as Sir Newnham Speight understood it, or else by some equally outlandish behaviour on the part of the universe itself.
Our conversation with Anderton, who we spoke to next, made me even more sceptical of his perpetrating a fraud upon his employer. The butler seemed eminently sensible for a servant, with a touching devotion to his employer. Their families had, it seemed, been neighbours when the two of them were boys. In Anderton’s youth, when his father had been driven by debt to kill himself, leaving his family to face the burden in his stead, the young Newnham Speight, just beginning to make his mark as an inventor, had taken pity on his old associates. He had taken William, the only son of the family, into his service – first as his man-of-all-work and later, as Speight’s fortune grew and the arrangements of his household became more regular, his manservant, before promoting him to his current position some fifteen years previously.
‘I never had much of a head for science or machines, sirs,’ Anderton told us earnestly, ‘not like Sir Newnham has. Maybe I could have run a factory as well as a household if he’d set me to it, but my old ma was in service before she married my dad, and I suppose it runs in the family. It always seemed the best way I could be useful to him.’
‘As I am sure you have been,’ Holmes agreed. ‘Although it occurs to me that some men might resent an arrangement which placed a person born their equal in such a position of authority over them.’
‘I dare say some would, sir,’ Anderton agreed cheerfully. ‘There’s no accounting for how some folk think, is there? But hand on heart, I’ve never felt anything but grateful to Sir Newnham for how he helped my family out of that spot. Thanks to him my ma lived out her days in peace, and my sisters are respectable women with situations of their own. You can’t put a price on that.’
Either his words were heartfelt, or else he was an exceptional liar. Looking at his round, smiling face, I found the second possibility as hard to countenance as Sir Newnham did.
‘Now then, Anderton,’ said Holmes, ‘you were in the Experimental Annexe, I believe, at the time when Mr Kellway made his disappearance. You stood the four o’clock watch with Mr Garforth, is that correct?’
‘That’s right, sir,’ Anderton confirmed. ‘I was there at five before four, and Mr Garforth arrived a few minutes later. We exchanged a few words with Lord Jermaine and Mr McInnery, and then they went upstairs to get some sleep.’
‘They had nothing to report?’
‘No, sir. Mr Kellway had been sitting quiet all the time since two, just as before, and there’d been no change in the other room. Both gentlemen thought Mr Kellway was looking a little tired, but it seemed like the experiment was a wash-out. His lordship said how it was rotten luck, because he’d thought Mr Kellway was the real thing.’
I said, ‘And what did you think, Anderton?’
A concerned look crossed Anderton’s chubby face. ‘It’s not my place to think about such matters, sir. I help out when Sir Newnham requires it. My eyes are as good as anybody’s if I’m told what to look out for.’
Holmes said, ‘It was an early start f
or you both. Was Mr Garforth in good spirits?’
‘He was quieter than usual. Normally he’s friendly, and very ready with his jokes. But he’d turned up late the night before, having been out with friends.’
‘What time was that?’
‘About half-past eleven. Truth be told, sir, I thought he was a little tipsy when I showed him to his room. Not that I suppose painters are early risers generally, unless they’re the sort that like painting sunrises.’
‘Mr Garforth is not that kind of painter?’
‘No, sir. Young ladies is his line, from what I’ve seen – and not overburdened by clothes, if you take my meaning.’
‘I see, yes. So the pair of you remained there for the next hour?’
‘Yes, sir. Mr Garforth spent most of the time walking up and down, sir – to keep him awake, he said, and I could see what he meant. That under-floor heating does make the room warm, and of course there’d been gentlemen smoking in there all night, so there was a bit of a fug.’
‘Did either of you leave the room at any time?’
‘Oh no. Mr Garforth had his jacket slung over a chair, sir, and he kept going back to it and taking things out of the pockets and fiddling with them. Paintbrushes and matchboxes and such, and his cigarettes of course. Mr Garforth’s a keen smoker; you almost never see him without his holder. As for me, after I’d made sure Mr Garforth didn’t mind, I sat quiet and read my book. I’m a great believer in reading, sir, when I’ve the opportunity for it. There’s nothing like a good book.’
‘Did you converse with Mr Garforth?’
‘He told me a joke or two, though his heart wasn’t really in it. Then of course we had the stop-watch, and every five minutes we’d check up on Mr Kellway and the things in the other room, and I dare say we talked about that a bit.’
‘Did you talk about Mr Kellway himself?’
‘Well, there might have been a remark or two. It’s an odd feeling, sir, when you’re watching someone like that. It’s like you’re spying on them, and yet at the same time you sort of forget they’re there when it comes to talking about them. When Mr Garforth first looked in on Mr Kellway he said he’d thought he was taller, though of course Mr Kellway was sitting down. He’s tall enough when he’s standing up, to my mind.’
‘Had the two of them met before?’ I asked, remembering Garforth’s card in Kellway’s pocket book.
‘Just the once, Mr Garforth said – he was leaving here with Mr Rhyne one day just as Mr Kellway turned up, and they ran into each other in the street outside. He’d missed the locking-in that evening, of course, on account of his other engagement. As for me, I think I only said something like, “He surely can’t be comfortable sitting like that so long, can he?” and perhaps wondered that he didn’t seem to be hungry or thirsty.’
This point had occurred to me also. ‘Is it normal for the subjects to go without food and drink?’
‘They’re not usually in there for so long, sir. And Mr Kellway said he wouldn’t need anything like that while he was meditating. I suppose I was more marvelling at it than wondering, if you follow me.’
‘Quite so,’ said Holmes. ‘Did anything else of note happen before Major Bradbury’s arrival?’
‘Not really, sir. Ah, well, there was one thing. Sir Newnham may not be best pleased when he finds out, but it’s only a small thing really, and Mr Garforth did ask me.’
Holmes steepled his fingers. ‘Pray tell.’
‘Well, sir, I’m afraid we opened the door to the outside for a short while, because it really was very close in the Annexe, and I happened to have that key with me – I carry keys to all the outside doors. It was a relief to us both to get some cool fresh air for a few minutes. But then the cat got in and started scratching to be let through into the laboratory, where she mustn’t go on account of how she sheds her fur all over the equipment, so I had to put her out and lock it up again.’
‘A night of incident indeed,’ said Holmes. ‘You are certain that you locked the door, I suppose?’
‘Quite sure, sir. I wanted to be sure nobody found it had been open, because, as I say, Sir Newnham wouldn’t approve. These experiments are supposed to happen in complete isolation from the outside world.’
‘And no other persons entered the Annexe during that time?’
‘No persons at all, sir, only the cat. The door was only open for a few minutes, and of course we could see it all the time.’
‘Did you leave the Annexe when you put the cat out?’
‘No, I knew that wouldn’t do. I sort of tossed her out, but quite gently. They land on their feet, sir, you know. Then Mr Garforth shut the door quick, before she could dash back in. And a moment later Major Bradbury came through from the laboratory and left that door open behind him. What Sir Newnham would have said if that animal had got in there I don’t like to contemplate, gentlemen.’
‘So this would have happened between a quarter and ten minutes before five?’ Holmes asked.
‘Yes, sir. I opened the door just after the four-forty observation, then the cat came in while we were doing the four-forty-five. By the time we’d got rid of her and Major Bradbury arrived, we were about to make the four-fifty. He told us not to mind him, so I looked in at Mr Kellway and Mr Garforth looked at the experimental materials, and we both agreed there was no change.’
‘Was Major Bradbury disappointed by that?’ I asked. ‘Mr Rhyne said he was hoping Kellway would deliver results.’
‘He did seem a bit put out by it. He told us he’d had trouble sleeping – he was in his dressing gown, in fact – and since he was awake he thought he’d come and see what was happening. He seemed quite excited about it, until we told him nothing had happened at all. He sat down, a bit gloomy, and lit his pipe. Then he seemed to cheer up again, and was kind enough to talk to me a bit about the book I’m reading. It’s an Arthur Morrison one, sir, about a private detective.’
Holmes smiled. ‘An improving volume, I have no doubt. Please go on.’
‘Well, sir, then we made the four-fifty-five observation and Major Bradbury suggested a game, but he and Mr Garforth couldn’t agree on cards or chess. They argued about it until five o’clock, and we made the check again, and found no change – I saw to Mr Kellway that time, and he was sitting just the same as before. So I read, and the Major smoked, and Mr Garforth paced some more. Then the stopwatch chimed again for the five past five, and… Well, sir, you know what happened after that.’
Holmes said wryly, ‘If I knew that, Anderton, Dr Watson and I could go home happy with the service we had rendered Sir Newnham. Please tell us in your own words what you observed.’
‘Well, that was my turn to look at the materials again, and of course they hadn’t moved. But just as I was looking Mr Garforth cried out, “My God, but he’s gone!” or something like that. He tried the door, then stood aside so Major Bradbury could see. Then the Major said, “Great Scott!” and went a bit pale and sat down. So then I looked too, and saw that the room was completely empty.’
‘You could see that clearly?’ Holmes asked. ‘The room was not lit.’
‘There was enough light to see. You’ve seen the room yourself, sir – the door’s got a big window in it, and the shadows weren’t anything like deep enough to hide in. I said something like, “Let’s look underneath the door – maybe he’s fainted from the hunger,” and Mr Garforth got down on his hands and knees and looked and said, “No, no, the cove’s gone – God alone knows how. Run and get Sir Newnham at once, and make sure he brings the key.” And so I did.’
‘You found Sir Newnham awake?’
‘Yes, sir, and nearly dressed. He sent me to wake Mr Rhyne while he finished, then he and I went down together.’
‘Was all as you left it when you returned?’
‘Mostly, sir. Major Bradbury was sitting in another chair – I think he’d sat down first on the one where Mr Garforth had hung his jacket. Mr Garforth had put it back on, and I didn’t blame him, sirs, I can tell you. That
room was warm, but I was feeling the chill myself; it seemed so unnatural what had happened. Of course when I thought about it later I realised it had to have been a trick of some kind, but at the time it properly gave me the shivers.’
‘Did any of the other observers join you then?’ Holmes asked.
‘Only Mr Rhyne, sir, none of the others – not till later, after we’d done a thorough check of the Annexe. That we did without delay, and found nothing else out of the ordinary, and of course no sign of Mr Kellway. I think that’s all I can tell you, sirs.’
‘Thank you, Anderton,’ Holmes said. ‘You’ve given us a very thorough account. Forgive me, but I must ask – you have told us that you were reading, and also that the room was warm and stuffy. I know the effect those circumstances can have on people’ – here he glanced at me – ‘and this was very early in the morning. Is it possible, Anderton, that your attention might have… lapsed for a moment or two? Long enough, say, for Kellway to have left Room A without your being aware of it and slipped out, either through the open back door or through the laboratory?’
Anderton’s chubby forehead wrinkled. ‘Well, I can’t see how, sir. His room was locked, as you know.’
‘But if that difficulty were somehow overcome? And that of his being seen by the other observers?’
‘I saw him in the room myself at five, sir, and the outside door was locked by then. But even so, sir, having it open had cooled the room down a little, and freshened the air. If I’d been going to doze off – which I wouldn’t have anyway, sir, seeing as Sir Newnham was trusting me not to – it would have been earlier on, when it was closer in there.’
Sherlock Holmes--The Vanishing Man Page 6
