The Confidential Casebook of Sherlock Holmes (9 page)

While the Henry Baskerville that I'd known had always seemed the most sympathetic of men, I reflected now that I scarcely knew him. I glanced at him involuntarily and saw a short, dark-eyed man, sturdily built, even verging on corpulence. He had thick black eyebrows and a strong, pugnacious face. He seemed stricken with alarm and concern, yet at that moment the affection that I felt for him withered like a green shoot struck by an arctic wind. He had been raised in Canada, I remembered, far from England's public schools. How had he become infected with so vicious a form of corruption?

Barely able to look at him, I muttered that she should be taken to the hospital. It was the woman who emphatically said “No!” in a voice that was deep and musical, the sound of the vowel somehow exotic. Her face was still turned away from me, whether from shame or modesty I couldn't tell, but she issued a series of sharp cries and moans as I tended to her wounds. I left her with a draught of laudanum in case her pain worsened.

“For God's sake, Baskerville, what have you done?” I demanded of him when we were on the street again.

“Nothing, I swear!” he replied. “I merely found her here like this.”

It was all I could do not to grab him by the collar and shake him. “Merely found her? You mean to tell me you just went out for a walk, wandered up here and found her by accident?”

“She sent a note saying she had something urgent to tell me, but—” He broke off, shaking his head. “Be my friend, ask no questions,” he pleaded.

I advised him that if she were to show any signs of fever, he was to call on me so that she might be taken to Charing Cross Hospital. It was with the greatest misgivings that I returned home, just as a lifeless streak of light on the horizon heralded a grey dawn breaking over London.

I was exhausted, but my apprehension was so great that I returned to the little room well before noon. The woman was gone. Her landlady told me that she had been taken away by a gentleman early this morning, leaning heavily on the man's arm. “A fine gentleman ‘e was, too,” she told me, happy to elaborate when I offered her a guinea. “An' I figger 'e might be the one who pays 'er rent, y'know?” In that way I discovered that the woman's rent had been paid each month with a cheque mailed from a solicitor's office.

I have returned home to sit in growing apprehension throughout the afternoon. I find myself perusing my old notes on the Baskerville case and the lengthy correspondence I sent to Holmes while he was investigating the rumours of the mythical hound of that poor family. I read and reread my notes, especially Holmes's comments at the very end of the affair, committing his words to my memory. Rarely have I felt such a sense of misgiving.

May 24, 1893

Well, it all seems quite obvious now, if even more ominous, but I was too upset at the time to think clearly. I tried to contact
Baskerville all yesterday, sent runners to the club, went there twice myself. At last I found him in. A servant brought him downstairs to meet me in the smoke-flavoured air of the club's receiving room.

“The woman you treated for me is gone. Is she with you?” he demanded accusingly as soon as we were alone.

“No, she's not. Sir Henry, I must talk with you.” A strange look passed over his face. Alarm? Relief? I couldn't be sure. “Is there some place where we could speak privately?”

“The India Room,” he replied and led me up the stairs and down the hall.

The darkness of the late afternoon was broken by shimmering fingers of sunlight streaking across the window at the end of the corridor. Silent servants moved about us hurrying on errands for other, unseen members of the club hidden within the quiet rooms about us. When the door opened into The India Room, a familiar figure turned toward me from the mantle, his grey eyes peering behind his gold-rimmed glasses. “James Mortimer!” I exclaimed, clasping his hand in genuine pleasure.

“I just arrived from Dartmoor,” Sir Henry's old friend and doctor explained. He squinted at me through his thick spectacles. “But you seem, like my friend Sir Henry, very troubled.” He was a tall, stooped man, very thin with a light complexion and a pronounced nose. As he stood beside the shorter and wider Henry Baskerville, the contrast could not have been greater. Dr. Mortimer had been the first to welcome Sir Henry to England, and had forsaken his own obligations to accompany him on a long voyage to restore the baronet's health after the affair with the hound. I had no doubt of Mortimer's honour and decency. How much, I wondered, did he really know about his friend?

“There is bad business afoot,” I said solemnly.

He nodded in agreement. “Would you like anything?”

“A whiskey.”

“I went to meet Dr. Mortimer at Victoria Station,” Baskerville explained. “I've told him everything. But when we looked in on that
woman, she was gone. We've searched, but no one has seen her. We returned here less than an hour ago.”

A whiskey, neat, was thrust into my hand. “Let's sit down,” I said. “I have something important to ask you.”

We were all whispering and moving quickly like conspirators. Mortimer was standing before the fireplace. Sir Henry crossed the room and sat down on the corner of the sofa and I turned to follow him. Before I could reach it, Dr. Mortimer flung himself down in the red leather chair and gave a ghastly cry. Struggling as though a powerful unseen force were pressing him back, he pulled himself up with great effort, then gave a gasp and fell face down on the floor. He was dead before my fingers could reach his pulse. “Great Scott,” I exclaimed as I turned him over and saw a deep gash in his back beneath his left shoulder blade. “It looks like he's been stabbed!”

“Good God!” Sir Henry leaped to his feet, his eyes wide, his lower lip trembling. “How could that happen? He was just—”

I cautiously probed the seam between the cushions of the chair, jerking back my hand as I felt cold metal. A knife blade was tightly wedged in the stuffing of the red leather chair. “Sharp as a razor!” I explained when I had taken my bleeding finger from my mouth. “It would have killed anyone who sat in it. Don't move, Sir Henry. Don't touch anything!” The ever-present servants clustered by the door and I sent someone for the police, giving orders that no one should be allowed to leave the building.

The police arrived quickly and I was glad to see my old friend Inspector Lestrade in charge. His first act was to secure the building and see to the removal of the body and the chair, with its lethal blade still in place. Then he climbed the stairs to the crowded room. “Who was here at the time of the crime?” he asked.

“The deceased, myself, and Sir Henry Baskerville,” I told him.

“And who had access to the room?”

“All the servants,” Sir Henry put in. “Dr. Mortimer and I had just arrived.”

“I thought you said that you came from Victoria Station an hour before,” I objected.

“Barely that,” he replied.

“Dr. Watson, come with me,” Lestrade said formally.

An empty room was found for us, and we sat beside a bare fireplace while I told him everything that had transpired. Lestrade listened closely, wrapping his coat about his shoulders, for a chill filled the room that made us both shiver. I gave him the facts just as I have noted them here, just as I would have done with Holmes.

“Very well,” was all he said when I was done. He went on to question Sir Henry and the servants, and it was several hours before he called us all together again at the scene of the crime.

“There is more than one crime here,” the Inspector announced. “A woman has been beaten and abducted, a man murdered. I have sent men to investigate, and I have learned that for the past two years the woman whom you treated last night, Dr. Watson—her name was Mrs. Agrafe, by the way—was supported by a monthly cheque. Those cheques originated in the chambers of Lester Stanley, Esquire. Who is your solicitor, Henry Baskerville?”

“Lester Stanley,” Sir Henry admitted.

“Yes, I thought so,” Lestrade said. “Watson, what's the matter with you?” he added with some irritation.

“Agrafe!” I exclaimed. “That's ‘staple' in French! Of course! I should have recognized her!”

“What are you rattling on about?” the Inspector demanded.

“The original crime, Lestrade!” I controlled myself and lowered my voice so that the servants and the policemen standing nearby couldn't hear. “Stapleton's wife, remember? I treated her when she was beaten by her husband just before he died fleeing justice. That woman in the room last night was Beryl Stapleton!”

“Are you sure? You said you never saw her face.”

“But I saw . . . other things.” I turned to Sir Henry. “It
was
Beryl Stapleton, was it not?” But Sir Henry only set his jaw and
scowled. “I'm sure it was her! She had scars that corresponded to wounds Mrs. Stapleton suffered in the original incident.”

“Why didn't you tell me this before?” demanded Lestrade.

“I only just realized it.”

“Is there anything else you've neglected to tell me?”

“Well, yes, actually, but only for decency's sake,” I crossed the room to whisper in his ear. “The lady had the letter
B
incised on her—ah. Well. On a private part of her body.”

Lestrade's eyebrows shot up. “Thank you, Dr. Watson, you have just handed me the final element in this disturbing puzzle.” He turned to Sir Henry. “Henry Baskerville, you are about to make a very advantageous marriage. Great fortune and many heirs seem inevitably yours.” When Sir Henry nodded in reluctant agreement, Lestrade went on. “What will you do to protect that marriage?”

“Protect it?” The baronet was confused. “Anything! Anything at all!”

“Yes, I believe that,” the Inspector nodded. “Just as I believe that your paramour became jealous. What caused you to beat her so savagely? Did she threaten to reveal your relationship with her?”

“Paramour?” Sir Henry echoed in what seemed like innocent astonishment.

“Don't try to deny it. This is a very intricate case, made more difficult because the original murder of your uncle, Sir Charles Baskerville, was solved by Sherlock Holmes. Mr. Holmes incriminated your cousin and pursued him to a terrible death in the quicksand of Grimpen Mire. The motives for the goings-on last night and today seem a separate puzzle. It's impossible to understand—unless one is clever enough to throw out Holmes's solution to that first case and start over. Do that, and the truth emerges as plain as the nose on your face.”

Lestrade had a buoyant, cocky attitude and was, I felt, enjoying himself a little too much. I was becoming annoyed with his blatant disregard for Holmes's memory. “Really, Lestrade!” I protested.

“Admit for a change that Holmes could be wrong,” he fired back. “Look at the matter with fresh eyes, Dr. Watson. Holmes had the wrong Baskerville! It was Sir Henry here, along with his accomplice, Dr. Mortimer, who conspired to kill Sir Charles in order to inherit the family fortune. He let his poor cousin take the blame and be hunted to death by Holmes and the rest of us.”

“That's outrageous!” Sir Henry exclaimed.

“I must agree!” I declared.

The Inspector was undeterred. “Sir Henry stole the affections of his cousin's wife, Beryl, and brutalized her in a most despicable way when she threatened his chances with his fiancée's family. And finally, he's done away with her. Probably with James Mortimer's help,” he added as an afterthought. “Why did you kill Dr. Mortimer? Was he threatening to blackmail you?”

“This is preposterous! I've done nothing!” Sir Henry protested.

“Wait, Inspector,” I objected. “Sir Henry had no way of knowing that Mortimer would sit in that chair. There are chairs all over this room. In fact, that is
my
favourite chair and I might well have sat in it myself if Mortimer hadn't beaten me to it!”

Lestrade barely hesitated. “And don't think it hasn't occurred to me that you, Dr. Watson, were the intended victim. Although you don't realize it, you have come too close to the truth. Whatever Dr. Mortimer's fate, you would never have left this room alive, for you saw the evil that Baskerville has done to his lover, and it would be only a matter of time before you understood the situation almost as well as I.” Unable to restrain a smug smile of satisfaction, he turned again to Sir Henry. “Baskerville, I am accusing you of the murders of your uncle, Sir Charles Baskerville, and of your accomplice, Dr. Mortimer. Furthermore, I suspect you are responsible for the assault, abduction and possible murder of Beryl Stapleton. I doubt we'll find that poor lady alive. What do you have to say for yourself?”

Sir Henry's face turned ashen and he sat abruptly on the
sofa as though his legs had buckled beneath him. “No,” he croaked. “No,
No!”

Lestrade turned to me and said with infuriating pleasure, “Sherlock Holmes had it all wrong.”

“You can't let him get away with that, Watson.”

“Wait just a moment!” I said, fighting to keep control of myself. “There's something you're not taking into account.”

“What's that?” Lestrade growled.

“Character!” I blurted, not sure where I was going to go with this. “I knew James Mortimer, and he was a good man. And I know Sir Henry Baskerville. I was a guest in Baskerville Hall for several weeks. I watched him as he fell in love with Beryl Stapleton, saw his reaction when he learned she was married to his cousin. I saw him face death, and I know the nature of the man. It is, if occasionally too eager, a good and noble nature. I apologize for my earlier doubts, Sir Henry, but on reflection I know you could never abuse a lady or plot to kill a friend. Furthermore,” I hurried on before Lestrade could interrupt, “I know the lady. Even though she was married to a man with a criminal mind, she managed to remain loyal to him while trying to thwart his malicious intentions. She is not the sort of woman who becomes someone's lover for money.” I turned back to Baskerville. “Is it true that you were supporting Mrs. Stapleton?” But I saw by the rise of colour in his cheeks that it was. Lestrade snorted.