Murder, My Dear Watson Read online

“And suppose, then, that years later the man saw face to face the very person who had left him there that day so long ago and realizing that the person did not recognize him, might he not be tempted to extract a bit of revenge?”

  I remembered a heavily bearded face, a limp, and a half-conscious salute and said, “Gordon?”

  “Very good, Watson,” said Holmes. “As you are probably not aware, the dyes in wallpaper in houses of this age often contain arsenic. I am sure that Gordon scraped and pulverized a quantity of the old paper he removed from the wall. This he added to Mrs. Oliver’s soup that he so helpfully brought to Murray. Seeing the slow death of the man he believed had deserted him must have brought him a great measure of satisfaction.”

  “It did, indeed,” said Gordon from the doorway. “I am sorry that you have put an end to my game, Mr. Sherlock Holmes. Now I will have to take a more direct approach.” He pulled a pistol from beneath the canvas apron he was wearing. “Please step back from the bed, Mr. Holmes.”

  “Very well,” said Holmes. “I . . .”

  His voice seemed to stick in his throat, and his face contorted horribly as he began to stumble forward.

  Gordon was momentarily distracted, but I, being better acquainted with Holmes than he, was not. As Gordon stared, I turned and grabbed the arm that held the pistol, jerking it downward and causing it to discharge a bullet into the floor. I twisted Gordon’s wrist with both hands, and he dropped the pistol just as Holmes reached us.

  “Hold him, Watson!” said Holmes, and I secured both Gordon’s arms. Though he struggled, he could not escape me.

  “Good old Watson,” said Holmes. “I knew you would not be fooled by my ruse. Now if Mrs. Murray will be so kind as to send for the police, we will turn Mr. Gordon over to them. After that, you can begin caring for your former orderly.”

  Mrs. Murray, who had been somewhat shocked at the gunshot and the brief struggle, recovered herself and dashed from the room to summon the law. Her husband said, “I would never have left anyone on that field had I been able to help.”

  Gordon struggled in my grip.

  “Swine,” he said.

  “You should read more Kipling,” Holmes said to him.

  Gordon glared at him but did not deign to respond, so I said, “Whatever do you mean, Holmes?”

  “That poem you are fond of had some advice for people like Gordon,” said Holmes. “‘Be thankful you’re livin’, and trust to your luck, and march to your jail like a soldier.’”

  I smiled in spite of myself. “I do not believe that Kipling said jail, Holmes.”

  “Perhaps not,” said he. “But it fits the case.”

  As usual, he was correct.

  THE VALE OF THE WHITE HORSE

  Sharyn McCrumb

  GRISEL ROUNTREE was the first to see that something was strange about the white chalk horse.

  As she stood on the summit of the high down, in the ruins of the hill fort that overlooked the dry chalk valley, she squinted at the white shape on the hillside below, wondering for a moment or two what was altered. Carved into the steep slope across the valley, the primitive outline of a white horse shone in the sunshine of a June morning. Although Grisel Rountree had lived in the valley all seven decades of her life, she never tired of the sight of the ancient symbol, large as a hayfield, shining like polished ivory in the long grass of early summer.

  The white horse had been old two thousand years ago when the Romans arrived in Britain and the people in the valley had long ago forgotten the reason for its existence, but there were stories about its magic. Some said that King Arthur had fought his last battle on that hill, and others claimed that the horse was the symbol for the nearby Wayland smithy, the local name for a stone chamber where folks said that a pagan god had been condemned to shoe the horses of mortals for all eternity.

  Whatever the truth of its origins, the village took a quiet pride in its proximity to the great horse. Every year when the weather broke, folks would make an excursion up the slope to clean the chalk form of the great beast, and to pull any encroaching weeds that threatened to blur the symmetry of its outline. They made a day of it, taking picnic lunches and bottles of ale, and the children played tag in the long grass while their elders worked. When Grisel was a young girl, her father had told her that the chalk figure was a dragon whose imprint had been burned into the hill where it had been killed by St. George himself. When she became old enough to go to the village dances, the laughing young men had insisted that the white beast was a unicorn, and that if a virgin should let herself be kissed within the eye of the chalk figure, the unicorn would come to life and gallop away. It was a great jest to invite the unmarried lasses up to the hill “to make the unicorn run,” though of course it never did.

  Nowadays everyone simply said the creature was a horse, though they did allow that whoever drew it hadn’t made much of a job of it. It was too stretched and skinny to look like a proper horse, but given its enormous size, perhaps the marvel was that the figure looked like anything at all.

  The hill fort provided the best view of the great white horse. Anyone standing beside the chalk ramparts of the ancient ruins could look down across the valley and see the entire figure of the horse sprawled out below like the scribble of some infant giant. Grisel Rountree did not believe in giants, but she did believe in tansy leaves, which was why she was up at the hill fort so early that morning. A few leaves of tansy put in each shoe prevented the wearer from coming down with ague. Although she seldom had the ague, Grisel Rountree considered it prudent to stock up on the remedy as a precaution anyhow. Besides, half the village came to her at one time or another to cure their aches and pains, and it was just as well to be ready with a good supply before winter set in.

  She had got up at first light, fed the hens and did the morning chores around her cottage, and then set off with a clean feed sack to gather herbs for her remedies and potions. She had been up at the ruins when the clouds broke, and a shaft of sunlight seemed to shine right down on the chalk horse. She had stopped looking for plants then, and when she stood up to admire the sight, she noticed it.

  The eye of the great white horse was red.

  “Now, there’s a thing,” she said to herself.

  She shaded her eyes from the sun and squinted to get a clearer image of the patch of red but she still couldn’t make it out. The eye did not appear to have been painted. It was more like something red had been put more or less in the space where the horse’s eye ought to be, but at this distance, she couldn’t quite make out what it was. She picked up the basket of herbs and made her way down the slope. No use hurrying—it would take her at least half an hour to cross the valley and climb the hill to the eye of the white horse. Besides, since whatever-it-was in the eye was not moving, it would probably be there whenever she reached it.

  “It’ll be goings-on, I’ll warrant,” she muttered to herself, picturing a courting couple fallen asleep in their trysting place. Grisel Rountree did not hold with “goings-on,” certainly not in broad daylight at the top of a great hill before God and everybody. She tried to think of who in the village might be up to such shenanigans these days, but no likely couple came to mind. They were all either past the point of outdoor courting or still working up to it.

  Out of ideas, she plodded on. “Knowing is better than guessing,” she muttered, resolving to ignore the twinge of rheumatism that bedeviled her joints with every step she took. The walk would do her good, she thought, and if it didn’t, there was always some willow tea back in the cottage waiting to be brewed.

  Half an hour later, the old woman had crossed the valley and reached the summit where the chalk horse lay. Now that she was nearer she could see that the splash of red she had spotted from afar was a bit of cloth, but it wasn’t lying flat against the ground like a proper cape or blanket should. She felt a shiver of cold along her backbone, knowing what she was to find.

  In the eye of the white horse, Grisel knelt beside the scarlet cloak spread open th
e ground. She wore a look of grim determination, but she would not be shocked. She had been midwife to the village these forty years, and she laid out the dead as well, so she’d seen the worst, taken all round. She lifted the edge of the blanket and found herself staring into the sightless eyes of a stranger. A moment’s examination told her that the man was a gentleman—the cut of his bloodstained clothes would have told her that, but besides his wardrobe, the man had the smooth hand and the well-kept look of one who has been waited on all his life. She noted this without any resentment of the differences in their stations: such things just were.

  The man was alive, but only just.

  “Can you tell me who did this to you?” she said, knowing that this was all the help he could be given, and that if there were time for only one question, it should be that. The rest could be found out later, one way or another.

  The man’s eyes seemed to focus on her for a moment, and in a calm, wondering voice he said clearly, “Not a maiden . . .”

  And then he died. Grisel Rountree did not stay to examine him further, because the short blade sticking out of the dead man’s stomach told her that this was not a matter for the layer-out of the dead but for the village constable.

  “Rest in peace, my lad,” said the old woman, laying the blanket back into place. “I’ll bring back someone directly to fetch you down.”

  “MISSUS ROUNTREE!” YOUNG Tom Cowper stood under the apple tree beside the old woman’s cottage, gasping for breath from his run from the village, but too big with news to wait for composure. “They’re bringing a gentleman down from London on account of the murder!”

  Grisel Rountree swirled the wooden paddle around the sides of the steaming black kettle, fishing a bit of bedsheet out of the froth and examining it for dirt. Not clean yet. “From London?” she grunted. “I shouldn’t wonder. Our PC Waller is out of his depth, and so I told him when I took him up to the white horse.”

  “Yes’m,” said Tom, mindful of the sixpence he had been given to deliver the message. “The London gentleman—he’s staying at the White Horse, him and a friend—at the inn, I mean.”

  Grisel snorted. “I didn’t suppose you meant the white horse on the hill, lad.”

  “No. Well, he’s asking to see you, missus. On account of you finding the body. They say I’m to take you to the village.”

  The old woman stopped stirring the wash pot and fixed the boy with a baleful eye. “Oh, I’m to come to the village, am I? Look here, Tom Cowper, you go back to the inn and tell the gentleman that anybody can tell him the way to my cottage, and if he wants a word with me, here I’ll be.”

  “But missus . . .”

  “Go!”

  For a moment Tom gaped at the tall white-haired figure, pointing imperiously at him. People roundabouts said she were a witch, and of course he didn’t hold with such foolishness, but there was a limit to what sixpence would buy a gentleman in the way of his services as a messenger. Choosing the better part of valor, he turned and ran.

  “Who is this London fellow?” Grisel called after the boy.

  Without breaking stride Tom called back to her, “Mis-terr Sher-lock Holmes!”

  GRISEL ROUNTREE FINISHED her washing, swept the cottage again, and set to work making a batch of scones in case the gentleman from London should arrive at tea time, which, if he had any sense, he would, because anybody hereabouts could tell him that Grisel Rountree’s baking was far better than the alternately scorched and floury efforts of the cook at the village inn.

  The old woman was not surprised that London had taken an interest in the case, considering that the dead man had turned out to be from London himself, and a society doctor to boot. James Dacre, his name was, and he was one of the Hampshire Dacres, and the brother of the young earl over at Ramsmeade. The wonder of it was that the doctor should be visiting here, for he had never done so before, though they saw his brother the baronet often enough.

  A few months back, the young baronet had been a guest of the local hunt, and during the course of the visit he had met Miss Evelyn Ambry, the daughter of the local squire and the beauty of the county. She was a tall, spirited young woman, much more beautiful than her sisters and by far the best rider. People said she was as fearless as she was flawless, but among the villagers there was a hint of reserve in their voices when they spoke of her. There was a local tradition about the Ambrys, people didn’t speak of it in these enlightened times, but they never quite forgot it either. Miss Evelyn was one of the Ambry Changelings, right enough. There was one along in nearly every generation.

  By all accounts Miss Evelyn Ambry had made a conquest of the noble guest, and the baronet’s visits to the district became so frequent that people began to talk of a match being made between the pair of them. Some folk said they would been betrothed already if Miss Evelyn’s aunt had not suddenly taken ill and died two weeks back, so that Miss Evelyn had to observe mourning for the next several months. And now there was more mourning to keep them apart—his lordship’s own brother.

  Grisel was sorry about the young man’s untimely death, but it’s an ill wind that blows nobody good, she told herself, and if the doctor’s passing kept his brother from wedding the Ambry Changeling, it might be a blessing after all. Whenever a silly woman sighed at the prospect of a wedding between Miss Evelyn and the baronet, Grisel always held her peace on the subject, but she’d not be drinking the health of the handsome couple if the wedding day ever came. It boded ill for the bridegroom, she thought. It always had done when a besotted suitor wed an Ambry Changeling, and so Grisel had been expecting a tragedy in the offing—but not this particular tragedy. The baronet’s younger brother dying in the eye of the white horse. She didn’t know what it meant, and that worried her. And his last words— “Not a maiden”—put her in mind of the village lads’ old jest about the unicorn, but how could a gentleman doctor from London know about that? It was a puzzle, right enough, and she could not see the sense of it yet, but one thing she did know for certain: death comes in threes.

  She was just dusting the top of the oak cupboard for the second time when she heard voices in the garden.

  “Do let me handle this, Holmes,” came the voice of a London gentleman. “You may frighten the poor old creature out of her wits with your abrupt ways.”

  “Nonsense!” said a sharper voice. “I am the soul of tact, always!”

  She had flung open the cottage door before they could knock. “Good afternoon, good sirs,” she said, addressing her remarks to the tall, saturnine gentleman in the cape and the deerstalker hat. Just from the look of him, you could tell that he was the one in charge.

  The short, sandy-haired fellow with the bushy mustache and kind eyes gave her a reassuring smile. “It’s Mistress Rountree, is it not? I am Dr. John Watson. Allow me to introduce my companion, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, the eminent detective from London. We are indeed hoping for a word with you. May we come in?”

  She nodded and stepped aside to let them pass. “You’re wanting to talk about young Dacre’s death,” she said. “It was me that found him. But you needn’t be afraid of upsetting me, young man. I may not have seen the horrors you did with the army in Afghanistan, but I’ll warrant I’ve seen my share in forty years of birthing and burying folk in these parts.”

  The sandy-haired man took a step backward and stared at her. “But how did you know that I had been in Afghanistan?”

  “Really, Watson!” said his companion. “Will you never cease to be amazed by parlor tricks? Shall I tell you how the good lady ferreted out your secret? I did it myself at our first meeting, you may recall.”

  “Yes, yes,” said Watson with a nervous laugh. “I remember. I was a bit startled because the innkeeper said that Mistress Rountree had a bit of reputation hereabouts as a witch. I thought this might be a sample of it.”

  “I expect it is,” said Holmes. “People are always spinning tales to explain that which they do not understand. No doubt they’ll be coming out with some outlandish nonsense ab
out the body of Mr. Dacre being found in the eye of the white horse. I believe you found him, madam?”

  Grisel Rountree motioned for them to sit down. “I’ve laid the tea on, and there are scones on the table. You can be getting on with that while I’m telling you.” In a few words she gave the visitors a concise account of her actions on the morning of James Dacre’s murder.

  “You’ll be in the employ of his lordship the baronet,” she said, giving Holmes an appraising look.

  He nodded. “Indeed, that gentleman is most anxious to discover the circumstances surrounding his brother’s murder. And you tell me that Dr. Dacre was in fact alive when you found him?”

  “Only just, sir. He had been stabbed in the stomach, and he had bled like a stuck pig. Must have lay there a good hour or more, judging by all the blood on the grass thereabouts.”

  “And you saw no one? There are very few trees on those downs. Did you scan the distance for a retreating figure?”

  She nodded. “Even before I knew what had happened, I looked. I was on the opposite hill, mind, when I first noticed the red on the horse’s eye, so I could see for miles, and there were nothing moving, not so much as a cow, sir, much less a man.”

  “No. You’d have told the constable if it had been otherwise. And the poor man’s final words to you were—”

  “Just like I told you. He opened his eyes and said clear as day. Not a maiden. Then he lay back and died.”

  “Not a maiden. He was not addressing you, I take it?”

  “He were not,” snapped the old woman. “And he would have been wrong if he had been.”

  “Did the phrase convey anything to you at the time?”

  “Only the old tale about the white horse. The village lads used to say that if anyone were to kiss a proper maiden standing upon the chalk horse, the beast would get up and walk away. So perhaps he had been kissing a lady? But that’s not what I thought. The poor man was stabbed with a woman’s weapon—a seam ripper, it were, from a lady’s sewing kit—and I think he was saying that the one who used it was not a woman, despite the look of it.”