‘Be careful!’ I warned her. ‘This may be some ruse of the watchers.’
She nodded, but bade the waiter show the man in to us. I eased my chair a little away from the table and grasped my Adams revolver, which I had not neglected to slip into my coat pocket that morning.
The waiter returned accompanied by a figure who seemed, at first sight, completely harmless. The clergyman was an elderly, stooped individual, in shabby black and carrying a bundle of tracts. He peered about him through thick, half-round spectacles and introduced himself in a reedy, elderly voice as a missionary in the East End.
Despite my warning, Mrs Fordeland ushered our visitor into a chair and pressed upon him a cup of tea and a selection of cakes. Tea he accepted, but he insisted that he must follow the abstemious example of his Master and take only bread and butter.
I waited in growing impatience as he supped his tea and munched steadily at two slices of bread and butter. When he had done, he gazed about him again, as though surprised to find himself there, then took out a slim black notebook from an inside pocket.
‘I have a message,’ he said, ‘which I have been asked to deliver to a Mrs Fordeland at this hotel.’
‘A message?’ I said. ‘From whom?’
‘You must not rush me, Doctor,’ he said. ‘I am an old man and the memory is not as useful now as once it was. I have been today in the vicinity of Commercial Road, attempting, as always, to bring a little light into the harsh world of the foreigners there. In the course of my efforts I was approached by a young man who seemed to be some kind of salesman. He made a generous contribution to my mission on the understanding that I would deliver his message when I returned to town.’
He raised his notebook as though to peer at the pages, but his eyes dilated and he stared past us at the conservatory windows beyond.
‘Great Heavens!’ he exclaimed.
Mrs Fordeland and I swung our heads in unison. There was nothing untoward that I could see beyond the panes. The hotel’s small garden lay in the sunlight and nobody was in sight.
When we turned back the lined features and spectacles of the old cleric had disappeared. Above the shabby black clothing were the familiar features of Sherlock Holmes. Mrs Fordeland stared for a moment, then emitted a loud laugh. I shook my head slowly.
‘Holmes,’ I said. ‘Why do I never realize that it is you?’
He laughed. ‘I always think it a pity that many of my best dramatic creations are wasted upon an audience which will never know that it was witnessing a performance. It is some small consolation to have your applause, Watson. Now, Mrs Fordeland, if I may rescind my former refusal of cake and take another cup of tea, I shall be able to report to you the result of today’s enquiries.’
Once fully refreshed he leaned back in his chair.
‘When you both arrived here this morning,’ he began, ‘Major Kyriloff left his aide to watch the hotel and took himself off. The other two watchers seemed to be satisfied that they need not watch further and their cab drove off, followed at a reasonable distance by my own conveyance.
‘I had expected,’ he went on, ‘that they would make for an Underground station and travel to the East End, or perhaps take their cab all the way. I admit to being a little surprised when they took their cab to Victoria and boarded a train to Sussex. I followed, of course, and found that their destination was the village of Burriwell, under the Downs.’
He paused and sipped his tea. ‘It is a dangerous practice to believe that, because the majority of a class of people behave in a particular fashion, that all persons of that type will so behave. It is misleading to convince oneself that all Frenchmen are romantics, all Jews financially acute, all Irishmen aggressive or all Scots careful with their money, and I fear that I had fallen into that error. I had identified the bearded gentleman and his companion as Russian refugees, and so unconsciously expected them to be located in the eastern slums among their compatriots.’
‘I was therefore,’ he continued, ‘the more surprised to find that, not only are our mysterious pair living in a pretty village by the Sussex Downs, they are dwelling, not in some rented cottage, but as house guests of a wealthy maiden lady.’
Both Mrs Fordeland and I were surprised by Holmes’ information, but his next remark was an even greater surprise to me.
‘Tell me, Mrs Fordeland,’ he said, ‘does the name Agatha Wortley-Swan mean anything to you?’
Our client looked completely perplexed. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I am quite sure that I have never heard that name before.’
‘I have,’ I said.
Holmes turned. ‘You know the lady’s name, Watson? In what connection, pray?’
‘When I was finishing my degree in London, some twenty years ago or more, and when I was at Netley for the Army medical certificate, Agatha Wortley-Swan was a well-known society beauty. Her picture appeared in the Graphic and the Illustrated London more than once, and I believe some of the fellows at Netley actually knew the lady.’
‘Excellent!’ exclaimed Holmes, ‘but she has never married, and my researches in the village and my gossipy enquiries in the village inn have referred me only to some unspecified “tragedy” which left the lady single. Do you recall that, Watson?’
I cast my memory back two decades. ‘She was engaged,’ I remembered, ‘because all the fellows at Netley were heartbroken, but it went wrong. Her fiance died, I believe, in peculiar circumstances. I think, perhaps, that he was murdered.’
‘Murdered!’ repeated Holmes, and his eyes lit with that peculiar sparkle which appeared when his mind was fully and enthusiastically engaged. ‘Do you, by any chance, remember the luckless fiance’s name?’
I sifted my memory again. ‘I think,’ I said, ‘that he was a Captain Parkes of the Royal West Mallows.’
Holmes snapped his fingers. ‘Of course!’ he exclaimed.
He rose abruptly. ‘We must take our leave, Mrs Fordeland. My device today has given me more data and, with the help of Watson’s memory for a pretty face, I hope soon to have yet more. Rest assured that we are on the way to identifying this mysterious pair and finding out the nature of their interest in you. In the meantime, do not forget to keep me aware of any change in the patterns of their behaviour.’
Holmes was silent on the way back to Baker Street, drumming his fingers impatiently on the handle of his stick and staring fixedly ahead of him. At our door he sprang from the cab and raced upstairs. By the time I had paid the cabby and followed him, he was sunk in an armchair leafing rapidly through one of the large scrapbooks into which he entered items which he deemed might be of use in the future.
‘Parkes, was it, Watson? Was he not murdered in Paris?’
‘It’s a long time, Holmes. I believe that he was murdered abroad, but I would not swear that it was Paris.’
He continued flicking rapidly through the pages, then gave a cry of triumph. ‘I have it, Watson! Listen to this!’ and he read me the entry.
‘From our correspondent in Paris. The large English community in this city has been stunned by the discovery of the fate of the missing Captain Parkes. Readers of our earlier notices of the matter will recall that Captain Parkes has been missing for some five days. The French authorities now inform us that a body taken from the River Seine has been identified by a brother officer as that of Captain Parkes. It appears that Captain Parkes, who went missing after attending a diplomatic reception with his fiancee, the noted beauty Miss Agatha Wortley-Swan, escorted the lady to her hotel and, on his way home, had the misfortune to fall in with some of the boulevard thieves who so plague this city. Perhaps the gallant officer attempted to defend himself too fiercely, because a source in the City’s police informs us that he had been severely beaten by a number of persons before being stabbed. This information is confirmed by Captain Wilmshaw, a brother officer, whose unhappy task it was to identify his friend’s remains.’
He closed the book with a snap and rose to replace it on the shelf.
‘But what happened?’ I asked. ‘Did they never find the killers?’
‘No, indeed,’ replied Holmes. ‘That is why I have Captain Parkes’ death indexed under U, for
“unsolved”. The Paris police, it appears, were content to lay the matter to the charge of some unidentified boulevard robber and take no further steps.’
