more precious now to her than any gems or lustrous metal.
“The Russian, with his understanding clouded by the multiple stresses of strangulation and rebirth, heard her out. Then he had a question of his own. He whispered it in English:’Where are the jewels? They are not here.’
“‘Are you not listen to me? I tell you where the treasure is, I swear, when you have help me find the soil I need. The jewels are not here. but they are all safe, in place you know, where you can get them!’
“‘I know.’ The pirate looked down at the red mess on the floor. ‘
“In near despair the woman clutched his arm, her long nails digging in, a grip that might well have crushed the bones of any breathing man. Once more she spoke in her own language.’Will you not listen to me, Kulakov?
“Indeed,” continued Holmes, “Doll told the truth in saying that she knew where the jewels were hidden–
There was a sensation among the listeners.
Holmes went on. “Let us try to put ourselves in this woman’s place. She had been in England for only a few days, and was still almost totally unfamiliar with the metropolis in which she found herself. When Kulakov, seeking vengeance, entered the room at the Angel Inn, she did not wish to oppose him directly in his murderous rage.
“Seeing that her patron and lover, Altamont, was doomed, Doll prudently gathered up the treasure that he had secreted in the next room and carried it to a certain place she had seen and remembered. It was a place from which she could easily retrieve the jewels, at any time between sunset and dawn, while they remained secure from accidental discovery by any of London’s swarming, breathing folk.
“It was even possible to theorize that Kulakov in a daze might have put the treasure in that place himself, and then have forgotten the act. but if we accept the scene in the Angel Inn as factual, then the correct explanation must be something else.
“Let us consider carefully what the doomed woman actually said to Kulakov when she was pleading for his assistance. According to the recent testimony of Kulakov himself, while hypnotized, her words were these:
“‘The jewels are not here. but they are all safe in a place you know, where you can get them.’
“On hearing this, Kulakov, who was already convinced that Peter Altamont had the treasure, assumed that Doll meant the family estate in the country–Norberton House. but there are several reasons why that could not have been her meaning, assuming she spoke the truth.
“To begin with, Norberton House was hardly a place known to Kulakov–he had heard it mentioned, but that was all. Nor had Doll ever been there. Again, if Doll spoke the truth, all the pieces of treasure, her own bracelet included, must be together–but we know now that her bracelet had been on her arm, in London, only minutes before she began to plead with Kulakov for help.
“Norberton House is hours distant from London by modern train. Not even the speed of vampire flight would have allowed Doll to carry the jewels there and return to the Angel Inn in the time allowed.
“If any further proof is needed, consider: Had Peter Altamont ever come into possession of the jewels, he would certainly have kept them. A sudden increase in his family’s wealth, dating from that time, would now be discoverable by a thorough search of the historical records–which it is not.”
There was a murmur of agreement round our little circle.
Holmes went on. “We are faced with the inescapable conclusion that Peter Altamont never had the treasure; that Ambrose, who betrayed Kulakov, had given Doll one trinket and kept the others with him in London, until he was killed. And that immediately after his death, Doll, who must have discovered where the things were hidden, spirited them away to what she must have considered a safe hiding place, within a mile or so at most of the Angel Inn.”
There was a murmur of comment around our circle.
Holmes resumed: “Remember, she told Kulakov:’It is a place you know.’ but at that time the Russian pirate had even less familiarity with England than she did. What places did she know in London, of which she could be certain that they were known to the Russian as well?”
“Execution Dock,” I suggested.
“Bravo! That thought had crossed my mind. but the dock, and the ground in its vicinity, was daily washed by tides, and trampled by hundreds or thousands of people engaged in the common commerce of the waterfront. What other–”
To my surprise, it was Sarah Kirkaldy, fists clenched and eyes flashing, who interrupted sharply. “Newgate! by God, Newgate Prison!”
Holmes’s eye twinkled. “Exactly! but then it seemed to me that we could probably be a little more precise. Doll’s last rendezvous with Kulakov before his transformation took place, we are informed, was in one of the condemned cells. We have learned from other contemporary sources that some of the old prison’s walls were actually crumbling at the time. None of the jeweled ornaments were large–they could be dropped into a hole or crack too small to accommodate a man’s arm.
“It requires no great stretch of the imagination to picture a crevice of convenient dimensions in the massive masonry–perhaps just outside the barred window through which Doll drifted on her visit–a recess large enough to hold the jewels, and practically inaccessible to breathing folk, but easy enough for any vampire to reach, particularly by night.”
We all applauded Holmes’s masterstroke of deduction, and he, pleased as a child, acknowledged our praise.
The treasure already having been retrieved by Mycroft from the ruins of the recently demolished prison, the question of who really owned it in 1903 remained to be discussed. The establishment of any genuinely just claim appeared to be impossible, and we all agreed that if the matter were submitted to the courts, it might well enrich a generation of lawyers, but no other benefit was likely. In the circumstances we chose unanimously to arrange for a quiet distribution of the value of the jewels among ourselves.
Martin Armstrong and Rebecca Altamont were married within the year. I have wondered, on the basis of no real evidence, whether the young American’s fascination with the vampire Louisa ever caused him to experience a certain disappointment that his bride was not in that category.
Ambrose and Madeline Altamont, with their surviving daughter restored to them, both enjoyed a gradual recovery from the fever and near-madness with which they had been afflicted–but neither was ever quite the same.
Since the war began, I have heard that Madeline at least, joining with a group of parents who have lost sons at the front, is still making plans for sittings with one or more new mediums, still convincing herself that they enjoy at least occasional success in their ongoing efforts to achieve contact with the departed daughter they so deeply love.
Sarah Kirkaldy and I remained very good friends. I spent some time with her in Scotland. I really could not find it in my heart to condemn the lady too strongly for her career as a medium. by and large, her clients received in full measure what they paid for: feelings of excitement and contentment.
In fact, I even consented to help out my newly prosperous friend Sarah with a difficult client or two. There was in Edinburgh a certain psychic investigator, as he styled himself, a very determined skeptic who seemed really bent on giving the poor young woman a hard time... but that is another story altogether.
Probably I should also add that I planned and executed no revenge upon the peasant who had hypnotized me in St. Petersburg. In that case, life itself, as so often happens, exacted sufficient retribution.
In fact, there were witnesses who heard Mr. Prince, just before departing for Scotland, confide to his cousin Sherlock Holmes that he wanted nothing more to do in any way with Gregory Efimovich Rasputin.
