The House of Silk

on a chaise longue, talking to a woman a few years younger than himself. He was wearing a black frock coat, silver-coloured waistcoast and patent leather shoes. His long hair was neatly combed back. To look at him, one might think he had just lost a hand at bridge. It was hard to believe that anything more untoward had occurred. However, he sprang to his feet the moment he saw us.

‘So! You have come! You told me yesterday that I had no reason to fear the man whom I believe to be Keelan O’Donaghue. And yet last night he broke into this house. He has taken fifty pounds and jewellery from my safe. But for the fact that my wife is a light sleeper and actually surprised him in the middle of his larceny, who knows what he might have done next?’

I turned my attention to the lady who had been sitting beside him. She was a small, very attractive person of about thirty years of age, and she impressed me at once with her bright, intelligent face and her confident demeanour. She had fair hair, drawn back and tied in a knot; a style that seemed designed to accenuate the elegance and femininity of her features. Despite the alarms of the morning I guessed that she had a quick sense of humour, for it was there in her eyes, which were a strange shade between green and blue, and her lips, which were constantly on the edge of a smile. Her cheeks were lightly freckled. She was wearing a simple dress with long sleeves, untrimmed and unbraided. A necklace of pearls hung around her neck. There was something about her that reminded me, almost at once, of my own, dear Mary. Even before she had spoken, I was sure that she would have the same disposition; a natural independence and yet a keen sense of duty to the man whom she had chosen to marry.

‘Perhaps you should begin by introducing us,’ Holmes remarked.

‘Of course. This is my wife, Catherine.’

‘And you must be Mr Sherlock Holmes. I am very grateful to you for replying so quickly to our telegram. I told Edmund to send it. I said you would come.’

‘I understand that you have had a very unsettling experience,’ Holmes said.

‘Indeed so. It is as my husband told you. I was woken up last night and saw from the clock that it was twenty past three. There was a full moon shining through the window. I thought at first that it must have been a bird or an owl that had disturbed me, but then I heard another sound, coming from inside the house, and I knew that I was wrong. I rose from my bed, drew on a dressing gown and went downstairs.’

‘It was a foolish thing to do, my dear,’ Carstairs remarked. ‘You could have been hurt.’

‘I didn’t consider myself to be in any danger. To be honest, it didn’t even occur to me that there might be a stranger in the house. I thought it might be Mr or Mrs Kirby — or even Patrick. You know I don’t completely trust that boy. Anyway, I looked briefly in the drawing room. Nothing had been disturbed. Then, for some reason, I was drawn to the study.’

‘You had no light with you?’ Holmes asked.

‘No. The moon was enough. I opened the door and there was a figure, a silhouette perched on the window sill, holding something in his hand. He saw me and the two of us froze, facing each other across the carpet. At first, I didn’t scream. I was too shocked. Then it was as if he simply fell backwards through the window, dropping down on to the grass, and at that very moment I was released from my spell. I called out and raised the alarm.’

‘We will examine the safe and the study momentarily,’ Holmes said. ‘But before we do so, Mrs Carstairs I can tell from your accent that you are American. Have you been married long?’

‘Edmund and I have been married for almost a year and a half.’

‘I should have explained to you how I met Catherine,’ Carstairs said. ‘For it is very much connected with the narrative that I related yesterday. The only reason that I chose not to do so was because I thought it had no relevance.’

‘Everything has a relevance,’ remarked Holmes. ‘I have often found that the most immaterial aspect of a case can be at the same time its most significant.’

‘We met on the Catalonia the very day that it left Boston,’ Catherine Carstairs said. She reached out and took her husband’s hand. ‘I was travelling alone, apart, of course, from a girl whom I had employed to be my companion. I saw Edmund as he came on board and I knew at once that something dreadful had happened. It was obvious from his face, from the fear in his eyes. We passed each other on the deck that evening. Both of us were single. And by a stroke of good fortune we found ourselves seated next to each other at dinner.’

‘I do not know how I would have lasted the crossing if it had not been for Catherine.’ Carstairs continued the tale. ‘I have always been of a nervous disposition and the loss of the paintings, the death of Cornelius Stillman, the terrible violence… it had all been too much for me. I was quite unwell, in a fever. But from the very first Catherine looked after me and I found my feelings towards her growing even as the coast of America slipped away behind me. I have to say that I have always sneered at the concept of “love at first sight”, Mr Holmes. It is something I may have read in yellow-back novels but which I have never believed. Nonetheless, that is what occurred. By the time we arrived in England, I knew that I had found the woman with whom I wished to spend the rest of my life.’

‘And what, may I ask, was the reason for your visit to England?’ Holmes asked, turning to the wife.

‘I was married briefly in Chicago, Mr Holmes. My husband worked in real estate, and although in business he was well respected in the community, and a regular churchgoer, he was never kind to me. He had a dreadful temper and there were times when I even feared for my safety. I had few friends and he did everything in his power to keep it that way. In the last months of our marriage he actually confined me to the house, afraid perhaps that I might speak out against him. But then, quite suddenly, he became ill with tuberculosis and died. Sadly, his house and much of his wealth went to his two sisters. I was left with little money, no friends and no reason to wish to stay in America. And so I left. I was coming to England for a new start.’ She glanced down and added, with a look of humility, ‘I had not expected to come across it so soon, nor to find the happiness that had for so long been missing from my life.’

‘You mentioned a travelling companion who was with you on the Catalonia,’ Holmes remarked.

‘I hired her in Boston. I had never met her before — and she left my employ soon after we arrived.’

Outside, in the corridor, the clock chimed the hour. Holmes sprang to his feet with a smile on his face and that sense of energy and excitement that I knew so well. ‘We must waste no further time!’ he exclaimed. ‘I wish to examine the safe and the room in which it is contained. Fifty pounds has been taken, you say. Not a very large sum of money, all things considered. Let us see what, if anything, the thief has left behind.’

But before we could make a move, another woman came into the room and I saw at once that, though part of the household, she was as different from Catherine Carstairs as could be imagined. She was plain and unsmiling, dressed in grey, with dark hair tightly bound at the back of her neck. She wore a silver cross and her hands were knotted together as if in prayer. From her dark eyes, her pale skin and the shape of her lips, I surmised that she must be related to Carstairs. She had none of his theatricality but was more like the prompter, for ever cast into the shadows, waiting for him to forget his lines.

‘What now?’ she demanded. ‘First I am disturbed in my room by police officers asking absurd questions to which I cannot possibly know the replies. And that is not enough? Are we to invite the whole world in to invade our privacy?’

‘This is Mr Sherlock Holmes, Eliza,’ Carstairs stammered. ‘I told you that I consulted with him yesterday.’

‘And much good did it do you. There was nothing he could do; that was what he told you. A fine consultation, Edmund, I am sure. We could all of us have been murdered in our beds.’

Carstairs glanced at her fondly but at the same time with exasperation. ‘This is my sister, Eliza,’ he said.

‘You reside in this house?’ Holmes asked her.

‘I am tolerated, yes,’ replied the sister. ‘I have an attic room where I keep myself to myself and everyone seems to prefer it that way. I reside here, but I am not part of this family. You might as well speak to the servants as to me.’

‘You know that’s not fair, Eliza,’ Mrs Carstairs said.

Holmes turned to Carstairs. ‘Perhaps you might tell me how many people there are in the house.’

‘Apart from myself and Catherine, Eliza does indeed occupy the top floor. We have Kirby, who is our