Sherlock Holmes - The Spider's Web E-Book

Philip Purser-Hallard

• Herausgeber: Titan Books
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Serie: The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Seitenzahl: 410

Beschreibung

Sherlock Holmes meets Oscar Wilde in this brand-new mystery inspired by The Importance of Being Earnest.It is 1897, and Sherlock Holmes is investigating a murder that took place during a society ball.Holmes and Watson rush to the scene, but are shocked by the flippant attitude of the ball's hosts: the wealthy Ernest Moncrieff and his new wife Gwendolen. Suspicion naturally falls upon the party guests, but the Moncrieff family and their friends are more concerned with the inconvenience of the investigation than the fact that one of them may have committed murder. But behind the superficial façade, Holmes and Watson uncover family secrets going back decades, and a mysterious blackmailer pulling the strings...

Leseprobe

Contents

Cover

Also Available from Titan Books

Title Page

Leave us a review

Copyright

Dedication

Preface

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Author’s Note

About the Author

ALSO AVAILABLE FROM TITAN BOOKS

Sherlock Holmes:Cry of the InnocentsCavan Scott

Sherlock Holmes:The Patchwork DevilCavan Scott

Sherlock Holmes:The Labyrinth of DeathJames Lovegrove

Sherlock Holmes:The Thinking EngineJames Lovegrove

Sherlock Holmes:Gods of WarJames Lovegrove

Sherlock Holmes:The Stuff of NightmaresJames Lovegrove

Sherlock Holmes:The Spirit BoxGeorge Mann

Sherlock Holmes:The Will of the DeadGeorge Mann

Sherlock Holmes:The Breath of GodGuy Adams

Sherlock Holmes:The Army of Dr MoreauGuy Adams

Sherlock Holmes:A Betrayal in BloodMark A. Latham

Sherlock Holmes:The Legacy of DeedsNick Kyme

Sherlock Holmes:The Red TowerMark A. Latham

Sherlock Holmes:The Vanishing ManPhilip Purser-Hallard

LEAVE US A REVIEW

We hope you enjoy this book – if you did we would really appreciate it if you can write a short review. Your ratings really make a difference for the authors, helping the books you love reach more people.

You can rate this book, or leave a short review here:

Amazon.co.uk,

Goodreads,

Barnes & Noble,

Waterstones,

or your preferred retailer.

Sherlock Holmes: The Spider’s Web

Print edition ISBN: 9781785658440

Electronic edition ISBN: 9781785658457

Published by Titan Books

A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd

144 Southwark St, London SE1 0UP

www.titanbooks.com

First edition: September 2020

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This is a work of fiction. Names, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead (except for satirical purposes), is entirely coincidental.

© Philip Purser-Hallard 2020. All Rights Reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

In memory of my dad, Terry Hallard, who never passed up anopportunity to say ‘A handbag?’

PREFACE

Many of the cases with which I was privileged to assist my friend Mr Sherlock Holmes require a degree of delicacy in the recounting. In some instances this has been because of the shocking nature of the secrets which our investigations revealed, but in others it is simply that the social status of those involved precludes their publication.

The former kind may, I fear, remain forever unpublishable, but as far as the latter goes it has been my habit to change the names and recognisable details so as to obscure the identities of the principals. This has allowed me to write with discretion about incidents that involved a number of the more eminent personages of our age.

The adventure which I have termed The Spider’s Web is not amenable to such treatment. One fact of biography was so well publicised at the time, and so unique to the person concerned, that mentioning it would make his identity inescapable. Yet, as it turned out to be of vital importance to the case, I cannot permit myself to obscure it. To do so would entail falsifying some of the links in the chain of reasoning that led Holmes to his conclusions, and he would rightly take grave exception to any such liberty.

Furthermore, the persons in this drama were eminent indeed, including a former Cabinet minister and members of the aristocracy, as well as others prominent in the London society of the nineties. Some were young at the time and are of respectable middle age twenty-three years later, and there is no reason to suppose that their children will not live long and healthy lives.

I have therefore instructed my solicitors that this account must be sealed unread, only to be opened a hundred years from now. At that time it can be supposed that anyone living who still remembers the principals will have other matters to concern them than the protection of their memory.

In any case, by then I can only imagine that the populace at large will have long ago forgotten the name, and the remarkable personal history, of Mr Ernest Worthing.

John H. Watson, MD, 1920

CHAPTER ONE

THE USES OF PALMISTRY

Lord Arthur Savile stared at Sherlock Holmes in dismay. ‘What crime?’ he asked.

‘The most serious of crimes, Lord Arthur.’ The detective returned his gaze sternly. ‘Ten years ago you murdered Mr Septimus Podgers of West Moon Street, by drowning him in the River Thames close to Cleopatra’s Needle.’

The nobleman gasped and turned very pale. His footman, a forbidding, thickset man whose tight-fitting livery bulged as he moved, stepped forward, presumably to throw Holmes and me out into Belgrave Square. Savile waved the man away with a resigned air, however, and said, ‘I think perhaps you had better leave us, Francis.’ My friend’s shot had reached its mark.

‘So she’s been talking, then,’ His Lordship said, with a sigh. ‘I had supposed she might.’

Judged by appearances alone, Lord Arthur was an admirable specimen of his class. In his middle thirties, handsome, tall and elegantly presented, he had been charming and scrupulously polite to us since Holmes had requested a private audience with him at his home in Belgrave Square.

The room, too, was furnished elegantly and austerely, even ascetically, although the carpets looked rather venerable to my eye. Bright forenoon light shone in from the green spaces of the square outside, where early spring flowers were beginning to speckle the earth with colour.

Holmes said sternly, ‘I can assure you, Lady Arthur has been the soul of discretion.’ I knew, having followed his painstaking investigation of the Winckelkopf case through all its stages, that there had been no information received from any such quarter. Indeed, I had some opportunity to watch the Saviles together at Lady Cissbury’s soirée the week before, and their devotion to one another had seemed to me quite exemplary.

Holmes added, gesturing at Savile’s hands, ‘The chief witnesses against you are these, my lord. You are quite literally betrayed by your own hands.’ He clicked his fingers for me to pass him his leather portfolio, which I did without demur. Sherlock Holmes always enjoyed his stagecraft.

‘My hands? Good gracious,’ said the aristocrat, becoming if anything rather paler. He raised both hands and stared at them as if they bore an ancient inscription he must decipher. He stammered slightly as he enquired, ‘May I ask how?’

‘These photographs,’ Holmes replied, opening the portfolio and brandishing the prints in question. ‘I obtained them last week at Lady Cissbury’s, under the pretext of photographing your spirit energy. A deplorable and unscientific practice, the feigning of which pained me but proved indispensably useful in this instance.’

Savile looked surprised. ‘I say. There was a funny whiskered fellow with glasses and a stoop. Lady Cissbury had him installed in the summer room, so her guests could have their auras photographed. Was that really you?’

Holmes bowed slightly. ‘I admit to some small skill in the art of disguise.’

I had been there too, concealed in a closet in case Holmes found himself in need of assistance, but Lord Arthur could hardly be expected to be aware of that.

The aristocrat leaned across to peer at the photographic prints Holmes had placed on the wooden chair beside us, the room being bereft of any writing desk or even a coffee table. Each was a life-sized image of one of Lord Arthur’s palms, spread out against the background of a black baize cloth, each line marked clearly in the photographic limelight. In each case Holmes had placed a luggage label next to the little finger, the number written on which distinguished these hands from those of forty-seven other guests. He was still pondering the usefulness of keeping the remainder on file for future use.

‘I can’t see any spirit energy here,’ His Lordship observed peevishly.

Holmes sighed. ‘That is what you may expect to see when I take your spirit photograph. More to the point, however, the hands photographed here are indisputably those of the killer of Septimus Podgers.’

‘I’m afraid I understand very little of this, Mr Holmes,’ Savile said a little plaintively, and I could understand his puzzlement. The Winckelkopf case had been an unusual one even by Holmes’s standards, beginning with no more than a name and a time, and leading to a trail of suspicious activity that ended in the death of Podgers the palmist, a decade in the past.

Our involvement in the affair had begun shortly after Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard came into possession of a ledger-book, stolen by a cleaning woman from her late employer, an elderly German resident of Soho who had recently died from a severe chill. It seemed that the woman had entertained suspicions that her employer’s business was of an illicit nature, and had retained the book in the hope of blackmailing his customers with it, but being unable to locate any of them she had instead turned to the police in hope of a reward. From its contents, Lestrade had realised that the deceased had been a dangerous criminal whom the Yard had been seeking for some decades, a prolific manufacturer of bespoke bombs known by the name ‘Herr Winckelkopf’.

The ledger book was a list of sales of explosive devices, and accordingly in many of the entries, alongside the buyer’s name or alias and the fee charged (for Winckelkopf had been happy to sell his skills to all comers, whether anarchists, nihilists, Fenians or common assassins, at a price), was a record of the precise time at which the bomb was set to explode.

‘Do you mean to say that Winckelkopf wrote down my name?’ Lord Arthur asked, when Holmes told him all of this. ‘That seems very slipshod practice for a man in his line of business.’

Holmes said, ‘On the contrary, you were listed as Mr Robert Smith. It was to identify the owner of that alias that Lestrade asked for my assistance.’

By comparing these times and dates with those of known revolutionary outrages, Lestrade and his men had been able to establish the identities of many of those who had used Winckelkopf’s services, but a few eluded him. ‘Smith’ in particular, who on Tuesday 24th May 1887, ten years previously, had paid the German four pounds, two shillings and sixpence for a mechanism timed to explode at noon on Friday 27th of that month, could not be identified. The police had no record of any explosion occurring at that time, the name was surely a pseudonym, and even if it were not, they could hardly track down and interview every Robert Smith in London. Rather than waste his men’s time, Lestrade had invited Holmes to look into the matter.

Holmes had adopted the theory that on this occasion Winckelkopf’s normally reliable mechanisms had failed him, and that the bomb had not exploded, or perhaps had exploded sometime later, when its intended target had been absent. He sifted through reports in every newspaper he could find for May and June of 1887, looking for any anomalous occurrences that might indicate something of the kind, until eventually he found, of all things, an account in the Chichester Express on Monday 30th May of a sermon preached in the cathedral by the dean at matins on the previous day.

In it the cleric had alluded to an amusing joke played on his family, an ormolu clock sent as a present which had, at that same preset time, emitted a small report and shaken loose an allegorical figure of Liberty, which had broken on the floor. He drew from this some sententious lessons about the limitations of freedom as an ideal, but for Holmes’s purposes the important point was that Winckelkopf had been known to use clocks, and ormolu clocks specifically, as a basis for his bombs.

‘I can only suppose that the batch of dynamite was defective, or more probably that the explosive was exposed to damp during its journey through the postal service,’ Holmes commented.

‘I suppose that would explain the outcome,’ said Lord Arthur. ‘But how did this lead you to Mr Podgers? I confess, Mr Holmes, I am agog.’ His enthusiasm seemed sincere, as if he had entirely forgotten the capital predicament in which he found himself.

‘Well, the question was naturally who might have wished to assassinate the Dean of Chichester. He is a man of quiet habits, not given to controversy or, as far as I can ascertain, to any firm beliefs at all. But we knew that Herr Winckelkopf was pleased to sell his services to all, and not only those of a political bent. I wondered, then, about the dean’s relatives.’

Lord Arthur smiled. ‘Ah.’

Like many senior clergymen, the Dean of Chichester was well connected, and with the help of Debrett’s Peerage, Holmes had been able to compile a comprehensive family tree. This had provided the interesting information that the dean’s first cousin once removed, Lady Clementina Beauchamp, had died, apparently of a heart attack, a mere ten days before this putative attempt on the dean’s life. Lady Clementina had left much of her property, including a house on Curzon Street, to her cousin’s son, Lord Arthur Savile.

Less than six weeks later, Lord Arthur had married the society heiress Sybil Merton, now Lady Arthur Savile, in a ceremony that, according to the gossip columns, had already been twice postponed. His uncle, the Dean of Chichester, had presided.

‘The connection between these various events was not altogether clear,’ Holmes observed drily. ‘As I said, all the indications were that Lady Clementina’s death was a natural one. And the dean had issue of his own, meaning that a nephew would have no hope of inheritance and little reason to attempt an assassination. But the connection was sufficient to prompt me to examine all the deaths reported in the papers during May and June that year, in case there were some other pattern linking them.’

‘And so Mr Podgers enters the story,’ Savile guessed, apparently quite enthralled.

‘Indeed. Podgers’ body was washed ashore in Greenwich on 2nd June. It was clear that he had drowned. His death was ruled a suicide, ascribed to mental derangement brought on by overwork. As it happened, I recognised the name. Podgers had been a cheiromantist, and was the author of a posthumously published treatise on palmistry that I had read myself, at a stage in my career when I was gauging the merits of physiognomic theories of criminology. It had stuck in my mind because of a vivid account he gave of reading a young man’s palm at a party and deducing that its owner would become a murderer.

‘Now you may say,’ Holmes suggested, ‘as Dr Watson did at this point, that cheiromancy is as nebulous a farrago of poppycock and claptrap as spirit photography.’

I had indeed said as much, quite vocally, when Holmes’s investigations reached this stage. As a medical man, I must acknowledge that biometrical descriptions have some validity in predicting criminality – the shape of the skull, for instance, is said to be an indicator of character, and I myself have noticed in my work with Holmes that pickpockets tend to have slim, delicate hands compared to the powerful fists of habitual brawlers – but even at their best, such inferences are general and imprecise. I considered it profoundly improbable that any feature in a man’s palm could reliably predict that he would commit a specific misdeed.

Holmes continued, ‘Nevertheless, from reading his account of his own theories and practice, I have no doubt that Septimus Podgers believed in it entirely.’

‘My wife tells me that Lady Windermere became quite convinced that Podgers was a fraud,’ Savile put in. ‘The late Lady Windermere, that is, the aunt of the present viscount.’

‘Perhaps she did,’ said Holmes. ‘It was at one of her soirées that you met him, I believe? The society pages place you both at Bentinck House on 29th April.’

Savile nodded, his face paling once more.

Once he had learned of Podgers’ connection with Savile, Holmes’s interest in the palmist’s death was piqued. He had worked out, using tide tables and navigational charts from 1887, along with his compendious knowledge of the Thames’s flows, currents and obstacles, approximately where and when the deceased must have entered the water. Accordingly, amid much grumbling from Lestrade about having to chase up the fading paperwork, Holmes had spoken to all the policemen who had been on duty near the Embankment during the 30th and 31st May 1887. At ten years’ remove their memories were naturally hazy, but Holmes had the news stories of the day at his fingertips following his perusal of the press archives, and by mentioning contemporary events had been able to jog one man’s memory.

This sergeant, though at the time a constable, recalled having seen a gentleman peering over the Embankment by the Needle in the early hours of the morning of the Tuesday, looking as if he had lost something in the river. His memories of the man matched the description of Lord Arthur Savile.

‘That is all very well,’ Savile pointed out amiably, ‘but there must be a good many men in London who match my description. And what reason would you suggest that I had to murder Podgers? I scarcely knew the man.’

‘We will come to the question of identification in a moment. In answer to your second question, I do not believe Podgers was your first choice of victim. That was a frail elderly woman who had the misfortune to be connected to you by ties of blood. You were away in Venice at the time of Lady Clementina Beauchamp’s death, and while you might have found an agent to murder her on your behalf, I did not think that you would entrust such a vital commission to an intermediary. The easiest way to kill a person in one’s absence, without the intervention of a third party, would be by poisoning an item that they would consume at a particular time. It would also be one of the least detectable, if the correct poison were selected.

‘It seems you made very little effort to cover your tracks. Mr Pestle, of the apothecaries Pestle and Humbey’s, clearly recalls selling you a capsule containing a lethal dose of aconitine in April of that year. He was rather alarmed until you assured him that you needed it to dispose of a sick, though very large, dog. Lady Clementina was known to be a martyr to heartburn, and my conjecture would be that you presented the capsule to her as indigestion medicine.’

‘But dear Lady Clem died of natural causes,’ Lord Arthur pointed out.

‘And so she did. The signs that would distinguish aconitine poisoning from a heart attack are subtle, but I have spoken to Lady Clementina’s personal physician, who insists that her body exhibited none of them. She thwarted your plan by dying before it could come into effect, as you must have discovered when you found the capsule untouched while disposing of her effects. Thus you were forced to look for another victim, because while Lady Clementina’s death was to your benefit, your motive had never been to profit from her inheritance.’

‘I should think not,’ agreed Savile with a shudder. Evidently he was of the variety of aristocracy who consider conversation on matters of money to be beneath their dignity.

‘And so,’ Holmes continued inexorably, ‘you turned to your uncle, the dean, and the elaborate assassination scheme you concocted with Herr Winckelkopf, to no ultimate avail after the dynamite in the clock was spoiled. Where, then, to turn? You were running out of relatives, and eager, I am sure, to be married quickly. And so, when a late-night stroll along the Embankment brought a chance encounter with Septimus Podgers, your reaction was immediate. Especially since in many ways Mr Podgers might have been considered the author of all your woes.’

Savile was smiling broadly now. ‘And why was that?’

‘I have to admit that I am hazy on that point myself, Holmes,’ I reminded my friend. Throughout this particular investigation I had been privy to his researches, and thus to more of his thinking than was his habitual practice, but the question of Lord Arthur Savile’s incentive for the murder, and his preceding attempts, remained opaque to me.

‘It is, I confess, a motive that is unique in my experience,’ Holmes admitted. ‘Lord Arthur murdered Mr Podgers because Mr Podgers predicted that Lord Arthur would commit murder.’

‘But you said yourself that palmistry’s a fraud,’ I protested.

‘It is. But Mr Podgers was not. In cases of widespread belief, some practitioners of a fraud may also be counted among its victims. I believe Podgers was honest, and sincere in his error. He described in some detail the dilemma he faced in seeing this young man’s fate in his palm. Should he tell him, and blight his future, or should he leave him in ignorance, thus failing to warn him of a misfortune he might seek to mitigate, if never to avoid? He tells us that he opted in the end for candour, but not what convinced him to do so.’

‘A hundred guineas convinced him, if you must know,’ Savile responded haughtily. ‘Apparently, I am lucky that he was a less meticulous accounts-keeper than Herr Winckelkopf.’

‘Of course, palmistry has no value in predicting the future,’ Holmes explained, ‘but like any other information, true or false, it can influence it. When a person has their fortune told through any method, however dubious, the knowledge of their supposed fate thenceforth becomes a factor in their decisions. In this case, we must consider the effect produced in the mind of a young man, well-educated but not of exceptional intelligence, in a state of heightened emotion due to his forthcoming marriage and perhaps somewhat impressionable as a result. If such a man came to believe that it was his inescapable destiny to become a murderer, then he might conceivably respond by trying to get this distasteful inevitability over and done with before the wedding.’

‘Conceivably he might,’ Lord Arthur agreed with a smile. ‘But do you suppose that a jury will follow you down such a path, Mr Holmes? Particularly when the accused is a notably handsome man of a wealthy and influential family?’

Despite his lazy defiance, I could hear underlying his words a real concern, if not the fear that I would have felt in his place. For all his bravado, Savile was seeking Holmes’s professional opinion on this point.

‘They will believe some of it, I am certain,’ Holmes said. ‘Ironically, perhaps, they might find the case against you in the matter of Lady Clementina the most damning. You stood to inherit, you bought enough poison to kill a person, and you lied about the reason for it. I fear it would not matter greatly to them that she died before being murdered – you determined that she would die, and her death duly occurred. Attempting to murder someone by poison carries a sentence of lifelong penal servitude. But we have not yet come to the most damning piece of evidence.’

From the portfolio he produced a bound edition of Septimus Podgers’ Treatise on the Human Hand – Holmes’s own copy, singed at the top of the spine from a volatile chemistry experiment conducted somewhat too close to his bookshelves, but perfectly serviceable still.

‘The book is illustrated,’ he observed, ‘with many diagrams of individual palms, showing the points Podgers considered of most interest. For some subjects he illustrates merely the right palm, for some both. These are the lines he found on those of the young man fated to commit murder,’ he said, laying open the book on the chair next to the photographs of Lord Arthur’s palms. ‘You will observe a commendable degree of accuracy in the reproduction,’ he said, ‘but I imagine these lines were seared into Podgers’ memory. We know that Podgers told the owner of these hands that he would kill, and we know that a month later he was dead. It will not be a difficult matter to convince a jury that these were the hands that killed him.’

Lord Arthur sighed. ‘It is a shame that the late Lady Windermere never met you, Mr Holmes. She would have so enjoyed lionising you at her parties. Yes, it is all true, exactly as you tell it. I was careless, I suppose, but I never imagined that it could all be connected as you have done. I congratulate you on being that rare yet not always enviable thing: a man whose reputation is perfectly accurate.’

Holmes nodded gravely, accepting the compliment. ‘I do not believe that you are an evil man, Lord Arthur. Foolish certainly, impressionable to a grave fault, and lacking the sympathetic connection with others that for most men would have made such crimes unthinkable, but not, I think, with any tendency to spite or malice. But you must see that I cannot fail to pass on what I know to the police.’

Lord Arthur said, ‘I am a family man, Mr Holmes. I love my wife extremely, and my son and daughter mean everything to me.’ He hesitated, and now I could see real anguish in his eyes. ‘I am also, I may say reluctantly but without any undue modesty, extravagantly rich. If there is anything you need, I am in a position to make your life very comfortable indeed.’

‘I am not Septimus Podgers, my lord.’ Holmes’s voice was cold. ‘You will not find my professional judgement amenable to the promise of a hundred guineas. Nor do I care to be cast in the role of blackmailer, which is what I should become if I accepted money in return for my silence. Besides, I rather think that you are less solvent than you pretend. Watson, please show Lord Arthur your revolver.’

As instructed, I produced my army service weapon from the pocket of my jacket.

Holmes said, ‘I had intended, out of consideration for the feelings of your family, to offer you an opportunity to surrender yourself to the police, but after what you have said I believe that you would take undue advantage of such a courtesy. Instead, I must insist that you accompany us to Scotland Yard, where we shall introduce you to Inspector Lestrade.’

CHAPTER TWO

THE HEIR IN THE HANDBAG

We led His Lordship to our waiting cab, the threat of my firearm overcoming the objections of the grim footman Francis. As we left the house, under the gaze of passing pedestrians and nursemaids with perambulators, another cab drew up carrying Lord Arthur’s wife and their two children. I feared recriminations, but Lady Arthur was far too well-bred to cause a scene in sight of all their neighbours on the square. She listened tight-lipped as her husband told her of our suspicions, in precise, cheerful tones that spoke eloquently of his guilt. She did not, I thought, look especially surprised. Then, glaring at us with eyes that held tears but dropped none, she led her children inside and we took her husband away to his appointment with Lestrade.

‘It is hard on them, of course,’ Holmes observed that evening, over an excellent plate of roast beef and Yorkshire pudding at Simpsons-in-the-Strand. ‘But a man with such a deed in his past cannot be allowed to walk free.’

‘I suppose not,’ I said. ‘And yet he seems to have led a harmless enough life since his crime. Was he really a danger to the public?’

Holmes said, ‘A man who has murdered once may do so again, if a reason presents itself. The cause of Savile’s downfall was his gullibility, and I saw no sign that he has become wiser during the past ten years. He could be easily led into criminal acts on behalf of others, if those others were persuasive enough. Besides, he is in financial difficulty, and the effect of that on a man of Lord Arthur’s background must not be underestimated. If I had accepted his generous offer of a bribe, he would have been obliged to pay me with money somehow ill-gotten, or, more likely, to arrange to meet me for payment on the Embankment, late at night and at high tide.’

I said, ‘I had been under the impression that his wealth was beyond question. You said he came into the late Lord Rugby’s fortune when he turned twenty-one.’ Holmes had ruled out from his considerations the death of that nobleman, another of Lord Arthur’s uncles, in a hunting accident witnessed by many when Savile was a mere boy.

‘Come, Watson, you know there are many ways in which a gentleman may lose a fortune, or even several of them. A gullible gentleman especially so. Besides, you have the evidence of your eyes. Did Lord Arthur’s house look like that of a wealthy man to you?’

‘It’s in Belgrave Square,’ I protested mildly.

Holmes tutted. ‘That he was moneyed in the past is not in dispute. Certainly the property has considerable capital value, but it is also one of the last possessions that a man, especially a man with a family to house, would divest himself of. I suspect that if we made enquiries, we might yet find it heavily mortgaged. Did you not note the absences on the walls where pictures would have hung?’

‘The room did seem rather sparse,’ I admitted. ‘And there was very little furniture.’

‘And even fewer ornaments,’ Holmes pointed out.

‘Perhaps he simply dislikes antiques,’ I said. ‘He’s obviously a man who knows his own taste.’

‘He dresses well,’ Holmes allowed, ‘though in last season’s clothes, which I imagine must pain him. He cannot afford new clothes for his servants either, even when the servants themselves are new. Francis seemed faithful enough, but he was not of the more refined species of footman, which is to say the more expensive. And dressed, if I am not mistaken, in a recent predecessor’s livery.’

Holmes’s points seemed indisputable, as they were wont to be. It would not do to let him become complacent, however, and I was casting around for some counterargument when a voice hailed us from close by. ‘Have I the honour of addressing Mr Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson?’

I looked up into the studiedly nonchalant face of another gentleman of about Savile’s age. Not as tall as Lord Arthur and somewhat less good-looking, he was nonetheless a more striking figure, impeccably turned out in white tie, white gloves and a dove-grey tailcoat, with a pale peach carnation in his buttonhole. My knowledge of the most expensive fashions is sadly limited by my means, but it was clear to any observer that this man’s appearance was of the utmost concern to him.

He said, ‘Forgive me, gentlemen, but your landlady told me that I might find you here. I’ve been searching for you rather urgently.’ His expression radiated well-bred impassivity, but the strain in his voice betrayed his agitation.

Holmes had risen, and so did I. ‘Pray join us,’ my friend said. ‘Do please partake of the Beaune. How may we be of service, Mr…?’

‘Goring,’ replied the newcomer, sitting with us. ‘Viscount Goring, if we must be precise about it. And I suppose we must.’

‘Ah yes, Lord Goring,’ said Holmes, shaking his hand. ‘Your father is the Earl of Caversham, I believe. I had the honour of being of some small service to him during his time in the Cabinet.’

Lord Goring nodded. ‘Yes, he has mentioned you approvingly. Apparently you are a fine example of what a man may achieve if he applies himself, something I persistently refuse to do. The general theme is a perennial one with him, although you are one of its less commonly heard variations. His high opinion explains why I thought of coming to you tonight under what are, I’m afraid, somewhat trying circumstances.’

‘It appears to be our day for interfering in the affairs of the aristocracy,’ Holmes observed. ‘Pray tell us about these trying circumstances, Lord Goring.’

Waving away a renewed offer of wine, Lord Goring said, ‘I come to you by a rather circuitous route. Before speaking to your landlady at Baker Street, I was briefly at my brother-in-law’s house at Grosvenor Square. But for most of the evening, I was in Belgrave Square.’

From this I assumed that he must be a friend of Lord or Lady Arthur Savile, come to berate or plead with us on their behalf. Holmes must have been thinking something similar, as before the viscount could say more, he asked, ‘What number Belgrave Square, please?’

Lord Goring blinked in surprise. ‘Number 149, the home of the Moncrieff family.’ This was, I remembered, the opposite side from the Savile house.

‘Thank you,’ said Holmes. ‘It is as well to have all the facts at hand. Pray continue.’

‘There was a ball there this evening. The Honourable Gwendolen Moncrieff is an old schoolfriend of my wife’s sister-in-law, and we were all invited. Up to a point it was a pleasant enough occasion, with many of the best type of people there, and many of the worst as well, which I always find the best combination for enjoyable company. The latter are amusing, the former instructive, and those who are neither may occupy themselves in attempting to distinguish the best and the worst apart.’

Rather irritably, Holmes said, ‘I assume you to be of the second type, Lord Goring, for your conversation has not been greatly instructive so far. If you have brought me nothing more than epigrams, I will ask your leave to enjoy our meal in peace.’

His Lordship accepted the rebuke calmly. ‘Forgive me,’ he said again. ‘I often speak frivolously in times of difficulty. I’ve said that the evening was pleasant up to a point, and that point was the discovery of a body.’

‘A body!’ I exclaimed. ‘Discovered where?’

‘In the back garden of the house, beneath a balcony. It appears the fellow fell. A tragedy, no doubt, for those who knew him, but appearances conspire to make the matter more immediately troublesome to one much closer to me.’

‘And who is that?’ Holmes asked, an eyebrow arched.

Lord Goring looked grave. ‘I am speaking of my wife. I left her at her brother’s house on my way to Baker Street, but I fear that will avert the unpleasantness only temporarily. The police were being summoned to Belgrave Square as we left.’

I said, ‘You fear they will suspect that she was involved in the death?’

‘I can hardly suppose that they will not. She assures me the deceased was unknown to her. Certainly he is a stranger to me, which many might say is to his credit. But it doesn’t explain how he came to be clutching my wife’s brooch as he fell. And neither, I am afraid, can I.’

‘Ah,’ said Holmes. ‘That, certainly, is a complication which our friends at Scotland Yard are unlikely to ignore. Watson and I will accompany you at once to Belgrave Square.’

‘I am exceedingly grateful.’ He clicked his fingers for a waiter. ‘Allow me to answer for your interrupted meal.’

‘I regret I must refuse, Lord Goring,’ Holmes said. ‘My business is to uncover the truth, and that you may rely on me to do without fear or favour. Whether or not my findings absolve Lady Goring of blame, it will compromise them if I am seen to have begun the case in your debt, even to the tune of dinner and a bottle of a middling wine.’

Lord Goring accepted the truth of this, and we collected our coats, our hats and his elegant antique walking-cane, and stepped out into the chilly spring evening, where His Lordship’s landau awaited us. It took us along the Strand, where hotel guests and theatregoers strolled in the warm amber glow of the gas-lamps, past Nelson’s Column and the Admiralty and between the majestic rows of plane trees on the Mall, in the direction of Belgravia.

On the way, Holmes asked Lord Goring about his hosts for the evening. ‘I believe I have heard of the family,’ he said. ‘Who is the Honourable Mrs Moncrieff’s husband?’

‘Oh,’ Goring replied easily, ‘his name’s Ernest Moncrieff. I’m not surprised that you’ve heard of him, he was rather famous for a little while. He used to be known, in London at least, as Ernest Worthing.’

‘Good heavens!’ I exclaimed. I remembered the case well – it had been widely reported in the newspapers at the time.

John Worthing had been a country squire and Justice of the Peace, usually known at his home in Hertfordshire as Jack, but to his friends in town by the name Ernest. He had been adopted as an infant and brought up by a philanthropic gentleman named Thomas Cardew, who on his death had left his country seat and much of his wealth to Worthing. With them came the guardianship of Cardew’s granddaughter, Cecily Cardew, who received the rest of his fortune.

Two years before our encounter with Lord Goring, Worthing had discovered that he was by birth the elder son and heir of the late General Ernest Moncrieff, and thereby that his Christian name was, indeed, Ernest. Unknown to any of them, the Honourable Gwendolen Fairfax, to whom Worthing had recently become engaged, was in fact his cousin, while his close friend Algernon Moncrieff, through whom he had met Miss Fairfax, was none other than his younger brother.

In itself, this assortment of coincidences would have been enough to make headlines, especially when it transpired that Algernon Moncrieff had also become engaged to his brother’s ward, Cecily Cardew. However, it had been the details of John Worthing’s (or rather, Ernest Moncrieff’s) early history that had especially captured the imaginations of both journalists and the reading public. He had learned of his true identity from the information of a former employee in the household of the then-Colonel Moncrieff, the nursemaid who had thoughtlessly misplaced him as a baby. Thomas Cardew had found the child in a cloakroom at Victoria Station, where this inept woman had accidentally deposited him in a handbag. The name ‘John Worthing’ had been bestowed by Cardew after the seaside resort to which he had been bound that day, although his discovery of the infant had naturally caused his plans to change.

Some of these details sprang immediately to my mind when Goring mentioned the name, while my memory of others I refreshed later with the help of Holmes’s comprehensive Index. The case of the so-called ‘Handbag Heir’ and his relatives had become something of an obsession with the popular press during the summer of 1895, though they soon moved on to celebrating some other sensation.

‘Quite so,’ said Goring drily in response to my involuntary utterance. ‘I need hardly say that great delicacy must be exercised in discussing Ernest Moncrieff’s family history.’

‘Of course,’ I agreed.

‘It is point of discretion among his friends to avoid mentioning it at all, in fact, as it is naturally a subject that causes him the greatest excitement.’

He said this with an air of amusement that it took me a moment to puzzle out. ‘You mean that if it’s mentioned he talks about it incessantly?’

Coolly, Goring replied, ‘I would not like to say so, Dr Watson. Certainly not in so many words.’

Passing the Palace, we shortly entered that district where so many of our nation’s most august and honoured families have their London homes, and in a brief while we found ourselves once more at Belgrave Square.

This close consists of a leafy, landscaped central area of greenery surrounded by beautiful cream-coloured terraces in the Georgian style. Four separate mansions stand at its corners, marking the cardinal points of the compass, but Number 149 was one of the terraced houses, standing six storeys high including attic and basement, with a pillared front entrance and balconies at several levels, front and rear.

These details were familiar to me, of course, both from my long residence in London and more particularly from our visit to Lord Arthur Savile’s house that morning. I glanced across the square towards the Saviles’ house in the far terrace as our cab drew up, but my view was blocked by the trees thronging the central park.

Seeing me looking, Lord Goring observed, ‘A few years ago, fashion favoured the far side of the square, but she is an inconstant mistress. Lady Bloxham, to whom Cardew and then Moncrieff let this house for many years, wouldn’t have cared to be on the fashionable side, but Moncrieff’s mother-in-law has a different view.’

I was briefly surprised by the idea that one of London’s most exclusive addresses could be subject to such gradations of prestige, but by then our cab was coming to a halt. As we climbed out, one of a brace of police constables came across to us, leaving his colleague stationed at the doorstep of Number 149. He touched the brim of his helmet and said, ‘Party’s over, I’m afraid, gents. There’s been an accident.’

Goring said easily, ‘Nonsense, my man. I told you when Lady Goring and I left that I would be back.’

Recognising him then, the constable said, ‘That’s as may be, my lord, but my inspector’s orders is that there’s not to be all these comings and goings. It’s all we can do to stop any more guests leaving than has already. We had to let Lady Bracknell go just now,’ he added, shuddering slightly at the memory.

‘Then I suppose your inspector should be delighted to see one of us returning. Let us in, there’s a good fellow.’ Lord Goring strode towards the front door with that unquestioning assumption of entitlement that aristocratic breeding uniquely confers – although I have observed that Holmes effects a very passable imitation. He did so now, leaving me following both of them rather more diffidently.

The policeman on the door stepped readily aside. We followed, and as this second man touched his helmet to us I realised I recognised him from some past case of Holmes’s. He said, ‘Mr Holmes, Dr Watson. We wondered if we’d be seeing you here. The inspector’s out the back with the body.’

Holmes paused for just a moment. ‘Which inspector, Constable Northbrook?’

‘Inspector Gregson, sir.’

Holmes nodded thoughtfully, then declared, ‘He will do.’

A butler met us in the entrance lobby and began to show us through to the rear of the house. As we passed along the main hallway, however, a side-door burst open emitting a surge of chatter and cigar smoke, and a handsome moustached man emerged. He was rather younger than Lord Goring and wore a white gardenia in his buttonhole. ‘Are these more policemen, Merriman?’ he asked the butler irritably. ‘Oh, it’s you, Goring. I thought you were the police again. There’s an absolute legion of them infesting my lawn. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen so many together in one place. I keep expecting them to break into a comic chorus. Who are these fellows?’ It was clear that this man was our unwitting host, Mr Ernest Moncrieff, formerly known as Ernest or Jack Worthing.

Lord Goring smiled. ‘Auxiliaries for the legion, I am afraid, Moncrieff. This is Mr Sherlock Holmes, and this is Dr John Watson.’

‘Very probably they are, but what on earth do you mean by bringing them here?’ Moncrieff demanded, shaking our hands peevishly. Behind him, in what must have been the house’s diminutive ballroom, a band struck up a waltz. ‘It’s outrageous that I should be besieged by official detectives in my own home, without amateurs, even gentleman amateurs, coming to reinforce them.’

‘My dear fellow, I’ve brought them here to do the police’s work for them,’ Goring explained patiently. ‘If they can uncover the truth of this matter then you will no longer be besieged.’

Another man, slighter, darker and a few years younger than Moncrieff, had emerged from the ballroom behind him, holding a plateful of small chocolate éclairs. This man said airily, ‘In my experience the truth, like brick walls and bathers, is generally better covered up. In all cases a tasteful drapery is more acceptable than the brute reality.’ He popped one of the pastries into his mouth.

‘The dead man might feel otherwise,’ Holmes observed, ‘were he in a position to feel anything at all, Mr…?’

Ernest sighed. ‘Oh, this is my preposterous brother, Algernon.’ Though I would not have taken them for blood relations, Ernest’s voice was full of the impatience and affection that men feel for their brothers, or for their closest friends.

Algernon Moncrieff fastidiously finished his éclair before saying, ‘Not one of us knows what the chap was even doing here. I consider it unconscionably presumptuous to fall to one’s death from the balcony of a perfect stranger. Even if a man has no balcony of his own from which to arrange a mortal fall, many of our public buildings are designed to afford every facility for such occasions. Oh, are you leaving us, Mrs Teville?’

This was addressed to a woman dressed very glamorously in a deep purple ballgown with lace at the cuffs, embellished with pearls and a slightly faded mink stole. Though the colour of the gown indicated mourning, the impression made by the ensemble was anything but sombre. To my practised eye she looked to be around my own age, which is to say no longer by any means in the bloom of youth; but her attire and hair, and the powder and rouge she wore on her face, were artfully contrived to make her seem ten or more years younger.

She said, in a low-pitched, rather dramatic voice, ‘I am afraid I must. It has been a most pleasant evening, apart from those parts of it that have been frightful. But really, such a misfortune as has occurred tonight might happen to anybody. You have my condolences, Mr Moncrieff.’

‘Our misfortune is as nothing compared with the loss of your company,’ Ernest gallantly assured her. She snapped open a prettily decorated fan to mask her smile.

‘Now, Mr Moncrieff, you must not flirt with me,’ Mrs Teville said, severely gratified. ‘My late husband would not have cared for it, and I am quite certain that your dear wife would not.’

Ernest replied gravely, ‘Since a man may not flirt with his wife, Mrs Teville, he is left with no choice but to flirt without her.’

‘My dear fellow,’ Algernon remonstrated, ‘Cecily and I flirt constantly. The alternative would be to talk seriously to one another, and if that were to happen I could hardly answer for the survival of our marriage.’

The partygoers were still impeding our path, and Holmes was becoming visibly irritated with their badinage. Lord Goring said, ‘If you will excuse us, Mrs Teville, I have brought these gentlemen to assist the police in the garden.’

‘Oh,’ Mrs Teville declared, showing no inclination to move. ‘And who are these very helpful gentlemen?’

Holmes bowed stiffly. ‘Sherlock Holmes, madam, at your service. And this is Dr Watson.’

Mrs Teville gasped in excitement, unless it was alarm, and fanned herself quickly. ‘Sherlock Holmes, the adventurer and sleuth? Sir, if I have need of your services I shall most certainly call upon them.’

‘I trust that you never will,’ Holmes replied.

‘Oh, but I hope I shall,’ she laughed. ‘I should far rather you were investigating someone else on my behalf than investigating me on theirs.’

‘Allow me to accompany you to your carriage, Mrs Teville,’ a man of around her age suggested smoothly as he, too, emerged from the ballroom, and claimed the widow’s arm as if Holmes were not there. ‘The police, puritans that they are, try to keep us here on the grounds that we may be guilty. Guilty!’ he laughed. ‘Speaking for myself, I hardly know the meaning of the word.’ He was grey-haired but very attractive, tall and obviously strong, and like Goring clearly prided himself on his appearance.

‘I thank you, Lord Illingworth,’ Mrs Teville replied, rather coldly. ‘I hardly think the services of an experienced diplomat such as yourself are necessary for such a simple venture. Perhaps Mr Holmes or Dr Watson would instead oblige?’

By now Holmes was looking extremely impatient. ‘I regret, madam, that we are both required most urgently on other business.’

‘Then it shall have to be Lord Illingworth. I am delighted to have met you, Mr Holmes, nevertheless.’ She allowed herself to be led to the front door.

‘Will the police let her through?’ I wondered.

‘After their encounter with our aunt, I doubt they will have the heart to refuse,’ observed Ernest, with a sympathetic shudder.

‘Indeed,’ Algernon agreed. ‘If the demoralising effect she has on policemen were somehow to be applied to their opponents, I should expect the capital’s crime statistics to halve overnight.’

As we followed Lord Goring to the back door, I heard Ernest retort, ‘Algy, I can’t see how you can possibly eat éclairs at a time like this.’

‘I can’t see how you can possibly expect me to eat these particular éclairs at any other time,’ Algernon protested as they retreated into the ballroom.