The Exploits of Sherlock Holmes (14 page)

superiority which it seemed nothing could shake.

"By George," Whispered Lestrade. "When I was here last night, I never saw Mr. and Mrs.

Cabpleasure together. That may account for the false moustache I found hidden in the hall.

Only one person was in that house this morning, and one person is still there. That means

—" Now it was Holmes's turn to be taken aback. "Lestrade, what has got into your head at

this late date?"

"They can't deceive me. If Mr. Cabpleasure is the same person as Mrs. Cabpleasure, if he

or she simply walked out of the house in man's clothes and then walked back in again—I

see it all now!"

"Lestrade! Stop! Wait! "

"We have female searchers in these days," said Lestrade, dashing towards the house.

"They'll soon prove whether it's a lady or a gentleman."

"Holmes," cried I, "can this monstrous theory possibly be true?"

"Nonsense, Watson."

"Then you must restrain Lestrade. My dear fellow," I expostulated presently, as Mrs.

Cabpleasure disappeared from the window and a piercing female shriek indicated that Lestrade

had imparted the intelligence of what he proposed to do, "this is unworthy of you. Whatever

we may think of the lady's manners, especially in commanding you to be here in a sober

condition, you must spare her the indignity of an enforced visit to the police-station!"

"Yet I am not at all sure," said he, thoughtfully, "that the lady would be greatly harmed by

such an enforced visit. Indeed, it may serve to teach her a salutary lesson. Don't argue,

Watson! I have an errand for you."

"But—"

"I must pursue certain lines of enquiry which may take all day. Meanwhile, since my address is

readily accessible to anyone, I feel sure that the conscientious Mr. Mortimer Brown will send me

a certain telegram. Therefore I would be grateful, Watson, if you would wait at our rooms and

open the telegram should it arrive before my return."

Lestrade's mood must have been contagious. Otherwise I know not why I should have

rushed back in such a hurry to Baker Street, shouting to the cab-driver that I would give him

a guinea if he took me there in an hour.

But the anticipated telegram from Mr. Mortimer Brown found me discussing midday dinner,

and added a fresh shock. It read:

"Regret my too-expeditious departure this morning. Must state openly I am, and have

always been, only a nominal partner of Cabpleasure and Brown, whose assets belong entirely to

Mr. James B. Cabpleasure. My telegraphed enquiry as to the twenty-six diamonds in the

Cowles-Derningham purchase was caused by caution in making certain be had brought these

diamonds safely home. If he took the diamonds, he had a perfect right to take them.—

Harold Mortimer Brown."

Then James Cabpleasure was not a thief! But, if he had not meant to fly the law, I was

at a loss to account for his behaviour. It was seven o'clock that night, and I heard Holmes's

familiar tread on the stairs, when inspiration came to me.

"Pray enter," cried I, as the knob turned, "for I have found the only possible explanation at

last!"

Flinging open the door, Holmes glanced quickly round, and his face fell.

"What, is there no visitor? Yet, perhaps I am premature; yes, premature. My dear Watson,

I apologize. What were you saying?"

"If Mr. Cabpleasure had in fact vanished," said I, as he scanned the telegram, "it would

have been the miracle Lestrade called it. But miracles do not happen in the nineteenth century.

Holmes, our diamond-broker only seemed to vanish. He was there all the time, but we did not

observe him."

"How so?"

"Because he had disguised himself as a police-constable."

Holmes, who was in the act of hanging up his cape and cloth cap on the hook behind the

door, turned round with his dark brows drawn together. "Continue!" said he.

"In this very room, Holmes, Mrs. Cabpleasure said that her husband's moustache made

him resemble a constable. We know him to be a fine mimic, with a reprehensible sense of

humour. To procure a fancy-dress policeman's uniform would have been easy. After the

misdirection with which he walked from the house and walked back again, he then put on the

uniform. In the half-light, with so many constables about, he went unobserved until he could

escape.

"Excellent, Watson! It is only when I have been with Lestrade that I learn to value you.

Very good indeed."

"I have found the solution?"

"It is not, I fear, quite good enough. Mrs. Cabpleasure also said, if you recall, that her

husband was of medium height and had no more figure than a hop-pole, by which she meant

he was thin or lanky. That this was a fact I proved today by many photographs of him in the

drawing room at Happiness Villa. He could not have simulated the height or the beef of a

metropolitan policeman."

"But mine is the last possible explanation!"

"
I
think not. There is only one person who meets our requirements of height and figure, and

that person—"

There was a loud clamour and jangle of the bell from below.

"Hark!" said Holmes. "It is the visitor, the step upon the stair, the touch of drama which I

cannot resist! Who will open that door, Watson? Who will open the door?"

The door opened. Clad in evening clothes, with cape and collapsible hat, our visitor stood

upon the threshold. I found myself looking incredulously at a long, cleanshaven, familiar face.

"Good evening, Mr. Alf Peters," said Holmes. "Or should I say—Mr. James Cabpleasure?"

Realization smote me like a blow, and I all but staggered.

"I must congratulate you," continued Holmes, with sternness. "Your impersonation of the

persecuted milkman was admirably done. I recall a similar case at Riga in 1876, and it is faintly

reminiscent of an impersonation by a Mr. James Windibank in '88; but certain features here

are unique. The subject of removing a heavy moustache for changing a man's appearance,

especially in making him look younger, is one to which I may devote a monograph. Instead

of assuming a moustache for disguise, you took yours off."

When he was dressed in evening clothes, our visitor's face showed as mobile and highly

intellectual, with dancing brown eyes which crinkled at the corners as though he might smile.

But, far from smiling, he was desperately worried.

"Thank you," said he, in a pleasant and well-modulated voice. "You gave me a very bad

moment, Mr. Holmes, when I sat on that milk-wagon outside my own house and I observed

that suddenly you saw through my whole plan. Why did you refrain from unmasking me then?"

"I wished first to hear what you had to say for yourself, unembarrassed by the presence of

Lestrade."

James Cabpleasure bit his lip.

"Afterwards," said Holmes, "it was not difficult to trace you through the Purity Milk

Company, or to send you the judiciously worded telegram which has brought you here. A

photograph of James Cabpleasure with moustache eliminated, shown to your employer,

disclosed the fact that he was the same man as one Alfred Peters, who six months ago

applied for a post with the milk company, and obtained two days' leave of absence for Tuesday

and Wednesday.

"Yesterday, in this room, your wife informed us that on Tuesday you 'returned' from an

unheard-of six months' absence in Amsterdam and Paris. That was suggestive. Taken together

with your curious conduct as regards the umbrella—which you did not prize when you

purchased it, but only when you had decided on your plan—and your incredible statement

that the umbrella would be the death of you, it already suggested a hoax or imposture designed

to deceive your wife."

"Sir, let me tell you—!"

"One moment. Shaving off your moustache, for six months you drove that milk-round;

and I have no doubt you enjoyed it. On Tuesday you 'returned' as James Cabpleasure. I find

that Messrs. Clarkfather, the wigmakers, supplied you with a real-hair duplicate of your lost

moustache. In dark winter weather or by gas-light it would deceive your wife, since the lady

takes small interest in you and we know you occupy separate rooms.

"Quite deliberately you acted in a violently suspicious manner. On Tuesday night you staged

that sinister scene with a non-existent 'fellow-conspirator' outside a window, hoping to drive

your wife into those vigorous measures which you believed she was certain to take.

"On Wednesday night the visit of Inspector Lestrade, who is perhaps not the most subtle of

men, told you that you would have witnesses for your projected disappearance and that it was

safe to go ahead. Dismissing the servants and drugging your wife, you left the house.

"This morning, hatless and without a greatcoat, you had the effrontery—don't smile, sir!

—to drive the milk-wagon straight up to your house, where in the pitchdark entry you played

the part of two men.

"Descending from the wagon, you disappeared into the entry as the milkman. Inside,

already prepared, lay Mr. Cabpleasure's greatcoat, hat, and moustache. It required only

eight seconds to put on hat and coat, and hastily to affix a moustache which on that occasion

need be seen only briefly from a distance and in halflight.

"Out you walked as the elegant diamond-broker,
seemed
to remember your missing

umbrella, and rushed back in again. It took but a moment to throw the trappings inside the front

door, together with an umbrella already left there, and slam the front door from the outside.

Again you reappeared as the milkman, completing the illusion that two men had passed each

other.

"Though Inspector Lestrade honestly believes he saw two men, we all observed that the

entry was far too dark for this to have been possible. But we must not too much blame

Lestrade. When he stopped the milk-wagon and swore he had seen you before, it was no mere

bullying. He really had seen you once before, though he could not remember where.

"I have said you had no fellow-conspirator; strictly speaking, this is true. Yet surely you

must have shared the secret with your nominal partner, Mr. Mortimer Brown, who appeared

this morning for the purpose of drawing away attention and preventing close scrutiny of the

milkman. Unfortunately, his caution and apprehension rendered him useless. You made a bad

mistake when you hid that false moustache in the hall. Still, the police might have found it

when they searched you. This so-called miracle was possible because you very deliberately had

accustomed your wife and her acquaintances to your worship of that umbrella. In reality, you

cherished the umbrella because your plans could not have succeeded without it."

Sherlock Holmes, though he had been speaking curtly and without heat, seemed to rise up

like a lean avenger.

"Now, Mr. James Cabpleasure!" said he. "I can perhaps understand why you were

unhappy with your wife, and wished to leave her. But why could you not leave her openly, with

a legal separation, and not this mummery of a disappearance into nowhere?"

Our guest's fair-complexioned face went red.

"So I should have," he burst out, "if Gloria had not been already married when she married

me."

"I beg your pardon?"

Mr. Cabpleasure made a grimace, with a sudden vivid flash of personality, which showed

what he might have accomplished as a comic actor.

"Oh, you can prove it easily enough! Since she longs to go back to her real husband—

never mind who he is; it's an august name—I'm afraid Gloria wants to be rid of me,

preferably by seeing me in gaol. But I can earn money, whereas the august personage is too

lazy to try, and Gloria's prudence has become notorious."

"By Jove, Watson!" muttered Holmes. "This is not too surprising. It supplies the last

link. Did I not say the lady insisted too much on her married name of Cabpleasure?"

"I am tired of her chilliness; I am tired of her superiority; and now, at forty-odd, I wish only

to sit in peace and read. However, sir, let me acknowledge that it was a cad's trick if you

insist."

"Come!" said Holmes. "I am not the official police, Mr. Cabpleasure—"

"My name is not even Cabpleasure. That was forced upon me by my uncle, who founded

the business. My real name is Phillimore, James Phillimore. Well! I have put all my

possessions into Gloria's name, except twenty-six costly and negotiable diamonds. I had hoped

to found a new life as James Phillimore, free of a blasted silly name. But I have been defeated

by a master strategist, so do what you like."

"No, no," said Holmes blandly. "Already you have made one bad blunder, though I was

deplorably late in seeing it. When a milk-wagon is driven to the front door instead of to the

tradesmen's entrance, the foundations of our social world are rocked. If I am to help you in

forming this new life—"

"If you are to help me?" cried our visitor.

"Then you must not be betrayed by a real name of which someone is sure to be aware.

From diplomatic necessity, until the day you die, Watson shall call the problem of your

disappearance unsolved. Assume what other name you choose. But Mr. James Phillimore must