The Lost Casebooks of Sherlock Holmes (60 page)

Kitchingham gave a fatuous and self-satisfied snigger.

‘There was none of that sort of thing given, sir. Where there's no call for it, we don't go in for your kind of clever arithmetic down here, Mr Holmes.'

‘Indeed not,' said Holmes with an icy fury that suggested Mr Kitchingham had now caught a tiger by the tail. ‘What you go in for, down here, appears to verge upon criminal negligence. When did Williams leave the premises?'

‘Almost at once,' said Kitchingham, whose face had reddened gratifyingly. ‘Mrs Williams died on Saturday, the inquest was on Monday …'

‘Before her relatives could hear of it, let alone attend it, I daresay!'

‘Couldn't say, sir. Then she was buried on Tuesday, next day.'

‘Large funeral was it? Something elaborate?'

‘Very small, in the circumstances. Decent but not expensive, as Mr Williams said. Common grave. Still, what could that matter to her, as he remarked?'

‘What, indeed?'

‘Never saw a man so struck down,' said Kitchingham, warm in justification of the widower. ‘Before the burial he saw the agents' clerk, Miss Rapley. Ended his tenancy. Sobbing his heart out on her desk, poor gentleman. Only once he brightened and said, “Wasn't it a jolly good thing I got her to make a will?” Fair play, it was. You don't want grief aggravated by intestacy at a time like that.'

We freed ourselves from the morbid enthusiasms of Constable Kitchingham and strolled back to the Royal Hotel.

‘Some mute inglorious Borgia here may rest!' Holmes gestured furiously at the sea-front of Herne Bay. ‘For all that the local constabulary know or care!'

‘They cannot work without evidence …'

‘Evidence!' His cry was loud enough to cause an elderly couple ahead of us to turn and stare in some alarm. ‘Does no one observe the psychopathic delight of a man in exposing his dead wife to strangers, naked on the boards of the bathroom floor for more than two hours? Does it mean nothing when he asks on the day of her burial in a common grave whether it wasn't a jolly good thing that he got her to make a will? Constable Kitchingham takes it as mere proof of what a splendid fellow he was!'

‘Holmes,' I said gently, ‘much as you may deplore the inquest, the verdict was never in doubt on the evidence. Bessie Mundy died in an epileptic seizure, which caused her to fall back with her head beneath the water, so that she drowned. The jurors made the only reasonable finding, death by misadventure.'

‘I have as little faith in coroners' officers and inquest juries as I have in policemen, Watson. I know only that Miss Constance Maxse is in mortal peril, God knows where. Policemen and jurors will do nothing for her. Truth and facts will save her. Great is truth and shall prevail. Even in Herne Bay.'

In our sitting-room after dinner, at the end of our first day, he stared morosely beyond the lace curtains, where a late sun glimmered warmly on the placid waters of the North Sea and on the rusty sails of barges steering for the Essex shore. Then, without a word, he took from his pocket a telegram and handed it to me. It was a simple reply from Inspector Lestrade concerning the death of that other Mrs Smith, Alice Burnham, lost at Blackpool.
THE POLICE HAVE NO SUSPICION OF FOUL PLAY
.

The case against George Joseph Smith as anything more than a bigamist and trickster depended solely on the fate of Bessie Mundy at the hands of her devoted and hygienic husband.

VI

In such unpromising circumstances, I never knew by what means Sherlock Holmes was able to command the attendance next morning of Mr Rutley Mowll, the East Kent Coroner, Mr Alfred Hogbin, undertaker, Dr Frank Austin French, Miss Lily O'Sullivan of the Herne Bay Aquatic Belles, and the unfortunate Constable Kitchingham. The venue was the bathroom of 80 High Street, which was in one of its periods of vacancy. Whether the unseen hand of Lestrade, or of Mycroft Holmes, had contrived this ensemble I have no idea. One thing, however, was certain. Holmes was in the mood of a sergeant-major addressing a defaulters' parade.

An exception to his displeasure was the prettily costumed Miss O'Sullivan, whose swimming dress of frilly blue pantaloons and bodice would have graced the most sophisticated lido. For the rest, Holmes was in a mood to brook no contradictions or evasions and I had never seen any group of people look so thoroughly petrified in his presence.

‘We will, if you please, begin with filling the bath!' The words rapped out in that bare, hard room with the grey light of the High Street filtering through its mean windows. ‘Constable Kitchingham! Take the two gallon bucket to the kitchen downstairs. Fill it from the copper, which is now brimming. Carry it up here and pour it into the bath. Continue until the bath is half full, then three quarters full, as both you and Dr French found it. Do not interrupt us otherwise.'

He was plainly enjoying his revenge upon them all for what he still called their ‘criminal negligence'. He pointed to the cast-iron enamelled bath with its four lions' feet. It stood with its head just under the street-window, as it had done at the death of Bessie Mundy. Then his finger stabbed at the lugubrious black-clad figure of Mr Hogbin, the undertaker of High Street, Herne Bay.

‘Now, sir! Take that useful implement of your trade, the tape-measure! Read off the length of the bath!'

Mr Hogbin nervously did as he was told.

‘The upper length is just five feet, Mr Holmes. The length at the base is three feet eight inches.'

‘And since it is too narrow for her to move much to either side, it is the length which is crucial. You also measured her for her coffin?'

‘I did, sir.' He stood with the tape round his neck and shoulders drooping, like a mournful carrion crow.

‘How tall was Mrs Williams?'

‘Five feet nine inches, sir. Tall for a lady.'

‘Such a pity the inquest did not hear that,' said Holmes savagely. ‘Nine inches longer than the bath at the top! More than two feet longer than the bath at the bottom!'

‘She was found lying flat along it, Mr Holmes,' said Coroner Mowll quickly, ‘flat along the bottom but with legs sloping upwards and feet out of the water.'

‘I am aware of how she was found, sir! My interest is in how she got where she was found!'

‘If you have read the report of the inquest, you will know that it was the result of an epileptic seizure, which caused her to fall backwards under the water.'

‘I am informed, Mr Mowll, that you hold your position as East Kent Coroner by virtue of being a solicitor. I wonder if you have the slightest knowledge of the sequence of events in an epileptic seizure.'

‘I believe I have some little experience in the matter.'

‘Who heard the scream?'

‘The scream?'

‘An epileptic seizure, unlike
petit mal
, is almost always preceded by a scream of such intensity that those who hear it seldom forget it. There is a street not more than a dozen feet below these windows, which are open in summer no doubt. There are rooms on either side of these flimsy lath and plaster walls. Curiously, when Mr Williams claimed to recite the symptoms of his wife's first fits, several days before, he also made no mention of such a scream.'

‘No one heard a scream.'

There was a pause while Constable Kitchingham carried a laden bucket across the bare floorboards of the room and splashed it into the bath.

‘A primary characteristic of such a seizure is rigidity,' said Holmes with great deliberation. ‘The woman's feet would be jammed against the far end of the bath and her trunk bolt upright. It would be as nearly impossible for her to get her head under water in a bath sixteen inches deep as one can imagine.'

Mr Mowll's eagerness to protect the reputation of Herne Bay led him to ingratiate with Holmes, as one who should pat a hungry lion.

‘She was on her back, sir, with her legs sloping up and feet out of the water.'

‘Which a single pair of strong hands would accomplish in a moment.'

‘Mr Holmes,' said the coroner firmly, ‘your reputation goes before you. You are known for your skill in the most difficult cases. However, no man can be expert in every field …'

‘I trust you may be able to produce authority for that insinuation!' my friend snapped back at him.

‘I merely point out, Mr Holmes, that you are plainly not
au fait
with events as they occurred. Nor is your expertise in medicine sufficient to tilt the scales in doubtful questions, where medical men themselves take varying views …'

‘Forgive me, Mr Mowll, but I decline to undertake responsibility for the vacillations and mutual hostilities of the medical profession.'

That brought silence for a moment until Mr Mowll tried again.

‘There is no case of murder by drowning known to English jurisprudence, Mr Holmes, in which a victim who is conscious has not offered the most desperate and violent resistance, sufficient to cause bruising and abrasions to both assailant and assailed. Neither husband nor wife in this case displayed a single bruise or scratch. Nor did Dr French find a drop of water spilt on the floor from a bath three quarters full.'

‘As to the last observation,' said Holmes coolly, ‘absorption by untreated wood and evaporation on a summer day with the temperature in the eighties would in any case reduce the time that water would be visible on the floor. However, we shall now put the entire question to the proof, with your permission. The bath is only half full, but that is enough for my purposes.'

‘If you wish.' Coroner Mowll stood back wearily, with folded arms.

‘Miss O'Sullivan, if you please,' said Holmes courteously.

Our bathing belle in her water-costume skipped forward, as if making her bow at a pierrot show.

‘One moment,' murmured Holmes, ‘allow Constable Kitchingham to add this last bucket of water.'

The final bucket was emptied into the bath with a sound like a gently breaking wave. Miss O'Sullivan raised a dainty foot and stepped into water that came half way to her knees. She adjusted the laces of her cap and lowered herself gently into the wider end of the bath. She gave us all a quick smile and a flutter of her lashes.

‘Now, my dear young lady,' said Holmes, more affably than he had said anything to anyone that morning, ‘I apologize for the coolness of the water but happily you are accustomed to that in your profession. This will not take long. Let us suppose that you are sitting upright in the bath. Sponging your arms, shall we say. You have no idea that anything is amiss. Of course you have in reality, but let us pretend. You have not a care in the world.'

She sat there, wiping her arms with her wet hands in dumb-show as Holmes removed his jacket and rolled up his sleeves. She smiled at him, a little nervously as I thought. Holmes gave her a quick smile and approached. We were watching to see him place his hand upon her head. He stooped a little at the bath, slipped his left forearm under her knees, his right arm round her shoulders, for all the world like a loving groom about to lift his bride and carry her to bed. It was so naturally done that she began to put her left arm about his shoulders to complete the embrace.

Then, without a word of warning, his left arm that was under her knees lifted them high. The right arm was withdrawn and Miss O'Sullivan went down on her back with her legs drawn high. The shelving depth of the bath was so narrow where she lay that her arms seemed imprisoned, though she managed several futile swimming motions with them. Her neck and shoulders jerked spasmodically and in vain to get her face above the water.

‘If seeing is believing,' Holmes said grimly to the rest of us, ‘you now know how Mrs Bessie Williams,
née
Bessie Mundy, met her death.'

I thought that no one who saw this dreadful experiment being carried out could have the least doubt of that.

‘Mr Holmes!' Coroner Mowll's cry was one of shrill alarm.

‘As little as thirty seconds might suffice!' Miss O'Sullivan's struggles seemed feebler as Holmes muttered these words. ‘As long as two minutes and more might be necessary!'

‘Holmes! For God's sake!'

The girl's face was horribly evident under the slight turbulence of the water as her arms went limp. Her eyes were staring up at us, her cheeks bulging, and a thin stream of bubbles reached the surface. He seemed not to hear me.

‘Holmes!'

It is not too much to say that I threw myself upon him from behind. For a second or two longer I could not break his grip. Then the brawny Mr Hogbin joined me and between us we drew him off. Miss O'Sullivan floated to the surface. Her eyes, which had been wide open, fluttered and closed. Letting go of my friend, I drew from my pocket the silver medicinal flask, which my father had given me when I left to join my regiment in India. I unscrewed it and touched it to her lips. The warming whisky made her retch a little and then brought her round.

‘So much for epileptic seizures,' said Holmes imperiously to the onlookers.

They stared at him, shocked and terrified, for they could all have sworn he meant to drown the girl as a demonstration. Holmes was completely unperturbed.

‘And then there is the matter of the piece of soap, said to be clutched in the right hand. It is also said by Dr French in his evidence that the hand was limp.'

‘And so it was,' said French nervously.

‘A limp hand cannot clutch a piece of soap or anything else. Perhaps I may refer you to the work of Dr Alfred Swaine Taylor on the matter. Only a quarter of those who drown die of asphyxia. When they do so, the hand would be limp. Had there been death in an epileptic seizure, which there was not, you would have had to prize the hand open. According to your evidence, the hand opened of its own accord and the soap fell out.'

Though Holmes had rattled their self-confidence, he had not changed the mind of the coroner. Mr Mowll was angry now, as well as frightened.

‘All that you have done, sir, is to tell us what we knew already. There are two possible explanations in this case for almost every aspect of it. The jury at the inquest heard them all and found its verdict of misadventure. You have stated the alternative hypotheses but you will not change that verdict.'