The Exploits of Sherlock Holmes (10 page)

"Logic, my dear fellow. Now let us see."

"One moment," I said firmly. "You spoke earlier of a crutch, but where could you have

obtained one at such short notice? That is an extraordinary crutch. It seems to be constructed

of some light-weight metal, and shines where the rays of the lamp—"

"Yes, yes, I already had it in my possession."

"Already had it?"

"It is made of aluminum, and is the relic of a case before my biographer came to glorify

me. I have already mentioned it to you, but you have forgotten. Now be good enough to

forget the crutch while you examine these cards. Oh, beautiful, beautiful!"

Were all the jewels of Golconda spread out before him, he could not have been more

ecstatic. He even rejoiced when I told him what I had seen and heard.

"What, you are still in the dark? Then do you take these nine cards, Watson. Put them

upon the desk in their order, and announce the name of each as you do so."

"Knave of diamonds," said I, placing the cards under the lamp, "seven of hearts, ace of

clubs—Good heavens, Holmes!"

"Do you see anything, then?"

"Yes. There are two aces of clubs, one following the other!"

"Did I not call it beautiful? But you have counted only four cards. Proceed with the

remaining five."

"Deuce of spades," said I, "ten of hearts—merciful powers, here is a third ace of clubs, and

two more knaves of diamonds!"

"And what do you deduce from that?"

"Holmes, I think I see light. Madame Taupin's is famous for its real-life effects. The older

wax figure is a brazen gambler, who is depicted as cheating the young man. By a subtle effect,

they have shown him as holding false cards for his winning hand."

"Hardly subtle, I fancy. Even so brazen a gambler as yourself, Watson, would surely

feel some embarrassment at putting down a winning hand which contained no less than

three knaves of diamonds and three aces of clubs?"

"Yes, there are difficulties."

"Further. If you count all the cards, both those in the hands and upon the table, you will

observe that their total number is fifty-six: which is four more than I, at least, am

accustomed to use in one pack."

"But what can it mean? What is the answer to our problem?"

The atlas lay upon the desk where Holmes had thrown it down when I gave him the

envelopes. Snatching up the book, groaning as he staggered and all but fell on that curious

crutch, he eagerly opened the book again.

" 'At the mouth of the Thames,' " he read, " 'on the island of—'"

"Holmes, my question concerned the answer to our problem!"

"This is the answer to our problem."

Though I am the most long-suffering of men, I protested strongly when he packed me off

upstairs to my old room. I believed that I should get no sleep upon the rack of this mystery,

yet I slept heavily, and it was nearly eleven o'clock when I descended to breakfast.

Sherlock Holmes, who had already breakfasted, again sat upon the sofa. I was glad of my

clean, fresh shave when I found him deep in conversation with Miss Eleanor, whose timidity

was lessened by his easy manner.

Yet something in the gravity of his face arrested my hand as I rang the bell for rashers and

eggs.

"Miss Baxter," said he, "though there still remains an objection to my hypothesis, the time

has come to tell you something of great importance. But what the devil—!"

Our door had been suddenly dashed open. To be precise, it was kicked open with a crash.

But this had been done only as a jest by the man who kicked it, for his loud, overfed burst of

laughter rang like a brazen trumpet.

In the aperture stood a burly, red-faced gentleman with a shining hat, a costly frock-coat

open over a white waistcoat to show the diamonds on his watch-guard, and the single flaming

ruby in his cravat.

Though not so tall as Holmes, he was far broader and heavier; indeed, with a figure not

unlike my own. His loud laugh rang out again, and his cunning little eyes flashed, as he held

up a leather bag and shook it.

"Here you are, cully!" cried he. "You're the Scotland Yard man, ain't you? A thousand

gold sovereigns, and all yours for the askin'!"

Sherlock Holmes, though astonished, regarded him with the utmost composure.

"Sir Gervase Darlington, I think?"

Without paying the slightest notice of either Miss Baxter or myself, the newcomer strode

across and rattled the bag of coins under Holmes's nose.

"That's me, Mister Detective!" said he. "Saw you fight yesterday. You could be better, but

you'll do. One day, my man, they may make prize-fightin' legal. Till they do, a gentleman's

got to arrange a neat little mill in secret. Stop a bit, though!"

Suddenly, cat-footed despite his weight, he went to the window and peered down into the

street.

"Curse old Phileas Belch! He's had a man following me for months. Ay, and two blasted

manservants in succession to steam open my letters. Broke the back for one of 'em, though." Sir

Gervase's shattering laugh rang again. "Nevermind!"

Holmes's face seemed to change; but an instant later he was his cool, imperturbable self as

Sir Gervase Darlington turned back, flinging the bag of money on the sofa.

"Keep the dibs, Scotland Yarder.
I
don't need 'em. Now, then. In three months we'll match

you with Jem Garlick, the Bristol Smasher. Fight a cross, and I'll skin you; do me proud, and I

can be a good patron. With an unknown feller like you, I can get eight to one odds."

"Do I understand, Sir Gervase," said Holmes, "that you wish me to box professionally in

the ring?"

"You're the Scotland Yarder, ain't you? You comprey English, don't you?"

"When I hear it spoken, yes."

"That's a joke, hey? Well, so is this!"

Playfully, deliberately, his heavy left fist whipped out a round-arm which passed—as it

was meant to pass— just an inch in front of my friend's nose. Holmes did not even blink.

Again Sir Gervase roared with laughter.

"Mind your manners, Mister Detective, when you speak to a gentleman. I could break you

in two even if you didn't have a bad ankle, by God!"

Miss Eleanor Baxter, white-faced, uttered a little moaning cry and seemed to be trying to

efface herself against the wall.

"Sir Gervase," cried I, "you will kindly refrain from using offensive language in the

presence of a lady."

Instantly our guest turned round, and looked me up and down in a most insolent manner.

"Who's this? Watson? Sawbones feller? Oh." Suddenly he thrust his beefy red face into

mine. "Know anything about boxin'?"

"No," said I. "That is—not much."

"Then see you don't get a lesson," retorted Sir Gervase playfully, and roared with mirth

again. "Lady? What lady?" Seeing Miss Baxter, he looked a little disconcerted, but directed a

killing ogle. "No lady, Sawbones. But a fetchin' little piece, by God!"

"Sir Gervase," said I, "you are now warned, for the last time."

"One moment, Watson," interposed the calm voice of Sherlock Holmes. "You must forgive

Sir Gervase Darlington. No doubt Sir Gervase has not yet recovered from the visit he paid three

days ago to the wax exhibition of Madame Taupin."

In the brief silence that followed, we could hear a coal rattle in the grate and the eternal

rain on the windows. But our guest could not be dismayed.

"The Scotland Yarder, eh?" he sneered. "Who told you I was at Madame Taupin's

three days ago?"

"No one. But, from certain facts in my possession, the inference was obvious. Such a visit

looked innocent, did it not? It would arouse no suspicion on the part of anyone who might be

following—some follower, for instance, employed by the eminent sportsman Sir Phileas Belch,

who wished to make certain you did not win another fortune by secret information as you did

on last year's Derby."

"You don't interest me, my man!"

"Indeed? And yet, with your sporting proclivities, I feel sure you must be interested in cards."

"Cards?"

"Playing-cards," said Holmes blandly, taking some from his dressing-gown pocket and

holding them up fan-wise. "In fact, these nine cards."

"What the devil's all this?"

"It is a singular fact, Sir Gervase, that a casual visitor to the Room of Horrors—on passing

the gambling tableau —can see the cards in the hand of a certain wax figure without even

giving them more than an innocent-appearing glance.

"Now some strange tampering was done one night with these cards. The cards in the hand

of the other player, the 'young gentleman,' had not even been touched, as was shown by

their dusty and gritty condition. But some person, a certain person, had removed a number of

cards from the hand of the so-called 'wrong 'un,' throwing them down on the table, and,

further, had added four cards from no less than two extra packs.

"Why was this done? It was not because someone wished to play a practical joke, in

creating the illusion that wax dummies were occupied in reckless gambling. Had that been the

culprit's motive, he would have moved the imitation gold coins as well as the cards. But the

coins were not moved.

"The true answer is simple and indeed obvious. There are twenty-six letters in our

alphabet; and twenty-six, twice multiplied, gives us fifty-two; the number of cards in a pack.

Supposing that we were arbitrarily to choose one card for each letter, we could easily make a

childish, elementary form of substitution-cipher—"

Sir Gervase Darlington's metal laugh blared shrilly. "Substitution-cipher," jeered he,

with his redhand at the ruby in his cravat. "What's that, hey? What's the fool talkin' about?"

"—which would be betrayed, however," said Holmes, "should a message of only nine letters

contain a double 'e' or a double 's.' Let us imagine, therefore, that the knave of diamonds

stands for the letter 's' and the ace of clubs for the letter 'e.' "

"Holmes," interposed I, "this may be inspiration. But it is not logic! Why should you think

a message must contain those letters?"

"Because already I knew the message itself. You told it to me."

"I told you?"

"Tut, Watson. If these cards represent the letters indicated, we have a double 'e' towards

the beginning of the word and a double 's' at the end of it. The first letter of the word, we

perceive, must be 'S,' and there is an 'e' before the double 's' at the end. No cunning is

required to give us the word 'Sheerness.' "

"But what in the world has Sheerness—" I began.

"Geographically, you will find it towards the mouth of the Thames," interrupted Holmes.

"But it is also, you informed me, the name of a horse owned by Lord Hove. Though this horse

has been entered for the Grand National, you told me that little is expected of it. But if the

horse has been trained with the utmost secrecy as another smashing winner like Bengal Lady—"

"There would be a tremendous killing," said I, "for any gambler who could learn that

well-guarded secret and back the horse!"

Sherlock Holmes held up the fan of cards in his left hand.

"My dear Miss Eleanor Baxter," cried he, with a sorrowful sternness, "why did you let Sir

Gervase Darlington persuade you? Your grandfather would not like to hear that you used the

wax exhibition to leave this message—telling Sir Gervase what he wished to know without even

speaking to him, writing to him, or approaching within a mile of him."

If previously Miss Baxter had turned pale and uttered a moan at seeing Sir Gervase, it was

as nothing to the piteous look now in her stricken grey eyes. Swaying on her feet, she began

to falter out a denial.

"No, no!" said Holmes, gently. "It really will not do. Within a few moments of the time you

entered this room last night, I was aware of your—your acquaintanceship with Sir Gervase

here."

"Mr. Holmes, you cannot have known it!"

"I fear so. Kindly observe the small table at my left as I sit upon the sofa. When you

approached me, there was nothing upon the table, save a sheet of note-paper emblazoned with

the somewhat conspicuous crest of Sir Gervase Darlington."

"Oh, heaven help me!" cried the wretched young lady.

"Yet you were strangely affected. You looked fixedly at the table, as though in recognition.

When you saw my eye upon you, you gave a start and changed colour. By apparently casual

remarks, I elicited the fact that your employer is Lord Hove, the owner of Sheerness—"

"No! No! No!"

"It would have been easy for you to have substituted the new cards for those already in the

wax figure's hand. As your grandfather said, there is a side door at Madame Taupin's which

cannot properly be locked. You could have made the substitution secretly at night, before you

called formally to escort your grandfather home in the morning.

"You might have destroyed the evidence before too late, if on the first night your

grandfather had told you what was amiss in the museum. But he did not tell you until the

following night, when both he and Robert Parsnip were there, and you could not be alone.

However, I do not wonder you protested when he wished to see me. Later, as Dr. Watson

quite unconsciously told me, you tried to seize and scatter the cards, in the wax figure's hand."