A Letter of Mary

The thought of Holmes steadied me. I looked grimly at my shadowed reflection and told myself, Enough of this, Mary Russell. You are here to track down the person who murdered a good woman, a friend. You are the former apprentice and now full partner of the best man in the business. You have a quick, trained mind that is second to few and certainly better than that of Col. Dennis Edwards. And you are the daughter of Judith Klein, who was by no means small in spirit. This rôle calls for caution and a sure touch, but it is nothing to be overwhelmed by, and you will not be intimidated by a large middle-aged man with overactive glands and hairy hands.

I went to bed then and listened to the night sounds of the city. With dim surprise, I realised that it was one week since Dorothy Ruskin had died, one week and a couple of hours and three miles from the site. I slept eventually, although I did not sleep well.

THIRTEEN

nu

The rain started during the night, in its typical understated London fashion. The grumble of distant thunder grew imperceptibly from the dying roar of the traffic, and the eventual rustle of drops on stones and slate gradually came to underlie what passed in London for a quiet night. Nothing dramatic, just dull London wetness. I huddled under my black umbrella in the bus queue the next morning and thought, Here I cannot even turn to my neighbours and say how good it is for the crops— they'd look at me as if I were from another planet.

I escaped from the crowded omnibus and its smell of wet wool a full twenty minutes early, so I went into Rosie's for a cuppa to start the day. Rosie was busy, but she sloshed my tea with affection and asked what I was doin' out so early.

"I found a position! I start with Colonel Edwards this morning. I met him at the pub last night and he said he needed a secretary, and he hired me."

Rosie froze, and her face travelled through surprise and appraisal to suspicion and reappraisal, then ended up at a politely noncommittal "Good for you, dearie, so I guess we'll be seein' summat of you."

Ten minutes later, I splashed up the drive to my new job, berating myself. Fine detective you make, Russell, I thought. Can't even play a rôle without worrying about what a complete stranger thinks of you. I shook the water from my umbrella, squared my meek shoulders, and rang the bell.

* * *

The work of any decent detective is at least nine-tenths monotony, despite the invariably brisk pace of any detective novel, or even a police file, for that matter. Take, for example, the accounts written by Dr Watson of the earlier cases of Holmes: They give the overall impression of the detective leaping into the fray, grasping the single most vital clue in an instant, and wrestling energetically with the case until all is neatly solved. There is little indication of the countless hours spent in cold, cramped watch over a doorway, of days spent in dusty records rooms and libraries, of the tantalising trails that fade away into nothing— all are passed over with a laconic reference to the passage of time. Of course, Watson was often brought in only at the end of a case, and so he missed the tedium. I could not.

I will not recount the secretarial work I did for Colonel Edwards, because to do so would bore even the writer to tears. Suffice it to say that for the next few days I was a secretary: I filed and organised, I typed, and I took dictation. At the same time, of course, I had my ears fully cocked and my eyes into everything, at every moment. I listened in on telephone calls when I could, hearing long, dreary, manly conversations about dead birds and alcoholic beverages. I went systematically through each filing cabinet until my fingers and back cramped, and I dutifully chatted with the servants whenever I could manage to happen across them, receiving mostly monosyllabic grunts for my pains. No, if I wanted a life filled with nonstop excitement and challenge, I should not choose the life of a detective. High-wire acrobatics, perhaps, or teaching twelve-year-olds, or motherhood, but not detecting.

It is endurance that wins the case, not short bursts of flashy footwork (though those, too, have their place.) For the next days, I soaked up all possible information about Colonel Edwards and the people around him: his eating and drinking habits, what he read, how he slept, his likes, dislikes, passions, and hates— all the urges and habits that made the man.

The first day, Thursday, I spent all morning with the colonel in his upstairs study, sorting out correspondence and putting things to order. We ate lunch together in the study, and afterwards he showed me, almost shyly, the first pages of his book on Egypt in the years preceding the war. I promised to take it home and study it, which seemed to please him. We then sat down to dictation.

The first letters were to the managers of two manufacturing businesses, concerned with the upcoming yearly reports. The third was a short letter to a friend confirming a weekend bird-slaughtering party in September. ("Do much shooting, Miss Small?" "Why, no, Colonel." "Invigorating way to spend a holiday. Of course, it takes some strength to use a bird-gun." "Does it, Colonel? It sounds jolly fun.") The fourth was to a bank manager, with details for increasing the monthly allowance for the colonel's son, Gerald, when he returned to Cambridge. (Thank God it's Cambridge, I thought, and not Oxford. I'm not exactly unknown there.) The fifth was of considerable interest to me, addressed to a friend, concerning a comember of an organisation whose name set off bells. It read:

Dear Brooks,

I've been doing a lot of thinking about the little flap-up last week, and I have come to the conclusion that I shall have to resign from the Friends. It was a downright nasty trick Lawson played on me, keeping information from me until the last minute like that. I was the chair of that committee, after all, and it makes me look a damned ('I beg your pardon, Miss Small, change that to confounded, would you please?') fool not to know it was a woman I was meeting.

His supporters seem to have rallied round, and there's little chance he'll resign. If he apologises, I might reconsider, but not otherwise.

My best to the missus, and hope to see you both on the twenty-fourth.

Dennis Edwards

I did not think his resignation threat referred to the Society of Friends.

Two other letters followed, but I recorded them mechanically, taking little notice of their content other than seeing that they had nothing to do with my interests.

"That's it for today, Miss Small. Do you want to read them back to me before you type them?"

"If you like, but I think they're quite clear."

"Didn't go too fast for you, did I? Let me see."

"No, not at all. Oh, do you read shorthand?"

"I read a bit, but I don't recognise this. What is it?"

I couldn't very well tell him the truth, that it was my own system, a boustrophedonic code based on six languages, three alphabets, a variety of symbols mathematical and chemical, and a hieroglyphic, designed to keep up with even the fastest of lecturers and leave me time to record nonverbal data, as well. It was totally illegible to anyone but Holmes, and even he found it rough going.

"Oh, it's a system I learned in Oxford."

"Were you writing right to left?"

"On alternate lines. Makes it much smoother, not having to jump back to the beginning of the line each time."

"Well, live and learn." He handed me back my notebook. "Time for a little something. Sherry, I think, Miss Small?"

"Oh, Colonel Edwards, I don't think—"

"Now look, young lady." His mock sternness was meant to be amusing. "I never drink alone if I can help it— it's bad for the health. If you're going to be around here, you'll have to learn to be sociable. Here." He handed me a brimming wineglass, and I sighed to myself. Oh well, at least the quality was decent.

An hour later, he stood up. "I must go, though I'd dearly love to repeat last night's dinner. You go on home, take my manuscript, and finish the letters tomorrow. We'll go to dinner tomorrow night."

Not with Holmes due back, we wouldn't. "Oh, no, I couldn't—"

"Tomorrow or Saturday, one or the other, I won't take a no."

"We'll, er, we'll talk about it tomorrow," Mary Small said weakly.

"Or tomorrow and Saturday both, if you like. Here's the manuscript. Didn't you have a coat? Oh now, look at the rain out there. I'll have Alex run you home and come back for me; it'll take me that long to climb into my stiff shirt anyway." Protests were ignored as he stepped out and shouted orders to his man. "That's settled, then. I don't like to think of you getting wet. Here's your coat."

He held it for me, and his hands lingered on my shoulders. "Don't you think I should call you Mary?"

"Whatever you like, Colonel." I busied myself with my buttons.

"Would you call me—"

"No, sir," I interrupted firmly. "It wouldn't be right, Colonel. You are my employer."

"Perhaps you're right. But we will go to dinner."

"Good night, sir."

"Good night, Mary."

* * *

My portrait of Colonel Edwards was filling out. It now included his home, his investments, his relationships with servants and hired help, and the suggestive knowledge that he had been duped by colleagues over the gender of D. E. Ruskin, for some as-yet-unknown reason, and was very angry about it. In addition, I now had eighty-seven pages of material written by his hand and shaped by his mind, and nothing, absolutely nothing, is so revealing of a person's true self as a piece of his writing. I hurried through the substantial tea provided by Billy's cousin, a tiny, whip-hard little woman with the unlikely name of Isabella, and shut myself in with the manuscript.

At page seven, there came a knock at the door.

"Miss, er, Small? It's Billy. There's a, er, gentleman on the telephone for you."

"Oh, good. Thank you, Billy. You're looking well. Perhaps we can have a chat sometime, over a pint? Where's the 'phone? Ah, thank you."

It was very good to hear his voice.

"Good evening, Mary," he said, warning me unnecessarily of the need for discretion— he never called me Mary. "How does the new job go?"

"Billy told you, then. It's very interesting. I've learnt a great deal already. He's a nice man, though I've heard some talk about him. Hard to believe, though."

"Is it?"

"Yes, it is. And you? How are you getting on?"

"Well, as you know, the place is pretty run-down; there's a lot for someone like me to do. I spent yesterday morning weeding the rose beds and the afternoon digging in the potato patch."

"Poor thing, your back must be breaking. Don't pull anything." I more than half meant it— sustained physical labour was not his forte.

"I was inside today with a leaking joint in the kitchen, and she started me stripping wallpaper."

"Lucky you."

"Yes, well, that's why I'm calling, Mary. I won't finish the job tomorrow, so she wants me to stay on until Saturday."

I shoved away the rush of disappointment and said steadily, "Oh, that's all right. Disappointing, but I understand."

"I thought you might. And, would you tell those friends of yours that we'll meet them Saturday night instead?" Lestrade and Mycroft.

"Sunday morning?" I asked hopefully.

"Saturday."

"Very well. See you then. Sleep well."

"Not too likely, Mary. Good night."

* * *

I read the manuscript through quickly, then took myself off for a long, hot, mindless bath. The second time, I made notes for improving it, the secretarial and editorial review. The third time, I went very slowly, reading parts of it aloud, flipping back to compare passages, treating it like any other piece of textual analysis. At the end of it, I turned off the lights and sat passively, wishing vaguely that I smoked a pipe or played the violin or something, and then went to bed.

And in the night, I dreamt, a sly and insidious dream full of grey shapes and vague threats, a London fog of a dream that finally gave way to clarity. I dreamt I was lying in a place and manner that had once been very familiar: on my back, my hands folded across my stomach, looking up at the decorative plaster trim on the pale yellow ceiling of the psychiatrist's office. One of the twining roses that went to make up the border had been picked out in a pale pink, though whether it represented a moment of whimsey on Dr Ginzberg's part or her painstaking attention to the details of her profession, I could never decide. As it was directly in line with the gaze of any occupant of her analyst's couch, I suspected the latter, but I liked to think it was both, and so I never asked.

In the dream, I was suspended by the familiar languor of the hypnotic trance she had used as a therapeutic tool, like a vise that clamped me to the padded leather while she chipped delicately away at my mind, peeling off the obscuring layers of traumas old and new. They all felt very old, though most of them were recently acquired, and I had always felt raw and without defence when I left her office, like some newborn marsupial blindly mewling its way towards an unknown pocket of safety. I had been taken from her before I had a chance to reach it. I was fourteen years old.

My voice was droning on in answer to a question concerning my paternal grandmother, a woman about whom I had thought I knew little. Nonetheless, the words were spilling out, giving such detail of fact and impression as to sound almost clairvoyant, and I was aware of the onlooker within, who, when I came up from the trance, would be faintly surprised and amused at the wealth of information that had lain hidden. I do not remember what Dr Ginzberg's question was— there was a vague flavour of an adolescent's concept of Paris in the nineties, the cancan and sidewalk bistros and the Seine running at the foot of Notre Dame, so I suppose it must have been to do with the early years of my parents' marriage— but it hardly mattered. I was quite content to chunter on in any topic she might choose— almost any topic.

And then she laughed. Dr Ginzberg. During a session.

It is difficult to describe just how shocking this was, even doubly wrapped as I was in the dream and the dreamy world of trance, but my sense of rightness could not have been more offended had she suddenly squatted down and urinated on the Persian carpet. Her kind of psychotherapist simply did not react— outside of her rooms, yes, when she was another person, but Dr Ginzberg in the silent room with the yellow walls and the pink rose and the leather sofa? Impossible. Even more astounding had been the laugh itself. Dr Ginzberg's laugh (and outside the yellow room, she did laugh) was a quiet, throaty chuckle. This had been a sharp barking sound, a cough of humour from an older woman, and it cut off my flow of words like an axe blade.

I lay, paralysed by the wrongness of the laugh and the remnants of trance, and waited for her inevitable response to an unjustified pause, that encouraging "Yes?" with its echo of the Germanic ja. It did not come.

I became aware, with that logic of dreams, that I was younger than I had thought, that my feet were imprisoned in the heavy corrective buttoned shoes I had worn until I was six, and that the shoes came nowhere near the end of the couch. Dr Ginzberg waited, silent, in her chair behind me. I drew up my right foot and pushed with the heavy shoe against the leather, then twisted my body around to look at her.

Her hair had gone white, and instead of being gathered into its heavy chignon, it flared in an untidy bowl around her ears. She wore a pair of black, black glasses, like two round holes staring out from her face, hiding all expression. What bothered me most, though, was not her appearance— for she was still Dr Ginzberg, I knew that— but the fact that she held in her hands not her normal notepad but an object that looked like a small Torah scroll, spread across one knee while she made notes on it.

She stopped writing and tilted her head at me.

"Yes?" Ja.

I felt comforted, but gave a last glance at the scroll on her lap, and then I noticed her hands. They had wide, blunt fingers, and no ring, and a thick fuzz of dark copper hairs covered their backs. After a moment, the hands capped the pen, clipped it over the top of the scroll, and reached up for the black, black spectacles. I watched her hands rise slowly, slowly from her lap, past her ordinary shoulders, to her temples, and as they began to pull at the earpieces, I saw the shape of her head, the flat wrongness of it, and with a rush of childish terror I knew that I did not want to see the eyes behind those dark lenses, and I sat up with a moan strangling in my throat.

The boardinghouse seemed to throb with movement, but it was only the pounding in my ears. The shabby furnishings, grey in the light that seeped through the ungenerous curtains, were at once comforting and inordinately depressing. I sighed, considered and discarded the thought of finding the kitchen and making myself a hot drink, and squinted at the bedside clock. Ten minutes past four. I sighed again, put on my dressing gown, lit the gas lights, and reached for the colonel's manuscript.

It was not time wasted. By the time dawn overtook the streetlamp, I had confirmed a few hypotheses, drawn others into question, and given myself something to think about during the day.

FOURTEEN

xi

The day proved to contain a surfeit of things to think about, even without the manuscript. The first was the figure who greeted me as I entered the study: The son had arrived home from Scotland. He looked up from his coffee and gifted me with what I'm sure he thought of as a captivating grin, which might have been had it reached his eyes.

" 'Allo, 'allo, 'allo, the pater's new secretary is certainly an improvement over the last one. I see he didn't tell you that the prodigal was coming home. Gerald Edwards, at your service." He was the quintessential 1923-model final-year Cambridge undergraduate, sprawled with studied negligence across the maroon leather armchair, dressed in the height of fashion in an amazing yellow shantung lounge suit. His dark hair was slicked back, and he wore a fashionable air of disdainful cynicism on his face, with a watchful awareness in his bloodshot eyes. He made no move to stand, merely watched my body move across to the desk and bend down to tuck my handbag into a drawer. I straightened to face him and answered smoothly.

"I'm Mary Small, and no, he didn't mention it. Is he here?"

"He'll be down in a tick. We were up until some very wee hours last night, and the old sarx doesn't recover as fast when you're Father William's age, does it?"

Looking back, I do not know what it was that raised my hackles at that point. His use of a Greek word to a marginally educated secretary could have been innocent, but somehow I knew, instantly, that it was not. The mind could not justify it, but the body had no doubts, and my heart began to pound with the certainty that this unlikely young man suspected that he was talking with no innocent secretary. Here was danger, totally unexpected, perceptible danger. I used bewilderment to cover my confusion.

"I'm sorry, I thought his name ... What did you say about sharks?"

"Sarx, my dear Miss Small, sarx. Corpus, you know, this too, too solid and all that. But surely you know Greek, if this is yours." He held up yesterday's dictated notes and watched me calmly. "I mean, this isn't Greek, though it's Greek to me, but there are a goodly smattering of thetas and alphas."

"Oh, yes, sarx, sorry. Actually, I don't know an awful lot of Greek, or Hebrew, which is the other language there. Don't you use this system at Cambridge? Your father did tell me you were there, I think?"

"Aha, a secret Oxford hieroglyphic, is it? How did you learn it?"

"Well, actually, it was ... I mean, well, there was this boy who taught it to me one summer."

"Taught you Oxford shorthand, eh, on a punt up the river? And did you learn a lot, moored beneath the overhanging branches?" He hooted most horribly, and I felt my face flush, though not, as he thought, with embarrassment. "Look at her blush! Oh, Pater, look at your secretary, blushing so prettily."

"Good morning, Mary. I didn't hear you come in. Is my son teasing you?"

"Good morning, Colonel. No, he only thinks he is. Pardon me, I'd like to get those letters typed." I retrieved my notebook, and the temptation to kick one long fashionably clad young limb as I passed was strong, but I resisted. Russell, I thought as I wound the paper into the machine, that young man is going to be a capital P Problem, even if you're wrong about his suspicious nature. Roving hands and a happy drinker, Rosie had said. Of the first, I had no doubt.

And so it proved during the day. While the colonel was off dressing, young Edwards perched on the desk where I was typing and undressed me with his eyes. I ignored him completely, and through tremendous effort, I made not a single typing error. After lunch, at which he drank four glasses of wine, he began to find excuses to brush past me.

In between episodes of avoiding the son, the father and I got on with our work. That afternoon, I reviewed the manuscript with him, made hesitant suggestions for expanding one chapter and reversing the positions of two others, and extended his outline for the remainder of the book. He sat back, well satisfied, and rang for tea. I accepted his offer of a cigarette and steadied the hand that held the gold lighter.

"So, Mary, what do you make of it?"

"I found it very informative, Colonel, though I haven't much background in the political history of Egypt."

"Of course you don't. I'm glad you find it interesting. What about going to Oxford the first part of the week and getting on with a bit of that research, eh? Think you could handle it?"

"Oh yes, I know my way around the Bodleian." I paused, wondering if I should ask one of the questions that had come to me in the night.

"Something else on your mind, Mary?"

"Well, yes, now that you mention it. It occurred to me, after I read it, that you make very little of the activities of women." That was putting it mildly: His two mentions of the female sex were both highly disparaging, one of them almost rabid in its misogyny. "Had you planned on—"

"Of course I haven't put women into it," he cut me off impatiently. "It's a book on politics, and that's a man's world. No, in Egypt the women have their own little world, and they don't worry themselves about the rest."

"Not like here, is it?" I deliberately kept my manner noncommittal, but he flared up with a totally unexpected and unwarranted violence, as if I had taunted him.

"No, by Jove, it isn't like here, all these ugly sluts running around screaming about emancipation and the rights of women. Overeducated and badly spoilt, the lot of them. Should be given some honest work to do." His face was pale with fury, and his narrowed eyes fixed on me with suspicion. "I hope to God you're not one of them, Miss Small."

"I'm sorry, Colonel Edwards, one of whom?"

"The insufferable suffragettes, of course! Frustrated, ugly old biddies like the Pankhursts, with nothing better to do than put ideas into the heads of decent women, making them think they should be unhappy with their lot."

"Their lot being laundry and babies?" He did not know me well enough, but Holmes could have told him he was walking on paper-thin ice. I become very quiet and polite when I am angry.

"It's a Godly calling, Miss Small, is motherhood, a blessed state."

"And the calling of being a secretary, Colonel?" I couldn't help it; I was as furious as he was, though where he looked ready to go for my throat, I had no doubt that I appeared calm and cool. I readied myself for an explosion, at the very least for the drawer to be emptied over my head, but to my astonishment, his face relaxed and the colour flooded back in. He suddenly sat back and began to laugh.

"Ah, Mary, you've got spirit. I like that in a young woman. Yes, you're a secretary now, but not forever, my dear, not forever."

I understood then, in a blinding flash of rage at his complacent, self-satisfied condescension, the deep revulsion a smiling slave feels for the master. It took every last iota of my control to smile wryly, take up my pen with my trembling hands, and move across to my place at the typewriter. At the same time, singing through me alongside the rage and the remnants of a fear I could not justify, was the triumphant sureness that here, at last, as clearly as if he had dictated it, was a motive for the murder of one Dorothy Elizabeth Ruskin.

* * *

I excused myself from dinner with a headache and insisted that the following evening I had an unbreakable engagement with a cousin. Yes, perhaps Sunday, we should talk about it tomorrow. No, the headache was sure to be gone by morning, and I should be happy to come in tomorrow. No, it was a pleasant evening, the rain had let up, and no doubt the fresh air would help my head. No need for Alex to turn out. I bid good night to Colonel and Mr Edwards.

I walked the two miles to the boardinghouse through crowded streets, and though my toes hurt, my not entirely fictitious headache had cleared by the time I let myself in the front door. Twice during the walk, I felt the disturbing prickle of someone watching, but when I casually turned to browse in the windows, there were too many people on the streets to enable me to pick out one trailer. Nerves, no doubt, the same nerves that made me overreact to the colonel's temper tantrum.

After Isabella's hearty tea, which was geared more towards the labourer's appetite than that of an office worker, Billy and I went around the corner for a pint. The pub, considerably more working-class than the Pig and Whistle, was owned by a cousin-in-law of one of Billy's maternal aunts, and the bitter was brewed on the premises. I poured the dark yeasty liquid down my throat and with one long draught washed away the cloying tastes of sweet sherry, the Edwards household, and Mary Small. I put the glass down with a sigh, realising belatedly that I had broken character. Oh well, even Mary Small was allowed her quirks.

"So, Billy, what have you been doing with yourself?"

He answered me quietly, though in the noisy pub, it was hardly necessary.

"I'm taking up art, miss. Painting."

"Really?" I looked at his clean hands. "What medium?"

"Medium?"

"Yes, what do you paint with?"

"Tubes of stuff, oily paint. Makes an 'orrible stink, it does."

"What sorts of things are you painting?"

"Boards with cloth pulled over them, mostly."

"Canvases."

"That's right. Actually, we're neighbours during the day, as well, miss."

"Are we?"

"Yes, I have a studio place upstairs over the bookshop, down the street from where you're working."

"Ah. I see."

"Yes, so you see, if you ever needs something during the day, I'm quite often looking out the window."

"Of course. Do you have a patron?"

"A what?"

"Someone who supports you in your art?"

"Oh yes, I certainly does. Do. Another half?"

"Let me pay for this round. By the way, Billy, were you by any chance following me this evening, when you left your studio?"

"Not followin', exactly. It may have been I was walkin' the same way as you." He stopped, looking sheepish. "Didn't make a very good job of it, did I?"

"Oh, on the contrary, I didn't see you at all. I just felt someone watching me. Glad to know it was you. However, if you don't mind, I'd rather you didn't trail me about. It makes me jumpy."

"If you say so."

"Thanks. And Billy? Smear a bit of paint on your hands and clothes tomorrow, would you? Just for effect."

He looked down accusingly at his betraying hands, then shook his head. "And here I keep thinkin' I'm getting better at this kind of thing. Only good for fetchin' beer, I am."

"And following a person. A real artful dodger, you are."

He grinned at the compliment and pushed his way through the crowd to the bar, shouting jovially to every third person. A less likely artist it was hard to imagine, but with a palette and the smell of turpentine about him, he would pass a cursory examination. As for any paintings he might produce, well, almost anything passed as art these days. He seemed to be enjoying himself, at any rate.

Half an hour later, I put down my empty glass.

"I must be off, Billy, I'm expecting a telephone call."

"I'll go with you."

"Stay and have another, Billy. The night's young."

"No, I'll go."

He called good nights and shepherded me to my door.

That night's telephone call was again closely guarded. He was ringing from a noisy pub, and though I didn't exactly shout, I'm sure Isabella's top floor could hear my every word. We greeted each other, and he asked about my day.

"Much the same. The son was there today, a very sharp young man, too sharp for his own good. He'll cut himself one of these days. Wanted to talk about Greek, of all things."

"Greek? Why did he think you knew Greek?"

"That shorthand I learnt in Oxford."

"Interesting."

"Yes. And the colonel was a wee bit unhappy with me today. Seems he doesn't like uppity women. Truly doesn't like them, I mean."

"But you disabused him of the notion that you might be one of them?"

"That I did. He said he liked young women with spirit, but he seemed to think I should marry and have babies."

"Did he now?" Laughter bubbled underneath his nonchalance. "And what did you say?"

"Not a thing. I just went back to my typing."

"A ladylike response."

"What else could I do? And you, did you finish the wallpaper?"

"Started hanging it. Luckily, it's a dark room. She's a funny old bat, talks your ear off once she gets started."

"That's good. The work goes faster if you can carry on a good conversation. Is she nice?" "Nice" meant a probability of innocence.

"She seems nice, yes. Don't know about her sons yet."

"No. We'll talk about it tomorrow night, shall we?"

"I do hope so. Take care, and Mary? Watch out for those suffragettes."

"Ugly sluts, overeducated and badly spoilt. Need to be given some honest work."

Little spurts of laughter leaked out of the receiver, and the connexion went dead. A satisfactory conversation, all things considered. I had told him the colonel was violently misogynist, unless the gyn were in the kitchen or nursery (or, presumably, bedroom), and he let me know that Mrs Rogers appeared uninvolved, though the sons were an open question. On top of it all, I had given him something to laugh about, to soften the hard floor of Mrs Rogers's shed.

FIFTEEN

omicron

There was no indication on Saturday morning that before the day ended I would be presented with three major additions to the case, all of them in the space of an hour: a rape attempt, a collection of esoteric publications, and a citation for speeding.

The morning was long and tedious, involving a systematic renovation of the business files and an equally systematic avoidance of young Mr Edwards's attentions. Lunch was heavy and alcoholic, and a cold drizzle prevented me from a temporary escape into the grounds. I went back to the study after an hour of male badinage, suffered with gritted teeth, anxious to get through the day so that I could hear what Holmes had found in Cambridgeshire.

Fortunately, the wine at lunch seemed to have slowed down the roving hands, for although Gerald followed me into his father's study and watched my every move, he didn't actually reach for me. The colonel went to his room to rest, and his son talked to me while I sorted files. His monologue dragged on, covering all the high points of cricket matches and rowing, and I occasionally nodded my head and watched for anything of interest in the files.

He did it cleverly, I'll give him that. I stood up to retrieve some files on the other end of the desk, and when I turned back, he was there, his arms clamped around me and his mouth seeking mine.

I do not know why I reacted so violently. I was in no real danger— I could have laid him out in three simple moves, or broken his neck in four, for that matter. I reacted in part because I was so immersed in the rôle of Miss Small, and even in 1923, few women would fail to react strongly to such an affront. Mostly, however, it was my sheer frustration and rage at the entire situation that erupted. I could feel the urge for his neck in my hands for one brief instant before sanity clamped down, and I considered what to do while dodging his reechy kisses.

The real danger was not to me and any honour I might possess, but to my rôle. If I were to overwhelm him physically, my time in the Edwards home would come to a sudden end. Mary Small would probably just scream, but aside from the fact that it was difficult to do with his mouth in the way, it would only delay the problem, not solve it. And, there was my pride. I wanted to hurt the slimy creature, but even a quick knee jerk would be out of character. Any injury must be bad enough to stop him, light enough to keep me from losing my position, and must appear completely accidental. All this reflection took about three seconds of grappling, and then my body assumed command.

I stumbled backwards half a step to put him off balance, with a twist, so he was forced to take a single step (my boy, your breath is foul!), and then leant away— all of them natural movements. I then rose slightly, twisted my head away from him, made certain of my balance and his full preoccupation, and finally swung one heel around hard to knock his feet out from under him while simultaneously giving a sudden stumbling lurch with all my weight behind me, my hip aimed at the sharp corner of the immovable oak desk just behind him. The high and satisfying scream that tore through the room did not come from my throat, and I stepped back to let him sink stiffly to the floor. He was not breathing. He looked quite green. I began to fluster about him before his knees hit the carpet.

The door burst open and Colonel Edwards was there, hair awry and pulling on his coat. I turned as he came in.

"Oh, sir, I'm so sorry. I don't know—"

"What in God's name is going on? Was that you I heard, or— Gerry? What the devil's wrong with him?"

As dear Gerry was somewhat preoccupied with curling into a tight knot and wheezing into a semiconscious state, I took it upon myself to answer, albeit quite incoherently.

"Oh, Colonel, I don't know. I just— he was— I fell, you see, and I must have hit his stomach or maybe the desk hit his back, and oh, shouldn't we call a doctor? He looks like he's having a fit; maybe he's dying." A tortured gasp followed by a deep groan told us that he had finally regained his breath. The colonel knelt beside him, saw no signs of blood, and stood up with narrowed eyes. He looked hard at me, took in the disarray of my hair and blouse, including a popped button, and started to smile grimly.

"I told him he'd get into trouble one of these days if he didn't keep his hands to himself. Wouldn't have thought it'd be you who gave it to him, but you never know."

"Gave it— But sir, I didn't mean to do anything. I just caught my heel on the carpet and tripped. Shouldn't we ring for a doctor?"

"Doctor couldn't help any. He'll get over it. It's nothing most men don't have happen sometime or another. Ice and a whisky should take care of it."

"But what—" I stopped. A complete innocence of male anatomical characteristics was surely not to be expected. "You mean I— oh dear. The poor boy." I knelt down, and Gerald, who had reached the sickly smile stage, smiled sickly up at me. "I'm so very sorry. I'm always so clumsy, and you did so surprise me."

"Yes, I imagine he did. Come, Mary, you'll not get much more accomplished today. Why don't you have a glass of sherry and then take your work home with you to finish up."

"But ... we can't leave him here!"

"I'm certain he'd be much happier if we did, wouldn't you, Gerry?" A weak, uncontrolled flap of the hand signalled agreement and dismissal. "I'll send Alex in with ice and brandy. He'll help you up." We left the room, and the colonel began to chuckle. I stopped short and drew an audible breath.

"Colonel, do you mind if I use the small room for a few minutes? I'm rather ... I would like a sherry after that, though."

"Certainly, my dear. I'll be downstairs."

I let myself into the large marble bath that lay between the colonel's study and his bedroom. His steps retreated down the hallway, and I heard him shout for Alex. Next door, the groans had given way to profuse, bitter, and unimaginative cursing. I grinned maliciously, locked the door, and turned on the tap in the basin.

I had three minutes, perhaps more. I moved swiftly to the other door, the one that opened into the colonel's private room, and pushed it open on noiseless hinges.

I did not know what I was looking for, but I was not about to pass up the opportunity. I ran my eyes over the room, inviting them to choose a target.

It was a large room, totally and unremittingly male: dark wood, undersized bow window, a thick, garish Persian carpet on the polished floor, cabinets— glazed on the top half, panelled below— covering one wall. There were two paintings: one of a man, which looked like a self-portrait by one of Rembrandt's third-rate students, all heavy moodiness and no technique, and the other a huge, gilt-framed, enthusiastically done nude of a remarkably well-endowed young blond woman who was cowering coyly before a thick, glossy, and lubricious snake. Not perhaps my image of Mother Eve, but the leering expression on the face of the snake was cleverly done, given the lack of facial characteristics to work with.

The cabinets were unrevealing, containing a variety of trophies and awards, family heirlooms (one assumed) and statuettes, predominantly of females in various stages of undress. One minute passed. The telephone rang, and I heard the colonel's voice. I pulled open a few of the wooden doors, to find clothing, no apparent hidden compartments, and enough dust to make it obvious that the housekeeper cut a few corners. I walked around the bed to the well-worn armchair that sat next to the window. It was oddly positioned, I thought, almost as if— ah! It was within arm's reach of a locked cabinet. I dropped next to the door and yanked a pin out of my hair, bent the end of it, and set to work. Two minutes gone. I heard voices downstairs, but not on the stairs yet.

After an agonising thirty seconds, the lock gave and I pulled the doors open, to find books. Pornography. Damn! I flipped through them quickly, but they were only books, mostly illustrated. I locked the doors again and heard the colonel bidding the caller good-bye. I made to rise, then froze. There, in front of my eyes, was a double row of cheap, well-thumbed pamphlets and paperback booklets. The title that jumped out at me was Emancipation and the Enslavement of the Family. There must have been nearly a hundred of the things, ranging from the inch-thick Cover Their Heads to a four-page Suffragettes: The Devil's Hands. I pulled out Women's Suffrage: Against God's Plan, noted the name and address of the publisher, and slid it back into its place as voices came shockingly loud directly outside the room. I plunged around the bed and closed the bathroom door behind me an instant before the knock came on the hallway door. I turned off the tap and hurried to pat my hair into order and correct the disarray to my person.

"Are you all right, Mary?"

"Oh yes, sir, I'll be down in just a moment."

"I have the files you were working on; you needn't go back into the study. I'll have Alex take you home; it's raining very heavily now."

"Thank you, sir. I won't be a minute."

Rapid repairs completed, I took several calming breaths and went downstairs to the loathsome and inevitable sherry.

"There you are, my dear, drink that. Look, Mary, I'm terribly sorry about the misunderstanding upstairs. Gerry's a bit impetuous sometimes."

Misunderstanding? Easier to misunderstand the intent of a gun barrel.

"It's fine, Colonel, really. Is he going to be all right?"

"Certainly. A bit sore for a day or two, but perhaps you've succeeded in teaching him discretion where I failed."

"But I didn't mean—"

"No, I realise you didn't intentionally hurt him. No one could have done that deliberately. Nonetheless ... Look, Mary, I've just had a telephone call from a friend to invite me to a talk Monday afternoon. Would that be a good day for you to go to Oxford? I know it's not much warning, and if you would prefer to work on at the files before starting on another project, I'll understand."

And leave me alone with Lothario? No thank you.

"Monday's a good day. I'll take an early train. I'm quite looking forward to it."

"Good, good. I'm glad about that." He did look pleased, but something else, as well. Actually, I thought, he was acting oddly. Not remarkably so, just small things, such as the way he was fiddling with his glass, the way he looked at me, reserved, somehow, and appraising. Was it suspicion? No, I thought not. If anything, he seemed more confident and less attentive of me. Polite, but dismissive, as well. My speculations were interrupted by the arrival of Alex with my coat. The colonel held it for me, handed me the file of letters and manuscript, and said that he would see me Tuesday morning. No mention of dinner that night or Sunday. Interesting, very interesting. Just what was it that had changed the man's attitude towards me, and why?

Alex, uncommunicative as always, led the way to the garage. The roadster that Holmes had hypothesised was back now in its place, a very fast and slightly dented (along the sides) sleek, black Vauxhall. I exclaimed over it.

"Yes, miss, it belongs to young Mr Edwards."

"It is a beautiful thing. It looks fast, too."

"I believe he is in the habit of driving it in the high sixties, on the proper roads, of course." Cars were obviously Alex's weak point, as this one made him positively effusive.

"Cor, stone the crows, as my granfa' used to say," I said appreciatively. This pithy bit of vernacular struck home, and he actually broke down and smiled. I walked over to admire the gleaming enamel and the red leather upholstery more closely, and I thought that perhaps when this case was over, I, too— But then my acquisitive yearnings were stifled by the sight of a jumble of papers pushed into the front pocket, and my curiosity came to the fore. I circled the car under Alex's proud gaze, then, sighing like a love-struck adolescent, climbed reluctantly into the suddenly dowdy saloon car. I opened my bag as Alex went to his door, and I gave an exclamation of dismay.

"What is it, miss?"

"I don't seem to have my pen in here. I must have left it in the study. Would you mind awfully just waiting for a tick while I pop up and— oh dear. Mr Edwards will be there. Well, perhaps I'll just wait until Tuesday to retrieve it."

"Would you like me to fetch it, miss?"

"Oh, I couldn't ask you to do that."

"Not to worry. In the study, did you say?"

"Somewhere around the desk. It's where I was working when ... It's gold," I finished weakly, to his well-hidden, butlerian amusement.

"Won't be a minute, miss."

I waited until his footsteps faded, then pushed open the door and leant into the front of the roadster. The corner of one piece of paper looked tantalisingly familiar. Several months before, I had been returning to an urgent appointment in Oxford, trying to coax a modicum of speed out of my amiable Morris, and had collected a summons for my pains. Here in my hand was an identical slip of paper. I turned it over, looked at the date unbelievingly, and felt a foolish grin take hold of my face. Gerald Andrew Edwards had not been in Scotland on the night our cottage had been ransacked, not unless he had spent the next twelve hours driving very fast. The following morning, he had been nabbed for speeding near Tavistock, about as far from Scotland as England went. I took my gold fountain pen from my bag, made a note of the details, and then, clutching the pen in my hand, followed Alex towards the house.

He was, of course, annoyed at his wild-goose chase after a pen that had fallen into the folds of a notebook, and he drove me in silence to Isabella's boardinghouse.

I climbed the stairs to my cheerless room and closed the door gratefully behind me. I shrugged off my damp coat and was arranging it over a chair and considering the effort of asking for a measure of coal to make a fire, when I heard a gentle knock. Billy stood there, holding out to me a wad of what looked like used butcher's paper that had been rolled, flattened, and folded.

"Letter for you, from a gentleman."

"A letter? Not a telegram?" I was astonished— I had received exactly five letters from Holmes in the eight years I had known him. (Holmes' chief method of distance communication was through brief telegrams, preferably so cryptic as to be unintelligible. One such had contained a deliberate misspelling that was corrected along the way by some conscientious telegraphist, thus rendering the message totally meaningless.)

"Not for you. A couple for me to send for him— one to Inspector Lestrade about a Jason Rogers, another for Mr Mycroft Holmes, something about sending a brown suit to be cleaned."

Which could mean, I realised, some prearranged code— All is known, must fly— or could mean merely that the brown suit wanted cleaning. I took the wad of paper apprehensively. "I'm glad he finally surfaced, if briefly. You saw him, then?"

"I did, for two minutes as he changed trains. He told me to say he was sorry he couldn't come tonight but that he'd see you tomorrow night."

"I'll believe that when I see him. How did he look?"

Billy hesitated, his worn face searching for words. He had begun life on the hardest of London streets, employed and fostered by Holmes, and though he was quick, he was not an educated man. He finally settled for: "Not himself, if you know what I mean. Of course, he was wearin' them old things and hadn't shaved, but he looked tired, too, and stiff. Not all an act."

"Hardly surprising. I hope he gets a proper bed tonight. Thank you for this." I held up the flattened scroll.

"He said you might want me to take it to someone else later. If you do, I'll be home." He jerked his thumb to indicate the room across the hall. I thanked him again and closed the door, put hat and gloves and shoes in their places, and poured myself a small brandy, which I took with the letter to the chair next to the window. I raised my eyebrows at his first paragraph.

My dear Russell,

I write this hurriedly on, as you will no doubt have noted, a train car whose underpinnings have seen better days. The information it contains may be of use to you, but the presentation of that information is of value to me: I find myself in the singularly vexing position of possessing a series of facts which, as you know, I habitually review aloud and put into order, even if my audience is no more responsive than Watson often was. However, you are off on your own track, Watson is in America somewhere, and I haven't time to wait about for Mycroft or Lestrade. Hence the letter. I should prefer to have the patterns reflected either by your perception or Watson's lack thereof; however, a stub of lead pencil and this unsavoury length of butcher's paper will have to suffice. (From the expressions on the faces of my compartment mates, none of them has ever before witnessed the miraculous generation of the written word. I shall attempt not to be distracted.)

First to the information: I successfully ingratiated myself into the employ of Mrs Rogers by the approach we had agreed upon— that is, I am an unemployed sailor who knew her husband, and I am as offensive as possible without quite coming to blows. She positively melts in my unshaven presence.

I was up on a ladder in Mrs Rogers's guest room, cursing the general intractability of inexpensive wallpaper, when I heard a car drive in, and shortly thereafter, without a knock, came the sound of heavy feet in the kitchen below. Murmured conversation followed, and I cursed further the unsuitability of my position for overhearing what was happening downstairs. In a few minutes, however, the feet came up the stairs and a head of thick black hair appeared in the door, then stared curiously at me and my work.

The owner of the hair, as you can imagine, interested me greatly. I gave him an abrupt greeting, typical of my character, and narrowly avoided dropping a length of paste-sodden paper on him. He commented on the quality of my work. I told him that she was getting what she paid for, that I never claimed to be a paperhanger.

"What are you, then?" he asked.

"Jack of all trades, master of none," I replied.

He reacted to this bit of originality with a sneer.

"I'd believe that you've mastered none, by the looks of these walls. What are you good at?"

"Ships. Machinery. Automobiles." This last was after I had seen the grease stains under his nails and the condition of his shoes and trousers.

"Hah. Probably can't even so much as change a tyre."

"I've changed a few," I said mildly, and deposited a globule of paste on his shoe.

"Well, you can do another if you like. There's a slow puncture in the car in the drive outside, and I'm in a hurry. You go take it off and see if you can find the hole."

I obediently laid down my brush and knife and took up the wrenches from the car's toolbox. It was not his automobile, of that I was certain. Too staid, too expensive, too well kept up. I would have given much to hear what was said during the next fifteen minutes, but short of climbing the wall— in broad daylight, without ivy or a convenient rope— and putting my ear to a window, I could not. I found the hole, patched it, and was putting the wheel back in place when he came out again.

"Here, don't tell me you've just started?"

"Oh no, it's all ready to go. Sir, if you'll hand me that pump, I'll finish it."

As the tyre filled with air, I admired "his" automobile.

"Is it yours, then?" I asked casually.

"Nah, it's borrowed."

"I thought it might be. I'd see you in something a touch flashier, somehow, and faster."

"Oh, this one's pretty fast."

"Don't look it," I announced sceptically, so he proceeded to tell me precisely how long it took him to drive from Bath, despite the hay wagons. I whistled appreciatively.

"You must've had to push it hard on the straight patches. A good friend, to let you treat his machine like that."

"Ah, he'll never know. Some of these old [censored] own these [censored] great hogs and never use them properly. Does a machine good to be stretched a bit."

"You ought to charge him extra for it," I jested, and he took the bait.

"Too right, add it to his bill."

Much laughter and joviality followed and an exchange of opinions regarding pistons, body frames, and the like. (Many blessings, incidentally, were called upon Old Will's grandson for his tutorials in automotive arcana.) He climbed into the luxurious transport that was not his own, and I stuck my head over the passenger side.

"Enjoy your drive back, Mr—"

"Rogers, Jason Rogers."

"Enjoy the road, Mr Rogers. I hear tell there's a very watchful constabulary round Swindon side, so if you're going through there, you better keep a light foot on it."

"Thanks for the warning, Basil. Give me a start, my man."

I obliged, and he slapped the car cruelly into gear and roared off down the way.

So, as you can see, Russell, I am off to Bath, on a somewhat slower but considerably safer means of transport, to look into the possibility of a motorcar-repair establishment run by a Mr Jason Rogers, grandson of Mrs Erica Rogers, a right-handed, black-haired man of about five feet ten inches, thirteen stone, with rounded shoes, who looks the sort to own a brown tweed suit and a workmanlike folding knife. I hope to have some interesting contributions to add to the discussion tomorrow evening.

Now as to the pattern into which this information may fit: As I mentioned, Mrs Rogers is a talkative woman, easily steered into one topic and another, with certain very definite exceptions, when a thick window shade is pulled down behind her eyes and she discovers that it is time to make a pot of tea or check on her aged mother. She is not wildly intelligent, but she is very, very canny, and her suspicions bristle whenever the topics of money (particularly inheritance), grandsons, the education of women, childbearing outside of matrimony, and dogs come up. Which of these areas might concern us, and which are merely extraneous remnants of personal history, is as yet difficult to discern, although some of the subjects are highly suggestive.

Certain oblique statements, gestures, and expressions have caught my interest, buried as they were in the flow of gossip, childhood reminiscences, and explanations of the proper technique by which a job is to be done. I shall not burden you at this point with the details of those conversations, which would exhaust my supplies of paper, lead, and time; however, the following points should be noted:

First and foremost, Mrs Rogers is possessed of a deep mistrust of close family relationships. Her asides about ungrateful siblings and faithless children do not, however, appear to extend to mothers or male grandchildren. Hence my rapid departure by rail.

Second, you noted that she seemed fond of that drivel perpetrated by Watson on the unsuspecting public, yet when I walked into the house, there was not a single thing more demanding of thought than an old copy of Mrs Beeton's cookery book. A spot of gossip with the neighbour's lad (never underestimate the observational powers of an intelligent child, Russell!) revealed that a load of things were carted off a few days ago, including several tea chests filled with books. Which goes to explain ten linear feet of sparsely occupied and recently scrubbed shelves upstairs. Canny, very canny.

Third, you were quite correct about the recent departure of household help. This was in the person of a rather dim child of seventeen years who was perfunctorily dismissed on the day Miss Ruskin left Cambridgeshire, sent home to her family with two weeks' pay and no explanation.

As Pascal says, I have made this letter long because I lacked the time to make it short, but time and paper both are drawing to a rapid close, and I shall have to sprint across town to make the Bath connexion. You might have Billy take this to Mycroft and Lestrade, if he's available.

Take care, wife.

Holmes

Postscript— I had thought to keep the following with me, but perhaps that is not a good idea. If it were found in my possession by the gentlemen I intend to visit, it could be difficult to explain. I do not need to warn you to guard it closely. I found it in a desk drawer in Mrs Rogers's room, inside an envelope which, as can be discerned from the letter itself, was stabbed and gouged repeatedly with an ink pen, leaving pieces of the nib embedded in the paper. The letter was in a prominent spot in the drawer, but it had been returned to its envelope before it was attacked and not removed from the envelope since then. I left the empty envelope behind, lest Mrs Rogers notice its absence. I am quite aware this is not an entirely appropriate means of obtaining police evidence, but really, I could not leave it there. If I have not returned by tomorrow evening, take it with you to Mycroft's and give it to Lestrade.

H.

The letter, in the distinctive strong hand of Dorothy Ruskin, read as follows:

22 November 1920 Jerusalem

Dear Erica,

I hope this letter finds you and Mother well and your son's wife recovering after her fall. My return voyage was as uneventful as possible in this day, and I have returned safely, which is all one can ask for.

Erica, I have given much thought to what I am about to say, and I pray that it will be read in as charitable a mood as it was written. I cannot leave that topic we touched on during my last week with you. I told you that I was worried about your health, but I may not have expressed myself clearly. Erica, there is no longer any reason to feel that mental imbalances are any less deserving of straightforward medical treatment than are physical weaknesses. Even more, perhaps, for the former can easily lead to the latter. Please believe me when I say that I wish the very best for you. You are my sister, my only family, and (to speak honestly) I do not believe that you are yourself.

I know that you feel quite normal, but I could see clearly that you are not. Mental illness is a beast who wanders about inside one, seeking which part he may devour, and that beast is loose inside you now. Please, dear sister, do not let him remain uncaged. I am willing— indeed, I should be happy— to pay for the cost of psychoanalytic treatment and for the cost of care for Mama if necessary during that time.

I will ask a friend to be in touch with you with some names of good doctors. I hope you will at least go to see one, for my sake, if only to obtain a clean bill of health and prove me wrong.

Speaking of health, we are in the midst of an outbreak of dysentery here, as it seems that in my absence no one bothered to educate the new cook on basic sanitation issues. I am writing this in Jerusalem, where I have come to buy the necessary medications.

Please know that I write this letter out of affection and concern for you and that I remain, as always,

Your loving sister,

Dorothy

SIXTEEN

pi

I did not go down to supper that night, though Billy later brought me up a piece of apple tart and some cheese and coffee. I stood at the window and watched the London night fall. The rain stopped abruptly just before dusk, and I thought of Patrick on the farm, praying for some dry days to finish the late harvest.

For a few hours this afternoon, I was so sure of myself, I thought. Where there were clear motive and opportunity, could firm evidence be far behind? And now Holmes tells me the trail lies elsewhere. My efforts since Tuesday have been in vain. Thank God I don't have to go there tomorrow— I don't know how long I can keep it up, knowing there is a good chance that it is futile. But, why the sister and the sister's grandson? The murder was calculated, not merely an act of insane rage. Money, then, that most ubiquitous of motives?

I stood unseeing and rubbed at the dull ache in my right shoulder, my mind an undisciplined welter of unconnected images and phrases. A thin memory wafted up, evoked no doubt by the reference to wall climbing in the letter I had just received. A memory of salt air, and a strong, young body, and the wonder of life opening up. A memory of a girl, not yet a young woman, sitting at the edge of a cliff, tossing pebbles at the rocky beach far below. Her blond hair is tugged out of the long plaits by the wind, and wisps blow into her mouth and across her steel-rimmed glasses. The lean grey-haired man next to her sits quietly, one knee up under his chin, the other dangling carelessly into space.

"Holmes?"

"Yes, Russell."

"What do you think makes a person kill?"

"Self-defence."

"No, I mean murder, not just defending oneself."

"I know what you meant. My answer is, self-defence, always."

The young face squints out across the Channel haze.

"You are saying that all murders are committed because the killer feels that he is being threatened by the other person."

"I should qualify that, I suppose, to admit the occasional unhuman who kills for pleasure or payment, but for the rest, yes. The injunction against the taking of human life is so strong, the only way most people can break it is to convince themselves that their life, their welfare, or the life of their family is menaced by their enemy and that, therefore, the enemy must be removed."

"But, revenge? And money?"

"Subdivisions of self-defence. Revenge returns the killer to a position of self-respect and reestablishes his sense of worth and power in his own eyes. The cousin of revenge is jealousy, anticipating the need for revenge. The other subdivisions are all forms of power— money being the most obvious and the most common." And, his voice added, the least interesting.

"What about the fear of being caught?"

"It acts as a balance to the urge for self-defence. Most people know at least one person whom they could be tempted to do away with, were it not too unpleasantly messy, but for the fear of being caught and having freedom, honour, and perhaps even life itself taken away by the judicial system. Be honest, Russell. If you found yourself in a position where you could rid yourself of another person, and you were absolutely certain that no one would ever even suspect you, would you not be sorely tempted?"

"Oh yes," I said with feeling.

Holmes laughed dryly. "I am glad your aunt could not see your face just then, Russell. I promise you that I won't mention this conversation to the local constable if her body is found one of these days." Holmes, who had never been formally introduced to my aunt, was no fonder of her manipulative ways than I, her orphaned ward.

"I'll remember that. But, Holmes, if all murderers— most murderers— are only acting in self-defence, then how can you condemn them? Any animal has the right to defend itself, doesn't it?"

His response was as unexpected as it was electrifying. My friend, my mentor, turned on me, with a look of such absolute disgust and loathing that I could not breathe, and had I not been frozen to the spot, my body would probably have fallen forward off the cliff just to be free of that awful gaze. His voice was tight with scorn, and it shattered my fragile adolescent attempts at self-assurance.

"For God's sake, Russell, human beings are not animals. For thousands of years, we've fought our way up from being animals, and the veneer is a fragile one at best. Some people forget this, but don't you, Russell, you of all people. Never forget it."

He stood up swiftly and stalked away, and I began to breathe again. After a while, I took myself home, shaken, confused, angry, and feeling about four inches tall.

That night after dinner, I went upstairs early to avoid my aunt's eyes and to think. My room was small, had no view to speak of, and was located on the cold north side of the house, but it had one invaluable feature: The stones of the main chimney stepped up along the outside wall just under my window, so that with the aid of a fine, nearly invisible rope, I could leave the house unseen. I used the escape route rarely, but knowing it was available transformed the room from a prison into a safe haven. I had even mounted a bolt on the door, which I threw now, and I stood with my forehead against the cool painted wood as the confusion and the emptiness welled up in me. Holmes was my only friend, all the family I possessed, and the thought of his disapproval devastated me.

A slight noise came from behind me. I whirled around, my heart in my throat, to see the man himself in the armchair next to the window, leaning forward to replace a book on the bookshelf, his unlit pipe between his teeth. I stared at him. He took the pipe out of his mouth, smiled at me, and spoke in a low voice.

"Good evening, Russell. If you do not wish to have uninvited visitors, you ought to pull the cord up after you."

I found my voice.

"Most people use the front door, for some reason."

"How odd. Would you prefer I went around ..."

"It would seem somewhat anticlimactic. What are you doing here? I'm afraid I can't offer you any refreshment, if you are here because Mrs Hudson has decided to go out on strike."

"What a terrifying thought. No, I am not in need of refreshment. I came to apologise, Russell. My words this afternoon were unnecessarily harsh, and I did not wish you to be disturbed by them."

I turned to tidy an already-neat stack of papers on my desk.

"It is not necessary to apologise," I said. "It was a stupid thing to say, and I deserved your response. I am relieved that you aren't angry with me," I added.

"My dear child, it was not stupid. The question of human responsibility is one that every adolescent must ask, or grow up never knowing the answer. The problem is that I forgot you are only sixteen. I often do, you know. It was a valid question, and I treated it as if it were a moral flaw. Please forgive me, and I beg you, do not let it stop you from asking questions in the future. You say what you like, and I shall attempt to avoid acting like an old lion with a toothache. Agreed?"

Embarrassed and relieved, I grinned and stuck out my hand. He stood up and took it.

"Agreed."

"I'll be off, then, before Mrs Hudson sends out the hounds for me. There may be something in your macabre joke after all— this will be the third time in a week I have made her serve me a cold supper. Ah well. Until tomorrow, Russell."

He reached down and pulled up the noiseless window, then threaded his long body out into the darkness.

"Holmes," I called. His head reappeared.

"Yes, Russell."

"Don't come here again," I said, then realised how it must sound. "I mean, while my aunt lives here, I can't— I don't—" I stopped, confused.

He studied me for a moment, and then his hard face was transformed by a smile of such unexpected gentleness that I clamped my jaws hard to block the prickle in my eyes.

"I understand," was all he said, and was gone.

But I never forgot his words on the cliff.

* * *

What had Miss Ruskin possessed that could turn two, perhaps three, human beings into killers? What of hers, what piece of paper or small, flat item could have driven someone to the extremity of running her down with an automobile? If I knew what it was, I would know who. If I knew who, I could deduce what it was. I knew neither.

So I went to bed.

PART FOUR

Sunday, 2 September 1923

[In Nature there are] no arts, no letters, no society, and worst of all continual fear and danger of violent death.

— Thomas Hobbes

SEVENTEEN

rho

Sunday morning began with the richly evocative sound of changes being rung on the bells and the sun streaming through a gap in the curtains, and deteriorated rapidly. For ten whole minutes, I lay happily contemplating the floating dust motes and deciding how best to use a beautiful, warm, free, late-summer Sunday in London. I luxuriously considered the riches available to me. Were I in Oxford there would be no doubt but that I should take to the river with boat, book, and sandwich, but where in London might I find a combination of strenuous work and pointlessness? Perhaps I could take a boat downriver to—

My blissful self-indulgence was broken by a sharp rap on the door, followed by Isabella's equally sharp voice.

"Miss Small? Gennleman downstairs to see you."

"A gentleman? But—" No, surely not Holmes. Who, then? Lestrade? Could something have happened to— Oh God. "Did he give his name?"

"A Colonel something, miss. Come to take you to church."

"To church!" I was absolutely flabbergasted.

"Yes, miss, it bein' Sunday and you new to the area and all, he says. What do you want me to tell him?"

"Tell him—" Dear God, of all the things I did not want to spend the morning doing, sitting in a stuffy building and singing muscular Christian hymns was fairly high up on the list. "Tell him I'll be down in ten minutes, would you please? No, better make it fifteen."

Make no mistake— I have nothing against Christian worship. Although I am a Jew, I am hardly a fanatically observant one, and at university I regularly attended church for the sheer beauty of the liturgy and the aesthetic pleasure of a lovely building being used for its intended purpose. However, I had a fairly good idea of where and how the colonel worshipped his God, and it was bound to be worlds removed from evensong at Christ Church. Nonetheless, a job was a job. And, I could always develop a headache or the vapours and return here.

The flowery cotton frock, white gloves, and wide-brimmed straw hat I appeared in seemed to meet with Colonel Edwards's approval, and he rose from his chair in what Isabella called her parlour and greeted me with an oddly formal half bow. He positively sparkled with his Sunday-morning polish, looking jovial and avuncular and nothing at all like the man whose pale rage had actually frightened me two days before.

"It occurred to me this morning, Mary, that I was being remiss in my duty as a neighbour to abandon you to your own resources on Sunday morning. If you've already made your plans, I should be most happy to take you to your own church, but if not ..." His voice trailed off in a question. I did not allow my baser self to take the offered escape.

"I should be delighted to join you, Colonel. I had no plans."

"Good, very good. Come then. We'll be late."

It was precisely as I had envisioned it, a nominally Anglican service conducted in an ugly Victorian monstrosity with no open windows, packed with overdressed enthusiasts, and complete with a sweating, roaring sermon based on an unspecified text but touching on topics ranging from employment problems to women's suffrage to the duties of an imperial power. The sermon was one of the longest I have ever had the misfortune to be subjected to, and as the man could not even manage to cite his biblical references properly, I did not feel it incumbent upon me to listen properly. I let myself sink into a light hypnotic trance, fixed an attentive look on my face, and reviewed irregular verbs. I worked my way through Greek, Hebrew, Latin, German, French, and Italian, and had begun on Spanish when the sermon thundered to its foregone conclusion. We paid our silver, sang a few more thumping hymns, and were given a blessed release.

But not to freedom. The ordeal moved to the next stage, which consisted of the stewed tea and watery coffee prepared by the Mother's Union to accompany their pink- and green-iced biscuits. Everyone knew the colonel, everyone came over to talk with him, and everyone glanced sideways at me before being introduced. I was certain that at any minute some acquaintance would recognise me and all would be lost, but I was spared that. I suppose the circle Holmes and I moved in, if it can be described by that term, had little overlap with that particular church population.

I was positively quivering by the time the colonel bade his farewells to the few remaining parishioners in the church hall, though whether my reaction was one of suppressed hysterical laughter or the urge to commit mass ecclesiasticide, I am still unsure. The colonel, however, was rarely unsure of anything, and he interpreted my withdrawn expression and trembling hands in a way that suited him.

"My dear Mary, how thoughtless of me to make you stand about sipping tea and chattering; you're obviously ready to break your fast. Come, I've made reservations at Simpson's. Now, where is Alex?"

Simpson's! Where even the busboy knew me as Mrs Holmes? That would never do.

"Colonel, I'd really rather not go to a restaurant just now. Do you mind?"

"Oh, well, certainly, my dear." My contradiction took him aback. "What would you like to do?"

"I had thought this morning of going to Kew. I know that half of London will be there, but I should greatly enjoy a walk." And hope that anyone who might normally know me would be put off by my change in dress, manner, and posture. I could always hide behind my hat.

The colonel puzzled at my rebellion for a moment, and then his face cleared with inspiration.

"I have just the thing, my dear girl. Just the thing. Here's the car. Only a bit of a drive is all. Alex, we want Westbury's."

"Very good, sir. We shall need some petrol before the day is through."

"They'll have it there for us."

"Colonel," I inserted, "I must be back by six o'clock. I told a cousin of my mother's that I'd take dinner with him."

"Six, you say? Oh, that's too bad. They do a very pleasant dinner at Westbury's. Perhaps they'll give us a good tea, though. Make yourself comfortable, Mary. We'll be about three-quarters of an hour."

"What, or who, is Westbury's?" I asked.

"Who, definitely. Though I suppose 'what' would not be too far off the mark. Westbury is a friend of mine, with the most magnificent house set into grounds by Capability Brown himself. Westbury has a large number of friends, and he and his wife love to entertain and do it very well, too. Unfortunately, Westbury is embarrassingly short of the old folding stuff— the dratted new tax laws, don't you know? So rather than confine themselves to the occasional small party, they hold one every weekend, Friday night to Monday morning."

He nodded to himself as if to admire a clever solution. I had obviously missed a key word somewhere.

"I'm sorry, Colonel, I fail to see how this avoids the expense."

"Oh, well, you see, the servants present each guest with a bill for services, be it afternoon tea or the full weekend with Saturday-night dance."

"Ah, I see. Westbury's is a weekend resort hotel."

"Oh, no!" The colonel was shocked. "The Westburys have guests, all friends. The servants handle the financial side of it, and it's all quite fair, a reasonable bill— they have a superb kitchen, a cook who is totally loyal since Westbury saved his life in the trenches— plus ten percent, of course. I occasionally do wonder if Westbury isn't given some part of it, by some means or another, but they aren't in business, oh my, no. It's just that their friends want to help out, and it's really such a pleasant place, it would be such a pity to open it up to the Americans and have charabancs full of day-trippers pocketing the silver and treading down the flowers, and one doesn't mind doing one's bit to cover costs, don't you know? They're such very nice people. Unfortunate about the money, though. Hmm."

I opened my mouth, shut it, and sat back in the leather and laughed until the tears came into my eyes, in a manner of total abandonment most unsuited to Mary Small. I laughed at the startled eyes of Alex in the mirror and at the Westburys' friends and the tax laws and the total madness of it, and the colonel eyed me uncertainly and then began to chuckle politely, as well. I very nearly told him then who I was, to put an end to the farce, but something stopped the words on my tongue, and I changed what I was going to say.

"Colonel, I— the whole thing sounds most delightful. Considerably better than Kew. I only might wish I had worn more practical shoes, so that I might take advantage of the grounds."

That distracted him, and we both peered down at my fashionable and therefore impractical heels, topped by the sleek sheen of my silk stockings. He cleared his throat and glanced out the window.

"Perhaps Mrs Westbury could help you. I say, do you ride?"

"I do, but not in these clothes."

"Oh, that would not be a problem. Westbury's is always prepared for that kind of thing. Course, the riding's nothing like before the war, but the few nags they manage to scrape together are usually sound. Wrong time of year for a hunt, sorry to say."

"That's just as well. My sympathy would be entirely with the fox."

He chuckled patronisingly, as if he had expected my reaction, then changed the subject. Actually, I am not against the killing of foxes, being a farmer myself and having lost numerous poultry to them over the years. What I dislike is the unnecessary glorification of bloodthirstiness. We no longer execute our criminals with the prolonged agony of stoning or torture, and I cannot see why we should grant a wild creature any less dignity. When we have a fox, Patrick and I take turns sitting up with a gun until it shows up, and we kill it cleanly. We do not run it to ground in terror and turn the dogs loose to tear it to pieces. Such a process demeans both hunted and hunter. But I digress.

It was indeed a magnificent house, and circling past the playing fountain to the portico, I could well imagine that it would be an appallingly expensive establishment to maintain. Two acres of roof? Three? I said a short prayer of thanksgiving that my own inheritance was too nouveau to have been bogged down in stone, glass, marble, and lead. Oak, plaster, and tile were more to my taste. Besides, a house like this means a plethora of servants, and I prefer freedom.

We were greeted by music and a gentleman who could have been a butler of long service or an hotel manager, a figure both subservient and authoritative.

"Good day, Colonel Edwards, it's good to see you again. I'm sorry I was not informed that you were coming, or I should have arranged something for you." There was just the slightest hint of reproach in his voice.

"No, Southern, I didn't know myself until we got into the car an hour ago. We're not here for dinner, just the afternoon, if there are a couple of spare mounts. However, I think Miss Small here would appreciate a crust of bread first and a change of clothing. Do you think the missus could help us?"

"Certainly, sir. I'll take her in now, if you like, and then bring her around to the terrace buffet."

"That's grand. You go with Southern, Mary; his good wife will fix you up with something to ride in."

The riding jacket I ended up wearing had been designed for a woman with less in the way of shoulders and height and considerably more in the way of breast and hip, but the breeches were long enough and the boots fit. Mrs Southern assured me that I need not dress for the terrace luncheon, and when I saw the gathering, I understood why. The guests wore everything from dazzling white linen and twenty-guinea sandals to egg-encrusted waistcoats and boots that Patrick would have scorned for mucking out the cow barn. I stood in the dark shadow of a portico and enjoyed the multicoloured crowd of perhaps sixty people, equally matched between men and women, eating and drinking and talking in the glorious sunshine all along the magnificent flower-blazoned terrace. Halfway down the terrace, stones cast out a triangular shelf into the formal flower beds, and on this platform a string quartet was playing gamely.

The colonel was standing with a group of three other men, a stemmed glass small in one hand and a delicate sandwich in the other. I made to step out into the light, then stopped dead as my eyes lit on the group coming up the terrace behind him. Damnation, just what I had feared all morning, someone who knew me well enough to see through the façade: the sister and cousin of a housemate from my undergraduate days, with whom I had gone to a rather poor ballet and spent a dreary weekend in Surrey. They moved up to the colonel's party and rooted themselves there.

The quartet swirled to an end, which reminded people of its presence, so that everyone turned and applauded politely. The cellist wiped her brow prettily and went to greet the colonel. Mrs Westbury, I decided, and pressed back into the building as the colonel looked vaguely towards the house. I should just have to wait until he came to find me and then insist I was not hungry, though I did not care much for the idea of a long ride on nothing more filling than two pink biscuits. There was no choice, however; I couldn't go out there now. I ducked back into the house, wondering hopefully if I might come across an untended pantry.

My path took me by the drawing room, which I had glimpsed on my previous journey down the hallway, and as I passed, there came a sweet, sharp burst of notes from a clavier. The scales tripped up and down the keyboard for a minute or two before settling competently down into a Scarlatti sonata I'd heard before. I edged my head around the door and saw an unmistakably familiar elegant back, all alone in a vast, ornate hall of mirrors and gilt, seated before a double-keyboard instrument whose rococo intricacy set off the performer's exquisitely simple grey suit and sleek towhead with startling perfection. I sank into a knobbly chair that might have come from the same workshop as the clavier, watching him with the pleasure that comes from witnessing one of nature's rare creatures in its own habitat.

The sonata came to what I remembered as its end, but before I could make up my mind either to slip out silently or to shuffle my chair noisily, the trailing notes gathered themselves again and launched into an extraordinary piece of music that sounded like a three-way hybrid of Schubert's "March Militaire" performed as a Goldberg Variation by Bach with Scott Joplin occasionally elbowing in. Nearly two minutes went by before I could sort out the central theme: He was improvising a musical jest on "Yes, We Have No Bananas." I snorted in laughter.

The clever hands jerked in discord, and he whirled around and off the bench to face me, but before I could feel remorse, the tense control in his shoulders and the taut line of his jaw had relaxed into pleased recognition.

"Good Lord, it's Mrs Sherlock!" The foolish, slightly lopsided face with the too-bland eyes registered amazement at seeing me in this setting.

"No, it is not," I corrected him severely. "It's Miss Mary Small, whom you've never set eyes on in your life."

His grey eyes flared with interest and amusement even as his face and posture lapsed instantaneously into the silly-ass act he did so well. "Miss Small, of course, so pleased to make your 'quaintance. Reminded me for a tick of someone I know— don't know her well, of course, only met her— a party somewhere, I s'pose. Come to think of it, you don't look the least like her. Maybe something around the eyes? No, must be the shape of the spectacles, and as I remember, she had brown hair. A short little thing, too. Nothing like you. Mary Small, you say? How d'you do, Miss Small?"

His high voice burbled to a close, and he held out a deprecating hand, which I took with pleasure and a laugh. "How are you, Peter? You're looking well." Despite his violent reaction to being startled, he did appear less strained and not so thin as when I had last seen him, some months before. He had had a bad war indeed, and he was only now beginning to crawl out of the trenches.

"Not so bad," he said, and then, probing politely, asked, "Is there anything I might do to assist, Miss Small?"

"Thank you, Peter, but ..." I paused, struck by a thought. "I might, actually, ask a small favour."

"But of course— gallant is one of my overabundant middle names. What dragon does milady wish slain, what chasm spanned? A star pluck't from the heavens, a cherry that hath no stone? Some shag for your pipe, perhaps?"

"Nothing so simple as dragons or bridges, I fear. I need two young ladies removed so that I might get at the groaning board, where they stand waiting to recognise me for whom I am not and address me loudly by a name I had rather not have heard."

"You wish me to murder two women so you can eat lunch?" he asked with one politely raised eyebrow. "It seems just a bit excessive when there are servants willin' and able to bring you a tray, but I dare say, any friend of Sherlock Holmes—"

"No, you idiot," I said over the giggles he always managed to draw from me. "Just remove them for twenty minutes. Take them to view the peacocks, or see the etchings, or bring them in to hear you play something horrid and dissonant on this machine."

"Please, don't insult the poor thing. It can't help how it looks, and its inner parts deserve better than the twentieth century." He patted the encrusted inlay of the top reassuringly.

"Play them Bach or Satie, I don't care, just so I have time to eat and escape into the grounds. In those dresses, they can't plan to venture far from the house."

"Deep waters, Holmes, and no small danger, from the peacocks if nothin' else. But your faithful Watson is ready as always to plunge into the fray, all enthusiasm and no wits. Who are these two delectable creatures awaitin' my seductive wiles, and if I may be so bold, on whose ears is not to fall the name of Holmes?" He held the door for me, and we entered the dark corridor.

"The ladies are silly but sweet, and you won't have to think of topics of conversation. The ears belong to a Colonel Dennis Edwards, who currently employs Miss Mary Small as his secretary."

"Edwards, you say? You do move with strange fish, my dear. I will demand payment for this onerous deed, you know. Which are my victims?" he added, peering alertly through the open door. I pointed them out to him, and he sighed. "Yes, we have met. A policeman's lot is not an 'appy one. Adieu, my lady, and if I do not survive this day, tell my mother that I loved her."

He screwed his monocle into place with a gesture of buckling on armour, then glided smoothly out into the crowd. I watched with amusement as he greeted his hostess, kissed the fingers of a matched brace of dowagers, shook various hands, greeted the colonel and said something that made him laugh, scooped up three glasses of champagne from a passing tray, and finally, with the ease of a champion sheepdog, cut out his two victims from the flock. Within four minutes from leaving my side, he was strolling down the terrace stones, one fluttering female on each arm, and I stepped out to take a plate. Rule, Britannia, with an aristocracy like that.

I applied myself industriously to a plate of assorted foodstuffs, drank thirstily several glasses of the excellent champagne, nodded politely to the bits of conversation that came my way, and watched warily for other familiar faces. The colonel seemed taken aback by my brusque manners, so after slapping my empty plate down onto a nearby tray, I made an effort to smile ingratiatingly at him before urging him to lead me to the stables.

Inside that dim and fragrant environment, I managed to avoid both the sidesaddle and the placid mare the colonel would have chosen for me, settling instead on a rangy gelding with a gleam of equine intelligence in his eye and airily brushing off the colonel's worried fussing that it was too much horse for me. Mary Small was slipping away fast, and I was fortunate that the horse had already been out that morning and was therefore less interested in bolting or scraping me off under a branch, situations that our Miss Small might have found trying.

Once away from the house, I began to breathe more easily, and I settled down to the business of enjoying myself. During the shakedown canter through the shady lane, the horse and I had a discussion about our partnership's chain of command, and when that had been settled to my satisfaction, I gave him some rein and aimed him at a fence. Despite his looks, his legs had springs like a Daimler, and when he recognised that he had a rider who appreciated his skills, he settled his ears with a nod of prim satisfaction and happily set about proving his worth.

A couple of miles later, I belatedly became aware of my escort and employer on my heels, and half-turning, I shot him a grin of pure enjoyment. He came alongside with a grin of his own, and we rode under the hot Kentish sky in something very like companionship. He was different mounted on the horse in his borrowed coat, more sure of himself, yet paradoxically less assertive. I thought he would be the same when engaged in any physical activity, hunting or rugby, closer to his essential nature than when in his too-large house in the city. He sat the horse well and took the hedges and walls smoothly, and he politely allowed me to win the race to the far edge of Capability Brown's compulsory lake. We dismounted and I unpinned my hat, unbuttoned my gloves, and rinsed out a handkerchief in the rather muddy water to cool my face. I spread my borrowed jacket out on the grass and lay back on it to let the sun work at increasing my freckles, listening to far-distant voices and birdcalls and the occasional slight jingles of the grazing horses.

"You ride well, Mary. Where did you learn?"

"I am a farmer." I came to myself with a start. "That is, I grew up on a farm in Oxfordshire."

"What does your family grow?"

"A bit of everything, really. Hay, market vegetables, a few horses, cows."

"That's where the calluses on your hands come from?"

I held them up against the sky and studied them.

"Not a city girl's hands, are they? Too many cows to milk." The musculature was much too generalised for that, but I doubted that he would notice my lack of the milkmaid's characteristic bulging carpal muscle. I flexed my fingers, then dropped my arms down at my sides and closed my eyes.

Moments of pure relaxation were rare for me. There was always the nagging of books unread, work undone, time a-wasting. For this brief slice of an afternoon, though, the choice was taken from me; the only alternative to relaxation was fretting. But the sun was too warm and my muscles too pleasantly loosened to fret, so I stretched out my long legs, crossed them at the boots, folded my glasses onto my stomach, and gave myself over to the sheer debauchery of simply lying in the sun. I was vaguely aware that I was presenting a sight shocking to the eyes of an Edwardian gentleman, long jodhpur-clad limbs and thin blouse, bare head and naked face and hair awry, giving herself over to a shameless and unafraid snooze. I smiled at the thought.

In the arms of Nature's soft nurse, I half-dozed, aware of the sun on my eyelids and a fitful breeze across my cheeks, the food in my stomach and the good air in my lungs and the faint remnant of wine in my blood, the odours of cleaning fluid and cedar from the coat under my head and the clean smell of horse moving off and the aroma of a warm male human nearby. I held the awareness of all these things of the day and the birdsong in a compartment, a light place into which I could reach at any instant, and allowed the rest of myself to sink away into the silent, warm, dark place that lies within.

Mary Magdalene. I had not thought of her in days, and yet a week ago, reading her letter aloud to Holmes, I should have said she would remain before my eyes for the rest of my days. Mary of Magdala, one vital link between the ministry of Jesus the Nazarene carpenter, the crucifixion of Jesus the political criminal, and the resurrection of Jesus the Son of God— a link who, having brought the news of the resurrection to the male disciples, vanishes utterly on Easter afternoon. I reflected, not for the first time, on the irony that this woman, later called a harlot, traditionally identified with John's "woman taken in adultery," this mere woman and her vision of the empty tomb was the foundation stone on which two thousand years of Christian faith was laid, and at that moment, lying there in the sun, I knew in my heart that, despite the difficulties, I accepted her authorship of my papyrus. I was filled with admiration for the pure, distilled strength of the woman with her simple, deadly decisions— and for the first time I wondered what had become of the granddaughter, Rachel, how old she had been, if she made it safely to Magdala. "I look out across my rocky desolation," the woman had written, in that flowing and spiky hand that gave the impression of hurried calm even before I knew her words, a rocky desolation and fleeing the coming wrath of the conqueror that would turn the holy place that was the heart of Judaism into a ruin where jackals would howl and soldiers empty their bladders, the same soldiers who carried pikes and swords and who stank of garlic and stale sweat in that land of sun and little water, a smell very unlike the cedar and the tobacco and the fresh male smell that was in my own nostrils now, which combination was evocative of Holmes. I lay limp, part of me drifting on a hillside in a long-off age under a different sun, and a bit of me aware of Mr Brown's cultivated natural landscape, and gradually a third part of me becoming aware of a series of distinctly arresting sensations that slowly transformed my state of torpid dreaminess into hypnotic attention, a third point of awareness that kept me frozen and divided, the awareness of lips exploring the exquisitely sensitive tracery of veins that ran up the inside of my wrist.

It was overwhelmingly erotic, the feather touch and dreamlike movement of his breath and mouth and moustache in my palm, on the swell and hollow of my thumb, up the line of my tendons, the amazing, unexpected, electrifying gentleness and sensitivity of his mouth taking possession of my right hand, and I arched my fingers to him and took one deep, shuddering breath, and an instant later I was on my feet, stumbling away from him, seeking the safety of my horse.

I scrubbed my palm and the inside of my wrist hard across the bristle of the animal's coarse hip, and as I yanked at the girth with unnecessary violence, I cursed my stupidity, my carelessness, my— yes, damn it, my absentmindedness— and I cursed as well my overreaction, for the second time in twenty-four hours, to an Edwards male. He came up behind me and held out glasses, gloves, hat, and jacket, and I clothed myself and mounted the horse without looking at him or taking his offer of a hand up.

"Mary, I—"

"No, Colonel. No." My rough voice was pure Russell. "I am sorry, but no. It's time to be getting back." I drove the hat pins roughly home, buttoned the gloves, and then forced myself to look down at him, but he only looked puzzled and a bit hurt, then slightly amused.

"Very well, Mary, if that's how you want it." He turned away to catch his own horse, but I couldn't leave it at that.

"Colonel? Look, I am sorry. It has nothing to do with how I want it, but it's how it has to be. I can't explain, not just now. I am sorry." And for a moment, with the tingle still warm on my wrist, I was truly sorry, and he saw it, and he smiled crookedly.

"I understand, Mary. It was foolish of me to think that you could be interested in an old man like me. I do understand."

I swallowed hard the protest that rose up, a bitter mouthful indeed. We both left the topic as it stood, and after he had mounted, we turned and rode back in a silence that was, oddly enough, not unfriendly. When the stable lads had received back their charges, I excused myself to go and reclaim my own clothes. Walking warily through the corridors, I made the upstairs room without challenge. Once there, I dismissed the maid as firmly as I had before, took my clothes from the wardrobe, and dressed quickly. I had just begun to pin my hair back together when a light tap at the door startled me.

"Yes?"

"Saint George here, slayer of dragons, at your service," drawled a light male voice.

I opened it, and my rescuer slipped in.

"I thought I'd check to see if my services were still needed, though short of a bigamous elopement, I cannot see how I might keep those two from the dinner party."

"Heaven forbid. No, we're going, as soon as I've taken my leave of the Westburys. Do you think you could—"

"A glass of bubbly under the rose bower is the most I can manage, I'm afraid."

"That would be perfect. Thank you, you dear man, you've saved me from a potentially difficult situation."

"The salvation of fair ladies is the entire purpose of my class, in case you had not realised. When ladies stop being in need of rescue, all like me will fade away."

"Like King Arthur, waiting to come again when England has need of him?"

"Good Lord, what a dreadful thought. Give me an honest retirement anytime. Speakin' of which, kindly present my greetings and regards to the gentleman with the pipe."

"I will. Come down for a weekend when this is all over, and I'll tell you all the sordid details. There's even an immensely early manuscript for you to admire."

"A first edition?"

"Without a doubt."

"Interestin'. I shall hold you to the offer. Well, it's been loverly, ducks, but two other ladies await my escort services. Give me five minutes to remove the dragons from downstairs, and the coast, as the fogbound lighthouse keeper said to his wife, will be clear."

"Thank you," I said again, and impulsively leant forward and kissed his cheek. He very nearly blushed, then busied himself with cleaning his monocle with his silk handkerchief and screwing it energetically over his eye.

"Yes, well, ta and all that. Cheerio."

I turned back to the mirror, smiling, and was surprised to see his fair head reappear at the door, the silly-ass attitude temporarily suspended from face and voice.

"By the by, Mary, a word in your ear. Doubtless you know already that your colonel has a potential for nasty behaviour, but you may not have met his son yet. If you do, watch yourself: He's a felony waiting to happen, and in him, the nasty streak goes clear across."

"We've met."

"Yes?"

"Indeed. He may walk carefully around sweet young things for a while."

"Hello, hello, do I see a gleam in your eyes? Heaven protect me from an emancipated woman who can throw men over her shoulder."

"I should think you know me better than to accuse me of something as unsubtle as that."

"But no less painful, perhaps?"

"Well ..."

"Take care, Mary." He laughed, then went down the hall whistling something complicated and Mozartian.

EIGHTEEN

sigma

I expected the drive back to London to be something of an ordeal, but it was not. The colonel was, if anything, more relaxed and friendly, almost as if he were relieved to have some bothersome question out of the way. The clouds, actual rather than metaphorical, gathered again as we neared London, and it was raining lightly when Alex pulled up in front of Isabella's boardinghouse. The colonel moved to open his door, but I put out a hand to stop him.

"Colonel, I just would like to say thank you for such a nice day. It was perfect. All of it." I looked into his eyes for a moment, then leant forward to plant a daughterly kiss on his rough cheek. He seemed very pleased, so I let it go at that and got out when Alex opened my door.

Holmes was not there. Drat the man. I bathed, dressed, fidgeted, and at seven o'clock put a call through to Mycroft.

"Good evening, Michael," I said. "I was calling to see if by any chance you had news of a friend of mine? I was halfway expecting him to appear before this."

"No, I haven't heard from him." His voice was surprised but untroubled. "If he hasn't shown up by now, he will probably come directly here. There's no reason to let his absence spoil your dinner."

"I suppose you're right. I'll give him a few more minutes, then come on over."

I fidgeted for another eight minutes, then threw up my hands and went down to find a cab. I stood in the protected doorway and looked in disgust at the unceasing rain, wondering how long it was going to take me to find an unoccupied taxi on a wet Sunday night. Fortunately, my luck was in, for a shiny black taxi cab, empty but for the driver, came cruising down the street. I waved for it to stop, bent down under my umbrella, and climbed in without waiting for the driver to open the door for me. As I sat back in the seat, he clashed the gears irritably and growled at me through the speaking window.

"Damn it all, Russell, you had more sense when you were fifteen than you exhibit now. How many times have I told you— what are you laughing at, woman?" I was laughing, suddenly intoxicated with the sheer pleasure of being back in the presence of this ageing, supercilious, impossible man who was often the only thing in my life that made any sense.

"Oh, Holmes, I knew it was you the instant I saw the taxi start up. You know, if you wanted to make a truly dramatic entrance instead of something predictably unusual, you could astonish everyone by merely walking up the stairs, where and when you were expected. Oh, don't look so crestfallen. I'm glad to see you're having a good time." I caught his eye in the mirror and watched as he began reluctantly to match my grin. "Now tell me what you're doing in this cab. The last I heard, you were going to Bath. Did you finish with Mrs Rogers, then?"

He held up his left hand silently, and by the light of the streetlamps I could see the fading wounds of a lengthy battle with thorns and the extreme dryness of skin that comes from long hours of chafing and immersion in wet glue.

"Yes, I see. Did you do the entire house?"

"Two rooms. I told the good lady I would return Tuesday morning."

"And is she a good lady?"

A long pause followed, only in part due to a surge of traffic around a cinema house. When we had negotiated the tangle, Holmes spoke again, musingly.

"I do not know, Russell. There are a number of oddities about this case, and not the least of them is Mrs Erica Rogers."

When we arrived at Mycroft's, Holmes parked the car with neither incident not illegality and turned to look at me through the glass partition.

"No one on our tail?"

"None I could see, and I was watching carefully."

"So I observed. Do you know, Russell, it is a distinct pleasure to look upon your features again. The floor of Mrs Rogers's shed was both hard and cold. Now," he went on before I could answer, "I just need to get something from the back."

The something from the back was a wooden crate that rattled metallically. He volunteered no information, and I did not spoil the surprise by asking. The doorkeeper eyed us closely before admitting us, and Lestrade opened the door with a glass in his hand.

It was, as always under Mycroft's roof, a superb dinner with agreeable conversation. Holmes, more formally clad now in clothing he kept in his brother's guest room, entertained us with stories about a one-armed tattooist in the West End, a woman who had a counting horse up in Yorkshire, the craft of stained glass, and the distinctive familial patterns of Kashmiri rug makers. Mycroft, more phlegmatic but with a nice line in what the Americans call "deadpan humour," contributed a long and absurd story concerning a royal personage, a hen, and a ball of twine, which may even have been true. Even Lestrade kept up his end, laying out for us the latest escapade of his nephew— an episode which had convulsed the lad's boarding school for a week and left the headmaster with a red face even longer. His tale ended with him saying, "Butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. That lad'll make a fine detective." When the laughter had subsided, Mycroft stood up.

"Shall we take our coffee and brandy in the next room? Mary, would you—"

"No, I do not mind if you smoke."

"Thank you, but I was going to ask if you preferred something other than brandy. A glass of sherry, perhaps?"

"God no!" All three men looked at me in varying states of astonishment at my vehemence. "I'm sorry, it's just that sherry seems to have played a somewhat excessive part in my life the last few days. I don't think I'll drink a glass of the stuff by choice for several weeks. Just the coffee, thanks."

"I do understand," said Mycroft. "I'll just see to it. Sherlock, perhaps you would stir up the fire." Lestrade followed him, leaving Holmes and me to choose chairs in front of the fireplace. Holmes threw some coal on the glowing remnants, then lowered himself into his armchair. With great deliberation, he stretched out first one long leg and then the other, and sighed deeply.

"Are you well?" I asked. His reply was to open one eye and look at me. "You drank rather more wine at dinner than is your custom, and you seem in some discomfort."

"I am getting old, Russell. Gone are the days when I could scramble about on the moors all day and curl up happily at night with a thin blanket and a stone for a pillow. Three nights on floorboards and one night without sleep following three days at strenuous labour make me aware that I am no longer a callow youth."

"Have the results matched the effort?"