Sherlock Holmes and the Ghosts of Bly

14

Sherlock Holmes adjusted the curtain of the dining-car window against a strong afternoon sun as the coaches of the London train eased forward. With a sigh, he lowered himself into his seat and waved a hand towards the distant landscape.

“I am bound to think occasionally, Watson, how pleasant it would be to retire from all this sort of thing. To seek out a fold or a ridge of the Sussex Downs and live entirely for oneself. I can almost taste at this moment the clean salt air across the Channel waves and over the chalk cliffs. Yellow gorse in the thickets, the sheep bells and the restful murmur of bees in warm summer evenings.”

“You would go out of your mind, Holmes, without a case to investigate.”

“I should devote a small part of my time to critical monographs on speculative topics. The ironies of justice, for example. I should choose as my cast those murderers who have gone to the gallows when the victim whose wealth they coveted would have died of natural causes a few months later in any case. Or the artless cracksmen in 1884 who went to great lengths in planning to break the safe of the City and Suburban Bank, only to find on arrival that another gang were already in possession of it on that same night. The subsequent battle between the two sides woke the entire neighbourhood and resulted in the arrest of all concerned.”

“I take it that you would include the Bly House murder in this catalogue of ironies?”

“Possibly. Major Mordaunt is a perfect example of the man who uses all his talent to plan murder, in this case to kill his nephew Miles, only for nature to do the job before he can.”

“And the murder of Quint?”

“Quite lacking in irony. As the immortal Robert Browning described his own Roman murder story in The Ring and the Book, an episode in burgess life, nothing more.”

“And the death of Major Mordaunt himself?”

He looked at me innocently. I prompted him.

“The sabotage of the boat.”

“Let us call it the curiosity of the boat!”

“If the cork bung had not burst inwards and the craft had not begun to founder, Mordaunt might have clung to the wreck. The bullet wound was not fatal. He might have been pulled ashore and his wound dressed.”

Holmes shrugged.

“To save him for the hangman and possibly to take Maria Jessel with him. He would not thank you for that.”

I was not to be deterred.

“Once she knew of her child’s death she would be a fury from the gates of hell. She has that build and that temperament. You have seen her. A fit young woman who could easily walk five miles to Bly from the station at Abbots Langley—and five miles back. She had been his partner in deception—if not murder. Ten-to-one she knew where the boat was hidden from their days together when she was his governess. She knew, at any rate, that he alone had access to the oars. If anyone used that boat to cross to the island now it would be he. By adjusting the bung, she had a perfect opportunity to ensure that the next time he used it would be his last. Even if a servant had seen her walking through the woods at Bly—she would have been reported as another apparition of the living dead. That would have been believed by no one. We know better!”

He gazed across the flat fields and shook his head in admiration of the theory.

“Knowledge is not proof, Watson. You also forget the part our client must play in any further investigation. Miss Temple would not thank you for putting her through the public ordeal necessary to convince a jury that Maria Jessel drowned Major Mordaunt. I will grant you that the message she sent from our séance was intended to destroy him, not to save him. But you can scarcely expect her to admit it now. We must leave it there.”

He beckoned the steward of the dining car.

“Her child is avenged,” he continued. “The sole witness who might implicate her in the death of Peter Quint is now dead. Let it rest there.”

He paused to order a pot of Earl Grey with cinnamon tea-cakes. Then he added, “When the contents of the military travelling chest are examined, the murderer of Peter Quint will be identified beyond question and Alfred Swain will earn the commendation that Scotland Yard always denied him.”

It was now almost two days since we had seen our beds. He stifled a yawn and stared from the carriage window across a ripening cornfield scattered with poppies. Then he looked back at me with a certain disapproval.

“The hunting instinct is strong in you, Watson. I have to tell you that if Miss Jessel is still in custody when we reach London, I shall advise her that she is entitled to legal representation. I shall also inform her that a competent Queen’s Counsel might go before a judge in chambers and, upon the present evidence, apply successfully for a writ of habeas corpus.”

“And we shall say nothing more of the boat?”

“I think Maria Jessel has suffered enough. I, at least, will take no further part against her.” He turned and looked at me with exasperation. “For God’s sake, Watson, I will not hound that young woman in order to please Tobias Gregson! Sometimes I must be judge and jury in the case I have established. I know you would not have it otherwise, old fellow!”

Then he stretched out his long legs as far as the carriage seats would permit and was asleep before our steward returned with the tea-tray.

Next day, when we were safely back in Baker Street, a wire from Lestrade confirmed that Major James Mordaunt, late surgeon of the Queen’s Rifles, had “popped up” from the lake at Bly as Superintendent Truscott had predicted. An autopsy was undertaken and an inquest was to be held in a fortnight’s time. Holmes and I had been witnesses to the man’s death and our attendance was required. I had no wish to see Bly again and was not best pleased that the court would convene in its manorial hall rather than at the Abbots Langley coaching inn. In case the jurors might need to view the scene, the house was thought to be more convenient.

There is a good deal of press interest in any case where a police officer has shot dead a suspect. The coroner, Dr Roderick Allestree of Chelmsford, strove to repress sensationalism. He instructed the jurors to find a verdict in the death of Major James Mordaunt—and no more. At the first hint of ghosts or previous murders or robbery at the Five Stones, he called the inquest to order. How did Major Mordaunt die? That was all.

Alfred Swain was first exonerated and then commended. He had fired to prevent the certain death of Sherlock Holmes. His marksmanship was impeccable and his bullet was found in the arm that held Mordaunt’s Webley pistol. The wound alone would not have been fatal, even without immediate medical attention. The major had drowned.

Ranged with plain wooden chairs, the dark manorial hall of Bly was oak-panelled and high-windowed but a little smaller than I had expected. Despite Dr Allestree’s best efforts, it was hard to separate the death of Major Mordaunt from the question of whether Peter Quint died in consequence of foul play at his hands.

Maria Jessel was probably saved by the manner in which Holmes gave evidence. He endured cross-examination by a legal bumpkin, Mr Mossop. This fellow had been hired by the Quint family to keep a watching brief, in case something might now be got by way of damages from the Mordaunt estate for the death of their relative. Mossop evidently believed that the implication of Maria Jessel—even if only as an accessory to crime—might open the way to a financial settlement of some kind with the Mordaunt estate.

It was a poor case, but it also put her in danger of criminal prosecution. As Holmes remarked beforehand, a conviction of Miss Jessel as accessory required a principal crime of murder to be proved, which seemed impossible with Mordaunt dead. However, if Mr Mossop hoped to succeed in getting his clients bought off, an indictment of some kind against Maria Jessel would open the way.

Mossop’s cross-examination of Sherlock Holmes was the keystone of this attempt. The process evoked an image of a short, stout gunboat popping its cannon at a well-armoured and deftly-manoeuvred battle-cruiser.

“Mr Holmes, as a criminal investigator, you will concede that facts pointing to the role of James Mordaunt in the death of Quint point also to Maria Jessel as an accomplice? In the light of present evidence, a verdict of accidental death upon Peter Quint can hardly be sustained.”

Dr Allestree stirred himself to intervene. Before he could do so, Holmes fixed his eyes six inches above the top of Mossop’s large head and asked, “You do not mean that question literally, do you, Mr Mossop?”

Dr Allestree sat back expectantly. An uneasy look came over Mossop’s reddening features, the face of one who senses some irretrievable error but cannot yet identify it. A large pit had opened and his adversary was nudging him gently towards it. Allestree intervened, as if to save him for Holmes to deal with.

“I think, Mr Holmes, we must do Mr Mossop the courtesy of assuming that he means what he says.”

Holmes, in formal morning dress and white tie, made a short bow to the coroner. As the jury looked on, it was greatly to Mossop’s disadvantage that he had thought a Norfolk tweed jacket would be good enough for a country court. He looked as if he might have been sent to Bly to carry the luggage for Sherlock Holmes. My friend was careful to look into the jurors’ eyes as he spoke, cutting out his adversary altogether.

“Were I fortunate enough to be retained on Miss Jessel’s behalf, I should undertake her case with complete confidence in the young lady’s innocence.”

That tripped Mossop very neatly. The jurors, who seldom took their eyes off the famous detective, heard that the great Sherlock Holmes believed in the young woman. After that, my friend could have said anything. What followed was conclusive.

“To see Miss Jessel is to know that she has nothing like the strength required to strike that terrible blow to Quint’s head, let alone to carry the body of a full-grown man half a mile over icy paths to the river bridge. If she did neither of those things, what part did she play in this crime—whose very occurrence remains unproven?”

“Major Mordaunt—”

“Quite so. Major Mordaunt was a well-built veteran of active service. He had escaped suspicion as accomplice to robbery and murder at the Five Stones. Quint was the only man who might still betray him. He and he alone had cause to wish that man dead. Major Mordaunt, now being dead himself, cannot be prosecuted. I have such faith in British justice that I do not believe any case against Miss Jessel would get past a local magistrate’s court, let alone a red judge at the Old Bailey.”

“Thank you, Mr Holmes,” said Dr Allestree, but my friend bowed again.

“It would be impertinent in me, sir, to suggest that this court should not take Mr Mossop’s question seriously. I, however, cannot.”

There was absolute silence among the jurors, and for a dreadful moment I thought they might applaud him. Mr Mossop sat down. In a few sentences, Sherlock Holmes had backed him into a corner and tied him into knots. The greatest criminal investigator of the age had announced to the world the innocence of the young woman whose liberty was at stake.

Dr Allestree rubbed salt into Mr Mossop’s wounds by reminding us that the sole issue was the death of James Mordaunt and the conduct of Alfred Swain, who had undoubtedly precipitated it. I hoped for “misadventure” or even “justifiable homicide.” Guided by the coroner and puzzled by the medical evidence, the jurors returned an open verdict.

I stood up and turned round. At the back of the court were two figures, sitting decorously apart. Maria Jessel wore a black veil of mourning. I could not imagine what had brought her to Bly. Despite Inspector Gregson’s memorandum, the Treasury Solicitor recommended no action against her. Peter Quint had died in the County of Essex, and Alfred Swain had argued against a prosecution. As for the boat, how a bung came loose was a matter of pure conjecture, and no evidence could be found to connect her with this. The one item that now appeared to prove her innocence beyond question was a message from her on the night of Mordaunt’s death loyally warning her lover of the danger he was in.

The second figure behind me wore no veil. It is always within the Home Secretary’s discretion to release a prisoner from Broadmoor—and that discretion had been exercised several days before. Proceedings to set aside the verdict of “not guilty by reason of insanity” on Victoria Temple were more complex and might be argued delicately throughout the summer term by the Lords Justices of Appeal. There was no doubt of the outcome.

Holmes and I congratulated our client. We listened encouragingly to her plans for buying a small house on the Devonshire coast, near Lynmouth, and joining a friend who ran a little school there. We congratulated Alfred Swain, whose integrity and marksmanship had carried the day.

Holmes was in demand for a further half-hour. He congratulated Superintendent Truscott on resisting a prosecution of Maria Jessel. In truth, Truscott had been all for it but was outmanoeuvred by Swain. Holmes, in his most affable manner, also suggested that reputations would suffer if the debacle of Victoria Temple’s case were to be followed by another. He intimated that Edward Marshall Hall and Rufus Isaacs had already offered their services to the young woman without fee. Isaacs was a demon in cross-examination with no great respect for the constabulary. Miss Jessel was troubled no further.

I took a final circuit of the lake. Summer warmed the immaculate lawns, the cedar canopies and alleys running to the water. The lake was full, its yellow pads of lilies stretching to rhododendrons in purple view. The sounds and the sense of habitation died away. I stared again across the Middle Deep to the shore where Miss Temple had seen Miss Jessel.

It was perhaps fifteen minutes’ walk back to the house. As on that previous occasion, there was an unaccountable stillness. As I listened, I heard not a sound of a bird—nor a sheep. I had surely been walking back for much longer than fifteen minutes. It was almost a relief, as I passed opposite the clearing of the apparitions, to hear the call of a bird and see the lake move. That call came again, but not quite at the same pitch or of the same duration. Of course it was an animal, not a bird.

It seemed best to step out and be going, but that curious call rang again. It was surely a cat’s cry. But it could not be. No cats could get to the island. How would they live there? It was damned nonsense—but it was a cat if it was anything. Then I thought of the mewling of the children as they stalked Victoria Temple. Damned nonsense, to be sure. If there were no cats on the island there were certainly no children! But in the warm summer gardens the air was cold. That was the breeze on the lake, no doubt.

A cat’s wail may be long and even undulating, but it does not break, as this one did, into a sob. This was distant, treble, plaintive, the hiccupping rhythm of a human motor that will not start. Very well, then there must be a children’s picnic on the island. It was entirely probable on a summer day and a preferable explanation to any other.

There was no boat, but even so … The sobbing rose louder and fell again. It broke as infant tears, then into a laugh. It was someone playing a joke! Who? And how? Another laugh, chuckling, derisive. In that case, reason required that children were playing a trick as Miles and Flora had played one with Miss Temple. That was all. But Miles and Flora had been alive—and now they were certainly dead.

All I had to do was to walk steadily along the remainder of the lakeside path. There was nothing to impede me, and every step brought me closer to the company of Holmes and the others. But to welcome safety in this way was to give in to the thing again. As I walked, the sobbing or chuckling, which had fallen behind, now seemed to keep pace. I hope I am no coward in such matters. Twice I swung round—and saw only motionless water-lilies and the high white clouds still as a stage-set against the blue summer sky.

The lawn was in front of me now and the gate to the courtyard. The Tudor garden tower with its ruined staircase rose warm and still at my side. This was where the whole thing had started and it proved to be no more than an easy cheat by James Mordaunt. No apparition could linger here now. I paused and listened. The calls and cries, whatever they were, had gone. How could they be more than country children sounding closer than they were—the effect of the wind carrying sound through branches and over quiet water? But now there was no wind, it was still again. The birds and the sheep were silent once more, for all the world as if they were listening to the silence.

I was level with the brick tower and I kept a dignified pace as I passed towards the courtyard gate. I was not to be hurried. I could look where I liked and hold my own. But I did not feel the need to look up at those battlements. Whether it was because I disdained to do so or because I preferred not to, I must leave to the reader to judge.