The Improbable Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

The Vale of the White Horse by Sharyn McCrumb

Sharyn McCrumb is the author of the Appalachian Ballad series, which includes the New York Times bestsellers She Walks These Hills, The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter, and The Ballad of Frankie Silver. Her novel The Rosewood Casket is currently in production for a feature film adaptation, and forthcoming novels include The Devil Amongst the Lawyers, and a book co-authored with NASCAR driver Adam Edwards called Faster Pastor. McCrumb has been honored with the Library of Virginia Award and her book, St. Dale, received the Book of the Year Award from the Appalachian Writers Association. In 2008, she was also presented with the Virginia Women of History Award.

The Uffington White Horse is a giant prehistoric chalk carving cut into the bedrock of a hillside in southern England. McCrumb says that she is fascinated by British folklore and prehistoric landmarks, and when she visited Wiltshire and saw the Horse, she knew that she wanted to incorporate it into a story someday. "The Vale of the White Horse" is the result.

This story is one of those rare ones in which we get to see the great detective Sherlock Holmes from the point of view of someone other than Watson. Of this character, the author explains, "Grisel Rountree is the English counterpart of a favorite character from my Ballad novels, the Appalachian wise woman Nora Bonesteel." She adds that the story is inspired in part by "my resentment of the urban know-it-alls who think that country people are less intelligent or sophisticated than city dwellers. I enjoyed making Grisel Rountree every bit as astute and eccentric as Holmes."

Grisel Rountree was the first to see that something was strange about the white chalk horse.

As she stood on the summit of the high down, in the ruins of the hill fort that overlooked the dry chalk valley, she squinted at the white shape on the hillside below, wondering for a moment or two what was altered. Carved into the steep slope across the valley, the primitive outline of a white horse shone in the sunshine of a June morning. Although Grisel Rountree had lived in the valley all seven decades of her life, she never tired of the sight of the ancient symbol, large as a hayfield, shining like polished ivory in the long grass of early summer.

The white horse had been old two thousand years ago when the Romans arrived in Britain, and the people in the valley had long ago forgotten the reason for its existence, but there were stories about its magic. Some said that King Arthur had fought his last battle on that hill, and others claimed that the horse was the symbol for the nearby Wayland Smithy, the local name for a stone chamber where folk said that a pagan god had been condemned to shoe the horses of mortals for all eternity.

Whatever the truth of its origins, the village took a quiet pride in its proximity to the great horse. Every year when the weather broke, folk would make an excursion up the slope to clean the chalk form of the great beast, and to pull any encroaching weeds that threatened to blur the symmetry of its outline. They made a day of it, taking picnic lunches and bottles of ale, and the children played tag in the long grass while their elders worked. When Grisel was a young girl, her father had told her that the chalk figure was a dragon whose imprint had been burned into the hill where it had been killed by St. George himself. When she became old enough to go to the village dances, the laughing young men had insisted that the white beast was a unicorn, and that if a virgin should let herself be kissed within the eye of the chalk figure, the unicorn would come to life and gallop away. It was a great jest to invite the unmarried lasses up to the hill "to make the unicorn run," though of course it never did.

Nowadays everyone simply said the creature was a horse, though they did allow that whoever drew it hadn't made much of a job of it. It was too stretched and skinny to look like a proper horse, but given its enormous size, perhaps the marvel was that the figure looked like anything at all.

The hill fort provided the best view of the great white horse. Anyone standing beside the chalk ramparts of the ancient ruins could look down across the valley and see the entire figure of the horse sprawled out below like the scribble of some infant giant. Grisel Rountree did not believe in giants, but she did believe in tansy leaves, which was why she was up at the hill fort so early that morning. A few leaves of tansy put in each shoe prevented the wearer from coming down with ague. Although she seldom had the ague Grisel Rountree considered it prudent to stock up on the remedy as a precaution anyhow. Besides, half the village came to her at one time or another to cure their aches and pains, and it was just as well to be ready with a good supply before winter set in.

She had got up at first light, fed the hens and did the morning chores around her cottage, and then set off with a clean feed sack to gather herbs for her remedies and potions. She had been up at the ruins when the clouds broke, and a shaft of sunlight seemed to shine right down on the chalk horse. She had stopped looking for plants then, and when she stood up to admire the sight, she noticed it.

The eye of the great white horse was red.

"Now, there's a thing," she said to herself.

She shaded her eyes from the sun and squinted to get a clearer image of the patch of red, but she still couldn't make it out. The eye did not appear to have been painted. It was more like something red had been put more or less in the space where the horse's eye ought to be, but at this distance, she couldn't quite make out what it was. She picked up the basket of herbs and made her way down the slope. No use hurrying-it would take her at least half an hour to cross the valley and climb the hill to the eye of the white horse. Besides, since whatever-it-was in the eye was not moving, it would probably be there whenever she reached it.

"It'll be goings-on, I'll warrant," she muttered to herself, picturing a courting couple fallen asleep in their trysting place. Grisel Rountree did not hold with "goings-on," certainly not in broad daylight at the top of a great hill before God and everybody. She tried to think of who in the village might be up to such shenanigans these days, but no likely couple came to mind. They were all either past the point of outdoor courting or still working up to it.

Out of ideas, she plodded on. "Knowing is better than guessing," she muttered, resolving to ignore the twinge of rheumatism that bedeviled her joints with every step she took. The walk would do her good, she thought, and if it didn't, there was always some willow tea back in the cottage waiting to be brewed.

Half an hour later, the old woman had crossed the valley and reached the summit where the chalk horse lay. Now that she was nearer she could see that the splash of red she had spotted from afar was a bit of cloth, but it wasn't lying flat against the ground like a proper cape or blanket should. She felt a shiver of cold along her backbone, knowing what she was to find.

In the eye of the white horse, Grisel knelt beside the scarlet cloak spread open on the ground. She wore a look of grim determination, but she would not be shocked. She had been midwife to the village these forty years, and she laid out the dead as well, so she'd seen the worse, taken all round. She lifted the edge of the blanket and found herself staring into the sightless eyes of a stranger. A moment's examination told her that the man was a gentleman-the cut of his blood-stained clothes would have told her that, but besides his wardrobe, the man had the smooth hands and the well-kept look of one who has been waited on all his life. She noted this without any resentment of the differences in their stations: such things just were.

The man was alive, but only just.

"Can you tell me who did this to you?" she said, knowing that this was all the help he could be given, and that if there were time for only one question, it should be that. The rest could be found out later, one way or another.

The man's eyes seemed to focus on her for a moment, and in a calm, wondering voice he said clearly, "Not a maiden… "

And then he died. Grisel Rountree did not stay to examine him further, because the short blade sticking out of the dead man's stomach told her that this was not a matter for the layer out of the dead but for the village constable.

"Rest in peace, my lad," said the old woman, laying the blanket back into place. "I'll bring back someone directly to fetch you down."

"Missus Rountree!" Young Tom Cowper stood under the apple tree beside the old woman's cottage, gasping for breath from his run from the village, but too big with news to wait for composure. "They're bringing a gentleman down from London on account of the murder!"

Grisel Rountree swirled the wooden paddle around the sides of the steaming black kettle, fishing a bit of bed sheet out of the froth and examining it for dirt. Not clean yet. "From London?" she grunted. "I shouldn't wonder. Our PC Waller is out of his depth, and so I told him when I took him up to the white horse."

"Yes'm," said Tom, mindful of the sixpence he had been given to deliver the message. "The London gentleman-he's staying at the White Horse, him and a friend-at the Inn, I mean."

Grisel snorted. "I didn't suppose you meant the white horse on the hill, lad."

"No. Well, he's asking to see you, missus. On account of you finding the body. They say I'm to take you to the village."

The old woman stopped stirring the wash pot and fixed the boy with a baleful eye. "Oh, I'm to come to the village, am I? Look here, Tom Cowper, you go back to the inn and tell the gentleman that anybody can tell him the way to my cottage, and if he wants a word with me, here I'll be."

"But missus… "

"Go!"

For a moment Tom gaped at the tall, white-haired figure, pointing imperiously at him. People roundabouts said she were a witch, and of course he didn't hold with such foolishness, but there was a limit to what sixpence would buy a gentleman in the way of his services as a messenger. Choosing the better part of valor, he turned and ran.

"Who is this London fellow?" Grisel called after the boy.

Without breaking stride Tom called back to her, "Mis-terr Sher-lock Holmes!"

Grisel Rountree finished her washing, swept the cottage again, and set to work making a batch of scones in case the gentleman from London should arrive at tea time, which, if he had any sense, he would, because anybody hereabouts could tell him that Grisel Rountree's baking was far better than the alternately scorched and floury efforts of the cook at the village inn.

The old woman was not surprised that London had taken an interest in the case, considering that the dead man had turned out to be from London himself, and a society doctor to boot. James Dacre, his name was, and he was one of the Hampshire Dacres, and the brother of the young baronet over at Ramsmeade. The wonder of it was that the doctor should be visiting here, for he had never done so before, though they saw his brother the baronet often enough.

A few months back, the young baronet had been a guest of the local hunt, and during the course of the visit he had met Miss Evelyn Ambry, the daughter of the local squire and the beauty of the county. She was a tall, spirited young woman, much more beautiful than her sisters and by far the best rider. People said she was as fearless as she was flawless, but among the villagers there was a hint of reserve in their voices when they spoke of her. There was a local tradition about the Ambrys, people didn't speak of it in these enlightened times, but they never quite forgot it either. Miss Evelyn was one of the Ambry changelings, right enough. There was one along in nearly every generation.

By all accounts Miss Evelyn Ambry had made a conquest of the noble guest, and the baronet's visits to the district became so frequent that people began to talk of a match being made between the pair of them. Some folk said they would been betrothed already if Miss Evelyn's aunt had not suddenly taken ill and died two weeks back, so that Miss Evelyn had to observe mourning for the next several months. And now there was more mourning to keep them apart-his lordship's own brother.

Grisel Rountree was sorry about the young man's untimely death, but it's an ill wind that blows nobody good, she told herself, and if the doctor's passing kept his brother from wedding the Ambry changeling, it might be a blessing after all. Whenever a silly woman sighed at the prospect of a wedding between Miss Evelyn and the baronet, Grisel always held her peace on the subject, but she'd not be drinking the health of the handsome couple if the wedding day ever came. It boded ill for the bridegroom, she thought. It always had done when a besotted suitor wed an Ambry changeling, and so Grisel had been expecting a tragedy in the offing-but not this particular tragedy. The baronet's younger brother dying in the eye of the white horse. She didn't know what it meant, and that worried her. And his last words-"Not a maiden"-put her in mind of the village lads' old jest about the unicorn, but how could a gentleman doctor from London know about that? It was a puzzle, right enough, and she could not see the sense of it yet, but one thing she did know for certain: death comes in threes.

She was just dusting the top of the oak cupboard for the second time when she heard voices in the garden.

"Do let me handle this, Holmes," came the voice of a London gentleman. "You may frighten the poor old creature out of her wits with your abrupt ways."

"Nonsense!" said a sharper voice. "I am the soul of tact, always!"

She had flung open the cottage door before they could knock. "Good afternoon, good sirs," she said, addressing her remarks to the tall, saturnine gentleman in the cape and the deerstalker hat. Just from the look of him, you could tell that he was the one in charge.

The short, sandy-haired fellow with the bushy mustache and kind eyes gave her a reassuring smile. "It's Mistress Rountree, is it not? I am Dr. John Watson. Allow me to introduce my companion, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, the eminent detective from London. We are indeed hoping for a word with you. May we come in?"

She nodded and stepped aside to let them pass. "You're wanting to talk about young Dacre's death," she said. "It was me that found him. But you needn't be afraid of upsetting me, young man. I may not have seen the horrors you did with the army in Afghanistan, but I'll warrant I've seen my share in forty years of birthing and burying folk in these parts."

The sandy-haired man took a step backward and stared at her. "But how did you know that I had been in Afghanistan?"

"Really, Watson!" said his companion. "Will you never cease to be amazed by parlor tricks? Shall I tell you how the good lady ferreted out your secret? I did it myself at our first meeting, you may recall."

"Yes, yes," said Watson with a nervous laugh. "I remember. I was a bit startled, because the innkeeper said that Mistress Rountree had a bit of reputation hereabouts as a witch. I thought this might be a sample of it."

"I expect it is," said Holmes. "People are always spinning tales to explain that which they do not understand. No doubt they'll be coming out with some outlandish nonsense about the body of Mr. Dacre being found in the eye of the white horse. I believe you found him, madam?"

Grisel Rountree motioned for them to sit down. "I've laid the tea on, and there are scones on the table. You can be getting on with that while I'm telling you." In a few words she gave the visitors a concise account of her actions on the morning of James Dacre's murder.

"You'll be in the employ of his lordship the baronet," she said, giving Holmes an appraising look.

He nodded. "Indeed, that gentleman is most anxious to discover the circumstances surrounding his brother's murder. And you tell me that Dr. Dacre was in fact alive when you found him?"

"Only just, sir. He had been stabbed in the stomach, and he had bled like a stuck pig. Must have lain there a good hour or more, judging by all the blood on the grass thereabouts."

"And you saw no one? There are very few trees on those downs. Did you scan the distance for a retreating figure?"

She nodded. "Even before I knew what had happened, I looked. I was on the opposite hill, mind, when I first noticed the red on the horse's eye, so I could see for miles, and there were nothing moving, not so much as a cow, sir, much less a man."

"No. You'd have told the constable if it had been otherwise. And the poor man's final words to you were-"

"Just like I told you. He opened his eyes and said clear as day, Not a maiden. Then he laid back and died."

"Not a maiden. He was not addressing you, I take it?"

"He were not," snapped the old woman. "And he would have been wrong if he had been."

"Did the phrase convey anything to you at the time?"

"Only the old tale about the white horse. The village lads used to say that if anyone were to kiss a proper maiden standing upon the chalk horse, the beast would get up and walk away. So perhaps he had been kissing a lady? But that's not what I thought. The poor man was stabbed with a woman's weapon-a seam ripper, it were, from a lady's sewing kit-and I think he was saying that the one who used it was not a woman, despite the look of it."

Holmes nodded. "Let's leave that for a bit. I find it curious that the doctor was walking on the downs at such an odd hour. In fact, why was he here at all? The family estate, Ramsmeade, is some distance from here."

"The doctor's brother is engaged to squire's daughter hereabouts," said the old woman.

"So I am told. I believe the Dacres had come to attend a funeral at the Hall."

"T'were the squire's younger sister. Christabel, her name was. Fanciful name for a flighty sort of woman, if you ask me. Ill for a long while, she was, and her not thirty-five yet, even. Young Dacre were a doctor, you know. So when the squire's sister took sick, the family asked Dr. Dacre to do what he could for the poor lady, on account of the family connection, you see. The doctor's brother affianced to the niece of the sick woman."

"Ah! Mr. Dacre often visited here to treat his patient then?"

"Not he. He has a fine clinic up in London. She went up there to be looked after. Out of her head with worry, she was, poor lamb. Even came here once to see if I had any kind of a tonic that might set her to rights. Now, Mistress Rountree, she says to me, I've got such a pain in my tummy that I don't care if I live or die, only I must make it stop. Is there anything you can give me for it? But I told her there were nought I could do for her, excepting to pray. There never has been for such as she. An Ambry changeling, she was. Know it to look at her, though I kept still about that. So up she went to London, and died upon the operating table up at the Dacre clinic."

"It was not, by any chance, a childbirth?" said Watson.

Grisel Rountree gave him a scornful look. "Childbirth? Not she! I told you: an Ambry changeling she was. Not that I believe all the tales that are bandied hereabouts, but call it what you will, there is a mark on that family."

"Now that is interesting," said Holmes. He had left off eating scones now, and was pacing the length of the cottage while he listened. "What do people say about the Ambrys? A family curse."

"Not a curse. That could be lifted, maybe. This is in the blood and there's no getting away from it. The Ambrys are an old family. They've been living at the Hall since the time of the Crusades, that I do know. Churchyard will tell you that much. But folk in these parts say that one of the Ambry lords, a long time back, married one of the fair folk… " She hesitated, choosing her words carefully. "One of the lords and ladies… "

"He married into the nobility, you mean?" asked Watson.

"Stranger than that, I think," said Holmes still pacing. "I think Mistress Rountree is using the countryman's polite-and wary-circumlocution to tell us that an Ambry ancestor took a bride from among the Shining Folk. In short, a fairy wife."

The old woman nodded. "Just so. They do say that she stayed for all of twenty years and twenty days with her mortal husband, and she bore him children, but then she slipped away in the night and went back to her own people. She was never seen again, but her bloodline carries on in the Ambrys to this day. Their union was blessed with five children-or blessed with four, perhaps. The fifth one took after the mother. And ever since that time there has been in nearly every generation that one daughter who takes after the fairy side of the family-a changeling."

"Fascinating," said Holmes.

"But hardly germane to an ordinary stabbing death," said Watson.

"One never knows, Watson. Let us hear a bit more. By what signs do you know that an Ambry boy or girl is the family changeling?"

"It's always a girl," said the old woman. "The prettiest one of the bunch, for one thing. Tall and slender, with beautiful dark hair and what some might call an elf face-big eyes and sharp cheek bones-not your chocolate box pretty girl, but a beauty all the same."

"A lovely girl in every generation?" Dr. Watson laughed. "That sounds like the sort of curse any family would envy."

"But that's not the whole of it," said Grisel. "That's only the good part."

"I suppose they were high-tempered ladies," Watson said, smiling. "The pretty ones often are, I find. Still, I hardly think that fairy stories would deter a modern gentleman."

"There is a good deal of sense wrapped in country fables," said Holmes. "He might do well to heed them. However, I don't quite see its connection to the death of the good doctor. Was the Ambry family angry that Miss Christabel Ambry had died in the doctor's care?"

"No. She were in a bad way, and they knew there was little hope for her. They didn't suppose anybody could have done any more than what he did."

"I wonder what was the matter with her?" mused Watson.

"That is your province, Watson," said Holmes. "You might call in at the clinic and ask. I shall pursue my present line of inquiry. We know that Dacre arrived here on the Friday. The funeral then was on Saturday, and he was found dying within the white horse in the early hours of Sunday morning. He had been stabbed with a silver seam ripper from a sewing kit, but his last words-presumably on the subject of his murderer-were not a maiden."

"Is there a tailor in these parts?"

"Watson, I hardly think that James Dacre would be taking an evening stroll across the downs with the village tailor."

Nor do I," said Grisel Rountree. "Anyhow, we don't have one. So you do think the person up on the hill was a lady after all?"

"We must not theorize ahead of the facts," said Holmes. "This seems to be a country of riddles, and the meaning of the doctor's words is still not clear."

A few days later Sir Henry Dacre, Bart. received his distinguished London visitors in his oak-paneled study at Ramsmeade. He was an amiable young man with watery blue eyes and a diffident smile. At his side was a dark-haired woman, whose imperious nature made her seem more the aristocrat than he. She was nearly as tall as Sir Henry, and her sharp features and glowing white skin were accentuated by the black of her mourning clothes.

"Good morning, Mr. Holmes, Dr. Watson," Sir Henry said. "May I present my fiancée, Miss Evelyn Ambry. My dear, these are the gentlemen I told you about. They are looking into the circumstances surrounding the death of poor James."

She inclined her head regally towards them. "Do sit down, gentlemen. We are so anxious to hear of your progress."

Dr. Watson raised his eyebrows, glancing first at Holmes and then at their host. "The matters we have to discuss are somewhat delicate for a lady's ears," he said. "Perhaps Miss Ambry would prefer not to be present."

Evelyn Ambry gave him a cool stare. "If the matter concerns my family, I shall insist on being present."

Sir Henry gave them a tentative smile. "There you have it, gentlemen. She will have her way. If Miss Ambry wishes to be present, I'm sure she has every right to do so."

With a curt nod Sherlock Holmes settled himself in an armchair near the fire. "As you wish," he said. "I have never been squeamish about medical matters myself. By all means let us proceed. As to the physical facts concerning the death of your late brother, we have done little more than confirm what was already known: that he died in the early hours of June 12 as the result of a stab wound inflicted in his upper abdomen. The weapon was a seam ripper, but it was not of the professional grade used by tailors. Rather it seemed more appropriate to the sewing kit of a woman."

"I have not the patience for sewing," said Miss Ambry. "Such an idle past-time. Grouse shooting is rather more in my line."

"Yet the instrument was of silver, which seems to preclude the villagers from ownership. Does anyone in your household possess such an item?"

She shrugged. "Not to my knowledge. Did you ask the household staff?"

"Yes. They could not be certain either way. Leaving that aside, we know that the doctor came to the village to attend the funeral of his patient, Miss Christabel Ambry, that he stayed at the inn, and after seven in the evening, when he had a pint in the residents' lounge, he was not seen until the next morning, when his body was found in the vale of the White Horse. This much we knew. So we turned our attention to London."

Sir Henry nodded. "You think some enemy may have followed my brother down from London and quarreled with him?"

"I thought it most unlikely," Holmes replied. "In the event we were able to discover no enemies."

"No, indeed," said Watson. "Dr. Dacre was highly esteemed in the medical profession. His colleagues liked him, and his patients are quite distressed that he has been taken from them."

"He was the clever one of the family," said Sir Henry. "But a dear fellow all the same."

"Are you quite sure that James had no enemies?" asked Evelyn Ambry. "Surely you did not interview every one of his patients? What about the relatives of the deceased ones?"

"Indeed we have not yet spoken with you," said Holmes. "I believe you would be included in the latter category. Had your family any resentment toward Dr. Dacre as a physician?"

"Certainly not!" Her cheeks reddened and she pursed her lips in annoyance. "Christabel was very ill. We had long feared the worst. I never go to doctors myself, but I thought James was an exceptional physician. He was tireless on Christabel's behalf. He fought even after we all had given up hope."

"Had the doctor ever mentioned any unhappy patients?" asked Watson, addressing Sir Henry.

"Never," said Sir Henry. "He seemed quite content in his relations with mankind, taken all round."

"Which brings us to womankind," murmured Holmes. "I am thinking of the doctor's final words: Not a maiden. Had your brother any romantic attachments, Sir Henry?"

"Yes. James was engaged to an American heiress. She was in New York at the time of his death, and as she was unable to return for the funeral, she has remained in America with her family. She is quite distraught. They were devoted to one another."

"I see. So there is no question then of a dalliance with a village maiden?" He glanced at Miss Ambry to see if the question called for an apology, but she had managed a taut smile.

"James was not at all that sort of man," she said. "Anyone can tell you that. He lived for his work, and he was quite happy to allocate the rest of his attention to Anne. She is a charming girl."

Dr. Watson cleared his throat. "I have been examining the medical records of Dr. Dacre's patients. They all seem straightforward enough. He specialized in cancer-a sad duty most of the time. I did wonder about your aunt, though, Miss Ambry. The records on her case were missing. There was only an empty folder with her name on it, and a scribbled note: "No hope! Orchids?"

"Do you know what Christabel Ambry died of?"

"Cancer, of course," said Evelyn. "We knew that. I'm afraid we did not press for details. Christabel seemed not to want inquiry on the subject."

"In that case, why did Dacre destroy the records?" said Watson. "He seems to have discussed the case with no one. And what of the notation on the folder?"

"Orchids? Well, perhaps he was thinking of sending flowers for the funeral," Sir Henry suggested.

"Orchids would be most unsuitable, Henry," said his fiancée.

"Well, I suppose they would be. At any rate I know he sent a wreath, but I'm dashed if I know what it was. White flowers, I think. I confess it is all Greek to me, gentlemen."

Sherlock Holmes stared. "I wonder if… " He stood up and began pacing before the hearth. After a few more moments of muttering, during which he ignored their questions, Holmes held up his hand for silence. "Well, we must know. Watson, again your medical skills will be called upon. Let us go and see the squire. I fear that we must discover a buried secret."

"I will not give you a love potion, Millie Hopgood, and that's final," said Grisel Rountree to the rabbit of a girl in her cottage door. "That young man of yours is a Wilberforce, and everybody knows the Wilberforces are mortally shy. He's the undertaker's boy, and he don't know how to talk to live people, I reckon."

"Yes, but-"

"All he wants is a bit of plain speaking from you, and if you won't make up your mind to that, all the potions in the world won't help you."

"Oh, I couldn't, I'm sure, Missus Rountree!" gasped the girl. "But as you'll be seeing him up to the Hall today, I was thinking you might have a word with him yourself."

"Me going to the Hall? First I've heard of it."

The girl pulled an envelope out of her apron pocket, holding it out to the old woman so that she could see the wax seal crest of the Ambrys sealing the flap. "I'm just bringing it now. The two gentlemen from London are back, and they'd like a word with you."

"Well? And what has your young Wilberforce to do with it?"

"Please, missus, they're going into the vault-after Miss Christabel."

"I am coming then," said the old woman. "See you tell Miss Evelyn that I am coming straight away."

Grisel Rountree found Sherlock Holmes walking in the grounds of Old Hall within site of the Ambry family vault. It was a warm June afternoon, but she felt a chill on seeing him pacing the lawn, oblivious to the riot of colors in the flower beds or the beauty of the ancient oaks. As single-minded as Death, he was. And as inevitable.

"So you've gone and dug up Miss Christabel, then?" she said. "Well, I don't suppose dug up is the right term, as she were in a vault."

He nodded. "It all seemed to come down to that. Dr. Watson is in the scullery there, performing an autopsy, but I think we both know what he will find."

"The lady died of cancer," said Grisel Rountree, looking away.

"Christabel Ambry died of cancer, yes," said Holmes.

"Ah," said the old woman. "So you do know something about it."

"I fancy I do, yes." He turned in response to a shout from the door of the scullery. "Here he is now. Shall we hear his report or will you speak now?"

"Does Miss Evelyn know what you are doing?"

"She has gone out with a shooting party," said Holmes. "We are quite alone, except for the undertaker's boy."

"Wilberforce," she said with a dismissive sigh. "He hasn't the sense to grasp what to gossip about, so that's safe. Let the doctor tell you what he makes of it."

Watson reached them then, rolling down his sleeves, his forearms still damp from washing up after the procedure. "Well, it's done, Holmes," he said. "Shall I tell you in private?"

Holmes shook his head. "Miss Rountree here is a midwife and local herbalist. I rather fancy that makes her a colleague of yours. In any case, she has always known what you have just been at pains to discover. Do tell us, Watson. Of what did Christabel Ambry die?"

Watson reddened. "Cancer, right enough," he said gruffly. "Testicular cancer."

"You must have been surprised."

"I've heard of such cases," said Watson. "They are mercifully rare. It is a defect in the development of the foetus before birth, apparently. When I opened up the abdomen, I found that the deceased had the… er… the reproductive organs of a male. The testes, which had become cancerous, were inside the abdomen, and there was no womb. The deceased's vagina, only a few inches long, ended at nothing. I must conclude that the patient was-technically-male."

"An Ambry changeling," said Holmes.

"But how did you know, Holmes?"

"It was only a guess, but I knew, you see, that orchis is the Greek word for testis, and I was still thinking about the changeling story. It was an old country attempt to describe a real occurrence, is it not so, madam?"

Grisel Rountree nodded. "We midwives never knew what their insides were like, of course, but the thing about the Ambry changelings is that they were barren. Always. Oh, they might marry, right enough, especially to an outsider who didn't know the story about the Ambrys, but there was never a child born to one of them. Some of them were good wives, and some were bad, and more than a few died young, like Christabel Ambry, rest her soul-but there was never an Ambry changeling that bore a child. That could be curse enough to a landed family with the property entailed, don't you reckon?"

"Indeed," said Holmes." And the doctor knew of this?"

"He did not," said Grisel Rountree. "None of us were like to tell him-no business of his, anyhow. And when Miss Christabel came to see me, she said she might be going up to London to the clinic. 'But I'll not be airing the family linen for Dr. Dacre, Grisel,' she says to me. 'Not with Evelyn engaged to his brother.' Miss Christabel put off going to a doctor for the longest time, afraid he'd find out too much as it was."

"And Miss Evelyn stated that she never consults physicians."

Watson gasped. "Holmes! You don't suppose that Evelyn Ambry is… is… well, a man?"

"I suppose so, in the strictest sense of the definition, but the salient thing here, Watson, is that Evelyn Ambry cannot bear children. Since she is engaged to the possessor of an entailed estate, that is surely a matter of concern. I fear that when Dr. James Dacre discovered the truth of the matter, he conveyed his concerns to Evelyn Ambry-probably at the funeral. They arranged to meet that night to discuss the matter… "

"Why did he not tell his brother straight away?"

"Out of some concern for the feelings of both parties, I should think," said Holmes. "Far better to allow the lady-let us call her a lady still; it is too confusing to do otherwise-to allow the lady to end it on some pretext."

Grisel Rountree nodded. "He mistook his… person," she said. "Miss Evelyn was not one to give up anything without a fight. I'll warrant she took that weapon with her in case the worse came to the worst."

"Not a maiden," murmured Watson. "Well, that is true enough, I fear. But the scandal will be ruinous! Not just the murder, but the cause… Poor Sir Henry! What happens now?"

From the downs above the Old Hall the sound of a single shot rang out, echoing in the clear summer air.

"It has already happened," said Grisel Rountree, turning to go. "It's best if I see to the laying out myself."

"Now there's a thing," said Sherlock Holmes.