The Adventure of the Willow Basket

by Lyndsay Faye

“An artisan of considerable artistic skill,” Sherlock Holmes answered in reply to my latest challenge, pulling a thin cigarette from his case. “A glass-blower to be specific, although I nearly fell into the rash error of supposing him a professional musician. Shocking, the way the mind slips into such appalling laxity after a full meal - I’ll be forced to fast entirely tomorrow in case my wits should happen to be called upon.”

Staring, I marvelled at the man before me, who scowled at his now-exhausted supply.

“Dear me, I shall have to stop for tobacco on our - “

“No, I won’t have it!” I lightly slapped the white linen tablecloth between us, causing our whiskys to shiver with a sympathetic happy thrill. “Eight in a row is quite too many, Holmes! Even you cannot pretend to clairvoyance.”

“You wound me, my boy.” He lit the cigarette, suppressing an impish expression. “I have never pretended to clairvoyance in my life, though I have placed eleven such repellent creatures in the dock for swindling the credible out of their hard-earned savings. One, a Mr. Erasmus Drake, defrauded over a dozen widows using only a mirror, a pennywhistle, and a cunning preparation of coloured Chinese gunpowder. He won’t be free to roam the streets for another three years, come to think of it.”

“Well, well, never mind clairvoyance then, but you have just identified the professions of eight individuals at a single glance! I shall have to commence approaching complete strangers and demanding they give us a full report of their lives and habits in order to corroborate your claims.”

“My dear fellow, surely you know by now that you needn’t trouble yourself.”

“All right - how do you know he is a glass-blower?”

The detective’s eyes glinted as brightly as the silver case which he returned to his inner coat pocket. We sat at our preferred table in the front of Simpson’s, before the ground-glass windows where we so often watched the passersby; but despite the glow bestowed upon London minutes before by her army of gas-lighters, the illumination beyond the wavering panes no longer sufficed for even my friend’s keen gaze to pick out those details by which he had built his reputation, and thus we had shifted in our seats to examine the restaurant patrons instead. Holmes’s turbot and my leg of mutton had long since been whisked away following our early repast, and we sat in a small pool of quiet amidst the throng of hungry journalists and eager young chess players, their sights fixed upon sliced beef in the dining room or cigars and chequered boards up the familiar staircase. There seemed not a man among them my friend could not pin with the exactitude of a lepidopterist with a butterfly; and, while his remarkable faculty always gives me as much pleasure as it does him, on that evening we reposed with the more luxurious complacency of two intimate companions who had nothing more pressing to do than to order another set of whiskys.

“I know he is a professional glass-blower because he is not a professional trumpet player,” Holmes drawled, gesturing with slight flicks of his index finger. “His clothing is of excellent quality, only a bit less so than yours or mine, suggesting he is neither an aristocrat nor a mean labourer, but rather a respectable chap with a vocation. His cheeks are sunken, but the musculature of his jaw is strongly developed, overly so, and there are slight indications of varicose veins surrounding his lips. His lungs are powerful - I don’t know if you heard him cough ten minutes ago, but I feared for the crystal. He has been expelling air from them, with great strength and frequency. At first I nearly fell into the callow error of supposing him an aficionado with some brass instrument, possibly playing for an orchestra or one of the better music halls, for which failing I blame the exquisite quality of Simpson’s seafood preparations. However, when I glimpsed his hands, I instantly corrected my mistake - his finger-ends display no sign of flattening from depressing the valves, but they do evince a number of slight burn scars. Ergo, he is a glass blower, one I would wager ten quid owns a private shop attached to his studio if the cost of his watch chain does not mislead me, and you need not disturb his repast, friend Watson.”

I was already softly applauding, shaking with laughter. “My abject apologies. I was a fool to doubt you.”

“Skepticism is widely considered healthy,” Holmes demurred, but the immediate lift of his narrow lips betrayed his pleasure at the compliment. My friend is nothing if not gratified by honest appreciation of his prodigious talents.

For some forty minutes and another set of whiskys longer, we lingered, speaking or not speaking as best suited our pleasure, and I admit that I relished the time. My friend was in a rare mood - for, while he is tensely frenetic with work to energise him, he is often brooding and silent without it. The extremities of his nature can be taxing for a fellow lodger and worrying for a friend, though I suspect not more so than they are burdensome for Holmes himself. It was a pleasure to see the great criminologist at his ease for once, neither in motion nor plastered to the settee in silent protest against the dullness of the world around him.

I was just about to suggest that we walk back to Baker Street when we wearied of Simpsons’s rather than flag a hansom, for it was mid-June and the spring air yet hung blessedly warm and weightless before the advent of summer’s stifling fug, when my friend’s face changed. The languid half-lidded eyes focused, and the slack draught he had been taking from his cigarette tightened into a harder purse.

“What is it?” I asked, already half-turning.

“Trouble, friend Watson. Let us hope it is the stimulating and not the unpleasant variety.”

It was then I spied our friend Inspector Lestrade casting his dark, glittering eyes around the dining room, turning his neatly brushed bowler anxiously in his hands. His sharp features betrayed no hint of their usual smugness, and his frame, already small, seemed to have shrunk still further within his light duster. When I raised a hand, he darted towards our table with his head down like a terrier on the scent.

“By Jove, there’s been a murder done!” Holmes exclaimed, as usual failing to sound entirely displeased by this development. “Lestrade, pull up a chair. There’s coffee if you like, and - “

“No time for coffee,” Lestrade huffed as he seated himself.

Holmes blinked in urbane surprise, and I could not blame him. I, too, suspected that beneath the inspector’s obvious anxiety lurked another irritant - while Lestrade is often officious, he is never curt, and he had not bothered to greet either one of us.

Musing, I took in the regular Yarder’s rigid spine and brittle countenance. My examinations drew a blank, save for the obvious conclusion that his nerves had been somehow jangled. I could not imagine what the matter might be, for the year was 1894 and I had not seen the inspector since April and the arrest of Colonel Sebastian Moran, a dramatic event indeed, but one which paled significantly in comparison to the fact of Sherlock Holmes being alive at all. Following my friend’s return from his supposed death at the grim plunge of Reichenbach Falls, I had wrestled briefly with powerful conflicting emotions, the pain of abandonment and the joy of an unlooked-for miracle foremost among them - but by June of that year, the occasional haunted, hunted looks in Holmes’s eyes, which even he could not conceal, combined with the rueful courtesies he showed me when his natural impatience ought to have driven such considerations clean from his vast mind, had convinced me he could not have done otherwise than he did. Excluding the deep pangs caused by my recent marital heartbreak, I felt as ebullient as any shipwreck survivor, and only wished our old friend Lestrade the same felicity.

“Tell me about the murder,” Holmes requested, “since you decline to be distracted by coffee.”

“Beg pardon?” Lestrade growled, for he had fallen into a reverie with his fingertips pressing his temples.

“Report to me the facts of the homicide, since you refuse the stimulating effects of the roasted coffee berry.”

“I do speak English, Mr. Holmes.” Lestrade tugged at his cuffs in fastidious annoyance, recovering himself. “It’s a bad business, gentlemen, a very bad business indeed, or I should not have troubled you. I applied at Baker Street, and Mrs. Hudson said you were dining here.”

“That much I have deduced by your - “

“Shall we skip the parlour tricks, Mr. Holmes?” Lestrade proposed with unusual asperity.

Holmes’s black brows rose to lofty heights indeed, as did mine, but he appeared more curious than offended. As I had not observed the pair interact other than a terse welcome back to London from Lestrade at Camden House in April, followed by some professional discussion of the charges Colonel Moran would face, I sat back against the horsehair-stuffed chair in bemusement which verged upon discomfort.

“It is a murder,” Lestrade admitted, clearing his throat. “Mr. John Wiltshire was discovered in his bedroom in Battersea this late morning, stone dead, without a trace of any known poison in his corpse, nor a single wound upon his body to suggest that harm had been done to him.”

“Remarkable, in that case, that you claim a murder has been committed.”

“He was drained of blood, Mr. Holmes. His body was nearly free of it.” Lestrade suppressed a shudder. “It disappeared.”

A chill passed down my spine. As it has been elsewhere mentioned in these chaotic memoirs that Holmes rather admires than abhors the macabre, I shall not elaborate upon this quirk of his nature - I must mention, however, that Holmes’s entire frame snapped into rapt attention, while Lestrade’s bristled in what I can only describe as animosity.

“There’s some who would think that horrible, but you’re not to be named among them, I suppose.” The inspector levelled a challenging stare at Sherlock Holmes.

“I readily admit to thinking it varying degrees of horrible based upon the character of the deceased,” Holmes replied with a yawn, reverting to his typical supercilious character. “The facts, if you would be so kind.”

“The facts as I have them in hand are these: Mr. John Wiltshire dined with his wife and an old friend on the night of his death, and later Mrs. Helen Wiltshire called for a bath to be drawn for her husband. The housekeeper asserts that the ring occurred, the water was heated, and nothing else of note took place. The upper housemaids all confirm that Mrs. Wiltshire slept in her own room that night, afraid to upset her husband’s apparent need for quiet and solitude. Other than the fact a man has apparently been bled to death by magic, you’d not find me disturbing your supper.”

“You know very well that we would hasten to come whenever you have need of Holmes,” I asserted, only noting in retrospect my grammatical error.

A glass of whisky appeared before the inspector. Nodding subtle thanks to the jacketed waiter, Holmes ordered, “Do have a sip - it seems as though the circumstances merit it.”

Lestrade’s countenance dissolved into what might - save for his own restraint - have been a sneer even as he tasted the drink. “Another deduction?”

“You have clearly been much taxed,” said Holmes, as dismissive as ever. “Pray, what would you have us do? I require an invitation or a client, and presently I have neither. Shall I look up vampires in my commonplace book and wire you upon the subject, or test your patience so far as to accompany you to the crime scene? Has the body been moved?”

“No. I came straight to you,” Lestrade retorted, taking another swallow, “whether I liked it or not.”

My mouth fell open, and Holmes’s deep-set eyes widened fractionally. I fully expected a scathing retort to follow close upon this subtle hint of dismay. To my great surprise, he merely rose, however, nodding at the quaint tobacconist’s shop nestled inside the restaurant, and said coldly, “I am at your disposal, Lestrade, after buying more cigarettes. You are giving me the distinct impression I shall have need of them. Watson, settle the bill if you would be so good.”

Never will I forget that crime scene, for it occurred after what had been so casually glad a day for me, and the shift into horror was as swift as our cab ride. John Wiltshire lay dead in his tastefully appointed bedchamber, its heavy emerald draperies thrown wide to let in the sunlight and now forgot under the shrouded gaze of invisible stars. He reclined in a bath over which a muslin cloth had been draped, the atmosphere in the room stale with police traffic and tense with revulsion, and a still-damp rubber tarp on the rug nearby informed me he had been examined by the coroner and then returned to his original attitude. Mr. Wiltshire’s head and upper torso were visible, his mouth slack and lips white as chalk. The setting and the centerpiece were utterly jarring, with the stately furnishings surrounding a body that appeared horribly - nay, obscenely - withered. Should I have reached out and touched the late Mr. Wiltshire’s skin, I could picture it crumbling to dust like paper left to desiccate for centuries. He had in life been a slender man, with deep pouches beneath his eyes and a thin, downturned mouth.

The coroner was finishing his notes wearing a grim expression and, after a gesture from Lestrade, he stepped aside to allow Holmes and myself to view the deceased. My friend whistled appreciatively, which garnered a dark look from Lestrade.

“Skin white as that cloth and utterly parched, vessels drained, form shrunken, as if he had shriveled into a husk,” I summarised. “But are we certain there were no epidermal wounds inflicted which could have caused this? He was examined on this tarp, I take it.”

“Indeed, Doctor. A minute examination was made in this room, but Inspector Lestrade insisted the deceased be replaced lest his original positioning or the water itself provide a clue for Mr. Holmes here,” the coroner answered, nodding politely.

“By the Lord,” Holmes said mildly, “and here I supposed the circumstances of the killing itself the only miracle which took place today. Admirable, Lestrade.”

My friend appeared to be getting a bit of his own back at last, and the official detective ground his teeth as Holmes dipped his torso towards the bath. Avid as the most passionate connoisseur, he lifted the dead man’s dripping hand from the water and examined the ivory cuticles, checked the underside of the limb draped over the lip, made a minute study of his dark hair and his unmarked scalp, even lifted the wizened eyelids to reveal his unseeing pupils. I watched, eager to help if I could, but all I beheld seemed the stuff of nightmare and not medicine. Holmes next drew his delicate fingertips along the copper rim of the tub, going so far as to touch the now-tepid water and bring it to his nose.

“For heaven’s sake,” Lestrade muttered in my ear - but at me there was directed no pique, merely the casual camaraderie of old.

I half-drew a hand over my moustache to hide a smile, but added under my breath, “If Holmes weren’t the most thorough investigator the world has ever known, I doubt he would be here.”

“More’s the pity,” Lestrade sighed as my companion pushed upright again.

“I have exceptionally keen hearing, you realise,” Holmes mentioned tartly. “Fascinating. As I happen to trust in your thoroughness, coroner - Adams, was it? Yes, Mr. Adams, I suppose you correct in stating that the body lacks superficial wounds. They should have bled into the water if he was killed here, in any event, and this liquid is far too pure to indicate a man’s entire life-force could have possibly been drained into it. I can see no trace of blood at all. Testing it for minute traces may prove necessary, and I have that ability, but more urgent matters demand our attention, supposing we can keep this evidence intact? Very good. I detect no more sign of poison than you do, but anyhow poisoning is a medically impossible means of sapping a fellow’s blood, unless we are dealing with a substance altogether unknown to science. So here we have a man whose blood was somehow siphoned, and the water is clear. Supposing the corpse had been moved, that would have proven nothing whatsoever, but...”

“But the corpse was not moved,” Mr. Adams obliged when Holmes paused expectantly, “because the deep depressions upon the back of his neck and the other on his forearm - there, where it was resting - indicate he was robbed of his blood here somehow, and left to die.”

“Capital!” Holmes exclaimed.

“Yes, we worked that one out on our own, Mr. Holmes,” Lestrade groused.

Sherlock Holmes did not deign to reply, instead turning his attention to the crime scene as Mr. Adams excused himself, intending to help the constables make arrangements to remove the remains. Holmes made every effort, as he always does, diving into corners and walking with his slender hands hovering before him, seeking any aberration which might bring light where all was dark. After some fifteen minutes of studying carpeting, framed photographs, a mahogany bedstead, and every crevice of every object in the room, however, he tapped his fist against his lips and turned back to Lestrade.

“Will you be so good as to deliver me this unfortunate fellow’s biography?”

“Readily, Mr. Holmes. Mr. Wiltshire is employed at a banking firm in the City and has been for some six years hence. We’ve had scant enough time to question anyone, but this afternoon his direct superior sent me a good report of him. The servants seem to think him a somber man, but altogether a satisfactory employer. He has no outstanding debts and no known enemies - he lives in a quiet fashion with his wife, Mrs. Helen - “

Holmes snapped his fingers. “I hadn’t forgot the detail, but was admittedly distracted by so very dramatic a corpse. They entertained an old friend last night - the wife, take me to the wife,” he commanded, and quit the room.

Lestrade followed, and I matched my stride to the shorter man’s. “I cannot help but sense that our presence on this occasion distresses you, Inspector.”

He glanced backwards in surprise. “Oh, I could never be distressed by your help, Doctor. It’s always a pleasure to see you. It’s merely that Mr. Holmes - well, never mind, Mr. Holmes has never cared a fig what I think, and I don’t see why he should start now, so I’ll say no more. He’ll be waiting for us, and he’s right to want interviews at this stage. There was a visitor, and it was the wife who rang for the bath to be drawn. I’ve not been able to question Mrs. Wiltshire yet - she fainted dead away at the sight of her husband and only recovered whilst I was fetching you. Never mind Mr. Holmes’s quirks when there’s a murderer to run to ground, I always tell myself.”

Still mystified for multiple reasons, I could do nothing save accompany him downstairs. We waited in a pretty parlour with all the lamps blazing, a room full of light and colourful decorative china, its walls masked by potted greenery. Something about its coziness unnerved me, and the chamber seemed all the more garishly cheerful when my imagination flashed upon the ghastly events doubtless taking place upstairs, as the shrunken rind which had once been a man was taken out the back through the servants’ entrance and at last to the morgue.

When Mrs. Helen Wiltshire entered, she naturally appeared greatly disturbed in mind - her comely complexion was ashen with dismay, her full lips a-tremble, her green eyes red at the edges, her pale blonde hair disarrayed from clutching it in the extremity of her emotion. She was of an age with her late husband, midway between thirty and forty, and was a lovely woman despite her distress. My friend was up in an instant and led her with easy courtesy to the settee, where she perched as if about to take flight.

Holmes smiled gently as he regained his own chair, displaying the almost mesmeric softness he only ever expends upon the fair sex, and only when he desires information from them; but then, I am not being quite just when I say so. My friend may not seek the company of women, but he genuinely abhors seeing them harmed.

“Are you quite comfortable, madam? Should you like a little refreshment to strengthen you? My friend here is a doctor, and he will be happy to locate something fortifying.”

“I... I don’t think that would be...” Mrs. Wiltshire shifted, attempting to smile with little success. She was silent for so long that Sherlock Holmes continued, face alive with encouragement.

“You are of Scottish origins, I observe. In the vicinity of Paisley, Renfrewshire, unless my ears deceive me.”

A wash of colour infused Mrs. Wiltshire’s dulled cheeks. “Aye, Mr. Holmes, though I’ve lost a good deal of that manner of speaking.”

“Yes, it’s extremely subtle. You went on a long stroll this morning, Mrs. Wiltshire? It must be pleasant, living so close to Battersea Park and its walkways, especially at this time of the year - though I discern from your boots that you wandered alongside the Thames on this occasion.”

She glanced up, twisting her fingers in her coral skirts. “Why, yes, Mr. Holmes. I was out walking. That is the reason I only learned at around noon that - oh, I can’t, I can’t,” she said upon a small sob. “I very often take long constitutionals. I’ve never regretted the habit so much as I did this afternoon, when I arrived home and discovered the house was in an uproar and the police had already been summoned over... over...”

“Quite.”

“I was most unwell afterward. I’ve only just found a tiny store of strength - I hope you will forgive my weakness, but...”

Again she trailed off, and again Holmes continued. “Will you please tell me about your caller of last night?”

Helen Wiltshire nodded, more tears forming. “His name is Horatio Swann, an explorer of some note.”

“Indeed!” Holmes exclaimed. “Yes, I have heard of him. He has made quite the name for himself in scholarly monographs.”

“Yes, that is the man,” she agreed with another weak twitch of her lips. “My husband and he were acquainted years ago, but Mr. Swann has been traveling in Siam, studying indigenous wildlife. We passed a most pleasant meal, and afterward John seemed fatigued at having spent so much time over vigourous conversation and plentiful claret. I ordered him a bath and left him to himself. He could grow... melancholy at times, Mr. Holmes. But for such a fate to befall him...”

Mrs. Wiltshire at this point dissolved entirely and ran from the room.

Lestrade exchanged a glance with Holmes, all pique forgotten in the peculiarity of the moment. He leant forward with his elbows on his knees. “She must have been quite devoted to him.”

“It would seem so,” Holmes replied without inflection.

“The poor woman must be wrought to her highest pitch of nerves over such a ghastly shock. We must seek out this Horatio Swann,” I conjectured, “and ascertain whether he has anything to do with the affair.”

“As usual, Watson, you have hit upon the obvious with uncanny accuracy,” said Holmes dryly. “But I wonder... well, there may be nothing in it after all.”

“Nothing in what, Mr. Holmes?” Lestrade questioned, a furrow forming above his narrow nose.

“It’s only a whim of mine, perhaps a trivial one at that. But why one should walk along the Thames, noisome as it is, when one could walk through Battersea Park?” Holmes mused, rising and ringing the bell.

A maid appeared within seconds. “Show in the housekeeper, please - what is her name?” Holmes inquired.

“Mrs. Stubbs, sir.”

“Mrs. Stubbs, then. Thank you.”

Lestrade nodded absently, stretching his legs out before him as if in agreement over Holmes’s choice of witness, and I dared to hope that whatever mood had plagued him had been a fluke, and that all would henceforth be well again. Mrs. Stubbs, when she entered, proved a broad woman with neatly arranged curls, the flinty spark of extreme practicality in her eyes, and a direct manner. She stood upon the Turkey carpet with her hands clasped placidly before her, the slight slump of her shoulders the only indication she had been sorely tried that day.

“Yes, gentlemen?”

“Mrs. Stubbs.” Holmes remained standing, pacing as he questioned. “My name is Sherlock Holmes, this is my friend and colleague, Dr. John Watson, and this is Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard. We wonder whether you might help us in clearing this matter up. You have been the housekeeper for how long?”

“Six years, sir. As long as the Wiltshires have lived in Battersea.”

“You find the position amenable?”

“I do.”

“Would you describe for me the nature of your late employer?”

“John Wiltshire was a good provider, and I hadn’t much cause to speak with him. At times, he seemed a bit wistful perhaps, but he never lashed out or gave me the impression such spells were anything more serious than fatigue.”

“Then you would say Mr. and Mrs. Wiltshire were happy together?” Holmes pressed, selecting a cigarette.

Mrs. Stubbs sniffed, seeming more impatient than offended. “As happy as anyone, I hope. They never quarreled, and when banking cost him long hours away, she never begrudged him the time.”

“Did she not?” Holmes threw the spent Vesta in the fireplace. “Have you any theory as to what happened last night?”

This at last seemed to move her, but she maintained a neutral expression, swallowing. “That’ll be for you gentlemen to decide, I’m sure.”

“Was there sign of any intruders this morning?” Lestrade put in.

“No, sir. Well, not precisely.”

Both Holmes and Lestrade paused at this, tensing. “What do you mean by ‘not precisely,’ Mrs. Stubbs?” Lestrade urged.

“It’s a silly thing, but the new scullery maid has misplaced the marketing basket.” Mrs. Stubbs shrugged. “She’s more than a bit simple, and everything is so tospy-turvy today - I’m sure it will turn up. Last week she managed to put the cheese wheel in the breadbox after clearing the servants’ supper.”

Lestrade sagged, disappointed.

“Would you describe this basket, Mrs. Stubbs?” Holmes requested.

Our eyes flashed to the detective in disbelief.

“It’s a plain split willow basket, about a foot-and-a-half long though not so wide, with a handle for the shoulder, lined with a cotton kitchen towel,” Mrs. Stubbs answered readily, though her tone was skeptical.

“Thank you,” said Holmes, whirling a bit as he strode in tight loops before the fireplace. “One question more, I beg. What was Mr. Wiltshire’s mood like after Mr. Horatio Swann had departed?”

“Morose, sir,” the housekeeper replied flatly.

Sherlock Holmes stopped, quirking an agile brow. “The usual affliction?”

“Worse, sir. Perhaps he’d a premonition.” Mrs. Stubbs set her lips grimly. “To die in such a way... God knows he deserved warning of it. Do call for me if you need aught else, but I’ve plentiful extra tasks to see to and would fain take my leave,” she concluded.

When she had departed, Lestrade slapped his knees and hopped to his feet, his unexplained ire fully returned. “This is a serious investigation, Mr. Holmes!”

Holmes swiveled to face the inspector, his high cheekbones dusted with colour, for the first time visibly vexed at the criticism. “I assure you I am treating it as such.”

“Oh, yes, I’m sure the exact description of this misplaced potato basket is going to greatly assist us in tracking down the killer! Why don’t you solve that mystery - question the scullery maid, that’ll be a good start - and I’ll catch a murderer. I need to see whether my men have finished,” Lestrade growled, storming out.

“What on earth can be the matter with him?” I wondered, regarding Holmes in amazement.

My friend pulled in smoke with a vengeance before crushing the cigarette in a tray for the purpose and shaking his dark head. “I had six theories at the beginning of the evening. I’ve eliminated five of them,” he confessed, striding in the direction of the outer hallway.

“Then what is wrong?” I repeated as we donned hats and gloves.

“A conundrum even I cannot solve.”

I opened my lips to protest but found Sherlock Holmes’s face as stony as I had ever seen it; he pivoted away from me, thrusting his hands into his pockets as we made to quit the blighted Wiltshire residence.

“But the murder, Holmes! Hadn’t you better question more of the ser - “

“That conundrum I can solve,” Holmes interrupted me. “As a matter of fact, I just did solve it, about five minutes ago. There was never any difficulty in the matter. Come, Watson. We must see what Mr. Horatio Swann has to say.”

As circumstances had it, we could not call upon Mr. Horatio Swann until the next morning, as Lestrade had not found us at Simpson’s until well past seven after travelling from Battersea and stopping at Baker Street, and Mr. Swann lived some miles distant, in a grand house near to Walthamstow. Lestrade supplied us with a four-wheeler and a pair of constables lest matters take a dark turn, and the journey would have been pleasant enough, passing through the small brick towns with their peacefully crumbling churches and snowlike dusting of white petals from the blooming Hawthorne bushes, had the inspector not been sullen and Holmes coolly silent. I, meanwhile, was abuzz with anticipation, desperately eager to discover what my friend had made of the dreadful affair.

When we three at last stood before the stately structure in question - walled round with charming grey stone, a little lane leading up to a curved set of steps, mullioned windows all sparkling as they reflected the dancing shadows of the white willow branches - Holmes hesitated upon the gravel. Lestrade and I by habit likewise slowed to see whether he would deign to share any of his thoughts.

Then Holmes froze entirely, his spine quivering. We waited, with bated breath, for him to speak - or at least I did.

“Well, what the deuce is the matter?” Lestrade queried, every bit as waspishly annoyed at my friend as previous.

Holmes chuckled, rubbing his hands together. “It’s all too perfect. I told you I had heard of Mr. Horatio Swann yesterday, did I not? I have followed a few of his monographs upon the subject of certain freshwater wildlife with particular care.”

“And what of it?” Lestrade demanded, exasperated.

“Rather an outlandish residence for a scientist, wouldn’t you say?” Holmes replied, winking. “Call for the constables. We’ll want them.”

Brown eyes widening in astonishment, Lestrade at once did as he was bid, returning a few yards up the lane and gesturing for the Bobbies to follow. By the time they had done so, Holmes had cheerily knocked upon the door and been admitted, I at his heels.

The taciturn butler led us - and, after some persuasion, the Yarders - into Mr. Swann’s study. From the instant I entered it, my eyes knew not where to light; the place was a splendidly outfitted gentleman’s laboratory, replete with chemical apparatus and walls of gilt-stamped leather books and specimen jars. Of these last, there were dozens upon dozens, lining the shelves like so many petrified soldiers at attention. When my friend saw them, he smiled still wider.

Mr. Swann, surprised, emerged from behind his desk. He was a strongly built man, with a shock of ruddy hair and a ruggedly handsome visage, still wearing a dressing gown and house slippers, as we had begun our journey as early as possible. He appeared merely intrigued at the sight of Holmes and myself - but when he glimpsed the uniformed constables behind Lestrade, his expression shifted to a grimace of pure rage.

“Gentlemen, allow me to introduce Mr. Charles Cutmore, the mastermind behind the infamous Drummonds Bank robbery which so confounded the Scottish authorities, the renowned author of no less than twenty scientific articles of note, and likewise the cunning author of the murder of Mr. John Wiltshire - whose name is actually Michael Crosby, by the by, and who some seven years ago aided this man in making off with six thousand pounds sterling. The pair of them had a female accomplice, to whom you have been introduced under the alias of Mrs. Helen Wiltshire. A pretty little bow to top this strange affair, would you not say so, Lestrade?” Holmes rejoiced.

The inspector stood there stunned for an instant; but a howl of fury and a charge for the door on the part of Mr. Charles Cutmore ceased all rumination. The set of brawny constables hurtled headlong into action, and the pair wrestled their frenzied captive into a set of derbies.

“You’ve no right!” Charles Cutmore spat at us. “After all o’ this time, by God, how d’ye think ye’ve the right?”

“Precisely my question, Mr. Cutmore,” said Holmes. “After all of this time safe in Siam with your plunder, why return?”

A steely shutter closed over the bank robber’s face even as he renewed his violent efforts to break free. He was dragged, spitting curses at the lot of us, into the adjoining parlour as the men awaited instructions.

“What the devil was that?” Lestrade cried. “A clearer confession I’ve never heard, but that doesn’t explain - “

“No, but this does,” Holmes said almost reverently, turning as he lifted one of the glass jars from its shelf.

A miniscule red creature swam within, suspended in pale green-tinged water. It was no bigger than my thumbnail, and the shape of a repulsive maggotlike larvae. I felt my skin tingle with disgust when I saw that, though eyeless, one end of the tiny worm was equipped with a gaping sucker-like mouth.

“Behold the Siamese red leech,” Holmes declaimed grandly, presenting it to us. “Not our murder weapon, Lestrade, but one of its kindred. Some of my own studies regarding blood led to a side interest in leeches, and this is one of the only deadly specimens in the known world. It possesses biochemical enzymes in its mouth which render its victims numb and dazed when attacked - and, after having bloated itself upon its unsuspecting meal, expanding to hundreds of times its size when unfed, the same chemicals shrink the wound until it is practically invisible.”

“My God, that’s hideous!” the inspector breathed, echoing my own thoughts. “But how did you - “

“Charles Cutmore and Michael Crosby were known to be the culprits in the Drummonds affair, but they went deep underground,” my friend explained, setting down the deadly specimen. “Crosby had never been photographed, though his description was circulated - he was the faceless banker who enabled the inside job to take place at all - but Cutmore was already making advances in his studies of marine animals, marsh grasses, freshwater habitats, and the like when the theft was discovered, and his photograph was published by the Scottish authorities, which is how I came to know of him. The pair were at school together in Edinburgh. Much more was known about Cutmore than Crosby and, at the time of the robbery seven years ago, Cutmore was affianced to one Helen Ainsley, with whom we spoke. I never dreamed that Charles Cutmore and Horatio Swann were the same biologist until yesterday.”

“It still isn’t clear to me,” I interjected. “You yourself asked him why he returned. Whyever should Cutmore murder Crosby, and after all this time?”

“There we enter the realm of conjecture,” Holmes admitted, “and shall only know all after Cutmore is questioned. But here is what I propose: after the robbery, Cutmore made off with considerably more than his share of the profits - note comparatively the residences of the conspirators, after all. So. Cutmore fled to Siam, publishing under an alias and waiting until such time as he could return to the British Isles without his features being so recognisable. Crosby, meanwhile, disappeared into the great cesspool of London and took Helen Ainsley with him, marrying her in Cutmore’s absence and continuing to practice banking, from time to time mourning his lost fortune. They may well have believed that the man who betrayed them would never return. But suppose that Cutmore still harboured affections for Helen Ainsley and regretted the loss of her? The reunion last night may have purported to be a friendly one, and Cutmore may even have vowed to restore what he owed them - we have seen the results, however.”

“You think this was a crime of passion?” Lestrade drew nearer, glowering.

“Of a sort. Of a very premeditated sort. You have met Charles Cutmore,” Holmes reminded him, half-sitting on the desk. “He and Mrs. Wiltmore were once engaged. He does not seem to me the type to remain in hiding forever, supposing he desires to return to someplace, or someone for that matter.”

“But what of her husband?”

“Surely you can see that her marriage to the man calling himself John Wiltmore was a matter of expediency - they knew one another’s worst secrets and were very much thrown together. I do not claim to have any practical knowledge of the matter, but who ever heard of a married couple who never fought, as Mrs. Stubbs claimed? If they seldom fought, I should only have suspected a happy union, and the same goes for an unhappy one if they fought often. But never? It wasn’t a union at all. In fact, I should lose no time arresting her.”

“On what charge?” Lestrade demanded.

“That of ordering a bath for her freshly unsettled husband and placing a Siamese red leech in it,” Holmes replied, his piercing tenor grown grave. “You don’t suppose that Charles Cutmore marched up the stairs and dropped it in unnoticed? When I asked him why he returned, he refused to answer, though he had already given himself away - he was trying to shield his former fiancée. The urge was an honourable one, though she shan’t escape the law. I haven’t evidence enough lacking her confession to prove my findings in the mystery of the missing willow basket, but judging by her behavior at the house, she’ll crack on her own once Cutmore is charged. The pair of them have been in contact for far longer than a day, I believe, probably since shortly after his return to England and his purchase of this estate.”

“The missing willow basket? Make some sense, by George!”

“Where is the leech now, Lestrade?” Holmes spread his hands in a dramatic show of longsuffering.

“Good heavens,” I gasped. “Holmes, you’re right - you must be. They planned it together. You said she had been walking by the Thames and not in the park. She took the leech, wrapped it in the cloth, and made off with it in the marketing basket. It must be in the river now.”

“Managing to make the most disgusting body of water in the history of mankind still more repugnant.” Holmes chuckled, clapping once. “Well done, my dear fellow.”

“To think that he left Helen Ainsley behind and then never forgot her, only to lose her again,” I reflected. “It’s a terrible story.”

“And you claim,” Lestrade hissed, advancing still further on my friend, “that you knew all this yesterday?”

Holmes glared down his hawklike nose at the inspector. “Can you be serious? Are you suggesting you would have believed me if I told you last night that John Wiltmore was killed by a Siamese leech?”

“I might have believed you.”

“You might have laughed in my face. This relentless persecution grows tedious, Lestrade.”

“Persecution?” Lestrade snarled. “I’m persecuting you? Oh, that’s rich, Mr. Holmes. Very funny.”

“Oddly, I don’t find it the slightest bit amusing.”

“Gentlemen-” I began.

“Let’s have it out in the open then, shall we? Man to man?” Lestrade’s shoulders hunched above his clenched hands as if he longed to express his emotions with pugilism.

“By Jove, yes, let’s,” my friend hissed, standing to his full height.

“Perhaps I had better give you some privacy.” Fearing nothing for my friend’s safety but feeling dreadfully awkward, I took a step backwards only to find that Lestrade was pointing at me furiously.

“That man,” Lestrade snapped, “would - no, don’t leave, Dr. Watson, you’d best hear my mind on the subject. That man there, Mr. Holmes, would have taken a bullet for you, I’d stake my own life on it.”

Holmes said nothing as I gaped at them.

“And what do you do?” Lestrade was turning crimson with fury. “Instead of seeing it through together, you leave the doctor out entirely, and then you make him think you were dead. You stood up there at the altar with him on his wedding day, for the love of all that’s decent, and do you suppose he enjoyed being written out of the picture? For that matter, how do you suppose I felt when I learnt about your demise from a common news hawker? Or when I discovered down at the Yard that Inspector Patterson was dashing about rounding up the scoundrels you had apparently been trying to capture for three long months? I should have thought we deserved better from you, Mr. Holmes, and you ought to know it.”

Sherlock Holmes, always remarkably pale-complected, had turned absolutely pallid during this speech, though his face betrayed no expression whatsoever otherwise. Meanwhile, my heart was in my throat. I had hardly begun to speak when Holmes held up a perfectly steady hand demanding my silence and said frostily, “You want to know why I left the papers needed to destroy the Moriarty network with Patterson and not with you?”

“I’d find the subject of interest, yes,” the small inspector seethed.

Holmes towered over him with that air of aristocratic mastery only he can assume. “I selected Patterson for the task because he was not you.”

“Of all the...” Lestrade spluttered in outrage.

My friend commenced idly examining his fingernails. “Professor Moriarty was proven to be directly or indirectly responsible for the murder of no less than forty persons, though I suspect the true death count to be fifty-two. Patterson is above the common herd, for a Yarder anyhow, but I had previously worked with him twice. You and I, Inspector,” he continued, pretending to struggle for the exact accounting, “have worked together on... let me think, dear me, thirty-eight cases, today marking the thirty-ninth. Now, I realise that so many figures in a row must be difficult for a man of your acumen to grapple with, but I shall add one more and have done. Ask me how many times I was shot at during the course of this very interesting little problem we are discussing.”

“How many?” Lestrade inquired rather faintly.

“Nineteen,” my friend reported, though this time fire underlay the ice of his tone. “And if you think I am not aware of the fact that man, as you referred to him, would take a bullet for me, then you are still denser than I had previously supposed.”

So saying, Holmes checked the time on his pocket watch and swept out of the room.

We were silent for a moment.

“Oh, good lord,” Lestrade groaned, rubbing his hand over his prim features. “I’m the biggest fool in Christendom. That was... God help me.”

“I’m going to...” said I, gesturing helplessly.

“Yes, yes, go!” the inspector urged, pushing my shoulder. “I’ll just confer with the constables while I reflect on the fact that Mr. Holmes is right to call me dense. Go on, quick march.”

Hastily, I gave chase. Not imagining my highly reserved friend had any wish to remain in a house where such a scene had just been enacted, as his levels of detachment border upon the mechanical, I dove for the entryway and the faintly blue atmosphere of the mild spring morning beyond.

I found Sherlock Holmes some thirty yards distant, leaning against the ivy-draped stone wall. He seemingly awaited my arrival, although he confined his eyes to the smoke drifting skyward from his cigarette. When I had reached him, I halted the words which threatened to leap from my tongue, knowing this situation required more careful handling. Several tacks were considered before I settled on the one likeliest to succeed without causing further harm, and immediately, I breathed easier.

“Well, my dear fellow?” Holmes prompted in a strained voice when I said nothing. Crossing his sinewy limbs, he lifted a single eyebrow although he still failed to look at me. “Have you any salient remarks to add to this topic? Come, come, I am eager for all relevant opinions upon - “

“Holmes,” said I, gripping him warmly by the forearm. “Everything I have to say has already crossed your mind.”

He did peer at me then, searching my face with the sort of razor focus he ordinarily devotes to outlandishly complex and inexplicable crime scenes. After what seemed an age of this scrutiny, a sorrowful smile crept over the edges of his mouth.

“Then possibly my answer has crossed yours,” he continued to quote in an undertone. “You stand fast?”

“Absolutely,” I vowed.

A flinch no one save I would ever have caught twitched across his aquiline features; he then clapped my hand which still grasped his arm and broke away to stub his cigarette out against the wall.

“The inspector is sorry over - “

“He needn’t be. As Charles Cutmore seems to have learnt to his detriment, the returning can be harder than the leaving.”

“Holmes - “

“Do you know, as many features of interest as this case held, I find I tire of it dreadfully, my dear Watson,” he announced, wholly returned to his proud and practical self. “A ride back to London with our friend Lestrade and his men and our quarry I think is in order, then a pot of tea at Baker Street and a complete perusal of the morning editions on my part, whilst you work upon whatever grotesquely embellished account of our exploits you plan to inflict on the world next, followed by a change of collar and an oyster supper before Massenet’s Manon at eight.”

So it came about that the good Inspector Lestrade, whose opinion of Holmes’s dramatic demise had been such a low one, came to look upon the matter in another light. Whether he ever again spoke to my friend of that impassioned conversation, neither man was gregarious enough to inform me; I highly doubt they broached the topic afterwards. To this very day, however, when Holmes requires a stout colleague or Lestrade has need of England’s greatest detective, they call upon one another without hesitation. The horrible death of Crosby the banker was determined a murder by the Assizes and will be tried as such; though the fates of Charles Cutmore and Helen Ainsley have not yet been determined, they belong to that enormous criminal fraternity who have such ample cause to bemoan the existence of my fast friend, the incomparable Mr. Sherlock Holmes.