Not an hour later, I was washed, dressed and standing in a Scotland Yard laboratory. Tovey’s gamble had paid off – as soon as Holmes heard the inspector’s strange story, my friend had taken his suitcase back to the guest room, changed from country tweeds to city attire and was waiting back in the hallway, hurrying me along.
My wife, now awake, had watched Inspector Tovey bustle us out of the front door and stated through thin lips her delight that Holmes had decided to extend his visit after all.
I knew she would have more words to say on the matter when we returned, but for now my attention was focused on the waxy appendage laid out on a tray on the pathologist’s slab.
“What do you make of it, Watson?” Holmes asked.
I bent to examine the hand, gently testing its joints, lifting each finger slightly in turn.
“There’s no sign of rigor mortis,” I reported, “which means, judging by the state of the skin, that the hand was removed more than forty-eight hours ago.” I looked up at Tovey. “When did you say it was found?”
This time, the inspector had no need to consult his notebook. “Ten past ten on Monday morning.”
“Which means that it was amputated no more than twelve hours before its discovery.”
I glanced up from the grisly artefact. “Remember how hot it was on Saturday, Holmes, before the weather broke in the evening?”
Holmes nodded. “If, then, the hand had been exposed to the warm air before that point—”
“I would expect the rate of decay to be significantly accelerated,” I confirmed, standing again.
“You mentioned amputation,” Holmes prompted, “suggesting surgical removal, rather than loss of the appendage in a fight?”
I turned the tray so that Holmes could see the sheared bone. The hand still possessed a length of forearm, three inches or so from the wrist.
“I assume that you have brought a magnifying glass?”
“As if I would leave the house without one,” Holmes declared, producing a large glass, which he delivered into my hand.
“Force of habit once again?” I countered, turning the lens on the two rings of exposed bone. I checked the cuts myself, before moving aside so that Holmes could make his own study.
“Ah yes,” he said, peering through the glass. “I see them.”
“See what?” asked the inspector.
“Grooves cut into the bone by a surgical saw,” I explained. “On both the ulna and the radius.”
“Does it have to be surgical?” Tovey enquired. “Butchers have been known to cut through bone.”
“They have,” replied Holmes, “but in this case, the doctor is absolutely correct.” He angled the glass so that Tovey could observe the markings.
“As you can see here and here, whatever implement sliced through these bones possessed fine teeth, capable of precision work. Butchery saws are positively barbaric in comparison with modern medical equipment.”
Pleased though I was that Holmes had jumped to my defence, my analysis of the bones was as yet incomplete.
“That may be true,” I said, taking back the glass, “although I would suggest that whoever performed the amputation, while obviously skilled, was in something of a hurry. Examining the cut itself, I would suggest that he got halfway through, before either the saw caught or he was disturbed. See? The angle of the cut changes slightly—”
“Meaning that our mystery surgeon shifted position to resume the operation,” Holmes said. “Excellent work, Watson. Now, what of these?”
Holmes was pointing to a thin line of puckered scars that ran an inch or so from the wrist.
“I thought you would never ask,” I said, eagerly. Carefully, I turned the hand over onto its back so that the bloodless palm faced upwards. “The scarring continues all the way around the wrist.”
“A perfect ring of stitches,” Holmes said, gently attempting to prise the scar apart with his middle and index fingers.
“Stitches?” Tovey repeated. “You mean that Pike – or whoever this is – attempted to slash his wrist and was stitched back together?”
“Suicides tend to stop at the wrist,” I pointed out, “not slice all around the arm.”
“What would produce such an injury, then?” the inspector asked.
“Replantation,” Holmes replied without hesitation. Tovey was still none the wiser. “Which is?”
“Impossible,” I said. “Replantation is the theorised surgical reattachment of a body part.”
Holmes took up the explanation. “Say a farm worker loses an arm in a threshing accident. There are those who believe that one day it will be possible to reattach the limb.”
“What? To sew it back on?”
Holmes nodded. “Reconnecting the vascular system and reattaching both muscle and bone. After a period of recuperation, the patient would be able to use his arm as if it had never been severed from the body. A medical miracle.”
“If the process were ever perfected,” I countered. “Even if muscles and blood vessels could be successfully stitched back together, infection would be inevitable. I have no doubt that one day such an operation may be possible, but not for decades, maybe even centuries.”
“And yet we have Mr Pike’s wrist,” Holmes said, once again examining the scars. “One enigma after another, eh? Whatever your doubts, Watson, even you must recognise the skill demonstrated in such needlework?”
Holmes was right. Whoever had produced such regimented sutures was no mere skilled surgeon; he was an artist. I had never seen work so delicate and yet secure, each stitch perfectly placed along the long white scar that circumnavigated the wrist.
“So, you’re saying that our hand had been severed before and reattached, only to be severed again?”
“Of course not,” Holmes said, bluntly. “That would be, as Watson explained, impossible – although I would think that the good doctor is itching to open up the wrist and see if there are any other signs of replantation beneath the skin.”
Undeniably the thought had crossed my mind. “Perhaps that would be an examination best left to the police pathologist,” I said, however, with a certain regret in my voice.
“Luckily, there is much we can learn from Pike’s hand without resorting to the scalpel,” Holmes said. “You say that it was discovered near Tower Bridge?”
Tovey nodded. “St Katharine Docks, to be precise.”
“The western or eastern basin?” Holmes asked, running his glass over the palm of the hand.
The inspector reached for his notebook, flicking through pages of neat handwriting. “Western,” he eventually reported. “Near the dockmaster’s house. He noticed it while checking the lock, discarded in a clump of weeds according to the first officer on the scene.”
“So that’s where it happened?” I asked. “Whatever it was?”
“I don’t think so, Watson,” Holmes said, passing me the lens once again. “What do you make of these lacerations? Here, across the distal palmar, and also on the thenar eminence.”
I examined the areas Holmes had indicated, first the bridge of skin beneath the fingers and then the cluster of muscle beside the thumb.
“They’re punctures rather than cuts,” I exclaimed, looking back up at my friend. “Bite marks, maybe. Some kind of dog?”
“A Jack Russell, I would suggest,” came the reply, “according to the distance between the wounds. Possibly a Border Terrier at a push.”
I continued my examination. “There’s no sign of inflammation around the marks—”
“Meaning that they were incurred after the hand had been removed from Pike’s body.”
A gruesome thought occurred to me. “Good Lord. Could the hound have been attempting to eat it?”
Holmes dismissed the notion with a shake of his head. “There are no signs of gnawing, although if we turn the hand over we can see similar wounds on the reverse.”
The detective did so, revealing a series of punctures in corresponding areas on the back of the hand.
“Carried then?” I suggested, the image of a small dog, trotting along the Thames with a human hand in its mouth, no less disturbing than the thought of the appendage being chewed.
“That would be my hypothesis,” Holmes agreed.
“So the hand was found by a dog,” said Tovey, his police-trained mind filing the evidence into a plausible course of events, “and transported to the docks.”
“Where it was dropped, ready to be discovered the following morning,” Holmes concluded.
“Then we’re no nearer to understanding where the dratted thing originated,” I sighed, instantly castigating myself. It was all too easy in cases such as this to reduce body parts to objects; mere evidence to be studied and then discarded when their usefulness had passed, a habit I always fought hard to resist. Whether I was in a pathology lab, or examining the mummies of the British Museum, I tried to remember that these things had once been parts of living, breathing people. They were neither artefacts nor evidence; they were human remains, and it was necessary to treat them with respect.
Of course, Holmes would have scoffed at such sentimentality. My friend had elevated professional detachment to an art form. Leaning closer, he held out his palm to me as if I were a nurse assisting at an operation. “Tweezers, Watson.”
Used to his brusqueness, I did as I was asked and watched as Holmes, keeping the tweezers closed, scraped beneath the fingernails.
“A dish if you please, Doctor,” he instructed, and I started to rummage through the pathology cupboards for a petri dish, Holmes hurrying me along.
“Give a man a chance,” I scolded him as I found a stock of glass containers and passed one over. Carefully, he tipped a scrap of dark sludge into the dish.
“Mud?” I enquired.
“Clay. In particular, London Clay of the stratigraphic range associated with the Ypresian age. Naturally it possesses a bluish-grey appearance, which turns brown when weathered.”
“Yes, yes. If you could spare us the geological seminar…”
Holmes sighed. “It’s found throughout the London Basin, from Wiltshire to Essex, but in the capital itself is most likely to be found near the Thames.”
“So our man was working on the river,” Tovey said, “before the hand was removed.”
“A logical conclusion, Inspector.”
“But if the hand was found by a dog…” I pointed out.
“We still have no idea where,” Tovey concluded.
I nodded. “The Thames covers a lot of ground.”
“Which is why I require hydrofluoric and perchloric acids, plus a hearty breakfast,” Holmes announced. “I assume that the pathology department has stores of the former, if not the latter?”
Soon, Holmes, Tovey and I had repaired to a local café for sustenance, while the clay sample settled in a solution mixed by my friend from the two acids. It may appear remarkable that we could even think of food after such a grisly examination, but the exertions of the previous evening and the strange thrill of being back on a case had left me ravenous. As Napoleon himself said, an army marches on its stomach, as do detectives of the law, especially in the case of Inspector Tovey. The amount of food the man could put away was almost as astonishing as the crimes he investigated, although the conversation was light and the friendship we had kindled all those years ago burned as brightly as ever.
Our appetites sated, we returned to the laboratory where Holmes boiled away the liquid, ready for the soil to be dried and filtered.
Then the waiting began anew, as Holmes tested and analysed the sample, while I whiled away the rest of the morning with The Times in Tovey’s office, which I was pleased to report was as neat and tidy as his vast beard was wild and unruly.
It was mid-afternoon before Holmes burst into the office, a large book in one hand and his results in the other.
“I thought as much,” he enthused. “If I am correct, and I know I am, I can pinpoint the last known location of our mystery hand before it was liberated from its arm.”
“We stand ready to be amazed,” Tovey said, flipping open his notebook in readiness.
Holmes deposited his papers on the desk. “It’s all there for you, Inspector. As I hypothesised, the sample was riverbank clay, and I have found significant traces of both copper and arsenic.”
“Arsenic?” I repeated, concerned by the mention of the deadly poison.
“Do not worry yourself, Doctor,” Holmes said, raising a calming hand. “In this case the chemical comes from an innocent source, if not an eminently wise one. Both copper and arsenic are used in the manufacture of the emerald green dye so beloved of wallpaper manufacturers and even confectioners these days.”
“Arsenic in confectionery?” Tovey exclaimed. “Next you’ll be telling us it’s used in toys.”
“Indeed it is,” Holmes confirmed, “which is why the practice has largely been discontinued. In fact, according to the gazetteer in New Scotland Yard’s surprisingly comprehensive library, only a handful of factories still practise the method.”
“Including one on the Thames?” I suggested.
“Not half a mile from St Katharine Docks,” Holmes revealed triumphantly.
“Then that is where we shall go,” I said, folding my newspaper and slipping it under my arm.
Holmes regarded me with amusement. “Watson, surely you are not telling me you are ready to charge around London on another crusade with me?”
“Someone has to look after you,” I replied. “Especially if you don’t have an umbrella to hand.”
Tovey looked between us in bewilderment. “I’m not going to pretend I know what you’re talking about,” said he, “but I can get a car outside for us in five minutes flat, if you don’t mind an old bloodhound of the law tagging along.”
“Of course not,” Holmes replied. “It is your case after all – and besides, I can hardly see you staying behind when you hear what else I discovered.”
“And that is?” I prompted.
Holmes’s eyes sparkled. “There was something else beneath Pike’s fingernails. A minute trace of a mud from a foreign shore.”
I could guess what was coming as Holmes slammed the book he had been carrying down on the desk, revealing it to be an atlas, full of colourful maps.
He found the page he was looking for and jabbed a finger at the map in question.
“Northern France,” I said, peering over.
“The Douai Plains,” Holmes confirmed. “Now, as we know from personal experience, Watson, the trenches were muddy places indeed.”
“More like hell on earth,” I murmured, trying not to dredge up memories that I had hoped to bury for ever.
“So, it is Pike’s hand?” Tovey asked, dragging me back to the here and now.
“The fingerprints alone tell us that, Inspector,” Holmes replied. “Of the fact that the hand belongs to Samuel Pike there is no doubt. What I want to know is where he has been for the last two years, and how he survived a German bullet to the brain.”