“EYE-OH, WADSAH!” CALLED WARLOCK FROM THE SOFA.
I stopped, hat still in my hand. My eyes narrowed. I presumed him to mean “Hi-ho, Watson!”—a greeting he often employed when his mood was good. Yet his mood was terrible. In fact, I was just returning from wandering about the city all day in the express attempt to avoid being caught up in his sulk. It now being over a month since our last case, Warlock was bored, inconsolable and insufferable.
My hand moved slowly as I placed my hat on its hook and ventured a tentative, “Hullo, Warlock. I must say, you seem to be in good spirits this evening.”
“Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm,” he agreed.
“What might be the cause of this sudden reversal?”
“I toog mah medisuh.”
“Medicine?”
“Yah. Medisuh,” he said jovially. He gave me a silly smile and sank back onto the sofa with a relaxation so profound that he seemed almost boneless. His head lolled forward just beyond the arm of the sofa, then suddenly fell. His brow smashed down onto our side table with a sickening thunk, but this drew no protest except for a grunt of self-recrimination, followed by a childish giggle.
Let me tell you: there are few surer ways of attracting a doctor’s interest. I sprang across the room to learn what medicine Holmes had dosed himself with. On the table next to his head stood a wooden goblet. A few sips of silvery liquid remained in the bottom, with fatty white chunks floating lazily in it. The odor it gave forth burned the nose, but had a familiar scent—almost like almonds.
Since there was no apparent source of this medicine in the sitting room, I ran to the door of Holmes’s bedroom and peered inside. On the desk where he kept his alchemical kit lay a paper parcel from our local dispensary. The largest jar of mercury I have ever seen lay open and half empty in the middle, surrounded by a vial of cyanide, an open packet of strychnine, and a half-used cake of Mrs. Hudson’s cleaning lye.
“Holmes!” I cried. “What have you done? You’ll be dead in minutes!”
“Nah,” he scoffed.
“Why, Holmes? Why did you do it?”
“Wadsah, calm dow. Ih has no effeh ohh me.”
“No effect?”
“No effeh.”
“If that is so, lift your head off the table!”
He gave a few feeble flops. His arms and legs seemed not to respond to his will in the least, but his torso could still bend back and forth. He looked like a salmon that had been caught and flung in the bottom of a boat. Holmes endeavored three or four of these contortions, managing only to raise his head a half inch or so from the table, before letting it plonk down once again, beside his deadly goblet.
“Meh…” he said, “I don’d wand do righ now.”
I stood, helplessly racking my mind for a way to save him. Lye I could deal with, though even if life was preserved, terrible and lasting damage was a certainty. Mercury is a comparatively slow killer, but even if I could void it from his belly, some quantity must already have been absorbed into his tissues and could never be purged. Even if he survived the day, madness, blindness, organ failure and death might follow. I could give him tannic acid for the strychnine, yet there was little hope in that. But cyanide? The body absorbed it so quickly that death was certain within minutes and little could be done.
As I panicked, my eye was drawn to the deadly silver semi-circles his goblet had left upon the surface of our side table. They looked to me like four crescent moons: unfeeling, unforgiving and unstoppable. One might as well try to halt the nightly waxing or waning of the moon above as to save the man that had partaken of those four crescents’ deadly brew.
But wait…
Four?
Even if Holmes had spilled some of his terrible “medicine” down the side of his glass on his first drink, he would have then had to put down the goblet and pick it up four more times to have left those marks. Probably, there was a fifth hiding below the base of the glass. Lye is even more notable for its level of pain than for its efficacy. How could he have sat blithely sipping on it for long enough to leave four marks?
“Holmes… When did you drink this?”
“Lungetibe.”
Lunchtime? A glance at the clock on the mantelpiece confirmed that it was now past eight. Even given Holmes’s liberal interpretation of when it might be proper to take the midday meal, six hours must have passed since his first drink.
Well… four hours, anyway.
“Are you telling me you’ve been sipping on this poison for half the day?”
“Yah, buh dond worry, Wadsah. Id has no effeh,” he said. He gave me a broad, friendly smile and lapsed into unconsciousness. His pulse was weak, his breathing shallow and interrupted by strychnine spasms and periods of apnea which lasted sometimes four or five minutes. I can hardly describe the mixture of hopefulness and helplessness I felt as I sat by him that night, wishing that all the medical knowledge I had spent so long mastering would prove false.
It did.
I do not recall dropping off to sleep, but I must have done shortly before dawn. I had no sense that I’d slept at all, only the sensation of jarring back to wakefulness when I heard Holmes say, “Watson, get the door, won’t you? I am indisposed.”
“Huh? Warlock? You’re alive?”
“So very alive! I tell you, Watson, I am renewed; I am rejuvenated.”
“Are you?” I asked, carefully appraising his physique. “Because you seem to be still unable to move your limbs.”
“Pish-tosh! Such pursuits are overrated. I tell you: I am relieved at last. None of the little buggers are whispering to me this morning. Not even Moriarty; I can’t hear him at all.”
“Is that why you drank poison?”
“Of course! Don’t you remember me telling you I had a penchant for poisons, on the day we met?”
“Well yes, but you didn’t mention that you intended to poison yourself!”
“I haven’t. What I have done is poisoned the thousand demons who clamor for my attention at all hours of every day. Yes, sir, I have clobbered them all into comas and I intend to enjoy each instant while they are knocked out. I myself am quite unaffected by such mortal draughts.”
“So you keep saying…”
“Look here, are you going to be argumentative all morning, or are you going to answer the door?”
“What—” I started to ask, but was interrupted by a rapping at the door and Mrs. Hudson’s shrill voice calling, “Didn’t want to knock you gentlemen up, but she insisted. Wouldn’t go away, would she?”
“I am sorry, I’m sure,” said a second lady’s voice, “but the matter cannot wait. And besides, it is nearly ten o’clock.”
The response of any well-bred Englishman to the realization that he has left visitors standing unattended on his doorstep is one of pure horror. I leapt across the room and swung the door wide. I was beginning to form some word of welcome or apology or both, but before I had quite decided on the phrase to use, Mrs. Hudson got a look at me and said, “Oh dear, Dr. Watson.”
I was still in my shirtsleeves from the night before. My collar had come undone and I found a patch of slick, sticky drool stretching from my shoulder, all the way down to the waist of my trousers. As for those trousers, I must have unfastened them at some point in the evening, for they were loose and headed down towards my ankles at a rapid rate. With a gasp, I caught them and pulled them back into place. For a moment I had the horrid realization that this must have been an occurrence straight out of one of Mrs. Hudson’s shameful novels. I was mortified to have stumbled into such a position, sure that she would gain indecent delight from having caught me so. Yet, her expression betrayed no intimate desires whatsoever. In fact, her raised eyebrow seemed only to say, “Meh… I’ve seen better.”
“Oh dear,” she said again.
“Yes… Good morning… I… I fear we are not prepared to receive visitors,” I stammered. “Do come in, though. Do.”
Mrs. Hudson did not come in. Instead, she indicated her companion with a jerk of her thumb, announced, “Miss Helen Stoner”, and shuffled off down the stairs.
I could think of no way to explain my situation, so I only said, “Welcome, Miss Stoner; please come in. May I offer you some tea?”
“How generous,” said she. “I would love a cup.”
It struck me as odd that she seemed in earnest when she called the offer generous. In this, the era of Victoria, a cup of tea is not a kindness when hosting; it is a necessity. I am not sure which would be more shocking: to enter a stranger’s home and discover their house had no floor or to enter and not be offered tea. I deduced that our guest was a person unused to kindness or even civility.
Her appearance did not disappoint that assessment. Though she was yet within her early twenties, her hair was shot through with gray and she wore a worried air. She dressed in the style of the country gentry, but there was a threadbare quality to her clothes. Her dress was dark and dour—suited more to an elderly spinster than a young one, I thought. She had a fair face and—given her age and station—she might have been quite the tempting marriage prospect, were it not for the overall haggard and harried look of her.
“Miss Stoner, I am Dr. John Watson. The gentleman on the sofa is my friend and colleague, Mr. Warlock Holmes.”
“Ah! It is him I came to see.”
“I thought as much; I shall attend to the tea. May I first take your coat?”
“Thank you.”
I settled our guest in one of the armchairs across from Holmes. He smiled at her and said, “Good morning, Miss Stoner, I hope you won’t mind if I don’t get up.”
“Of course.”
“I absolutely could, though, if I wanted to.”
“Er… yes, Mr. Holmes, I am sure that must be the case.”
“I’ll be a few moments with the tea,” I said. “Miss Stoner, why don’t you tell Holmes what is wrong.”
She shook her head and averted her gaze to her hands, which lay upon her lap, each fretting with the lace of the other’s cuff. “I am not sure anything is wrong,” she said. “Yet, I am in fear for my very life.”
“Hmmm… mysterious already,” said Holmes. “Do tell us all.”
“Well… I live with my stepfather in Surrey. Until two years ago, my sister lived with us, but she is gone now.”
“Gone?” asked Holmes.
“Dead. Murdered, I fear. And—oh, it is silly—but I have it in my mind that I am next. Julia was my twin, you see. Sisters are always close and twins, they say, are even closer. Julia and I shared the further bond of growing up together without a father.”
“What happened to him?” asked Holmes.
“He died when we were only two. We grew up with my mother. We were comfortable enough; Mama had some family money and my father’s army pension. When we were eight, she married Dr. Grimesby Roylott—that’s my stepfather. God forgive me, but I do not know what she saw in the man.”
I suspended my tea-making long enough to ask, “He has a temper, I presume?”
“Oh, have you heard of him? Yes, his rages are famous throughout Surrey. They joke of him in the taverns, I know it! Only when he is not there, I am sure. When he is present, none would dare to laugh. Dr. Roylott is… Well, I will not speak ill of him, but I hate to think of what he would do if he knew I had come here today.”
There was something particularly dark about the way she said it and I had to ask, “This is off the topic, I know, Miss Stoner, but has your family ever been troubled by scurvy, rickets or polio?”
“No, nothing like that.”
“Neither your mother, your sister nor… yourself?”
“Certainly not.”
“Ah well, I apologize for the interruption. How did your mother get along with Dr. Roylott?”
Miss Stoner barked out an angry laugh and said, “Seven years ago she was killed in a railway accident and let me tell you, Dr. Watson, it must have come as a great relief to her. I cannot account for her attraction to the man, or why she would want to go live in his dreadful little house. Now she is gone, just like Papa is gone. And Julia is gone and… Oh, why should I even try to preserve myself? We’re all going, don’t you see? Chance is picking us off one by one and maybe the living are not so fortunate as the dead…”
She was entirely hysterical at this point. Abandoning my tea, I rushed to her side and took her hand. “There, there, Miss Stoner,” I said. “All is well. You have come to Holmes and me now; we will put things to rights, you will see.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “Yes, of course. I wonder… is there a place where I might…”
“Just this way, Miss Stoner,” I said, taking her by the arm and leading her to the bathroom. “Take your time. Holmes and I are perfectly comfortable out here.”
I ought to have left her and gone back to the sitting room. Indeed, I gave her every impression as the door closed that I was doing just that, but as soon as the latch clicked, I hastened back to it, as quietly as I could.
“What are you doing?” whispered Holmes.
Unwilling to make a noise, I carefully mouthed “listening” so Holmes might read my lips.
He nodded his understanding, then screwed up his face and a moment later said, “Watson, I’m surprised at you. Listening at the door while a lady uses the lavatory—it just isn’t like you.”
“Holmes! Damn it! I—” I rushed back into the sitting room “—I am not listening to hear her use the lavatory! That is… No! She is hysterical and she is wearing a whalebone corset! Did you see her? She can barely breathe in that thing. I am listening for the sound of her falling to the floor.”
“The floor?”
“Yes. You may be unaware of this, Holmes, but proper English ladies will often ask for a quiet place to compose themselves. Once installed, the constriction of their undergarments often causes them to faint.”
“I did not know that.”
“Well, it would be of little concern, but if she happens to fall in a posture that makes breathing even more difficult, that whalebone corset may prove to be the end of her.”
“Ha! That is a silly way to die, don’t you think?” laughed Holmes.
“Is it? Then why do you suppose it is so very popular?”
I strained to hear if our guest was still on her feet, but presently she ran some water in the basin and I knew her to still be conscious. Warlock gestured me over to him to make a confession.
“I don’t even know why she’s here, Watson.”
“She needs help, can’t you see?”
“But our help?” said Warlock. “I told you of the brimstone thread once, do you remember? How it moves through the tapestry of life, crossing one strand, then the next?”
“Yes, yes.”
“Like cloth, reality moves in distinct patterns, Watson. As such, threads that cross the brimstone must bear some proximity to one another. I myself… how shall I say… I run parallel to the brimstone thread and right along it. Thus, the people who come to me for help usually do so because they—like me—have encountered the brimstone thread more than once. Their problems tend to be ones that can only be addressed by those who have become accustomed to the mystic and the weird.”
“What is your point, Holmes?”
“As yet, Miss Stoner has given no indication that her troubles are… unusual. There seems to be no particular reason she has been brought to me as opposed to, say, Scotland Yard. Should we ask her to leave?”
“Certainly not! Did you see her left arm, Holmes?”
“She’s wearing a long-sleeved dress.”
“Yes, and even so, it is clear that her left forearm curves notably away from her body. Did you observe her shoes?”
“Erm… they’re black?”
“Immaterial. What is important is that the soles are of differing thicknesses. One of her legs is shorter than the other, yet she claims to have suffered none of the bone-deforming illnesses that haunt our age.”
“So?”
“So, at some point, her left arm has been broken and she received no medical care for it. Likewise, her left leg—I am guessing her left femur at the distal epiphyseal plate—was broken in her youth, severely enough that it never grew to its proper length. From the little she’s told us so far, I have to presume that this stepfather of hers is to blame. The man is a monster, Holmes!”
“Ah. Well, she’d better stay, then.”
“Quite,” said I and walked back towards our bathroom door to check on our guest. I had taken no more than two steps before I recalled to whom I had been speaking and turned back to say, “Not a proper monster.”
“No?” said Holmes; he looked disappointed.
“It is only a figure of speech. I mean that I presume him to be a normal man whose behavior is abominable. I say this to you now, because I don’t want you to sulk if it turns out he isn’t a minotaur or something.”
Holmes gave me a sour look, but nodded his agreement. Soon, the click of the bathroom lock gave me to believe our guest was returning. She stepped back into the sitting room, calmer and more collected than she had been.
“I’m sorry,” said she. “I’m not even sure why I came here.”
“I know! Neither am I,” said Holmes. “It’s funny, isn’t it?”
“Perhaps I should just return home to Stoke Moran and forget this—”
She didn’t finish. I’m sure if he could have made it to his feet, Holmes would have been on them. He shouted, “Stoke what?”
“Moran?” I said.
“Yes. Stoke Moran. That is our home. It was one of the great houses of Surrey once, but now it’s gone to wrack and ruin.”
“And one may presume the house is named for the family that established it?” I asked.
“It is,” Miss Stoner said. “The Roylott side of the family has had it for a generation or two, but the house was traditionally held by the Morans.”
“That’s why she’s here,” Warlock declared. “I knew there must be a reason.”
“Do you know if any of these relatives might be named Sebastian Moran?” I asked.
“A few, I think. Sebastian is a common name, out our way.”
“May one also presume that Dr. Roylott is far from the only member of the family with a sour reputation?”
“One may indeed,” Miss Stoner agreed, “though I think few of the locals would put it so delicately. The Morans have been hated for generations.”
“If your stepfather is anything like the Moran I know, he is a formidable gentleman indeed,” said Warlock.
“Perhaps. I’ve never met any of them, apart from Dr. Roylott,” Miss Stoner said, shrugging.
“Pray, let it continue to be so,” I muttered. “But let us return to your unfinished tale, Miss Stoner. You have not yet spoken of the reason behind your fear. Why do you suppose yourself to be in mortal danger?”
“The timing of my sister’s death… and the strangeness of it. You see, she had just become engaged when she died. I thought my stepfather’s famous temper would have been woken, for the existence of what little remains of Stoke Moran is reliant upon my sister’s and my inheritance. So long as we live with Dr. Roylott, he is steward of those funds. In the event of marriage, the inheritance would, of course, have followed Julia and her groom.”
“Yet Dr. Roylott was not troubled by her engagement?” I asked.
“No. In fact, he took pains to make himself cordial to both Julia and her fiancé. We half fancied he had undertaken a campaign to ingratiate himself to them and was intending to cajole from them the funds he needed to maintain the house. Julia and I were speaking of it on the night she died…”
Here Miss Stoner paused to collect herself, for the tears had come again. Presently she told us, “We were in my bedroom. The night was early; the sun had only just set. She complained about her own room. It was stuffy, she said. The window could not open far because of the bars and the vent brought no comfort—no fresh air but only the stench of Dr. Roylott’s cigars and his horrid animals.”
“Animals?” I asked.
“Yes. Roylott had his practice in India.”
“So did I, almost.”
“He was forced to leave it when—in an altercation over some stolen silverware—he beat his native butler to death.”
“You know, Watson,” Warlock noted, “he does sound an awful lot like Sebastian Moran.”
Miss Stoner continued, “When he came back, he brought a monkey, a cheetah and a box of trained cobras. The snakes are confined to his room, but the monkey and the cheetah have their freedom to wander the grounds, so Julia and I had bars upon our windows and we locked our doors at night. Julia made such complaint of her room that night that I offered to share my bed with her, as we used to when we were little. She said no, she would sleep in her own bed and stop being silly. But she asked me if I ever heard noises coming from my vent, sometimes.”
“Do you?” I interjected.
“Naught but wind and rain, as you would expect. Yet Julia said she often heard a rasping, a sort of metallic bang and the sound of soft chanting, deep in the darkest hours of night. I thought it only fancy, but it seemed to disturb her. Well, finally she took her leave of me and went back to her room. I don’t know what time it was—it must have been some time after nine, maybe ten in the evening. I only saw her one more time after that. At two o’clock she came back.”
“To your room?”
“Yes. I was awoken by the rattle of my doorknob and a scratching on my door. At first I was afraid it was the monkey, but in the confused noises, I recognized Julia’s voice.”
“What did she say?”
“Nothing that could be understood. She sounded frantic, at first. But by the time I had risen and opened the door, she seemed quite calm. She stood in my doorway, staring straight ahead, tilting on her heels as if dizzy or drunk. She didn’t even look at me. Then she said, ‘The _eckled _and,’ and then… and then…”
“What happened, Miss Stoner?”
“Her eyes—they shrank.”
“Shrank?”
“Yes, back inside her head, like two rotten grapes. Then all her skin fell off.”
“What?”
“Yes, all upon the rug in a great heap. She was only muscle and bone. She stood there for a moment, trying to say something—it sounded like ‘the _eckled _and’ again—and then her muscles fell away and her skeleton collapsed down on the whole pile of it all. That was the end of her. That is how she died.”
“Disgusting!” Warlock declared, though his tone of admiration was unmistakable.
“And, gentlemen, I fear I shall end the same way,” Miss Stoner continued, “for now—through fortune I scarce dared to hope for—my neighbor Mr. Greymalkin has asked my hand. The wording of Mother’s will is such that if I do wed, not only my share of the inheritance will follow me, but Julia’s share as well. Without those monies to support them, Stoke Moran and Dr. Roylott must fall into abject poverty. Yet he did not protest. My stepfather only offered his congratulations and immediately began work on Stoke Moran.”
“What sort of work?” I asked.
“Stone work of some sort. I’m not sure the exact nature of it, but it has made my room uninhabitable. Dr. Roylott insists I stay in Julia’s chamber, that very chamber where she was stricken to death—or so I suppose. Oh, I didn’t want to go of course, but Dr. Roylott is… possessed of a most convincing character and I must admit that I spent last night sleeping in my dead twin’s bed.”
Even more palpable than my sympathy for Helen Stoner was the swell of hatred I felt for Grimesby Roylott. If any chance remained that I might forgive him, Miss Stoner removed it when she burst into fresh tears and said, “And what should I hear last night, in the depths of darkness? I heard the metallic rasp! I heard the banging! I heard the chants! Oh, I could not stay, gentlemen! I fled to the pantry and hid until first light, then made my way here. But I am to return, don’t you see? He expects me to sleep there tonight! I don’t know if I can face it again! What should I do? Oh, what should I do?”
Holmes digested the question for a few moments then said in slow, thoughtful tones, “Well… I can’t put my finger on exactly why, but… I don’t know… it just seems inadvisable to sleep there. What do you think, Watson?”
“Holmes! Of course she shall not sleep there! She will not play meekly into this villain’s hands! Shame on you for considering it! No, Miss Stoner, here is what I propose: you go back to Stoke Moran and pretend that nothing unusual has occurred. This afternoon Holmes and I will…”
But my eye fell across the immovable carcass of my friend and I amended my statement to, “Well… at least one of us will come there to examine the room and formulate a strategy to save you from this mischief.”
“Hear, hear!” Holmes proclaimed.
“Could you? Oh, could you?” Miss Stoner cried, alight with new hope. “We have not discussed payment yet and my stepfather controls the finances, but once I am wed…”
“Let us just consider it an early wedding gift, shall we?” I said. “Expect me by train this afternoon. I presume the house is set back from the road?”
She nodded. “There is a long drive up to the house. Do watch out for the cheetah. And the monkey.”
I gulped. “Try to watch the main road to intercept me and keep my arrival a secret from Dr. Roylott. I shall see you in a few hours, Miss Stoner. Until then, be of good cheer; this world yet contains justice and the hearts of men are not so hard as to turn away from a lady in need. You will be safe, I swear it.”
I ushered her out, bid her farewell and went back upstairs to dress for the country and check my pistol. I had just set about clearing away our teacups when Mrs. Hudson’s voice rang out from the floor below us, screaming in protest. A moment later, I heard heavy steps on the stairs then our front door fell in with a sudden crash. The hinges bent and failed; the lock splintered the doorframe as it was forced into our sitting room. In the doorway stood an angry, red-faced giant of a man with Mrs. Hudson dangling from his left sleeve, still trying to arrest his rampage. I was sure her collection of illicit novels must have offered no end of tips on how to wrestle men to the ground. Also certain was that she had been eagerly awaiting the chance to put these ideas into practice. She didn’t look pleased with the way things were going, however. Our monstrous guest paid no heed whatsoever to the struggling septuagenarian clinging to his arm.
“Warlock Holmes!” the trespasser cried. “Which of you is Warlock Holmes?”
Warlock began to screech out terrified, high-pitched wails, contorting his body as violently as he could in an attempt either to stand or simply to wiggle under the sofa. I stood my ground and assessed the invader.
His shoulders were impossibly broad. Compared to his vast torso, his legs were small and bowed outwards from the strain of supporting so heavy a load. He wore a red frock coat, a pale yellow scarf and a top hat. His right eye clutched a monocle with such force I thought the glass would shatter. He had cultivated a magnificent ginger moustache, the tips of which quivered as he raged. The overall effect was one of a furious, steroid-riddled circus ringmaster. Yet, the family resemblance was obvious—he was certainly related to Sebastian Moran. In fact, I think if Moran and Grogsson could somehow be made to have a child together, the resultant monstrosity would exactly resemble Dr. Grimesby Roylott.
“What a quaint method of knocking our country cousins have,” I said. “No wonder they find themselves impoverished. They must spend a fortune on doors.”
“What are you doing?” Holmes squeaked.
In truth, I was baiting Dr. Roylott. He was a frightening specimen and I might have lacked the courage, if it were not for the fact that I had my hand resting on the handle of my service revolver. Some men find courage in a bottle, but I keep mine in my coat pocket.
“Where is my stepdaughter?” Roylott roared. “I know she has been here! Has she been here? Has she?”
“How should I know? We have not been properly introduced,” I said.
“Don’t play the fool with me! Where is she? She’s no business with you and you’ve no business with her, do you hear?”
I smirked and noted, “Look at that silly little top hat, Holmes. Don’t you hate it when country folk put on airs?”
“Don’t antagonize him, Watson!”
Yet Roylott was not antagonized; he was thrilled. Though most people shy from conflict, Grimesby Roylott seemed to draw a fierce glee from it. Striding into our sitting room, he looked around for a moment, then walked to the hearth. He drew our poker from its stand. At first I thought he meant to use it as a weapon, but instead he placed one hand at either end and twisted the iron rod into a perfect circle. Holmes squealed. Not content with this show of force, Roylott thrust the center of the new-made ring into his mouth and bit down until the two halves separated and fell, clanging, to the floor. He smiled at us, then turned to spit the section of iron rod that remained in his mouth into the fire and said, “If you come to Stoke Moran… If you come to my house—”
“I shall certainly endeavor to treat your possessions with more respect than you have shown mine,” I interjected.
“—you will not escape alive. We in my family do not tolerate interlopers. Is that clear?” He shook his fist at me. It was a monstrously large thing, with bulging veins and knotted knuckles. His hide was spattered with grotesque freckles from which grew tufts of curling red hair.
“Quite clear,” said I. “Now, is there something we may help you with, or will that be all?”
He turned on his heel, threw Mrs. Hudson onto our dinner table and strode out through the door. A moment later, we heard the door to Baker Street bang open and I knew he had gone. Mrs. Hudson was not injured (at least, not as much as I secretly hoped she might be), but Holmes seemed quite unhinged.
“Holmes! Cease that screaming, if you please. You’re giving me a headache.”
“I don’t like him, Watson!”
“Neither do I.”
“You cannot go to Stoke Moran,” Holmes insisted. “Not alone. He’ll kill you, Watson. Can’t you see? He isn’t… He’s not normal.”
I wanted to protest that all would be well, but the severed halves of our poker argued that Holmes might indeed have a point. If I were caught alone by Roylott, without witnesses and unprotected in his house, what hope would I have?
“Still… I must go,” I decided.
“Perhaps we will discuss it further when Mrs. Hudson has gone,” Holmes suggested.
A moment later, he suggested again, louder this time, “When Mrs. Hudson has gone!”
She gave him a bitter glance, brushed a few pieces of rubble off her dressing gown, then mumbled something rude about the quality of our guests as it compared with the state of her doors and tottered out.
“Really, Watson, you mustn’t go alone,” Holmes insisted. “I don’t know what sort of medicine he has been studying, but he has the marks of a man who has made one or two mystical modifications to himself. Such treatments often result in less than beneficial effects to the psyche. If you wish for a second opinion, go to Charing Cross Hospital and consult with my friend Dr. Jekyll on the matter. He can tell you.”
“No. I believe you, Holmes. Yet, what choice is there? Miss Stoner will be in immediate danger in only a few hours and you are in no state to accompany me. There’s no way we’ll have you fit for an adventure in the time we have.”
He thought for a moment, then said, “But… try, won’t you? You’re a doctor, after all.”
I attempted to explain that there was no known procedure for rehabilitating victims of this sort of poisoning, since none had previously survived it. Yet Holmes would not listen and insisted that I endeavor to cure him. I began by flexing the affected limbs (so… all of them). He had no strength and no voluntary control. It was too late for ipecac, so I gave him great quantities of water to flush the toxins from his tissues as best I could. There was no sign of progress whatsoever.
“This isn’t working, Holmes.”
“No, it is,” said he. “Why, by the boon that is owed to me by Kh’kath Harh Kugn, I can feel my strength returning.”
Outside the wind rose to howling force and the horses on the street screamed out all at once.
“You just cast a spell!” I said.
“What? Me? No, no, no. There’s no such thing as spells—you said so yourself. Why, it is through the merit of your medical skill that I can now move my fingers again and no other reason.”
“Holmes, I have asked you not to use your powers! You yourself have told me how detrimental it is to our world every time you do.”
“Yes, but my sudden improvement is due to your powers, Watson, not mine. It’s not as if I pledge my troth to the fires of Mekzahn Greh-degh for greater life! That is not why I am suddenly able to stand. It’s because you are such a fine doctor. Shall we go?”
The sky outside grew black as night. The streets filled with the panicked cries of those who rather wondered where the sun had gone off to all of a sudden. By the light of our fire, which flared first blue, then green, I could see Holmes standing by the sofa, looking at me expectantly.
“Holmes! Damn it!”
“Think nothing of it, Watson. I have the feeling that compared to any mischief Roylott may work, such transgressions are slight.”
My protests continued, of course, but there was no sense in going without him. As we stepped out into Baker Street, the light of day was meekly returning as crowds of frantic Londoners ran this way and that.
* * *
Stoke Moran was not quite a castle. Dating from the period of the English Civil War, it was one of a particular breed of country homes that were constructed by people with guilty consciences or those who had reason to feel that if the war went one way rather than the other, they could expect a fairly large contingent of armed soldiers to come knocking at any hour. Thus, though it lacked an actual barracks, it did sport a high stone wall of some thickness, crenelated turrets and was positioned atop a high hill with a commanding view on all sides. It was a home, but it was a defensible one. Thus it did not surprise me that, as Holmes and I approached, Helen Stoner came out to meet us. Anybody watching the road from one of the turret rooms would see visitors more than a mile off.
“Don’t worry,” she called as she neared. “My stepfather has gone to the city this morning and has not returned. If he was not on your train, he cannot possibly return before the next. We have some time.”
“We shan’t need much, I warrant,” said I. “Chiefly, I wish to examine Julia’s room and that of Dr. Roylott. Or… I mean… Holmes wishes to examine them.”
I could have told her that Holmes and I knew perfectly well that Dr. Roylott had been in London, but chose not to alarm her. Holmes gave her a tired smile. Despite the invocations he had applied in our sitting room, he was still weak and unstable. I had allowed him to lean on my arm on the walk from the train station, but I practically had to drag him up the hill on the final approach to Stoke Moran.
Helen’s, Julia’s and Roylott’s rooms were on the second floor, overlooking the road. Roylott had the corner suite, next to him was Julia Stoner’s old room (where Miss Helen Stoner was supposed to now be lodging) and finally Miss Stoner’s own room, which did not look as if it were undergoing nearly enough work to render it uninhabitable. It was furnished in a manner that bespoke a country estate in decline, but we found no clue of worth.
Julia Stoner’s room was a different story. Even Holmes, lacking as he was in observational prowess, noted the difference immediately. “It’s a lot nicer than your room,” he said.
“Holmes! How rude!” I chided.
Miss Stoner waved me down and said, “Julia’s room was redecorated just after her engagement was announced. We supposed Dr. Roylott did it to curry her favor.”
“That is not what I suppose,” I mumbled, casting an eye over the room. There were a number of peculiarities, apparent at the most cursory examination. “Miss Stoner, I think you said that your sister complained of the smell of Dr. Roylott’s cigars. Can you see why she might?”
“Not offhand.”
“Holmes, can you?”
“She didn’t like cigars?”
“Look at the vent: it is of newer construction than the walls of the room—newer by far. It runs along the ceiling as vents often will, but do you note the peculiarity?”
“Do I ever?”
“It does not lead outside. It runs through the internal wall, towards Dr. Roylott’s room. Why would you vent one room into the next? It’s quite unaccountable. Not only that, but observe: the vent ends just touching this bell pull rope which in turn hangs down onto the bed, just beside the pillow. A strange proximity, I think.”
I gave the bell pull an experimental tug, but was rewarded with naught but silence for my effort.
“Oh, that…” Miss Stoner said, with a blush, “that is merely for show.”
“Show?”
“Yes. Dr. Roylott said we lacked the funds for a bell, but he did not wish us to live with the indignity of seeming unable to afford one. He therefore purchased a bell pull with the intent of purchasing a bell at a later date.”
“I can see why he may have told you so,” I harrumphed, “but I refuse to believe that such was his true motive. If it were so, he would not have gone to such extravagant measures to ensure this bed is never moved from below the bell pull.”
“What good is a bell pull that cannot be reached from one’s bed?” Miss Stoner asked. “I cannot think of a reason one would want to move the bed away.”
“And yet, if you ever did encounter a reason, it still would not furnish you with the ability. Did you note that this bed has been bolted to the floor?”
“Odd,” said Holmes. “Why would Roylott do that?”
“I suspect he wishes to ensure that whoever sleeps in this bed is forced to do so directly under that vent, with this bell pull coming down almost onto their pillow.”
“Why? What does it mean?” asked Miss Stoner.
“It means you are absolutely not to spend another night in this bed until this situation is understood and defused,” I replied. “I do not wish to be crude, Miss Stoner, but I think Holmes and I would very much like to rifle Dr. Roylott’s room now, if you please.”
“That may present some difficulty,” Miss Stoner said, fretting with her cuffs again. “My stepfather is intensively secretive. He maintains that room himself and allows nobody inside; I’ve never had so much as a peep through that door. He keeps it always locked and wears the key on a chain about his neck at all times.”
It seemed we were stuck, but Holmes—who had taken the opportunity to move down the hallway a few paces and examine the lock on his own initiative—reported, “Luck is with us! The door is unlocked.”
“But that is impossible!” Miss Stoner protested. “He always… What is that smell?”
I tested the air and replied, “That, Miss Stoner is the smell of…” and here I paused to regard Holmes with an accusatory glare, “…sulphur and burning iron.”
“By God!” Miss Stoner cried. “What is that dripping from the lock?”
“I suspect it is the inner workings of the lock itself,” I said, unable to think of a suitable lie.
“Oh, no. Oh, dear me,” said Holmes. “It seems as if this lock has been fiendishly booby-trapped to melt itself if someone should tamper with it. I’ve only just avoided being burned!”
“Nefarious! Ingenious!” Miss Stoner declared.
“I’m surprised to hear you think so,” I said, rolling my eyes at Holmes in a manner meant to convey that he had just been extremely lucky. “In any case, we are in. Let us see what secrets Dr. Roylott keeps.”
These secrets were of such quantity and clarity that even the unobservant Holmes spotted some the moment he pushed open the door. Before I had even the chance to look in, he asked, “I say, Watson, what do you suppose that pile of skulls is for?”
Pushing past him I entered into the lair of a mad fiend. Dr. Roylott did seem to have a penchant for bone-based décor, the walls being decked in shrines and ritualistic pictograms formed principally out of human bones. Several skulls had been set down into pelvises so that they looked as if they wore upturned collars of bone. The whole affair was decked in pale yellow bunting that draped the room from corner to corner along all four walls. Connecting this with the yellow scarf I had seen Roylott wearing and the fact he had held a medical practice in India, I made a connection.
“He’s a Thuggee,” I said.
“Hullo! I know those chaps,” said Holmes.
From the hallway, Miss Stoner said, “Thuggee? What are you speaking of? I don’t…”
She did not finish, for she rounded the doorway and encountered her stepfather’s true nature. She gasped and fell back against the wall. It took her some moments to control her breathing—that dashed whalebone corset again, I think—at which point she muttered, “All those bones… Do you suppose… Julia?”
“Oh, no. No, I am sure not. No man can offer such disrespect to the bones of his own family member,” I said, though in my heart I knew I was almost certainly lying. I further suspected that if Helen Stoner had not decided to hide in the pantry last night, her bones might now be here as well.
“I say, Watson, look over here!”
Holmes was bent over a table on which lay a number of instruments and concoctions that reminded me of his own alchemical workstation at 221B, though this one was more extravagant and possessed of a distinctly evil character. Curved knives and gleaming, silver-plated hypodermic needles lay in neat rows. Though this laboratory was of interest to me, there were two other matters of greater concern.
The first was the cobras. I found them in a glass terrarium by the window. They were sluggish in the cold, but gazed at me with all the malevolence their breed is known for.
The second was the vent, which ended just above Dr. Roylott’s alchemical workstation. Though it featured a curved downspout, I could just discern light at the end where it opened above the late Julia Stoner’s bed, some dozen feet away. It was certainly wide enough for a cobra—in fact I think all three could have slithered through abreast if they wished.
Turning to my compatriots, I said, “I have seen enough. I do not know exactly how Roylott has worked these crimes, but I am certain he is to blame. This is what I suggest: Miss Stoner, you are to give Dr. Roylott no indication that you have spoken with Holmes or me, or that you know his secret. I understand that this may be difficult, but it is of critical importance. Can you do it?”
“I… I think so.”
“Good. You are to agree to sleep in Julia’s bedroom again tonight. When Dr. Roylott has retired to his room for the evening, you are to signal Holmes and me with a lantern placed in Julia’s window—Holmes and I will be stationed nearby. Make sure the front door is unlocked, then return to your own bedroom and wait there. When we see your signal, Holmes and I will sneak into Julia’s room and endeavor to catch the good doctor at his mischief. Agreed?”
“Are you sure?” asked Miss Stoner. “Do you think the two of you are enough to face such a monster as my stepfather has proved to be?”
“Oh,” said Holmes, with a sideways smile in my direction, “I imagine we’ll be all right.”
“But isn’t he—what did you say—a thug?”
“Thuggee,” I said, “but you are correct in that we derive our English word ‘thug’ from their sect. They are an Indian murder cult, dedicated to Kali, the goddess of destruction and…” I had to choose my next words carefully, “…marital relations, external to the formality of wedlock.”
“Well, if you are certain you can confront him,” Miss Stoner said, “you could wait at the local inn. It’s just at the base of the hill. If you arrive early and ask for a seat by the window, you will have a clear view of Stoke Moran.”
“Capital. We must hurry, I think. Holmes and I took some time walking here and the next train must be arriving soon. Miss Stoner, you may want to splash some water on your face and take a moment to compose yourself.”
She nodded her agreement and bustled down the hall, whereupon I turned to Holmes and whispered, “And as for you… Dr. Roylott must have no idea that his sanctum has been violated. This means his lock must be intact and fastened.”
“Ohhhh…”
“Well, you should have thought of that before you melted it. Now put it back with as little magic as you can manage. I will say our farewells to Miss Stoner.”
* * *
I soon discovered the chief flaw in my plan: it lay in Holmes’s and my weariness, combined with the sheer amount of time we needed to bide while waiting for the occupants of Stoke Moran to settle in to slumber. The most felicitous remedy was to hire a room at the very inn where we were supposed to wait and sleep through the afternoon and early evening.
I woke much refreshed. Holmes looked better too, though a certain clumsiness remained in his limbs, which told me they were not answering to his will as they should. I thought some food might effect a partial cure, so we went down into the tavern to sit by the window, eat and wait.
In a country dominated by sheep and shepherds, mutton is not considered a delicacy. Yet when it is fresh and delivered hot from the oven, baked into a hearty country pie, it is difficult to best. I married mine with a pint of stout and rejoiced. Holmes pouted until the innkeeper agreed to make him a plate of toast. Once this was joined by a cup of their runniest vegetable soup, he settled in, happy as a cat. As we ate, he asked me, “So, what do you make of this case, Watson?”
Gazing around to be sure we were not overheard, I replied, “I feel sure that Dr. Roylott murdered his stepdaughter. I am unsure as to his exact modus operandi, but I have a theory: suppose he has trained his cobras to slither through the vent, down the bell pull and attack whatever sleeping unfortunate lies upon the bed below.”
Holmes gave me a squinty look, as if he found this highly unlikely.
“No, think about it, Holmes! Remember the cobras? Remember their mottled scales? Can’t you imagine a woman, surprised and bitten in the dead of night, crying out about the horrifying speckled band that had just worked her ill? That’s what I think Julia Stoner was trying to say as she died, ‘the speckled band’!”
“All right, I see your point, Watson,” Holmes said, “but then again, might she not just say, ‘Help, a snake?’ It’s got fewer syllables and the benefit of clarity too, don’t you think?”
“But what else could she have been trying to say?”
“I don’t know,” Holmes shrugged. “Go through the alphabet. ‘And’ is a word. So is ‘band.’ ‘Canned’ also. ‘Dand’ and ‘eand’ are not, but ‘fanned’ is…”
“Yes, but how many words end in ‘eckled’?” I said.
“Well I have been too much a gentleman to bring up the other flaw in your conjecture, Watson. Have you ever heard of a snake whose bite causes one’s skin and musculature to fall off?”
“No,” I admitted, “but then, I have never known of anything else that could either.”
I fell silent to ponder that. I made no headway on the problem but I did notice we had another. Our supper was finished and the dishes cleared away, yet as I stared at the windows of Stoke Moran on the hill above, I realized it might be hours yet before our signal showed.
“You know, Holmes,” I said, “we may need to order a drink from time to time, else the innkeeper will take it amiss that we hold this table all night.”
“As you say, Watson. Just be careful. We must be at our best tonight and you know how drink affects you people.”
“You people?”
“Yes. Well, you know… everybody who isn’t me. Alas, I shall never know the comfort of alcoholic torpor, since such draughts have no effect on my person.”
“No effect?” said I. “Just as poison has no effect on you, I suppose?”
“Just so, Watson.”
“Except that I have seen its effect on you, Holmes. Just last night you were completely overcome with it.”
“Preposterous.”
“When Miss Stoner came this morning, you were unable to stand.”
“Or I chose not to, in order to make her feel unthreatened though she was entering the domicile of two unknown gentlemen.”
“Ha! A fine explanation, Holmes, but we both know you could not stand.”
“Watson! I am surprised at you. Just because I am immune to alcohol and other poisons and you are not, that is no reason to engage in envy and lies!”
“Lies? How dare you!”
“I am sorry, Watson, but you wear your envy as a Texan wears a hat: though it is a monstrous thing that would uglify any man, you seem almost proud of it.”
I am sure I could have argued in circles with him for hours but I had a more wicked expedient for proving my point. I cast about the room until I found the man I needed. He was at once the fellow who looked like he could least afford a drink, while also being the fellow who looked like he most often did. I beckoned a barmaid over to us and asked, “I say, miss, what is that slop-shirted shepherd in the corner drinking tonight?”
“Same thing as he does every night, sir.”
“I wonder if you would be so good as to bring a bottle for my friend and me.”
She hesitated, then said, “I’m not sure you’d want any of that, sir.”
“Most nights, I am sure you would be correct. But tonight is special.”
She shrugged and moved off to fetch our bottle of destruction.
“Bring four glasses,” I called after her.
“You gentlemen expectin’ comp’ny?”
“No.”
I then turned to Holmes and asked him, “So you think you could drink more than any man in this tavern?”
“Any man?” he scoffed. “Any ten men! Any ten men and the horses that bore them here!”
“Very admirable. Let’s just set the bar at three, shall we? I will drink a glass of… whatever it is I just ordered. You will then drink three and we shall see which of us begs off first.”
The bottle arrived at our table with a heavy thunk. Its mottled brown glass was covered in a slick of grease. I could not read the label as it was cheaply printed and had not profited by storage—by the looks of it, it had spent a century or so in the belly of a sunken pirate sloop. Nevertheless, the cork slid free with a joyous pop. I can only assume it was pleased to end its association with the foul bottle and roll off into the comparative cleanliness of the nearest pile of rat droppings. The smell that issued forth from the bottle was strangely familiar to me, yet at first I could not place it. At last, the dim recesses of my memory brought it forth. As a youth, I had spent one summer at the home of my uncle. While living, he had been a maker of stringed instruments. Ah, yes! Cello varnish! I poured a glass for myself and three for Holmes.
“To good health,” said I, raising the glass to my lips and draining it in a single gulp. My eyes burned; my throat swelled; my stomach spasmed. Still, it was worth it to see the look on Holmes’s face.
“Your turn,” I coughed.
“Ah… yes… so it is, I suppose,” he said. He grew visibly sick as he raised the glass, even before it touched his lips. He drank it down just as quickly as I had. He placed his glass back down and paused to let forth a high-pitched scream of distress. All eyes turned to our table. The slovenly shepherd in the corner raised his glass in salute. I imagine it was rare for him to meet someone who understood what he was going through.
I stared at Holmes, a smile on my lips, daring him to touch his second glass. He looked horrified at the notion of repeating his ordeal, but reached down with a trembling hand and grasped it. He held his nose while he swallowed it then cried out, “Aaaaaigh! Why? Why is it like that?”
I smiled and asked, “Well, Holmes, are you ready to admit…”
But he held up a hand to silence me and then—to my horror—drank down the third glass. This time he managed to avoid crying out, though only by clenching his mouth shut with both hands. He nodded that it was my turn and settled back in his chair, writhing slightly.
I must have grown quite pale.
I really hadn’t thought it would come to a second round. Then again, I did not wish to return to Baker Street and spend the rest of my days being forced to admit that Holmes was immune to both poison and alcohol. Given the difficulty he’d had with his first three drinks, I thought it unlikely he could manage even one more. Thus, with doubtful hand and faulty courage, I reached down to refill my cup.
Some hours went by.
I’m not sure how.
I only remember laughing quite a bit. We must have invited the shepherd over, for he joined us in finishing two more bottles and I never did manage to get the smell of him out of my clothes. I think we must have engaged in a series of dares and forfeits. I cannot recall them precisely, but I do remember our best penalty: he who had erred had to reach down under the table with his knife and carve a chip from one of the table legs. He then had to eat it, without attracting the attention of the innkeeper. I do not remember who won or lost, but between the three of us, we ate one of the table’s sturdy oaken legs and made pretty good progress on a second. I continually reminded Holmes that we must be ready when Helen Stoner signaled for us, but after a time it seemed as if he didn’t know what I was talking about.
“Holmes, we have to stop. Stop. What will happen when the signal comes?” I protested, some time after midnight.
“What is this damned signal you keep talking of, Watson? It sounds like something you made up.”
“No. I didn’t. It’s… it’s a lantern.”
“There are plenty of lanterns.”
“No. In the window.”
“Plenty of lanterns in the windows.”
“Not our window. The house. The house on the hill.”
“Like that lantern?” said Holmes, pointing to the light in the late Julia Stoner’s window. “But that’s been there for hours.”
I was out the door in a flash, with Holmes close behind. The shepherd wanted to come too, but we eventually shouted him away. We staggered up the hill, along the muddy road.
“Shekels!” Holmes declared.
“What?”
“The money of post-Roman Judea! Don’t you see, Watson, if someone was rich, he’d be well-shekeled! He’d be the Shekeled Man!”
“That’s a bit of a stretch, don’t you think?”
“Ah, but when a fellow is strangled or hanged, could he not be said to have been neckled?”
“Nope.”
“Oh. Public speakers sometimes get heckled, though.”
“That’s true, they do,” I admitted, “but keep quiet, Holmes. We’re almost there.”
I think we must have made more noise than we ought, sneaking into Stoke Moran and up the winding stairs. Luckily for us, our quarry was too distracted to note our approach; from behind Roylott’s closed door, we could hear muffled chanting.
“He’s started it,” I hissed. “Quick, Holmes, into Julia’s room!”
The room was in half-darkness, lit only by the lantern Helen Stoner had obscured behind the curtain to signal us.
“I don’t see anything,” whispered Holmes.
“Watch the vent,” I told him. “That is where danger shall approach.”
Even as I said it, there was a dull metallic bang from the vent, followed by the sound of an unknown, fleshy body sliding through the duct.
“Here comes the cobra,” I said, but when our antagonist emerged from the vent, it was no snake. A human hand protruded itself from the edge of the vent and began groping about for the bell pull. Its spotted complexion and profusion of curly ginger hair proclaimed this to be the hand of Dr. Roylott. It used only two fingers to feel about; the others clutched something that gleamed metallic in the lantern’s failing light—I recognized it to be one of his hypodermic needles.
The wayward human hand found the bell pull and started down. As I had suspected, it seemed the pull was there as a guide to reach the pillow below. As unsettling as the hand was, what followed was even more horrifying. The hand was not disembodied. A long, prehensile forearm flowed out of the vent and began coiling down the rope. Certainly there could be no bones within, for it was rubbery and capable of bending in any direction at any point along its length.
“Disgusting!” proclaimed Holmes. He was alight with admiration.
In his shock and inebriation, Holmes quite forgot to keep his voice down. The creeping hand recoiled in surprise, then struck out in Holmes’s and my direction with the hypodermic poised. We tried to get out of the way, but as I fled, the needle caught the flapping tail of my overcoat and pierced it. The back of my coat instantly disintegrated into a putrid brown liquid. Holmes saw this better than I could, and the fright of it caused him to cry out again. The hand turned towards him and pursued him about the room, striking randomly with the deadly needle as Holmes pelted back and forth screaming, “Ahhhhhhhhh! Watson! Help! The Freckled Hand! The Freckled Hand!”
In the fervor of its attack, the hand struck the pillow, the mattress and the easy chair with its murderous needle. All three melted into puddles of stinking slop. Holmes had the misfortune of placing his foot in one of these as he ran. He slipped and went down heavily. His trademark hat fell from his head and the contents of his pockets fairly exploded forth. His magnifying glass slid across the room towards me, but what caught my attention most was the metallic device that fell upon the carpet as he began to rise and renew his flight—his handcuffs.
As Holmes ran off, I dived in to recover them. I fastened one side to the stout lower rail of the bed, then waited. The next time Roylott’s viperous arm passed, I lunged out and snapped the other cuff around it. In my panic, I fastened it cruelly tight. Roylott must not have been expecting that, for the arm jerked back and forth arhythmically a few times before it turned on me and tried to end my life with its bewitched poison. I flung myself to the far corner of the room and sat breathless against the wall. Holmes joined me and clapped a hand on my shoulder, crying, “Bravely done, Watson. I think we have him now.”
The hand recoiled all the way up to the silver handcuff and feverishly attempted to pull itself through. I feared Roylott would manage to yank it free and resume his murder attempts, but the cuffs held fast.
I breathed a sigh of relief and asked, “What is it, Holmes? What has Roylott done?”
“One more trick he picked up in India, Watson. I think he must be a fakir.”
I had heard of these mystics and recalled that they were famous for methods of manipulating their own bodies that seemed quite beyond the capabilities of mortal man.
“That makes some sense,” I agreed.
“In fact,” said Holmes, “he is a master of their art. I must say, I am impressed. Such transmutations are difficult to perform and even harder to maintain. Do you hear how much louder and more strained his chanting has become?”
“Ahhhhhhhhh! Watson! Help! The Freckled Hand! The Freckled Hand!”
I listened and agreed that I could note the change.
“In a few moments his spell will fail,” said Holmes. “He will find himself returned to his normal shape, exhausted and unable to defend himself. He’ll be helpless, Watson.”
I nodded that this was good, but held that opinion only for a fraction of a second. Soon, the full ramifications of the situation occurred to me and I found myself shouting, “Keys!”
“Eh?” said Holmes.
“Where are the keys?”
“What keys? For what?”
The chanting reached a fever pitch, then began to fail. I could hear Roylott gasping for breath in the next room over.
“The handcuffs, Holmes! Quick!”
He patted at his pockets fruitlessly, and decided, “I must have dropped them when I fell. Look around, Watson.”
But it was too late. Roylott’s voice gave way to a fit of coughing, followed by a ragged scream. His spell failed. His body began to resume its normal shape and, as his hand was attached to the bed in our room, his body was drawn inextricably towards it. From his room came the shriek of tortured metal as the vent deformed. An instant later, the duct within our room began to bulge and shift. A number of rivets popped free and a second later the vent over the bed became a spout. Several gallons of chunky gore erupted forth all over Julia Stoner’s vacant bed.
* * *
Another case closed. Another success, we thought. True, I had slain a man, which offended my sensibilities and violated my Hippocratic oath. Yet this had been the result of an accident and the personality of the victim was such that nobody ever said to me that they missed his company. More to our satisfaction, Miss Helen Stoner was preserved from harm. Despite the sudden, strange death of Dr. Roylott, her fiancé’s zeal to marry held and the couple moved away to begin their life together. They could have stayed at Stoke Moran, I suppose, but Helen Stoner was never happier than the day she packed her bags and left it forever.
In the Adventure of the Freckled Hand, we see one of my greatest failures. I allowed myself to be distracted. Our survival, our seeming victory and Helen Stoner’s happy ending brought me such elation that I failed to consider the greater consequences of the case. I happily moved on to the next adventure and thought no more of Stoke Moran. How many men would have paused to ask themselves, “What will become of that house now?” Would a wiser fellow have worried that perhaps the next heir might be none other than Sebastian Moran? Would he have realized that—should Moran succeed in reconstituting his fallen master—Moriarty would now have a sturdy stone house with defensible walls and an evil magical workstation already in place?
A better man might have.
I did not.
I apologize to you all.