THE CASE OF THE ADDLETON TRAGEDY, by Jack Grochot

Sherlock Holmes was ecstatic when he returned to our rooms at Baker Street after a morning of investigating the bizarre death of Sir Reginald Abercrombe, who was recklessly riding a galloping horse through a neighborhood in Kilburn and fell lifeless from the saddle in the back yard of Mrs Mortimer Snead. The animal kept running and made its way back to the livery stable, leaving the outstretched corpse of Sir Reginald on the lawn for a terrified Mrs Snead to discover when she went out to dry her linens on the laundry line.

One of Scotland Yard’s most inexperienced inspectors, Joseph Kennedy, called on Holmes just after breakfast to ask for his assistance in unraveling the mystery of how Sir Reginald met his abrupt end.

“It was a simple matter of deduction, Watson, a mere distraction from my regular work,” the consulting detective confidently informed me. “The hoof prints in the grass directly under the clothes line were a clear indication that Sir Reginald hung himself without a thought of the danger in his behavior. A trip to the livery stable confirmed that he had rented a horse for the day and that it arrived home minus its rider. An examination of the cadaver at the hospital revealed that Sir Reginald died of a crushed windpipe. Case closed. Now here is the most interesting tidbit: The horse he rode was none other than Silver Blaze, racing champion of the Wessex Cup in Dartmoor, whose disappearance I solved and which you so fluently chronicled with your penchant toward exaggeration. I recognized Silver Blaze instantly when I visited the stable and found him in cross-ties while being groomed by the manager. As the hostler explained it, Silver Blaze suffered a bowed tendon in a subsequent contest and was retired. The owner learned that Silver Blaze, unfortunately, was unable to breed, so he sold him for a pittance to his friend, the livery stable manager, who nursed Silver Blaze back to soundness, but by then he was too old and too fragile to compete again.”

“All of which proves that fame is a fleeting condition,” I responded philosophically in reaction to the news. “As for the problem of Sir Reginald, I can only say it is fortuitous that it was resolved in a few hours, knowing that you are juggling several investigations at once in this, your busiest year, since I sold my practice in Kensington and moved back to our shared diggings.”

Having made that observation, I was reluctant to burden Holmes with a conundrum of my own—yet it bothered me so greatly that I spoke up, despite my misgivings, to solicit his advice.

“Yesterday afternoon,” I began hesitantly as he sat comfortably in the wicker basket-chair, “the postman delivered a distressing letter to me concerning a predicament of my former commanding officer in the second Afghan war, Captain Ichabod Addleton.”

“What sort of predicament—anything that might require my services?” Holmes asked graciously, pretending not to be preoccupied.

“It seems that Captain Addleton has been driven out of his good senses by a calamity, the simultaneous deaths of his wife and daughter,” I answered gravely. I rose from the desk and handed Holmes the correspondence, explaining that it was from the captain’s sister, with whom he was living in Blackwall. “I never met her, but the captain apparently mentioned me to her before he dropped into the abyss,” I went on.

“Her penmanship is exquisite,” Holmes commented as he glanced at the two pages of stationery. “She must be considerably younger than he.” Holmes read aloud:

“Dear Dr Watson,

“I am writing to you out of desperation and concern for my brother, Ichabod Addleton, who once told me of your remarkable published article in a medical journal regarding the complexities of the human brain. I am afraid my brother has lost his mind, and perhaps you can help restore his sanity.

“Ichabod sank into deep depression after a fire at his home in Knight’s Place killed his loving wife, Annabelle, and his only child, Daphne, who was only twenty-two years old and betrothed to a soldier in Her Majesty’s Palace Guard. The victims were overcome by smoke and perished in their beds, while Ichabod escaped the flames because he was away that night at the Veterans’ Club playing cards.

“His depression led to delusions, and now he confines himself to his rooms on my second floor, thinking that he is William Shakespeare and composing the same lines of a play over and over.

“I have consulted a therapist, who conducted an interview with my brother, and he came to the conclusion that Ichabod believed himself responsible for the demise of his family. The therapist, Dr Michael Paquet, stated to me that the situation seemed hopeless, because he could not convince my brother that the disaster was accidental due to a faulty chimney attached to the fireplace, just as the police had theorised.

“I implore you, Dr Watson, to come talk to Ichabod and see if you can make progress where Dr Paquet could not. My brother might respond to you in a more positive way, because he respects and admires your heroic efforts in Afghanistan, as well as the reputation you have earned since your honourable discharge from the military.

“Yours truly,

“Amanda Addleton”

Sherlock Holmes shrugged his bony shoulders as he stood to hand back the letter, but otherwise showed no emotion. “It is brief and to the point, Watson, although it leaves questions unanswered, such as why your Captain Addleton would consider himself to blame. We should go there in the morning to find out for ourselves,” Holmes offered.

“But what of your other cases—would not a journey to Blackwall interfere with your schedule?” I countered.

“If it means helping a dear friend settle a difficulty, my schedule can accommodate a day’s delay,” he said sincerely. “Now tell me what you know of the captain and the therapist, Dr Paquet.”

I explained that Captain Addleton was in charge of my regimental unit in the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers from the time I joined the medical corps as an assistant surgeon until a short time after I was seriously wounded in 1880. I remembered how Captain Addleton sat sympathetically at my bedside many times in the field hospital, barking out strict orders to the nurses about my care and encouraging me to lightly exercise to improve the circulation in my limbs. I also recalled the conversations we had regarding our kin back in England. I related to Holmes that it was during those chats that the captain told me stories about his young daughter and about the hardship of separation from his Annabelle. He would describe his magnificent stone house near Twickenham Green and the immense fireplace that warmed the entire downstairs, except for the kitchen, where Annabelle kept a woodstove burning and cooked or baked all day to her heart’s content. He fondly referred to their housekeeper, a quick-tempered girl in her late teens, who treated Annabelle like the mother she always wanted but was denied because the woman died in childbirth. The youthful servant, he said compassionately, lived with her quarrelsome father in a nearby apartment, but she detested the arrangement because he never forgave her for the fate of his wife.

Additionally, I informed Holmes that Captain Addleton and I maintained contact by post after we left the service, but the occasional communications dwindled to nothing over the last few years.

“As for Dr Paquet,” I continued, “the physician’s directory cites his work with patients diagnosed as schizophrenic and delusionary. He studied under the noted Swiss psychiatrist Paul Eugen Bleuler, the author of numerous monographs on the subject of mental illness.”

“What you tell me about the captain is suggestive,” Holmes observed, without elaborating. “And Dr Paquet seems competent enough, but he gives up too easily. You can accomplish more than he, I am certain.”

We were interrupted in our discussion by a familiar footstep on the stairs. Our landlady, Mrs Hudson, entered our rooms to bring us a hot pot of tea and freshly-made crumpets, with a word of rapprochement for Holmes. “You haven’t been eating properly because of all your comings and goings lately, so here is a snack to tide you over until dinner,” she said thoughtfully. “And don’t you run off this evening, for I am making a special supper, chicken pot pies and mashed potatoes, one of your favourites. That will put some meat back on your skinny frame.”

We thanked her profusely and she accepted our gratitude with a slight smile, a nod, and a grunt; then she exited the flat after quickly inspecting the curtains in our sitting-room. “I need to wash these soon—your pipe and cigar smoke has turned them yellow,” she remarked.

After we ate the mid-day treat, Holmes went off on one of his capers, in disguise as an elderly mendicant with a salt-and-pepper beard and a pair of spectacles that had a crack diagonally across one of the lenses. I used the time while he was gone to complete my notes on a recent investigation Holmes had finished successfully involving the theft of the Bishopgate jewel collection.

Holmes returned to our quarters just in time to partake of Mrs Hudson’s delicious meal, he still in costume. It startled our landlady when she saw him seated at the table and for a moment she thought a street beggar was there in his place.

Later, after I had scoured the pages of the evening Star that our news agent delivered, I went up to bed, leaving Holmes in his lavender dressing gown engrossed in his reference books. I was restless and slept fitfully, dreaming and awakening to images of the bleeding troops in the Afghanistan campaign.

Morning came with a violent thunderstorm, so after we had toast and coffee, we donned our slickers and caught a London growler to Charing Cross Station for a train to the eastern terminus of the railway in Blackwall. By the time we reached our destination, knowing the address from the letter sent by Miss Addleton, the weather had improved, so we draped our slickers over our arms and approached the front door of the two-storey brick dwelling. Neatly-trimmed hedges, dripping with rain, surrounded the house and lined the walkway.

Amanda Addleton greeted me like a long-lost relative after I introduced myself, and she was amazed to meet Holmes, about whom she had learned from the magazine articles I had penned. I guessed Miss Addleton to be in her early forties. She wore her sandy-coloured hair braided in pig-tails, which accented her tiny ears and round face to the point that it made her appear unattractive. Her flowered dress was loose-fitting, save for the section around her wide hips.

“How is your brother?” I asked after we exchanged pleasantries.

“Physically, he seems fine, although he has lost weight since he relocated here. But his mental state is deteriorating,” she answered. “When I call him Ichabod or Captain, he sloughs me off and says Captain Ichabod Addleton is in his grave, strung up on the gallows for murdering his wife and daughter. ‘My name is William, William Shakespeare,’ he retorts. Then he goes back to his sheets of foolscap, repeatedly writing ‘O, ye scoundrel! Hath ye no shame?’ Occasionally, he cries—sobs, actually—and I can hear him all the way down here. He is a tortured soul now, once a brilliant tactician.”

She pleaded with me to try harder than Dr Paquet to revive her brother, suggesting that when we went face-to-face his memory of our association might shock him back to reality. I started up the steps to his rooms and listened at the door to the sound of a man moaning. I rapped gently and heard him tell me to come in.

“Who are you?” he demanded, and rose from the desk chair.

“I am your former charge in the Army unit, Dr John H Watson,” I replied, surprised at how unkind the years had been to him.

“And so you are. So you are, John. Put on a few pounds and turned grey around the temples, eh?” he noted. “I’ve been dead for almost two years now, executed for killing my darling Annabelle and my beautiful Daphne. I have been re-incarnated as William Shakespeare and I am writing a drama that depicts the life of Captain Addleton. I am stuck, though, at the beginning. I can’t seem to get past the opening lines. See for yourself.” He extended his hand, which held a sheet of foolscap, and paused for me to grasp it and read. “You are a writer, John, tell me what you recommend.”

“But I don’t understand,” I said. “Who is the scoundrel?”

“Why, it is Captain Addleton, of course,” he shot back.

“What makes him a scoundrel?”

The captain stiffened. “I can’t tell you that—it is a secret,” he responded curtly.

“Well, then, if you won’t reveal the secret, I don’t see how I can help you get beyond the opening lines,” I blurted.

He sat down at the desk again. “It is time for you to leave, John. I have things to do,” he concluded, and buried his head in the papers that were scattered in front of him.

I went downstairs to relay the details of the short repartee to Holmes and Miss Addleton, who were in the dining room having tea. I shared a cup with them and was charmed when Miss Addleton praised my results as a minor breakthrough. Holmes gathered from my description of the dialogue that the guilt the captain harboured stemmed from an incident or a chapter in his marriage, which he wanted no one to discover.

“What propelled him over the edge, Watson, was the content of a parcel Miss Addleton recalls him receiving soon after he arrived here,” Holmes disclosed, adding that the package was left on the front stoop during the night and contained only the name Ichabod on the wrapping. “It felt heavy, as if it were a large book,” Miss Addleton further remembered.

“I saw a volume on his desk entitled A History of the Royal Army,” I interjected.

“Oh, my word!” exclaimed Miss Addleton. “That was a cherished birthday gift to him from Annabelle! But how did he acquire it? He came to live with me with only the clothes on his back. He had no belongings—they were all lost in the fire.”

“The book must have been what you found on your doorstep,” Sherlock Holmes stated to her. “It probably was salvaged from the ruins of the home at Knight’s Place, but by whom? Watson, please go upstairs and ask Captain Addleton if you can borrow the history briefly. Perhaps it has some inscription that would shed light on this little puzzle.”

I did as he asked, and when I requested the loan of the book, Captain Addleton informed me that it was too precious to remove from his sight, because his wife had sent it to him from the Great Beyond. To prove it, he showed me this scribbled message on the flyleaf:

“Ichabod,

“Here is your treasured history book that was spared by the fire. Come join me, for I shall love you through eternity.” There was no signature below the words.

I hurried downstairs and reported my findings.

“Obviously, the captain has a female admirer, but he is confused and can’t fathom the book came from her, not his deceased wife,” Holmes commented. “Imagine the irony if the book and the inscription pushed him over the brink.”

Miss Addleton was aghast at the concept of her brother being romantically linked to another woman. “He was devoted to Annabelle. It is possible, is it not, that he rejected the love of this other woman?” Miss Addleton queried rhetorically.

“Anything is possible,” Holmes replied soothingly. “But I suspect we have unearthed Captain Addleton’s secret.”

“Well, what do we do now?” she said, whimpering.

“To confront him today with the prospect of knowing about his private horror would likely do more harm than good,” I chimed in. “We have penetrated into his dark world deep enough for now. My friend and I will be leaving, but I can return in a few days to see the captain again. Besides, I need some time to think about the next session with him.”

Holmes agreed, and so we departed after I patted her softly on the forearm.

Once we were outside, Holmes suggested we take the train to Windsor Station and walk to Knight’s Place so he could satisfy his curiosity about the fire at the captain’s former residence.

“What do you expect to find there?” I wanted to know.

“Perhaps something the official police overlooked, or maybe a clue to the identity of the other woman—a piece of information that would aid you in your future conversations with Captain Addleton,” he speculated.

Our walk from Windsor Station, which was crowded with tourists, took us through mews and streets with park-like qualities until we reached Knight’s Place, where the great stone house of the Addleton family stood abandoned with its roof collapsed and window frames charred from the thick smoke.

Holmes led the way in by shoving open the burned front door, which was ajar. “Be careful here, Watson, for the floor might not be intact,” he warned. Once inside, we marveled at the destruction of a once-comfortable drawing room, with paneled walls that were scorched so badly that we could not determine what kind of wood had covered the blocks of stone. We cautiously made our way past a huge fireplace with a granite mantel and into a dining hall, the ceiling of which was caved in, causing the chandelier to crash and shatter atop a table so large that a host could entertain a dozen dinner guests. Miraculously, the remainder of the floor was left untouched by the blaze, including the relatively small library, where Captain Addleton’s female admirer must have salvaged the history book.

Upstairs, every part of the hallway connecting the bedrooms was covered in soot, even the interiors of the rooms and their furniture, which were otherwise unscathed. “Curiously, Watson, the fire seems to have been concentrated in the two lower rooms—not up here where a faulty chimney would have done the most damage,” Holmes observed. “Let’s make a closer inspection of the drawing room.”

As we descended to the bottom of the staircase, Holmes got down on his hands and knees to examine the baseboard with his magnifying glass. “Hmmm. Ah ha,” he said under his breath. He followed the glass all along the baseboard to the fireplace, repeating, “Ah ha,” then stood erect. “My suspicions were correct, Watson,” he announced finally in a low voice. “This fire was the handiwork of an arsonist. The burn pattern on the baseboard is in the form of splashes—see here, and there, and over here. An accelerant, probably lamp oil, was used to ignite the flames. As usual, the authorities botched the job, and because of their bungling, a double-homicide has gone unpunished.”

“The captain!” I shouted excitedly. “He insists that he murdered his wife and daughter!”

“That has yet to be determined, but it does undoubtedly cast Ichabod Addleton in an inauspicious light,” Holmes postulated. “Come, we shall have a further look in the library, but be wary of where you step—the floor is weak in spots.”

I asked Holmes as we gingerly approached the study if we should go to Scotland Yard with the information. “If justice is to be served, I believe that is our only alternative,” he said reluctantly. Once inside the library, Holmes was drawn immediately to the hand-carved, grimy, mahogany desk, and he began opening the drawers after first examining the miscellaneous papers on top. “Nothing of interest to us here so far,” he judged. He came upon a locked bottom drawer and opened it easily with the barrel-and-bit key he always carried on a ring attached to his trouser belt loop.

Inside the drawer was the captain’s service revolver, resting on several pieces of correspondence. Holmes dropped his hand in, placed the revolver on the desktop, removed the letters, and started at once poring over them. “The first one is from Annabelle,” he revealed, “telling her husband, affectionately, how much she and Daphne appreciated the opportunity he gave them to visit their relatives on the Continent over an extended period. These other four are steamy love notes with a distinctly different style of handwriting than Annabelle’s. Compare them, Watson, to the handwriting you saw on the flyleaf of the history book.”

“It appears to match,” I told Holmes, regretfully, after I glanced over his shoulder.

He placed the weapon back in the drawer, neatly folded the correspondence, and tucked it into his inside jacket pocket. “Enough of this burglary business,” he intoned, “for we have a solemn duty to convey the facts to the Yard.”

We rode in a hansom to the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police Service at Whitehall Place and went through the rear public entrance, where Holmes requested a meeting with Inspector Tobias Gregson. Holmes had once described him as the smartest of the Scotland Yarders, quick, energetic, but conventional. “With Inspector Gregson,” Holmes said to me while we waited, “we have as good a chance as any for a reasonable discussion. It is a delicate task for an outsider to instruct the authorities on how they went wrong.”

After a short while, Inspector Gregson appeared in the lobby and clasped Holmes’s hand warmly, saying it had been a long time since their last encounter. “Dr Watson, I have been reading your accounts of your confederate’s triumphs, but I’m eager to learn about one of his failures, too,” he said to me, smiling.

“They are few and far between, and not nearly as intriguing,” I retorted.

We accompanied him to his office, and once inside, he addressed Holmes. “I assume this is not a social call, so what can I do for you?”

Diplomatically, Holmes explained the situation in detail, after which Tobias Gregson excused himself to look up the file on the fire at Knight’s Place. When he returned in more than a few moments, his expression was dour. “I apologise for the delay, gentlemen,” he began, “but I had to assure myself that our records were accurate. It seems there was no investigation of the deaths because the constables on the scene made the determination that the fatalities were accidental due to an accumulation of creosote in the lower portion of the chimney. Among us, I consider this negligent. However, it can be rectified. I shall report our conversation to my superiors and I believe a probe will ensue now. I thank you both for bringing this matter to my attention.”

On the way out, Holmes inquired if I carried my discharge card from the Army.

“I have it in my wallet, as always,” I answered.

“Excellent,” he said. “You can escort me as a guest for dinner at the Veterans’ Club. This is a Monday. Miss Addleton advised me that her brother played cards with a regular group of close friends every Monday and Friday night. We shall interrogate those friends tonight and ascertain if her brother can establish an iron-clad alibi for the date on which the tragedy occurred. If he cannot, I fear his destiny is sealed.”

The menu at the club was limited but appetising. Holmes and I ordered the beef brisket with buttered potatoes and broccoli, then shared a decanter of brandy afterward to await the gathering of comrades at the gaming tables in the recreation room off the dining hall. Our waiter pointed out the cluster of men with whom Captain Addleton once had enjoyed rounds of poker until the club closed at midnight. Holmes approached them and politely begged their pardon for interrupting, then informed them of his purpose for asking his questions.

Three of the participants remembered that a police sergeant intruded on their game the night of the fire and broke the news to Captain Addleton that his wife and daughter had died from smoke inhalation. “Ichabod was rattled and slumped in his chair,” recalled one of the men, a Mr Wetherington. “He had been here the entire time until then, which was about eleven-thirty,” Mr Wetherington stated positively. “It was such a shock, I shall never forget it—I knew both women, had been to their home,” he lamented. “I understand that Ichabod is still grieving.”

“Yes, he stays with his sister in Blackwall and never leaves his rooms,” Holmes confirmed.

“Pity. We could do with his wit again,” Mr Wetherington confessed, remorseful that his companion had been absent so long.

“Tell me, if you would,” Holmes went on, “did Mr Addleton ever mention that he had an enemy, or was there someone who held a grudge against him?”

They all shook their heads no.

“Did he ever talk of any women in his life besides his wife and daughter?” Holmes wanted to know.

“Now see here!” a Mr Price protested. “Just what do you mean to imply by that question?”

Before Holmes could respond, Mr Wetherington named Sally, the Addletons’s housekeeper. “Ichabod would sometimes regale us with her shenanigans,” he related, then grinned. “She was like a second daughter to him. I met her also when I visited Ichabod—a raving beauty, she is.”

After a few parting words, Holmes and I boarded the Underground for our trip back to Baker Street, where he decided during a chat in the sitting-room that identifying the arsonist was more urgent than any of his other pending cases. “They are incidental when contrasted against this one,” he allowed.

And so it was early the next morning that we took the train again to Blackwall, where Miss Addleton apprised us of the whereabouts of Sally, whose last name was Wiggins. After the fire, Sally went to work as a fashion model for Herrod’s Department Store in Stafford, having vacated the apartment she shared with her grumpy father and moved in with a roommate at a flat on Priory Street in the East End. Holmes and I next traveled to Stafford to interview the young woman, and we were ushered by the store proprietor to his finely decorated suite on the fifth floor.

“At the moment,” he said, “Miss Wiggins is showing a new line of gowns from Paris to a group of ladies belonging to the Westminster Society. I can arrange for her to come here afterward. In the meantime, gentlemen, please help yourselves to some coffee or tea over there on the salver.”

Soon, she appeared in the doorway, and we both rose, cups in hand and stunned by her elegance—long, wavy blond hair caressing her shoulders, sparkling blue eyes, an angelic face with an upturned nose, and a perfectly curved figure that fitted tightly into a flattering, pale-green evening dress, which sensuously flowed over her bare ankles.

Holmes, charming her with a compliment, spoke of the purpose of our calling, and she reacted with distress. “The murder of Annabelle and Daphne?” she repeated breathlessly. “I can’t understand. Who would want to kill Annabelle and Daphne?”

“And possibly the man of the house, as well,” Holmes added. “Not many people knew he would be away playing cards the night the fire was set.”

“Oh, good Lord,” Miss Wiggins ejaculated. “They hadn’t a foe in the world. Who would do such a thing?”

“That is what I hope you can assist us in discovering,” Holmes told her.

“Assist you how?” she inquired.

“By sitting down at a table when you go home today and writing a list of all the people the family knew or who had been to their house,” Holmes stated. “Here is my address,” he said, tearing a sheet from his notebook. “You can send the list to me there as quickly as you are able.”

“I shall make your request a priority, Mr Holmes,” she promised before gracefully seating herself on the sofa, nervously clutching the slip of paper Holmes had given her.

We left Miss Wiggins composing herself in the proprietor’s suite and took the train to Charing Cross, walking the distance from the station to Baker Street while silently mulling over the developments thus far. Earlier, as we rode on the Pullman coach, Holmes offered a perplexing comment that caused me to wonder what he had in mind. “I have two reasons for asking Sally Wiggins to provide me with the data,” he admitted. “The first is obvious, and the second is perhaps the solution to this whole affair.”

We were eating a late lunch of some leftovers that were in the ice chest when our landlady knocked and entered our rooms after I answered, “Please come in, Mrs Hudson.” We knew it was she from the cadence of her rapping. “Peterson, the commissionaire,” she announced, “is waiting downstairs for a reply to this message directed to you both.” She handed me the note, which came from Miss Addleton.

“Mr Holmes and Dr Watson (it read):

“I have terrible news about my brother. They have carted him off in irons and accused him of murder, telling me that he wanted his wife out of the way so he could be with the other woman.

“Please help him and tell me what I am to do.”

“Fools!” Holmes bellowed. “Why would he start a fire that also endangered a daughter he idolized?”

Holmes hastily wrote instructions for Miss Addleton on the reverse side of the message and handed it back to Mrs Hudson. “Here is a half-sovereign for Peterson if he can deliver the reply this afternoon,” said Holmes, and, turning to me, asked if I was prepared to have another try at bringing Captain Addleton back to his good senses.

“I’ve thought about my approach and I think I’m ready,” I responded.

“Capital, Watson,” he went on, “then let’s be off to Scotland Yard, where you can visit the captain in the dock and I can engage Inspector Gregson in a Dutch-uncle talk. I must concede I anticipated this outcome from the conference with him yesterday, but I had hoped he would be more circumspect, rather than rush to judgment.”

We arrived at police headquarters just as Tobias Gregson was enlightening the press gathered in the lobby how he had recently uncovered clues that led to solving the cold case.

Afterward, in the privacy of his office, Holmes inquired of the inspector if he knew that Ichabod Addleton had witnesses who could establish his innocence.

“Let him produce a dozen witnesses,” Inspector Gregson contended. “I have a star witness to whom the defendant confessed the crime—your biographer, Dr Watson.”

“But he is insane; he hallucinates,” I interjected. “Does that not reduce his confession to rubbish?”

“He is lucid enough to know right from wrong,” the inspector argued. “That is sufficient to render his admission admissible in court, and you, Doctor, are compelled to testify as to what you heard from his own lips.”

“What transpires between a patient and his physician is confidential,” I debated, realising my argument was a weak one.

“We shall see about that,” Inspector Gregson snapped.

Holmes interrupted our dispute with a request that I meet with the captain in the lockup.

The inspector acquiesced. “Of course, by all means,” he said gladly. “But be forewarned, I shall want to know what he has to say.”

Holmes accompanied me to the cellblock, and we found the prisoner in an agitated state. When I introduced Holmes to Captain Addleton, he was unimpressed until I informed him that Holmes was there to help him attain his freedom.

“That is wonderful,” he remarked, “for it is impossible for a playwright to compose his best work in a place like this—no paper, no pen, no table.”

“We have learned Captain Addleton’s secret!” I proclaimed. “We now know why he was a scoundrel!”

He reacted with a start, then settled. “What is it that you know?” he asked.

“We have discovered that Captain Addleton was unfaithful to his wife; he concealed a lover,” I revealed.

“It was not a matter of love. It was a dalliance on his part while his wife was on holiday,” William Shakespeare declared. “The other woman took it more seriously, though, and pursued the captain. She became obsessed. She went to extremes. She took drastic measures.”

“Who was this other woman? What was her name?” I persisted.

“That is not important, John,” he continued. “The harm she inflicted was irreparable. Besides, it was Captain Addleton who was responsible for the catastrophe. It was he who instigated the adultery. O, ye scoundrel! Hath ye no shame?”

Even using other methods, I attempted to accomplish the impossible with the captain, so Holmes and I left him brooding about his confinement. I reported my lack of success to Inspector Gregson and went with Holmes back to our diggings.

Later that afternoon, Billy, a page-boy at Baker Street, brought Holmes an envelope that contained the list Miss Wiggins had drawn up naming associates and acquaintances of the Addleton family.

“As I suspected, Watson,” Holmes boasted, “Sally Wiggins is the other woman. Her handwriting is identical to that in those four lurid love notes locked in the bottom desk drawer.”

Holmes decided to confront her that very evening at her apartment on Priory Street, but first he wrote a message and asked Mrs Hudson to give it to Billy for delivery immediately. We hailed an empty cab that was passing our building and in five minutes we were taking the stairs down to the Underground terminal. Holmes rode in the train car with his hands clasped behind his head, his dark eyes closed, and his toes tapping in rhythm, as if imagining a tune, but I surmised he was plotting his next strategic move. A half-hour later he was turning the small lever that rang the doorbell at apartment number 4-C.

“Who is it?” came a sweet feminine voice from inside.

“It is Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson, here to see Miss Wiggins about a pressing matter,” Holmes replied.

“She is in the bathtub but won’t be much longer,” said her roommate. “I’ll go tell her who it is. Please wait.”

A moment later, the roommate swung open the door. “She said for you to come in and have a seat. She’ll be out directly,” said the jittery young lady. “It’s not often a detective and a doctor come calling. Is something amiss?”

“Don’t be upset,” Holmes said to reassure her. “Miss Wiggins will explain after we have gone on our way.”

“If you say so, I won’t worry then,” the roommate remarked. “I must excuse myself and leave this instant or I will be late for a dinner engagement with my beau. He adores it that I am punctual.” With that, the young lady departed in a flash.

In time, Miss Wiggins emerged from the bath, drying her wet, stringy hair with a towel and appearing far less elegant than she did at work. Now without makeup and wearing a bulky, white terrycloth robe over plaid pajamas, she flopped down into an armchair and brusquely asked: “Did you bring me news of a revelation in your investigation?”

“In a manner of speaking, yes, I did,” answered Holmes coyly.

“My list was helpful, then,” she glowed.

“Yes, it was, in a way you didn’t expect,” he went on.

“What on earth do you mean?” she inquired.

“Perhaps if you would be more forthcoming, I could explain myself in more explicit terms,” he added.

“What are you getting at, Mr Holmes,” Miss Wiggins demanded.

“What I am getting at is this, my dear,” Sherlock Holmes began. “You and Ichabod Addleton were entwined in a love triangle. You were jealous of Annabelle, because Mr Addleton refused to divorce her. You threatened to eliminate the wife if you couldn’t marry him, and you carried out that threat by setting the house ablaze on a night you knew Mr Addleton would be away.”

“Prove it,” she said calmly.

“I intend to, Miss Wiggins. Here are four love notes in your handwriting, graphically depicting your intimacy,” said Holmes, spreading the correspondence on the coffee table that stood between them. “In one of these notes, you frankly state: ‘If I can’t have you, Ichabod, I’ll fix it so she can’t have you either.’ It is dated two days before the fire. I have sent a message requesting Inspector Gregson of Scotland Yard to come here at seven o’clock with a writ to search your flat. I shall hazard a guess that he and his men will locate a skeleton key that fits the rim lock on the door to the servants’ entrance at the former Addleton residence. Also, they will find incriminating evidence in a diary on your nightstand, a memoir of your life’s events which I perused while you were bathing. After all is said and done, the authorities might still retain Mr Addleton in custody, because they could regard him as a co-conspirator.”

“He is in jail?” she whined.

“He has been arrested for the murder of his wife and daughter,” Holmes informed her.

“Oh, God, no! They’ll hang him!” Miss Wiggins sputtered. She bent forward, buried her troubled countenance in the palms of her hands, and burst into tears, totally losing control of herself. “I still love him with all my heart,” she heaved. Then, after a period of quiet, she thrust herself upward in a daze. “But they won’t hang a woman, will they?” she wondered, glaring at Holmes. She answered her own question: “No, they won’t. It’s me the police want, Mr Holmes. Don’t let them hang him for what I alone did. He is faultless, an innocent, broken man. Oh, Ichabod, my poor, poor Ichabod.” Again, she cried, hysterically.

Some weeks later, Miss Wiggins pleaded guilty to homicide by arson and was sentenced to ten years imprisonment in the women’s section at Parkhurst Penitentiary. Captain Addleton never recovered, and, tragically, he died in an asylum at the age of fifty-six.

about the author

Jack Grochot is a retired investigative newspaper journalist and a former federal law enforcement agent specializing in mail fraud cases. He lives on a small farm in southwestern Pennsylvania, where he writes and cares for five boarded horses. His fiction work includes the book Come, Watson! Quickly!, a collection of five Sherlock Holmes pastiches. He is an active member of Mystery Writers of America.