I raised a finger to my lips and glanced over his shoulder to the back stairs. In a low voice, I said, “I have an…errand to do.”
“At this hour?” He studied my clothing, wrinkled his nose, and asked in a lower tone, “You’re obviously planning a trip through the woods. To the Straton cottage, I presume?”
“I know Mr. Straton didn’t murder Mrs. Brown. Constance told me.”
Another wrinkle of the nose. “Told you.” He glanced behind me and into my bedroom. “Is she in there?”
“No.”
He stared at me, and I knew he was assessing me and his next move. I’d seen the same expression when he played Mother in chess. “You’ll have hell to pay if they catch you out of your room.”
“I’ve considered the consequences and find nothing that would be worse than sending an innocent man to gaol.” After a weighted pause, I played to his weakness. “I’m doing this for you as much as anyone. Remember, the sooner we resolve these deaths, the sooner you return to Oxford.” His brows arched, and I knew I’d convinced him. “I could use some help in keeping everyone from my room until I return.”
Another glance into the bedroom. “Sometimes you are truly a twit. Do you think anyone will believe you’re in your room when your bed is still made?”
“I was in a hurry, and I—”
He waved a hand at me, as if shooing me toward the servant stairs. “Go. Before Father and Mother decide to retire. I know what to do. I used to sneak out of my bedroom at night in Eton. When I wanted to be alone with my thoughts, I would make my bed to appear I was in it and then go to a storage room in the attic. I made it up into quite a nice sitting area from some discarded pieces. Over time, I even allowed a few of the other boys to join me.”
“The Diogenes Society.”
“You know about it?”
“It’s still there. One of the boys from the upper forms invited me because I was your brother. I can understand its appeal to you. They had a rule about no talking. I found it rather…stifling.”
He tucked his chin and studied me for a moment. “I can see that for you. You’ve always been a rather restless soul. Always running about wanting to do things. Like now. You’d best get going.”
“Thanks. For helping me.”
“I’m not doing it for you. I’m doing it for me.”
He spun on his heel and stepped into my room, shutting the door behind him.
Leaving him to his subterfuge, I headed toward the stairs, listening for any sounds signaling movement on either the main or servants’ stairs. Hearing none, I descended to join the girl.
Constance and I stepped from the greenhouse (She was right. The door was unlocked), and I moved toward my uncle’s workshop.
“What are you doing?” she asked in a harsh whisper. “The woods are this way.”
“I know, but I want a lantern. It’s going to be dark under the trees, and we’ll travel more quickly with a light.”
At Ernest’s workshop, I paused before entering. When I heard no noise, I decided he was either asleep or still in the main house and let myself in. I retrieved a lantern from a bench just inside the door and headed toward the edge of the woods with Constance.
A slight mist blanketed the ground, strips of white floating about our feet. It grew heavier the further inside we progressed. About ten to fifteen minutes after passing onto the trail, I heard a rustling in the underbrush and jerked my head in the direction of the sound. Chances were the rustling belonged to a deer or similar creature, but even then, some animals would attack if provoked or frightened. Constance, however, continued to trudge ahead, oblivious to the noise. All the same, while I kept pace with her, I found myself listening for any indication of other creatures possibly crossing our path.
As we entered the deepest part of the woods, I found myself clutching the lantern’s handle harder as noises seemed to pop up all around me. Despite my heightened vigilance, I might not have heard the sound if we hadn’t slowed to climb over a fallen log. Straddling the log, I paused when a low moaning emanated from my right. I turned to Constance to ask if she had heard the same sound, but she stood frozen, her finger to her lips to silence me. We both waited for the noise to come again. Barely breathing, I listened, searching for the groaning until my ears rang.
Then a faint sighing floated on the breeze. I glanced in the direction of the Straton’s cottage, feeling the pull to accomplish my mission, and I would have continued on that path had I not caught a word in the next sigh.
“Help.”
Constance turned and moved with such speed I could barely keep her within the lantern’s glow. I almost ran into her back when she halted at the edge of a small clearing among a stand of yew trees. A dark hump lay almost at her feet. When I raised the light higher to get a better view of the fallen figure, Constance shrieked and dropped to her knees.
“Papa!”
I knelt beside her to help turn him onto his back. Mr. Straton’s features twisted in pain, and the only word he muttered was, “Help.”
“Papa,” she repeated and grabbed his shoulders. “What happened?”
He winced at her movement and groaned, but said no more.
The shadows cast by the lantern made it difficult to make out his injuries. With great effort, I pulled her away from her father, removed my gloves, and ran my hands over the man to see if I could tell where he’d been hurt. When I touched wetness above his abdomen, I pulled my hand back to check it in the light. She cried out again when she saw the red stains on my fingers.
“We have to help him,” she said, almost babbling. “Get him to a doctor. He can’t die…can’t die.”
“Constance.” I gripped her shoulders and forced her to meet my gaze. “We can’t carry him, but he does need help. One of us has to stay. The other must run back to Underbyrne and fetch others.”
She glanced back at her father. “He can’t die…he can’t die.”
For the first time since I’d known her, the girl seemed lost, unable to think or respond to the situation. As much as I wanted to shake her, I turned her face to mine and forced myself instead to speak in a low, even tone.
“You have to go get help. Go back to Underbyrne and bring my parents. I’ll take care of him while you’re gone.” I glanced at the man lying still on the ground and said, “I won’t let him die.”
She focused on me, and for the first time, I could tell she comprehended what I was saying. “Promise?”
I nodded, unwilling to verbalize again what I feared might be an empty vow.
We both rose to our feet, and I accompanied her back to the trail. Before she turned herself in the direction of my home, I pulled a handkerchief from my pocket and tied it to a branch of a bush at the side of the path. “This way you’ll know where to turn to find your father. Can you find your way without the lamp? I need it so that I can dress the wound.”
“Remember your promise,” she said, and rushed away from me.
After she had disappeared into the woods’ gloom, I turned to retrace my steps. While the lantern did provide some help in identifying the broken branches and trampled plants Constance and I had created in our search for Mr. Straton, I realized if I marked the whole trail the others would be able to find their way to the injured man faster. I ripped the handkerchief into strips and tied them at various intervals to lead to the yew clearing.
When I reached Constance’s father, I sucked in my breath. Even in the yellow light, Mr. Straton’s grimy face was pale. How much blood had he lost? A crimson circle covered the right side of his shirt and jacket and soaked the yew needles underneath him. Only the slow rise and fall of his chest let me know he was still breathing.
Kneeling at his side, I now worked quickly to see how I might tend to him until help arrived. I pulled back the shirt and jacket and found the source of the bleeding. It seeped from a slit between two ribs. The image of the dead workman in Mr. Harvingsham’s office rose unbidden to my mind, and bile surged into my throat.
I pushed both the image and the rising nausea away, willing myself to return to the job at hand. With shaking fingers, I unwound the scarf from my neck and pressed it against the wound. He moaned, but didn’t open his eyes. His skin was cool to the touch. Fearing he might catch a chill, I removed my jacket and covered him as much as possible. Once I completed these tasks, I rested as best I could next to him. All my strength seemed to drain from me. Perhaps I’d pushed myself too far too soon after my fall, or it was the effects of the cool night, but I found my thoughts drifting. I forced myself to keep pressure on Mr. Straton’s wound. At some point, my eyelids began to droop.
I must have dozed off but woke with a start when I heard voices coming toward me. I jerked to attention and shouted in their direction. “Over here.”
Father and Benson the gamekeeper were the first to break into the clearing and the lantern light. Mother and Constance followed, with Ernest, Mycroft, and Mr. Simpson the last to arrive. The steward carried a length of canvas attached to two poles. I recognized it as the stretcher Benson used to carry a deer or other animal carcass to the butchering shed.
Everyone held back as Mother knelt next to Mr. Straton. She turned back my coat and, after adjusting the light, checked the wound under the scarf. My makeshift bandage had adhered to the skin, and she had to peel it off. After studying it a moment, she must have recognized it as mine because she passed it to me, and I stuffed it into my trouser pocket without thinking. She pulled a jar of honey out of a small black bag she had brought and quickly applied a thick layer of it to the cut and applied a clean bandage to it.
“That will have to do for the moment,” she said, sitting back on her heels. “Once back home, I can determine how deep the cut is. Let’s get him there as soon as possible.”
The adults exchanged glances, but it was Father who said aloud what I knew the others were thinking. “Mrs. Holmes, you’re not suggesting we take him back to Underbyrne? Surely he would be better at the village hospital?”
We had all assumed he would be transported to the low building near the surgeon’s home. While Mother and others of our social stature might take care of ill or injured family members at home, the poorer classes would be cared for at the hospital for the surgeon’s convenience.
“The trip into town would be dangerous for him. I even fear the travel to our home, but I can care for him better there.”
The shadows cast by the lantern light only accentuated the furrows in Father’s brow. “As a justice of the peace, I’m not certain we should harbor a fugitive in our home.”
“It won’t be harboring if we inform the constable where he is. I can tell you now, there is no need to worry he will run off.” She glanced at Constance and shifted her tone slightly. “I’ll take personal responsibility for him.”
“Please, sir,” Constance said. “He didn’t kilt no one. Master Holmes was going with me to see if we could prove it.”
Father shook his head, but said, “He can stay at least until he’s healed enough to make his own defense.” He turned to me. “You, boy, have no reprieve. We’ll discuss your impertinence after the man has been settled in one of the empty servant rooms.”
“Yes, sir,” I said with a drop of my head.
Over the next half hour, the men loaded the unconscious farmer onto the stretcher, covered him with blankets, and with one on each of the four corners, carried him out of the woods to a waiting wagon. As we tramped behind the men, Mother turned to Constance and me.
“Constance said something about proof her father hadn’t killed Mrs. Brown. What did she mean?”
“The constable and Mr. Brown say he killed Mrs. Brown because she poisoned Mrs. Straton. Constance says her mother never took what Mrs. Brown gave her. Her father burned it when he found it in her mending basket. We were going to fetch the basket and see if any was left.”
Constance nodded in agreement but glanced down when Mother studied both of us.
“Why didn’t you simply tell me? Instead of running off into the woods like this? And you, Sherry, still recovering from a brain commotion.”
My shoulders slumped under my mother’s rebuke. As much as I wanted to defend my actions, a part of me knew she was right. I also knew that had Constance and I not done so, Mr. Straton would have bled to death in the woods, only ten minutes or so from his home. Mother must have come to the same conclusion because when she spoke next, her voice had lost the tinge of reprimand she’d had earlier.
“We probably should consider what might be in the mending basket. Constance, after we settle your father at Underbyrne, I’ll send you out with Mr. Simpson to your cottage to collect the basket and your brothers and sisters. We have enough extra beds in the servant’s attic for all of you. We’ll discuss a more permanent arrangement in the morning.”
She lifted her chin to that news. “Thank you, madam. I promise to help in any way I’s can.”
Despite my relief for Mr. Straton and my previous analysis of the consequences, I still dreaded what awaited me at home. I had not one, but both parents upset about my actions. No head injury in the world would save me a second time from their current disapproval. I did wonder, however, if finding and rescuing Constance’s father didn’t count for something.
Everyone else remained subdued and in their own thoughts on the ride back. Even poor Mr. Straton remained unconscious. I’d hoped he might be able to tell us who had stabbed him, but the most he did was moan when the wagon wheels hit a rough patch on the road.
Constance stayed at his side throughout, her small hand gripping his. She never glanced away from his face. I wanted to comfort her, assure her he would be all right, but feared to make a hollow assertion. I’d already promised her once and feared repeating it might only raise her hopes. She only let go of his hand when the men took him up the stairs to the servants’ rooms. When he was settled in bed, Father remained behind with me and the women.
Mother turned to Constance. “Go downstairs to Mr. Simpson. He’ll help you fetch the children along with the mending basket. I’ll have Mrs. Simpson prepare a room nearby for all of you.”
The girl bit her lip, showing no enthusiasm for leaving her father. At the door, she checked over her shoulder one more time before descending the stairs.
After we could no longer hear her footfalls on the stairs, Mother turned to me. I dipped my head, steadying myself for the reprimand I knew was coming. Instead, she said, “Go to the kitchen and ask Cook for a kettle of boiling water and a pan. Also more honey. We are going to have to act quickly if we are to avoid infection. Also, have Mycroft and Ernest join us.”
As I reached the door, I overheard Father speak in a low tone, “Violette, are you certain you can save him? Perhaps I should call Harvingsham? He does have experience with stitching cuts.”
“He would also insist on bleeding him. I think the man has bled enough already, don’t you? The stitching will be rather straightforward. I’m more concerned about infection. The honey should help prevent that.”
Mr. Straton moaned and twisted on the bed. “Honey.”
I turned to check and see if he had awakened, but he had muttered the word without opening his eyes. Mother and Father appeared not to have heard the man, as they continued to speak in low voices as she prepared needle and thread and bandages to minister to the man.
When I returned, Mother had removed the bandage and was cleaning the wound again. “Sherlock, good, put the pan of boiling water on the table and drop the needle and thread in it.”
“Won’t it make it more difficult to sew if it’s wet?”
“Perhaps, but a Hungarian doctor by the name of Semmelweis has found that by washing hands and wounds, the incidence of death decreases.” Her hands moved in sure and precise motions as she spoke. “While he didn’t specifically note instruments, it seems to me that if washing hands reduces death, wouldn’t cleaning all implements touching the body do the same?”
Once the needle was threaded, she paused to examine the cut between the man’s ribs one more time. “Rather an odd-shaped incision,” she muttered as much to herself as to any of us.
Ernest and Mycroft appeared in the doorway.
“Good, I’ll need all four of you to hold the man down. Can’t have him twisting about when I try to stitch the injury shut.” She turned to her brother. “But before I do, I want you to consider the wound.”
Ernest stepped to the bedside and peered at the man’s side. “What about it?”
“Consider its shape. It’s not the same thickness as a blade would be.”
“Yes, I see what you mean. The ends are much thinner than the middle.”
“After we finish here, I would like you to work on another pig—”
“Really, Mrs. Holmes,” Father said with a sigh. “Another pig? Many more of these little experiments of yours will deplete the swine population to dangerous levels.”
“Better swine than people, wouldn’t you agree? A killer is stalking our woods. Sherlock and Constance were quite lucky not to have come upon whoever stabbed this man.”
Father turned to stare at me for a moment, and I dropped my head. Only at this remark had I realized how close one or both of us might have come to meeting our end. I recalled the rustling in the woods. At the time, I’d only been afraid of animals. Whoever had tried to murder Mr. Straton was definitely the most dangerous creature we could have encountered. I also realized what I had just glimpsed in my Father’s eyes. Fear, certainly, but also love. While I’d never doubted my father cared for me, at that moment, I came to understand the depth of his love. The very thought of losing me, when I stood safe and sound in front of him, filled him with dread.
“As I was saying, Ernest,” Mother continued, “procure a dead pig and collect all the implements you can to see if you can replicate the wound. Perhaps knowing what stabbed the man will tell us who stabbed him.”
“I’ll check the library also,” Mycroft said. “I might find the implement among the various books on horticulture and farming.”
“An excellent idea,” Mother said. “If you do find any, provide them to Ernest so that he can check them.”
“But won’t Mr. Straton be able to tell us this?” I asked.
She took a quick study of the man from head to toe. “I hope. The next twenty-four hours are very important for him. Now, everyone, I need you to hold him still while I close the wound.”
The clock struck two while the four of us struggled to keep the man still. He didn’t thrash as much as twist his body when the needle entered his skin. Mother, however, proved to be quite efficient and had the wound closed almost before the chimes’ echo died away.
Once the bandage was wrapped over the wound, Mother touched the man’s forehead. “Perhaps a little feverish. But then again, he’d been lying on the forest floor. As much as I’d like to give him something for the pain and the fever, he’s not conscious, and I fear him choking on a liquid. We’ll simply have to wait until something changes. I’ll have one of the servants monitor him with orders to come and get me if something changes.”
“I’ll watch him, madam,” Constance said in the doorway.
We all turned in her direction as she entered the room. Her timid step revealed her fear of what she’d find in the bed. Her reach was slow and reluctant as she touched her father’s hand resting on the blanket covering his chest.
“Have the children all been put to bed?” Mother asked. Constance nodded. “I would prefer you do so as well, but somehow I think you’d simply return once we left. And you have offered to help. Gentlemen, if you’ll excuse us, I’ll give some instruction to Constance, and head downstairs shortly.”
The moment she referenced sleep, I became aware of how acutely weary I was. All the agitation of finding Mr. Straton, bringing him back to Underbyrne, and treating his wound drained from me, and my extremities became heavy and leaden. With great effort I followed the other men from the room and down the stairs.
Father pulled me aside when we reached the second floor.
“Sherlock, your conduct of late concerns me. This sneaking off when you could have… Your mother convinced me not to confine you to the house this time, but if your behavior doesn’t improve, we will have to revisit the freedom you have been afforded.” He glanced at his bedroom and sighed. “I’m too tired now to discuss this further, but be forewarned and consider it before future actions.”
I nodded and suppressed the grin threatening to appear unbidden despite my fatigue. My logic had paid off in the end. My parents could hardly punish me too severely when my misdeed had saved a man’s life.
Once in my chamber, I fought the desire to lie down without taking off my clothes. Only my concern about soiling my linens with the mud from my pants and jacket convinced me to undress. After changing into my nightclothes, I crawled into bed and fell asleep almost immediately.
When I awoke the next morning, the sun was already streaming through the window. I quickly dressed and made my way to Mr. Straton’s room. Constance sat by his side, her head resting on the cover near his chest. I hadn’t planned to speak to her, but she raised her head when I took a step back to exit.
“What time is it?” she asked.
“Ten o’clock. In the morning. Have you had anything to eat?”
“Mrs. Simpson had someone brings us all somethin’ to eat. I couldn’t hardly swallow, but the others finished off what I didn’t.”
“Any change? In your father, I mean.”
She glanced at him and shook her head. “Your mother came in and checked on him. Said he needs to sleep to make more blood, but that he’s not been too feverish, and that’s good. She’ll be in later to change the bandage.”
“You know to ask if you need anything. I’m going to get breakfast and find Mother. Do you want to join me?”
She reached out and ran a hand over her father’s arm, then shook her head. “I want to be here. In case he wakes up.”
In the kitchen, I found Cook already working on dinner, but she offered to fix me a plate to hold me until then.
“If you want, you can also take something to your uncle in his workshop. Your mother’s with him. He came in early this morning, asking about my tools that aren’t knives. When I showed him some, he took them all and disappeared.” She paused as she cut some carrots into round coins. “At least he left the knives.”
When I arrived at the workshop with a basket of food enough for three, I found Mother and Ernest standing at a canvas-draped work table. On it lay three sides of pork, their pale-pink skin marked by a number of slits and holes. A jumble of tools, some of which I assumed belonged to Cook, rested near the battered carcasses.
She raised her head when I entered. “Sherry, you’re just the person we needed. You also saw Mr. Straton’s wound before I stitched it closed. Do any of these resemble it?”
She handed me a magnifying glass.
I studied the first pig’s side. “I don’t know for certain, but these cuts appear to be too clean compared to what I saw.”
“I agree. You have a keen eye. The blades on these tools appear too sharp and thin.” She directed me to the next side. “What about here?”
“These are cruder cuts. That one”—I pointed to one example—“might be similar, but it’s not wide enough. The wound was longer.”
“Interesting,” Ernest said. “That was made by a crowbar.”
He picked up a long, iron bar and showed me its flattened, chisel-like end. “But you say it was longer?”
Mother thought for a moment and said, “Perhaps the perpetrator wrenched it about, making the hole bigger?”
“We can see,” said Ernest.
He slammed the crowbar’s end into the pig’s side, then wiggled it back and forth for a moment. When he extracted it, we all peered at the incision created.
“What do you think?” Mother asked.
Both she and my uncle focused on me, and I realized these two adults were actually seeking my advice. I shifted the weight on my feet and studied the gash again.
“It’s still not long enough, is it?” I said after a moment. “And now the middle is all mucked up. The cut was cleaner than that, I think.”
Ernest studied the end of the crowbar again. “So the most likely candidate would be something with a wedge-like end, but wider.”
“Do you have any instruments that might fit the description?” Mother asked, glancing about the workshop.
“Not that I can think of.” He sighed. “I’ll go out to the barn and see what I might find out there.”
“And check with Mycroft on his research. But let’s eat first. While you’re collecting the items, I’ll see what might be in the mending basket.”
I raised my head. I’d forgotten about Mrs. Straton’s mending basket. Mother smiled at me when I glanced about to locate the item. While dangling the prospect of the basket might have been to test my patience, the pace at which Mother finished the sandwiches Cook had prepared suggested she was losing that battle herself. In no time, Ernest was off in search of more items to test in the pig carcasses, and Mother and I were gathered at another work table.
As a first step after donning a pair of work gloves, she spread out the contents on the table. The items at the very top were two socks of different colors and an apron with a rip in it. Compared to the assortment of cloth scraps, yarn, and threads in the rest of the basket, I assumed the three pieces were the mending Constance had gathered from Mrs. Gibbons.
Next in the basket was a linen napkin with a rip as well. Mother studied it for a moment. “This appears to be one of ours.” She opened it completely. “It is. See the embroidered H in the corner? I’ll have to ask Mrs. Simpson when she gave it to Mrs. Straton for mending. I don’t recall seeing her.”
She shook her head and surveyed the items laid out before us.
“Constance said her father destroyed the packet. What do you expect to find?” I asked.
“I’m not certain, but I’ve observed that when items co-mingle, they often exchange bits of themselves. Like finding horsehairs on your clothes after visiting the stables even when you hadn’t touched the animal. Constance said the packet had spilled, so some of it might still be on something in the basket.”
“Do you wish me to start on one end while you examine the other?”
“A brilliant idea. What one may miss, the other might see when we cross in the middle.”
After retrieving two of my uncle’s magnifying glasses and donning my own pair of work gloves, I bent over the first item and examined it from one end to the other and from side to side before going on to the next. I found the glass’s display of the weave and various fibers in the cloth or yarn intriguing. When I came across the first bit of foreign matter on a cloth scrap, I called Mother over for her opinion.
She did her own review of the cloth. “It appears to be a bit of fuzz. Perhaps from the yarn or another of the scraps.” She straightened and glanced about the place. “Let’s make a list of what we find. Perhaps that will help us determine what may be out of the ordinary.”
By the time I'd made it almost to the halfway mark, I had an extensive list of bits of fuzz, threads, and...
“Mother”" I asked as I considered my list. “What’s the basket made of?”
She turned to it and picked it up. “Willow, I believe.”
“Not straw? I’ve found a few bits of a dried grass or plant.”
Her forehead creased. “Something like this?” She pointed to a particular square on her end of the items, but near the center as well. I studied it with my glass. This specimen had a bit of flower still attached to it. I raised my gaze to hers.
“This isn’t pennyroyal.”
“Very good, dear,” she said. Despite my keen observation, her voice carried no joy. “What do you think it is?”
The dried stem had a mottled purple hue along the bottom part. With great care, I crushed a bit using the end of the magnifying glass and sniffed. While not potent, I could still catch the rank odor of…
“It can’t be, can it?” I asked aloud, with a similar tone to that of my mother’s. “Surely she wouldn't have taken hemlock on her own?”
“How do we know what’s in another's heart? I have known others....”
Her face took on the same faraway look Uncle Ernest often showed. When she focused on me again, her eyes shimmered with tears. Who had she known willing to take their own life?
“Do we know for certain that she took it willingly?” I asked. “It’s a common enough plant. One can find it everywhere. What if someone else confused it with pennyroyal?”
“All good questions, but I am not certain we can ask anyone in her family. If she did take her life, then they would most likely not admit it. At least now we know what killed the woman. The question is who gave it to her?”
The scent of the hemlock lingered in my nostrils and the itching in the back of my mind returned. Before I could dig down and uncover it, Mrs. Simpson threw back the workshop door, making it slam against the wall with a loud bang.
“Mrs. Holmes, I came quick to let you know. The constable’s here and is demanding to interrogate Mr. Straton.”
In one quick motion, Mother pulled off her gloves and tossed them on the floor at the end of the table by the basket. I followed her example and rushed with the two women back to the main house.
When we stepped into the house through the kitchen, Cook pointed us in the direction of the servant staircase. Constable Gibbons and Father were at the foot. They both turned in our direction when the two women and I rounded the corner into the hallway. From Father’s glare at me, I could tell he considered my presence a violation of social conventions regarding conversations among adults. Without a word, I retreated from the hallway, but remained close enough to hear the exchange.
“Ah, Mrs. Holmes, so glad you are here. The constable came to return your ledger.”
“How kind of you,” Mother said in a voice that betrayed none of the contempt I knew she harbored for the man.
The constable cleared his throat. “It was what you said it was. Notes regarding plant experiments. At least that’s what the expert reported.”
“You hired an expert? For what purpose?” Father asked. “Who on the village police committee approved such an expense?”
“Because the entries were written in code, I felt the need to confirm its contents. I do have some discretion in my budget. I used that.”
“Had you simply believed me in the first place, the expense wouldn’t have been necessary, but I am grateful for having my notes back. It represents years of work.”
The man gave a hurrumph in response and continued. “I thought I might as well bring it with me since I was coming out to interrogate Straton.”
“I think you might find that rather difficult, given that the man is unconscious. Or at least he was an hour ago when I checked on him last. His daughter is keeping vigil and has orders to call for me should he awaken.”
“How do you know he’s not pretending?”
“I suppose he could feign sleep now, but not when I stitched his wound. He also couldn’t invent the loss of blood from the stabbing, or the fever that had already attacked him by the time he was found. If you’re concerned about him disappearing, I can assure you that even if awake, he would be too weak and ill to flee.”
Another hurrumph. “I want to see the man. Let me point out you are harboring a criminal. A warrant is out for his arrest.”
“Harboring would involve us willfully hiding him. We informed you of his presence the moment he arrived at Underbyrne. As for the warrant, we have it on good authority, sir,” Father said, lifting his chest, “that the man was drunk and unable to murder anyone on the night Mrs. Brown died.”
“Who says so?”
“The daughter Constance reported it to us—”
“Do you truly think I’d take that girl’s word? She’s a convicted thief. On the other hand, Mr. Brown will testify the man threatened his wife in a public place. Everyone knows Brown is as close to a saint as they come.”
A pause ensued, and while I couldn’t see her, I imagined Mother struggling to keep her face and voice civil to the man. When she finally spoke, her words were clipped. “Even a saint can make a mistake about what he heard.”
“Perhaps, but I see no reason to think that in this case. The man has been tireless in his pursuit of his wife’s murderer. Mr. Holmes was about to take me up to see for myself.”
“We’ll be down in a moment. Please, follow me, Constable,” Father said. After a pause, he added, “I think it best if just the two of us visit the man.”
At that remark, I felt for her. Never had I been aware of him shutting my mother out of a matter, especially when it involved someone under her care. The command, mild as its presentation was, clearly set her in her place. Regardless, when she spoke, her tone carried none of the sting I’m sure she felt inside.
“Of course, Mr. Holmes.”
After the two men had ascended the servants’ staircase, I stepped next to her. Her back was straight and her face set, but I knew she had to be reeling from the backhanded reprimand. As much as I wanted to console her, her posture told me to keep to myself. I opened my mouth to share my concern, but she hushed me by raising her hand. I understood her effort to silence me a moment later.
The narrow corridor leading to all the house’s levels made for a perfect sound conduit, and we could hear the men’s conversation perfectly.
“I assure you,” my father was saying, “should the man regain consciousness and enough strength to become a flight risk, we will gladly turn him over to you. But at the moment, additional movement would probably eliminate him as either a prisoner or a witness.”
The constable snorted again. “I have no need of him as a witness.”
“An assault was committed against him,” Father said. “He is the only one at present who can tell us how he was stabbed and left to die in the woods.”
“Probably got into it with one of the others at the tavern. Not the nicest drunk you’d ever meet, I can tell you that. The assault was most likely justified.”
The footfalls faded slightly, and I knew they had reached the third floor. A moment later, a single set of footsteps announced someone’s descent. Constance emerged from the stairwell. Her eyes were puffy but wide. “Mrs. Holmes, you aren’t going to let him take my papa?”
She shook her head. “He’s too sick to move. I think the constable will agree to that. Has your father said anything?”
“Nothin’ that make no sense,” she said, blinking her eyes. “I can hardly make out his words.”
“Still feverish?”
A nod.
“Please ask Cook to prepare a kettle of water and give you a pot of honey. I’ll check his dressing after the constable leaves.”
“I’ll help you,” I said, and followed Constance to the kitchen.
Along the way, she stopped and grabbed my arm, saying in a harsh whisper, “He said he was arrestin’ Papa. What am I going to do if he does?”
“He’s not going to arrest him,” I placed my hand over hers. As much as I wanted to tell her about how we were working on the identity of her father’s attacker, I wasn’t certain my mother would want that known. I also found it hard to concentrate on anything but the warmth of her hand on my arm. With great effort, I managed to assure her with, “My parents won’t let him. But we do need to make sure he recovers. Come along.”
By the time we returned to the servants’ stairs, my mother had disappeared—either to hide from the constable or to check on Mr. Straton. After a short discussion, Constance and I decided we would check in the man’s room first.
As expected, Mother was there, already seated at his side, the man’s shirt raised to expose his bandaged side. When we arranged the water, linen for bandages, and honey on the table next to him, Mother frowned. “Is that all the honey there is?”
“That’s what Cook said.”
“It’s enough for this treatment, but we’ll need more.” She sighed. “I suppose I could send someone to fetch it for me, but I would prefer to get it myself. That way I can also share what we’ve learned with Mr. Brown.”
Before I could ask if I could join her, Mycroft threw back the door to the room, waving a heavy book over his head. “I found it. I know what stabbed Mr. Straton.”