The Adventure of the Missing Irregular

by Amy Thomas

“Mr. Holmes, Eccles is missing.”

It was with these words that the intrepid captain of my friend’s irregular force greeted us on the morning three days before Christmas. Wiggins stood slightly forward on the balls of his feet, eager to share his news, his chest puffed out by the importance of it.

Holmes eyed him calmly. “For how long?”

“Three days.”

“And you’ve done the usual?”

Wiggins nodded. “Checked all the places twice.”

“What about her mother?”

I had been listening to this conversation with what I like to think was a normal level of concern, but when I heard the unexpected pronoun, I fixed my friend with a pointed look of disapproval.

Wiggins, meanwhile, tipped his hand up to his mouth in a drinking motion. “Not in a state to notice who’s been in or out.”

“Thank you, Wiggins,” said Holmes. “I see that you’re freezing and haven’t eaten today. Go and get something from Mrs. Hudson while I gather my things.”

The boy hopped off to do as told, and my friend rose to gather a small kit of supplies. “If only adults were as sensibly amenable as children,” he muttered, whilst, beyond the closed door, I heard Mrs. Hudson’s exclamations of horror at the boy tramping dirt through the building.

“Holmes,” I said sharply, “am I correct in assuming that Eccles is a girl?”

“Yes,” he answered briefly.

My indignation only grew. “I gather why these children are helpful to your work. Truly I do. I’ve even said it was noble of you to provide an income. But girls, Holmes? It’s not natural.”

My friend stopped and stared at me for a moment, as if deducing the most expedient way to proceed. “I could speak to you of the competence of many women, such as our own landlady, that extends far above their station, but instead I will tell you about Maria Eccles, ten years old. Wiggins brought her to me two years ago. She and her mother had just been thrown out of the miserable space they occupied atop a chemist’s, for failing to pay the rent the proprietor requires for them to subsist in a rat-infested closet. The father deserted them long ago. Before alcohol became her only employment, the mother used her beauty to earn enough of a pittance for herself and her daughter to live upon. They were both half-frozen when Maria came to me. I paid her enough to keep the room, and she became part of my force. She’s certainly as clever as the boys, cleverer than quite a few of them. More importantly, she has a home with her mother because of what I pay.

“Should I have let them starve, Watson, or foist them on the charity of the public, which is about the same thing?”

I shook my head. “Of course not.”

He continued. “Yes, Watson, I employ girls. They’re good at the work, and the pay keeps them just as alive as their male counterparts.”

Needless to say, I was silenced by my friend’s words, and I nodded my assent. “You’re quite right.”

“Yes,” he said. “I am.”

Just then, Wiggins burst back in, effervescent with food and attention. “Here, put this on.” Holmes handed him one of his own jumpers, and the boy put it on over his shirt, pushing up the too-long sleeves and putting his threadbare jacket over both, until he looked like a miniature old man. He didn’t seem to mind. As usual, he gazed at us both with a cocky stare.

“We’ll go to the room first,” Holmes said brusquely.

“I knew you’d say that,” said our young visitor. “I’ve been there, but of course, you’ll find more than I did.” He looked downcast for a moment.

“I shouldn’t worry about that,” said my friend, wrapping a scarf around his neck. “You’ve plenty of time to learn.”

I followed them outside, wrapping my coat tight against the chill. My relatively short acquaintance with Holmes meant that most of the other children hadn’t yet warmed to me, but Wiggins’s frequent visits to my friend had created a stronger acquaintance between us. He was an unusual child, precocious beyond his years, a bit cheeky, but an uncannily capable captain. I didn’t envision him following in Holmes’s footsteps, though he certainly picked the work up quickly. He was far more suited to a profession like barrister, which would utilize his talents of human understanding and, as he grew older, most likely, manipulation. I had little experience of such things myself, but my mind was ever less averse to speculation than that of the man who shared my flat.

Predictably, Wiggins, who was used to walking the city in shoes so worn he was practically barefoot, was thrilled at the novel prospect of riding in a hansom cab. He hopped in between Holmes and myself, brimful of questions about the conveyance and horse, which Holmes answered with equanimity. He considered, I had already learned, that curiosity in the young was an admirable quality which should be encouraged at every possible turn. I did not disagree, but I still found it dissonantly peculiar to see Sherlock Holmes exhibiting utmost patience when dealing with a human being of any sort.

We arrived at a disreputable-looking chemist’s within the half-hour. It was exactly as I’d imagined it to be, considering the unfortunate prospects of Eccles and her mother, complete with peeling paint, a half-faded sign offering dubious “Medicinal Remedies”, and windows thick with grime. A Dickensian sort of place, which, I could not help thinking, had a peculiar appropriateness considering the time of year.

Upon entry, we were greeted by Eaker, a man whose appearance did not in any way personify the narratively-pleasing stereotype of wizened and cunning proprietor. He was a pleasant-looking, squarely-built man whom I supposed to be near his fortieth year, smiling in a friendly way. “May I assist you gentleman with a compound?” Just then, he saw Wiggins, who came in behind Holmes, and his expression changed to one of pure malevolence.

“I told you not to come back here, you little filth,” he hissed. “Leave these gentleman alone, or I’ll take a broom handle to you.” He looked at us as if he intended to apologize for the imposition of such a lowly creature, but he found Holmes staring back at him in white-faced fury. I had, as yet, seen my friend truly angry very few times, but I knew the signs. He was not a man to let another person rob him of his composure, but he was also relentless when his ire was truly raised.

“This boy is in my employ,” he said coldly. “I have no intention of patronizing your miserable establishment, but I wish to gain access to the room upstairs, where Mrs. Eccles and her daughter reside.”

For a moment, the man looked as if his temper might be turned on my friend and me, but he apparently thought better of angering two determined-looking men any further and instead jerked his head in the direction of a narrow staircase off to one side of the room.

“Thank you,” said Holmes, quite as if he meant the opposite, and we proceeded up the wooden stairs.

“I’ve had a couple of bruises off him before,” said Wiggins, bobbing up the stairs. “I’m quick on my feet, but he got me by surprise once. Thanks for telling him off.”

“Good lad,” said Holmes, but I could tell that his attention was engaged in deducing the details of our surroundings. What looked like an ordinary unkempt stairwell to me no doubt contained far more for my friend’s eyes. I knew from experience that he could read worlds in what I only saw as dust and grime.

At the top of the stairs, we entered a close, musty corridor which had closets and storage rooms, but only one area designed for habitation. I use the description imprecisely. Had I entered the room rented by Eccles and her mother without knowing its use, I would have assumed it was another cramped closet. As it was, we came in and found an almost-empty room with a tiny stove against one wall and a worn quilt on the floor. There was certainly nothing in this mean little chamber that would suggest to anyone that it was nearly Christmas. “Where’s Dorothea, her mother?” asked Holmes, walking around to each wall and corner and using his magnifying glass to check footprints in the dirt on the floor.

“She goes out once a day,” said Wiggins. “If Loo’s given her money, she buys bread and gin. If not, she begs until she gets enough for the gin, if not the food. I didn’t think she’d be up.”

“All the better for my purposes,” said Holmes, still scouring the room for information long after I’d given up on deducing anything other than the obvious presence of empty bottles and an overlay of dust on every surface.

“The mother’s been gone for more than a few hours,” said Holmes tersely, touching the top of the stove with his fingers. “Is that unusual?”

“Not when she’s drunk off her head,” said Wiggins, immediately closing his mouth on any other observations he might have had. He knew that my friend did not appreciate being distracted by extraneous discussion.

“I don’t suppose our friend downstairs would have any light to shed on the matter, but I wish to search the shop for whatever details it might present. Wiggins, you’d better go. If Eccles contacts any of you, go to Baker Street at once and leave word with Mrs. Hudson.”

“Can’t I stay?”

“No,” said Holmes, not unkindly. “You’ll be of much more use away from us. Here.” He took a coin out of his pocket, and the boy accepted it soberly and turned on his heels and left without another word.

“You’ve quite a way with him,” I said.

Holmes looked up from his contemplation of the far left corner of the small room. “I treat him exactly as if he’s a human being.”

I followed my friend back downstairs, where the proprietor looked, if not benevolent, at least slightly less infuriated with Wiggins out of the way. “Sir,” said Holmes, “I need to search the rest of the premises. I will pay you, since I’m under no illusion that the idea of a missing woman and child will be enough inducement in itself to entice your cooperation.”

The man flushed at this. “Well, Sir, I-” he fumbled for words. “I was not aware of your identity when you first appeared. You are, I believe, Mr. Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street.” Rather than appearing pleased at this, Holmes gave the man a look of supreme irritation, as if he would rather have remained unknown to such a repugnant character. Nevertheless, he answered, “I am that man.”

“Then there’s certainly no need for payment,” said the other man hurriedly, clasping and unclasping his hands nervously, his demeanor entirely different from what it had previously been.

“I insist upon it,” said Holmes with steel in his voice. “I won’t be indebted to the likes of you.” With that, he put a pile of coins on the counter in front of the chemist. “Come, Watson, we must search.”

I followed my friend to the far corner of the shop, but not before, I confess, I had stolen a look at the proprietor’s stormy countenance. I have always been a man of simple pleasures. I count my enjoyment of Holmes’s effect on others to be one of them.

“Why would this have anything to do with the girl’s disappearance?” I asked, as soon as I’d joined Holmes behind a bottle-laden shelf.

“Looking for a trail, Watson,” he said enigmatically, doing his usual work of scanning each nook and cranny and corner, as I followed and tried to observe more than the usual collection of chemical remedies both useful and otherwise.

After ten minutes of this, Holmes straightened up from his perusal of a bottle of pills. “I suppose this is about as much as we’re likely to gain,” he said quickly, and began to lead the way out the creaky wooden door.

“Mr. Holmes!” The proprietor’s voice arrested us. “I - might know something about the girl.”

“Oh, yes?” Holmes stared at him coolly.

“She - hasn’t been here for three days,” he answered quickly. “The mother has, but not the little girl.”

“When did you last see her?” Holmes asked.

“Three days ago, around eight in the morning,” he replied.

“Thank you,” said Holmes, “and when her mother reappears, please direct her to 221b Baker Street, if you would be so kind.”

The man nodded, and I could see his desire to be helpful to the detective from the newspapers warring with his annoyance at being treated like an unimportant part of the drama.

When we were back outside on the busy street, I turned to Holmes. “Did you find anything of interest in the shop? I confess I saw little.”

“For once,” he replied, “I agree with you. I wanted to search the place, but my other aim was to give the unpleasant owner some time to contemplate his own involvement in the matter and decide if he wanted to remain antagonistic. I deduced correctly that his pride would win out, and he wouldn’t be able to settle for keeping silent.”

“But surely,” I put in as we re-entered our cab, “he knew very little.”

Holmes smiled. “Quality is more important than quantity, Watson, when one cannot have both. What he told us is very useful. We now know that Eccles disappeared in the early hours of the morning, which Wiggins did not know, since he meets with her in the afternoon.”

“But surely she goes out early each day,” I said.

“Indeed,” Holmes answered, “but it rules out the possibility that she came back and left again in the evening for an unusual errand from which she did not return. You observed the door to the chemist’s apartment behind the shop, I am sure. The walls of the place are thin, and I trust that he’d have known if either the girl or her mother had taken a late-night stroll.”

“Do you really intend to speak to the mother?” I asked, as we neared Baker Street once again.

“Certainly,” Holmes answered, “if she appears. Even her drunken recollections may assist us in formulating an idea of events.”

We did not have to wait long to find out what Dorothea Eccles did or did not know, for as soon as we arrived, we found her in our flat, sitting across from Wiggins with a cup of tea in her hand. “I found her after I left you, at one of her usual places,” said the boy. “Thought you’d want to see her.”

“Very good,” said Holmes. “You anticipated me, which can’t be said for many people.” He handed over another shiny coin, which Wiggins pocketed after twirling it around in his fingers for a moment.

The woman was a pitiful sight. Her dress, which had started out as some other color, was now brown and dingy with accumulated dirt, and she stared at us with blank, sad eyes.

“Mrs. Eccles,” said Holmes, “when did you last see your daughter?” As Wiggins had assured us, she was hardly in a condition to provide veracious testimony, but she nodded slowly after a few moments.

“Mrs. Stubbs,” she said. “I saw her go there yesterday. She never came home.”

“Who is Mrs. Stubbs?” Holmes asked, but she had fallen silent, and she stared into the fire, as if hoping to regain her wits there.

“I know the answer,” said Wiggins, suddenly and unexpectedly. “Mrs. Stubbs sells old bread on the corner of this street, but she didn’t go there yesterday, or we would have seen her, since we started watching the street two days ago - when she missed two of our meetings in a row.”

Holmes again turned his attention to the boy. “We have reason to believe her last visit there was three days ago. Does she go there often?”

“Not until lately,” Wiggins answered. “The bread she sells is terrible, but Maria started going a few months ago. I thought it was because her mother was taking more of her money, so she couldn’t afford better.” He spoke about Dorothea Eccles as if she wasn’t there, but I couldn’t really blame him, so absent and lost did she seem.

“Have you ever been there with her?” Holmes asked, and I wondered to what on earth his questions were tending.

Wiggins shook his head. “No, but Colin’s seen her going there.”

“Then we’ll speak to Mrs. Stubbs,” said Holmes, rising. “Come along, Watson and Wiggins. Mrs. Eccles, you may use our fire while we’re gone, if you wish,” said Holmes, and, turning to me, “We’ll make sure Mrs. Hudson looks in on her.”

With that, the three of us wrapped up against the chill again and hailed another cab to take us where we’d already been. This time, we stopped at the end of the street, where Wiggins assured us that Mrs. Stubbs resided when she was not peddling her repugnant wares, which she only did in the earliest part of the day, long before the hour of our arrival.

Within a moment, the rickety door was opened to us by the proprietress herself, a woman whose faded finery appeared to be making a valiant effort at respectability but was, on the whole, failing. “What?” She asked. “Not open now. Bread tomorrow.”

Holmes stepped forward and handed her a coin. “A little girl comes here. Maria Eccles. Do you remember her?”

“A lot of little girls come here,” she said, “and boys,” but her tone was not uncivil, and she held the money like a treasure.

“Ten years old, brown hair, exceptionally intelligent,” said Holmes. “Wears a silver locket.”

Mrs. Stubbs made a show of thinking long and hard about her answer. “Yes,” she finally replied. “Comes every three or four days - for the last half-a-year or so.”

“What does she buy?” asked Holmes. “How much bread? Enough for how many people?” I had been trying to follow Holmes’s line of enquiry, but I found myself baffled by the question.

“Barely enough for one, I should think,” she answered, and my friend nodded.

“As I expected,” he said. “Which way does she go when she leaves, if you can recall?” She jerked her head in the direction away from the shop where mother and child lived. “That way. Always.”

“Thank you. You’ve been most helpful.”

The woman’s face registered disappointment that she could think of no other way to extort money from Holmes, but she called after us. “Come in the morning for the best bread in town, Dearies!”

Wiggins snorted at this, but knew better than to cause a scene that would halt Holmes in his progress, and he followed us like an obedient, if highly excitable, puppy.

“Bread for one,” said Holmes. “For half-a-year, she buys bread for one and goes outside the area she’s meant to keep her eyes on for me. Finally, one day, she disappears in that direction and doesn’t return.”

“There is any number of reasons a young girl might not return home in this part of London,” I said, my mind filled with grave conjectures.

“But the bread, Watson!” said Holmes. “Think of the bread.”

“It makes every kind of sense for a child with limited means to purchase cheap bread for her meals,” I answered.

“Aha,” said my friend, “but only for one, and only every few days, at that? As Wiggins has asserted, she provides for herself and her mother. They may not be living a luxurious existence, but neither has died of starvation. Does she buy bread in two different places?”

I was quite flummoxed at this, and I shook my head. “I don’t understand it.”

“Wiggins,” he continued, “do you know the story of Maria’s father?”

The boy nodded, his eyes wide and serious. “She told it to me once, but made me promise not to tell anyone.”

“Excellent,” said Holmes. “You may tell us, since Dr. Watson and I are quite far outside the realm of ‘anyone’.” I smiled at this, but Wiggins spent a moment of serious thought before he spoke again.

“She said when she was small, her father was a bricklayer, but he was hurt when part of a wall fell onto him. He couldn’t work, so he didn’t have any money for food. And - he stole so Maria and her mother could eat. Someone found out, and they threatened to turn him in to the police if he didn’t pay them off, but he couldn’t, so he went away to avoid going to prison.”

“The fog begins to clear, Watson,” said Holmes, though I couldn’t see how. “Very good, Wiggins. Your memory serves well.” The boy, who for all his enthusiasm had been uncharacteristically sober as a result of worry for his friend, smiled widely at this, but quickly returned to his former state of solemnity.

“Will you send her away?” he asked curiously. “Will you stop letting her work for you?”

“That,” said Holmes, “will depend on the reason and mode of her disappearance, but I very much doubt that it will be necessary.” Wiggins visibly relaxed at this, and I was touched by his evident trust in my friend and concern for his comrade.

“From whom did her father steal the money?” Holmes asked, continuing his mode of questioning.

Wiggins shook his head. “She never told me.”

“Very well,” said Holmes. “Go and attend to your usual activities, and I’ll send a message to you when I need you again.”

This seemingly cold dismissal was met with cheerful acquiescence by Wiggins, who scampered off as if he hadn’t a care in the world.

“Excellent!” said Holmes, turning to me. “We will return to Baker Street and find out from Mrs. Eccles who her husband’s debtor is.”

“And if she doesn’t know?”

“One thing at a time, Watson,” he answered.

We reached home in the early afternoon and found the lady in question speaking to Mrs. Hudson, with a plate of scones in hand and looking less famished, at any rate. As soon as we entered the flat, our landlady offered us a warming libation against the chill and retired to her own rooms.

“Mrs. Eccles,” said Holmes, “I believe I will have the opportunity to reunite you with your daughter very soon, and perhaps more, but I need you to tell me whom your husband robbed before he disappeared, if you know.” He spoke abruptly, to astonish the lady into replying before any natural reticence could encumber her.

She stared at him for a moment, and there was intelligence somewhere in her eyes, I thought, that circumstance and desperation hadn’t quite succeeded in eradicating. “Do you know how it happened?”

“Not yet, but I’d be very glad if you would tell me,” Holmes answered, sitting opposite her with uncharacteristic patience.

Dorothea Eccles clutched a glass of the same liquid that was warming the insides of Holmes and myself. “My husband is - was, I suppose - a clever man. He worked as a bricklayer, but he was also acquiring education to become a chemist. That is how he met Eaker, the horrible man who owns the house where Maria and I live.”

“Aha,” said Holmes. “I suspected that there was more than general unpleasantness behind the man’s demeanor.”

“James worked for him to learn the trade, for two years after the accident that hurt his arm. He asked Eaker to take him on full-time, since he could no longer lay bricks, but the man refused and said that my husband ought to owe him money for all he’d taught him, not taking into account any of the time James had spent doing his work for him.” She stopped speaking for a moment, her face filled with deep indignation.

“My husband had pride, but he was desperate, so he asked for a small loan. But Eaker also refused him there. I believe - he was jealous, because my husband was more intelligent than he, and the customers had begun to prefer him. He’d begun to fear that James would eclipse him in skill and take his business, which he certainly would have done. He’d have kept a far better establishment.

“At that time, Maria was a small child, and she became ill. We spent the remaining money we had on the doctor. Mr. Holmes, you will already know that she still has a weakness in her breathing - she falls ill very easily. At any rate, my husband was driven to near-despair over this. For several weeks, we thought we would lose her, and he blamed his inability to provide a better home and better food.

“Then, late one night, he went to Eaker’s and came home with more money than I’d seen since his injury. I asked him where it was from, and he told me his master had decided to pay all he owed him for the work he’d done. I didn’t believe him, and he finally confessed that Eaker had left him in charge that night, and he’d purposefully omitted the last several orders of the day from the record.” As she said this, she looked away from Holmes, and I could tell that the shame was still keen, even though the event was long past.

“I was surprised, because James had always been an honest man, and it nearly killed him to admit the deed to me, but once he had, I didn’t know what to do. Our need for the money was so great that I could not bear the thought of returning it and facing exposure.

“It seemed, for three weeks, like James had succeeded, but my husband was a cleverer man than criminal, which I suppose does him more credit than otherwise. One of the orders he’d failed to record was a close friend of Eaker’s, who came back when the proprietor was in the shop and referred to his purchase, a purchase Eaker didn’t know about. From there, he figured out what had happened. My husband begged for mercy - for time to pay him back - but he said that if the whole sum wasn’t returned by the following day, he would turn James in to the police.

“We could not pay back what we had already spent, so James fled, and that was the last time I saw my husband. When Eaker found out, he purported to be deeply sorry for me and my daughter, and he offered us the room we now occupy. The truth, I believe, is that he was hoping my husband would return, and he wanted to have us underfoot so that if James tried to do so, he could exact his revenge.

“Two years ago, he threatened to put us out onto the street, for I believe he had realized, as I have, that my husband was probably no longer in this world. At that time, Maria began working for you to pay what he required, because my - earnings - were only enough to feed us, barely, and I am not a young woman.”

“And one not overmuch concerned with temperance, as I understand it,” said Holmes, startling me with his harshness.

“Yes,” she agreed, “I have not endured our situation as bravely as I ought to have done, and our Maria does greater credit to James and me than either of us deserves.”

“I expect to have this matter resolved within a day or two,” said Holmes, just as Mrs. Hudson knocked lightly at the door and entered.

“Mrs. Eccles, I have a room ready for you. I won’t hear of you going back out in this chill. I do hope you’re finished with her, Mr. Holmes. She needs rest.”

“Yes, excellent,” said Holmes. “I would not have had her return to Eaker’s this night.”

Dorothea looked at our landlady in wonder and stood to follow her, but she turned back to us. “I have not always been as I am now.”

After she had left, I dined, while Holmes wrote out a long paper in his best hand. He spoke not a word, and I could not fathom what he was doing, but after an hour or so, he arose, folded it, and put it into his pocket. “Come, Watson! We must away to that accursed street once again.”

“Whatever for?” I asked, following obediently.

“To settle the man’s debt, of course,” he replied.

“This is what is owed to you from the theft of James Eccles, with heavy interest,” said Holmes, standing in front of the counter in Eaker’s shop and showing the shocked man a pile of notes. The chemist reached out to take the money, but my friend held it back and produced a folded document from his coat. “Before I will release the money to you, you will sign this letter absolving Eccles of the accusation of any crime against you, and vowing that you will pursue no legal action against him. I suggest you accept the offer, for you’ll not get another.”

Eaker looked at Holmes’s affidavit, which was written in plain, unadorned language, and left no doubt of its meaning. As he perused it, I could sense the internal war between his desire for vengeance and his pure, unadulterated avarice. Finally, he took out a pen and signed with precision, not handing back Holmes’s paper until he had the money in hand, easily five times as much as he was actually owed.

My friend pocketed the signed document, then turned and left the shop without another word. I followed, noting how pleased he seemed as soon as we were outside. “Well, Watson, we’re nearly to the end of the matter now,” he said cheerfully.

“I fail to grasp your meaning,” I answered frankly. Though I had not known him overlong, I was, by this time, well aware that he did not expect me to share his powers of deduction or to reach conclusions nearly as quickly as he did.

“Why do you suppose I paid the man’s debt?” he asked, as we secured a cab to return us to Baker Street.

“For the child,” I answered. “I supposed that she had fled because of some sort of threat from Eaker, and that your intention was to secure her freedom from his endangerment.”

“Aha,” he answered. “Not the worst surmise of your short career, Watson, but what of the stale bread? If the girl was fleeing danger, why stop for a mite’s worth of nearly-inedible bread?”

I had no answer to this and shook my head. “I can’t account for it.”

“The solution to any mystery, as you know, must encompass all the facts,” said Holmes. “The bread is what put me on the right track in the first place, and it is there that the heart of the matter may be deduced.

“When Wiggins first came to me, I considered Eccles’s situation. She is an extremely clever girl and aptly skilled at evading danger. She also has ample allies in Wiggins, the other children, and myself, of course, if she had found herself or her mother in any kind of danger. I also considered the strangeness of her change in habit regarding the bread. If, as Wiggins assumed, she was simply responding to financial straits, the quantity of bread she was buying wouldn’t have been enough to keep herself and her mother alive. Yet alive they are, and in decent health, considering. In addition, she neither took the bread home nor ingested it immediately, which would be the expected action of a starving person, instead taking it in a direction away from home and away from the area where she is paid by me to keep watch.”

“Was she taking it to someone?” I asked, my mind expanding to admit a new angle of thought.

Holmes smiled. “You’re getting there now, Watson. I believe the elder Eccles has returned, and that, if we lie in wait for Maria’s next visit to the bread-seller, we may find both of them and deliver the news to Mr. Eccles that he is no longer in danger if he returns to his family.”

“But if she’s been buying him bread for six months, why did she just now disappear from her usual duties, and why do you think she’ll come back?” I asked.

“Excellent questions,” said Holmes complacently. “I do not yet know what changed in the past few days. From the facts, it appears that the father has been giving money to her to secure food for him, just enough to keep him from absolute starvation. Though I abhor guessing, I suspect the girl hasn’t been home because of her mother’s absence. Perhaps the only reason she hadn’t gone to her father before was to care for her. She may have intended to return if her mother did.”

“As for returning to Mrs. Stubbs’s miserable establishment, she has not been absent any longer than her usual interval of days, and she has no reason to consider the place unsafe. Waiting for her there may prove fruitless, but we will know within a day or two, because if more than a day or two past the usual interval elapses, we may safely deduce that she no longer intends to frequent the place.”

In truth, my medical duties not yet copious enough to make the waste of a morning or two much of a hardship, and early the next day, just one before Christmas Eve, Holmes and I met Wiggins one street beyond the chemist’s and took our place on the first floor of an abandoned building across from Mrs. Stubbs.

As it turned out, we did not have to waste more than an hour-and-a-quarter, for Maria appeared soon after the woman had opened sales for the day. I did not know the girl’s appearance, but Holmes and Wiggins both spotted her face and figure beneath her ill-fitting coat.

From our vantage point, we watched the girl purchase stale bread, then turn in the direction Mrs. Stubbs had indicated that she usually went. Holmes held us back for a moment before leading the way downstairs and out the back of the house.

Had he intended to follow for a long period of time without being seen, Holmes would no doubt have left Wiggins and me behind, for following in a group of three is an unwieldy business. As he’d suspected, however, we did not need to keep Maria in view for many streets before we followed her around a corner and found the little girl and a man entering a crumbling lodging house, hand-in-hand. Upon seeing us, she gave a violent start and hung her head, her eyes downcast.

“Now, Eccles, there’s no need for that,” said Holmes quickly. “We fully understand the matter.”

As the five of us lingered outside, Wiggins bristled. “You could’ve left some kind of word. We’ve wasted days looking for you.” Holmes put a hand on his shoulder to quiet him.

“Mr. Eccles,” said my friend, “I believe the easiest way to resolve this matter is to inform you that no criminal accusations exist against you any longer; you’re free to return home.”

The man, who, I realized from Holmes’s speech, was Maria’s father, stared in open amazement. “How?”

It was the girl’s turn to speak, and she looked up with tears in her eyes and did so in a shaky voice. “Mr. Holmes - paid him off, didn’t you?”

My friend looked back at her steadily. He was still a young man then, one possessed of a character filled with right angles and sharp edges, but he smiled. “It would have been a great inconvenience to me to lose an assistant as capable as yourself, and I deduced that the easiest way to retain your services was to facilitate your father’s return.”

Wiggins understood and was finally mollified. He nodded to Maria, and she nodded back, and that was the end of the matter as far as any animosity was concerned.

“Papa,” said the little girl, turning toward her father, “this is Mr. Holmes, Dr. Watson, and Wiggins.”

The man bowed his head slightly. “I thank you gentlemen for your care of my daughter, and for your kindness to me.”

“I wish to know the story of your return,” said Holmes.

Eccles answered with great feeling. “When I left my wife and child, I spent every moment wishing to God I hadn’t, but I believed it would be worse for them to have a father and husband in gaol than one who’d disappeared. It’s a long and tedious story, but my arm finally healed, and since then I have been a nameless nomad, staying nowhere long and working every possible moment, with the idea that someday I might come home and pay back what I owed, and, perhaps, be reunited with my family. Six months ago, I came back to London with nearly enough money and a job that would pay the rest. I had no intention of seeing my Dorothea or Maria until I was ready to fix it with Eaker, but I went to buy bread at the cheapest place I could find, and while I was there, I saw the face of my little girl passing by on the street. I have not seen her for many years, but she looks so much like my wife that I was in no doubt. I tried to restrain myself, but I could not resist speaking to her, and she - my Maria - remembered her father’s face after all these years.”

“She met you daily and bought bread for you from then on,” said Holmes. “That much I understand. But why did you disappear three days ago?” He looked at the girl, who held her father’s hand tightly.

James spoke again. “Four days ago, I had enough money to pay back the debt, with ten-percent extra, hoping that he would accept it after all this time. I had not known until my return that my wife and daughter lived above that horrible man’s establishment, and when I found out, I determined to bring Dorothea and Maria to my lodgings when I was ready to pay him, in case he turned violent or the police were called. However, when Maria came to me that day, she told me that her mother was nowhere to be found - which, I understand, is not uncommon. I convinced Maria to remain with me, and I watched the shop to see when her mother might return, not willing to chance Eaker until I’d hidden her in my lodgings with Maria. It has - been a great hardship to be so close to my family for these six months but to be separated from them. That is the apology I offer for my daughter’s disappearance.”

“Your wife is safe,” said Holmes. “She lodged with my landlady overnight, and she awaits you on Baker Street. You will not find her in the best of health, but you will find her alive.”

“I will, of course, pay you the sum I’d intended to pay Eaker,” Eccles added.

Holmes shook his head. “Your daughter’s services are invaluable to me, and you will require the money for Christmas, so we’ll say no more about it.” The man seemed about to argue, but he saw the sense of it after a while and merely nodded. We five made our way to Baker Street a happy, if sober, company.

The Eccles family spent Christmas in James’s Spartan lodgings. Dorothea had a long journey before her to reach true soundness of mind and body, but her face was less drawn, and she spent a portion of the day sober. In spite of what time and circumstance had done to her, her husband’s eyes held nothing but adoration. Maria perched herself on her father’s knee and refused to let go of him all day long, and he did not seem any more eager to relinquish his hold on her.

I know these things from personal observation, for Holmes, Wiggins, and I were invited guests at the event. Mrs. Hudson, generous soul that she was, prepared a repast for us to share, and we partook of it in dismal conditions made cheerful by the bonds of family and friendship and the promise of a more hopeful future.

I said nothing to Holmes when we returned home, but I stored the memory of the Eccles Case in my mind, and it informed my opinion of him thereafter. The man I had supposed to be brilliant but unbending was, I had come to know, capable of deep generosity toward his fellowman. Much time would pass before I understood the true depths of his regard for my friendship, but that Christmas, I learned that the man the world knew as an infallible reasoning machine had far more within him than it would ever realize.

I pondered these same things on a rainy afternoon many years later whilst sitting in church, with Holmes beside me, as Wiggins and Eccles were united in holy matrimony. They were married on Christmas Day, which I thought was very fitting, and though my friend did not expound on the subject, I believe he shared my opinion. His smile, still rare, though less so than it had once been, told me so without words.