One glance up the tracks showed us he was right. At the very moment the three combatants tumbled out of view, a locomotive had burst from the mist at the far end of the valley and was heading towards us at full steam. It was clearly not a scheduled service, for it pulled behind it only one carriage and it travelled at such a speed that its smoke seemed black with urgency.
Even at first glance it was clear from its tremendous velocity that the driver had no intention of stopping at Kirkhaugh station. Perhaps our exertions that night had made us all dull-witted, perhaps we were simply bewildered by the rapidity of its approach, but for a few seconds we simply watched in awe, unaware of the implications. Then understanding came upon us with a rush.
‘By Hades!’ the viscount exclaimed. ‘The basket!’
‘The urn!’ I gasped.
‘The pots!’ Mr Verity added for good measure. ’The basket! The urn! The Lazarus Testament!’
For as we stared in horror, a single obstacle stood in the path of the oncoming locomotive. The great peat-basket that contained the whole collection of ancient ceramic pieces remained carefully positioned where Mr Summersby had placed it, precisely and perfectly in the way of the oncoming train.
‘Stop!’ I shouted desperately and began to wave my arms, imagining the terrible carnage that must follow if the train hit those ancient vessels. But even as I gesticulated I knew it was useless. We were too far away to attract the driver’s attention and too far away to reach the precious basket before its contents were destroyed forever.
‘Great God! It’s going to smash the lot!’ The viscount was also gesturing, a look of utter horror in his eyes. ‘Stop!’ he yelled. ‘For goodness’ sake, stop!’
But in our rush of despair we had forgotten that there remained one person who could reach Mr Summersby’s basket before the train hit it. Miss Peters had disappeared from the embankment immediately after Mr Summersby’s charge, presumably with the idea of assisting her companions. Whether our shouts had alerted her to the danger, or whether it was the sound of the train that brought her scrambling back, I couldn’t be sure, but now she reappeared on the side of the track, her gaze jumping from the basket to the train and back again.
‘The basket, Hetty!’ I begged. ‘Move the basket!’
We were all shouting now, even Mrs Hudson, as Miss Peters scampered onto the line and took hold of those great leather straps. With rising horror, I saw the huge locomotive come into focus behind her, still at full steam, looming darkly and horribly over her slight figure. And for all her efforts it was clear the weight of the basket was too much for her. Three times she attempted to heave it from away from the line, tugging and pulling with all her strength, trying to topple it from its perilous position. But nothing she attempted moved it even an inch, and now the train was very close indeed, its brakes suddenly screaming.
‘Get clear, Hetty!’ I implored. ‘Give it up!’ Only seconds remained, I knew, and in despair I braced myself for the crash.
But instead of leaping away, Miss Peters released her grip on the basket and seemed instead to be peering inside, examining its contents.
‘Jump!’ we cried. ‘Hetty! Please!’
I don’t know if she could even hear us. The train was now only yards away, its momentum still barely checked. Twenty seconds, I thought. Fifteen. Ten. Jump, Hetty! Jump!
Just when her destruction seemed inevitable Miss Peters appeared to make a decision. Her hands darted out and selected just one of the dozen urns that peeped from the top of the basket. With a great heave, she raised it clear of the others and, part clutching it, part staggering beneath its weight, fell back from the basket and away from the quivering track.
The train must have missed her by no more than inches, for while she was still falling backwards the front of the locomotive struck the basket firmly in its centre. I remember the moment of impact with complete clarity – the sickening crack of those ancient jars as they exploded into fragments, the cloud of dust that billowed up from the tracks and, worse, the dreadful knowledge that the entire contents of the basket had been reduced in that moment to a thousand tiny pieces, or else lay utterly pulverised beneath the iron wheels.
I was dimly aware of activity in the locomotive, of a driver shouting, his voice drowned by the shriek of metal on metal as the train shuddered to a halt only a dozen yards from where we stood. The first figure to emerge from it was none other than Sir Percival Grenville-Ffitch himself, looking this way and that in alarm.
‘What the…? Eh? Mrs Hudson? Good lord!’ he spluttered as he struggled to make sense of what he saw. ‘Whatever are you doing here? As for us, we’ve come to secure the Lazarus Testament…’
But to our shame none of our party paid him any attention. We were already dashing towards the fallen figure of Miss Peters. As I hurried past the stationary carriage I glimpsed the nervous face of Mr Fallowell, the timid expert in Aramaic, looking down on us, accompanied, it seemed, by a great number of uniformed policemen, still unaware that their arrival had created the very havoc they’d been sent to prevent.
I think Mrs Hudson was the first to reach Miss Peters, although I was close behind her, and to my great joy I saw at once that she was alive and apparently uninjured, sitting upright and coughing in the dust with the urn she had rescued hugged tightly to her breast. The strange turban she had insisted on wearing was beginning to unravel and a loose end of fabric hung down between her eyes like a stray lock of hair in Paisley print.
‘You see, Flottie!’ she beamed when she saw me. ‘I just knew it was going to be me who rescued the Lazarus Testament! Haven’t I been telling you that for ages? And see, I have!’ She broke off to cough a little more.
‘But my dear young lady…’ A voice spoke from behind me and I looked up to see Sherlock Holmes emerging from the bushes with Mr Spencer behind him. From the marks on their faces it was clear that their encounter with Mr Summersby had not been a comfortable one. ‘There is, I fear, only a small chance that the pot you have saved is the one that contains the Lazarus Testament,’ the detective continued. ‘Although your efforts have been valiant, I fear they may yet prove futile.’
But Miss Peters scarcely seemed to hear this doubting voice. ‘Rupert!’ she shrieked. ‘What has that brute done to you?’
‘Just a scratch, Hetty,’ Mr Spencer replied and I saw that a trickle of blood was escaping from his gashed forehead. ‘I think I caught the edge of Mr Summersby’s boot at some point. And I’m afraid to say he got away from us. We hung on to him for as long as we could, but he’s built like a bear. In the end he escaped by plunging into the river. It’s running pretty fast at the moment and I thought it would be the end of him but he made it across, and neither Mr Holmes nor I cared to follow him!’
‘I hardly think it matters,’ Mr Holmes assured him. ‘He will surely not get far by daylight. And it was the contents of that basket that really concerned us.’
‘But just look what has become of them!’ I wailed, pointing to the debris scattered over the track. The viscount was already sifting through it disconsolately with the toe of his boot, as if in search of anything that might resemble the remains of an ancient parchment. As he did so, Mr Fallowell and Sir Percival hurried up to us.
‘Oh, dear! Oh, dear!’ the smaller man lamented, surveying the scene. ‘Mr Verity has explained to us what has happened. I fear our arrival has not proved propitious. And it is I who must take the blame! It was I who urged Sir Percival to bring reinforcements by special train. With so many villains around, it seemed a sensible precaution.’
‘Villains?’ The viscount looked up with a smile. ‘How right you are! These archaeologists. You just can’t trust them.’
‘And who, pray, is this?’ Sir Percival inquired, eyeing the bald peer with some suspicion.
‘This, sir, is Viscount Wrexham. Or, to be more accurate, the seventh Lord Beaumaris,’ Mrs Hudson explained. ‘You will recall that you asked Mr Holmes to solve the mystery of his disappearance.’
‘The viscount? Him?’ Sir Percival sounded incredulous. ‘Good God, man! What has happened to your hair? You’ve aged twenty years! Mind you, we thought you were dead.’
Behind me, Dr Watson was clearing his throat, his eyes still bleary.
‘But tell us, Holmes, how did you come to appear like that, just when you were needed? You should have seen it, Sir Percival! It was the most remarkable thing. Dashed if I can tell how he managed it!’
The great detective dismissed these plaudits with a wave of his hand. ‘Ah, Watson! Once again I must disappoint you. The explanation is very simple. I came up from London ahead of Sir Percival and had planned to spend the night at Haltwhistle. But I found I could not rest, so in the early hours of this morning I set off to walk to Alston. It was not difficult. I knew I simply had to follow the rails. And it was purely by chance that I heard the shouts of Mr Spencer and Miss Peters as they sought a place to cross the river. Happily, with the knowledge acquired during my brief career as a bird-watcher, I was able to suggest a place where it might be forded. Our arrival in Mr Summersby’s path was completely fortuitous.’
Dr Watson, however, was not to be talked out of his admiration. ‘Well, I still say it was the most remarkable thing. I only wish, after all your efforts, that the outcome was a happier one.’
‘But it is a happy one!’ Miss Peters declared indignantly. ‘And I keep telling you so. Really! After practically losing my head under that train, not to mention doing all sorts of damage to my nails, I do think a little gratitude would be in order! If it wasn’t for me, your silly old testament would have been a lot of very choky dust like the rest of those pots. And, do you know, I almost think you’d have deserved it!’
‘But, Hetty,’ I asked, ‘I know you were terribly brave, but how could you possibly hope to choose the right one from among so many?’
‘Well–’ she began, but was silenced by a strangled cry from Mr Fallowell.
‘The urn!’ he mouthed, pointing at Miss Peters’s chest. ‘The urn! It’s a miracle!’ And without another word he flung himself to his knees beside her and began to run his figures down the vessel’s smooth curves.
‘But surely, Mr Fallowell,’ Sir Percival protested, ‘you don’t mean to tell us that the very urn we’re after is the only one to have survived?’
‘I certainly do!’ the little man retorted, his eyes still full of wonder. ‘It’s a miracle!’
‘No, it isn’t!’ Miss Peters put in crossly, but the scholar was not to be silenced.
‘See here!’ he went on, pointing. ‘See the way the lip turns downwards? So characteristic of that precise period! And so rare! There cannot be more than a dozen complete specimens anywhere in the world! This must be the one!’
‘Well, of course!’ Miss Peters agreed, apparently a little mollified. ‘And honestly, Mr Fallowell, if you’d seen the other pots you’d have known it was this one straightaway. They all had rounded lips, you see, so of course they couldn’t be the right one, could they? They just weren’t nearly old enough.’
She turned to the rest of her audience with an air of utter nonchalance.
‘Probably late medieval. Not rare at all, you see,’ she explained, dismissing them with a contemptuous shrug of her shoulders. ‘I don’t know why Mr Baldwick thought he could hide this one among them. To anyone with even the slightest knowledge about Mesopotamian funerary ceramics the difference is glaringly obvious.’
I confess this pronouncement was met with a rather stunned silence.
‘But, Hetty,’ Mr Spencer asked, blinking a little, ‘you must forgive us for being just a little surprised at your grasp of the subject. It isn’t an area of expertise for which you’re generally known…’
‘Well, really, Rupert!’ Miss Peters raised her chin loftily. ‘My life isn’t all hats and dances, you know. And, of course, if you ever actually looked at any of those dusty old books of yours, you’d know all about it too. The one you need is about halfway up on the left-hand side, I believe. A very large volume. With a smart new binding. Now tell me,’ and she looked around very sweetly, ‘do you think this train might take us all back to Alston now? I’d rather like to take a hot bath before we open up this pot of mine.’
And noticing the loose strand of her turban for the first time, she frowned and then with great earnestness began to tuck it back in.
‘Well, of course, Flottie,’ Hetty confided after a lengthy soak in Mrs Garth’s bathtub, ‘I was absolutely as surprised as anyone.’
As well as a generous quantity of hot water, the landlady of the Angel Inn had also provided a plain but inoffensive set of clothes so that Miss Peters might discard her outlandish costume of the night before. She stood before me looking strangely demure in an old-fashioned dress and blouse, and most unlike an Italian countess.
‘I just remember hearing that ghastly train coming,’ she went on, ‘and then realising I couldn’t shift the great heavy basket, and suddenly it struck me that I could at least save one or two of the pots. And as I looked at them, all wedged in like beer bottles, and practically in the shadow of the train, a bit in that dreadful book suddenly came back to me. I’ve no idea how. I mean, I only read a few lines of it, and it really was the most tedious thing I’d ever come across. And then, just when I thought I was going to die, there it was, clear as crystal in my head! Can you imagine, Flottie? Moments from death, and instead of thinking about all the wonderful things that have happened to me, I’m thinking about ancient Mesopotamian pottery. It was too terribly gruesome! And, of course, the bit I’d been reading had gone on and on about the different lips on the wretched things, so that was what I found myself looking at, and, well, one of them was different from all the others, so obviously that was the one, and I just had time to snatch it out before poof! Everything was white and I thought I was dead, but then I started choking, and it seemed to me that if I was choking to death I must still be alive…’
She stretched blissfully and beamed at me.
‘Oh, Flottie, I’m so happy! I’ve always dreamed that one day I’d actually help Mrs Hudson, instead of just getting in the way. And now there’s going to be a world famous discovery, and it’s all down to me! I think that nice French chef at the Mecklenburg ought to name a dish after me, don’t you? After all, he named one after that frightful Johnson woman who saved her maid from drowning even though we all know that she makes her maids so miserable they’d probably rather drown. Of course, I don’t believe her dish will ever really catch on, you know. I mean, Chicken Ethel just doesn’t sound very nice, does it, Flottie? Anyway, the best thing of all is that Rupert will be forced to confess how utterly despicable he’s been. I mean, he might know lots of things, but, really, he’s never rescued a priceless biblical document from certain destruction, has he?’
I was spared having to reply by the appearance of Mrs Hudson with the news that Sir Percival and the other gentlemen had arrived at the Angel and were waiting downstairs for the opening of the urn.
‘Mr Fallowell seems to think Mrs Garth’s parlour will be a suitable place for the unsealing,’ she told us. ‘Dry but not too warm. There had been some talk of doing it at Mr Verity’s house but of course I made it clear that you two had done enough gadding about for one day, and certainly weren’t going out in weather like this.’
It was certainly true that the weather had taken an inclement turn, and in the Angel’s snug the gentlemen’s coats were steaming slightly in front of the fire. Everyone who had been involved in our Alston adventures was there: Sir Percival and Mr Fallowell, Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson, Mr Spencer and Mr Verity. Even Viscount Wrexham was there, having won the respect of the entire company by the sporting way he’d accepted his defeat. When Mrs Hudson ushered us into the room, Sir Percival rose to his feet and bowed.
‘Before we proceed to the main business of the day,’ he announced gravely, ‘I should tell you that I have just received word of Mr Summersby. He was apprehended earlier today trying to board a train for Newcastle. It turns out his real name is not Summersby at all, but Braddock, and under that name he is wanted in America for any number of acts of violence. He broke down completely when he realised his wife had escaped without him, and told us everything. It is as you said, Mrs Hudson, his wife cultivated Mr Baldwick’s company when he was in the United States and fleeced him of a great deal of money. Such was her skill in the matter, they parted with Baldwick on good terms.
‘The Summersbys relocated to the South of France, with the intention of preying on similar individuals, and it was there they received a letter from Mr Baldwick, a letter written only hours before his death. Baldwick told them that the Lazarus Testament was at Broomheath Hall, but he didn’t mention where. So they came here at once to find it and to make their fortunes, but after weeks of looking, they grew desperate. There had been a line in Mr Baldwick’s letter about taking the secret to his grave, and they began to think he had meant it literally. Hence that gruesome business in the ruined chapel. But Archie Crummoch came across them as they dug up Baldwick’s grave and declared he would denounce them to the rector. Summersby admits striking him, but claims that he never intended to kill. If he can convince a jury of that, he might just escape the noose.’
‘And his wife?’ Miss Peters asked. ‘Flottie says Mrs Hudson locked her in the belvedere when the rest of us went chasing off onto the moors.’
Sir Percival appeared to flush slightly.
‘Yes, that is true. Very quick thinking, I’m sure, Mrs Hudson. Unfortunately, the local constable was unaware of this. When he arrived at Broomheath this morning to resume his watch in the Home Barn, he found the house deserted and the treasure gone, but he did hear a knocking from the building you call the belvedere.’
‘You don’t mean he let her out?’ Miss Peters gasped.
‘Regrettably, yes,’ Sir Percival confirmed. ‘She told him such a very moving story about brigands and kidnappers that he even agreed to drive her to the doctor in Alston before raising the alarm. Of course she didn’t visit the doctor. It appears she went straight to the station and took a ticket for London, but we don’t believe she’s travelled that far. No one noticed her changing trains at Haltwhistle and, to tell the truth, we don’t really know where she is. But I daresay we shall pick her up shortly. A woman on her own like that… She can’t get far.’
This prediction was met with a general nodding of heads but Mrs Hudson did not nod.
‘A very clever and resourceful woman,’ was her only comment, but something in the way she said it seemed to anticipate the young lady’s eventual escape – although even Mrs Hudson could surely not have predicted the route by which she would achieve it, in a journey that was later to become notorious: by farm carts to South Shields, thence by collier to Aberdeen; by fishing smack to the Färoes; by whaler to East Greenland; by sled to West Greenland; on a sloop to Newfoundland amongst a cargo of seal furs; and thence by stages to New York, where under a different name she was to have such a glittering criminal career.
But although this was not the last time my path was to cross Mrs Summersby’s, that day at the Angel Inn my thoughts were only of the Lazarus Testament and of the opening of the urn that had been sealed for so many centuries. And it was clear from the eyes of my companions and from the tense atmosphere in the room, that I was not alone in this. Mr Fallowell favoured us all with a few words about the history of the famous parchment and about the fragility of ancient documents in general, and then, finally, led us into the front parlour where we came face to face with the urn itself.
It had been placed on a small incidental table in a room full of chintz and china and prints of children holding puppies, but even these surroundings seemed somehow altered by its presence. I don’t know how it came about, but in the parlour that day there was something of the long-fermented silence of an ancient cathedral, and I would no sooner have laughed or fidgeted there than I would have pulled faces in a chapel. Looking around, I saw Mr Holmes looking very grave. Dr Watson had discarded his pipe in a show of reverence.
‘And now,’ Mr Fallowell continued, ‘I shall break the seal…’
We had formed a close semi-circle around him and not one of us made a sound as he went to work. I noticed that his hands trembled slightly as they neared the urn and more than once he stopped to wipe his palms against his waistcoat.
‘The seal is likely to be a combination of beeswax and other substances. To be honest, we aren’t sure of its exact composition. But I can vouch for its efficacy,’ he went on, beginning to turn the stopper with some difficulty.
‘There!’ he declared at last, stepping back a little. ‘It’s done.’ He looked around at our eager faces. ‘When the elders of the Church caused this seal to be made, little would they have imagined the place or circumstances of its opening.’
‘And its contents, sir?’ demanded Sir Percival, his patience creaking under the strain.
‘Let me see…’
Mr Fallowell reached into the urn until his arm disappeared up to its elbow. And as we watched, breathless with suspense, we saw his expression change from a frown of concentration into a look of puzzlement and then slow-dawning horror.
‘I… I… There’s nothing there!’ he stammered. ‘Only this…’ And pulling out his hand, he revealed a fistful of ashes – pale grey, crumbling fragments that turned to dust at the touch of his fingers.
‘Burned!’ he gasped. ‘The document is burned!’ And thumping down the ashes upon the table he began to search the urn again, pulling out handful after handful of the same dull substance.
By now our circle had broken and we were all crowding around him, anxious to see for ourselves. I reached out and ran my fingers through the light, flaky ash. On one fragment, a little less than half an inch across, I thought I could make out traces of an ancient script, but the whole thing, writing and all, dissolved into dust at my touch.
‘This cannot be! It cannot!’ Mr Fallowell was insisting. ‘The seal was unbroken, I swear it!’
‘So this cannot be Mr Baldwick’s work?’ Mr Spencer asked. ‘We know he was very unbalanced…’
‘No!’ Mr Fallowell was adamant. ‘The seal was unbroken, just as it would have been a thousand years ago!’
‘In that case,’ Mr Holmes observed, ‘there can only be one explanation. It would seem–’
‘Aha!’ Mr Fallowell’s fingers had touched something and very, very slowly he pulled his hand from the urn. Between his fingers rested a small rectangular tablet of clay, no more than an inch high and two inches across. From where I stood I could see there were words engraved on it, and these, I saw, were in a more familiar script.
‘What does it say?’ Sir Percival barked.
Mr Fallowell read for a moment before replying, then straightened and looked around him.
‘It’s in Latin,’ he told us, ‘and if I may translate, the message reads something like this…’
He cleared his throat.
‘In the name of God, our Father, and for the preservation of the divine mystery, Vespasian decreed that this document should be burned. Thanks be to God.’
In the silence that followed, Viscount Wrexham let out a low whistle.
‘So it seems my old man was right. The Lazarus Testament really was dynamite, after all! I wonder what it said. It must have been pretty devastating for them to destroy it outright like that…’
‘Wait!’ Unnoticed by the rest of us, Mr Spencer had continued to search the urn while Mr Fallowell was busy with the tablet and now he pulled from it a handful of ashes in the middle of which, brittle and charred but still legible, lay one small surviving fragment of parchment.
The room fell silent at the sight of it and we watched Mr Spencer lower it to the table and lay it down with the most tender care. Mr Fallowell seemed almost too awed to approach it, pausing to clear his throat again before moving closer.
‘Can you read it?’ Miss Peters asked, her voice trembling a little, as if from the effort of holding in check for so long her natural exuberance. ‘Goodness!’ she added. ‘Perhaps we’re going to learn the secret after all!’
Mr Fallowell stooped to examine it but did not dare to touch it with his fingers.
‘The writing is in Aramaic,’ he informed us, ‘and yes, I can make it out. Let me see…’
He composed himself for a moment or two, his face only inches from the scrap of parchment.
‘Unfortunately the flame has left certain lacunae in the text,’ he explained. ‘That is to say, there are some gaps. But what I can make out reads thus.’
And in a slightly hoarse voice he began to read.
‘Yesterday I took dispute with the seller of fish. His goods are expensive and of poor quality ... As I have repeated ten thousand times in these pages, manners are assuredly not as they were in the days of my childhood. The tax collector is a boy with pimples, his mother a ... Young men respect not their elders, neither their experience nor judgement ... I was forced to complain about the quality of the candles ... the cost of mules ...a good horse for that and money left over ... When I was a youth ...’
The scholar’s voice trailed off. ‘I’m afraid that’s all,’ he concluded a little lamely.
‘That’s all?’ Dr Watson looked bewildered. ‘But that’s hardly the stuff of ancient mystery! It sounds more like the ramblings of a retired colonel from Tunbridge Wells. And believe me, I’ve met a few.’
‘Indeed, Watson.’ Mr Holmes straightened and there was something in the manner of the movement that spoke of finality, of a chapter drawing towards its close. ‘It seems we shall never know the full details of the reminiscences Lazarus committed to writing, nor why it was decided they needed to be destroyed. But from the fragment remaining to us, I should say there’s a distinct possibility that Lazarus did not, after all, compose an explosive account that threatened the foundations of Christendom. Perhaps the elders of the Church simply found his diatribe something of an embarrassment. Who can say? Now, Sir Percival, I take it that you consider my work here done? This morning I received a telegram about a fascinating strangulation off Fleet Street and I rather think my presence is required.’
‘Why, of course, Mr Holmes.’ Sir Percival nodded. ‘But first, perhaps Mr Fallowell and I might have a few words with you in private? You see, we shall be expected to produce a full report for the Prime Minister and we would value your thoughts…’
With a bow to the rest of us, the old gentleman took his leave and ushered Mr Holmes from the room. Mr Fallowell bobbed politely in our direction and scurried after them.
‘So that’s that, then?’ Viscount Wrexham asked, his voice sounding rather indignant. ‘My word, what an anti-climax! I’d been thinking all this would make a rather good drama for the stage. But an ending like that rather scuppers things, doesn’t it? Not at all what the public wants. No sensational denouement, no ancient curse, no supernatural forces at work – only some rather grumpy memoirs about the price of fish! It’s a pity. I’m told there’s a lot of money to be made in the theatre nowadays.’
He reached out and touched the urn. ‘In a way I’m rather glad my old man never did get his hands on it. It would have been a bitter disappointment for him. And now I think it’s time I came up with a new plan to restore the family fortunes. There’s a race meeting at Carlisle tomorrow, I believe, and a fellow has to start somewhere.’
He pulled a watch from his waistcoat pocket and I recognised the silver timepiece that Mr Swan had been holding that fateful day in Baker Street.
‘Ah, yes,’ he went on, noticing my reaction. ‘Pauncefoot’s watch. He’ll be pleased to have it back. I had the devil of a time persuading him to give it up. The poor fellow! I understand he’s terribly upset about his old friend’s death. I think he rather blames me for it. What about you, Flotsam? Do you?’
So direct and frank was his gaze, that for a moment I struggled to know what to say.
‘Well, sir,’ I began, ‘I suppose accidents do happen. All the time. But then again, if you hadn’t tried to mislead Mr Swan… Oh, sir! I really couldn’t say.’
A shadow seemed to pass over his face and he bowed his head.
‘I stand condemned, Flotsam. Perhaps if I were to make it my mission in life to do nothing but good works from this day forward, you might learn to think better of me. Now that would be an end to the drama that would warm the audience’s heart! Nothing like a bit of redemption, eh? But I fear I should only disappoint you. My spirit is willing but it is also famously weak, especially when faced with any sort of temptation. Perhaps it would be wiser simply to assure you that my offence was unintentional and my regret genuine. Now, if I hurry I may be able to catch the afternoon train and be in Carlisle by supper time. With the honest wages of domestic service in my pocket, I have some sort of stake to play with. And if I can’t teach these north-country farmers a thing or two about horseflesh, things will have come to a pretty pass!’
He too left us with a bow. As he departed, a small eddy of air from the closing door stirred the ashes on the table and caught up the one remaining flake of legible parchment. Light though the draught was, it was enough to lift the fragment from the table, and in attempting to catch it, Mr Verity succeeded only in crushing the charred remnant into tiny pieces.
‘My goodness!’ The solicitor’s face was the very picture of dismay. ‘The only remaining piece… A priceless shard of history…’
Mr Spencer smiled. ‘I don’t think you need to be too hard on yourself, sir. It was too fragile to survive for very long. And besides, no one seems very interested in it anymore, do they?’
Rather huffily, Miss Peters began to scoop the little pile of fragments from Mr Verity’s hand back into the urn.
‘Well, I must say, Rupert, I think it’s a bit rich of Sir Percival! Some of us have risked their lives to rescue these little bits because he was making such a fuss about them, and now he simply doesn’t care! Just because old Lazarus wasn’t writing about angels and things. And, really! If those fusty old bishops were going to burn it all those years ago, I do think they might have said so! Think of all the trouble they’ve caused. And anyway, if they knew the document was just ashes, why did they take so much trouble looking after the urn?’
Mr Spencer looked down at the traces of ash still clinging to one of Mrs Garth’s lace doilies.
‘I suppose in more religious times, even the remains of the document had some significance, Hetty. After all, they had been in the possession of Lazarus himself, which would make them a pretty remarkable relic in their own right.’
This aspect of things seemed to strike Mr Verity for the first time and he hurriedly brushed some grey smuts from his waistcoat.
‘Dear me!’ he exclaimed. ‘I suppose that’s true. And here’s me, covered in relic, as you say. Most lacking in respect.’ His attempt to brush it away had merely pressed the ash further into the fabric, and he began to look rather anxious. ‘Yes, most disrespectful. Can’t wander around like this… If we’re finished here, perhaps you’d excuse me? I might just nip home and change…’
His departure left me with only Dr Watson, Mr Spencer, Miss Peters and Mrs Hudson for company. For a moment we all looked around at each other, and then Dr Watson began to smile; and with that, the room ceased to be a place of awe and silence and became once again Mrs Garth’s homely and welcoming front parlour.
‘So,’ he began, ‘here we are again. And if I may say so, I think we’ve all done jolly well. We’ve cracked the code and found the Viscount and seized what remains of the Lazarus Testament. What happens now, Mrs Hudson?’
The housekeeper straightened. ‘Well, sir, Mr Holmes says he’s dashing back to London, which means the house will need airing and the beds preparing and some supplies buying in. And whatever matter he involves himself in next, I’m sure he will want you by his side, sir. So I daresay we ought to be packing our bags and vacating Broomheath Hall. I suppose Mr Verity will need to find a new tenant now that the Summersbys have gone.’
Dr Watson looked thoughtful.
‘I confess Mrs Summersby fooled me completely,’ he admitted. ‘Such a charming woman! When she took the trouble of bringing us out that flask of brandy, I don’t mind telling you I flushed like a schoolboy.’
‘Well, I never liked her,’ Miss Peters declared. ‘I always suspected there was something devious about her.’
‘Nonsense, Hetty!’ Mr Spencer spluttered. ‘You insisted that she had no hidden depths at all! Besides, you were so busy making up preposterous tales of Neapolitan life that you could hardly have formed a proper opinion.’
‘Yes,’ Miss Peters sighed. ‘I suppose I did rather lose myself in the role at times. Do you know, I keep thinking about dear old Professor Corelli. He sounds such a jolly man, if rather naughty. Then, of course, I remember that I invented him, and I’m terribly disappointed.’ She shook her head very prettily. ‘But now I should go and wire your uncle, Rupert. I told him I was nipping out to the shops, and that was nearly a week ago, although I don’t suppose he’s noticed yet. But think how cross he would be if he did! You know that mood when he goes purple and shakes with rage and talks about sending me to a nunnery? I do so hate it when he does that. So I thought if I sent him a telegram saying I was actually visiting a nunnery…’
‘Great heavens!’ Mr Spencer groaned. ‘If you will excuse me, I had better go with her to see if I can prevent further carnage.’ He nodded to Mrs Hudson and favoured me with one of his warmest smiles. ‘As always, Mrs Hudson, Flotsam, it has been a pleasure.’
Dr Watson watched them go then cast an eye towards the window. The rain seemed to be getting heavier.
‘They say it is breathtaking here in summer,’ he mused, ‘but, do you know, Mrs Hudson, right now I rather fancy being back in Baker Street again. Excitement is all very well, but there comes a time when a fellow likes to be by his own fire, with one of your hot whisky toddies in his hand. I daresay we could all do with a night or two under our own roof, eh, Flotsam?’
And as Mrs Hudson smiled and quietly began to wrap the long-lost urn in her shawl, I could only agree. But it was not the comfort of the fireside I found myself looking forward to, but to all the bustle and excitement that awaited me: to my lessons in Bloomsbury Square and my expeditions with Scraggs; to the shouts of the flower girls and the rumble of the carriages; to the busy markets and the thronging streets; to all the surging life and drama of the city; and perhaps best of all, to the thud of the knocker heralding a new visitor with a new story, and possibilities for danger and daring and love and adventure that seemed to me, that day in Alston, infinite and unending and impossibly wonderful.