“For an instant I was on the point of rushing in. The doorhad been opened to admit the men and their burden. It was thewoman who had opened it. But as I stood there she caught aglimpse of me, and I think that she recognized me. I saw her start,and she hastily closed the door. I remembered my promise to you,and here I am.”
“You have done excellent work,” said Holmes, scribbling afew words upon a half-sheet of paper. “We can do nothing legalwithout a warrant, and you can serve the cause best by taking thisnote down to the authorities and getting one. There may be somedifficulty, but I should think that the sale of the jewellery shouldbe sufficient. Lestrade will see to all details.”
“But they may murder her in the meanwhile. What could thecoffin mean, and for whom could it be but for her?”
“We will do all that can be done, Mr. Green. Not a momentwill be lost. Leave it in our hands. Now Watson,” he added as ourclient hurried away, “he will set the regular forces on the move.
We are, as usual, the irregulars, and we must take our own lineof action. The situation strikes me as so desperate that the mostextreme measures are justified. Not a moment is to be lost ingetting to Poultney Square.
“Let us try to reconstruct the situation,” said he as we droveswiftly past the Houses of Parliament and over WestminsterBridge. “These villains have coaxed this unhappy lady to London,after first alienating her from her faithful maid. If she haswritten any letters they have been intercepted. Through someconfederate they have engaged a furnished house. Once inside it,they have made her a prisoner, and they have become possessedof the valuable jewellery which has been their object from thefirst. Already they have begun to sell part of it, which seems safeenough to them, since they have no reason to think that anyoneinterested in the lady’s fate. When she is released she will, ofcourse, denounce them. Therefore, she must not be released. Butthey cannot keep her under lock and key forever. So murder istheir only solution.”
The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge 1193
“That seems very clear.”
“Now we will take another line of reasoning. When you followtwo separate chains of thought, Watson, you will find somepoint of intersection which should approximate to the truth. Wewill start now, not from the lady but from the coffin and arguebackward. That incident proves, I fear, beyond all doubt thatthe lady is dead. It points also to an orthodox burial with properaccompaniment of medical certificate and official sanction. Hadthe lady been obviously murdered, they would have buried herin a hole in the back garden. But here all is open and regular.
What does this mean? Surely that they have done her to death insome way which has deceived the doctor and simulated a naturalend—poisoning, perhaps. And yet how strange that they shouldever let a doctor approach her unless he were a confederate, whichis hardly a credible proposition.”
“Could they have forged a medical certificate?”
“Dangerous, Watson, very dangerous. No, I hardly see themdoing that. Pull up, cabby! This is evidently the undertaker’s, forwe have just passed the pawnbroker’s. Would you go in, Watson?
Your appearance inspires confidence. Ask what hour the PoultneySquare funeral takes place to-morrow.”
The woman in the shop answered me without hesitation thatit was to be at eight o’clock in the morning. “You see, Watson,no mystery; everything above-board! In some way the legal formshave undoubtedly been complied with, and they think that theyhave little to fear. Well, there’s nothing for it now but a directfrontal attack. Are you armed?”
“My stick!”
“Well, well, we shall be strong enough. ‘Thrice is he armed whohath his quarrel just.’ We simply can’t afford to wait for the policeor to keep within the four corners of the law. You can drive off,cabby. Now, Watson, we’ll just take our luck together, as we haveoccasionally done in the past.”
He had rung loudly at the door of a great dark house in thecentre of Poultney Square. It was opened immediately, and thefigure of a tall woman was outlined against the dim-lit hall.
“Well, what do you want?” she asked sharply, peering at usthrough the darkness.
“I want to speak to Dr. Shlessinger,” said Holmes.
“There is no such person here,” she answered, and tried to closethe door, but Holmes had jammed it with his foot.
“Well, I want to see the man who lives here, whatever he maycall himself,” said Holmes firmly.
She hesitated. Then she threw open the door. “Well, come in!”
said she. “My husband is not afraid to face any man in the world.”
1194 The Complete Sherlock Holmes
She closed the door behind us and showed us into a sitting-roomon the right side of the hall, turning up the gas as she left us. “Mr.
Peters will be with you in an instant,” she said.
Her words were literally true, for we had hardly time to lookaround the dusty and moth-eaten apartment in which we foundourselves before the door opened and a big, clean-shaven baldheadedman stepped lightly into the room. He had a large red face,with pendulous cheeks, and a general air of superficial benevolencewhich was marred by a cruel, vicious mouth.
“There is surely some mistake here, gentlemen,” he said in anunctuous, make-everything-easy voice. “I fancy that you have beenmisdirected. Possibly if you tried farther down the street—”
“That will do; we have no time to waste,” said my companionfirmly. “You are Henry Peters, of Adelaide, late the Rev. Dr.
Shlessinger, of Baden and South America. I am as sure of that asthat my own name is Sherlock Holmes.”
Peters, as I will now call him, started and stared hard at hisformidable pursuer. “I guess your name does not frighten me, Mr.
Holmes,” said he coolly. “When a man’s conscience is easy youcan’t rattle him. What is your business in my house?”
“I want to know what you have done with the Lady FrancesCarfax, whom you brought away with you from Baden.”