A Study in Lavender: Queering Sherlock Holmes (22 page)

It was nearly half-past seven when I heard an older model brougham pull up outside. Two carriage doors were opened and then slammed.

The barrier of pulp and ink did not fold or indeed even rustle. Watson remained oblivious of our visitors’ approach. The bell would ring in a moment. Were I to announce that I knew our visitors to be a pair, he would extol the powers of my reason. Were I to similarly detail that one of them was a woman, for I could hear the heels of her shoes on the stones outside, this too would delight him. Watson and I were divided not by an overwhelming chasm in mental agility but simply a willingness to be aware. This refusal, on his part, left so many things unspoken between us. These things would not delight him though for these many years I had secretly hoped they might. These things would not find their way into the pages of his memoirs. So I, complicit in this ballet of wilful ignorance, played my part and he, cruelly obtuse, played his.

The bell rang, then our pageboy threw open the door and announced, “The Lord and Lady Stamford.” The lady in question swept in, followed by her husband. She had the overly proud hauteur of a noble house, a second daughter I guessed, whose name was of greater value than their cheques. True, her dress was of the highest quality but several seasons out of date and its seams were puckered here and there where a fumble-fingered servant had mended it once too often. By contrast her hat, a great pile of green velvet and black feathers, looked expensive and new, purchased perhaps through the grace of an American dowry. The sharp eyes that peered out from under the brim were steady but open too wide. Not with alarm, I thought, but with the habit of a woman who must rely on peripheral vision to steer her through the parlours of gossiping birds who were dressed in newer plumage.

The earl had a blocky but warm face which must have been handsome in its day. Now however, his features hung heavily from the sagging triangle of weary eyebrows and bushy moustache. The proud chin and broad neck had taken up too close of an acquaintance and his posture had settled into a perpetual shrug. As he took off his hat, I could see that his lordship’s hairline had retreated in the opposite direction, retreating from the field of his forehead with deep marks of regret. He had, I thought, married for a love burning high on expectation only to since discover he possessed too little fuel to maintain its flame. His manner of dress, like that of his wife, showed signs of wear. The black coat had a tinge of grey, the yellow waistcoat was scratched with earnest brushings. Had I owned them, his lordship’s shoes, though well polished, would have been sent out with the rubbish. His was a great house clinging to a precipice.

I invited them to sit near the fire and offered each a sherry. Lord Stamford brightened for a moment but the lady refused for them both.

“Mr Holmes,” said she, “and Dr Watson, it is with gravest sincerity that I expect you both to promise your complete discretion. Dr Watson in particular, have I your word as a gentleman that the misfortunes of our family will not be exploited in your…” she waved a gloved hand in a tiny circle.

“The good doctor is no longer publishing,” I said.

“And in any case,” he interjected, “my accounts of our little adventures were significantly altered in names, places and even those details which might reveal the true identities of Mr Holmes’s clients.”

“I’ve read them all,” said the earl but, after a sharp glance from his wife, quickly added, “at my club.”

“Then you have no doubt realized that Mr Holmes is an expert at locating missing letters, stolen heirlooms, and even absent brides.” Watson pushed his face forward through the blue cloud of his cigar smoke expectantly.

The next few moments were a series of half-words, expressive breaths and significant, though poorly received, glances between the two.

“If I might,” I gently inserted myself into their subtle duel. “Was the marriage fait accompli?”

The noble couple nodded in unison.

“So Virginia Stamford née Barnes shall be henceforth be referred to as the bride of your son. The truth is not served by dressing the facts in fancy.”

Perhaps the earl shrugged or perhaps it was just an exacerbation of his anatomical slouch.

“Let us determine the data as they stand. If I may?” My feet followed the churnings of my psyche and I began to pace back and forth before the fire. All eyes, and the countess’s hat, followed me. “How long had Lord George the junior known his bride?”

“They are said to be. Their money came from,” her voice caught for a moment, full of aristocratic repugnance at bourgeois industry, “cattle.”

“It was positively vulgar,” added the countess, though her voice was tinged with awe. “The girl’s father made his fortune quite suddenly, nouveau riche, you know.”

“And am I to understand that the fiduciary health of your house relies upon this garish good fortune?”

“It does.” And with that, the countess disappeared behind the brim of her hat, not to speak again. Her husband continued the tale.

“The girl is well-schooled, beautiful and charming in every way, not at all American in the way so many of them are. I can’t imagine what she could have done that would have given George cause to disappear. Except…”

“Except,” I interjected, “for the strange man who attempted to storm his way into the Church.”

“Yes! Though the girl was in fine spirits, George seemed quite distraught at the shouting. Such a change came over him, positively a look of anguish.”

Renewing his theory of the errant bride, Watson broke in and asked, “Is it possible that the interloper was a former acquaintance of the bride who objected to the wedding?”

“Yes, the family was in London more than long enough for her to have formed any number of entanglements, though she remains at our house in Grosvenor Square and has expressed no interest in going out nor has she taken any callers. Though I daresay her father will be calling soon. That is, unless we are able to perceive what has happened to my son.”

“Indeed.” I sat and as I did so, I realized that the countess was weeping beneath her hat. “Did you return to the house immediately after the wedding?”

“We did. After the disruption, my son was in poor spirits and never came down to dinner. When we looked in his rooms, he had vanished without a trace.”

“The newlyweds were to spend their wedding night in your home?”

“Yes, they would be away on their honeymoon soon enough and my darling wife couldn’t stand to give up even one more night to our son’s absence.” Here, he patted the countess’s gloved hand. From under the hat came the tiniest whimper.

“Have you a portrait of the couple?” I asked.

From within his coat, the earl brought out a thick cardboard envelope from which he drew a photograph. The bride looked quite fetching in her dress, which was clearly of the finest tailoring and festooned with expensive lace. She stood just above middle height, magnificently proportioned, with light hair. Her chin and neck formed a sculpted curve that turned her face toward her husband and about her lips there rested the very slightest shadow of a smile.

The groom’s face, by contrast, was turned directly toward the photographer’s lens and in his expression one could perhaps imagine the echo of a startle. The man’s eyebrows had inched up an iota from their rest while the soft skin under the orbs themselves tightened toward the nose. There was however, something soft about the mouth that suggested a languor not seen in his eyes. His hair was slightly longer than was the style but was pomaded into shape, while his morning coat and waistcoat were so carefully cut as to give him the air of a dandy. On his lapel bloomed a pale carnation.

I turned the photograph over to read the stamp and found it was a shop whose address was along Regents Street, between Oxford and Piccadilly. The location gave me cause to comment. “Did you go to the photographer’s studio before or after the ceremony?”

“Before,” said Stamford.

“And it was after this visit that your son’s spirits worsened.” Though I phrased this as a question, it was not. His lordship recognized my rhetorical tone and stayed silent. “Yet, even in the absence of the newly pledged husband, the mysterious man from the church has not attempted to spirit away Virginia?”

“Yes, your lordship. And Lady Stamford,” I added as I extended a hand to draw the morose countess to her feet. “Not only will I take the case but I have already solved it.”

“Impossible!” the countess nearly shouted. “Then where is our son?”

“I have already outlined the shape of the truth. Once I have sketched in the finer details I will speedily deliver a second, more complete portrait of the couple in question. If you would be so kind as to tell her young ladyship that I will call on her shortly?”

Giving their consent, the aristocratic couple moved toward my door and I returned the photograph. After their departure I lit a cigar and settled into the basket chair for a few moments.

“Watson, would you be so good as to refresh my whiskey and soda?”

“I would be glad to do so,” he said, “though only if you will tell me how you intend to solve this puzzle. Even you cannot be so certain with so few clues.”

“As I said to his lordship, it is only the details that await, not discovery but confirmation. Simply because the modern mind shirks from facing the truth does not mean that nature, in its turn, engages in the same modesty.”

“It’s scandal then?”

“Quite so, or it should be if I were to allow it. As it stands, the question of the case is not the current location or condition of the missing groom but rather the future. I can only hope that the bride has not fallen in love, for that is the state most perilous to the titled and wealthy.”

“But fallen in love with whom? The case is a veritable Gordian knot of possibilities. The mysterious man at the church could be a blackmailer or he could be holding the young lord hostage hoping to extort some of the family’s new wealth.”

“You are only adding new loops and tangles to the knot, my dear Watson. Have patience and remember that what we learn in this case may very well change the course of many lives. Perhaps even ours.”

Though he questioned me for further details and, indeed, the specifics of my suppositions, I declined. It is the dance of ideas that intrigues him, not the ends. I must forever deny Watson the predictive mechanics of my mind. I often find myself distracted in wondering what would happen should he acquire those abilities for himself, should he actually strip away the modesties which I so freely mock. Like a stage-magician, I keep my audience in his seat by a never-ending legerdemain where the coins and rabbits are criminals employed only to keep his eyes from that which is in plain sight. I began to think that this case of the missing groom, more than any scheme by Moriarty, might prove to be my undoing.

“But I have heard all you have heard and yet,” Watson broke into my reverie, “know nothing. You’ve lost me completely, Holmes. Ah but here’s Lestrade. Good evening, Inspector!”

The timely arrival of our friend from Scotland Yard prevented me from having to explain more to my companion. The inspector wore a stocking cap, heavy jumper and harried expression. He carried an oilcloth bag which he dropped to the floor with a wet thump.

“Lestrade my friend, you look disconsolate.” I said.

“It’s this Stamford business,” he replied. “The Earl of Warrington has half the Yard trying to prove that his son was the victim of an American Delilah. The bride’s father, Mr Barnes, has the other half hunting his lordship, accusing him of being a fortune-hunting rascal who has absconded with the lady’s dowry. Sadly, I am leading the latter party but have only now just discovered clues vindicating my competitors.”

“I’ve just been saying the same thing,” added Watson. “He confounds everyone but in the end he has the most infuriating habit of being right. Though in this case, I cannot imagine what fish he expects to find in the cottages.”

A look of supreme smugness crept across Lestrade’s face and he produced the contents of the oilcloth bag with a flourish.

“You are not the only one who is able to correctly interpret facts and evidence,” he said.