A Study In Scarlet Women (25 page)

“Don't worry.” Charlotte came beside Livia and placed an arm around her shoulder. “Inspector Treadles will get to the bottom of this. He is very good at what he does.”

Charlotte didn't possess the instinct to comfort. Livia well knew this: When they'd been girls, Charlotte remained in her corner of the room and observed as Livia battled with her sometimes overwhelming feelings of inadequacy and insignificance. But over the years her sister had learned that it made Livia feel less alone, less despair stricken, to be gently stroked on the back. Or embraced. Or patted on the arm.

Really, any kind of contact at all.

And the odd thing was, knowing that Charlotte was not naturally inclined to physical closeness made her touches not less
effective, but more—they were not a reflexive reaction to the distress of another, but a considered one.

Livia leaned on her sister and finally gave voice to the fearful thought that tumbled day and night in the back of her head. “What if Inspector Treadles gets to the bottom of it, only to find out that Mr. Sackville's butler did it?”

Leaving Livia forevermore known as the woman who probably had something to do with Lady Shrewsbury's death.

Her entire life she had been frustrated by her invisibility. At home she was the last daughter her parents remembered. In Society the women were prettier, livelier, younger, cleverer, or even more pathetic—she knew of at least one instance in which a widower offered for a plain, penniless spinster who would otherwise have to endure a lifetime under the thumb of a tyrannical brother. Whereas Livia always seemed to carry her own special shield of obscurity everywhere she went, behind which she could stand in the middle of a room and not be noticed.

How she'd yearned to be the center of attention.

And how cruel to be taught this way that she ought to be careful what she wished for.

“Inspector Treadles will apprehend real suspects in no time,” said Charlotte. “You have my assurances as a consultant to the Criminal Investigation Department.”

Livia snorted. “This reminds me. I saw the advert for Sherlock Holmes's services. Are you really taking clients? How do you keep up the pretense?”

Charlotte explained the procedure she and Mrs. Watson had established. “I saw my first two clients this morning. We already made thirty shillings.”

“So fast?”

“Yes. And I have another client lined up for the afternoon.”

She opened her reticule, took out a small pouch, and put it in Livia's hand. Livia didn't have to open the pouch to know it was the jewelry and money she'd given Charlotte the night she had run away.

She gave it back. “It's too early. You don't know that you'll still have clients in a week—or a month. And I still have reservations about this Mrs. Watson.”

Charlotte shook her head. “I'm more worried about you now than I am about myself. You take it. Mrs. Watson has invested her own funds to set up Sherlock Holmes's operation, so she has every motive to keep me around and in good shape until she at least recoups her cost.”

Livia stared down at the pouch. “Oh, Charlotte, what is going to happen to all of us?”

“According to my crystal ball, Mrs. Watson will make a fortune. I will make a name. You will clear your name, as will Papa. And Mamma will feel relieved for a short while and then more aggrieved than ever.”

Oh God, if only. If only. “While we are looking through your crystal ball, can you tell me if I'll always be stuck at home with Mamma and Papa?”

“Only if you want to be, Livia,” said Charlotte softly. “Only if you want to be.”

“Lady Sheridan, thank you for seeing me on such short notice,” said Inspector Treadles.

Lady Sheridan smiled without warmth. “Your note did not leave much room for refusal or delays, Inspector.”

She was a small, fine-featured woman, her grey hair swept back in a precise and severe chignon. But whereas her husband was hale and vigorous, Lady Sheridan reminded Treadles of nothing so much
as her town house, a once-beautiful entity made worn by time and adverse circumstances.

“I apologize for the necessity of the intrusion,” Treadles said as gently as he could. “But we have an eyewitness account of your return to Paddington Station from a Great Western train. The eyewitness, who has been interviewed by my colleague, is entirely certain that she saw you on the day Mr. Sackville died—and even produced her diary entry to bolster her claim.”

“Lady Avery kindly sent a message to that effect.” A note of irony lined her words. “I did return to London that day. I am one of the patronesses of the Young Women's Christian Association and attended the opening of a new center in Bath, which took place before numerous witnesses. Then I got on a train the next day and came back.”

“You didn't go to Stanwell Moot?” It would have been a fairly convenient side trip from Bath.

“I assure you, Inspector, I never set foot in Stanwell Moot.”

Unfortunately, that was probably true. Constable Perkins's conscientious legwork had not produced a shred of evidence that either of the Sheridans had ever visited the village or its vicinities.

“I was also told that you were once very fond of Mr. Sackville. That you lamented that he had drifted away from the family. Lady Avery said you claimed not to know why he cut off contact, but there is a very real possibility that you knew and chose not to tell her, as she was liable to repeat what she learned to others.”

“An astute observation.” The expression on Lady Sheridan's face was almost a smile.

Treadles found himself warming up to the old woman at this sign of almost approval. He had to issue a stern reminder to himself that she was still a prime suspect. “Can you elucidate us as to why Mr. Sackville drifted away from the family?”

Lady Sheridan waved a weary hand. “One of those tedious
arguments between brothers about their manly honor—I can't recall how it began.”

Her dismissal of the matter seemed genuine enough. Treadles tried a different angle. “Lord Sheridan insisted that there was no estrangement.”

“And I believe that he believed so. Until Harrington died he was probably still expecting his brother to ring the bell and admit he'd been wrong all these years.”

Could it truly be so insignificant, an argument that caused formerly affectionate brothers to become strangers?

“Mr. Sackville's passing does not seem to have grieved you, my lady.”

“I have been brought up to never grieve in public. In any case, we lost him long ago—my husband might not have realized but I did, eventually. I already grieved.”

Her voice was hard.

Inspector Treadles rose and inclined his head. “Thank you, my lady. That will be all.”

“Breathe in,” Mrs. Watson ordered.

Charlotte sucked in hard. Mrs. Watson yanked on the laces of her corset. On Sherlock Holmes's supposed sickbed lay a tangle of scarlet and gold silk, the blouse, skirt, and scarf of the
ghagra choli
that she had just taken off. With Mrs. Watson tying the corset laces, Charlotte stepped into her petticoats and peeked at the street below from behind the curtain.

She had been followed from the Holmes house to 18 Upper Baker Street, she was fairly certain of that. But now there was no one—and no carriages—loitering below.

The doorbell rang just as she finished dressing. Charlotte put the pile of
ghagra choli
into an armoire and took a seat in the parlor; Mrs. Watson went down to open the door for Mrs. Marbleton.

Her inquiry had been one of the earliest Sherlock Holmes responded to.

Dear Mr. Holmes,

I am concerned for my husband.

Mr. Marbleton writes twice a day when he is away. If he feels postal services are too slow, he cables in addition. And anytime circumstances permit, he telephones, in spite of my protest that it is hardly the thing to do for the lady of the house to stand in a passageway and shout her more tender sentiments for all to hear.

I have not heard from him in thirty-six hours. Instead, a strange letter bearing no return address has come. I cannot puzzle out what it is trying to tell me: The sentences make sense, but why would anyone think that I have the remotest interest in animal husbandry?

The letter is typed, on plain paper. I enclose a replica I have made of this letter in the hope that you may be able to advise me.

Yours,
Mrs. C. B. Marbleton

Charlotte had written back immediately.

Dear Mrs. Marbleton,

I am very sorry to hear about your husband. Although I cannot ascertain his whereabouts, I can tell you something of the note you received.

The text, while coherent, has no significance. However, by examining the punctuation—namely the hyphens and the full stops—it emerges that the letter contains a message in Morse code.

Decoded, it says Call for me at general.

Should you have further need of my service, you are welcome to call upon 18 Upper Baker Street at four o'clock tomorrow afternoon.

Your servant,
Sherlock Holmes

And now Mrs. Marbleton had arrived, a woman who had been without news of her husband for more than seventy-two hours, when she normally heard from him several times a day when he was away.

She was pale and tense, but otherwise willowy and handsome, a woman in her forties, her visiting dress of an elegant simplicity that Livia would have much lauded. Pleasantries were exchanged. Charlotte gave the by now standard speech concerning her “brother” in the next room. Mrs. Marbleton, with hands clutched tightly together in her lap, tendered her best wishes for Mr. Holmes's health.

Charlotte let the silence that followed linger for a few seconds before she asked the by now also standard question, “Would you like to know for certain that Sherlock's powers of observation and deduction are very much intact?”

“I was at the General Post Office this morning and retrieved a letter meant for me. I have been plentifully assured of Mr. Holmes's mental acuity,” said Mrs. Marbleton, already holding out the letter. “Would he mind taking a look at this new one?”

This letter was not typed. Instead it was pasted with individual letters—letters cut out from books, rather than newspapers, judging by the thickness of the paper. The text praised the material and workmanship of boots cobbled by a Signor Castellani of Regent Street.

“I already asked around,” said Mrs. Marbleton. “There is no establishment by that name or owned by anyone of that name. I checked for the hyphen-and-full-stop code from the previous letter, which didn't appear to be the case. I also tried using the crossbars
on the t's and the dots on the i's, to see whether it was a variation on a theme—that doesn't appear to be the case either.”

She'd spoken in a near monotone, as if regurgitating facts that had nothing to do with herself. But Charlotte heard the quaver in her voice, the fear and anguish.

She made the usual pilgrimage to “Sherlock's” bedroom. Mrs. Watson, seated inside, looked almost as tormented as their client. Had news of Surgeon-Major Watson's death reached her in a state of unsuspecting naivety, or had she been dreading that terrible confirmation for days on end?

Charlotte didn't know what to do, so she placed the cup of tea that had been brought for “Sherlock” into Mrs. Watson's hands and sat next to her for a bit.

Upon her return to the parlor, she told Mrs. Marbleton, who had been staring at her own untouched tea, “My brother is of the opinion that this should be a straightforward Bacon's cipher.”

“What is that?” Mrs. Marbleton's gaze was dark and intense—an intensity that derived not from hope, but despair.

“It's a system devised by Francis Bacon to hide a message in relatively plain sight. If you'll examine the letters that have been pasted, they are of two different typefaces, Caslon and Didot—and only those two.”