The Big Book of Sherlock Holmes Stories (28 page)

They had entered Piccadilly, and I was still at their heels, when they turned abruptly into Albany Courtyard. By a fortunate coincidence I had for some weeks been visiting the Albany in my professional capacity, having been called in by my old friend General Macdonagh, who was now at death's door. I was therefore known to the commissionaire, who touched his hat as I hastened past him. With the realization that this was where Raffles lived, the course of action I should adopt became clear to me. He had the latchkey in his door, as I came up.

“By Heavens!” his companion cried. “It's Watson!”

“
Dr
. Watson, if you please, Bunny.” The scoundrel turned to me with a leer. “This is indeed a charming surprise, Doctor.”

Ignoring the covert insolence of the man, I demanded sternly if he would accord me a brief audience in his rooms.

“But of course, my dear Doctor. Any friend of Mr. Holmes is our friend, too. You will excuse me if I lead the way.”

My hand went to my revolver, and as the door of his rooms closed behind us, I whipped it out, at the same time producing the case which contained the imitation ruby.

“Here is your imitation stone,” I cried, tossing the case on to the table. “Hand over the real one, or I shall shoot you like a dog.”

Accomplished villain though he was, he could not repress a start of dismay, while his miserable confederate collapsed on a sofa with a cry of horror.

“This is very abrupt, Doctor,” Raffles said, picking the case up and opening it. “May I ask if you are acting on the instructions of Mr. Holmes? It is, after all, with Mr. Holmes that I am dealing.”

“You are dealing with me now. That is the only fact you need to grasp.”

“But Mr. Holmes was entirely satisfied with the stone I handed him.”

“I am not here to argue. Will you comply with my request?”

“It is disgraceful of Holmes to send you to tackle the pair of us single-handed.”

“
Mr
. Holmes, you blackguard! And he knows nothing of what I am doing.”

“Really? Then I can only say he does not deserve such a lieutenant. Well, Bunny, our triumph was, I fear, a little premature.”

A minute later, I was in the passage, the case containing the genuine stone in my breast pocket. Through the closed door there rang what I took to be the bitter, baffled laugh of an outwitted scoundrel. In general, I am of a somewhat sedate temper, but it was, I confess, in a mood which almost bordered on exultation that I drove back to Baker Street, and burst in on Holmes.

“I've got it! I've got it!” I cried, waving the case.

“Delirium tremens?” Holmes enquired coldly, from his arm-chair. I noticed that he was holding a revolver.

“The original ruby, Holmes!”

With a bound as of a panther Holmes leaped from his chair and snatched the case from my hand. “You idiot!” he snarled. “What have you done?”

Vexed and bewildered, I told my story, while Holmes stared at me with heaving chest and flaming eyes. My readers will have guessed the truth, which Holmes flung at me in a few disconnected sentences, interspersed with personal
observations of an extremely disparaging nature. It was indeed the original ruby which Raffles had brought with him, and which Holmes, suspecting that Raffles would attempt to retrieve it while he slept, had entrusted to my keeping. The warning which Holmes had given Raffles not to visit him again was now explained, as was also the vigil with a loaded revolver on which my friend had embarked when I burst in on him.

The arrest a fortnight later of Raffles and the man Bunny, and the restoration of the famous ruby to its lawful owner, will be familiar to all readers of the daily papers. During this period the extremely critical condition of General Macdonagh engaged my whole attention. His decease was almost immediately followed by the unexpected deaths of two other patients, and in the general pressure of these sad events I was unable to visit Holmes in order to learn from his own lips the inner story of the final stages in this remarkable case.

AUGUST WILLIAM DERLETH
(1909–1971) was born in Sauk City, in Wisconsin, where he remained his entire life, most of which appears to have been spent at the typewriter, as he wrote more than three thousand stories and articles, and published more than a hundred books, including detective stories (featuring Judge Peck and the Sherlock Holmes-like character Solar Pons), supernatural stories, and what he regarded as his serious fiction: a very lengthy series of books, stories, poems, journals, etc., about life in his small town, which he renamed Sac Prairie.

When Derleth learned that Arthur Conan Doyle had no plans to write more Holmes stories, he wrote to ask permission to continue the series; Conan Doyle graciously declined. Nonetheless, Derleth proceeded, inventing a name that was syllabically reminiscent of Sherlock Holmes, and wrote his first pastiches about Solar Pons, ultimately producing more stories about Pons than Conan Doyle did about Holmes.

Pons is all but a clone of Holmes. Both have prodigious powers of observation and deduction, able to tell minute details about those they have just met, deduced in seconds of observation. They also are physically similar, both being tall and slender. Holmes stories are narrated by Dr. John H. Watson, Pons stories by Dr. Lyndon Parker, with whom he shares rooms at 7B Praed Street; their landlady is Mrs. Johnson. Holmes's elder brother, Mycroft, has even greater gifts than Sherlock, and Solar Pons's brother, Bancroft, is also superior.

Among the few differences between Holmes and Pons are their time frames. The most memorable Holmes adventures took place in the 1880s and 1890s, whereas Pons flourished in the 1920s and 1930s. Pons is also a more cheerful figure than Holmes, less given to depression and bouts of drug use.

Several of the Pontine tales have titles taken from the famous unrecorded cases to which Watson often alluded, including “Ricoletti of the Club Foot (and his Abominable Wife),” “The Aluminum Crutch,” “The Politician, the Lighthouse, and the Trained Cormorant,” and the present story.

“The Adventure of the Remarkable Worm” was first published in
Three Problems for Solar Pons
(Sauk City, Wisconsin, Mycroft & Moran, 1952).

“
AH, PARKER
!”
EXCLAIMED
Solar Pons, as I walked into our quarters at 7B Praed Street late one mid-summer afternoon in the early years of the century's third decade, “you may be just in time for another of those little forays into the criminological life of London in which you take such incomprehensible delight.”

“You have taken a case,” I said.

“Say, rather, I have consented to an appeal.”

As he spoke, Pons laid aside the pistol with which he had been practising, an abominable exercise which understandably disturbed our long-suffering landlady, Mrs. Johnson. He reached among the papers on the table and flipped a card so that it fell before me on the table's edge, the message up.

“Dear Mr. Pons
,

“Mr. Humphreys always said you were better than the police, so if it is all right I will come there late this afternoon when Julia comes and tell you about it. The doctor says it is all right with Mr. P., but I wonder
.

“Yours resp., Mrs. Flora White.”

Pons regarded me with a glint in his eye as I read it.

“A cryptogram?” I ventured.

Pons chuckled. “Oh, come, Parker, it is not as difficult as all that. She is only agitated and perhaps indignant.”

“I confess this is anything but clear to me.”

“I do not doubt it,” said Pons dryly. “But it is really quite simple on reflection. She makes reference to a Mr. Humphreys; I submit it is that fellow Athos Humphreys for whom we did a bit of investigation in connection with that little matter of the Penny Magenta. She wishes to consult us about a matter in which a doctor has already been consulted. The doctor has not succeeded in reassuring her or allaying her alarm. She cannot come at once because she cannot leave her patient alone. The patient, therefore, is at least not dead. She must wait until Julia comes, which will be late this afternoon; it is not amiss, therefore, to venture that Julia is her daughter or at least a schoolgirl, who must wait upon dismissal of classes before she can take Mrs. White's place and thus free our prospective client to see us.

“Since it is now high time for her to make an appearance, she has probably arrived in that cab which has just come to a stop outside.”

I stepped to the window and looked down. A cab was indeed standing before our lodgings, and a heavy woman of middle age was ascending the steps of Number 7. She was dressed in very plain house-wear, which suggested that she had come directly away from her work. Her only covering, apart from an absurdly small feathered hat, was a thin shawl, for the day was cool for August.

In a few moments Mrs. Johnson had shown her in, and she stood looking from one to the other of us, her florid face showing but a moment's indecision before she smiled uncertainly at my companion.

“You're Mr. Pons, ain't yer?”

“At your service, Mrs. White,” replied Pons with unaccustomed graciousness, as his alert eyes took in every detail of her appearance. “Pray sit down and tell us about the little problem which vexes you.”

She sat down with growing confidence, drew her shawl a little away from her neck, and began to recount the circumstances which had brought her to our quarters. She spoke in an animated voice, in a dialect which suggested not so much Cockney as transplanted provincial.

She explained how she “says to Mr. 'Umphreys,” and he “says to me to ask his friend, Solar Pons; so I done like he said,” as soon as her niece came from school. Pons sat patiently through her introduction until his patience was rewarded. He did not interrupt her story, once she began it.

She was employed as a cleaning woman at several houses. This was her day at the home of Idomeno Persano, a solitary resident of Hampstead Heath, an ex-patriate American of Spanish parentage. He had bought a house on the edge of the heath eleven years before, and since that time had led a most sedentary life. He was known to frequent the heath in the pursuit of certain entomological interests. As a collector of insects and information pertinent thereto, he was attentive to the children of the neighborhood; they knew him as a benign old fellow, who was ever ready to give them sixpence or a shilling for some insect to add to his collection.

Persano's life appeared to be in all respects retiring. Judging by what Mrs. White told in her rambling manner, he corresponded with fellow entomologists and was in the habit of sending and receiving specimens. He had always seemed to be a very easy-going man, but one day a month ago, he had received a post-card from America which had upset him very much. It had no writing on it but his name and address, and it was nothing but a comic picture card. Yet he had been very agitated at receipt of it, and since that time he had not ventured out of the house.

Mrs. White had been delayed in coming to her employer's home on this day; so it was not until afternoon that she reached the house. She was horrified to find her employer seated at his desk in an amazing condition. She thought he had gone stark mad. She had striven to arouse him, but all she could draw from him was a muttered few words which sounded like “the worm—unknown to science.” And something about “the dog”—but there had never been a dog in the house, and there was not now. Nothing more. He was staring at a specimen he had apparently just received in the post. It was a worm in a common matchbox.

“Och, an 'orrible worm, Mr. Pons. Fair give me the creeps, it did!” she said firmly.

She had summoned a physician at once. He was a young
locum tenens
, and confessed himself completely at sea when confronted with the ailing Persano. He had never encountered an illness of quite such a nature before, but he discovered a certain paralysis of the muscles and came to the conclusion that Persano had had a severe heart attack. From Mrs. White's description, the diagnosis suggested coronary trouble. He had administered a sedative and had recommended that the patient be not moved.

Mrs. White, however, was not satisfied. As soon as the doctor had gone, she had consulted “Mr. 'Umphreys,” with the result that she had sent the note I had seen by messenger. Now she was here. Would Mr. Pons come around and look at her employer?

I could not refrain from asking, “Why did you think the doctor was wrong, Mrs. White?”

“I feels it,” she answered earnestly. “It's intuition, that's what, sir. A woman's intuition.”

“Quite right, Mrs. White,” said Pons in a tolerant voice which nettled me the more. “My good friend Parker is of that opinion so commonly held by medical men, that his fellow practitioners are somehow above criticism or question by lay persons. I will look at Mr. Persano, though my knowledge of medicine is sadly limited.”

“And 'ere,” said our client, “is the card 'e got.”

So saying, she handed Pons a colored postcard
of a type very common in America, a type evidently designed for people on holiday wishing to torment their friends who are unable to take vacations. It depicted in cartoon form a very fat man running from a little dog which had broken his leash. The drawing was bad, and the lettered legend was typical: “Having a fast time at Fox Lake. Wish you were here.” The obverse bore nothing but Persano's address and a Chicago postmark.

“That is surely as innocuous a communication as I have ever seen,” I said.

“Is it not, indeed?” said Pons, one eyebrow lifted.

“I could well imagine that it would irritate Persano.”

“ ‘Upset' was the word, I believe, Mrs. White?”

“That he was, Mr. Pons. Fearful upset. I seen 'im, seein' as how 't was me 'anded it to 'im. I says to 'im, ‘Yer friends is havin' a time on their 'oliday,' I says. When 'e seen it, 'e went all white, and was took with a coughin' spell. 'E threw it from him without a word. I picked it up and kept it; so 'ere 'tis.”

Pons caressed the lobe of his right ear while he contemplated our client. “Mr. Persano is a fat man, Mrs. White?”

Her simple face lit up with pleasure. “That 'e is, Mr. Pons, though 'ow yer could know it, I don't see. Mr. 'Umphreys was right. A marvel 'e said yer was.”

“And how old would you say he is?”

“Oh, in 'is sixties.”

“When you speak of your employer as having been ‘upset,' do you suggest that he was frightened?”

Our client furrowed her brows. “ 'E was upset,” she repeated doggedly.

“Not angry?”

“No, sir. Upset. Troubled, like. 'Is face changed color; 'e said something under 'is breath I didn't 'ear; 'e threw the card away, like as if 'e didn't want ter see it again. I picked it up and kep' it.”

Pons sat for a moment with his eyes closed. Then he took out his watch and consulted it. “It is now almost six o'clock. The matter would seem to me of some urgence. You've kept your cab waiting?”

Mrs. White nodded. “Julia will be that anxious.”

“Good!” cried Pons, springing to his feet. “We will go straight back with you. There is not a moment to be lost. We may already be too late.”

He doffed his worn purple dressing-gown, flung it carelessly aside, and took up his Inverness and deerstalker.

Throughout the ride to the scene of our client's experience, Pons maintained a meditative silence, his head sunk on his chest, his lean fingers tented where his hands rested below his chin.

The house on the edge of Hampstead Heath was well isolated from its neighbors. A substantial hedge, alternating with a stone wall, ran all around the building, which was of one storey, and not large. Our client bustled from the cab, Pons at her heels, leaving me to pay the fare. She led the way into the house, where we were met by a pale-faced girl who was obviously relieved to see someone.

“Been any change, Julia?” asked Mrs. White.

“No, 'm. He's sleeping.”

“Anybody call?”

“No 'm. No one.”

“That's good. Yer can go 'ome now, that's a good girl.” Turning to us, our client pointed to a door to her left. “In there, Mr. Pons.”

The light of two old-fashioned lamps revealed the scene in all its starkness. Mrs. White's employer sat in an old Chippendale wing chair before a broad table, no less old-style than the lamps which shed an eerie illumination in the room. He was a corpulent man, but it was evident at a glance that he was not sleeping, for his eyes were open and staring toward the curious object which lay before him—an opened match-box with its contents, which looked to
my untutored eye very much like a rather fatter-than-usual caterpillar. A horrible smile—the
risus sardonicus
—twisted Persano's lips.

“I fancy Mr. Persano is in your department, Parker,” said Pons quietly.

It took but a moment to assure me of what Pons suspected. “Pons, this man is dead!” I cried.

“It was only an off-chance that we might find him alive,” observed Pons. He turned to our client and added, “I'm afraid you must now notify the police, Mrs. White. Ask for Inspector Taylor at Scotland Yard. Say to him that I am here.”

Mrs. White, who had given forth but one wail of distress at learning of her employer's death, rallied sufficiently to say that there was no telephone in the house. She would have to go to a neighbor's.

The moment our client had gone, Pons threw himself into a fever of activity. He took up one of the lamps and began to examine the room, dropping to his knees now and then, scrutinizing the walls, the book-shelves, the secretary against one wall, and finally the dead man himself, examining Persano's hands and face with what I thought to be absurd care.

“Is there not a peculiar color to the skin, Parker?” he asked at last.

I admitted that there was.

“Is it consistent with coronary thrombosis?”

“It isn't usual.”

“You saw that faint discoloration of one finger,” continued Pons. “There is some swelling, is there not?”

“And a slight flesh wound. Yes, I saw it.”

“There is some swelling and discoloration of exposed portions of the body surely,” he went on.

“Let me anticipate you, Pons,” I put in. “If the man has been poisoned, I can think of no ordinary poison which would be consistent with the symptoms. Arsenic, antimony, strychnine, prussic acid, cyanide, atropine—all are ruled out. I am not prepared to say that this man died of unnatural causes.”

“Spoken with commendable caution,” observed Pons dryly. “I submit, however, that the evident symptoms are inconsistent with coronary thrombosis.”

“They would seem so.”

With this Pons appeared to be satisfied. He gave his attention next to the table before which Persano's body sat. The surface of the table was covered with various objects which suggested that Persano had been in the process of trying to identify the remarkable worm when he was stricken. Books on entomology and guides to insect-life lay open in a semi-circle around the opened match-box with its strange occupant; beyond, in the shadow away from the pool of light from the lamp on the table, lay a case of mounted insects in various stages of their evolution from the larval through the pupal. This, too, suggested that Persano was searching for some points of similarity between them and the specimen unknown to science.

I reached out to take up the match-box, but Pons caught my arm.

“No, Parker. Let us not disturb the scene. Pray observe the discarded cover of the box. Are there not pin-pricks in it?”

“The creature would need air.”

Pons chuckled. “Thank heaven for the little rays of humor which your good nature affords us!” he exclaimed. “The worm is dead; I doubt that it ever was alive. Besides, the parcel was wrapped. Let us just turn the cover over.”

He suited his actions to his words. It was at once evident that the pin-pricks spelled out a sentence. Together with Pons, I leaned over to decipher it.