The Strange Return of Sherlock Holmes Page 4

  ‘That is the puzzling part. We found nothing out of place except in that bathroom. Every other room appeared completely undisturbed. Not a single item was touched, not a single item damaged or out of place – except for the front door which, as I have said, had been jimmied and the lock broken. Mr Jenkins informed us – we telephoned him in Scotland – that it was he who had removed the sun porch door and leant it in the back hallway, intending to dispose of it when he returned from holiday. He no longer wants a door separating the sun porch.’

  ‘When will Mr Jenkins return?’ asked Coombes.

  ‘That is anybody’s guess,’ said Bundle. ‘He lives in the cottage only about one week each month. He is a theatrical producer in London. He comes and he goes.’

  ‘Does he have neighbours?’

  ‘Only Mrs Ogmore. She is ninety-five. I’m afraid she, at her age, is just a wee bit unreliable. She said she saw nothing last evening except Father Pritchard riding by on his bicycle.’

  ‘When was that?’

  ‘A little after dusk had settled on the hills. Unfortunately, Father Pritchard has been dead for eighty years. I doubt anyone in town ever knew him except her.’

  ‘Ahh,’ said Coombes. ‘And has Mrs Ogmore ever seen the good Father on other occasions in recent years?’

  ‘That I cannot tell you, Mr Coombes. I would not doubt that she has.’

  ‘That could be an important detail,’ said Coombes.

  Bundle spread his thick fingers, suddenly letting drop the problem he had been turning over and over in his hands. He leant back in his chair, and grinned. ‘Long ago, sir, our mutual acquaintance at Scotland Yard – you know who I mean – warned me that you were a man for detail. But I confess, sir, I am surprised, nonetheless, at the quantity of detail you require.’

  ‘I wonder,’ said Coombes, ‘would you be good enough to allow me to have a look at the crime scene?’

  ‘Certainly, sir,’ said Bundle. ‘It would be a pleasure.’

  Coombes hurried to his room. A few minutes later he reappeared wearing a brown Harris tweed sport jacket with leather elbows, brown wool trousers, smooth leather shoes, a brown shirt open at the collar, and a plaid wool hat that made him look a little like Bing Crosby. Soon we were in Bundle’s police car gliding along a deserted lane beyond the edge of town. Leaves whirled down and the bright sun was masked and unmasked by scudding clouds, and the whole landscape seemed to shrink and grow with the dimming and brightening of the light. Bundle pointed, ‘There be Mrs Ogmore now, rake in hand.’

  ‘Ah, may we have a word with her?’ cried Coombes.

  Bundle hit the brake and swung into the driveway.

  Mrs Ogmore was raking briskly. She wore a large straw hat. She was thin, and her thin white dress blew, and she wore a green jacket that was too big for her. Coombes got out of the car and walked to her and the two of them stood amidst swirling leaves, facing each other a few feet apart. Bundle and I hurried up to them.

  ‘My name is Cedric Coombes,’ said Coombes. ‘I’m working with Sergeant Bundle.’

  ‘How do you do,’ she said, and looked up at him with pressed lips as she nodded firmly.

  ‘May I ask you a question?’

  ‘Of course. You look like a sensible young man.’ She smiled coquettishly.

  ‘Have you often seen Father Pritchard riding his bicycle?’

  ‘Not in recent years. He’s been gone a long time.’

  Here Sergeant Bundle raised a finger and interrupted. ‘Now, think clearly, Constance,’ he said. ‘Think what you are saying. This morning you told me . . .’

  ‘I am thinking perfectly clearly,’ said Constance Ogmore. ‘Father Pritchard has been dead for eighty years. The last time I saw him was in 1927 when I was fourteen years old. You are talking foolishness.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Coombes. ‘But yesterday evening, just after dusk, did you see anyone riding a bicycle?’

  ‘I don’t remember seeing anyone,’ she replied, in her high little voice. ‘I do remember Father Pritchard used to ride a bicycle. He used to ride all round the countryside in his priestly robe.’ Suddenly she chuckled. ‘When the wind was up he looked like a bat! I shouldn’t say such things, of course.’

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Ogmore,’ said Coombes.

  Coombes left her – almost rudely, I thought, under the circumstances – and hurried to the car, limping wildly on his game leg.

  Bundle put the car into gear. ‘Lord, lord, poor woman,’ he gasped as he backed out.

  Fifty yards further down the lane we came to the drive leading to The Old Vicarage. Already the body had been removed from the house. Coombes walked carefully through every room, upstairs and downstairs, and with his ancient magnifying glass he examined table tops, floors, curtains. What he was looking for I could not imagine. On several occasions I noticed Sergeant Bundle standing with his hands on his fat hips, and with a self-satisfied smile on his face, gazing with amusement at the bent and urgent figure of Coombes. I had the feeling – once again – that Coombes reminded me of someone. I decided it must an actor in an old film. But I could not recall the film or the actor. Maddening.

  The last room he examined was the bathroom. I had seen blood and death aplenty in Afghanistan, but the sight of a tub full of blood – a literal blood bath – unsettled me and I did not look at it closely. Coombes, however, was on his knees by the tub, carefully examining all the fixtures, every aspect of the room. To my surprise he suddenly produced a small digital camera from his pocket and began taking photographs, seeming to pay particular attention to the pane-smashed door which had been removed from the top of the tub and leant against a wall.

  The cottage was furnished with an eclectic mix of ancient and modern objects, nineteenth century antiques and paintings cheek by jowl with modern appliances and modern art. Much of the art had a theatrical theme, reflecting the interests of a theatrical manager – photographs of Lawrence Olivier, John Barrymore, Vanessa Redgrave and other famous stage actors, a painting of Sarah Bernhardt, an engraving of David Garrick as Richard III by William Hogarth, and so on. Coombes lurched about with insect energy and only once did his attention seem to waver from the task at hand. He stopped suddenly and gazed at a box camera on one of the bookshelves in the study, and he said, ‘Why, I had a camera like that. Do they still sell them?’ Then he seemed to bethink himself, and he murmured, ‘Surely not, no.’

  ‘I’m sure you can find one in London, sir,’ said Bundle, rocking back on his heels. ‘Many an antique dealer specializes in cameras.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ muttered Coombes, and he tilted his glass to examine a book more closely, without touching it.

  ‘I’m sure I can’t imagine what you are searching for,’ said Bundle, his thick fingers fidgeting. I had noticed for some while that he had been growing impatient with the excruciating slowness of Coombes’s examination.

  ‘I may already have found it,’ said Coombes. ‘If you gentlemen would be good enough to come with me to the entry hall, I’ll show you.’

  On the entry table were a bust of Shakespeare and a bust of Voltaire, and between the two were artfully piled a number of old and new books. ‘There is one book on this table that was put here recently,’ said Coombes. ‘You can see a fine layer of dust on the table itself, if you look against the light. That same dust is on each of the books, except one. This one.’ He pointed to a closed book lying face down on the table.

  ‘Well, sir?’

  ‘Someone has put it here within the last day or so. It has a dark dust jacket, and dust would plainly show on it, if there were any. Also, if you look closely you will see that someone has not only set the book on to the table, but twisted it slightly, thus creating the shape of a small fan in the dust, where the book was turned.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Bundle, squinting and nodding. ‘That is the case.’

  ‘This book may well tell us a tale or two that the author never envisioned,’ said Coombes. ‘I should like to examine it more closely.’

  Bun
dle stepped backwards a pace and held his arms wide, palms up. ‘Help yourself, Mr Coombes.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Bundle raised a brow, rocked back on his heels, and looked on with an expression both patronizing and puzzled as Coombes pulled a plastic shopping bag from his pocket, removed the book carefully from the table top, and placed it into the bag. ‘I will be sure to give this back to you, sergeant,’ said Coombes. ‘I will take good care of it.’

  ‘I can’t imagine what you hope to learn from a book. It looks new.’

  ‘Very new,’ said Coombes. ‘Now let us examine the area around the house. The rain of yesterday should have prepared the earth for tracks. A pity that the police have been driving in and out, tromping here and there.’

  ‘We had to arrive, Mr Coombes,’ said Bundle with a smile, and he held his finger in the air. ‘We had to arrive, didn’t we, sir?’

  Coombes hopped down the front steps. He circled the cottage, looking carefully at the ground as he went, pausing every few paces to look up at the house, at the nearby trees, at the surrounding area. He then made his way along the driveway, staying to the edge. The driveway was light sand and gravel, damp with rain. Every once in a while I heard Coombes groan ‘Ah!’ as if he’d found something. When he reached the end of the drive he motioned me towards him and pointed to a patch of sand amidst grass at the very margin. ‘Can you see the tracks – a fat bicycle tyre. What they call a mountain bike tyre.’

  ‘I see it,’ I said. ‘Barely.’

  ‘Let me call your attention to this other set of tracks, nearby. Two sets of bicycle tracks. One going in, one coming out. Both at the very edge of the driveway.’

  ‘They become plainer and plainer as I stare.’

  ‘Now look, Wilson, in the centre of the drive. Someone walked to the cottage in the rain last night. You see occasionally a footprint. Many of the prints have been wiped out by the tyre prints of police vehicles, but many remain.’

  Coombes was off again, turning right at the end of the drive and proceeding along the edge of the lane, squatting so low that he seemed to be almost crawling. He darted along like a monkey, past Mrs Ogmore’s driveway, and then he veered into the trees. Suddenly he stood and waved at me and shouted, ‘Go get the car!’

  I walked back to The Old Vicarage where Sergeant Bundle was waiting. We drove out into the lane, turned right, and then I spotted Coombes far into the trees, on his hands and knees.

  ‘Lord, Lord, what is that man doing!’ cried Bundle. ‘I am responsible for him!’

  Coombes crawled awhile, then suddenly stood and held up what appeared to be a black cloth. He waved it at us and then made his way towards the lane, on an angle. We picked him up and drove on slowly.

  ‘You crawled a long way through the grass, Mr Coombes,’ said Bundle. ‘I’ve never seen detective work done in that manner before.’

  ‘It was necessary.’

  ‘Ah, but you crawled a very long way for a man of your age,’ said Bundle. ‘I don’t know if that is good.’

  ‘You mustn’t take your duties too seriously, sergeant. I found something of interest.’

  ‘Yes?’

  Coombes held up a black pillow slip.

  ‘How very odd,’ said Bundle. ‘Who would sleep on black sheets?’

  ‘Fashion,’ I said.

  ‘Odder still,’ said Coombes, ‘is that two holes have been cut in it – apparently eye holes.’

  ‘Do you see a connection between this and the murder?’ asked Bundle.

  ‘We must ponder that possibility,’ said Coombes. He leant back in his seat, closed his eyes, and pressed his fingers together. He did not speak for the rest of the short journey. But when we reached Chancery Lane Coombes said to Bundle, ‘By the way, sergeant, could Lydia be the girl’s name that the victim mentioned to Mr Twembley?’

  ‘Yes, yes, that was it!’ cried Bundle. ‘Lydia, yes. Where did you see that name, sir?’

  ‘Just a guess, Bundle, just a guess.’

  That evening Coombes was much changed. He was no longer depressed. He seemed alternately in a state of alert agitation, meditative calm, and reflective melancholy. He sat in front of the fire with his fingers pressed together, staring into the flames or up at the ceiling. All at once he sprang from his chair – as if he had been tied there and suddenly burst his bonds – and he began to pace the floor mercilessly, wall to wall, around and around. Suddenly he stopped. A faraway look invaded his face. His shoulders fell a little, as if an unwelcome thought had just overtaken him. He turned to me and said, ‘Do you think they really need me on this case, Wilson? Or are Bundle and my Scotland Yard contact merely concocting therapy?’

  ‘Therapy?’ I said, looking up from my book.

  ‘Therapy for an old man, yes.’

  ‘I haven’t the foggiest idea what you are talking about. Whatever can you mean, Coombes? You say the strangest things sometimes. I begin to wonder if you are keeping some deep dark secret from the world.’

  ‘Perhaps I am, Wilson,’ said he, in a faraway voice. ‘Perhaps I am.’

  ‘Who is this mysterious contact of yours at Scotland Yard? And what has he to do with Sergeant Bundle? Bundle is always referring to your famous contact – with a wink wink, and a nod nod. I am not a terribly clever man, Coombes, but I do pick up on the obvious.’

  Coombes stalked back and forth across the floor with renewed anxiety, rubbing the back of his neck with his hand. ‘Yes, yes, I doubt you could help me unless you knew all the facts.’

  ‘I don’t wish to pry into any man’s secrets,’ I said. ‘But I have wondered why the police should be consulting you on a murder case. I’ve been baffled from the beginning. A common man such as me needs to be provided with a few facts before he can judge a matter.’

  ‘Quite so, quite so.’

  ‘If ever you wish to tell me what your connection is with this mysterious “Scotland Yard” contact, I’d be very glad to listen.’

  For a moment he paused in front of the fire and seemed about to tell me something. Then he walked on, at a gentler pace, still rubbing his neck. ‘It is a very long story, Watson . . .’

  ‘Wilson.’

  ‘I could hardly expect you to believe it even if I dared tell you.’

  There we left it, for the time being.

  FOUR

  Suspicions of the Impossible

  I did not sleep well that night. Coombes reminded me of someone. How very odd! More and more I had the feeling he was a person I had once known well – perhaps in Afghanistan, or in schooldays at Eton, or even back in the early days of childhood in my father’s garden. The notion grew on me that Coombes had been not merely a remote acquaintance but someone I had been more or less intimately acquainted with. Stuff and nonsense! Impossible. Very odd, though. Perhaps I felt this way only because I was living in a retirement dream where nothing seemed entirely real, living in a town that was a fairy tale – a Kingdom of Books! I wandered through its crooked streets as if under a spell, navigating into tiny bookshops where I hoped to meet Mr Pickwick, or Miss Havisham, then prowling through a gloomy castle heaped with books so ruinously mouldy that I scarcely dared touch them for fear of being poisoned. I began to wonder if the horrors of Afghanistan were with me still, causing me to hallucinate.

  I opened my eyes to a bright morning. As I shaved I could smell toast, tea. Coombes had been up for hours, apparently. I resisted the temptation to be the first to say good morning. I poured myself a cup of Earl Grey, sat down before the cold fire, and sipped.

  Coombes was staring at the wall, evidently deep in contemplation. He appeared to spend half his life energetically gathering facts and details, the other half sitting in a stupor while processing those facts in his brain. I had to admit that I liked the man, cold and analytical as he was. He seemed to mean well. When he wasn’t impatiently seeking out more facts, he was genial enough. When his strange, cold passions made him, for a moment, rude, he was always ready to see his fault and apologize. Yet his strange
silences and occasional dramatic poses seemed at times to border on affectation. I found them annoying. I sipped the Earl Grey and made the slightest move to reach for my book, intending to go read it on the patio. But Coombes stopped me with a sudden cry. ‘You know, Wilson, this case has some very singular features!’

  ‘Horrible,’ I said. ‘A literal blood bath.’

  ‘It has rejuvenated me enormously,’ he said.

  ‘I’ve noticed that,’ I said, feeling a twinge of revulsion.

  He sprang from his chair and almost sprinted to the window, hopping slightly on his injured leg. ‘I wish I had a pipe,’ he said.

  ‘If you smoke I’ll be obliged to move out,’ I said.

  ‘Oh, I shan’t smoke ever again. My London doctor strictly prohibits it and I wouldn’t wish to disappoint him after he has worked so hard. I have an appointment with him next week, and he would find me out.’ Coombes laughed.

  ‘I thought you had an appointment with him just a few weeks ago. Are you ill, Coombes?’

  ‘Not ill – though I ought to be. I feel perfectly healthy, apart from my injured leg, but he has good reasons for wishing to check on me once a month.’

  I let this cryptic statement pass. I stood up and poured another cup of tea. ‘Well, tell me, Coombes, have you cracked the case for Sergeant Bundle?’

  ‘Not cracked it, I’m afraid, though the general outlines of the crime are clear enough.’

  ‘Well, I’m certain Sergeant Bundle will be happy to hear any theory you may have,’ I said. ‘He appeared to be completely at sea.’

  ‘Ah, poor Bundle. He is one of those blustering, ambitious sorts who grabs on to things with great gusto and heaves each detail, willy-nilly, into the scales of judgement. But as he does so he is apt to drop facts and crush evidence and inadvertently leave his thumb on the scale as he weighs the evidence. He has not the delicacy of touch or refinement of mind to nudge the truth out of trifles. He is boisterous and willing, but lacks true talent.’

  It was just this sort of supercilious comment that sometimes rubbed me the wrong way and made me wonder what sort of man Coombes really was. ‘Come, now, Coombes. The man was doing his job. I rather like him.’