A Letter of Mary (13 page)

His exact position in the governmental agency into whose offices he walked daily was that of a glorified accountant. It amused him to think of himself that way, though it was quite literally true: He kept accounts. The accounts he kept, however, seldom limited themselves to pounds, shillings, and pence. Rather, he accounted for political trends in Europe and military expenditures in Africa; he took into account religious leaders in India, technological developments in America, and border clashes in South America; he counted the price of sugar in Egypt and wool in Belgium and tea in China. He kept account of the ten thousand threads that went to make up the tapestry of world stability. He had a mind which even Holmes admitted to be his own superior, but unlike Holmes, Mycroft preferred to sit and have information brought to him rather than stir himself to gather it. He was, in a word, lazy.

* * *

I had heard him correctly, despite the telephone: He did have grouse and a superb port for us, although the heat and humidity of London took the edge off the appetites of at least three of us. By unspoken agreement, we ate without discussing the Ruskin case, and we took our port to his sitting room. The windows were opened wide in the hope of a breath of air, and the noise of the Mall at night poured in as if we were seated on the pavement. I put my wine to one side and brushed the damp hair from my forehead, wishing I could wear one of the skimpy new fashions without revealing parts of myself I did not care to reveal— automobile accidents and gunshot wounds leave scars.

"So," purred Mycroft, "you bring me another interesting little problem. Do you mind if we smoke, Mary?" The invariable question, followed by my customary permission. Mycroft offered cigars, and I settled myself into the chair that I calculated would be clearest of the drift of smoke. After the interminable fuss of clipping and lighting, Mycroft nodded at the Scotland Yard inspector, who was looking a bit stunned with the food and drink and, I think, with the august company.

"Chief Inspector Lestrade, if you would begin, please."

His small eyes started open, then blinked rapidly as he fumbled in an inner pocket for his notebook. As I watched him awkwardly holding the big cigar in one hand and trying to manipulate the pages with the other, I wondered how a man with such structurally unappealing features could manage to possess a certain degree of charm. His suit was ill-fitting, he needed a shave and a haircut, his collar was worn, his eyes were too small and his ears too large, but I warmed to him nonetheless. Suddenly, it occurred to me that my feelings towards the little man were distinctly maternal. Good God, I thought, how utterly revolting, and I turned my mind firmly to the problem at hand. Lestrade cleared his throat, looked doubtfully at the cigar, and began his report in official tones and a formal manner.

"In conversation with Mr Holmes on Saturday and Sunday, and subsequently confirmed by my superiors, we agreed to extend our investigations in three directions, each representing one area of known contact Miss Ruskin had in this country since she arrived. These areas are, first of all, Miss Ruskin herself, and any bank accounts, wills, et cetera, which she may have established while she was here. Second is her sister, Mrs Erica Rogers, and third is the gentleman she dined with just before she died, Colonel Dennis Edwards. We agreed that, for the moment, the possibility that people from outside the country were involved would be left in the hands of Mr Mycroft Holmes."

"I should like to say a few words when you have finished, Chief Inspector," said Mycroft.

"I'll be as brief as possible. Miss Ruskin herself creates something of a problem. She entered the country from France on Friday, reached Town just before noon, checked into her hotel at two-ten, and stayed there until the following morning, when she went up to Cambridgeshire to see her mother and sister. She remained with them until Monday evening, when she checked back into the same hotel. Tuesday morning, she went out and was not seen again until after ten o'clock in the evening. As yet we've no idea where she went."

"Two hours from Victoria Station to the hotel, you say?" murmured Holmes with a brief smile touching his lips, but did not elaborate.

"You've looked at the museums, for the missing Tuesday?" I asked.

"I have a man on it, working his way through a list of the more likely museums and libraries. I don't suppose she mentioned anything to you?" he asked without much hope, and I answered.

"No, she didn't, sorry. Did you try Oxford? She did say something in a very general way about being there."

"I haven't been able to spare a man for it yet, but I did direct the local force to begin enquiries. Nothing to date."

"If it would help, I could give you the names of some people in Oxford who might know if she'd been in town. There's an old man in the Bodleian Library who's been there forever and a day; he's sure to know her. It might save a few hours if you could reach them by telephone. Not that the old man would talk on the infernal machine."

"Couldn't hurt." Lestrade flipped to a blank page in his lined notebook, and I wrote down several names and where they might be found. He looked in satisfaction at my scrawl, then turned back to his place.

"Wednesday, she reached you at midday, which means she had very little time in the morning to see anyone, though the hotel was not certain just when she left. She came back to the hotel for a very short time Wednesday night, apparently to change bags, but not clothes, and met the colonel for dinner at nine o'clock."

"Tell us about the colonel," suggested Holmes, who looked deceptively near sleep in the depths of his armchair. Lestrade flipped pages, dropped ash onto his trouser leg, and cleared his throat again.

"Colonel Dennis Edwards, age fifty-one, retired after the war— a widower with one son, aged twenty-one. He was in and out of Egypt before the war, and in 1914 he was posted to Cairo. Went into Gallipoli in March of 1915, and stayed until the end, the following January. Given a fortnight's home leave and then was shifted to the Western Front. Decorated in 1916 when he pulled three of his men out of a collapsed trench under fire. Wounded in March of '17, spent six months in hospital, and returned to active service until the end of the war. There seems to have been some unpleasant business about his wife, though the exact story is hard to pin down. She died in York in July of 1918— he was in the thick of things at the Marne— though why York, nobody seems to know, as she had no family there. The boy, by the way, didn't go to her during the school holiday— he'd been sent off to an aunt up in Edinburgh."

"What did she die from?" I asked.

Lestrade rumpled his hair absently, thus adding another endearingly unattractive characteristic. "Funny thing, we haven't been able to find out. The hospital moved their offices three years back, and some of the records went missing. All they've been able to come up with is one of the older nurses, who remembers a woman by that name dying either, she says, of pneumonia or childbirth fever; she can't remember which. She thinks the woman was brought in by a handsome young man but couldn't swear to it. Don't know if I'd trust her if she could, anyone who can't even remember whether a patient was in the maternity ward or in with the respiratory diseases. However, it does seem that Mrs Edwards was brought in by a man, according to the one piece of paper the hospital found relating to her admission, but he signed his name as Colonel Edwards. The real colonel was, as I said, in France, had been for more than eight months, and the signature was not his."

"There are distinctly unpleasant overtones in all of this." Mycroft's distaste spoke for us all.

"Nothing conclusive yet, but I'd have to agree. Seems the colonel found the circumstances of his wife's death too much to take, too, on top of everything else. He was demobbed in February of 1919, and five months later he spent seven weeks in hospital, with a diagnosis of severe alcoholic toxaemia. They dried him out and sent him home, and after that he straightened out. He got himself involved with the local church and from there met this same group of retired Middle East hands who were about to provide the backing for Miss Ruskin's excavation— the Friends of Palestine."

"I've been wondering, Inspector," I interrupted, "how did the colonel miss the fact that it was a woman who was in charge of the project? Holmes said the man was surprised at that."

"Yes, that was odd, wasn't it? I spoke with two of his friends on the committee that recommended the project, and according to them, Miss Ruskin always signed herself as D. E. Ruskin and never corrected their form of address."

I had to smile. "Her articles were all published under that name," I admitted. "She was, after all, a realist and very anxious to get her dig. I doubt that it was deliberate to begin with, but she probably knew the sort of men she was dealing with and therefore allowed them to continue in their false assumption until they were in too far to back out."

"I imagine it appealed to her sense of humour, as well," commented Holmes.

"That, too. Can't you just hear her laugh?"

"Nothing else about Colonel Edwards?" asked Mycroft.

"We're still looking at bank accounts and family connexions. The son is still away, expected back this weekend."

"And the driver?"

"The colonel's man and the man's wife are the only permanent household servants. They've been with the family for thirty years, and the man's father served the colonel's father before him."

"Any change in their account of Wednesday night?" asked Holmes.

"No, we went over it again, and he says he left the restaurant around midnight, was driven home, and went to bed."

"Did you ask him about the telephone call he made from the restaurant?" Holmes asked.

"That I did. He says he was trying to reach the friend who arranged the meeting with Miss Ruskin, but he couldn't get into contact with him. We talked to the man— name of Lawson— and he agrees that he was not at home that night."

"No way of finding where the colonel phoned, then?"

"Afraid not. All the exchange can tell us is it wasn't a trunk call."

"A London number, then."

"Must've been. If, indeed, he actually made the call. Any road, there were no notable inconsistencies between his story and his servant's, not yet anyway. I'll question them both again tomorrow."

"Does he know yet that this is a murder investigation?"

"We left it as a death under suspicious circumstances, but he's not stupid. He may have guessed it's more than routine."

"Well, it cannot be helped. What about Mrs Erica Rogers?"

"I was up there again this morning, but I can't say we have too much on her yet. The neighbours say she was at home both Wednesday and Friday, as far as they can tell. However, Miss Russell will have told you that the house is peculiarly difficult to overlook— it is near the main road, but bordered by woods on one side and a high privet hedge between it and the nearest neighbour. Her lights did go off as usual around ten-thirty, both nights, and nobody noticed any car arrive after that. She lives alone with her mother; a day nurse comes in Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings. Doctor regularly, too."

"What's wrong with the old lady?"

"Just age, I think. Lots of small things, arthritis, bronchitis, heart— nothing quite big enough to carry her off. Must be a stubborn old thing. Totally useless trying to question her, by the way— hearing like a fence post and pretty near gaga to boot."

"It must be expensive, caring for an invalid. What income is there?"

"Investments by the father, for the most part— not big, but steady. He's been dead for twelve years. Two-thirds of the income goes to Mrs Rogers and her mother, one-third to Miss Ruskin."

"And the will?"

"Mrs Rogers directed us to the family solicitor, who showed me the will Miss Ruskin drew up ten years ago. It left everything to her mother and sister, aside from a few specific items, which she wanted sent to various individuals, some to the British Museum. A codicil added five years ago specified additional items, but that did not change the will itself."

"Any other family?"

"Now, that was an interesting thing. Mrs Rogers was most cooperative when it came to questioning the mother, and she came across with the solicitor's name, but as soon as we branched off onto the rest of the family, she seemed to lose interest in the conversation. She mentioned that she has two sons, and then it seemed we would have to leave, it was time for Mama's bath."

"Any idea what colour hair the sons have?" Holmes murmured.

Lestrade looked up at the question, then started to shake his head.

"There were two men among the photographs in Mrs Rogers's house," I remembered. "Nothing to give a reference for their height, but both of them had very dark hair."

"Ah. Lestrade, when you find them, if you can get a sample of their hair without being too obvious, it might be useful. Was there anything else?"

Lestrade had to admit that until such a time as the enquiries concerning wills and safe-deposit boxes began to come in, there was nothing else. However, I thought it was a tremendous amount to have pulled together in such a short time, and I said so. He blushed and looked pleased.

"I agree," said Holmes dutifully. "Well done. All right, I shall go over what I have learnt, though you've all heard parts of it already." He then touched his fingers together in front of his lips, closed his eyes, and reviewed the results of his work in the laboratory, the mud and the hairs left by the intruders, the examination of the papyrus. I brought out the box and allowed it to be handled and admired while I read my translation of the letter. I then gave box and manuscript to Mycroft for safekeeping. He took them off to the other room, then returned with four glasses and a bottle of brandy.

"It is becoming late, and I believe the good inspector has been short of sleep lately," Mycroft began. "I shall try to make this brief." He paused and turned his glass around in his massive hands, gathering our attention to himself— he was as much of a showman as his brother. He broke the tension by shooting Lestrade a hard look. "You understand that some of what I will tell you is not common knowledge and must under no circumstances make itself into any written record, Chief Inspector."