The Three Monarchs, Page 2

  ‘I see no significance at all.’

  ‘That is because you are not looking for it, my dear Inspector Jones. You ignore whatever seems irrelevant to your investigation without appreciating that it is in the smallest and most insignificant details that the truth can be found. But there is nothing more to be done here. Let us continue to Hamworth Hill.’

  Inspector Jones sat morose and silent as we travelled together by coach to North London. We finally arrived at a quiet road containing a row of six houses, all of them very similar, built in the classical style – brick and white stucco – with the entrance set back from the road and two pillars framing the front door. The Abernettys lived at the far end, as Jones had told us, and it was immediately apparent to me that their house was in a state of some decay, with the paint flaking off the front walls, a few cracks in the plasterwork and the windows tarnished and in need of repair.

  ‘It is strange, do you not think, Watson,’ Holmes remarked, ‘that our burglar should have considered this house worthy of his attention.’

  ‘You took the very thought out of my mind. It would seem obvious to me that the occupants were not wealthy.’

  ‘You have to remember that it was night,’ Jones muttered. He was leaning against the coach and his face was flushed as if the exertion of returning here had worn him out. ‘This is a well-to-do street in a fashionable suburb and it might well be that, with the cover of darkness, the house would have looked as enticing as its neighbours. Moreover, the burglar broke into numbers one and five as well as number six.’

  ‘I believe you said that a Mrs Webster lives at number one. I think we shall begin with her.’

  ‘Not with the Abernettys?’

  ‘The pleasure of meeting the Abernettys will be all the greater for the anticipation.’

  It was, therefore, to the home of the elderly widow, Cordelia Webster, that we next repaired. She was a short, stout woman who greeted us effusively and never once seemed to stop moving from the moment she opened her door and led us into her cosy front room. It was clear that, since the death of her husband, she had lived a somewhat solitary life and that the break-in, and even the death a few doors away, had provided her with considerable excitement.

  ‘I could not believe at first that anything was amiss,’ she explained. ‘For I heard nothing during the night and, when the police officer called on me the following day, I was sure he must be mistaken.’

  ‘The door at the back had been broken open,’ Jones explained. ‘I found footprints in the back garden, identical to those I had already observed at the Abernettys.’

  ‘I assumed at once that it was my jewellery he was after,’ Mrs Webster continued. ‘I have a strongbox in my bedroom. But nothing had been touched. It was only the little statue of Queen Victoria that was missing from its place on the pianoforte.’

  ‘You would have been sorry to lose it, I am sure.’

  ‘Indeed so, Mr Holmes. My husband and I travelled to St Paul’s on the day of the jubilee and watched the procession with Her Majesty as it arrived. What an example she is to us all! I have to say that I bear my own loss more easily knowing that we share the pain of widowhood.’

  ‘Your husband died recently?’

  ‘Last year. It was tuberculosis. But I must tell you that Mrs Abernetty could not have been kinder to me. In the days following the funeral, she was here constantly. I was beside myself – I’m sure you can imagine – and she looked after me. She cooked for me, she kept me company . . . nothing was too much trouble. But then she and her husband did exactly the same for old Mrs Briggs. I swear you would not find two more caring people in the world.’

  ‘Mrs Briggs, I understand, was your erstwhile neighbour.’

  ‘Indeed so. It was she who employed the Abernettys. Mrs Abernetty was her nurse and Mr Abernetty was her general servant. That was how the two of them came to live there. She and I were very close and many times she told me how grateful she was to them. Matilda Briggs was not wealthy. Her husband had been a solicitor, a prominent member of the Law Society. He died at the age of eighty-three or -four and left her quite on her own.’

  ‘There were no children?’

  ‘They had none of their own. There was a sister and she had a son but he was shot dead in Afghanistan. He was a soldier.’

  ‘And how old was the nephew?’

  ‘He could have been no more than twenty when he died. I never met him and poor Matilda would never speak of him without becoming quite upset. The boy was all the family that she had, but she could not even bring herself to have his photograph near her. At the end of her life, she had no one to whom she could leave the house and so she gave it to the Abernettys to thank them for their long service. It was a very generous thing to do.’

  ‘Were you surprised?’

  ‘Not at all. She mentioned to me that they had discussed it with her and she made it clear to me that this was what she had decided. She left the rest of her money to the church but the house she gave to them.’

  ‘You have been most lucid and helpful, Mrs Webster,’ Holmes said. He held out a hand and Jones gave him the figurine that he had brought with him. ‘You are quite certain, incidentally, that this is the correct one? They are, after all, practically identical.’

  ‘No, no, no. It is mine, most certainly. I managed to drop it while I was doing the cleaning and it was quite badly broken. But my husband took great pains to repair it for he knew how fond I was of it.’

  ‘He could have purchased another one.’

  ‘It would not have been the same. He enjoyed mending it for me.’

  There only remained to examine the back door where the break-in had taken place and this we did. Jones showed us the footprints that he had found and which were still clearly visible in the flowerbed. Holmes examined them, then turned his attention to the lock that had been forced open.

  ‘This must have made a great deal of noise,’ he said. He turned to Mrs Webster who was standing close by in the expectation and, indeed, the hope of further interrogation. ‘You really heard nothing?’

  ‘I do sleep very heavily,’ that lady admitted. ‘On some nights I take a little laudanum and a few months ago Mrs Abernetty recommended pillows stuffed with camel hair. She was absolutely right. Since then I have had no trouble at all.’ We took our leave and walked together to the far end of the terrace, passing the house owned by the Dunstables who were still absent.

  ‘It is a shame we cannot interview them,’ I said to Holmes.

  ‘I doubt that they would have very much to tell us, Watson – and I suspect that the same will be true of the Abernettys. However, we shall see. This is the front door . . . in need of fresh paint. The whole house appears neglected. Still, it came to them as a bequest, and a most generous one it must be said. Will you ring, Watson? Ah – I think I hear someone approach.’

  The door was opened by Harold Abernetty, a tall, slow-moving man with stooped shoulders, deeply lined features and long, silver hair. He was about sixty years old and reminded me, I must confess, of an undertaker. His expression was certainly very mournful and he was wearing a morning coat, which was sober and a little threadbare.

  ‘Inspector Jones!’ he exclaimed, recognising our companion. ‘Do you have any news? I am glad to see you. But who are these gentlemen whom you have brought with you?’

  ‘This is Mr Sherlock Holmes, the famous detective,’ Jones replied. ‘And this is his companion, Dr Watson.’

  ‘Mr Holmes! But of course I know the name. I must say to you, sir, that I am amazed that so trifling a matter should be of interest to one such as you.’

  ‘The death of a man is never trifling,’ Holmes retorted.

  ‘Indeed so. I was referring to the theft of the statues. But it was quite wrong of me. Will you please come in?’

  The house shared the same proportions as Mrs Webster’s, but it had a clammy, quite sombre feel. Even though it was still inhabited, it was as if it had been abandoned. Mrs Abernetty was waiting for us in
the parlour. She was a very small woman, almost swallowed up by the armchair in which she sat, dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief and still barely able to speak.

  ‘This is a terrible business, Mr Holmes,’ Abernetty began. ‘I have already explained everything to the inspector but I am of course willing to help you in any way I can.’

  ‘This is my fault,’ Mrs Abernetty sobbed. ‘Harold shot that young man for my sake.’

  ‘It was my wife who woke me,’ Abernetty continued. ‘She had heard a door being broken open and sent me downstairs to investigate. I took the gun with me, although I never intended to use it. When the man saw me and came rushing towards me . . . even then, I didn’t know what I was doing. I fired the shot and saw him fall – and wish with all my heart that I could have wounded him and not brought an end to his young life.’

  ‘What did you do after he had fallen?’

  ‘I hurried to my wife and told her that I was unharmed. Then I got dressed. My intention was to find the nearest police officer but first I noticed the bag that the young man had brought with him and, although I knew I should not tamper with the evidence, I took a look inside. That was when I saw the three china figures, lying next to each other. I recognised one of them as being our own. I had bought it for my wife as a souvenir of the Golden Jubilee and I saw at once that it was missing from its place on the sideboard. As you can imagine, I was completely astounded by the presence of the other two – but then I remembered that I had seen one in Mrs Webster’s front room.’

  ‘It was on her piano,’ Mrs Abernetty said.

  ‘I realised then that we might not be the only victims of burglary that night, something that was soon confirmed when Inspector Jones began his enquiry.’

  ‘You cannot blame my husband. He did nothing wrong. He never intended to hurt anyone.’

  ‘You do not need to distress yourself, Mrs Abernetty,’ Holmes assured her. ‘I have seen your neighbour, Mrs Webster. She speaks very highly of you.’

  ‘She is a good woman,’ Abernetty said, ‘still much distressed by the loss of her husband last August. But we are all advancing in years. These things are to be expected.’

  ‘She told us about Matilda Briggs.’

  Abernetty nodded. ‘Then you know how much we owe her. Mrs Briggs employed us for many years. Emilia . . .’ here he turned to his wife, ‘nursed her through a long illness and, out of gratitude, having no immediate family of her own, she bequeathed us this house in her will.’

  ‘There was, I believe, a nephew.’

  ‘He was a colour sergeant with the 92nd Highlanders. He was killed at the Battle of Kandahar in southern Afghanistan.’

  ‘It must have been a great blow to her.’

  ‘She was upset, certainly. But the two of them had never been close.’

  ‘And the rest of the money?’

  ‘She gave it to the local church, for the relief of the poor,’ Mrs Abernetty said. ‘Mrs Briggs was a very devout person and a member of the Royal Maternity Charity, the Temperance Society, the Society for the Rescue of Young Women and many others.’

  Holmes nodded then got his feet, signalling that the interview was over. I was surprised that he had no further questions and that in this instance he chose not to examine the back door or the garden, but then he had already said that he had not expected to learn very much from this encounter. It was only as we left that he turned back to the elderly couple.

  ‘One last question,’ he said. ‘Where are your neighbours, the stockbroker’s clerk and his family?’

  ‘They are in Torquay,’ Mrs Abernetty replied. ‘They are visiting Mr Dunstable’s mother.’

  Holmes smiled. ‘Mrs Abernetty, you have told me exactly what I wanted to know and your answer was exactly what I had expected. I congratulate you and wish you a good day.’

  We walked a short way down the hill in silence but at last the man from Scotland Yard could bear it no more.

  ‘Do you have any answer to this riddle, Mr Holmes?’ he burst out. ‘Three little statues of almost no value at all are stolen from three adjoining houses. What was the purpose of the theft? It seems to me that you have asked no questions that I have not already asked and seen nothing that I had not already noted. I fear I have wasted your time bringing you here.’

  ‘Far from it, Inspector Jones, I have a few enquiries to make but otherwise the affair could not be more clear. Shall we meet at my rooms in Baker Street tomorrow morning? Would ten o’clock be convenient?’

  ‘I can certainly be there.’

  ‘Then let us part company for the time being. Watson, will you walk with me to the station? I find the air a little fresher up here. Good day to you, Inspector Jones. This has indeed been a quite singular case and I thank you for bringing it to my attention.’

  This was all he would say and Jones returned to the waiting coach with a look of complete bafflement on his face. I will admit that I was no wiser myself but knew better than to ask questions to which no answers would yet be forthcoming. I also knew that I would have to absent myself from my practice for a third day in succession as it would be inconceivable for me to miss the solution to such a pretty puzzle as the three monarchs had presented.

  The next day, I returned to Baker Street at ten o’clock precisely, meeting Inspector Jones at the door. We climbed the stairs together and were met by Holmes who was wearing his dressing gown and just finishing his breakfast.

  ‘Well, Inspector Jones,’ he began, when he saw us, ‘we have a name for the dead man. It is Michael Snowden. He was released from Pentonville Prison just three days ago.’

  ‘What was his offence?’

  ‘Blackmail, assault, larceny – I fear Master Snowden led a life that was as dissolute as it was short. Well, at least he never went as far as murder. There is some solace in that.’

  ‘But what brought such a man to Hamworth Hill?’

  ‘He came to claim what was rightfully his.’

  ‘Three china figurines?’

  Holmes smiled and lit his pipe, tossing the spent match into the fireplace. ‘He came to claim the house that had been left to him by his aunt, Mrs Briggs.’

  ‘Are you saying that he was her nephew? Mr Holmes – you cannot possibly know that!’ the inspector cried.

  ‘I do not need to know it, Inspector Jones. I deduced it. When all the evidence points in only one possible direction, then you can be fairly certain that as you move forward you must arrive at the truth. Michael Snowden was never a soldier and he did not die in Afghanistan. This was made clear to me from what Mrs Webster told us. She said that Matilda Briggs was so upset by the death of her nephew that she never kept a picture of him in the house. But that did not strike me as even slightly credible. Had he died in the army, serving his country, she would surely have done the exact opposite. She would have been proud to keep his memory alive. However, a churchgoing woman, a member of the temperance society, were she to have a nephew who was a rake and a criminal—’

  ‘She would pretend that he had died abroad!’ I exclaimed.

  ‘As a soldier, or something like that. Precisely, Watson! That was why she would not have his image near her.’

  ‘But she still left the house to the Abernettys,’ Jones insisted.

  ‘So they say. But again, Mrs Webster – an excellent witness, by the way, with an astonishing grasp of detail – made a most interesting remark. The Abernettys, she said, had discussed the will with their employer, Mrs Briggs. Not the other way round! I saw at once what might have happened. An elderly, sick woman, left on her own with a scheming manservant and a wife who is also her nurse, is persuaded to change her will in their favour. They want the house and they take it, cutting the nephew out.

  ‘However, this is a lady with a conscience. At the last moment, she has a change of heart and writes to her nephew, telling him what has happened and expressing a desire that he should inherit after all. I have spoken to the prison warder, incidentally, and he has confirmed that Snowden did indeed receive
a letter a few months ago. As the saying goes, blood is thicker than water and perhaps his aunt believes that even at this late stage he will reform. There is little that Michael Snowden can do about the situation. He is still in jail, serving a lengthy sentence. But the moment he is released, he comes to his aunt’s house and confronts the two extortionists.’

  ‘They murder him!’ Suddenly, I could see it all.

  ‘I am sure they tried to reason with him. They gave him a glass of sherry and it was when he proved adamant – doubtless he threatened them – that Mr Abernetty took out his revolver and shot him. Snowden dropped the sherry, spilling it on his shirt but much of the stain was, of course, concealed by his blood.’

  Jones had listened to all this with something close to distress etched on his features. ‘It all seems quite clear to me, Mr Holmes,’ he said. ‘But I still cannot see how you worked it out.’

  ‘It was the three monarchs that gave the game away. Mr Abernetty needed a reason to kill a young man who – he could at least pretend – was a complete stranger to him. Simple enough to say that he was a burglar. But why would any burglar choose a house that was in such disrepair and which would clearly contain nothing very much of value? That was his dilemma.

  ‘His solution was ingenious. He would rob two more houses in the same terrace and he would do so in such a way that the police could not fail to assume that mere larceny was the motive. Why did he choose number one and number five? He knew that the Dunstables were away in Torquay – that much Mrs Abernetty told us herself. And he was also aware that Mrs Webster, with her laudanum and camel-hair pillows, was a heavy sleeper and unlikely to wake up.’

  ‘But why the three figurines?’

  ‘He had no choice. There was nothing worth stealing in his own house and he did not have the necessary skills to open Mrs Webster’s strongbox. He knew, however, that all three houses happened to contain the same jubilee souvenir and that created a perfect diversion. You may recall that my housekeeper, Mrs Hudson, abandoned the tea because she was distracted by a dancing dog, and very much the same principle applied here. Mr Abernetty correctly assumed that you would worry so much about these wholly inoffensive objects that you would never question whether a real burglary had taken place. He was just unfortunate that on this occasion you chose to bring the matter to me.’