The Reichenbach Problem

  “Like what?”

  “Well, like, for example, perhaps there was a slip following a passionate embrace.”

  “A what?”

  “Might Brown have attended a tryst here? They embrace, they kiss, they share a joke, they chase one another, he misses his footing… and tragedy.”

  Holloway considered this proposed scenario for a moment, and then pronounced: “I have never heard such rubbish in all my life.”

  I was aggrieved. “It is possible.”

  “Nonsense. What on earth would two people be doing having a tryst up here, perched on the edge of a precipice? If they were both from the village, why didn’t they meet in the woods, or one of the meadows where they would not be disturbed? If they wanted not to be disturbed, that is, because the relationship was illicit for some reason.”

  “You are right to consider the illicit, or otherwise, nature of such a hypothetical relationship. However, if it were not frowned upon or restricted in some way, it is entirely possible that they might have met here simply because Brown was a stranger in the area, and had not seen this landmark before. In fact, they might even have chosen to make their way here, whatever the legality of their relationship. Indeed, it might even be that the second party came from another direction entirely, and this was an easily identifiable place for them to arrange to meet.”

  “But why meet?”

  “I do not know… but… if you were making love, where would you choose to do it? Why not somewhere as wild, and exciting, and desperately romantic – yet dangerous – as this?”

  “Doyle! Never in all your stories have you ever given any indication of this lurid side to your nature.”

  “I am not averse to exploring such matters, provided it is done responsibly, tastefully and for the right reasons.” I fell silent and gazed at him steadily, until I could discern that he had settled a little. I also hoped that my silence might unnerve him. I was becoming increasingly irritated by this gentleman’s preconceptions and assumptions as to my nature and character. Why did everybody, I wondered, imagine that through my stories they could come to know me in the slightest? I would never allow any impropriety into my stories, and abhor those writers who venture there. Nevertheless, this was the real world and I a doctor. Such unspoken matters do exist between people, and it would be folly, when one needed to explore every possible avenue in a case, to ignore them.

  “But if they arranged to meet, or came here on purpose,” Holloway broke my studied silence, “then why did Brown come with town shoes and without his alpenstock?”

  “Because it was a spur of the moment matter. Brown, perhaps, was just out around the town when he received the opportunity to come here. Or… perhaps he was not thinking straight for one reason or another.”

  “What reason?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t have all the answers. If I did, we wouldn’t be standing here arguing. We’d be back in the village resolving matters directly.”

  “No, precisely, you don’t have all the answers, Sherlock. You make yourself out to be the great detective. But you stumble and bumble about these bizarre locations, pretending you know what you are doing; yet it is evident you do not have the first idea of what it is you are about.”

  “I disagree. I…”

  Holloway held up a hand. “No. Do not give me any more of your buffoonery. I have had my fill of all your absurd hypotheses. I am going to return to the village and have done with all of this.”

  “I beg your pardon. It was your fault. You engineered this whole affair in the first place. If you had not inveigled me into assisting in your crazed schemes I would, doubtless, right now be engaged on a gentle stroll through some Alpine meadow with a lit pipe and uplifting thoughts.”

  “My fault? You are the great detective with all the preposterous theories. I have had my fill of all this. I am going. You may do what you will.”

  “But – we need to continue our inspection of the location…”

  “Then you had better get on with it. Before darkness falls, and you end up not being able to see anything. Not that there is anything to see, anyway.”

  And with that, he departed.

  I stood stock still for some considerable while, dumbfounded and infuriated by the gall of the man. I had a sneaking suspicion that much of the dissent he had just displayed was premeditated. To my mind, he had grown weary and flummoxed by the clambering up and down of cliff faces and, being flighty by nature, had no stomach for the task. So he had latched on to the first opportunity to withdraw his services. If he could, at the same time, make me the villain of the piece to justify himself, then all to the good. I sat down on a moss-covered rock and filled a pipe. I lit it, and considered what my next move should be.

  It did not take me long to decide that I had come there to do a job, and do that job I most decidedly would. Holloway or no Holloway. I got up from my seat and began, again, to systematically search the area.

  I divided into quadrants that part of the track and surroundings which I believed offered the most likely starting point for Brown’s struggle. I then searched each one thoroughly. It took almost a whole half-hour and returned nothing of significance. I sat down again on my rock and had another think.

  Obviously, if there were no story to tell from the landscape, then there was no story to be told. No scuffle, no fight, not even any evidence of a courting couple having pressed down a soft part of the surrounding vegetation by their intimacy. I set my chin in my hand and my elbow upon my knee. I was aching all over from my exertions and I was growing weary. Yet the stubborn part of the Conan Doyle in me refused to admit defeat. I had walked all the way here, walked all the way down to the shelf on the cliff, and struggled all the way back up again. I was blessed if I would go back to the hotel with absolutely nothing to show for it.

  Above all, though, I refused to allow Holloway to have the last laugh. If I came back with absolutely nothing, he would, I was certain of it, set about whispering into the ears of everybody who would care to listen, and even those who would not: Doyle’s a booby. Doyle’s a pretentious bumpkin with asinine theories that simply do not hold water. I could hear him saying it even now. And I hated him for it. For contorting my whole visit here into a fantasy of monstrous proportions.

  I rose again from my seat. I had been scanning the immediate vicinity while cogitating, and had seen the cliff edge near the force. Of course, if there had been any struggle at all, it would not have necessarily started until his life was seriously under threat. If a person had grabbed him without revealing his or her ultimate intention of thrusting him over the edge of the cliff, Brown would have simply walked backwards with the pressure to begin with. If he were anything like me, he would have tried to persuade his persecutor that whatever violence that person had in mind would not solve anything. So he would back away and back away, all the time talking in a soothing, hopefully disarming voice. And then, when he realized that he was now near the edge of the cliff and his life was very much in danger, that he was barely a foot from extinction, then he would struggle. Then he would dig his heels in. Then he would twist and squirm. Then he would try with all his might to wrestle himself out of the grip of his oppressor. And then, with fear clutching at his heart and the force roaring like some terrible ravenous dragon in his ear, he would try to wrench himself free. And he would yell… Yell for dear life that someone may, please, please, come to his rescue! Yet the yell would not have been heard. How could it, with such a din going on all around him, as it was even now? Would that be why he had been invited up to this fearsome, isolated precipice? So that no one could hear him scream?

  There was nothing for it. I would have to creep towards the edge of the cliff and examine the ground there. If Holloway had been here, I might have taken comfort in the fact that he could have held me as I explored the area. But on my own…?

  The thought filled me with a plunging dread.

  Then I told myself to just get on with it.

  I laid my ice axe do
wn alongside my jacket and my hat, and crept forward.

  The rocky outcrop, which formed the lip and created the overhang which led to the plummet, was greasy and covered in moss and mud. The spray from the cataract at the top of the fall created a mist, which set everything nearby glistening. I held my breath and edged even closer, like an explorer peering into a volcano that was liable to erupt at any moment. I still could not see the edge clearly enough, so with great trepidation, I shuffled forward a little more and stooped, so that I might more clearly see if any marks had left their impression in the surface. I started to feel quite dizzy and unsteady on my feet. I did not think I was prone to vertigo, yet the proximity of the force and its incessant downward rush was compelling. It was as if I were drawn to it, and in thrall to it. Come! Fall with me! It will be the most exhilarating time of your life! Come! Fall! Fall with me!

  Suddenly, I started to sway involuntarily; my knees began to buckle and my legs shook. I looked for something to cling on to. But there was nothing. Did Brown look in vain like this? I sank onto my haunches. My centre of gravity having been lowered, I was able for a moment to steady myself and feel just a little more secure. Like a duck, I waddled even closer to the edge. My toes were a few negligible inches from the precipice and still the cataract sang its siren’s song: Come! Fall!

  And then I saw something. A scuff mark. Two. In the mud. Right on the edge. Undoubtedly, they were the marks of shoes as the wearer slid backwards. I could tell because whoever it was, and I suspected that it was Brown, had tried to right himself before he had lost his balance and skewed over backwards. He had, perhaps, leaned forward and dug his toes into the mud; possibly even whirling his arms forward as one does when trying to keep one’s balance.

  And then he must have lost the struggle – his town shoes unable to offer him any purchase. I looked to left and right of that fearful evidence. Were there any other signs, I wondered?

  And then, O piteous sight. I saw it.

  The mark of a hand, Brown’s left hand, imprinted into the mud.

  As he toppled, he must have made one last despairing lunge and caught hold of the edge for an instant. Then his hand was dragged backwards over the precipice as the weight of his body, combined with gravity, pulled him inexorably to his doom.

  I huddled there, just at the edge of the gorge for a moment, and ran through the whole scene in my mind’s eye. A stroll, perhaps. Some kind of initial struggle, whereby Brown began to be forced backwards. A greater struggle as he realized how close he was to destruction. A final push, which set the poor man tottering and whirling his arms in empty space. The loss of balance, the fall, the final despairing clutch at terra firma and then his scream: lost in the roar of the force.

  Gone.

  I could imagine him turning and tumbling, then cracking his head and his bones on the unforgiving rocks of the perpendicular gorge; his flesh being torn on the shrubs and branches.

  I shuddered. It was as if I had been the one falling myself. And that image produced another terrible thought. The person who had pushed him, if indeed that is what had happened, would have been standing immediately behind where I was even now squatting and peering over the abyss. That notion created in me an irrational fear; a sense that perhaps that person, that agent of evil, was right this minute behind me. Perhaps they had crept up on me and were even now bracing themselves for one simple shove abaft my shoulder blades. One little push and I, too, would be sent hurtling into the chasm to my death.

  The mind plays the most desperate tricks on one. Yet, before I could rationalize my way out of this morbid notion, I found that the idea had me in its grip. I stood, suddenly. I was compelled by the urge to turn and face this imagined foe. As I stood, I realized I had stood up too quickly. I was immediately overcome by an uncontrollable dizziness.

  I reeled.

  My left foot caught one of the slimy patches and shot out from beneath me, backwards into space. In an instant my other foot followed and I knew that I was now helpless and unable to preserve myself.

  I toppled.

  The fearsome chasm began reaching out for me with its terrifying, grasping fingers, hauling me down into my own private Charybdis.

  Come! Fall!

  I screamed.

  Nobody could hear me.

  EIGHT

  There is an interesting phenomenon associated with rugby football, and rugby players in particular, that those who have never played this remarkable game might not really begin to appreciate. It is this.

  When a player is being tackled, it is usually around the legs. This means that he is restricted in how he moves. After many seasons of dashing about a muddy field with merry shouts, the good player begins to adopt a technique which enables him to still have some degree of control over his body as it is being felled in the tackle. It is an adjustment of weight. A turning of the torso, definitely. But it is also, more subtly, an expression of will.

  One of the places a player is quite often tackled on the field of play is within a yard or so of the scoring, or try, line. If he has the ball in his hands, it is absolutely imperative that he makes it his most earnest intention to ensure that as he loses the purchase on his feet and topples, the ball is placed on the right side of that line. Notwithstanding in which direction his body is presently travelling. He wants to score. It is a matter of life or death that he does score. And he has no intention of allowing such a minor inconvenience as having his legs swept away from under him by a burly sixteen-stone full-back prevent him from achieving that aim. So he wills himself to fall in the right direction, shifts his weight as he falls, twists if necessary, and sends as much of his body as is practicable pitching forward towards the try line.

  So it was with me. Something ingrained through my school and college years of playing rugby football instinctively came into its own as I toppled and lurched on the edge of the precipice. As my legs disappeared from under me, and I twisted to regain my balance, something within me willed myself to send my body lurching forwards towards level ground and away from the abyss. A wing three-quarter scoring the winning try for England in the dying moments of a match at Rectory Field could not have performed the feat any better.

  I landed with a thud and bounced my head unceremoniously on a low, mossy rock. Although my feet dangled almost comically in space over the edge of the cliff, nevertheless I was safe. I dragged myself forward and brought my feet inboard. Slowly, still on my stomach, I inched myself further inland until I was sure that this time, if I stood up, not only would I do it slowly, but I would also do it without any possibility of putting myself at risk again.

  It was then that I saw the second set of footprints. They were not town shoes but studded boots. I stood up unsteadily, and transfixed by these new marks began to follow their story in the damp earth atop the cliff. Here and there they brought me to other marks, which were undoubtedly town shoes. Brown’s. It was the prints of the boots that were on top. This told me that they had been put there after Brown’s. The boots were worn at the outside of the heel, so they belonged to a man. They were also about the same size as Brown’s feet. So, one must imagine that, whomever it was, was of a similar height and possibly a similar build. Brown, by estimation, was just below average height and was slightly built. He did not have very big feet. Could they, perhaps, have been owned by one of the body-bearers who had brought the poor fellow back to the village? Possibly. Although as far as I could recall, there were only burly fellows, above average in height. Moreover there was no evidence of any of them having been at this particular spot.

  I followed the trail of footprints back towards the edge of the precipice and noted my heartbeat rising proportionately. Fear returned, but I forced myself to press on. Now that I had a clear view of these tracks, it was important to pursue them to the conclusion of their story. There was a point at which there seemed to be a lot going on. Feet were being placed down in quick succession, without taking full-sized steps. And then I saw, now that I had this trail to follow, th
at Brown had taken two or three paces towards the precipice. The others never ventured closer than about five feet; wise fellow. Then the footprint story ended. Grass, moss, rocks, rain, everything had conspired to stop the tale before I could glean everything possible out of it.

  Having explored as much as was evident, I sat down once again on my trusty rock. Then, finally, nervous reaction set in. Feeling now both nauseous and shaken, I placed my head in my hands and sat there shaking.

  In due course, I managed to settle my nerves and light my pipe. Soon afterwards, having restored my equilibrium, I gathered up my accoutrements and began my return to the village. Although it was well into the afternoon, I began to make haste as I intended to be back as soon as possible after the draining of the westering light. I did not wish to overnight at some wayfarer’s lodgings.

  As I walked, I meditated upon the scant evidence that I had collected up on that fateful cliff top. I decided to omit the second set of footprints for the moment. I speculated upon whether it were possible for a walker to chance upon the edge of a precipice and accidentally tumble over. Of course it was. It was also true that Brown had fallen at night. At least, that had to remain a supposition until the post-mortem revealed the actual time of death. A report I hoped I would ultimately be able to see.

  So Brown walks near the precipice in the dark. Only, too late, he realizes his proximity to destruction, turns around and, trying to regain his equilibrium, falls off backwards. This never happens – you come to the edge, you rear backwards in terror. It could be, of course, that he did exactly as I had done: crept forward for some reason, then spun around and slipped at the same time. I was investigating the edge, though, in a crouch, and the blood had rushed from my head. Why would he have crouched? Dropped something over? His pipe knife? His alpenstock? Would he have looked over to try and see whatever it was? In the dark? Accident seemed an unlikely theory. There were too many elements that would stop him doing what I did. The roar of the force was enough warning for any sane person. Unless, like me, they had a very pressing reason for approaching the rim. I could not believe Brown had a reason, apart from folly. But, by all accounts, he seemed a particularly serious, introspective fellow.