“That would certainly have the range,” Holmes mused. “The Martini–Henry is sighted to 1,800 yards.” He nodded decisively. “Very welclass="underline" are there any other points of interest to which you would draw my attention?”
Watson shrugged. “The state of the body is similar to half a hundred I saw in Afghanistan.” He clapped his hands and then started to pull off his apron. “Now, if you will excuse me, I have a holiday to return to.”
“Would it have been a difficult shot, in your estimation?”
Watson was, by now, rolling his shirtsleeves down and fastening his cufflinks. “Not if the shooter was a practised hunter – big game in India or deer on the Scottish Highlands, it makes little difference.”
“Distance?”
“A shot like this, taken with a standard rifle by an experienced marksman, could be accomplished accurately – by which I mean within an inch of the aim point – over, perhaps, five hundred yards.”
Holmes glanced over at me. “I do not suppose that you recognise this man from any of your… regular haunts?” he inquired.
I shook my head. “Absolutely not. I would have remembered such a noble brow, and such a fine head of hair. And, of course, those muscular shoulders.”
“Indeed.”
By now Watson had pulled his jacket on, picked up his bowler hat and his medical bag, and was heading for the door. He turned, in the doorway, as if expecting Holmes to say something – “Goodbye”, perhaps, or “Thank you!” – but his friend was frowning and looking at the floor. Instead, I waved at the good doctor, and he left with a scowl on his face.
“We must go to the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens.” Holmes said. “I need to see the scene of the crime.”
We left the unfriendly edifice of Great Scotland Yard behind us and Holmes hailed a cab to take us to Vauxhall. It was late afternoon, and as the sun began to dip behind the roofs of the buildings, I drew my coat closer around me.
Characteristically, Holmes did not seem to feel the cold. He did not, I had noticed, seem to feel much of anything. I envied him that. I felt too much of everything – my mind is vulnerable to insults and slights that the average man would shrug off, and my skin sometimes feels as if it has been sanded down to a tenth of its previous thickness. I had to try five different laundries before finding one that uses just enough starch to keep my collars and cuffs stiff but not so much that it makes me come out in a rash.
We left the cab at the corner of the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens, and entered via a gap in the low stone wall and tall hedges that surrounded the area. Lanterns had already been lit and were hanging from posts, and there were enough people promenading along the paths and sitting or lying around blankets and picnic hampers on the grass that it was beginning to look crowded. A band was playing off to our right, and a puppet show was taking place in a booth to our left. I had seen similar scenes many times over the past few years – carefree Londoners enjoying their free time. It made me wistful. I wish I could join in, but I am not a gregarious man.
A young lad in a cloth cap passed by. He winked at me. I was about to wink back when I remembered that I was on what I can only describe as “duty”. With a tinge of sadness in my heart, I looked away.
Holmes pulled a folded sheet of paper from his pocket. Unfolding it, he glanced at the illustration upon its surface. He glanced around.
“According to this picture, which I had Miss Morris draw for me, she and her fiancé were standing about a hundred yards away from here, in this direction.”
He set out in a straight line across the grass, nearly stepping on plates of food or knocking over bottles as he went. A chorus of complaints rose in his wake. Instead of following and apologising – which I suspect Dr Watson would have done – I diverted around the edge of the grass until he stopped, and then found a path to him that offended the least number of people. I have no problem with offending people, by the way – I merely prefer to do it at long range, in print, and to get paid for it.
“This is the spot, as near as I can tell,” he said, looking around. We were over towards the edge of the grassy area, near to the bushes that marked one of the Pleasure Gardens’ borders. “Miss Morris stated that her fiancé was facing her, and she was facing away from the bushes. She said that she remembered seeing that church steeple –” he pointed into the distance “– directly behind his head. Now, you shall be Miss Morris and I shall be her fiancé.”
“I would not have it any other way,” I murmured as he grabbed me by the shoulders and positioned me. He was a tall man – taller than Miss Morris’s fiancé – and so I could not see the church spire behind his head, but I found that if I moved my own head then I could spy it over his shoulder.
Holmes pointed over my own shoulder. “Based on the downwards trajectory of the bullet, the shot can only have come from the roof of that building.”
I turned to see where he was pointing. Over the hedges I could see the top of a brown stone building with thick sills above narrow windows. They made the building look as if it was frowning heavily. “We need to gain access to that roof, in case the shooter has left any evidence behind.”
“You do that,” I said, catching sight of one of the Garden’s attendants, obvious in his striped shirt and cap. “I shall go and question the natives.”
Holmes bounded off without a backward glance, while I raised a hand to attract the attendant.
“Can I help you, sir?” he asked, approaching. “Directions to various entertainments or cafes, perhaps, or just a potted history of the gardens themselves and the famous people who have visited in the past and continue to do so?”
“Perhaps another time,” I rejoined. “I am assisting the police with their investigations into the recent death of a young man.” I felt no guilt at saying I was assisting the police – I was assisting a man who was assisting the police, and that seemed good enough. I once danced with a man who’d danced with a girl who’d danced with the Prince of Wales, which leads me to tell people that I got close to dancing with the Prince of Wales – it is a similar situation.
He winced. “Ah, yes. We have been instructed not to talk about that, sir. Bad for publicity, if you see what I mean. I believe the owners of the gardens have impressed upon the owners of the city’s newspapers that their regular advertisements would be stopped if the newspapers carried anything more that a cursory report. People would not like to go to a place where someone has recently died.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I said. “The general public, in my estimation, have a vein of morbid curiosity running through them like the letters in a stick of Blackpool rock.” I slipped a coin into his hand with a well-practised motion. I suspect I could be a theatrical magician and prestidigitator with little or no practice. “Was this where it happened?”
“It was, sir,” he said, slipping the coin into his pocket with a similarly smooth motion. Perhaps we should form a double act. “The young man was just over there, on that patch of grass. Some say that he was shot. With a bullet! Others say he was stabbed, or suffered a sudden haemorrhage.”
“Indeed. And if a gun was fired, did you see where the shot might have come from?”
He shook his head. “There was nobody around holding a gun, and nobody did a runner.”
“Thank you,” I said, and started to turn away.
Perhaps he did not think he’d given me enough value for my money, because he added: “Of course, if the man was shot then another two feet to the left and it would have been a greater tragedy. Not that this was not a tragedy, but the Earl of Montcreif was standing just beside the young man.”