‘Watson, my instinct tells me there is something here afoot. Surely you agree there are points about the case which promise to make it unique?’
‘I am sure I do agree, Holmes,’ I responded. ‘But we have a train to catch.’
‘What was it Siviter told us about the pond at Scotney Castle?’
‘That it replicates the wagon pond in Constable’s painting?’
‘That is its provenance - but what of its condition?’
‘As it was dug only the other day to anticipate Pevensey’s arrival, I would deduce...’
‘Yes, Watson, well done - the Standard reports a dangerous condition of the verge. This clearly cannot be. In conversation with this special correspondent why has Lord Fusey failed to exculpate himself by bringing this fact to the man’s attention - why so?’
He paused, still maintaining a perplexed expression. Then, ‘It seems to have been a very deliberate affair... yet if this is foul play... murdered men are seldom stripped of clothing.’
I was thunderstruck at so sudden a reference to murder. ‘Holmes,’ I protested, ‘you have just read out the constable’s conclusion - an indigent may have wanted to bathe...’
Holmes turned to me sharply. ‘You look a little bewildered, Watson. I tell you, there is the dark shadow of an unusual crime behind this occurrence which a singular chance has placed in our hands.’
‘Holmes!’ I returned, unable to hide my incredulity. ‘I am inclined to think...’
‘I should do so,’ my companion retorted, quickly vexed when challenged in an assumption. ‘Do you deny the report has given us a set of very suggestive facts?’
I fell back into an unsettled silence. I had had no time to give any thought at all to such facts as we were offered. Were we so quickly deep in some weighty quest, I wondered?
Again Holmes plunged back into the Standard.
‘Watson, you do not need a double lens or a measuring-tape to examine such simple facts. They are not laid down in faded pencil-writing in this report. There are several most instructive points about it, not less than seven, whose value we can only test by further inquiry. Even four such points should have you reaching for your service revolver.’
I was keen to reach our lodgings as soon as possible. ‘Holmes, may I humbly ask for even one of these instructive points which indicates anything other than the suicide or accidental death of an itinerant wanderer, other than a mistaken description of the verges?’ I requested, allowing a hint of sarcasm to creep into my tone.
‘Answer this, my dear friend, are knee-breeches the summer uniform of England’s tramps?’
‘Why, no, Holmes,’ I responded. ‘I would hardly think...’
‘Why else would it say his legs were ‘unusually seared by the sun... from above the calf to just below the knee’? Surely vagrants are more accustomed to corduroy trousers tied beneath the knee with string!’
There had been more than one occasion where Holmes just as swiftly concluded we were in the starter’s blocks of a desperate crime, only to withdraw his claim on a further moment’s cogitation. I felt the lack of the service revolver Holmes had mentioned. Our considerable speaker’s fee in large bank-notes was tucked in my coat. I would not breathe freely until I climbed our stairs and locked the money in the bureau of my dressing-room.
I glanced up at the station clock. Perhaps upon a moment’s consideration Holmes would discover an irredeemable flaw, one which would put the kibosh on his quick conclusion. I hoped we would soon be aboard the evening train whirling back to Charing Cross and thence by brougham to Baker Street and home.
My companion’s face stayed buried in the Standard.
‘’A pair of shiny dark glasses was discovered between finger and thumb, but identifying papers or other memoranda are lacking what do you make of that?’ He looked up sharply. ‘This further point cannot have escaped your Machiavellian intellect? Watson, there is a thread here which we have not yet grasped, and which might lead us through the tangle.’
I replied brusquely, resentful at the gibe. ‘I cannot answer about identifying papers, but perhaps the dark glasses were in a pocket when the clothing was stolen?’
I turned from him, attempting his trick of feigning lack of interest, to no effect.
‘If a tramp came across a pair of dark glasses in stolen clothing why would he retain them?’ Holmes demanded. ‘How likely are they to have been his own purchase or a gift? If it were theft, rightful ownership could speedily be established by the confluence of costly clothing in good condition and these dark glasses. The authorities would lay an unanswerable charge at his door and throw him in prison.’
‘Holmes,’ I broke in anxiously, ‘the train will be here at any moment.’
Ignoring my intervention, Holmes shot a further pensive look at the article. ‘What then of the pockets, Watson? The fact they are completely empty?’
‘Holmes,’ I said impatiently. ‘Should they contain a milliner’s account for thirty-seven pounds fifteen made out by Madame Lesurier of Bond Street? Or the stolen plans of a revolutionary submarine? What of the pockets, Holmes, beyond the fact they are empty?’
‘It is their very emptiness which should engage you. Even vagabonds would transfer two inches of tallow candle and wax-vestas when they shed their former skin.’
He threw me a determined look. ‘No! I declare the wit of the fox is here. This is the most finished piece of blackguardism since the days of the Borgias. All the indications seem to me to point in that direction. I repeat, there is the smack of a great crime in the air.’
Dismayed by his hyperbole I stood forlorn at his side at a country railway station. Little did I imagine how Holmes’ deduction would eventually be realised, how strange and sinister this new development would be.
‘’Skin of a yellow and brown spiny snake...’?’ he continued, with an incredulous look. ‘Watson, how many spiny snakes have you encountered in your travels? Did you trample on them in the Himalayas or the Khyber Pass? Did these same snakes sneak inside your blanket by night and scratch you? I warrant not! Sea urchins, sand dollars, basket stars which make up the Echinodermata have such spines, not snakes, but such creatures are scarcely of utility for a hatband, though...’
After a short reflective pause he added, ‘... not from Asia or South America but South Africa.’
He swung round to face me. He spoke in a sharp tone. ‘Watson, we must waste no time. There are withers to be wrung! An unclad corpse and a pile of clothing topped by this hat is no accident. It is an object-letter as cunning and deadly as any we have had to decipher. I say that in the history of crime, even if we include the Brixton Mystery, there has seldom been a tragedy which presented stranger features.’
Before I could remonstrate further, with a quick gesture he beckoned the newspaper boy, still close, to approach him. ‘Is there a jitney or post-chaise in the village?’ he asked.
Keen to make a penny, the boy replied, pointing to the yard at a vehicle even smaller than a Governess cart, ‘Sir, I have a dog-cart for my papers.’
‘So you do,’ Holmes responded quite amiably. ‘No doubt you are a veritable jehu, but I do not wish for a mettlesome dog. We would rather a four-in-hand.’
‘There’s a sociable on hire driven by a pair of spanking greys. It stands in the village at the ready.’ The boy added, ‘though quite a departure from here.’
‘See this,’ said Holmes, holding up a sixpence. ‘Put quicksilver in your shoes and bring us the swift four-seater.’