The · Astounding · Bottomless · Tin · Dispatch · Box

Very early the next morning, even before the sun had deigned to rise above the horizon, I found myself on a north-bound train dozing fitfully on the singularly lumpy seat cushion of a private car.  Sherlock Holmes sat opposite me, growing progressively more restless as the miles past.  The smoke from his pipe echoed the steam that issued from the engine which propelled us through the countryside.  In my uneasy dreams, the pipe smoke and the steam seemed to converge together in the compartment to laugh at me.

 The rhythmic drumming of Holmes’ fingers on the windowsill roused me.  “Do you think there’s anything to investigate?”  I asked sleepily, more to get Holmes to stop fidgeting than through any real interest.

 “Perhaps.  There are some interesting points.”  He shot me a startlingly quick, mischievous grin.  “There is every possibility that it is merely a missing cat, though I have great hopes it will prove otherwise.  No, Watson, we do not have sufficient facts.  We must keep our minds open to any eventuality. But here, if I am not mistaken, is our station.”

 Sure enough, the train soon ground to a screeching, laborious stop.  We were the only passengers to disembark at the station, which was nothing more complicated than a platform with a small ticket booth off to the side.  The train chugged away leaving us standing on the silent platform in the pink light of sun rising lazily over the low hills.

 We did not have to wait long, for soon enough a coach pulled by two black horses pulled up to the gate.  The driver glared at us from behind his muffler.  “Sherlock Holmes?”

 Holmes nodded, his eyes sparkling with the excitement of a new case.  “You have come from Lord Duncastle?”

 “Ay, sir.  The lady is anxious to speak to you.”  He did not even bother to open the door for us.  We had barely set foot inside the coach before it took off with a jolt, throwing us both back into the seat.  The resulting tangle of bodies nearly caused me an embarrassment, but Holmes managed to right himself quickly, straightening his rumpled clothing and staring unconcernedly out the window as if nothing unusual had happened.  I leaned back in the seat, feeling the tension leave my body like electric current, burning a path down my spine and out my fingers and toes.

 The majority of the journey passed in silence.  The steady swaying of the coach and the even rhythm of the horses’ hooves combined with that comfortable silence conspired to lull me to sleep.  However, it seemed that no sooner had I rested my head against the seat back than I felt Holmes’ hand on my knee, and when I opened my heavy eyelids, a great house loomed before us.

  Holmes leapt out of the coach before it had stopped moving and I followed at a more placid pace.  Together we followed the coachman around the side of the magnificent house, through a small, attractive garden to a small entrance at the back. Thus it was that the first glimpse I had of the Duncastles’ estates was of their kitchens.

When wound our way through a maze of kitchens, pantries, and servants’ quarters and when we at last emerged into the public part of the house, the decadence and splendor of the front hall seemed almost shocking.  Here we were met and ushered into a bright, cheerful sitting room by a gruff man in ill-fitting butler’s livery.  He spoke very little, and the few words he did say were coarse and thickly accented.  Clearly a hasty replacement for the missing butler.

 The lady of the house reclined in a velvety chair near the fire.  On a lesser woman, the high lace collar and multiple folds of rich fabric would seem suffocating, but Lady Duncastle was too formidable a woman to be drowned by fabric.  She had a graceful, aristocratic face framed beautifully by carefully groomed, graying hair and her dress fell very artistically over the chair and onto the floor, disguising what little imperfections age had wrought on her figure.  When she rose to greet us, extending her hand, she moved slowly and carefully, reminding me inexplicably of a yacht enjoying a stately retirement after a successful, glamorous career. “Welcome, Gentlemen.  Please forgive the rather clumsy service.  We are all in uproar due to our butler’s, untimely trip to London.  But business is business and it cannot be helped.” 

 “Ah, then it is certain he has left for London on business?”  When on a case, Holmes had no use for pleasantries.  Lady Duncastle graciously hid her look of surprise and gestured my eager friend to a chair.  With a sigh and a nod of thanks I took a chair to the side and pulled out my notebook, preparing to take notes.

Holmes had the sense to return her kindness with a smile of greeting that lasted an instant.  He held her hand only a fraction longer before immediately turning his attention to the matter that had brought us to the plush sitting room.  “Can you positively confirm that your butler has left on business.”

 She sighed.  “I know little of my husband’s business.  Johnson is an institution in this house.  He has been with my husband’s family for generations, and he is the heart and soul of loyalty.  I cannot imagine him perpetrating a deception of any kind.  Why would he want to take my poor Darling?”

 I jotted down the name in my notebook, inquiring as I did so, “Darling is the name of your cat?” 

 “Yes indeed, Dr. Watson.  Poor dear, she has been missing for fully three days now, as has Johnson.  Both gone without a trace.”

 Holmes leaned forward in his chair his body radiating waves of energy and his sharp eyes focused on the lady’s face as though he would read her thoughts.  “Lady Duncastle, would you be so kind as to tell me exactly what occurred the night the cat and the butler disappeared?”

 “There is very little to tell, and most of it has already been related to the police.  I last saw poor Darling three evenings ago.  She sat with me here in this room and Johnson was kind enough to bring me a cup of tea that evening.  It was the last I saw of either of them.  The next day Darling was gone and Johnson had left for London.  The whole incident put Lord Duncastle in an ill mood and he spent most of the day hunting in the woods.”

 “Is Lord Duncastle an avid hunter?”  Holmes asked with an air of polite interest.

 “Oh yes, he has a room in the house devoted to his trophies.  It is rather early in the season for good hunting, though.  He took the cart with him, but came back empty-handed.”

 Holmes suddenly sat up very straight, “He took the cart with him?  Are you certain?”

 “Yes I am positive.  I saw him leave in it.”

“And came back empty-handed you say? What a shame.”  Holmes fell silent for a moment, staring at the window meditatively, though his fingers tapped a restless rhythm on the arm of his chair.  “There is construction on the west wing of the house,”  He stated at last.

 Lady Duncastle blinked, but quickly recovered from the odd change of topic.  “Yes, the roof was in need of repairs, and when the repairs proved extensive, Lord Duncastle and I decided it would make just as much sense to redo the entire wing.”

 “Could the cat have escaped while the workmen were here?”   I flinched at the bluntness of my words, but there was no way of phrasing the question politely. 

 Lady Duncastle shook her head ruefully.  “My husband asked that same question, but that cannot be.   The wing is closed off and Darling generally stays where I am.  She sits on my lap, she sleeps at the foot of my bed, and when I wake up, she follows me into the breakfast room and has a saucer of milk.  However, on December 29^th she did not follow me into my room and she did not show up for breakfast the next morning.  I cannot explain it myself, if I could I would have no need of your services.”

 Holmes nodded and favored her with a smile calculated to disarm her.  “I understand Lady Duncastle.  Did your husband have any enemies, anyone that might wish his family harm?”

 “The Duncastle line is older than the house, itself, and we are very wealthy.  I suppose wealthy people with old, decaying titles insight their own breed of crime, do they not?”

 “Indeed they do.”  Holmes agreed.

 At his words, Lady Duncastle sat up in her chair, her back as straight as if it were a tree trunk and just as immovable.  “Mr. Holmes, I know I must appear a distressed old lady who is in need of coddling, but I assure you nothing could be farther from the truth.  Darling is my pride and joy and I will reward you heavily if you can return her to me.  She is a loyal cat, and I assure you, she would not run away on a whim.  All my instincts tell me that something is amiss in this house.  I do not know what it is, but since the construction began my husband has not been himself.  He treats the servants with contempt that borders on animosity and although we are well-liked and usually quite popular, we have had no visitors in several weeks.  Mr. Holmes, I want you to find my dear cat, of course, but there are greater mysteries here.  I would like to know why Johnson has run off to London so suddenly and why my husband as not said more than two kind words to me in nearly a fortnight.  If you can solve all three mysteries, you will certainly be worthy the great reputation you have created for yourself.”

 Holmes bowed and rose from his chair.  “I will throw all my energies into your case.  In the course of my investigations I have learned to trust a woman’s intuition, and it has never failed me.  There are some points I would like to further investigate.  May we see the front hall?

*****

We were ushered into a spacious foyer.  It was sparsely furnished, but brilliantly lit by a large chandelier.  The candle light, bounced and reflected by a myriad of crystals, seemed to dance on the lush Turkish carpet that adorned the entryway.

 “You are admiring the chandelier, Dr. Watson?” Lady Duncastle remarked.  I nodded mutely.  “It is the pride and joy of my crystal pieces.  The silver and the prisms were made by different artisans, both Parisian, and both the very finest at their craft.  My husband’s mother gave it to us as a wedding gift.

 “It is splendid, to be sure,” I replied. 

 “Watson!”  Holmes’ imperious call took me somewhat by surprise, for he had been investigating the room and when he spoke he lay sprawled over the Turkish carpet in a rather indecent manner.  I quickly gathered my composure and knelt beside him.

 “You see the amount of cat hair?  And look here,” He pointed to a tassel that had been torn clean off the rug, “Severed by a claw, undoubtedly.  Ha!”  At his shout of triumph I pulled out my notebook and hurriedly moved to look over his shoulder.  He held his magnifying glass over a small, dark red stain near the centre of the carpet.  “Tell me, doctor, that that is anything other than blood.”

 A shriek behind us reminded me that our conversation was still audible to the troubled lady of the house.  I rose quickly to revive her as she leaned heavily against the wall.  In spite of her agitation, she managed to preserve her dignity remarkably and when she spoke, her voice was a solid as a rock.

 “Mr. Holmes, what has happened here?”

 Holmes stood and for a moment his eyes flitted around the room, lighting on the rug, the door, the chandelier, and Lady Duncastle in quick succession.  He took careful stock of her and then spoke clearly and frankly.  “There has been a great struggle involving,” He glanced down and tapped a spot on the rug with his foot, “Two men and a cat.  Blood has been spilt, whether it is human or feline I cannot say without a proper test, but I would venture that it is feline.”  Here, Holmes paused to asses Lady Duncastle’s condition. 

 The lady took two deep breaths to settle her nerves and, brushing off my assisting hand, stood away from the wall, erect and proud as a queen receiving visitors.  She had nothing of the distress and sadness I would expect of an elderly woman who had just been informed that her cat had been murdered.

 “There is more?” She asked.

 Holmes merely nodded.  “Both men exited via the front door, but only one left of his own will.  The other was dragged out by his feet.”

 His statement was greeted with a silence that stretched so long it seemed to become a fourth person in the room.  With a firm hand, I banished it scrounging for the first question that came to mind.  “Are you certain, Holmes?”

 “It is undeniable.  See the impression in the carpet here?”  He pointed to a  long, thin section of compressed fibers that ran the length of half the rug.  “Such a mark could only be made by the weight of a human head dragged across it.”

Chapter 1: In which Holmes receives a rather dubious comission

Sherlock Holmes stood framed by the bow window, the weak but persistent sunlight of a late December afternoon casting his lean form in shadow.  I could not see his meditative and melancholy expression but I knew it to be there all the same.  Holmes had been idle for the past three days and the inactivity had begun to wear on him.   The violin lay discarded on the basket chair, its varnish slowly discoloring in the firelight.  The deal-topped table was strewn with the litter of a dozen half-finished experiments, and various indices, newspapers, and case logs lay scattered over the sitting room floor like the wreckage of a sunken ship.

Holmes’s restlessness was rather surprising, for he had just recently completed a rather engaging case that had fallen into our laps quite by accident a scant two days after Christmas.  The whole business of the precious Blue Carbuncle found by a Scotland Yard inspector in the crop of a misplaced Christmas goose is one I hope to one day add to the chronicles of Holmes’ cases the Strand has so recently begun to publish.  They have been received quite well, much to Holmes’ chagrin, and so I have spent much of my idle time organizing my notes and selecting cases that lend themselves particularly well to publication.

I was employed to that end on this afternoon, though truth be told most of my attention had been diverted by Holmes.  It was not often that I got the opportunity to observe him without his knowledge, so I shamelessly took advantage of his distraction, and the flattering sunlight, to admire his form. 

 Sherlock Holmes is not a handsome man.  He is much too tall, emaciated, and angular to be considered attractive by modern standards.  But silhouetted as he was by a waning sunlight that softened the sharp line of his jaw, accentuated the musculature of his lean figure, and set his penetrating grey eyes glittering it was easy to forget his imperfections. I had become all together too focused on his attractive qualities lately.  I could not understand it, and in truth, I did not want to fully comprehend the meaning of the emotions surging through me.  Instead, I paradoxically hid them from Holmes and succumbed to them in the privacy of my own thoughts.

 Without other distractions, I could not prevent my attention from constantly straying to my companion, and so needless to say, I felt the idleness nearly as keenly as Holmes, himself.  Thus it was with double my normal enthusiasm that I received inspector Lestrade into the sitting room.  My heart fell immediately, however, to see his rueful expression and shaking head.

 “You have something on hand, Lestrade?”  Holmes asked eagerly as he displaced the violin in order to take up his usual position in the basket chair.

 Lestrade snorted, “I suppose so, if you can call it a mystery.  I’m rather embarrassed to put it to you, truth be told, as nothing could be less worthy of your abilities, but I simply have no time to chase after lost pets.

 “I see you have been engaged to find Lady Amelia Duncastle’s lost cat.”

 Lestrade jolted out of the chair he had just settled himself into, “How…” He caught himself and laughed self-deprecatingly, “I should know to expect it by now, but it always catches me by surprise.”

 “There is a letter which clearly bares her seal in your pocket Lestrade, and I believe I remember seeing a short advertisement concerning her absent feline in the newspaper yesterday.”

 “I saw it, as well Holmes.  A substantial reward was offered,” I replied.

 
“The money, Doctor Watson, may be the only interesting feature of the case,” Lestrade agreed.  “But I have been landed with it and I simply have no time to go chasing after lost cats.”

 
“Neither do I,” Holmes replied irritably, “Has the house been searched, the grounds?”

 "Yes, very thoroughly,”

 “The staff questioned?”

 “No one has seen the blasted thing.  The housemaid heard it yowling the night before last and since then there has been no sign of it.”

 “Well, well, what are the particulars, Lestrade?  Perhaps there is more to this business than meets the eye.”

 “I doubt it but I should be eternally in your debt if you would look into it.  The facts are relatively simple.”  Lestrade pulled out a small notebook and consulted it.

 “The cat appeared perfectly normal on the 29^th  of December.  It ate its customary two meals and sat in Lady Duncastle’s lap while she did her sewing in the drawing room that evening.  Lady Duncastle retired around 10 o’clock.  Her husband stayed awake for another few hours and then he also retired.  Around two in the morning the housemaid heard a commotion in the front hall.  She says she heard raised voices, and is certain one of them belonged to the butler, but cannot swear to the second.  She heard the cat yowl several times in the space of a few minutes, and then the sound stopped.  In the morning when the household roused itself, neither the butler nor the cat were anywhere to be found”

 Holmes had leaned back in his chair, his eyes closed and his fingertips pressed together resting lightly on thin lips, but now he leaned forward, his body vibrating with energy.  “Why is the family investigating the disappearance of the cat and not the butler.”

 Lestrade sighed, “The butler, Johnson I think his name is, has been with the Duncastle family for generations.  The entire household attests to his loyalty.”

 “And yet he is missing.”

 “Lord Duncastle claims Johnson left early in the morning to attend to family business in London.”

 “However?” Holmes prompted

 “However, no one else in the household knew of the trip and Lord Duncastle is unclear as to the exact nature of the business.” 

 “Tut, tut!  These are deeper waters than they appear.” Holmes mumbled meditatively, his body falling back into the chair.  For a moment he sat limply with his arms hanging over the sides and his impossibly long legs stretched out in front of him.  Then suddenly, he jumped up, eyes glittering with all the excitement of a hound on a new scent.

 “Well, Lestrade, I believe we will look into your little problem after all.  What do you say to a weekend in the country, Watson?  I notice your wound has been aggravated by the winter weather, perhaps some time in the open air would revive you?”

 “Certainly, Holmes,” I replied, pleasantly astonished that he had taken notice of the increasingly more pronounced stiffness in my shoulder.

 “Excellent!  Pack a bag, then.  I believe there is a morning special that will speed us there before most of London has had a chance to eat its breakfast.”  He turned suddenly back to Lestrade, “I suppose it’s too much to hope for an undisturbed scene.” 

 “Actually, Mr. Holmes, the family has been quite studious about leaving the front hall untouched.  Even the lord and lady of the house have done all their comings and goings from the servants’ entrance.”

 “Why, this is excellent,” Holmes cried, “You will wish to join us?” 

 “No, sir, I leave it entirely in your hands.  I will wire Lady Duncastle tonight and she will expect you in the morning.”  Lestrade rose and collected his coat and hat, looking back at Holmes ruefully, “I suppose I am in your debt for taking it over, though that’s nothing especially new.  Good luck in finding the beast.”

 With that, Lestrade saw himself out.  Holmes reached for his pipe, and for several minutes, the room lapsed into silence, the only noise the occasional soft puffing of smoke as Holmes reclined against the mantle piece, staring into the fire. 

 I found myself considering his form by the light of the flames. My attempts at distracting myself from him by staring at the bearskin rug at his feet failed miserably, for then, unbidden, images came to mind of Holmes sprawled upon that rug, his naked body gleaming in the firelight.  I was in the midst of rather desperately considering ringing for supper when Holmes’ voice broke in on my thoughts, “I believe I shall retire early tonight.  Be prepared to leave quite early Watson.”

 “The early bird catches the cat, I suppose,” Holmes chuckled, knocking the tobacco into the fire.  It sparked briefly and his long fingers jerked back reflexively, replacing the pipe on the mantle and fiddling absently with his pocket watch. 

 “There may be nothing to it at all,” Holmes said quietly, almost to himself, “and yet… the husband.”  He shook his head, laughing and turning to me, “It is the curse of the specialist to see complication always, even if none exists.  You will forgive me, Watson, if our journey results in a wild goose chase?”

 I smiled in return, “I am always happy to accompany you,” I would follow you to the ends of the earth, “the country air will do us both a world of good.”

 He nodded and in the next instant had disappeared into his room.  I collapsed back into my chair in sheer exhaustion.  When Holmes was as compelling as he had been tonight, it was difficult to reign in my emotions.  I considered the merits of forgoing dinner in favor of bed, but decided a walk would settle my nerves.  I packed a bag in preparation for the investigation and set out from Baker Street in search of a diversion, ignoring the soft beckoning of the lone light left burning in the sitting room.