“You intend to help him?”
“Of course. I wouldn’t miss it for the world. This has all the makings of a splendid case. We shall take a cab immediately to Lauriston Gardens.”
“We?”
“Oh, yes, you too, Doctor. I insist!” he cried, rising from the table and flapping off his dressing-gown. “I want you to witness my brilliance at first hand. I cannot have you thinking that I am merely capable of party tricks, simple deductions concerning where someone comes from or where they have been. You should see for yourself the very practical nature of my skills. I trust you don’t object to accompanying me?”
I could not help but grin at his suggestion. It was, of course, just the scenario I had hoped for.
Within five minutes we were in a cab on our way to Lauriston Gardens, off the Brixton Road, and my first adventure with Sherlock Holmes had begun.
It was a cold and misty morning, and a grey veil hung over the housetops. My companion was in an excited mood and was forever leaning forward to spy out of the window of the cab to check the progress of our journey, so eager was he to reach our destination.
“Have you formulated any theories about this strange business?” I asked.
Holmes shook his head vigorously. “No data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorise before you have all the evidence. It biases the judgement. That is why it is essential that I visit the scene to investigate it for myself; no doubt Gregson will have missed numerous clues which could point the way to the truth. Ah, here were are at last: Lauriston Gardens.”
Holmes leapt up and instructed the driver to stop immediately. We were some hundred yards from the house in question, and we completed our journey on foot.
Number 3 Lauriston Gardens wore an ill-omened and minatory look. It was one of four crumbling dwellings, all unoccupied and each containing a crooked To Let sign by the front door. Dark, begrimed windows stared with an air of vacant melancholy out on to the empty street. The garden of Number 3 was bounded by a three-foot brick wall with a fringe of wooden rails upon the top, and against this wall was leaning a stalwart policeman, surrounded by a little knot of loafers who craned their necks and strained their eyes in the vain hope of catching a glimpse of the proceedings within.
I had fully expected Sherlock Holmes to bound up the garden path and enter the house in order to study the scene of the crime. This was not the case. With an air of affected nonchalance, he strolled along the pavement, gazing vacantly at the ground, the sky, the houses opposite and the line of railings. I followed some distance behind, feeling uncomfortable and slightly ludicrous.
After having a brief word with the constable, he beckoned me and we proceeded slowly down the path. Holmes kept his eyes riveted to the ground. There were very many marks of footsteps upon the wet clay soil, a great number no doubt belonging to the policemen who had been coming and going. In my opinion there was nothing that my companion could learn from his scrutiny. And yet he gave this performance — and a performance it was, with his facial tics and mutterings. Twice he stopped and I saw him smile, and I heard him utter an exclamation of satisfaction. I felt sure that such actions were self-conscious ones designed to impress and intrigue me.
At the door we were met by a flaxen-haired man with a notebook in his hand who, on seeing my friend, rushed forward and shook his hand effusively.
“It is indeed kind of you to come,” he said, in a rasping voice. “I have left everything untouched.”
“Except that!” Holmes responded, with some heat, indicating the pathway. “If a herd of buffaloes had passed along there, there could be no greater mess. No doubt, however, you had drawn your own conclusions, Gregson, before you permitted this.”
The policeman flushed. “I have had so much to do in the house... It is in there that the heart of the mystery lies. My colleague, Mr Lestrade, is here also. I had relied on him to look after this.”
Holmes glanced at me and raised his eyebrows sardonically. “Well, with two such fellows as yourself and Lestrade upon the case, there will not be much for a third party to find out,” he said smoothly.
“We have done all we can, but I am not sure we have uncovered all that is possible. It’s a queer case, and I know of your taste for such things.”
Holmes leaned close to me and whispered in my ear, “What did I tell you? They are stumped.”
“Would you care to look at the room?” said Lestrade.
“Yes, but first — you did not come in a cab?”
Gregson shook his head.
“Nor Lestrade?”
Another shake of the head.
“You arrived together in a police wagon?”
“Why, yes.”
“I thought so. I recognised the wide spread of the wheels, so much broader than those of a hansom. Good, that’s one thing settled. Very well, lay on, Macduff.”
With these words he strode into the house, followed by Gregson, whose features expressed his blank astonishment.
A short passage, bare-planked and dusty, led to the kitchen and other downstairs rooms. Two doors opened out of it, to the left and to the right. One of these had obviously been closed for many weeks. The other belonged to the dining-room, where the body had been found. Holmes walked in, and I followed him with that subdued feeling in my heart which the presence of death inspires.
It was a large square room, looking all the larger for the absence of any furniture. A vulgar flaring-paper adorned the walls, but it was blotched in places with mildew, and here and there great strips had become detached and hung down, exposing the crumbling plaster beneath. Opposite the door was the fireplace, surmounted by a mantelpiece of imitation white marble. On one corner of this was the stump of a red candle.
The solitary window was so thick with dirt that the light which filtered into the room touched everything with a grey bloom that was intensified by the layer of dust which coated the whole apartment.
All these details I noted down afterwards. On entering the room, my immediate attention was captured by the motionless figure that lay stretched out upon the floorboards, with vacant sightless eyes staring at the discoloured ceiling. The figure was that of a man in his early forties, middle-sized, with dark shiny hair which was swept back from his face, and a neatly clipped moustache. He was dressed in a heavy broadcloth frock-coat and waistcoat, with light-coloured trousers, and immaculate collar and cuffs. A top hat was placed on the floor beside him. His hands were clenched, but his arms were spread wide as though the death struggle had been a fierce one. His rigid face bore an expression of horror.
On seeing the man, I felt faint. A sudden searing light flashed before my eyes, blinding me, and for a brief moment I was back in Afghanistan in the heat of the infirmary tent, looking down at a dead colleague. His eyes held the same terror and disbelief, and the body was contorted with agony in a similar fashion.
I stumbled and reached for the wall to steady myself. I shook my head and took a deep intake of breath in an effort to banish this vision from my mind. Thankfully, the others in the room were too absorbed in their preoccupations to notice me.
The man I recognised as Lestrade was standing by the corpse, jotting things down in a notebook. He was lean and ferret-like, with bright beady restless eyes.
“This case will cause us problems, I am sure,” he remarked, addressing Holmes. “It beats anything I have seen.”
“There are no clues,” said Gregson.
“None at all,” agreed Lestrade.
“We shall see, we shall see,” said Holmes, with no attempt to disguise the arrogance of the remark. He approached the body and, kneeling down, examined it intently. “You are sure there is no wound?” he asked, pointing to the numerous splashes of blood on the floor around the corpse.