The Hell-Hound of the Baskervilles Page 10

  “Yes,” said Lestrade, flipping through his notebook with feigned nonchalance. “It seems she reported the happenings to one Inspector… Torg Grogsson.”

  I gave a tortured groan and put my head in my hands. To my surprise, Holmes did the same. But then, why not? Did it not all make perfect sense? She was pretty. She possessed an odd sort of charm—anybody in a room with Violet Smith would have difficulty paying attention to anything else. She certainly had no care for convention and, as a special bonus, she was tall enough that she might not look out of place on the arm of a hulking behemoth of a detective inspector who’d been feeling rather lonely of late.

  “I only just found out about the situation,” Lestrade said. “When I did, I was forced to wonder if Miss Smith’s visit might possibly correspond with the last time I’d seen my fellow inspector. Can either of you gentlemen recall seeing Grogsson in the last two weeks?”

  “And now—and this is odd—” said Violet Smith, “there are two men with black beards following me on tricycles! And one of them is really, really big!”

  * * *

  Knowing that Miss Smith would return to Farnham station on the Monday morning 9:50, Holmes and I took the 9:13. No sooner had we arrived in Farnham, than one of the mysteries solved itself.

  Or perhaps it deepened.

  “Big, black bee-ahds!” cried a barker, from behind his stand of artificial facial hair. “Get yer big, black bee-ahds, hee-ah! Sandy side-burns! Red moustaches that challenge credulity! Get ’em all for the anonymity dance! Facial hair of all sorts, to hide your identities from the lovelies! Don’t let ’em know who they’re marryin’ until it’s too late—that’s the wise man’s way! Bee-ahds, hee-ah!”

  “You… you have an anonymity dance?” I said.

  “Why else come to Farnham?” the barker asked. “It’s the only thing that sets us off, i’nt it? Big beards for small men and a chance to dance before they know what you’ve done!”

  “Oh, Watson!” Holmes enthused. “It sounds perfect for you!”

  “What? No it doesn’t! What are you talking about? I’m a perfectly respectable—”

  “We can’t let an opportunity like this pass us by! It may be your last.”

  “But… I’m a highly eligible—”

  “He’ll take one false red moustache, please.”

  “No I will not, Holmes! No! Thank you, sir, but no. Come on, Holmes, we’ve got business to attend to. Miss Smith’s train arrives in half an hour. We’ve got to get out on the road to Chiltern Grange and lay in wait for our client and her pursuers.”

  “But, Watson… consider… a life of solitude…”

  “Look here, Holmes, the only thing I wanted from that barker, I have got! Information! It seems the only description we have of our suspect is moot. With Farnham in the grip of a false-beard epidemic, the man Miss Smith describes might be anybody. Now, come on! All your blithering about toast this morning cost us the early train. We must hurry. Recall that all our quarry will be mounted, while we must go on foot.”

  “No we don’t,” said Holmes, pointing at the next barker down the line.

  “Tricycles! Get-cha tricycles hee-ah!”

  “No.”

  “But, Watson, look at them: they’re beautiful!”

  Holmes led me towards the line of gleaming machines and spread his arms, as if he wished to hug the whole lot of them. The barker—no fool—took this as an invitation to do business. Probably his first business of the week. Lord Charlington’s enthusiasm for three-wheeled, pedal-powered conveyances did not seem to have spread to his social inferiors. The sign above the stall conveyed not only his patronage, but the fact that he had originally valued the rental of a tricycle at two shillings per hour. Via a series of cross-outs and pencil-ins, this price had been reduced to tuppence a day and yet still a line of tricycles sat waiting.

  “I see you’ve come to invest in the wave of the future, friend!” the barker barked. “Ain’t they gorgeous? Transportation of tomorrow, and that’s a fact!”

  “Nope,” I said. “Holmes, come on! We have to go! Miss Smith will be here soon and she is a formidable bicyclist; we must get the start on her.”

  “Bicycle? Bicycle?” the barker cried out, raising his hands to his head in professional horror. He ran to the side of his stall and fetched out the demonstration bicycle he kept for just such occasions. He trotted it out, then let go of the handlebars. It crashed to the ground.

  “Oh no!” he cried. “Wouldya look at that?” He raised it up, but let go again, sending it earthwards for a second time. “What a dangerous design!” the barker decided. “Why, it can’t even stay up at a standstill! Can you imagine what she’s like at speed? I think I’ve just saved your life, friend! Hey… you know what…? Rent a tricycle!”

  “No,” I told him. “Come on, Holmes, we’ve got to go.”

  I grabbed my friend by the arm and dragged him towards Charlington Lane.

  “But, Watson, even if it’s not as fast as a bicycle, surely it’s better than going on foot! Why not?”

  “Because I am a grown man, Holmes, and I still possess a shred of dignity.”

  * * *

  By the time we reached the top of Crooksbury Hill, I possessed no shred of dignity. My shirt was soaked through with sweat and my every breath sounded as if it must have been issued by an asthmatic goat. Holmes had little trouble keeping up with me. This, I ascribed to his preternaturally long legs. Or perhaps he had called upon demonic aid. The idea that he was simply fitter than me, despite the month he had spent dead, was not an acceptable theory. It came as a wondrous relief when Holmes glanced behind us and exclaimed, “Look! There she is!”

  As I turned to look, my foot caught a divot in the lane and I plunged face first into the dirt. I lay, panting. If only the road had been muddy, at least I might have had a drink, but luck was ever my enemy.

  Through the clouds of face-induced dust, I could just make out the solitary figure of Violet Smith, beginning her laborious ascent. Yet, as the dust began to settle, I could see she was not solitary at all. From the heat haze behind her, a figure materialized. Then a second. Then a third. Then a fourth.

  Twice as many as we’d been promised.

  All four of her pursuers were male. All tricycle-mounted and all bent to their task with earnest vigor. The closest figure was the smallest and also the least formidable. One could see the ride had taxed him—and why not—even Lord Charlington’s tricycle-of-tomorrow seemed to lack adequate pedal-to-handlebar clearance for the adult knee. This first fellow huffed and puffed piteously, through his bushy black beard.

  The second displayed no such troubles. He must have started a ways behind the first gent, for though he was still behind he made up the pace with every thrust of his pedal. The man moved with a liquid grace and such strength that, after watching him for a few moments, one could not help but wonder if maybe a tricycle was a reasonable form of transport. He wore a grand red moustache that cleared his face by an inch or two at either side.

  The third was… clearly… Grogsson. His size and his ill-aptitude for subtlety proclaimed him, even at great distance. I’m tempted to say he looked like the proverbial circus-bear-on-a-tricycle but, since there was never a bear as large or powerful as Torg Grogsson, the description beggars itself. In a sad attempt to conceal his identity—or perhaps two sad attempts—he had purchased both a big black beard and a big red moustache from the local facial-hair vendor. This mismatched array waggled back and forth with terrible force as Grogsson’s unequaled leg muscles powered him up the hill. I might have thought him the clear favorite in this unexpected race, but a moment’s observation told a different tale.

  He was struggling. Firstly there was nowhere near enough room for Torg’s massive legs between the pedals and handlebar of his beleaguered vehicle. In order to make himself fit, he’d been forced to hang his buttocks well behind the tricycle seat, propping himself upright with main strength, against the handlebar. Of course, this meant that as he ped
aled, he yanked the bar this way and that, ensuring that each powerful thrust either forced him well off course to starboard, or equally so, to port. Then there was the fact that a simple tricycle tire cannot convey the amount of force Torg was expressing onto a dusty lane without sliding. At every pump the front tire skittered and slid. Yes, Torg may have the advantage of strength over his competitors, but what could it avail him, if not to dig a one-wheel-wide, zigzagging trench down the center of Charlington Lane? To compound it all, the tricycle had surely not been designed to withstand even a tenth of the mechanical force it was undergoing. At every third or fourth pedal, some piece of it would break free and bounce away.

  The fourth rider was so far back, so piteously slow, that I could discern little of him. Oh, except his large, false black beard.

  “Watson?” said Holmes, staring down the hill at the oncoming assemblage. “What in the nine hells am I looking at?”

  “No idea, really.”

  “What should we do?”

  “Still no idea.”

  It was too late, anyway. Violet Smith crested the hill and rattled past us.

  Holmes glanced downwards at me, granting me one final chance to offer a strategy. I had none. Left to his own devices, Holmes elected to step into the road, wave his arms and bellow, “Hey! Hey! Who are you fellows?”

  The first tricyclist looked up in horror. It seems he must have feared detection, or at least identification. Quickly—before he neared enough for us to discern his features—he turned around and raced back down the hill.

  The second tricyclist seemed to fear detection not only by us, but also by the first tricyclist. He wrenched his wheel to the left, propelling his vehicle off the lane and onto the neighboring pasture. As he was by far the finest cyclist of the lot, this presented little problem for him. With supernatural affinity, he pumped off over the field, his red moustache waving a jaunty farewell.

  The third cyclist seemed to fear any kind of discovery whatsoever. He was—after all—a detective inspector, engaged in a stunning piece of covert police work. He wrenched his handlebars to the right, which was the final straw for his overtaxed machine. The front wheel separated from the rest and bounced free. An instant later, the front fork augured into the dirt lane and Torg’s magnificent bulk came crashing down on what remained of his tricycle, crushing it to a puddle of mechanical scrap. Before he’d even come to a halt, Torg bounded up from the dirt and took to his heels.

  The fourth rider fell from his saddle, lay gasping in the road for a few moments, then remounted and trundled back towards Farnham.

  “Really, Watson,” said Holmes, watching them all go, “what do you think we’re looking at?”

  “Something… very odd,” I said.

  * * *

  As I deemed it unlikely that our mysterious tricyclists would pursue Violet Smith on a day when she was not present, it seemed safe to assume we had until Saturday morning to plan our second attempt. This is not to say the week passed uneventfully.

  On Tuesday, I attempted to confront Torg Grogsson. I had no luck. He was neither at his home, nor at Scotland Yard. The sergeant on duty informed me that he had reappeared earlier in the week, filed for a leave of absence for “police technologies development” and disappeared again with a gas-welder, a cart-load of steel tubes and one of the Yard’s more easily frightened engineers.

  On Wednesday night we had a telegram from Violet Smith:

  TO WARLOCK HOLMES AND THAT OTHER FELLOW,

  MR. CARRUTHERS HAS PROPOSED MARRIAGE. THAT’S NOT RIGHT IS IT? AND I ALREADY TOLD HIM I’M MARRYING CYRIL. AND I’M PRETTY SURE I’M ONLY ALLOWED TO MARRY ONE PERSON. AND THAT’S ALL I WANT ANYWAY. AND HE SAYS HE LOVES ME. AND I SAID HE’S TOO LATE. AND HE’S TOO OLD. AND I FEEL A LITTLE STRANGE TEACHING HIS DAUGHTER PIANO. BECAUSE HE’S GOT HER CALLING ME MUMMY NOW. AND I’M NOT HER MUMMY. BUT I THINK HE GIVES HER A SHILLING EVERY TIME SHE DOES IT. SO SHE WON’T STOP. AND THERE’S THIS MAN WITH A BLACK BEARD WHO KEEPS PEEPING IN THE WINDOWS. AND HE’S REALLY, REALLY HUGE. BUT HE RUNS AWAY WHENEVER I TRY TO ASK WHAT HE’S DOING. AND I DON’T LIKE IT HERE ANYMORE. AND I WANT TO GO HOME. SO WHAT SHOULD I DO?

  It’s a good thing she had a hundred a year, or she could never have afforded such telegrams.

  I cabled back that she must try to avoid trouble until Saturday—that if only she could maintain the façade of normalcy, Holmes and I would have another chance to discover the identity and motives of her multiple pursuers. I promised I would redouble my efforts.

  Which I did. On Thursday, Holmes and I went back to Farnham. I had a devil of a time dragging him past the beard and tricycle vendors, yet I knew I must stay focused on my task. Violet Smith had said her original pursuer had vanished from the lane near Charlington Hall. With Lord Charlington gone, who was in residence? This was the sort of gossip most of the locals would know and all of them would be willing to discuss at the local tavern. Once I had Holmes settled with some toast and soup, I walked to the bar and asked the landlord, “I don’t suppose Charlington Hall is available to rent, is it?”

  He gave a gruff snort and said, “There’s plenty round these parts who wish it was. But no, that crazy clergyman has it. Horton Williamson, that’s ’is name.”

  “Ain’t a clergyman no more,” one of the locals said. “He’s defrocked.”

  “Aye’s right,” the landlord remembered. “’Cause he wouldn’t shut up about crucifixion and angels.”

  Holmes looked up from his soup, tilted his head doubtfully to one side and said, “Er… but isn’t that what clergymen are for? Talking about crucifixion? And angels? If memory serves, they’re fairly large parts of that whole… thing… aren’t they?”

  “Well yes,” the local conceded, “but Horton Williamson’s extra keen on it. Says he can uplift the mortal man to be more like an angel.”

  “So much that your average Jack would be able to survive crucifixion,” the landlord laughed.

  “Right,” said the local. “And if that’s what lifted Jesus to divinity, it can’t be all that bad for his followers, either.”

  “Thinks we all oughta try it,” the landlord said. “Not all that eager to go first, though, is he?”

  “But… that is inane!” I said.

  “Insane,” the local agreed.

  “Admirable,” decided Holmes. We all turned to stare at him. “Well I mean, there’s something noble about the man who holds to his convictions, isn’t there? Even if he knows they can never become the mainstream practice?”

  “Well, let’s hope they don’t,” I said. “Come along, Holmes; I think it’s time we had a closer look at Charlington Lane.”

  “Watson! My soup!”

  “Finish up, then. Finish up.”

  * * *

  Considering how many people lived in and around Farnham, it was surprising how little used Charlington Lane was. We passed a few farmer’s carts and a few young people out for a stroll, but no others. Indeed, there was little of interest until we at last came to Charlington Hall. Its grounds had once been separated from Charlington Lane by a hedge maze. Once, I say, because the maze was now riddled with holes, making it less of a barrier and more of an ideal staging point from which to sneak onto or off the lane. Peeking my head into a few of these holes, I could see that Lord Charlington’s fascination with the tricycle was no recent phenomenon, nor was it reasonable in its scope. Several of the machines were stored within the maze—some in fine condition, some little more than three-wheeled rust sculptures. The man must have been a fanatic.

  Just past Charlington Hall, the lane turned a corner. About a third of a mile past was a little hill on the far side of the road, with a dirt path running up it and a few squat little yew trees. Apart from the hedge maze, it seemed the only reasonable concealment in the area. From the hill, up to Mr. Carruthers’ house—Chiltern Grange—the lane was unsheltered on either side.

  As we walked, Holmes’s mood worsened. “I want to go home, Watson. Or at least back to that tavern. You made me leav
e half my toast. Do you think they still have it?”

  “No, Holmes.”

  “But they’ll have more, if we ask?”

  “Holmes, this is important work.”

  “No it isn’t. We’re just out for a walk in the country, looking at hedges, hills and trees. There’s no demons and no soup… I want to go home.”

  “Soon, Holmes. Look, the last time we came here to find Miss Smith’s pursuers we made a hash of it. Next time we must be better prepared.”

  Holmes huffed his displeasure. “I am almost starting to miss Mrs. Hudson.”

  “Look, just a little farther to Chiltern Grange, then we can go, all right?”

  Oh, how glad I am that we went on all the way. Robert Carruthers’ rented home was surrounded by a low wall, overhung with ivy. Skirting the shadow of this wall made it an easy task to creep all the way around the house, unobserved. The thick ivy even gave us some concealment whenever we cared to peep over the top. As we neared the front of the house, we heard raised voices.

  “Now, that sounds a little more exciting, Watson!” Holmes said, brightening. “Let’s go see what that’s about, eh?”

  Three men stood arguing at the door of Chiltern Grange. Holmes and I peeked over the wall to observe them.

  “That one has got to be Robert Carruthers,” I whispered, indicating the man who stood inside the doorway, shouting out. He was in his fifties, paunchy and graying, but energetic. “See how his scalp has been mangled? Miss Smith said that Woodley struck him and that he required stitches.”

  Holmes made a face of disgust/admiration and nodded his agreement.

  “And that one must be Horton Williamson,” I said, pointing at one of the two fellows who stood upon the steps. “The little liar’s walking around in a cassock, waving a Bible about. I’d say he’s trying a bit too hard to pass himself off as a clergyman, eh, Holmes?”

  “You’re probably right, Watson,” Holmes agreed, “but I hardly care. What I want to know is, who or what is that?”