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charleygirlTitle: Jack In The Green 6/10
Author: charleygirl
Rating: G
Words: 3456
Characters involved: Sherlock Holmes, Doctor Watson
Genre: Mystery, Drama
Disclaimer: These characters, while out of copyright, were created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and do not belong to me. Hope Barton and its inhabitants do, however.
Summary: Watson makes a discovery, and Holmes makes a confession...
Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five
JACK IN THE GREEN
CHAPTER SIX
With his mantle he’ll cover the trees that are bare
And our gardens he’ll trim with his jacket so fair
But our fields he will sow with the hair of his head
And our grain it will ripen till the old Jack is dead
- Martin Graebe, performed by Magpie Lane
I found it difficult to sleep that night.
Every time I closed my eyes I saw the gurning countenance of the Green Man. Try as I might I could not rid myself of the infernal thing, and I definitely could not accept it as a benign creature, a god of the spring and harvest. I was being irrational, I knew, but to me there seemed to be something malevolent about it, as it tripped its way through my mind, scattering leaves behind it.
Eventually, at about half past two I gave up the struggle and ventured downstairs to borrow one of Molly’s books, which I had seen given pride of place on the case in the parlour. If I could not sleep then at least I could spend the time acquainting myself with the writings of my only living relative. If Holmes were to be believed, they would no doubt appeal to my ‘romantic nature’.
I had assumed everyone to be asleep at such an hour, and so was most surprised and somewhat alarmed to see a light shining under the parlour door, and a shadow moving about within. My first thought was of burglars, and the next that it might be best to fetch my revolver from my room before reason kicked in and I realised that it might easily be Molly or Samuel, equally unable to close their eyes for long. Nevertheless, I picked up a stout stick from the hall stand as I opened the door, brandishing it in my free hand.
“Do come in and close the door, Watson,” Holmes’s voice said, startling me. “And please put the weapon away. You do not look in the least threatening, I assure you. No man in his nightclothes ever does.”
I threw the stick onto the sofa and shut the door quietly behind me. “What the devil are you doing down here?” I asked. He was curled up on the window seat, the window itself open behind him to allow the smoke from his cigarette to escape. Evidently he had been unable to sleep as well, as I could see from the light of the single lamp he had lit that he was wrapped in his mouse-coloured dressing gown.
“I needed to think,” he said. “Sleep does not come easily to me.”
I frowned. His eating and sleeping habits were usually deplorable, but I had thought that lately I was having success in trying to establish a regular routine. “Things were getting better in that respect, were they not?”
He gave me a quick smile. “I often find myself wakeful, even without the concerns of a case to occupy me. The legacy of an old friend, it would seem.” As he held the cigarette to his lips I could see his hand shaking, and realised he was referring to the cocaine.
I had warned him before we made our trip to Cornwall that in giving up the drug he would suffer from uncomfortable symptoms as his body struggled to deal with the withdrawal. In the event he had appeared to cope with the sudden changes in mood, the tremors and disturbed sleep patterns, as they made less of an impact on him than they would have done on a man of more regular habits. I had, however, assumed as he had ceased to mention them that the symptoms were becoming less severe. It would seem that I was wrong, and I found myself wondering whether the performance that afternoon had been entirely an act for Edwards’s benefit.
“You should have told me,” I said now.
Holmes shrugged. “I did not wish to worry you further. You have had entirely too much to concern you of late.”
“Do you really think that would matter to me? I am your friend, Holmes – I only wish to see you well again.”
“So you do not think it some kind of divine retribution that I am continuing to suffer for my foolishness?”
“No, I do not.”
He cast me a sidelong glance. “Really? I am not so sure.”
“That is arrant nonsense, Holmes.” I crossed the dim room to his side. The smell of his tobacco mingled with that of the night-scented stock growing outside. “Is there anything I can get you? Do you need - ”
“No, no, none of your doctoring.” He waved the suggestion away. “I have endured the discomfort thus far; no doubt I can see it through. That is, of course, if there is to be an end to it.”
“Of course there will be an end. Everything has its end, Holmes.” I sat down on the seat beside him and accepted a cigarette from the offered case, glad he had not decided to light his pipe and fill the room with the noxious fug it usually produced. “Is there likely to be a swift end to this case?”
He quirked an eyebrow. “Everything has its end, Watson.”
“You know what I mean. Was your visit to the vicar this evening helpful?” He had not walked back to the house with us after our fruitless visit to the school room, instead claiming he wished to speak to the Reverend Culver again.
“Possibly. It is difficult when there are so few concrete facts to deal with. Everything so far has been relayed to me by a third party. I need first-hand evidence!”
“Well,” I said, trying to sound cheerful, “Maybe the schoolmaster will be able to provide that evidence. He did see the girl, after all.”
He did not look convinced, but said, “I hope so, Watson, I hope so.” He sighed, sharply, and stubbed out the remains of his cigarette, flicking it through the window to land amongst the bushes. Getting abruptly to his feet, he began to pace, back and forth in front of the light, like some ghostly apparition. “Had I been aware of the true facts last night - ”
“I am sorry that Molly felt she had to withhold the information, but a promise - ”
“ – is a promise. Yes, I have heard that before. It has aided no one and been the cause of several deaths.”
“I pray that will not be the case here. You should not be such a cynic, Holmes,” I said, a little disturbed by this attitude.
“How can I be otherwise when I have seen such things? You are lucky, Watson, you have retained your faith in human nature.” He stopped moving for a moment and regarded me sadly. “There are times when I envy you that.”
It was very late, and we were both tired. That was the only explanation I had for this most uncharacteristic confession. I stood up. “You need sleep, old man. So do I. I’m sure that things will look better in the morning.”
He sighed again and nodded, watching me as I closed the window and blew out the lamp. I was used to his moods by now, but a new investigation had seemed to lift his spirits – I could only hope that it was frustration which had produced this sudden depression as I did not like to think of him sitting up at night with such thoughts. As I followed him up the stairs I wished that there was some way of ensuring progress in the case, for both our sakes.
“Holmes,” I said as we reached our respective doors, a question suddenly occurring to me. He looked up, regarding me steadily in the moonlight. “How did you know that Miss Melville and Mr Edwards were courting?”
To my relief, he smiled tiredly. “The bicycle, Watson. Who but a wealthy woman, and one close to him, would have given him such an expensive present?” He opened his bedroom door. “Goodnight, my dear fellow.”
I watched the door close behind him before seeking my own bed.
***
I have no idea whether Holmes managed to sleep that night. My only memory after entering my room is of falling into bed at some time after three and knowing nothing more until the sunlight streaming through a gap in the curtains woke me several hours later.
When I descended, I discovered Molly alone at the breakfast table, Samuel gone up to the hall on some errand and no sign of Holmes. When I enquired as to his whereabouts Molly told me that he had spent some time pacing up and down in the garden before heading off towards the village.
“He would not take even a mouthful of food,” she said, looking concerned. “Is that normal?”
“Unfortunately, yes. He will have been considering the facts of the case – you were right not to disturb him,” I replied.
We ate in silence for a while, Molly looking absently out of the window and I trying to quell my rising frustration with my friend. I knew that I could not treat him like a child, but I was disappointed to find that after all my hard work over the past few weeks he was slipping back into his habits of old.
At last, Molly turned to me. “Will you come to church with me, John? I would appreciate some company, and Reverend Culver does not preach an unpleasant sermon.”
“Very well,” I agreed, knowing that I would be little use to Holmes at present even if I did know where he had gone.
***
The little church was full, the sermon blessedly short.
I was thankful for the latter given the effect the former and the sun shining through the small windows had on the interior, making it uncomfortably warm. Molly looked worried throughout, her eyes constantly flitting over the congregation. As I could see no sign of the schoolmaster Edwards I concluded that he had still not returned, and that his absence was not a common occurrence.
“He always attends on Sunday morning, without fail,” she said as we left.
“Perhaps he was detained. If the message was urgent - ”
“Perhaps. But I would like to walk back past the cottage, just to make sure, if you have no objections.”
“As you wish,” I said.
We strolled towards the green, which had been taken over by a group of children practising with the maypole, supervised by a couple armed with a fiddle and accordion. A jaunty tune accompanied us as we crossed the stretch of grass towards the schoolmaster’s cottage.
Molly tried knocking on the door and calling the man’s name, but there was no answer and no apparent life within the building. The curtains had not been pulled across the windows, and all seemed as we had left it the previous evening. While Molly tried the back of the cottage, I peered idly through the window of the school room once more. The framework which would eventually become ‘Jack’, with its coat of foliage, still rested upon the floor by the blackboard, but as I turned away I caught a glimpse from the corner of my eye of something else, something I had not seen there before. I shaded my eyes with my hand and attempted to see it more clearly. When I did, my heart sank into my boots.
“John?” Molly must have been standing at my shoulder for some moments before she spoke, startling me. “John, is something the matter?”
I turned to face her, not wanting to voice my fears until I was absolutely sure what had happened. “We need to fetch Holmes.”
***
It took some time to find him.
Molly ran back to the house, but there was no trace of him inside or in the garden. We both hurried anxiously around the green, looking somewhat aimlessly for him without having any idea where he might have gone. Eventually, to my surprise the door of the Green Man opened and he came out. I knew that my friend was not interested in religion, but I had not expected to see him emerging from a tavern on a Sunday morning, especially as that tavern was not yet open for business.
“What is it, Watson?” he asked, seeing immediately the anxiety that must have been evident upon my face. I led him back to the school room and pointed out the sight that had caught my attention: protruding from behind the ‘Jack’ was a leg clad in tweed trousers, the hem confined by a bicycle clip.
Holmes’s face tightened. “We must get inside. How strong is the door?” He slipped around the side of the building and tested his shoulder against the wood. I knew that he would have broken it down had Molly not stopped him.
“It’s all right, Mr Holmes, I have a key. I fetched it when I went back to the house to find you.”
“Excellent, Mrs Foster!” Holmes took the key from her, but did not open the door immediately, making instead an examination of the ground in front of it. “What do you make of those footprints, Watson?”
I crouched down to take a look. The prints were deep in the ground, as though either the person who had made them was rather heavy, or had been carrying a considerable weight. There was something curious about them, however – most shoes or boots of my acquaintance had either round or square toes, but these were pointed, quite sharply so. “I have never seen shoes like these before,” I said.
“I am not surprised. No Englishman would affect such a fashion. I have encountered their like before, in Paris. They are the product of an enterprising shoemaker with a considerable flair,” Holmes replied. He was kneeling, examining the door through his lens. “This door has been opened with the correct key, but by someone who quite obviously had difficulty finding the lock in the dark.” He stood, inserted Molly’s key into the lock, and opened the door. We followed him into the dim room beyond.
I immediately moved towards the ‘Jack’ in the corner. The foliage, which had begun to wither in the stuffy confines of the building, almost entirely covered the body of the unfortunate Mr Edwards. I lifted the section which would sit on the wearer’s shoulders, obscuring his face, and set it aside. Behind it, the man’s features were deathly pale, great bruises blossoming on his skin. Blood had dried across his forehead and down one side of his face, no doubt from a lacerated scalp wound. More had dribbled from his nose, but thankfully the bone there did not appear to be broken. I pressed two fingers to the carotid artery, and was relieved when I found a pulse, weak and thready, but still beating. As I stood there, Edwards took in a shaky breath, and I hurried to remove the rest of the framework around him.
“Holmes!” I called. “He is alive!”
My friend hurried over, and helped me to shift aside the remainder of the costume from the badly-injured schoolmaster and lay him down gently on the floor. With him in a prone position I could make a more thorough examination, and this I did carefully. He had been brutally beaten: there were several head wounds, though all of them quite shallow and looking worse than they actually were because of the amount of blood they produced; at least two broken ribs, possibly three; a handful of other fractures and extensive bruising. It was quite clear to me that whoever had perpetrated this attack had carried him to the school room and left him there, either to hide what he already believed to be a corpse, or to abandon him to his inevitable fate – whatever the reason, it was unlikely that he would have been found before Monday had I not chanced to look through the glass.
“Will he live, Doctor?” Holmes asked, watching me closely.
“If he gets treatment immediately, then he has a chance. Is there a hospital nearby?” I asked Molly, who shook her head.
“Not for at least fifteen miles.”
“Then we need a doctor, urgently. I will treat him, but I cannot remain with him indefinitely – he will need constant attention. And we had better fetch the police,” I added as she moved towards the door.
“I’ll send lads for Doctor Bateman and Sergeant Taplow,” she told me, and hurried off.
I did my best to make Edwards more comfortable, but without my bag and equipment there was little I could do. He was unconscious, and though that was dangerous it would be better for him as I had no pain relief I could administer. “Why the devil should someone wish to do this?” I wondered, my anger bubbling to the surface.
Holmes looked thoughtful. “The placing of the body is interesting, is it not?”
I glanced at the remains of the ‘Jack’. “It would seem an ideal place to hide it.”
“Perhaps, but is the attacker consciously or unconsciously trying to tell us something? Tomorrow is May Day, Watson, and the village will be celebrating the age-old traditions which herald the advent of spring. This ‘Jack’, this Green Man or whatever you wish to call him, is a symbol of that pagan rite, that of the earth coming alive again after the long winter months. He nurtures the seeds, which could of course relate to Mr Edwards’s position as schoolmaster, but there is something else…” He glanced at me and raised an eyebrow. “Jack personifies fertility, Watson. Either the attacker is casting aspersions upon Mr Edwards’s relationship with Miss Melville, or he is telling us something about himself.”
I shook my head, fatigue and anxiety clouding my mind. I could see no such symbolism, merely a severely injured man. Before I could tell him so the door behind us banged open and Hope Barton’s official representative of the law entered the room, Molly at his heels. A short, bullish man in the uniform of a sergeant of police which had evidently been donned in a hurry, he approached us, chin thrust out in a belligerent manner.
“Whatever is going on here?” he demanded. “Breaking and entering is a crime, I’ll have you know.”
“So I am aware. That is why I used the key,” replied Holmes acidly. “This man has been brutally attacked and left for dead, sergeant. The person responsible is a little less than six feet tall, strong, and has a rather singular taste in footwear.”
Taplow stared at my friend for several moments before he said, “Exactly who are you, sir?”
Holmes introduced himself, and the sergeant’s face clouded even further. “Aye, I’ve heard of you. You’re a meddler. Well, I’ll have no meddling here, I’ll tell you that now.”
“Inspector Undershaw of the Banbury police force said the same thing. He did, however, revise his opinion when I assisted him to solve a pretty little murder,” said Holmes. “I would advise you to work with me rather than against me, sergeant. I may just be able to help you, too.”
“Undershaw? Would that be the Mabbitt murder, sir?” Taplow asked, his aggressive manner dissipating in an instant.
“It would indeed. If you would care to take my advice, I would direct you to the footprints directly outside the door and the scratches around the lock. Also…” Holmes moved across the room to the fireplace, and began to sift through the ashes with the poker. After a few moments he gave a cry of satisfaction and withdrew something white, which he brought to the window to examine.
“Why should anyone light a fire on such a mild evening?” I wondered.
“Why indeed?” Holmes peered at the note – for such it was – he had found through his lens. “To burn this, I would imagine. It is lucky for us that in his haste he did not check to see that the job was done.” He held out both the paper and the glass to me – leaving Molly to watch over Edwards, I moved to Holmes’s side to take a look. I could make out little to begin with, as the ink had faded almost into nothing from the heat of the flames. A few words retained a darker pigment, but half of the note had burned away completely, leaving just the end of a sentence:
ke, come at once!
sual place.
L.
I could make little of it. Then I became aware of Molly looking at the note over my shoulder.
“That is Miss Charlotte’s writing,” she said.
TBC
Author: charleygirl
Rating: G
Words: 3456
Characters involved: Sherlock Holmes, Doctor Watson
Genre: Mystery, Drama
Disclaimer: These characters, while out of copyright, were created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and do not belong to me. Hope Barton and its inhabitants do, however.
Summary: Watson makes a discovery, and Holmes makes a confession...
Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five
JACK IN THE GREEN
CHAPTER SIX
With his mantle he’ll cover the trees that are bare
And our gardens he’ll trim with his jacket so fair
But our fields he will sow with the hair of his head
And our grain it will ripen till the old Jack is dead
- Martin Graebe, performed by Magpie Lane
I found it difficult to sleep that night.
Every time I closed my eyes I saw the gurning countenance of the Green Man. Try as I might I could not rid myself of the infernal thing, and I definitely could not accept it as a benign creature, a god of the spring and harvest. I was being irrational, I knew, but to me there seemed to be something malevolent about it, as it tripped its way through my mind, scattering leaves behind it.
Eventually, at about half past two I gave up the struggle and ventured downstairs to borrow one of Molly’s books, which I had seen given pride of place on the case in the parlour. If I could not sleep then at least I could spend the time acquainting myself with the writings of my only living relative. If Holmes were to be believed, they would no doubt appeal to my ‘romantic nature’.
I had assumed everyone to be asleep at such an hour, and so was most surprised and somewhat alarmed to see a light shining under the parlour door, and a shadow moving about within. My first thought was of burglars, and the next that it might be best to fetch my revolver from my room before reason kicked in and I realised that it might easily be Molly or Samuel, equally unable to close their eyes for long. Nevertheless, I picked up a stout stick from the hall stand as I opened the door, brandishing it in my free hand.
“Do come in and close the door, Watson,” Holmes’s voice said, startling me. “And please put the weapon away. You do not look in the least threatening, I assure you. No man in his nightclothes ever does.”
I threw the stick onto the sofa and shut the door quietly behind me. “What the devil are you doing down here?” I asked. He was curled up on the window seat, the window itself open behind him to allow the smoke from his cigarette to escape. Evidently he had been unable to sleep as well, as I could see from the light of the single lamp he had lit that he was wrapped in his mouse-coloured dressing gown.
“I needed to think,” he said. “Sleep does not come easily to me.”
I frowned. His eating and sleeping habits were usually deplorable, but I had thought that lately I was having success in trying to establish a regular routine. “Things were getting better in that respect, were they not?”
He gave me a quick smile. “I often find myself wakeful, even without the concerns of a case to occupy me. The legacy of an old friend, it would seem.” As he held the cigarette to his lips I could see his hand shaking, and realised he was referring to the cocaine.
I had warned him before we made our trip to Cornwall that in giving up the drug he would suffer from uncomfortable symptoms as his body struggled to deal with the withdrawal. In the event he had appeared to cope with the sudden changes in mood, the tremors and disturbed sleep patterns, as they made less of an impact on him than they would have done on a man of more regular habits. I had, however, assumed as he had ceased to mention them that the symptoms were becoming less severe. It would seem that I was wrong, and I found myself wondering whether the performance that afternoon had been entirely an act for Edwards’s benefit.
“You should have told me,” I said now.
Holmes shrugged. “I did not wish to worry you further. You have had entirely too much to concern you of late.”
“Do you really think that would matter to me? I am your friend, Holmes – I only wish to see you well again.”
“So you do not think it some kind of divine retribution that I am continuing to suffer for my foolishness?”
“No, I do not.”
He cast me a sidelong glance. “Really? I am not so sure.”
“That is arrant nonsense, Holmes.” I crossed the dim room to his side. The smell of his tobacco mingled with that of the night-scented stock growing outside. “Is there anything I can get you? Do you need - ”
“No, no, none of your doctoring.” He waved the suggestion away. “I have endured the discomfort thus far; no doubt I can see it through. That is, of course, if there is to be an end to it.”
“Of course there will be an end. Everything has its end, Holmes.” I sat down on the seat beside him and accepted a cigarette from the offered case, glad he had not decided to light his pipe and fill the room with the noxious fug it usually produced. “Is there likely to be a swift end to this case?”
He quirked an eyebrow. “Everything has its end, Watson.”
“You know what I mean. Was your visit to the vicar this evening helpful?” He had not walked back to the house with us after our fruitless visit to the school room, instead claiming he wished to speak to the Reverend Culver again.
“Possibly. It is difficult when there are so few concrete facts to deal with. Everything so far has been relayed to me by a third party. I need first-hand evidence!”
“Well,” I said, trying to sound cheerful, “Maybe the schoolmaster will be able to provide that evidence. He did see the girl, after all.”
He did not look convinced, but said, “I hope so, Watson, I hope so.” He sighed, sharply, and stubbed out the remains of his cigarette, flicking it through the window to land amongst the bushes. Getting abruptly to his feet, he began to pace, back and forth in front of the light, like some ghostly apparition. “Had I been aware of the true facts last night - ”
“I am sorry that Molly felt she had to withhold the information, but a promise - ”
“ – is a promise. Yes, I have heard that before. It has aided no one and been the cause of several deaths.”
“I pray that will not be the case here. You should not be such a cynic, Holmes,” I said, a little disturbed by this attitude.
“How can I be otherwise when I have seen such things? You are lucky, Watson, you have retained your faith in human nature.” He stopped moving for a moment and regarded me sadly. “There are times when I envy you that.”
It was very late, and we were both tired. That was the only explanation I had for this most uncharacteristic confession. I stood up. “You need sleep, old man. So do I. I’m sure that things will look better in the morning.”
He sighed again and nodded, watching me as I closed the window and blew out the lamp. I was used to his moods by now, but a new investigation had seemed to lift his spirits – I could only hope that it was frustration which had produced this sudden depression as I did not like to think of him sitting up at night with such thoughts. As I followed him up the stairs I wished that there was some way of ensuring progress in the case, for both our sakes.
“Holmes,” I said as we reached our respective doors, a question suddenly occurring to me. He looked up, regarding me steadily in the moonlight. “How did you know that Miss Melville and Mr Edwards were courting?”
To my relief, he smiled tiredly. “The bicycle, Watson. Who but a wealthy woman, and one close to him, would have given him such an expensive present?” He opened his bedroom door. “Goodnight, my dear fellow.”
I watched the door close behind him before seeking my own bed.
***
I have no idea whether Holmes managed to sleep that night. My only memory after entering my room is of falling into bed at some time after three and knowing nothing more until the sunlight streaming through a gap in the curtains woke me several hours later.
When I descended, I discovered Molly alone at the breakfast table, Samuel gone up to the hall on some errand and no sign of Holmes. When I enquired as to his whereabouts Molly told me that he had spent some time pacing up and down in the garden before heading off towards the village.
“He would not take even a mouthful of food,” she said, looking concerned. “Is that normal?”
“Unfortunately, yes. He will have been considering the facts of the case – you were right not to disturb him,” I replied.
We ate in silence for a while, Molly looking absently out of the window and I trying to quell my rising frustration with my friend. I knew that I could not treat him like a child, but I was disappointed to find that after all my hard work over the past few weeks he was slipping back into his habits of old.
At last, Molly turned to me. “Will you come to church with me, John? I would appreciate some company, and Reverend Culver does not preach an unpleasant sermon.”
“Very well,” I agreed, knowing that I would be little use to Holmes at present even if I did know where he had gone.
***
The little church was full, the sermon blessedly short.
I was thankful for the latter given the effect the former and the sun shining through the small windows had on the interior, making it uncomfortably warm. Molly looked worried throughout, her eyes constantly flitting over the congregation. As I could see no sign of the schoolmaster Edwards I concluded that he had still not returned, and that his absence was not a common occurrence.
“He always attends on Sunday morning, without fail,” she said as we left.
“Perhaps he was detained. If the message was urgent - ”
“Perhaps. But I would like to walk back past the cottage, just to make sure, if you have no objections.”
“As you wish,” I said.
We strolled towards the green, which had been taken over by a group of children practising with the maypole, supervised by a couple armed with a fiddle and accordion. A jaunty tune accompanied us as we crossed the stretch of grass towards the schoolmaster’s cottage.
Molly tried knocking on the door and calling the man’s name, but there was no answer and no apparent life within the building. The curtains had not been pulled across the windows, and all seemed as we had left it the previous evening. While Molly tried the back of the cottage, I peered idly through the window of the school room once more. The framework which would eventually become ‘Jack’, with its coat of foliage, still rested upon the floor by the blackboard, but as I turned away I caught a glimpse from the corner of my eye of something else, something I had not seen there before. I shaded my eyes with my hand and attempted to see it more clearly. When I did, my heart sank into my boots.
“John?” Molly must have been standing at my shoulder for some moments before she spoke, startling me. “John, is something the matter?”
I turned to face her, not wanting to voice my fears until I was absolutely sure what had happened. “We need to fetch Holmes.”
***
It took some time to find him.
Molly ran back to the house, but there was no trace of him inside or in the garden. We both hurried anxiously around the green, looking somewhat aimlessly for him without having any idea where he might have gone. Eventually, to my surprise the door of the Green Man opened and he came out. I knew that my friend was not interested in religion, but I had not expected to see him emerging from a tavern on a Sunday morning, especially as that tavern was not yet open for business.
“What is it, Watson?” he asked, seeing immediately the anxiety that must have been evident upon my face. I led him back to the school room and pointed out the sight that had caught my attention: protruding from behind the ‘Jack’ was a leg clad in tweed trousers, the hem confined by a bicycle clip.
Holmes’s face tightened. “We must get inside. How strong is the door?” He slipped around the side of the building and tested his shoulder against the wood. I knew that he would have broken it down had Molly not stopped him.
“It’s all right, Mr Holmes, I have a key. I fetched it when I went back to the house to find you.”
“Excellent, Mrs Foster!” Holmes took the key from her, but did not open the door immediately, making instead an examination of the ground in front of it. “What do you make of those footprints, Watson?”
I crouched down to take a look. The prints were deep in the ground, as though either the person who had made them was rather heavy, or had been carrying a considerable weight. There was something curious about them, however – most shoes or boots of my acquaintance had either round or square toes, but these were pointed, quite sharply so. “I have never seen shoes like these before,” I said.
“I am not surprised. No Englishman would affect such a fashion. I have encountered their like before, in Paris. They are the product of an enterprising shoemaker with a considerable flair,” Holmes replied. He was kneeling, examining the door through his lens. “This door has been opened with the correct key, but by someone who quite obviously had difficulty finding the lock in the dark.” He stood, inserted Molly’s key into the lock, and opened the door. We followed him into the dim room beyond.
I immediately moved towards the ‘Jack’ in the corner. The foliage, which had begun to wither in the stuffy confines of the building, almost entirely covered the body of the unfortunate Mr Edwards. I lifted the section which would sit on the wearer’s shoulders, obscuring his face, and set it aside. Behind it, the man’s features were deathly pale, great bruises blossoming on his skin. Blood had dried across his forehead and down one side of his face, no doubt from a lacerated scalp wound. More had dribbled from his nose, but thankfully the bone there did not appear to be broken. I pressed two fingers to the carotid artery, and was relieved when I found a pulse, weak and thready, but still beating. As I stood there, Edwards took in a shaky breath, and I hurried to remove the rest of the framework around him.
“Holmes!” I called. “He is alive!”
My friend hurried over, and helped me to shift aside the remainder of the costume from the badly-injured schoolmaster and lay him down gently on the floor. With him in a prone position I could make a more thorough examination, and this I did carefully. He had been brutally beaten: there were several head wounds, though all of them quite shallow and looking worse than they actually were because of the amount of blood they produced; at least two broken ribs, possibly three; a handful of other fractures and extensive bruising. It was quite clear to me that whoever had perpetrated this attack had carried him to the school room and left him there, either to hide what he already believed to be a corpse, or to abandon him to his inevitable fate – whatever the reason, it was unlikely that he would have been found before Monday had I not chanced to look through the glass.
“Will he live, Doctor?” Holmes asked, watching me closely.
“If he gets treatment immediately, then he has a chance. Is there a hospital nearby?” I asked Molly, who shook her head.
“Not for at least fifteen miles.”
“Then we need a doctor, urgently. I will treat him, but I cannot remain with him indefinitely – he will need constant attention. And we had better fetch the police,” I added as she moved towards the door.
“I’ll send lads for Doctor Bateman and Sergeant Taplow,” she told me, and hurried off.
I did my best to make Edwards more comfortable, but without my bag and equipment there was little I could do. He was unconscious, and though that was dangerous it would be better for him as I had no pain relief I could administer. “Why the devil should someone wish to do this?” I wondered, my anger bubbling to the surface.
Holmes looked thoughtful. “The placing of the body is interesting, is it not?”
I glanced at the remains of the ‘Jack’. “It would seem an ideal place to hide it.”
“Perhaps, but is the attacker consciously or unconsciously trying to tell us something? Tomorrow is May Day, Watson, and the village will be celebrating the age-old traditions which herald the advent of spring. This ‘Jack’, this Green Man or whatever you wish to call him, is a symbol of that pagan rite, that of the earth coming alive again after the long winter months. He nurtures the seeds, which could of course relate to Mr Edwards’s position as schoolmaster, but there is something else…” He glanced at me and raised an eyebrow. “Jack personifies fertility, Watson. Either the attacker is casting aspersions upon Mr Edwards’s relationship with Miss Melville, or he is telling us something about himself.”
I shook my head, fatigue and anxiety clouding my mind. I could see no such symbolism, merely a severely injured man. Before I could tell him so the door behind us banged open and Hope Barton’s official representative of the law entered the room, Molly at his heels. A short, bullish man in the uniform of a sergeant of police which had evidently been donned in a hurry, he approached us, chin thrust out in a belligerent manner.
“Whatever is going on here?” he demanded. “Breaking and entering is a crime, I’ll have you know.”
“So I am aware. That is why I used the key,” replied Holmes acidly. “This man has been brutally attacked and left for dead, sergeant. The person responsible is a little less than six feet tall, strong, and has a rather singular taste in footwear.”
Taplow stared at my friend for several moments before he said, “Exactly who are you, sir?”
Holmes introduced himself, and the sergeant’s face clouded even further. “Aye, I’ve heard of you. You’re a meddler. Well, I’ll have no meddling here, I’ll tell you that now.”
“Inspector Undershaw of the Banbury police force said the same thing. He did, however, revise his opinion when I assisted him to solve a pretty little murder,” said Holmes. “I would advise you to work with me rather than against me, sergeant. I may just be able to help you, too.”
“Undershaw? Would that be the Mabbitt murder, sir?” Taplow asked, his aggressive manner dissipating in an instant.
“It would indeed. If you would care to take my advice, I would direct you to the footprints directly outside the door and the scratches around the lock. Also…” Holmes moved across the room to the fireplace, and began to sift through the ashes with the poker. After a few moments he gave a cry of satisfaction and withdrew something white, which he brought to the window to examine.
“Why should anyone light a fire on such a mild evening?” I wondered.
“Why indeed?” Holmes peered at the note – for such it was – he had found through his lens. “To burn this, I would imagine. It is lucky for us that in his haste he did not check to see that the job was done.” He held out both the paper and the glass to me – leaving Molly to watch over Edwards, I moved to Holmes’s side to take a look. I could make out little to begin with, as the ink had faded almost into nothing from the heat of the flames. A few words retained a darker pigment, but half of the note had burned away completely, leaving just the end of a sentence:
sual place.
L.
I could make little of it. Then I became aware of Molly looking at the note over my shoulder.
“That is Miss Charlotte’s writing,” she said.
TBC
