Mike Ashley - The Mammoth Book of New Sherlock Holmes Adventures

"At the Clarence, yes."

"An admirable establishment. Which means you are not pressed for time this evening?"

"No, sir."

The haggard look was back on our visitor's face.

"For God's sake, Mr Holmes, help me! This ghastly thing has appeared again. Both my sanity and my life are at stake!"

There was a long silence in the room, broken only by the distant clatter of a passing hansom. Holmes waited until our visitor had regained his calm and then gently asked him to continue. Draining the contents of his second glass of whisky with one fierce gulp, Smedhurst plunged straight into his story.

"I had grown tired of London, Mr Holmes, and felt the need of country air. There was also a young lady with whom I had formed an attachment. We had met at one of my exhibitions and I had escorted her to several functions in London. She lived at Parvise Magna, a small village in Dorset, so when I went down I searched for a suitable dwelling in the area. I soon found what I wanted. It was an ancient cottage and needed a lot of repair but stood in its own land about a mile from the village. It had belonged to an old man, Jabez Crawley, who had let it go to rack and ruin, and who had died the previous year. However, I negotiated a fair price with a local lawyer who had handled Crawley's affairs, and moved in. At first, all went well and when my renovations had been completed I was extremely happy."

Here Smedhurst paused and flushed slightly. Holmes leaned forward in his chair, a gentle smile softening his austere features.

"You had come to an understanding with this young lady."

"Exactly so, Mr Holmes. A Miss Eveline Reynolds, a very charming person."

"I can well imagine, Mr Smedhurst," I put in.

Holmes's smile widened.

"Ah, there is your romantic streak again, Watson."

"Well, Mr Holmes," our visitor continued, "as I have indicated things went admirably. I had my studio on the first floor of the cottage and was turning out good work. Eveline – Miss Reynolds, that is – was a frequent visitor to the cottage and I also visited her home. She is an orphan and lives with an elderly aunt, the latter making me welcome enough.The first indication that something was wrong occurred a few months after my taking up residence. I returned home from a visit to Eveline

one evening to find the premises in some disarray. Things had been moved from their familiar places, there were muddy boot-marks on the stairs, and some canvases in the studio had been disturbed."

"In other words a search had been made," said Holmes, a gleam of interest in his eyes.

"Exactly, sir. To say I was extremely annoyed, let alone alarmed and dismayed, would not adequately describe my feelings. I lit every lamp in the place and made a thorough search but found nothing."

"The front door had been securely locked?"

"Certainly, Mr Holmes. I would never leave my home in that lonely place without first making all secure."

"Perhaps your domestic help…" I put in.

Smedhurst shook his head.

"I have a woman who comes in twice a week to do some cleaning and cooking but she arrives only when I am there." "No one else has a key?" said Holmes.

"Not that I am aware of, Mr Holmes. There is only one key, an enormous thing more suited to the Bastille. The lawyer explained that the old man was terrified of being robbed and insisted on one key only and had a special lock fitted."

"And the back door?"

"Firmly locked and bolted."

"Nothing was stolen?"

"I made a thorough inventory but nothing was missing, so far as I could make out."

"Did Miss Reynold have a key?"

Again the vehement shake of the head.

"I offered to have one made for her but she did not wish it. We both felt it might compromise her."

"Quite so," I put in.

Holmes got up to knock out his pipe in the fender, his face alive with interest.

"Hmm. This is intriguing. There is more, of course?"

"Much more, Mr Holmes, but I will be as concise as possible. The next thing that happened was strange noises around the house. Heavy footsteps as though someone were on the prowl. Then the front door latch would be tried. That was the most frightening thing of all, Mr Holmes. In a lonely cottage, late at night, all sorts of thoughts pass through one's head."

"Quite so."

"And then there were ghostly tappings at the window. I can tell you, Mr Holmes, that by that time my nerves were considerably on edge. These things continued for some months. In the interim Miss Reynolds and I had become engaged to be married."

I was about to offer my congratulations when I was arrested by the warning look on Holmes's face.

"You told your fiancée nothing about these unnerving incidents?"

"Certainly not."

"You did not investigate these happenings?"

"I did, Mr Holmes. I have a very powerful hand lantern and I lit that and went outside. But I left the front door open, so that the light spilled across the garden, and I never moved more than three yards from the door."

"You were very wise, Mr Smedhurst. Someone was evidently attempting to lure you from your home."

Smedhurst turned white and caught his breath with a little gasp.

"I had not thought of that, Mr Holmes. This happened on several occasions, but I could never find anyone though there were occasional traces of boots in the mud when the weather was wet. Thank God, all these activities stopped when spring came."

"Obviously, Mr Smedhurst. The person who was trying to frighten you could not carry out his activities during light spring and summer evenings."

"But what is the point of all this, Mr Holmes?"

"Hopefully, we shall see in due course," said my companion.

"Well, with the cessation of these manifestations, I regained my spirits somewhat and Miss Reynolds and I formally announced our engagement. In the meantime I visited the lawyer and in a roundabout way asked whether the former occupier of the cottage, Jabez Crawley, had ever mentioned anything out of the way there."

"And what was this gentleman's reaction?"

"Oh, he simply asked me a few questions about faulty drains, draught and damp and so forth and then queried whether I wished to sell the cottage."

Holmes clasped his thin fingers before him and sat studying my client's troubled face in silence for a long moment.

"Last winter the things began again," said Smedhurst. "Only it was worse this time. Not only weird noises, footsteps and tappings but one evening a fortnight ago a ghastly face like crumpled parchment appeared at the parlour window. I had left the curtains drawn back and you may remember the severe weather in February, so that there was a rime of frost on the panes. I caught a glimpse only for a moment but it turned my soul sick inside. A hideous white idiot face like a dwarf. I sat slumped for what must have been an hour without stirring outside. Nothing else happened or I should not have been able to answer for my sanity."

"You may well say so. But you have other troubles also, Mr Smedhurst."

The bearded man looked startled.

"I have heard that you can work miracles, Mr Holmes, and that you can almost see into people's minds."

Holmes gave a short laugh.

"Hardly, Mr Smedhurst. But I know a deeply troubled man when I see one. There is something beyond all this business, is there not? Something connected with Miss Reynolds?"

Smedhurst half-started from his chair and gave a strangled cry.

"You are right, Mr Holmes. There has been a growing estrangement because of all this. She wanted to know why I had changed but I did not want to involve her…"

He broke off and buried his head in his hands.

"Now I hear that she has taken up with a young man who has come to live in the village…"

Holmes put his finger to his lips and then laid his hand on our visitor's shoulder.