Marcia Muller: The Plague of Thieves Affair

“A business matter, madam. My apologies, but surely you won’t mind waiting an extra five minutes.”

“Surely I do mind. Do you know who I am?”

“No. Do you know who I am?”

“No, and I don’t care.”

Sabina smiled sweetly. “My sentiments exactly.”

The woman muttered something rude under her breath, which Sabina ignored. She focused her thoughts on Dr. Axminster and the man he still considered, so far as she knew, to be the genuine Sherlock Holmes.

It was at the doctor’s mansion that John had first encountered the bogus Sherlock, during his investigation into the series of home burglaries that had developed into the Bughouse Affair. The man she now knew to be Charles Percival Fairchild III had been Dr. Axminster’s houseguest at that time, courtesy of a mutual acquaintance in the south of France; he had beguiled the physician and his wife and small coterie of friends into believing his outlandish claim that after miraculously surviving his battle with archenemy Professor Moriarty at Reichenbach Falls, he’d decided to remain “deceased” instead of returning to his practice in London and eventually made his way to San Francisco on some sort of secret mission. He had stayed with the Axminsters throughout his involvement in the Bughouse Affair and for a short period afterward. He may or may not have had recent contact with the doctor; anything was possible where “that conceited crackbrained popinjay,” one of John’s more colorful descriptions, was concerned.

Her wait was relatively short. A second uniformed nurse appeared, apparently to summon the still glowering matron, and it was she who took in Sabina’s card instead. She reappeared after only a minute or so, and announced that Dr. Axminster would see her immediately.

His office was also handsomely appointed, with a row of windows overlooking the busy thoroughfare below. Dr. Axminster stood before a rosewood desk waxed to a high gloss, a short, round-faced man with a Lincolnesque beard and ears that John had described to her as resembling the handles on a pickle jar.

“My dear Mrs. Carpenter,” he said, smiling and taking her hand, “this is an unexpected pleasure. It has been some time since we last met. More than a year, isn’t it?”

“Yes, in the offices of Great Western Insurance. I hope you’ll forgive me for breaking into your busy schedule this way, Doctor, but I really won’t keep you more than five minutes.”

“Not at all, my dear lady, not at all.” Axminster was addicted to horehound drops, a paper sack of which sat on the desktop; he popped one into his mouth. “What may I do for you? You haven’t a medical complaint, I hope?”

“No, nothing like that. It concerns Mr. Sherlock Holmes. I’m trying to locate him for a rather important reason.”

“Ah, I see. Quite a character, Mr. Holmes. That iconoclast Ambrose Bierce called him an imposter in one of his Argonaut columns, likened him to the infamous Emperor Norton if memory serves — a spurious claim if ever there was one. He’s not only the genuine Holmes but every bit the brilliant detective he is reputed to be. Not,” Axminster added hastily, “that you and Mr. Quincannon aren’t his equal.”

“Thank you. Have you had any contact with him recently?”

“No, I’m sorry to say. Not since he left my home shortly after the events last year. Left rather abruptly, as a matter of fact, without so much as a by-your-leave. Ah, well, that’s genius for you, eh?”

Lunacy, too. Not that the two are so far apart.

“Do you have any idea where I might find him?”

“I’m afraid not. My wife and I were of the opinion that he’d left the city and returned to England.”

“He was still here in October,” Sabina said. “He popped up briefly during a case I was investigating at the time.”

“Indeed? Well, well. I wish I’d known — I would have invited him to partake of our hospitality again. I really did enjoy having a gentleman of his obvious breeding under my roof. Amusing fellow, possesses all sorts of esoteric knowledge. Quite an accomplished violinist, as well.”

Sabina remembered the strange, not very harmonious melody the man had been playing when she and John had visited him at the Axminster home. Accomplished violinist? As John would say, “Bah!”

Axminster sucked with obvious pleasure on his horehound drop. “You have reason to believe Mr. Holmes is still somewhere in the city, Mrs. Carpenter?”

“No. Merely the hope that he is.”

“Need his assistance on another case, eh?”

“Let’s just say it’s a professional matter.”

“Oh, of course, not at liberty to discuss it. I understand perfectly. Well, I do hope Mr. Holmes is still among is. If so, and you locate him, give him my regards and ask him to come calling again.”

“I’ll do that,” Sabina lied. She thanked the doctor for his time and took her leave.

An answering wire from Leland Hazelton in Chicago was waiting upon her return to the telegraph office. Roland W. Fairchild was indeed authorized to act on the firm’s behalf in the search for Charles Percival Fairchild III. Time was of the essence — kindly proceed with all dispatch.

Yes. She would do just that.

Carpenter and Quincannon, Professional Detective Services, made use of several reliable informants. The two Sabina depended on most often were the “blind” newspaper vendor known as Slewfoot, and Madame Louella, a fortune-teller who claimed to be a native of a Transylvanian tribe of Gypsies but who had in fact made her way west from Ashtabula, Ohio. Both had developed strings of contacts in the Barbary Coast, the Uptown Tenderloin, the waterfront areas, and the various working-class neighborhoods.

Madame Louella had been of considerable help during the Body Snatchers Affair the previous fall, so Sabina went first to her Kearney Street parlor. The woman sat alone in her “fortune room” like a spider waiting to ensnare a fly, her large body draped as usual in a flowing gold robe emblazoned with black and crimson cabalistic signs, her head covered by a somewhat moth-eaten gold turban. She had heard of the bogus Sherlock, though not in recent memory. Her vow to have him found in short order, followed by a wheedling request for a few dollars in advance — “I’m in arrears on my rent, dearie, and living hand to mouth” — were as familiar as her outfit. Madame Louella was a competent snitch, but no miracle worker, and a chronic poormouth. Sabina left her with nothing more than the promise of a successful finder’s fee of twenty dollars.

Slewfoot occupied his usual stand on the corner of Market and O’Farrell. Checkered suits were his normal mode of dress; the one he wore today was an eyesore of brown and bilious yellow. He, too, knew nothing of the whereabouts of the elusive S. Holmes. Sabina made him the same offer as the one to Madame Louella, which satisfied him. He knew better than to make rash promises and to ask for cash in advance.

The likelihood of either Slewfoot or Madame Louella producing the desired results was thin at best. If Charles the Third was still somewhere in or near the city, he would surely be using another of his assumed names and dressing in costumes other than his distinctive Sherlockian outfit. In order for one of the informants’ sources to locate him, he would have to be identified first — a difficult if not impossible task. Sabina held out little hope that this would or could be done.

The last of her tactics was the most likely to succeed, though it, too, was problematical. The shrewd addlepate might regularly peruse the city’s newspapers, and then again he might not.

She went to the downtown offices of the Morning Call, the Examiner, and the Evening Bulletin — the last even though it was an exploitative sheet that employed the most obnoxious of muckracking reporters, Homer Keeps, with whom she and John had had run-ins in the past. At each she placed the same advertisement in the personals section, to be run immediately and for a week’s duration.