Colin Dexter - Morse’s Greatest Mystery and other stories

But there was no sound from the Mycroft corner.

“You were able to verify your conclusion?” I asked.

Holmes nodded briskly. “We know the firm for which Wyndham worked, and we had a full description of Darvill. I therefore eliminated from that description everything which could be the result of deliberate disguise—”

“Which means that you have not verified your conclusion!” Mycroft’s sudden interjection caused us both to turn sharply towards him.

“There will always,” rejoined Holmes, “be a need and a place for informed conjecture—”

“Inspired conjecture, Holmes,” I interposed.

“Phooey!” snorted Mycroft. “You are talking of nothing but wild guesswork , Sherlock. And it is my opinion that in this case your guesswork is grotesquely askew.”

I can only report that never have I seen Holmes so taken aback; and he sat in silence as Mycroft raised his bulk from the chair and now stood beside the fireplace.

“Your deductive logic needs no plaudits from me, Sherlock, and like Dr. Watson I admire your desperate hypothesis. But unless there is some firm evidence which you have thus far concealed from us...?”

Holmes did not break his silence.

“Well,” stated Mycroft, “I will indulge in a little guesswork of my own, and tell you that the gentleman who just stormed out of this room is as innocent as Watson here!”

“He certainly did not act like an innocent man,” I protested, looking in vain to Holmes for some support, as Mycroft continued.

“The reasons you adduce for your suspicions are perfectly sound in most respects, and yet — I must speak with honesty, Sherlock! — I found myself sorely disappointed with your reading — or rather complete misreading — of the case. You are, I believe, wholly correct in your central thesis that there is no such person as Horatio Darvill.” (How the blood was tingling in my veins as Mycroft spoke these words!) “But when the unfortunate Mr. Wyndham, who has just rushed one way up Baker Street, rushes back down it the other with a writ for defamation of character — as I fear he will! — then you will be compelled to think, to analyse, and to act, with a little more care and circumspection.”

Holmes leaned forward, the sensitive nostrils of that aquiline nose a little distended. But still he made no comment.

“For example, Sherlock, two specific pieces of information vouchsafed to us by the attractive Miss van Allen herself have been strongly discounted, if not wholly ignored, in your analysis.” (I noticed Holmes’s eyebrows rising quizzically.) “First, the fact that Mr. Wyndham was older than Miss van Allen only by some five years . Second, the fact that Miss van Allen is so competent and speedy a performer on the type-writer that she works, on a free-lance basis, for several firms in the vicinity of her home, including Messrs Cook and Marchant. Furthermore, you make the astonishing claim that Miss van Allen was totally deceived by the disguise of Mr. Darvill. Indeed, you would have her not only blind, but semi-senile into the bargain! Now it is perfectly true that the lady’s eyesight is far from perfect — glaucopia Athenica , would you not diagnose, Dr. Watson? — but it is quite ludicrous to believe that she would fail to recognize the person with whom she was living. And it is wholly dishonest of you to assert that the assignations were always held by candlelight, since on at least two occasions, the morning after the first meeting — the morning , Sherlock! — and the morning of the planned wedding ceremony, Miss van Allen had ample opportunity of studying the physical features of Darvill in the broadest of daylight.”

“You seem to me to be taking an unconscionably long time in putting forward your own hypothesis,” snapped Holmes, somewhat testily.

“You are right,” admitted the other. “Let me beat about the bush no longer! You have never felt emotion akin to love for any woman, Sherlock — not even for the Adler woman — and you are therefore deprived of the advantages of those who like myself are able to understand both the workings of the male and also the female mind. Five years her superior in age — her step-father; only five years . Now one of the sadnesses of womankind is their tendency to age more quickly and less gracefully than men; and one of the truths about mankind in general is that if you put one of each sex, of roughly similar age, in reasonable proximity... And if one of them is the fair Miss van Allen — then you are inviting a packet of trouble. Yet such is what took place in the Wyndham ménage. Mrs. Wyndham was seventeen years older than her young husband; and perhaps as time went by some signs and tokens of this disproportionate difference in their ages began to manifest themselves. At the same time, it may be assumed that Wyndham himself could not help being attracted — however much at first he sought to resist the temptation — by the very winsome and vivacious young girl who was his step-daughter. It would almost certainly have been Wyndham himself who introduced Miss van Allen to the part-time duties she undertook for Cook and Marchant — where the two of them were frequently thrown together, away from the restraints of wife and home, and with a result which it is not at all difficult to guess. Certain it is, in my own view, that Wyndham sought to transfer his affections from the mother to the daughter; and in due course it was the daughter who decided that whatever her own affections might be in the matter she must in all honour leave her mother and step-father. Hence the great anxiety to get out to dances and parties and the like — activities which Wyndham objected to for the obvious reason that he wished to have Miss van Allen as close by himself for as long as he possibly could. Now you, Sherlock, assume that this objection arose as a result of the interest accruing from the New Zealand securities — and you are guessing , are you not? Is it not just possible that Wyndham has money of his own — find out, brother! — and that what he craves for is not some petty addition to his wealth, but the love of a young woman with whom he has fallen rather hopelessly in love? You see, she took him in, just as she took you in, Sherlock — for you swallowed everything that calculating little soul reported.”

“Really, this is outrageous!” I objected — but Holmes held up his hand, and bid me hear his brother out.

“What is clear, is that at some point when Wyndham was in France — and why did you not verify those dates spent abroad? I am sure Cook and Marchant would have provided them just as quickly as it furnished the wretched man’s description. But as I was saying, with Wyndham in France, mother and daughter found themselves in a little tête-à-tête one evening, during the course of which a whole basketful of dirty linen was laid bare, with the daughter bitterly disillusioned about the behaviour of her step-father, and the mother hurt and angry about her husband’s infidelity. So, together, the pair of them devised a plan. Now, we both agree on one thing at least, Sherlock! There appears to be no evidence whatsoever for the independent existence of Horatio Darvill except for what we have heard from Miss van Allen’s lips. Rightly, you drew our attention to the fact that the two men were never seen together. But, alas, having appreciated the importance of that clue, you completely misconceived its significance. You decided that there is no Darvill — because he is Wyndham. I have to tell you that there is no Darvill — because he is the pure fabrication of the minds of Mrs. Wyndham and her daughter.”

Holmes was staring with some consternation at a pattern in the carpet, as Mycroft rounded off his extravagant and completely baseless conjectures.