Moriarty

Sherlock Holmes was languishing in an armchair with the blinds half drawn and a shadow across his forehead reaching almost to his eyes. He was evidently pleased to see me, for he greeted me as if nothing had changed and as if I had never really been away. Slightly to my regret, however, I saw that he was not alone. My old chair on the other side of the fireplace was taken by a burly, sweating figure whom I recognised at once as Inspector Athelney Jones of Scotland Yard, the detective whose wrong-footed assumptions and subsequent actions had caused us both irritation and amusement when we were investigating the murder of Bartholomew Sholto at Pondicherry Lodge. Seeing me, he sprang up as if to leave but Holmes hastily reassured him. ‘You have timed your visit quite perfectly, my dear Watson,’ he said. ‘I have no doubt you will remember our friend, Inspector Jones. He arrived just a few moments before you and was about to consult me on a matter of the greatest delicacy — or so he assured me.’

‘I am quite happy to come back if it is not, after all, convenient,’ Jones demurred.

‘Not at all. I confess that I have found it increasingly difficult to rouse myself without the friendship and good counsel of my own Boswell. Take the Trepoff murder, for example, or the strange behaviour of Dr Moore Agar — in both instances it was only through purest chance that I prevailed. You have no objection, Watson, to hearing what the inspector has to say?’

‘Not at all.’

‘Then it is agreed.’

But before Jones could begin, the door opened and Mrs Hudson bustled in carrying a tray laden with tea, scones, a small plate of butter and a seed and currant cake. The pageboy must have informed her of my arrival, for I noticed that she had included a third cup but, casting his eye over the spread, Holmes came to a very different conclusion.

‘I see, Mrs Hudson, that you were unable to resist the charms of the street entertainer who has chosen our doorstep for his performance.’

‘It is true, Mr Holmes,’ the good woman replied, blushing. ‘I heard the music and did watch for a while from an upstairs window. I was going to call out to them to move on but the dog was so amusing and the crowd so good-natured that I thought better of it.’ She scowled. ‘But I cannot see what it is on my tea tray that could possibly have given you any information concerning my movements.’

‘It is of no great importance,’ Holmes laughed. ‘The tea looks excellent and, as you can see, our good friend Watson is here to enjoy it.’

‘And a great pleasure it is to see you again, Dr Watson. The house isn’t the same without you.’

I waited for Mrs Hudson to leave before turning to my friend. ‘You will forgive me, Holmes,’ I said. ‘But I cannot see how you could have drawn such a conclusion from a plate of scones and a seed cake.’

‘Neither of them told me anything,’ Holmes replied. ‘It was in fact the parsley that Mrs Hudson has placed on top of the butter.’

‘The parsley?’

‘It has been placed there only a minute ago. But the butter has been out of the pantry and in the sun. You will see that it has melted in this warm weather.’

I looked down. It was indeed the case.

‘The parsley has not sunk into the butter, which suggests an interval of time during which Mrs Hudson was interrupted in her duties. Apart from the arrival of my two visitors, the only distraction has been the music and the applause of the crowd outside.’

‘Astonishing!’ Jones exclaimed.

‘Elementary,’ Holmes returned. ‘The greater part of my work is founded upon just such observations as these. But we have more serious business at hand. You must tell us, Inspector, what it is that brings you here. And meanwhile, Watson, might I inveigle upon you to pour the tea?’

I was happy to oblige and, while I set about my work, Athelney Jones began his narrative, which I set down as follows.

‘Early this morning, I was called out to a house in Hamworth Hill, in North London. The business that had brought me there was a death by misadventure, not a murder — that had been made clear to me from the start. The house was owned by an elderly couple, a Mr and Mrs Abernetty, who lived there alone, for they had never had children. They had been woken up at night by the sound of breaking wood and had come downstairs to discover a young man, darkly dressed, rifling through their possessions. The man was a burglar. There can be no doubt of that for, as I would soon discover, he had broken into two other houses in the same terrace. Seeing Harold Abernetty standing at the doorway in his dressing gown, the intruder rushed at him and might well have done him serious harm. But as it happened, Abernetty had brought down with him a revolver, which he always kept close by, fearing just this eventuality. He fired a single shot, killing this young man at once.