The Exploits of Sherlock Holmes (29 page)

recognized and lastly a man in brown country tweeds with a pale, sunken face framed in mutton-

chop whiskers. As we drew near, they turned towards us, and I could not repress an exclamation

of horror at the spectacle that their movement disclosed to our eyes.

At the foot of the cedar tree lay the body of an elderly man. His arms were outstretched,

the fingers gripping the grass and his beard thrust up at so grotesque an angle that his

features were hidden from view. The bone gleamed in bis gaping throat while the ground about

bis head was stained into one great crimson halo. The doctor stepped forward hurriedly.

"This is a shocking affair, Mr. Sherlock Holmes," he cried nervously. "My wife hastened to

the station as soon as she received your wire. I trust that she was in time to meet Miss Ferrers?"

"Thank you, yes. Alas, that I could not myself have got here in time."

"It seems that you expected the tragedy, sir," observed the policeman suspiciously.

"I did, constable. Hence my presence."

"Well, I'd like to know . . ." Holmes tapped him on the arm and, leading him to one side,

spoke a few words. When they rejoined us, there was a trace of relief in the man's worried

face. "It shall be as you wish, sir," he said, "and you can rely on Mr. Tonston repeating his

statement to you."

The man in tweeds turned his sunken face and pale grey eyes in our direction. "I don't

see why I should," he said tartly. "You're the law, aren't you, Constable Kibble, and you've

taken my statement already. I have nothing to add. You would be better employed in sending in

your report of Mr. Ferrers' suicide."

"Suicide?" interposed Holmes sharply.

"Aye, what else? He's been glooming for weeks past, as all the household can testify, and

now he's cut his throat from ear to ear."

"H'm." Holmes dropped on his knees beside the body. "And this is the weapon, of course. A

horn-handled clasp-knife with a retractable blade. Italian, I perceive."

"How do you know that?"

"It has the mark of a Milanese bladesmith. But what is this? Dear me, What a curious

object."

He rose to his feet and closely examined the thing which he had picked up from the

grass. It was a short-barrelled rifle, cut off immediately behind the trigger by a hinged

stock, so that the whole weapon folded into two parts. "It was lying by his head," observed the

constable. "Seems that he was expecting trouble and took it with him for protection."

Holmes shook his head. "It has not been loaded," he said, "for you will observe that the

grease is undisturbed in the breech. But what have we here? Perhaps, Watson, you would lend

me your pencil and handkerchief."

"It's only the hole in the stock for the cleaning rod," rapped Mr
.
Tonston.

"I am aware of that. Tut, this is most curious."

"What then? You stuck the handkerchief wrapped round the pencil into the hole and now

you've withdrawn it. There's nothing on the handkerchief, and yet you find it curious. What the

devil did you expect?"

"Dust."

"Dust?"

"Precisely. Something has been hidden in the hole and hence the fact that the walls are clean.

Normally there is always dust in the stock-holes of guns. But I should be glad to hear a few

facts from you, Mr. Tonston, as I understand that you were the first to raise the alarm. It will

save time if I hear them from your own lips instead of reading through your statement."

"Well, there's little enough to tell," said he. "An hour ago, I strolled out for a breath of air

and caught sight of Mr. Ferrers standing under this tree. When I hailed him, he looked

round and then, turning away, seemed to put his hand up to his throat. I saw him stagger

and fall. When I ran up, he was lying as you see him now, with his throat gaping and the

knife on the grass beside him. There was nothing I could do save send the manservant for Dr.

Nordham and the constable. That's all."

"Most illuminating. You were with Mr. Ferrers in Sicily, were you not?"

"I was."

"Well, gentlemen, I shall detain you no longer if you wish to return to the house. Watson,

perhaps you would care to remain with me. And you too, Constable."

As the doctor and Tonston vanished through the parterres, Holmes was galvanized into

activity. For a while, he circled the grass about the dead man on his hands and knees, like

some lean, eager foxhound casting for its scent. Once he stooped and peered at the ground very

closely, then rising to his feet, he whipped his lens from his pocket and proceeded to a

searching examination of the trunk of the cedar. Suddenly he stiffened and at his gesture the

constable and I hastened to his side. Holmes pointed with his finger as he handed the

glass to the police-officer. "Examine the edge of that knot," he said quietly. "What do you

see?"

"Looks to me like a hair, sir," replied Constable Kibble, gazing through the lens. "No, it's not

a hair. It's a brown thread."

"Quite so. Perhaps you would kindly remove it and place it in this envelope. Now

Watson, give me a hand up." Holmes scrambled into the fork of the tree and, supporting

himself by the branches, peered about him, "Ha, what have we here!" he chuckled. "A fresh

scrape on the trunk, traces of mud in the fork and another small thread from some coarse

brownish material clinging to the bark where a man might lean his back. Quite a treasure-trove.

I am about to jump down and I want you both to watch the exact place where I land. So!" He

stepped to one side. "Now, what do you see?"

"Two small indentations."

"Precisely. The marks of my heels. Look wider."

"By Jingo!" cried the constable. "There are four, not two! They are identical."

"Save that the others are not quite so deep."

"The man was lighter!" I ejaculated.

"Bravo, Watson. Well, I think that we have seen all that we need."

The officer fixed Holmes with his earnest eyes. "Look here, sir," he said. "I'm clean out of

my depth. What's all this mean?"

"Probably your sergeant's stripes, Constable Kibble. And now, let us join the others."

When we reached the house, the police-officer showed us into a long, sparsely furnished

room with a groined roof. Doctor Nordham, who was writing at a table in the window, looked

up at our entrance. "Well, Mr. Holmes?"

"You are preparing your report, I perceive," my friend remarked. "May I suggest that you

pay particular regard that you do not convey a false impression?"

Dr. Nordham gazed stonily at Holmes. "I fail to understand you," said he. "Can you not be

more explicit?"

"Very well. What are your views on the death of Mr. Josua Ferrers of Abbotstanding?"

"Tut, sir, there is no question of views. We have both visual and medical evidence that Josua

Ferrers committed suicide by cutting his own throat."

"A remarkable man, this Mr. Ferres," Holmes observed, "who, not content with

committing suicide by cutting his jugular vein, must continue to sever the rest of his neck

with an ordinary clasp-knife until, in the words of Mr. Tonston here, he had cut his throat

literally from ear to ear. I have always felt that, were I to commit murder, I should avoid

errors of that kind."

My friend's words were followed by a moment of tense silence. Then Dr. Nordham rose

abruptly to his feet, while Tonston, who had been leaning against the wall with his arms

folded, lifted his eyes to Holmes's face.

"Murder is an ugly word, Mr. Sherlock Holmes," he said quietly.

"And an ugly deed. Though not, perhaps, to the
Mala Vita."

"What nonsense is this!"

"Tut, I was relying upon your knowledge of Sicily to fill in any small details that I may

have overlooked. However, as you dismiss as nonsense the name of this terrible secret society,

it will doubtless interest you to learn a few of the facts."

"Have a care, Mr. Holmes."

"To you, Dr. Nordham, and to Constable Kibble, there will appear to be gaps in my brief

account." My friend continued. "But as these can be filled in later, I will address myself to

you, Watson, as you were present during Miss Ferrers narrative.

"It was obvious from the first that her father was hiding from some peril of so relentless a

nature that even in the depth of this deserted country-side he went in fear of his life. As the man

had come from Sicily, an island notorious for the power and vindictiveness of its secret societies,

the most likely explanation was that either he had offended some such organization or as a

member he had transgressed some vital rule. As he made no attempt to invoke the police, I

inclined to the latter supposition and this became a certainty with the first appearance of the

Dark Angels. You will recall that they were nine in number, Watson, and that the print,

inscribed with the words 'six and three,' was nailed to a tree in the avenue on December 29th.

"The next visitation took place on February 11th, exactly six weeks and three days from

December 29th, but this time the angels, six in number, were nailed to the front door.

"On March 24th came the third and last appearance, exactly six weeks after the second.

The dreaded herald of death, again nine in number, but now without inscription, lay on the

very platter of the master of Abbotstanding.

"As I listened to Miss Ferrers' voice and calculated the dates rapidly in mind, I was

dismayed by the discovery that the final nine of the Dark Angels, assuming them to represent

the same period of time as the first, brought the date to May 7th. Today!

"I knew then that I was too late. But, if I could not save her father, I might avenge him

and, with that object, I attacked the problem from a different angle.

"The face at the window was typical, of course, of perhaps the most barbarous trait in the

vengeance of secret societies, the desire to strike horror not only into the victim himself but

into his family. But the man had been careful to cover his features with his hands, despite the

fact that he was looking not at Josua Ferrers but at his daughter, thereby suggesting to my

mind that he feared recognition by Miss Ferrers as much as by her father.

"Next, it seemed to me that the cold, deadly approach of
the fatal prints from tree to door,

from door to breakfast-table, inferred an intimate knowledge of Josua Ferrers'

circumscribed habits, possibly an unchallenged right to enter the house and thereby place

the card on the table without the necessity for forced windows and smashed locks.

"From the first, certain features in Miss Ferrers' singular narrative stirred some vague

chord in my memory, but it was not until your remark, Watson, about a foot in the open

grave that a flood of light burst suddenly into my consciousness."

As Sherlock Holmes paused for a moment to draw something from his cape pocket, I

glanced at the others. Though the old room was rapidly deepening into dusk, a sullen red

light from the last rays of the sun glimmering through the window illumined the absorbed

expressions of Dr. Nordham and the constable. Tonston stood in the shadows, his arms still

folded across his chest and his pale, glittering eyes fixed immovably upon Holmes.

"It was to certain passages in this book, a fore-runner of Heckenthorn's
Secret Societies,
that

my memory was recalled by. Dr. Watson's words." My friend continued. "Here is what the

author has to say on a certain secret society which was first introduced into Sicily some three

centuries ago. 'This formidable organization,' he writes, aptly named the
Mala Vita,

communicates with its members through a variety of signs including Angels, Demons and the

Winged Lion. The candidate for membership, if successful in his trials of initiation which

frequently include that of murder, takes oath of fealty with one foot in an open grave.

Punishment for infraction of the society's rules is relentless and, where death is the price,

three separate warnings are given of the approaching doom, the second following six weeks and

three days after the first, and the third six weeks after the second. Following the final warning, a

further period of six weeks and three days are allowed to pass before the blow falls. Any

member failing to carry out the punitive orders of the society becomes himself liable to the

same punishment.' There follows a list of rules of the
Mala Vita,
together with the penalties

for breaking them.

"That Josua Ferrers was a member of this dread society there can now be little doubt,"

Holmes added solemnly, as he closed the book. "What was his offense, we shall probably

never know, and yet one may hazard a pretty shrewd guess. Article 16 is surely among the

Mala Vita's
most singular rules, for it states simply that the penalty for any member who

discovers the identity of the Grand Master is death. I would remind you, Watson, that

Ferrers laid emphatic instructions on his daughter that her answer to all enquiries must be

that she knew nothing of his affairs, adding only that the name of the maker was in the

butt of the gun. Not a gun, mark you, but
the
gun, which clearly indicated that the