Missing in Somerset

I wrote this piece years ago as part of my undergraduate qualification in English with Writing. This creative short story is a pastiche of Edgar Allan Poe and Arthur Conan Doyle, following Holmes and Watson to an estate outside of Bristol to locate a missing woman. It is in no way perfect, but I am quite pleased with how it turned out.

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I sat reclining in my chair, lazily scanning the day’s headlines. The weather of late had been dreadful across the country, and there were multiple flood warnings stated in the papers. For a whole day my companion had rambled about the room with his chin upon his chest and his brows knitted, tapping and re-tapping his pipe with the strongest black tobacco, absolutely deaf to any of my questions or remarks. As I peered over the newspaper, he abruptly sat cross-legged on the floor and began examining his pipe. We sat in silence. Both of us jumped as there was a sudden knock at the door.

I did not gain very much by my inspection of the man who came into the room. Our visitor bore every mark of being a high-end butler. He was of medium build and entirely unimposing. His hair was greying in places, but his eyes still had a hint of a youthful glimmer that was shrouded by worry. We noticed him shivering with cold from the weather outside and quickly had a pot of tea made for him. Once he’d settled in a bit he introduced himself as W____ W____, butler to Lord and Lady M____. My companion gently began the conversation.

“Perhaps, W____, you would have the great kindness to begin your narrative. I ask you not merely because my friend Dr. Watson must hear it as well but also because the nature of your person makes me anxious to have every possible detail from your lips.”

“Well, it all began on Monday night with the disappearance of my Lady M____,” he began slowly. “We know that she went missing from her chambers. No-one has reported seeing her about the property since then and the servants are at a loss as to where she might be. The police have been on the case since the moment the house awoke in the morning and reported her absence. My Lord M____ is entirely distraught over her disappearance and will let none near him. He has isolated himself completely within his study. The inspector and his men discovered a single glove of my lady’s at the edge of the property and have since cordoned off that area as a potential crime scene. I have a horrible feeling that something terrible has happened to Lady M____.” On finishing his statement, he turned to face my companion squarely, “I implore you, Mr Holmes, to join me in Bristol, collaborate with the police and discover what could have possibly happened to her.”

“I must ask some preliminary questions before I agree to depart for the other side of the country,” my companion replied. “Firstly, can you describe to me the lady’s actions on the day of her disappearance?”

“My Lady awoke at her usual hour and went about her normal day’s routine. She went for a ride after lunch and seemed slightly out of sorts on her return home. It was mentioned among the staff that her mood carried on throughout dinner and that she retreated to her room before the meal was complete.” His voice began to shake a little as he finished speaking, “I awoke the following morning to learn from a maid that she had disappeared. I discovered my lord sitting alone in his study, grey with grief and worry, horribly disheveled in appearance. No-one has seen her since that night.”

“And that morning the police were summoned?”

“Yes, by myself. My Lord was in no state to handle such affairs.”

“Did you notice anything else out of the ordinary that morning?”

“Aside from what I have just recounted, nothing whatsoever.”

“As it stands, I have yet to develop a clear idea of what has happened to the lady. The best course of action to solve this missing person’s case would be to follow W____ to Bristol and convene with the local authorities,” stated my companion.

The butler thanked us profusely on his way out the door, saying that he would meet us at the station on our arrival in Bristol.

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It was late in the morning on the following day when we arrived at Temple Meads station, Holmes having spent the entire journey staring out the window as if in a trance. It was beyond me what he could be focusing so intently on when we had such little detail about the case. Two gentlemen were awaiting us when we arrived – one a tall, fair man with clean-cut hair and beard and penetrating blue eyes; the other, W____, the butler who had presented us with the case in London. The tall gentleman introduced himself as Inspector L____, a man who was rapidly making a name for himself in the Somerset detective force.

Moments later we were all seated in a comfortable landau and were rattling through the city. The inspector was full of his case and poured out a stream of remarks, while Holmes threw in an occasional question or interjection. I listened with interest to the dialogue of the two detectives.

Holmes leaned back in the carriage and the conversation ceased. Not long after, our driver pulled up at the manor. Some distance off, across a paddock, lay a long stone outbuilding, identified by the butler as the old stables. In every other direction were the rolling hills of Avon, green and scattered with trees, broken up only by churches and the city in the distance. We all sprang out of the carriage with the exception of Holmes, who continued to lean back with his eyes fixed upon the sky, entirely absorbed in his own thoughts. It was only when I touched his arm that he roused himself with a violent start and stepped out into the sun.

“Excuse me,” said he, turning to Inspector L____, who had looked at him in some surprise, “I was daydreaming.” There was a gleam in his eyes and a suppressed excitement in his manner which convinced me, used to as I was to his ways, that his hand was upon a clue, though I could not imagine where he had found it.

“Perhaps you would prefer at once to go up to the house, Mr. Holmes?” asked the butler. As our carriage drove away, we were quickly led to the house, through the entry and into a cozy sitting room. W____ excused himself to go off to retrieve his employer from the study. He was not gone five minutes when he returned with an exhausted-looking man. Lord M____’s state of being had not been understated by his butler; the man looked haggard, with an almost deranged look in his eye. Every aspect of his being indicated immense emotional distress, from the dishevelled state of his hair to an unpleasant smell that seemed to be emanating from him.

“You may place considerable confidence in Mr. Holmes,” said the inspector confidently. “He has his own little methods, which are, if he won’t mind my saying so, a little too theoretical and fantastic, but he is quite the detective. His reputation precedes him, and it is not too much to say that once or twice, as in that business of crime solving he has been more nearly correct than the official force in London and elsewhere in our great country. I’m sure you’ve remember the high-profile case involving that horse, Silver Blaze? Impeccable detective work!”

The lord flinched slightly at this, though he nodded his head respectfully at my companion to carry on.

“You may anticipate me to be gentle with you given your present state and the disappearance of Lady M____, however, that will not be the case. In order for me to complete my role, I need the utmost honesty from you, Lord M____.” The way in which my companion spoke surprised everyone except for myself, his directness had long since become a force of habit.

Lord M____ nodded, though had begun avoiding nearly all eye contact from the inspector and myself.

“When did you last see the lady?”

“On the night of her disappearance, when she excused herself from dinner before finishing her meal,” he said in a stiff voice.

“Who was it that discovered her dropped glove?”

He answered that the article had been discovered by the police on their initial search of the property.

“You are certain that you have not seen her since that evening?”

Lord M____ flushed slightly, repeating in a growl that no, he had not seen his wife since that evening at dinner.

“Have you been out for a walk beyond your well-groomed property since before the night of the lady’s disappearance?”

“No,” he replied, suspicion rising in his voice.

“Has Lady M____ previously given you any indication that she may have reason for leaving this place without notifying you?”

Holmes did not appear surprised when Lord M____ jumped to his feet and said exactly what he thought of the implications regarding his wife before storming from the room. I raised my eyebrows at my companion, he simply smiled, giving no indication of his thoughts.

“Moving on,” he said jovially.

We were escorted by the butler out of the sitting room, through the house and back outside. Stepping out into sunny weather, we made our way toward where the glove was found.

“There was no wind that night, I understand,” said Holmes.

“None, but very heavy rain,” the inspector replied.

“In that case there would have been footprints left had the crime been committed outside.”

“Yes, I presume there would be.”

“You fill me with interest. That an officer such as yourself neglected to inspect for footprints left from that night makes me question the superiors who appointed you. I perceive that the ground has been trampled up a good deal. No doubt many feet have been there since that night.”

“Having entered the scene long before the mud dried, a piece of matting has been laid there at the side, and we have all stood upon that.”

“Excellent. You have done something correctly.”

Holmes and I walked on with the inspector to the scene of the crime. On reaching the outlying fence, Holmes removed the matting to inspect the footprints thereunder. He hummed contemplatively to himself before rising and turning to the inspector and myself, “you will notice here that there are two tracks of footprints. One set, hobnail boots with clearly distinct impressions in the mud, the second set, a pair of elegant and highly expensive boots. Both undeniably worn by men. Look here, Watson,” he said, pointing at the ground by the post, “what do you notice?”

“There appears to be blood staining on the ground around the footprints and smeared on the base of the post. The mud surrounding indicates that something was dragged underneath the wiring while whoever left these footprints climbed between.”

“I assume you are able to determine the general direction from which these prints are leaving and where to they are going, Watson?”

I answered that it was clear the receding prints were heading away from the property, but that they were clearly coming from the direction of the outbuilding I previously mentioned. The inspector expressed his frustration at not having noticed such a detail on his first visit to the spot.

“To know how things end, we must properly know how they began,” my companion stated as he turned and began striding quickly towards the stable.

Entering the slightly disused building, I noted that fresh hay had been laid across the entirety of the floor. The stable hand looked up from the saddle he was cleaning and gave us a distrusting look. He kept out of the way as Holmes opened all of the shutters, letting in as much light as he could. “I hope you don’t mind our intrusion. You see, the lovely lady has gone missing and we have been employed to discover where she could be!”

The stable hand, who introduced himself as G____ H____, indicated that no inconvenience had been caused and that we were to take as long as necessary, with the hopes that we didn’t mind his carrying on with his work.

After replying that his presence was no problem at all, my companion asked, “you don’t happen to know anything about what happened to Lady M____, do you?

“Only that she went missing a few nights ago.” He continued in a murmur, “she was a woman with a face that a man might die for.”

“Interesting that you should say that,” replied Holmes.

Suddenly, my companion stretched himself prostrate on the floor and, leaning his chin upon his hands, made careful study of the hay and dirt in front of him. “Hullo!” He exclaimed. “What’s this?” It was a thin chain covered in dust, an extraordinarily delicate pendant hanging from it.

“I cannot think how I came to overlook this place as a potential crime scene,” remarked the inspector.

“Had you done your job properly, you wouldn’t have missed it. Your lack of awareness for such things is surprising for a man of your profession. Even the men in London do alright most of the time.”

“What! You expected to find evidence as such?”

“I thought it not unlikely. The majority of crimes happen near the home, particularly with matters such as this.” Rising to his feet, chain in hand, my companion looked about him. He dropped the evidence into his coat pocked and strode towards a wall hung with old farrier’s tools, “Watson, what do you notice here?”

Stepping to his side I indicated an empty hook. The sun-bleaching of the wood beneath marked where its tenant usually hung.

“Indeed!” said Holmes. “The silhouette clearly signifies a hoof-knife. I should be surprised if that were not a key piece of evidence regarding what happened to the missing lady. Two things must be done now; one, we must follow the footprints away from the property, and two, Lord M____’s study must be thoroughly inspected.”

“You don’t suspect Lord M____ to be in any way responsible for the lady’s disappearance?” the inspector asked in surprise.

“I suspect the only way to eliminate him as a suspect is to inquire further into his movements over the last day, particularly as it is so out of his character to isolate himself. My reputation may proceed me, his does even more so. He is a well-known philanthropist who spends the majority of his time engaging in a wide variety of activities, not sulking by himself.”

We left the stable and returned to the sitting room in the manor. By that time, the lord had retreated into his chambers. Given access by W____, Holmes inspected the study independently of the rest of our party. He returned to us with a satisfied grin on his face and presented us with a letter addressed to the lady.

“This was in the bottom drawer of the lord’s desk,” he said excitedly, “the wear on the creases and edges indicate it has been read frequently since it was written. Before I pass this evidence on to you, we must follow those footsteps leading off the property. There is no time to lose.”

Holmes and I proceeded to the edge of the estate. The inspector, confirming my companion’s opinion of him, remained behind in the manor. Retracing our steps from before, it was evident that whatever had been dropped in the mud had then been picked up and carried away from the property and into a valley.

“This way, Watson,” my companion said, breaking the silence. “It is of the utmost importance to discover what was carried away from the property, in such horrendous weather no less.”

We walked briskly along the trail of evidence, in a few moments arriving at a wood. A small stream at the bottom of the hollow gave evidence of being at high water days before, having since returned to its usual state. We traced both pairs of boot prints to the water’s edge and followed them downstream.

Moments later we came upon the corpse of what had once been a beautiful woman. The body, swollen from days on the banks of the stream, had been met with a brutal demise. The throat of the victim was nearly ripped out by a semi-blunt blade. Upon closer investigation we found postmortem bruising over the arms and shoulders, scrapes on the hips, legs and back caused by being carried such a distance and left on the bank of the river. There were lacerations around the wrists from ropes which were still present and evidence of dislocation of the joints, clearly indicative of the means of transport.

The body was that of Lady M____.

Having made our gruesome discovery, we decided to return to the manor to liaise with the inspector. Without explanation, my companion guided us on a hurried detour to the stables. We entered the dilapidated building to discover a scene nearly as horrific as the one we had just left – the stable hand had strung himself by the neck from the rafters! My companion and I quickly cut his suspended body down and laid him gently on the hay before proceeding to check for signs of life. We found none. Cause of death: undeniably suicide by hanging. Holmes then inspected the deceased’s pockets. The left was home to two pieces of vital evidence that Holmes pocketed before we rushed to the house to inform the inspector.

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Our party was joined by Lord M____, whose appearance had not improved since that morning. The smell had worsened and he looked about the room nervously as my companion began his speech.

“As I am sure you all deduced early on, this has not been a typical missing person’s case,” my companion stated in an authoritative voice. “Your loyal butler retrieved me from London, the facts of the case as he knew them. It was clear to me that the evidence he gave us was by no means complete. My distance on our arrival was caused by my pondering the motive behind her disappearance. I knew at once that the glove was of little significance other than indicating where to begin our search for evidence. You will remember the locket we found this morning?”

We nodded as the lord looked up, a expression of confusion developing on his face.

“I have it here,” my companion said, laying it on the table. He turned, “Lord M____, do you confirm that this locket is one of the lady’s possessions?”

He nodded, “I have seen it before. I assumed it was a gift from her sister.”

“Are you aware that it was engraved?”

To this he shook his head in the negative.

“If you would be so kind, inspector, as to read the engraving on the inside?”

“Of course,” the inspector replied, picking up the delicate piece of jewellery and opening it carefully. “For my dearest love — G.H.”

On hearing the nature of the engraving, the lord lost the last of his colour, a look of immense agitation rising up in his exhausted features.

The inspector looked up slowly at my companion, “those are not the initials of Lord M____.”

“That is very much a statement of the obvious, inspector, but thank you. Here we have the first indication that something was amiss in the lives of Lord and Lady M____. Would you suppose it a large leap to assume that the lady was having an affair, inspector?”

“Not a large leap at all, Mr Holmes, but is there further evidence of such a thing?”

“As a matter of fact, there is. You have marvellously lead me onto the next condemning piece of evidence,” he pulled the letter obtained in the study from his pocket. The lord pressed himself back into his seat as though the letter were a snake about to bite him. My companion ignored him, stating, “Watson, if you would open the letter and relay the contents of it to us?”

I did so, lifting it from the table and opening carefully. I read it out, hesitating slightly at the vulgar expressions encapsulated therein. The inspector’s jaw fell open in shock at the contents and proceeded to call out when I read the initials that concluded the piece: G.H.

“You can see why it became very clear to me that passion was a deciding factor in this mystery,” my companion remarked as I finished reading the letter out. “I at once deduced from the letter and the locket that the lady was leading a double life unbeknownst to her husband until that fateful night. She snuck out of her chambers, letter in hand, and used the servants’ passages to escape the house unnoticed, at the behest of the man who penned that letter. Little did she know that she was followed by her husband.”

Lord M____ looked up with a distinct expression of shock and fear.

“It is simplicity itself,” continued my companion, “did you notice, my dear Watson, that on the inside of the lord’s left shoe, just where the light strikes it, the leather is scored by six almost parallel cuts?” He gestured towards the lord’s boots, “obviously they have been caused by someone in distress who has carelessly scraped round the edges of the sole in order to remove crusted mud from it. Undeniable evidence that he had been out of doors on that fateful night. Of the two sets of boot prints receding from the stables, the set so obviously expensive match those of Lord M____. They also indicate that the initial crime happened in those very stables.”

“When I hear you give your reasons,” I remarked, “the thing always appears to be to be so ridiculously simple that I could easily do it myself, though at each successive instance of your reasoning I am baffled until you explain your process. And yet I believe my senses are as good as yours.”

“This leads me on, Watson, to the missing hoof knife.” My companion placed the bloodied knife and the letter on the table in front of him, “As we’ve seen from our discoveries today, it was used for brutal operation that night. The explanation thereof is detailed in this second letter, the suicide note of G____ H____. After reading it inspector, I am sure you will follow the adequate course of action.”

All colour drained from the inspector’s face as he read the letter. He was entirely ashen on its conclusion and looked slowly over to my companion.

“The letter tells the truth, inspector,” Holmes confirmed. “I had my suspicions of the lord’s involvement from the start. What well known philanthropist isolates himself from the world? On our arrival, the lord’s avoidance of our enquiries, as well as our presence, added to my conviction that he was somehow implicated in the lady’s disappearance. Our discovery of the bloodied fence added to the urgency of our mission, as I knew from then on that we were faced, not simply with a disappearance, but with a tragedy.”

“The only tragedy here is your involvement, Mr Holmes,” growled the lord. “You’ve meddled in something that is none of your business.”

My companion looked him directly in the eyes, “my business lies in detection, Lord M____, and I pride myself in never disappointing a client. Your loyal butler W____ was concerned for the wellbeing of the lady. Now, if you would be ever so kind, the inspector would like to take your official confession for the murder of Lady M____.”

Lord M____ began his testament in a reluctant rage, “I heard her leave her chambers that night and yes, I followed her. She led me to the stable, where I found her with him,” he said. “On the discovery of such horrendous betrayal, I flew into a fit of rage and lunged at the bastard. The nearest instrument was that god forsaken knife and I knew it was the surest way to eliminate him from the equation. The blow was meant for him, not for her, but for the pain she has caused me since, I feel no remorse for her death.”

“Yes, we know that you feel no remorse for the loss of the lady,” my companion interjected, “your recent agitation has simply been due to your fear of discovery.”

“I threatened him with the same fate of my cheating wife. We bound her in ropes and carried her corpse into the valley under cover of the storm. It would have ended there if he hadn’t been so weak as to cripple under the weight of his actions and confess all. In a letter no less. And the nerve of keeping the weapon on his person, uncleaned, clearly evident of the crime.”

“You’re correct, it was clearly evident. Though you are mistaken in thinking that her body wouldn’t be found. It was lying right on the bank of the river, not swept away as you were so intending. I hope you enjoy your time in gaol for murder.”

The Lord and Lady M____ were so well known that it was no surprise the papers covered the story in full the following day. Naturally, the press altered the facts in sympathy of the lord, saying that the reason for his isolation was that he was ‘entirely overcome with remorse for his actions,’ when in reality, it was her lover who was consumed with regret. He had penned his last, tear-stained letter in confession to her and hung himself from the rafters, ‘to join her in spirit where no mortal man can venture.’

“You see, Watson,” Holmes explained in the early hours of the morning as we sat over a glass of whisky and soda in Baker Street, “it was perfectly obvious from the very first day that the only possible motivation for her disappearance was a secret lover of some kind.”

“You reasoned it out beautifully,” I exclaimed in unfeigned admiration. “It is so long a chain, and yet every link rings true.”

“It saved me from ennui,” he answered, yawning. “Alas! I already feel it closing in upon me. My life is spent in one long effort to escape from the commonplaces of existence. These little problems help me to do so.”

“And you are a benefactor of the race,” said I.

He shrugged his shoulders. “Well, perhaps, after all, it is of some little use,” he remarked. “ ‘L’homme c’est rien-l’oeuvre c’est tout,’ as Gustave Flaubert wrote to George Sand.”

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Written May 2019