The Classified Dossier: Sherlock Holmes and Count Dracula(5)
“See here, man!” I said. “What is the meaning of this?”
The driver was hunched over with his face in his hands, and I saw him pull something wet from the front of his mouth and then drag off a heavy wig. When he turned, I was astonished to see Sherlock Holmes smiling down at me.
“Forgive me, Watson,” he said with a chuckle, “but I did think you would rather come to the heart of the investigation at once.” He dropped the wig at his feet, and stuffed the cotton wads that he’d used to help change the shape of his face into his pocket.
“Good Lord!” I said, quite astonished.
Holmes next discarded the shabby outer garment he’d used as part of his driver’s disguise and stepped down from the box only to usher me back inside the cab. When he followed me and shut the door behind him, his face had a deadly earnestness to it.
“I should warn you, Watson, that this case is possibly the murkiest, most sinister case in which we have ever been involved. My plan is for you to wait here and provide a rear guard while I investigate inside.”
“Couldn’t I be of far more assistance inside?”
“Perhaps,” he admitted, “but this is one time that I fear the risks are far too great, and I haven’t the time to explain them. It is already past noon, and we shall need every minute of the remaining day.”
“If there is danger,” I said stoutly, “then that is all the more reason for me to come with you. I quite insist!”
He gripped my arm in camaraderie. “I can always count on you, Watson. Very well. Did you bring the package from Ingerson?”
I wordlessly handed over the package of bizarre ammunition, quite at a loss as to why such elaborate precautions were necessary, but knowing that my friend would not order such a curiosity without good reason. Holmes pulled his own revolver from his jacket pocket and ejected the regular cartridges onto the cab seat and began replacing them with the silver bullet cartridges from the package. He gestured for me to do the same.
“Let me fill in the new details of this investigation,” he said. “The case containing the finger was clearly used previously for the far more mundane purpose of holding cigarettes, yet Stross, our forger, does not smoke. So I theorized that the Indian tobacco found in the case might lead us to the finger’s source. I resolved to trace the recent sale of the Indian tobacco, which led me to several unremarkable places, but also to here, the Carfax Estate. I have found a number of subtle and disturbing characteristics of this property, which belongs to the Lady Willingdon, an elderly widow who has been gone for some months visiting in Europe. She is unharmed and whole with all her fingers as of yesterday, according to the French officials that I telegraphed. Denied her inheritance because of her sex, she still has some wealth, but owns very little property in England. This is her sole estate, and she only has this because it was awarded back to her, after previously being sold to a foreign dignitary. Due to a legal miscalculation and the lack of said dignitary having any presence or legal representation, the sale was considered illegal, and came back to the lady some time ago. Neither she nor anyone in her employ has been here in many years. According to the officials, it has been abandoned and untenanted, but I have found tracks of more than one person at the entrance, so ‘abandoned and untenanted’ can hardly be accurate. We need to find out more about whatever clandestine activity is happening here. I urge you to the highest level of caution, Watson.”
“Then whose finger…” I asked.
“That has yet to be determined,” Holmes said quickly. I knew my friend well enough to guess that he suspected a great deal more than he told me, but also knew that he always had good reasons for revealing his deductions in the proper place and time. Following Holmes had never yet given me cause for regret, and I was far too old a campaigner to change my habits now. My gun now loaded, I indicated my readiness to follow wherever he should lead.
Not since the affair with Milverton had I felt so much that our roles in society had been twisted out of shape, as if we were now the criminals instead of upholders of the law. The gate may have been rusted, but we found the lock secure with signs of recent use. I had seen Holmes pick locks with the competence of a seasoned burglar, but after examining the gate he turned aside and walked the hansom around to the back part of the stone wall and used the simple expedient of pulling the carriage close to the wall and climbing over. Should any representative of the law have come by during this time we might have found ourselves in the novel and entirely unenviable position of being arrested, but luck was with us, and such was not the case.
Holmes lowered me down with a steely grip on my arm, then dropped down beside me with ease. It never ceased to amaze me, this change from a tweedy scholar in Baker Street to active bloodhound or even criminal, if the cause was just.
“Going in this way,” he whispered into my ear, “we avoid any dogs, as well as those who might be watching the gate, since their activities are all concentrated there.” And so it was. We made our way across the unkempt grounds so overgrown with bracken and gorse and so filled with dead foliage that it might not have been tended to for decades. The grounds had to be at least twenty acres, if not more, and included an immeasurable amount of overgrown foliage, a small stream and a dark, weedy pond. The house, when it came into view, was a very large, squared-off edifice, bulky against the grey sky. As we got closer, we could see that it was a haphazard affair, with some of it fairly modern, or at least of this century, while other portions of heavy stone looked positively medieval, with few windows, and those high up and barred with rusty iron. There was no difficulty gaining entrance, however, as many of the less substantial portions of the house were in poor repair and included several broken windows and doors falling nearly off their hinges. Holmes’s fear regarding dogs proved to be unfounded, as there were none on the estate.