Sherlock Holmes: Before Baker Street by David Marcum (books to read to be successful TXT) 📗

clarified his last remark. ‘Lady Hester was my prize Berkshire sow. It was a blow and unexpected, but it happens. Then old Mrs. Brown’s grey mare dropped down dead outside the church, and people started saying we had a devil on the loose. The vicar is no use at all. He seems to have gone completely to pieces about the whole matter. And then there’s Lady Bulmer.’

“‘Another of your pigs?’

“He appeared affronted. ‘No, a respectable gentlewoman from Lincolnshire. She came to the village in the summer with her daughter. The climate is better for her health, so I understand. She keeps herself to herself, though her daughter is often seen about the village.’

“His repetition of one particular phrase was not lost on me. ‘I take it your interest is in the daughter.’

“A blush spread down his neck and beneath his collar. ‘Maud is her name,’ said he, somewhat dreamily. ‘Eyes the colour of summer cornflowers. She’s a talented artist and a musician too. She used to play the church organ until the rumours started.’

“‘It is not uncommon for newcomers to be the subject of gossip in a small community.’

“‘Not everyone gets accused of being a witch.’ Again, he grabbed my arm. ‘I am concerned where this will lead. People are fearful. A child fell out of an apple tree and broke his wrist. Word got round that Lady Bulmer had stumbled on a fallen apple and cursed the tree. What next? Five women were hanged in the village several hundred years back after being accused of witchcraft. The crossroads is still known as Gallows’ Corner.’

“‘It is unlikely a similar fate will befall Lady Bulmer and her charming daughter.’

“‘Can you be sure?’

The genuine anxiety in his honest features gave me pause. Seeing my hesitation, he pressed his case.

“‘Come to Norton Deverill, and see for yourself. I’ll make it worth your while.’ Then he played his trump card. ‘I’ll put you up at Deverill Grange. Think of it, blazing fires, soft beds, and as much bacon as you can eat. Please, say you’ll come. It is Christmas, after all.’

“Put like that, I was in no position to refuse. Christmas or not, I had nowhere else to go.

“As it happened, Zeal had somewhat exaggerated his home comforts. I had a taste of things to come when our transport from the station turned out to be an open tumbrel, of the type used to take prisoners to the guillotine during the days of Revolution in France. Our driver, a man Zeal addressed as Hil Taylor, was a surly individual, given to grunted responses, and with the manner of a man with long-held grievances. Something about the way he gritted his teeth and ground out the word ‘sir’ made me wonder if Zeal’s concerns should not be closer to home.

“Such considerations were wasted upon my companion, who enthused instead about the brisk country air after the smoke of the city. I had already endured several hours of discourse on the correct confirmation of the boar – in every sense of that word – and I fear his praise of the slumbering countryside in its winter repose failed to inspire. To add to our woes, a thin rain began to fall, dulling what was left of the late afternoon light, and the best our driver could offer was the threadbare blanket from the back of his shambling bay steed.

“I do not know if you are familiar with the village of Norton Deverill. It has seen a change in fortunes of late, thanks in no small part to Zeal’s patronage and encouragement of a branch line, but in those early days of his tenure, it was as desolate a place as one may imagine. The railway had diverted twenty miles to the south, bringing prosperity to its neighbours at the expense of the isolated villagers.

“That some had moved away was evident from the crumbling cob walls and slumped thatch of several of the dwellings that we passed. Away from the main street, where the public house was boarded up, the few houses that were strung along the road showed the parlous state of their inhabitants in their need for new panes of glass and leaning chimneys.

“The one exception in this sea of decay was a cottage outside the village with a new plate bearing the name ‘Aeaea’ on the gate and newly-painted fence. The garden was tidy and the foliage trimmed back in preparation for the season to come. A young maid was sweeping the last autumn leaves from the path as we trotted past. She raised doe eyes to stare at us with a mixture of polite curiosity and wariness. I caught a flash of something silver at her neck, peeping out from under the grey scarf she wore against the cold.

“‘The home of Lady Bulmer,’ I noted.

“Zeal seemed taken aback. ‘However did you know that?’

“The state of the cottage was enough to set it apart, and that alone should have informed the meanest of intellects this was the home of an outsider of some means. There was another factor too, which raised my interest in the lady. Had Zeal paid more attention in his Classics classes, he too might have found the reason for the villagers’ unease.

“‘She is a tenant of yours?”

“‘Indeed she is. I thought I should have to pull the old place down, but she has worked her magic.’ He checked himself and reconsidered his words. ‘That is to say, she has worked exceedingly hard. She has only a maid of all work for the domestic chores.’

“‘The girl we saw in the garden.’

“Zeal nodded. ‘Mary Chaucer her name is. Very obliging, by all accounts. She helps Mrs. Balfour when Lady Bulmer can spare her.’

“I urged him to elaborate.

“‘Mrs. Balfour lived at Deverill Grange until her husband died. It was her son with whom I made the exchange for