Gaslight Grimoire_ Fantastic Tales of Sherlock Holmes - Barbara Hambly [44]
“Ah, Dr. Watson,” he said; “or should it be ‘Gentleman of the Jury’? Do you still find for ‘Not Proven’, or have you had any second thoughts?”
I shook my head. “I do not know,” I said honestly. “I have worked with Holmes for many years, and am rather inclined to his viewpoint that there is nothing that cannot be explained logically and rationally. And yet…” I paused. “I am not, I think, more imaginative than my fellow man, nor a person inclined to foolish fancies; yet I confess to you that as we stood outside the door of that room, I would have given a good deal not to go in there; and all the while we were inside it, I felt that there was … something in the room with us, something malignant, evil.” I shook my head. “I do not know,” I repeated, “but I am prepared to weigh the evidence and be convinced.”
Low reached out and shook my hand. “Thank you,” he said quietly. Then his eyes returned to the case which he had been studying, and he pointed at an item within it. “I was reading this before you came over,” he said. “It is one of the relics from the Abbey of Lufford, a tile that dates back to the fifteenth century. The original is in Middle English, and rather difficult to make out, but a translation is on the card beside it. I wonder if Karswell ever saw it; in the unlikely event that he did, he certainly paid no heed to the warning.”
I gazed at the card, and read the following words from Lufford Abbey:
Think, man, thy life may not ever endure; what thou dost thyself, of that thou art sure; but what thou keepest for thy executor’s care, and whether it avail thee, is but adventure.
The Finishing Stroke
The Finishing Stroke
by M. J. Elliott
Some may call it a tragedy, others a fantasy. My friend Sherlock Holmes will not have it that those terrible events surrounding the Tuttman Gallery are capable of anything other than a rational, albeit unorthodox, explanation. While he admits that the violent death of Anwar Molinet is beyond our ability to explain at present, he is insistent that future scientific developments will one day show how such a thing might be possible. I confess, I do not share his confidence — should I call it hubris? — and to this day, he chides me for ever daring to suggest a supernatural solution to the mystery.
“Can it be, Watson,” he says, “that you, a trained man of science, have fallen in with the spiritualists, soothsayers and other such frauds and self-delusionists?”
I make no reply, and never shall. But I set down here the full, unbiased account of our most mysterious adventure, and leave it to the reader to decide.
Sherlock Holmes did not, as a rule, encourage visitors at 221B, but he frequently made an exception for Inspector Lestrade. I confess, I have never understood his fondness for the company of the rodent-faced policeman over other officers for whose intelligence he expressed a higher regard, but I have rarely seen my friend happier than when sharing a bottle of the Beaune with his old adversary. It was common on such occasions for Lestrade to voice his concerns regarding any recent problematic investigations. I expected today would be no different, but this afternoon the police official appeared agitated, glancing at the clock on the mantelpiece from time to time.
“Are we keeping you from your duties, Inspector?” asked Holmes, with more than a touch of mockery.
“Er, no, Mr. Holmes. Not just at this moment. I was just thinking … it should be happening soon. Cawthorne’s post-mortem, I mean.”
It took very little effort on my friend’s part to persuade him to elucidate.
“Anwar Molinet was the fellow’s name,” Lestrade explained.