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“So you never saw the men who collected it?”

“No, sir.”

“It must have taken several people to remove the painting. It is large and heavy.”

“That it is,” the old man laughed. “Why, when old Dr Giddings presented the picture to the college it took six of us to put it up – an’ all the time the dean – that’s the former dean who’s now warden – hopping and dancing around and shouting at us to be careful.”

As they walked the length of the long nave Holmes asked, “You were saying you’d had some trouble with boisterous undergraduates.”

“Gentlemen they call themselves!” the aged verger sniffed. “Sacrilegious and heathen hooligans I calls them. First week of term it was. I caught four of ‘em in here, scrambling about over the stalls. One of them had a lamp and he was holding it up to that Dutch painting. I was afeared he’d set light to the thing. You can imagine, sir, when I saw you on the same spot it brought it all back. So you’ll forgive me if I was a bit sharp with you.”

“I quite understand,” Holmes replied sympathetically. “Yours is a heavy responsibility. What happened to these rowdies?”

“I fetched Junkin, the senior porter, and a couple of his men. They were more than a match for a bunch of drunken undergraduates. We turfed them out and took their names and I reported them directly to the warden. What happened to them after that, I don’t know. They’ve certainly not been back here.”

“Do you remember any of their names?”

“Indeed I do, sir. They was all Magdalen men and their ringleader was the Hon. Hugh Mountcey, Lord Henley’s son. You’d think the aristocracy would know better, wouldn’t you, sir?”

They had arrived at the west door and the guardian of the chapel held it open. Holmes thanked his informant and passed into the narrow lane outside.

Back in his rooms Sherlock Holmes abandoned all pretence of pursuing his own studies. The mystery of the missing painting had quite taken hold of his reasoning faculties. He threw himself down on a sofa, lit a pipe and pondered the additional information gleaned from the verger. The Nativity, it appeared, had been scheduled for restoration, a fact which now enabled the fellows, temporarily, to conceal its abduction. It had also seemingly provided excellent cover for the thieves. As to the Magdalen men who had made a nuisance of themselves, that certainly suggested a connection with the earlier outrages perpetrated during the summer and autumn terms.

Clearly this motley assortment of stolen Oxfordiana had common features. Each item was treasured by the establishment which owned it. Abduction of each required audacity and daring. Its removal was designed to create embarrassment for its owners, who, for that reason, were unlikely to call in the police, thus risking scandal and popular ridicule.

Yet, Holmes mused, there were also disharmonies. The stolen objects differed greatly in quality, importance, and size. There seemed to be no pattern to the thefts. The removal of Oriel’s flag had demanded mountaineering ability; Magdalen’s sundial had been neatly prized from its surrounding stonework by someone well versed in the skills of the mason. Only a scholar with a knowledge of rare printed books could have created the forgery which had, briefly, deceived the Radcliffe library staff. Then there were the elements of difficulty and risk. With each escapade these had become greater. There was a considerable gulf between the nocturnal raid on Oriel to remove its standard and the carrying off of the New College painting. The former certainly had the air of a traditional student rag. The latter was a major crime and had called for elaborate and meticulous planning.

That brought one on to the issue of motive. What did the perpetrators want with this bizarre collection of objects? Three of the items had little monetary value. The incunabulum and the painting were, by contrast, highly prized artefacts which could only be disposed of through specialist underworld channels. Holmes dismissed the idea of student escapades.