The Mammoth Book of New Sherlock Holmes Adventures - Mike Ashley [142]
“You have left me a long way behind,” I grumbled.
“Consider the patterns, Watson,” he said.
“The patterns on the casket?” I asked. “What of them?”
“No, Watson,” he sighed. “The patterns of the evidence as it unfolded.” He leaned forward.
“Let us begin at the beginning. The newspapers told us that snow would not lie and grass would not grow upon the Black Barrow. I admit I took that for folklore or exaggeration, but you heard Edgar say that it was the case. What did that suggest to you?”
I confessed to no idea at all.
“Watson!” he expostulated. “You have been in mining districts; you have seen heaps of coal waste on which grass will not grow nor the snow lie.”
“But that is caused by fires smouldering within the heaps,” I said. “Ordinary soil does not smoulder, Holmes.”
“No indeed, Watson, but that analogy led me to believe that something within the barrow might be emitting some influence or emanation that warmed its surface yet discouraged growth.”
“Such as what?” I asked.
“I admit that, at first, I could see no solution along that line, but then I recalled pitchblende.”
“Pitchblende?” I echoed. “What on earth is that?”
“It is an ore, of uranium, found in several places. For centuries German miners have been aware of it and afraid of it, for they knew that it could cause burns and sickness. Now, you will recall my telling you of my experiments in coal-tar derivatives at the Montpelier laboratories in France, earlier this year?”
“Certainly.”
“Among my colleagues there was a French scientist, Jacques Curie, a specialist in electro-magnetism. He introduced me to a remarkable group of people who have theories about that substance. One was a Monsieur Bacquerel, another was Curie’s own brother, Pierre, and another was Pierre’s assistant and fiancee, a determined and intelligent young Polish lady called Marie Sklodovska. All of them believe that pitchblende emits some influence that can affect its surroundings.”
“Good Heavens!” I said. “This sounds more like witch-craft than science.”
“I assure you that they are all very fine scientists, Watson, and it occurred to me to proceed on the basis that they are right and that pitchblende, or something like it, had been hidden in that barrow when it was first set up.”
He paused. “That would neatly explain our first few facts, but what of the disease? Well, Mr Edgar gave us the answer to that, with his clear proof that the bronze casket had been rifled in the night. Edgar’s spoiled photographs were also the proof that something was in the barrow that spoiled his plates. He failed to realize it, but the later success of his photography was also the proof that something had been removed from the mound. He was sadly wrong about Sir Andrew’s guilt. It was, of course, the younger Lewis. No doubt, as Edgar described, he waited at the inn for his father’s return, and Sir Andrew, fresh from his discovery, would certainly have mentioned it to his son. And so Anthony Lewis robbed the Black Barrow that night as a revenge on his father for refusing to meet his debts, and by so doing he brought about his own death.”
“By Jove!” I said, “I begin to see. Everyone who came near was affected in some degree, but he slept with it beneath his bed,” and I shuddered at the thought of the luckless youth asleep while the malign emanations that Holmes had described seeped into him hour by hour.
“Exactly, Watson. I told you that we had stumbled upon a crime in our enquiries, but it brought with it its own fearful sentence. Sadly, the presence of that baleful urn at the ‘Goat and Boots’ was also responsible for the deaths and other effects in the village, though I suppose we should rejoice at the good fortune of Mrs Henty and young Mary. Evidently the influence of the substance is not entirely malign and, if my friends on the Continent, can refine and control it, it may yet