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“Should we not ask Lestrade to seek out the Baroness?”

“And lose the only hope we have of recovering the letter? No, Watson, we shall attend this auction sale. We are permitted to bid any sum, but I have other plans – I recommend you bring your pistol.”

His pipe then claimed his attention, and it was not until the cab was taking us to Charing Cross station that I was able to ask Holmes why the Baroness had gone to so much trouble to disguise the rendezvous.

He answered readily enough. “Because I know our good friend Lestrade is hot on the track of both the Baroness and Meyer, though he has orders not to take them up. Why else did the first message, ‘The circle contains a stop’ appear? It conveys: ‘Danger of being quodded’. The Baroness feared arrest and that is what gave us our second chance, Watson, the delay between the messages. There must be no question of failure now.”

We descended from the London, Chatham and South-Eastern Railway train at half-past ten at Blackheath station, whence it was but a short drive up from the village to the wild heathland and the Dover Road, and then to Shooter’s Hill. All conversation had ceased, and one might well have imagined us as Scarlet Pimpernels in a desperate race to Dover. Indeed, our own mission was of even more importance. Our driver halted at an old mounting block near the summit of the hill and no sooner was he paid than Holmes was striding eagerly down the hill back towards London, ignoring the dust thrown up by passing vans and carriages. A milk cart swayed dangerously near, its measuring cans almost catching my friend, and its driver grinning infuriatingly. The air was sweet and fragrant after the smoke of London, and in the villa gardens late tulips, giving way to the blue and purples of May, made a pretty sight after the grimy and blackened buildings bordering the streets of London.

However, we had no time to linger over such pleasures. Already Holmes was striding up the path that led to the tradesmen’s door of a sizeable villa. I struggled to keep abreast of him, but by the time I reached the door he was already rapping upon it for the second time. When no answer came, he thrust it open, having found it unlocked. I patted the pistol in my pocket for reassurance, as I followed him in. There was something about the place I did not like. Perhaps it was its silence, its grey coldness. We walked into a surprisingly large and airy kitchen, and the sensation of an empty house intensified.

“We are somewhat early,” I commented, merely for the sake of breaking the silence to counter my unease.

“Hush.” Sherlock Holmes walked through into the main house, and hard on his footsteps, I came to the parlour door. This too was open.

The house was empty of life indeed, but the appalling sight that met our eyes told us that life had not long fled from it. My hand was at my pistol even as my eyes took in the terrible scene before us. Sprawled on the Persian rug before the hearth was a woman’s body, clad in black bombazine, and its sightless, staring eyes turned horribly towards us; blood covered the carpet and was splattered on the walls. There was no weapon to be seen, only a profusion of blood to suggest a stab wound in the chest. But there was worse. By the window overlooking the rear garden lay the body of another woman. This one was of a somewhat younger woman, perhaps forty, old for the mob cap and print gown she wore. The maid had died in the same appalling way as her mistress, whom I presumed to be the cook-housekeeper. I hurried to confirm what I knew must be the case, that there would be no pulse to be found in either.

“Is there life, Watson?”

“In neither, Holmes,” I replied quietly, rising to my feet after a brief examination of both bodies. “What devilry is this? To stab the housekeeper and the maid?”

He made an impatient gesture. “You see, but you do not observe, Watson. This may well be the housekeeper, but that is no serving maid. What maid could afford such kid boots, or keep her hands in such fine condition?