The Mammoth Book of New Sherlock Holmes Adventures - Mike Ashley [255]
“He was residing in Buckingham Palace as a guest of the King. There is no question of his involvement in this affair.”
“I have no doubt of it, but, if I am to act with the minimum of hindrance I must ask Your Excellency to prevail upon the Prince to leave England at once and return to Constantinople.”
“I will do as you ask, Mr Holmes. The departure of the Prince would take a great weight off my mind.”
He rose from his seat. “Will you accept the case, Mr Holmes?” he asked.
“I will gladly do all I can to assist in this matter,” replied my friend, “but I will need an address at which I may contact you.”
“The Turkish Embassy in Belgrave Square will find me,” replied the Pasha and, after donning his hat and cloak, he departed. When the horses’ hooves had died away in the street outside, I asked Holmes what he intended to do.
“I will have an early night, Watson,” he said, “there will be much to do tomorrow.”
The dawn of the new day saw us having an early breakfast, after which we took a cab for Victoria station, where we boarded the first train to the village of Stoke Morden. As the train rattled towards its destination, Holmes, after watching the scenery fly past for a time, suddenly turned to me and said; “What do you make of the dying man’s last words, Watson?”
“He referred to a salon and pointed at the Turkish Military Attaché,” I said, “On the face of it, it would suggest that he was accusing him of the murder, but I confess I cannot see the significance of his reference to a salon. Could it be that he and the Turk had agreed to meet in a particular salon to discuss some dispute, but that the Turk decided to take matters into his own hands and shoot Simeonov without taking the trouble to discuss the matter first? It seems far-fetched, but I can think of no more plausible explanation.”
“And yet, Watson, other plausible explanations may be offered,” replied Holmes, “It may be, for example, that he was directing those present to some incriminating evidence to be found in a salon that may be known to one of them. I will admit, however, that I do not find such an explanation compelling.”
“There is also the most singular altercation that immediately followed the man’s death, when the Count and the Military Attaché accused one another of murder,” I said.
“Is that how you interpreted it?”
“Yes, what other interpretation could possibly be made?”
“Consider what was actually said,” replied Holmes, “The Count shouted ‘This is your doing, you murderer’ at the Military Attaché, but the Military Attaché did not, in fact, make a counter-accusation, but said, ‘I am not a murderer, you know the truth, ask yourself who is the murderer.’ He did not say ‘I am not a murderer, you are the murderer’; his actual reply would suggest that he did not believe that the Count was the murderer, for if he did he would, presumably, have said so quite openly, since there seems to be little love lost between the two of them.”
“In that case his reply seems further to suggest that both he and the Count know the identity of the murderer,” I said.
“That is, of course possible,” said Holmes, cryptically, and was silent for the rest of the journey.
When we arrived at Stoke Morden, Holmes hailed a cab and asked our driver to take us to Royston Manor, the home of Lord Eversden. After a frosty drive beneath an iron-grey sky, we arrived at the ivy-covered Manor that was the scene of the terrible murder, the commission of which seemed to threaten the peace of the world. We rang the ancient bell and an aged, somewhat lugubrious butler opened the door. Holmes presented his card and asked to see Lord Eversden. We were shown into a large drawing room, where we awaited the arrival of his lordship. Holmes and I stood looking out of window at the bleak winter scene and at the rooks circling and cawing above the trees. Suddenly, the drawing room door was flung open and two men, apparently in the middle of an involved argument, entered together. One was a man