The Moor - Laurie R. King [99]
examined the rest: another shirt, both patched and in need of laundering, and a pair of thick socks, also dirty; a pen and a small block of lined paper; a yellowback novel with a sprung cover and water damage along its top edge (the product, I diagnosed, of a book dealer's pavement display, already cheap but rendered nearly unsaleable by an unanticipated shower of rain), and a copy of a book by Baring-Gould that I had not found in his study, although I had been looking for it: his guide to Devon.
I picked up the guidebook, checked the inside cover for a name, and found the first sheet carefully torn out. Pethering concealing his own name, perhaps, or was this book stolen from a library? I turned to the index and found Dartmoor, thumbed through to the central section on the moor, and found that Pethering had been there before me. He had used a tentative hand and a pencil with hard lead, but had made up for his lack of assertiveness in sheer quantity, correcting Baring-Gould's spelling, changing the names of some locations, and writing comments, annotations, and disagreements that crowded the side margins and flipped over onto the top and bottom.
I held out a random page to Holmes, who was busy dismantling a patent pencil. "Would you say this handwriting belongs to Pethering?"
He glanced at it and went back to the object in his hands. "Without a doubt."
"Do you think Fyfe would object to my borrowing it? Even without Pethering's comments, I had intended to read the book, only I couldn't find a copy in the study."
"You may have noticed that the study is now largely inhabited by volumes no one has valued enough to carry off. Gould keeps this book in the drawer of his bedside table along with his New Testament and Book of Common Prayer. And no, I'm sure Fyfe would not notice it gone."
"Baring-Gould keeps a guide to Devon in his bedside table?" I said. It seemed an odd place to find it, particularly as the man could scarcely see to read, even in a bright light.
"Sentimentality, I suppose." Holmes gave up on the pencil and tossed it back in the bag. "He can no longer get onto the moor, and can't even see it from the house, so he keeps his books easily to hand, along with one or two photographs and a sheaf of sketches." His words and gesture were so matter-of-fact as to be dismissive, but the lines etched on his face were not so casual.
I was so struck by the poignancy of the image that I did not think about his words until we had left the inn and were going down the hill towards Lew House.
"You said he keeps his books beside his bed. What are the others?"
"Just Devon and his book on Dartmoor. Oh, and a few manuscript copies of some of the songs he collected."
"I should very much like to look at the Dartmoor book."
"He wouldn't mind, I'm sure. It's not particularly rare, just something he treasures."
"Good. Now, how are we dividing up?"
"I shall follow Pethering's track up onto the moor, if you hunt down Miss Baskerville in Plymouth."
I had known he would suggest this particular arrangement rather than its reverse—even towards me, Holmes was usually gallant about shouldering the less comfortable tasks. Of course, this meant he took possession of the more interesting leads as well, but in this case I would not argue for the privilege of walking back out onto the moor. I merely asked when the next train left Coryton. Holmes took his watch from an inside pocket and glanced at it.
"Mrs Elliott will have an ABC, but I believe you'll find going to Lydford will put you on a train in a bit under two hours."
That would leave me time to change from my habitual trousers into the more appropriate all-purpose tweed skirt I had brought. Coming past the stables, I put my head inside and asked Mr Dunstan please to get the dog cart ready again. I smiled a sympathetic apology at his