Young Sherlock Holmes_ Death Cloud - Andrew Lane [20]
‘A lovely lady,’ Crowe murmured.
Sherlock led the way round the house to where the manure was stacked prior to being spread across the vegetable patches and the orchards. The smell was rank and warm despite the brandy-soaked handkerchief, penetrating his nose and mouth and coating his throat with a bilious tang.
The shed was dilapidated, and Sherlock and Crowe had to remove piles of broken wood and rusty farm implements before they could manoeuvre the body inside. Sunlight spearing in through holes in the roof and walls illuminated the body in hand-sized patches, leaving the rest of it mercifully in darkness. It looked to Sherlock like some grotesque life-sized doll that had been carelessly thrown away, arms and legs dangling over the edges of the wheelbarrow.
‘No point in both of us stayin’,’ Crowe said, stepping outside and removing his handkerchief. ‘You head back to the house. Get one of the maids to run a bath for you – a hot one. Scrub yourself down with carbolic soap. Change your clothes, and leave the ones you’ve got on out for burnin’, if you have enough spare. If not, get the maid to take them away for washin’.’
After his bath, when his skin was red and raw from scrubbing with the dark red carbolic soap, Sherlock dressed in his spare clothes and left the house. He could still smell the tarry scent that the soap had left on his skin, and his eyes stung. Coming round the corner of the house, wiping the persistent tears from his eyes, he saw Amyus Crowe standing outside the dilapidated shed in conversation with a burly man in a black frock coat. That must be the local doctor. As Sherlock got closer he could hear the doctor’s high-pitched, arrogant voice saying: ‘We need to alert the civic authorities. This is the second body we’ve found displaying similar symptoms. If this is the plague then we need to take precautions right away. Tomorrow’s fair will have to be cancelled and all the public houses closed in order to prevent the spread of the disease. Heavens, we may even have to cordon off the roads leading in and out of the town until the danger has passed!’
‘Hold your horses,’ Amyus Crowe said in his slow, deep voice. ‘We’ve only got two bodies. Two raindrops don’t make a rainstorm.’
‘But if you wait until the rain is pouring down before you put your umbrella up, you’ll get soaked,’ the doctor rejoined.
Suddenly Sherlock realized that he knew more than they did. The body, the boils, the cloud of smoke – all this was exactly what Matty Arnatt had seen when the man in town had died. What was the smoke?
‘Let’s at least wait until we can get an expert to look at the bodies.’
The doctor shook his head in annoyance. ‘What expert? I can perform an autopsy, but the sight of those swollen buboes is enough for me. We have to assume that we’re dealing with bubonic plague and act accordingly.’
Crowe raised a reassuring hand. ‘I’m acquainted with a lecturer in tropical diseases who lives in Guildford. Professor Winchcombe. We could send for him. I’ll write a letter.’
‘Write if you wish,’ the doctor said, ‘but while you’re doing that I’ll be talking to the mayor and the town council, and the Bishop of Winchester as well.’
‘What’s he got to do with it?’ Crowe asked.
‘Farnham Castle is the official residence of His Grace.’
Sherlock moved closer, but Amyus caught sight of him and waved him away. Sherlock felt a flash of irritation. It was he who had found the body, but now Crowe seemed to want to keep him out of it. What did Crowe expect him to do – hang around until the conversation was finished and then just pick up their lesson where it had stopped? He had better things to do with his time. If Crowe wanted to complain, let him write to Mycroft.
Feeling irritation churning inside him, Sherlock turned and walked away into the woods.
Once he was in the trees, the house was lost from sight within moments. The ground gave spongily beneath his feet as he walked. All