The Adventure of the Second Stain

A Sherlockian pastiche with a chilling conclusion by Larry Lefkowitz

Howard K. Elcock’s artwork for “The Adventure of the Three Garridebs,” The Strand Magazine, vol. 69 (1926).

Although Holmes allowed me to recount “The Adventure of the Second Stain,” he was in no hurry to allow me to present to the public, “The Adventure of the First Stain.” Now, however, he has now agreed with me that it is time to rectify the error. “Best not to leave any stain unremoved, Watson.”

It began on a cold winter’s day following a night of snow. The horse dung had melted holes in spots and the horses’ hooves had cleared paths in others, but the snow had not yet turned to a dirty brown amalgam. A few icicles hung outside our window. Holmes had lit his pipe and held his slippered feet to the cheerful blaze of the fire.

When the bell rang, Holmes commented, “That’s the telegraph boy with a wire.”

I stared at him in wonder. “How do you know, Holmes?”

“Such a careless ring reflects its having become routine.”

It was indeed the telegraph boy. Holmes took the wire, read it, chuckled, and tossed it over to me. It was a request for assistance from inspector Lestrade. In his wires, Lestrade never failed to include the word “startling,” “unusual,” “peculiar,” or “vexing” prefixing the word “case.” If it was a real puzzler, he employed more than one such description in combination, as in the present instance.

“Come on, Watson, this may prove to be interesting,” said Holmes, reaching for his cloak. “It seems Lestrade has some real need for our assistance.”

Our hansom pulled up before an impressive townhouse, indicative that its owner had ample means and probably an estate in the country. I hastened to enter, but Holmes stopped me with a firm hand on my arm. “Do you know, Watson, that it is one of the curses of a mind with a turn like mine that I must look at everything with reference to my on special subject. You look at these townhouses and you are impressed by their beauty. I look at them and the only thought which comes to me is a feeling of the impunity with which crime may be committed there.”

Lestrade’s bulldog features lit up with pleasure when he saw us. “You’ll be interested in this one, Holmes, a clean murder if ever I saw one. And of a woman.”

The victim, wearing a dress of dove-colored satin with ostrich feather trimming, lay upon a Persian rug of unusual richness. The soft light of the overhead lamp fell upon her, playing over a portion of her grave, aristocratic face and tinting with a dull, metallic sparkle the rich coils of her luxurious hair. One white arm and hand lay extended at her side. Her whole pose and figure projected a portrait of melancholy beauty. Her face bore no signs of the anguish or hate we had often noted on the face of a murder victim, almost as if she had looked upon her dispatcher with nobles oblige.

“Do you recognize her, Holmes?” inquired Lestrade.

The tall, austere figure of Homes bent over and looked closely at her face. “Viscountess Waverly.”

“The same,” confirmed the detective.

“How old, Lestrade?”

“Nine and twenty.”

“She had excellent taste in perfume, Lestrade – ‘Blue Jessamine.’ There are seventy-five scents which it is very necessary that a criminal expert should be able to distinguish from each other. ‘Blue jessamine’ is number eighteen in my listings.”

Lestrade fidgeted. “Is all this really relevant?”

“Dr. Watson would tell you that these little digressions of mine sometimes prove in the end to have some bearing on the matter.”

Lestrade bent over the body and pulled back her dress, revealing a perforation beneath the heart area.

“When was she killed, Watson?” Holmes asked me.

“A few hours ago,” I said.

“The weapon?” Holmes turned to Lestrade.

“None was found. It seems to have melted into thin air.”

“Perhaps the murderer took it with him,” I said.

Holmes was examining carefully the carpet near the body. “A stain of some sort here,” pronounced Holmes.

“We did not notice,” said Lestrade.

Holmes glanced at me with his “I’m not surprised” glance. He sniffed at the stain. “It has no odor. I believe it is of water, but I will take a portion of the carpet to be sure. He took a small knife from his pocket and expertly cut out the piece.

I could not myself see the bearing of this incident, but I clearly perceived that Holmes was weaving it into the general scheme which he had formed in his brain.

A lamp in the form of a silver ‘Aladdin’s lamp’ was hung from a silver chain. As it burned, it filled the air with a subtle and aromatic odor.

I nodded at the lamp. “The late Viscountess possessed an exquisite, if exotic, taste in lamps and scents.”

“’Oytzers of Xerxes,’ pronounced Holmes. “It originated in Persia. Number thirty-six in my list of perfumes. It contains a balsamic base.”

Holmes checked the windows, opening them and peering out.

Lestrade watched him with resigned patience, long since familiar with his punctilious methodology. “You have evidently seen more in this room than was visible to me.”

“No, but I fancy I may have deduced a little more. I imagine that you saw all that I did.”

I gazed upon the lady’s features, stung by the unnecessary demise of such a beauty.

“Well, for now, we have only the stain,” said Holmes when he had finished his examinations. “Come around this evening about seven, if you can, Lestrade, and I will let you know what the stain is. And bring with you, please, any information on Viscountess Waverly.”

Lestrade nodded. “Right, Mr. Holmes.”

Back at Baker Street, Holmes grabbed a bit of beef off the side board, thrust it between two pieces of bread in rough homage to the Earl of Sandwich’s contribution to cuisine, and between setting up his chemical apparatus, finished it off. I prepared myself a quick repast before the malodorous chemicals would render my appetite nugatory. My rapid ingestion was accompanied by my companion’s no doubt food-inspired, if not particularly relevant, comment, “You will remember, Watson, how the dreadful business of the Abernetty family was first brought to my notice by the depth which the parsley had sunk into the butter on a hot day.”

I did not remember, but nodded with which I trusted was an appreciatory nod.

Holmes was soon involved in much heating of retorts and distilling of vapors, ending in a smell which almost drove me out of the apartment. Holmes was oblivious to all save his results.

“Just as I had surmised, Watson. H20.”

“Water, Holmes? What bearing can it possibly have on the murder? Viscountess Waverly wasn’t drowned.”

“No, not according to the quantity of the stain. There is also that little matter of the chest wound.”

“I was being droll, Holmes.”

“I never doubted it, Watson.”

Lestrade was prompt, as usual, and acceded to Holmes offer of a whiskey and soda. “Not during official office hours, mind you,” said Lestrade, “but after official hours … Now what have you found, Mr. Holmes?”

“As I had predicted – water.”

Lestrade seemed disappointed. “We found no glass.”

“Perhaps it wasn’t water to be drunk.”

“What else, then? She didn’t die from drowning.”

“Great minds …” said Holmes, looking at me.

“What’s that?” exclaimed Lestrade.

“Nothing of importance. Yet I feel that the water will play a part. My experience over the years has shown me that the seemingly unimportant clue often turns out to be important and often crucial. Now let me hear your report on Viscountess Waverly.”

I will spare the reader Lestrade’s report. Save to say that the Viscountess had the usual history of a known family, the usual education, and social calendar. Holmes listened with half-drooping lids until Lestrade mentioned that she liked skiing.”

“Skiing?” he asked, suddenly alert.

“Yes – skiing. Seems she was a frequent visitor to the famous ski slopes of Europe. Her husband was a former Swiss ski instructor and mountain climber.”

“Indeed,” exclaimed Holmes. “It seems she married beneath her, as we in England like to denote it.”

“Yes,” confirmed Lestrade. “Everyone continued to call her Viscountess Waverly despite her marriage. Tongues wagged for a while, but they stopped when the marriage proved to be a good one, though some people thought he married her for her money.”

“Ah, that is interesting,” Holmes said. “In the event of her death, he may have stood to inherit all. We shall certainly look into that aspect.”

“We will certainly have to look into something,” mused Lestrade. “So far we are left with a stain upon the rug.”

“And yet there was something else. A series of marks on the rug. I thought it was part of the figure in the carpet, but perhaps not. We must go back to the victim’s residence. And afterwards, the mortuary. Oh, Watson, be so good as to bring your nail file.”

I could discern that hidden excitement that Holmes felt when he had suddenly discovered a clue.

The same house at night appeared decidedly sinister. Holmes was bent over the carpet with his light like some resolute Diogenes seeking an honest clue. “You see here, Watson and Lestrade, these markings. I believe the victim attempted to leave a message.”

Lestrade shook his head. “Mr. Holmes, there was never a man like you for attentiveness to clues that otherwise would go overlooked.”

Holmes waved away the compliment, though his smile showed that it had pleased him.

“A message Holmes?” I said. “With what?”

“With her nails,” said Holmes grimly. I can make out what appears to be an ‘i’ and a ‘c’, then two letters I cannot decipher, then an ‘l’ and an ‘e’.”

“Icable?” ventured Lestrade. “The name of the murderer is ‘Icoble,’ ‘Icefle,’ ‘Icimle.’ Whatever one tries forms a strange name if I ever heard one.”

“We shall have to dwell upon all the possibilities,” said Holmes. And now to the mortuary. It’s a bit late, but I know the attendant. Helped him out with a little matter once.”

Which was well, for the attendant opening the door partly at Lestrade’s knock and spying the little detective, said, “Closed at this hour, Inspector – oh, Mr. Holmes.” He opened the door fully, all willingness. “Anyone special I can show you, Mr. Holmes?”

“The Viscountess,” said Lestrade.

The man pulled open a cabinet. Holmes requested my nail file. “Just a bit from under the nails. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find evidence of carpet fibers. The microscope will tell.

“Very thorough, I’m sure, Mr. Holmes, said Lestrade in admiration.

“It has always been my habit to hide none of my methods, either from my friend Watson or from anyone else who might take an intelligent interest in them.”

Back at baker Street, Holmes’ microscope confirmed his surmise as to the fibers. “I hope to be soon be in the position of being able to put into a single coherent narrative one of the most singular and sensational crimes of modern times.”

I observed that Holmes’ eyes were shining and his cheeks tinged with color. Only at such moments have I seen those battle-signals flying.

The next morning, Holmes roused me. “Sorry to knock you up, old boy, but I believe I am on to something. I was playing with the letters which the Viscountess left in the carpet, rearranging them in the hopes of coming up with a name when it suddenly struck me that perhaps she was leaving a clue as to the murderer through the weapon! I believe that she was only able to write part of the name.”

“Yes, the nature of the wound wouldn’t have given her much time.”

“Precisely, Watson. And what I believe that she was attempting to write was ‘ice sickle.’”

“’Ice sickle’?” I exclaimed. ‘Perhaps the wound could have been made by such a weapon’s blade. I am not sure.”

“Well, it’s all we have to go on. An ice sickle is a Russian tool, usually. I wonder if there is a Russian connection. I will look into that, you may be sure.”

The next day found us once again at the Viscountess’ townhouse. Holmes questioned the servants in turn. They were all, save one, faithful retainers in the sense that Viscountess had long retained them in service. Holmes finished questioning them quickly, satisfied with their stories. Only one didn’t fit the pattern. According to a maid, he had been added to the house staff on the insistence of the Viscount’s bother, Malcolm, who had brought him back on one of his frequent trips to Russia. It seemed this brother was a paleontologist who was involved in research into primitive animals. And that his current project was trying to recover a Brontosaurus from the Siberian ice.”

Holmes reacted to this information as if stung. “Watson, what tool would be most needed for hacking a Brontosaurus from its eons in the ice?”

“An ice sickle,” I exclaimed.

“Elementary, my dear Watson,” Holmes beamed at me. “The brother had been informed of his sister’s death, the maid reported, but he said he couldn’t take time off now from his present work of arranging a dinosaur banquet for the Society of Paleontologists.”

“A what?” I asked, askance.

Holmes was amused. “It seems that the Viscountess’ brother thought it would be a rare event to dine on Brontosaurus steak.”

“I should think so. Two hundred-million-year-old steak. I’m not sure, medically speaking, I would myself partake in such an experiment.”

“Oh, I’m not so sure Mrs. Hudson’s beef cutlets are any less dangerous. I, myself, wouldn’t mind having a go – at the steak – not the cutlets.”

“Well, if brother Malcolm is the murderer, I would be exceedingly careful.”

“If I attended, I would wear a suitable disguise. A visiting Australian paleontologist might do nicely. It would also give me a chance to research a considered monograph on the effects of freezing on tissue preservation.”

The reader will not be surprised to learn that Holmes effected just such a disguise, nor that he went to the banquet. But before doing the latter, he tried out the disguise on me. I had just returned from seeing a patient and before I could open the door, it was opened for me.

“You must be Dr. Watson,” said in a pronounced Australian accent a man wearing a large flappy hat at a jaunty angle. “I bid you welcome.”

“See here,” I began to remonstrate. “It just so happens that I live --” The man had removed his hat and his Van Dike beard. “Holmes!” I exclaimed. “I didn’t recognize you!”

“Well, if it fooled you, Watson, who knows me, it should fool Doctor Malcolm Waverly, who does not.”

It was late at night when Holmes returned from the paleontologists’ banquet. I was dozing in my chair, a medical treatise upon my lap, when Holmes entered, the wide hat in one hand, the Van Dyke beard in the other.

“Good of you to wait up for me, Watson” he said.

“How did it go, Holmes?” I inquired.

“The taste of Brontosaurus is interesting, something between venison and frogs-legs. I would like to have brought a piece back with me for you, Watson, but such a culinary treat was permitted solely to host paleontologists – those from England. ‘When you Aussies throw a banquet with some Jurassic kangaroo as dinner, you can take leftovers for your friends,’ I was told.”

“And what of the other little matter?”

“You mean the murder – the Viscountess’ brother as suspect?”

“Precisely, Holmes. Did you draw him out?”

“I did. After dinner, when the cigars were distributed, I drew him aside. He was a thick-set, burly man with a brown, weather-beaten face, a splendid forehead, and blue eyes which were keen to the verge of fierceness. At once he sprung at me. ‘Your head! He said.

“’What of it?’ I replied.”

“’I had hardly expected, Mr. Wallaby (my name for the evening), so dolichocephalic or such a well-marked supra-orbital development. You put the dinosaurs to shame.’”

“I bowed and thanked him for his intended compliment, and immediately complimented him on the identicality of his ears to those of his late sister. ‘There is the same shortening of the pinna, the same broad curve of the upper lobe, the same convolution of the inner cartilage. In all essentials, it is the same ear.’”

He looked at me closely, but didn’t take the bait. I turned the subject to his work with particular interest in how he de-iced the Brontosaurus. I feigned interest in his discussion of block and tackle and such, but finally asked him if he or his workers used ice sickles in their work.”

“’To be sure,’ he said, to my inner delight.”

“’And you use the sickle yourself?’”

“’Well, mostly the workers, but if need be –”

“’And would you, if need be, employ one on a human being?’ I said, believing, occasionally, in the direct question as the best method of catching a criminal with his defenses down.”

“He seemed genially puzzled by my remark or an expert liar, and seemed, suddenly, to find me odd. “How, Mr. Wallaby, would you use one on a human being – unless he is encased in ice, of course. Ah, I see, a Neanderthal caught in the ice-age. Now that would be a find. Of course, no banquet in that case. Not in England, at any rate. I don’t know about Australia.”

“I was referring to the possibility of such a tool being, you will forgive me, employed in the murder of your sister.”

“His draw dropped lower than that of a Cro-Magnon man when he saw what I meant. ‘You suspect me, Mr. W—who are you?’ he thundered in a voice that would have done a Brontosaurus proud.”

“I removed my wide hat and my beard and bowed. ‘Mr. Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective.’”

“’And your presence here is to establish whether I am a suspect?’”

“’Yes, an effort in which I have met with some success.’”

“You could have saved yourself the trouble, Mr. Holmes. I was as saddened as anyone by my sister’s death, and had it not been for the banquet arrangements being necessary at the same time, I could have told you that I have an alibi. There are five gentlemen here from the British Paleontology Society who will swear that I was working all night with them the night of my sister’s death to have all in readiness for the banquet. I suggest we summon them at once.’”

“And he did, and they did verify his story.”

“It seems pretty convincing,” I said.

“Yes, Watson, especially as one of their number, Professor Bronte, I have known for years. It was he who had procured for me an invitation to the banquet. ‘A pity you didn’t let me know the purpose of your mission. I could have saved you an appearance here!’ he said.”

“’Not at all,’ I replied. ‘Not everyone gets a chance to feast on Brontosaurus.’”

“So, the brother is not the murderer,” I commented.

“’It seems not,’ said Holmes. “I made a blunder, my dear Watson – which is, I am afraid, a more common occurrence then anyone would think who only knew me through your memoirs.”

His remark surprised me. There was something in his masterly grasp of a situation and his keen, incisive reasoning, which made it a pleasure to me to study his system of work, and to follow the quick, subtle methods by which he disentangled the most inextricable mysteries. So accustomed was I to his invariable success that the very possibility of his failing had ceased to enter my head.

The next day and the one following, Holmes possessed a mood which his friends would call taciturn, and others morose. He ran out and ran in, smoked incessantly, played snatches on his violin, sank into reveries, devoured sandwiches at irregular hours, and hardly answered the casual questions I put to him. It was evident to me that things were not going well with his quest.

I tried once more to bring him out toward the evening of the second day. “I was sure that the ice sickle would lead to something.”

“Yes, it seemed the key to the case, but now it seems the ice sickle is not the murder weapon, although from the letters in the carpet, it appeared so definite. Circumstantial evidence is a very tricky thing,” added Holmes thoughtfully. “It may seem to point very straight to one , but if you shift your own point of view a little, you may find it pointing in an equally uncompromising manner to something entirely different.”

“Once again, as Lestrade would put it, the weapon has disappeared into thin air,” I said.

Holmes eyes suddenly took on that keen look that indicated a thought of profound importance. “That’s it, Watson – ‘thin air,’” he exclaimed, gripping my shoulder. “We have overlooked the husband, the former alpine guide. The ice sickle is resurrected.”

“You mean, Holmes, that he might have used an ice sickle. I didn’t know that mountain climbers used it.”

“Nor did I. But I shall soon find out.”

Mountain climbers did not, As Holmes learned, to his disappointment. “Yet, Watson, he could have gotten hold of one. What troubles me is whether the wound could have been made by such a tool. You were not sure.”

Bring me one and I will let you know my opinion.”

That afternoon, Holmes strode in with an ice sickle tucked like an umbrella under his arm. “I obtained this from a former client who operates an ice house. It certainly is capable of doing in someone.”

“Someone, but not the Viscountess Waverly,” I pronounced after I had examined the device. “It would have made a wider wound. The fatal would was made by something more delicate, a stiletto, perhaps.”

“Something stiletto-like,” Holmes mumbled, pacing about the room in that way of his of displacing his nervous energy. Suddenly he stopped. “Watson, what a fool “I’ve been!”

“How’s that, Holmes?”

“There is the murder weapon,” he exclaimed, pointing.

I followed the direction of his finger.

“The window?”

“The icicle.”

“Come now, Holmes. The icicle is thin enough to create the wound we saw, perhaps, but you must admit that it is an unlikely weapon.”

“Yet it all fits, Watson. The chain of evidence is resurrected. The stain of water –the melted icicle. The narrow wound. And most of all, the message. ‘Icicle,’ not ‘ice sickle.’”

I stood up in amazement. It seemed so easy once Holmes explained it. I marveled that I had not seen it before.

Holmes placed a hand on my shoulder. “I see that you understand.”

“I do, Holmes. But the murderer?”

“Our ex-ski and mountain-climbing guide. He has been in close contact with snow and icicles. An ingenious choice of a weapon, you will admit. No weapon to be found, and almost no clue of it. If we had arrived a little later, there would have been no stain. And even with the stain, the police would have paid no attention to it, did pay no attention to it.”

“The guide’s mistake was having you on the case. He couldn’t have anticipated that.”

“Perhaps not. Nor would he have thought his wife clever enough to leave her clue. No doubt he left at once after the murder so he wasn’t around to discover it. It seems she was possessed of a character worth far more than her husband’s.”

“The woman sometimes is, Holmes.”

“So you say, Watson, so you say.”

Holmes had planned to bring Lestrade and myself and confront the husband. But before the confrontation could be arranged, the husband got wind somehow that he was under suspicion, perhaps from some hint inadvertently dropped in hostility by the Viscountess’ brother, who given food for thought by Holmes ice sickle inquiry, had himself begun to build a connection with the husband’s mountain-climbing past. The two had never liked one another. In any event, the husband fled the country. England was saved the expense of his extradition and imprisonment when the freighter he had slipped out on struck an iceberg and sank with all hands off the coast of Newfoundland.