25. THE CASE OF THE BROKEN WATCH

A case from years earlier raises suspicions...

“It seems that Lucy Gharnghast is proving to be a trial to her parents, who only want the best for her, according to the Times this morning,” said Holmes suddenly, breaking off from his daily routine of absorbing everything his paper had to say on a wide range of subjects and staring in my direction.

“It’s a pretty name, Lucy,” I commented, not being at all interested in the comings and goings of rich young ladies in need, as Jane Austin would have put it, of a rich husband.

“That’s as may be, Watson, but Lady Gharnghast appears to be in a state of severe distress over it,” said Holmes, “and she has been a client of ours, remember, some years ago? The case of the broken watch?”

“I’ve yet to write that one up,” I said, “but then, it would take a genius to unravel the events and convert a simple little problem into a full blown adventure, and too much time has elapsed since the watch was broken.!”

“You underestimate things, Watson,” said Holmes mildly. “The broken watch was one thing...”

“It provided an accurate estimation of the time when Lady Gharmghast was accosted in her bed,” I said, “the intruder, Benjamin Gamble, a guest in the house and one liable to somnambulism if I recall, having dropped it and trodden on it in his haste to get away when he realised where he was and that she was awake.”

“And the watch having stopped at precisely the moment his foot stamped on it. Yes, Watson, a common enough means of establishing time in police stories and yet rare in real life.”

“You know that it’s rare, Holmes?”

“I merely have to summarise the number of times a broken watch has proved useful in a case that we have solved because of it, and arrive at the answer of none,” he said, impishly. “Even in the case of the broken watch, as we like to call it. The watch was stopped at three minutes past three, if my memory serves me correctly...”

“...as it always does, Holmes,” I interrupted.

“Quite. Well, at three minutes past three that watch might have been anywhere! It could have stopped, having unwound to the point that it would no longer function, hours before. It might have ceased functioning at three minutes past three in the afternoon rather than at three minutes past three in the early hours of the morning! Yet we used the broken watch as evidence that a nervous young sleepwalker was innocently accosting Lady Gharnghast at precisely three minutes past three in the morning of the very day when she found her bed covers ruffled and herself somewhat breathless when her husband came from his own room to see what was disturbing her.”

“And the bounder was hauled before the magistrate and bound over,” I pointed out, “on the evidence of that watch.”

“Why do you call him a bounder, Watson? What is it about the person that makes you assume that he is, of all things, a bounder? After all, he was a guest of theirs. They knew him, one would assume, quite well. And his sleepwalking was shown to be a long term affliction of his.”

“Well, he was in a lady’s bedroom, and that is usually understood to be the most personal of private places,” I said, “not even Lord Gharnghast dares tread into it without invitation, I recall! You must remember that many inhabitants of large houses where there is an abundance of bedrooms choose to sleep separately even when they are man and wife. It solves the problem of snoring to start with, among others...”

“And why would her husband require such an invitation?” he asked me mischievously, knowing the answer and delighting in obliging me to put the natural desires of a happily married couple into words.

“You know the answer to that, Holmes,” I replied, refusing to take the bait.

“It is elementary, my dear fellow,” he purred, “Lord Gharnghast, like many men, occasionally wishes to embrace his lady wife and maybe even place a delicate little kiss upon her fragrant head! There’s nothing at all unusual about that! So he requests her permission, and if she is so inclined she gives it. So why was the blackguard who intruded into the good lady’s boudoir there? What was his motive at three minutes past three at the dead of night? Or wasn’t he actually there at that time at all? Was he there, perchance, at a different hour and had he established the wrong hour for his visitation? Or did he want everyone to concentrate on that time rather than any other?”

“What are you getting at, Holmes?” I asked. “The case was over twenty-odd years ago and nothing has been said between then and now!”

“I put it to you, Watson, that events that night flowed very differently to the version we accepted at the time on evidence of a broken watch, the very same version as described by Lady Gharnghast and even admitted to by Benjamin Gamble when he was arraigned before the magistrate for intruding on a lady’s privacy. It may be true that he was found by the good lady’s husband at three minutes past three, but at what hour did he arrive there? Or had he merely sleepwalked quite inadvertently a moment or two earlier like he claimed?”

“You’re not making any sense at all, Holmes,” I remonstrated, “and what has all this got to do with the difficulties that Lady Gharnghast is having with the beautifully named Lucy? And why is such a personal matter even in The Times?”

“It is the season, as you probably know even though you despise it...” said Holmes, indicating what he assumed to be my attitude with a circular wave of his hand.

“Despise is a strong word, but I find it offensive,” I said, “that young ladies should be carted off to ball after ball in their most expensive finery, in the hope of ensnaring a husband, when all they really need to do is, in normal society, find attraction in a gentleman by chance, which is how my dear departed Mary and I met. But the debutantes’ balls, they’re more like cattle markets than civilised meetings of young people seeking a partner for the remainder of their lives, and I find the very notion quite tasteless.”

“Yes, yes, Watson, but it is the way of things,” suggested Holmes. “Anyway, Lady Gharnghast was interviewed for the society column this week, and they included a photograph of her with her wretched daughter of whom she was complaining bitterly, the one who refuses to parade like, as you suggest, cattle,” murmured Holmes. “She is of the new breed of young woman, the ones you seem to applaud, those who are rather keen on achieving better things than trapped husbands, who feel the need to contribute in more worthy ways to society and even be educated beyond the capabilities of their female brains.”

“Good for her!” I applauded.

“So take a look at the image in the paper, Watson,” said Holmes.

I walked across to where he was sitting and glanced at the picture in the paper. Then I took it from Holmes and stared intently at it.

“Good Heavens!” I said.

“Precisely,” smiled Holmes, “for that young lady with the merest hint of a scowl on her face could be the female image of the young man who, at three minutes past three in the early hours of a morning twenty-odd years ago, was apprehended in Lady Gharnghast’s boudoir where he was supposed, I believe, to be briefly sleepwalking quite innocently and accidentally...”

“And where, if this picture suggests anything, he may have lingered with Lady Gharnghast for quite some time...” I breathed.

“Precisely. And it may explain why, despite years of trying, the Gharnghasts have failed to produce siblings for the strong-minded young woman,” murmured Holmes, “if it turns out that poor Gharnghast is, what do they call it, firing blanks?”

“So the case of the broken watch...” I breathed.

“Isn’t even over yet,” nodded Holmes. “though may I suggest we say nothing of this to anyone concerned?”

© Peter Rogerson 13.08.17