45. THE CASE OF THE GOLDEN SOVEREIGN

A touching little tale (I hope), following on from the smuggler story.

This tale follows the one concerning the smuggler's boat, but can be read on its own. 

Holmes and I had just spent a quiet night sleeping in the cabin of the narrow boat we had hired for our case of the smuggler’s ship on the river. The smugglers that we had been employed to drive into the arms of Authority had set off at the crack of dawn and, as their own more modern vessel passed us, it spluttered to a standstill as a consequence of non-petroleum products mixed in with its fuel, and drifted powerlessly with the flow of the river until it was out of sight. There was a confused noise of shouting and gunshots as the revenue men boarded her.

Meanwhile, we both enjoyed a hearty if cold breakfast.

“Shall I put some sticks of kindling in the fire-box, and light it?” I asked, supposing that Holmes would be only too happy to get back to Baker Street.

“If it pleases you, not yet,” he replied slowly. “I have a memory from my childhood that might fascinate you as my self-appointed biographer,” he added with a smile. “I spent my childhood with my parents not too far from here as the crow flies, and when my father was away on business my mother found a range of fascinating occupations with which to entertain Mycroft and myself. Mycroft, you understand, was then and, of course, still is, seven years older than me, so it was no easy matter for a woman on her own to find activities that appeal to, say, a seven year old and his fourteen year old brother at the same time.”

“I should think not, Holmes,” I grunted.

“Well, one summer she announced that we were to go for a journey by train into the country in order to collect a basket of blackberries in order for our cook to produce a few jars of blackberry jam, which has always been among my favourites. I was delighted, but Mycroft could see little point in that kind of adventure when, he said, jams of a wide variety of fruits are readily available in the village store.”

“Always the practical one, your brother,” I contributed.

“Quite,” said Holmes, thoughtfully. “Anyway, my mother, the dear woman, had to threaten him with the birch and he only grumpily condescended to accompany us when he was reminded how skilled our father can be when it comes to corporal punishment. In order to placate him my mother gave him a gold sovereign for his trouble, and you know how valuable a sovereign is!”

“He still likes his gold,” I grunted, knowing how well the Government rewarded Mycroft for his valuable work on its behalf.

“Quite so,” nodded Holmes, “and to bring my account to a conclusion let me explain what Mycroft did when we reached the area my mother had chosen, one where wild blackberries grow in great profusion, not far from an ancient priory where there dwelt what looked to me like a coven of nuns.”

“Holmes!” I protested.

“Anyway, my mater planned for us to walk round a particular field, attending to picking ripe blackberries as we went, and Mycroft was still being grumpy and generally disagreeable despite his sovereign. The blackberries were both plentiful and delicious, and we picked a good basket full by the time we were half way round the field when I spied Mycroft fidgeting with something golden in his hands, the sovereign, as if he had some devious scheme of his own. You must appreciate that any man who works so closely with the Government as Mycroft does these days must have a devious streak in his nature! And as I watched him I saw him as he lodged his valuable coin in a crack between two crude and unplaned fencing joists.”

“To what purpose?” I asked, my curiosity aroused.

“It was clear to me that he was going to create a scene in which he claimed that awkward climbing across styles and fences had dislodged his sovereign from his pocket, and it was lost. Mother, in her frustration, would most likely offer him a replacement after searching his pockets, and then, with a second sovereign in his possession he would secretly retrieve the first from its hiding place.”

“Cunning,” I nodded, “and bordering on the criminal!”

“Precisely, Watson,” agreed Holmes. “But, you understand, I saw through his plan and it was a simple affair for me to remove the sovereign from its hiding place when he wasn’t looking and conceal it somewhere completely different.”

“Which you did, I suppose?” I grunted.

“Again, precisely,” grinned Holmes. “And that replacement niche for gold was in a crevice of a fallen, rotting tree near the entrance to the field. And, you know, it is less than a mile from here and it has crossed my mind that we might see if it is still there forty years later!”

“If the tree was rotting then it will certainly be rotten now,” I argued.

“Come, Watson! We need the exercise, cooped up in Baker Street for half our lives! And, as I said, it isn’t so far from here.”

And it wasn’t. I knew we couldn’t be far off when we passed a couple of nuns in their full habit, women I would probably have judged to be harsh of countenance had I been able to see more than their eyes. After we passed them Holmes almost crowed his delight when we climbed into a field over a rickety old style.

“The rotten tree!” he pointed.

But the tree wasn’t alone. A woman was sitting on it, supervising two small boys who were running hither and thither through tall grass.

“That’s exactly where my mater sat,” whispered Homes, “and in exactly that position!”

“And you were c**k-a-hoop, like her scoundrels?” I suggested.

“Much quieter, back in the 60s,” he smiled.

“I’ll see what I can see,” he said to me, secretively, and he approached the seated woman.

“Madam, you take me back over the years,” he said, politely, “to when my own mother brought me here with my brother, is search of blackberries.”

“There won’t be any of those yet,” she replied, “not for two months at least. But I will probably return in the autumn for free fruits.”

“May I … would you think it improper if I...” and he sat on the rotten tree and looked around at it for where he might have concealed the sovereign many years earlier.

“There was a crack in this old tree trunk,” he explained, “and when I was a boy...”

“But that would have been an age ago!” she laughed, “and this rotten timber hasn’t been here above five years! There was another one before it, though, that I recall, and that other one was very special to me for one day, when the twins were younger, little more than babies, I brought them here and sat on this very spot and, I doubt you’ll believe this, a sliver of the rotten wood fell to the ground and I discovered, inside its diseased pulp, a golden sovereign!”

“How fortuitous!” I said as if astounded. “Just the one?”

She smiled at me. “Just the one,” she agreed, “and ever since then I have returned quite often in case my luck is repeated, for I have the twins, who are a mighty handful, and their father was slaughtered in the wars, though he did live long enough to return to us for a week before his flesh finally gave out. So if another tree were to yield to me another sovereign it would be more than welcome.”

“A sorrowful story,” muttered Holmes. “Tell me of the boys’ father?”

“He was a good man,” she sighed, “and he gave his life in the wars. He almost lived, but the poisons that were eating him eventually took him from me. He always said that if the army doctor, what was his name? Watson, I think he said it was, if had been able to continue his care for him he might well have survived. He loved that man, he did, and the care he took with him.”

Both Holmes and I rattled around in our pockets, and as if we were twins ourselves we each pulled a handful of coins and pressed them into her hands.

“These are from your husband’s Doctor,” I said, almost choking.

“And these are from his friend,” added Holmes, “come on, Watson, back to the boat before we miss the tide!”

And we almost ran off, lighter of pocket and heavier of heart as we climbed over the wooden style and out of the field, leaving a mother staring with disbelief at the contents of her two hands.

“The country ought to take greater care of the kin of those who die for victory,” muttered Holmes. “I have often said that,” he added.

© Peter Rogerson 13.09.17