The Holmes-Dracula File by Fred Saberhagen (best books to read for beginners txt) 📕

   “Ah,” commented the inspector, in a voice devoid of understanding. “Holes. One in the front and one in back.”

   “Indubitably.” Holmes was nettled by this slow-wittedness, and the color returned fully to his cheeks. “They are holes. And what do you make of them?”

   “Well. I don’t know as I’m prepared to say.”

   “Oh, out with it, man. They’re bullet-holes, of course, or I’m prepared to change my career to basket-weaving. Watson, which side of this garment would ordinarily be worn in front? As I thought. It is the front-side bullet-hole, then, that is so well marked with powder burns, showing that the shot was fired at extreme close range. While the hole in back is marked with—nothing. Nothing, mark you, neither burns nor blood.”

   Holmes’ voice had fallen off, as if he now spoke only to himself. Falling into a moment of reverie, he stared off across the river as if the hazed wharves there on the south bank might possess some secret information. Then with a shake of his head he roused himself. “Upon my word, Watson, business is looking up. A month of routine, and then two intriguing puzzles in as many days.”

   Turning back to Lestrade, Holmes asked: “There is, I suppose, no bullet wound upon the woman’s body?”

   “The medical examiner and I both looked, sir. There is none.”   “Then let her poor clay be removed.” Holmes gestured toward the other pier. “Take her up tenderly, as I believe the poet has it.” But he was actually smiling as he spoke. At the moment the woman’s tragedy meant less to him than the intellectual challenge it represented.

   Once more he held the garment up. “I think you must agree, Watson, that if this was on the body of a man when these holes were made, the bullet must have passed through or very near his vital organs.”

   “Yes, certainly.” Holmes was now examining the small holes closely with his lens. “The condition of these edges indicates that the bullet passed through the garment after it was wetted. It is still far from dry; let us say that it was wetted no more than about twelve hours ago—probably by immersion, for last night there was no heavy rain. All these facts are consistent with the hypothesis that the holes were made about the same time that the woman was killed, and the one shot fired from her pistol, the bullet lodging in the shed wall.”

   “Well, it may be. But I don’t see, Mr. Holmes, how all this theorizing now is likely to help us catch a maniac.”

   Holmes let his hand holding the garment fall to his side. His voice was distant. “Lestrade, let me call your attention also to the singular matter of the blood.”

   Lestrade and I both gazed around. “I see no blood,” the Scotland Yard man complained.

   “That, of course, is the singular matter. There is not much left of the German lady’s throat except one gaping wound, which must have bled her life away in moments. But on the boards of this pier there are visible only four small drops of blood-”

   “I saw none at all,” Lestrade protested.

   “—four small drops. And none at all upon her clothing, where some stain would seem inevitable, even after immersion in the river.”

   I ventured: “Is it possible that that terrible wound might have been inflicted while the woman was in the water?”

   “Bravo, Watson! But then, why four drops, instead of none at all? And the absence of the woman’s blood is not the only puzzle. One would think that the man who wore this shirt must have bled copiously himself if he were alive when shot. Even if he were already dead, the bullet’s passage should have left some traces, at least, of flesh and blood upon the fabric. Nor do I see here threads from an undergarment, that might have completely absorbed a small amount of such debris.”

   “Well, I cannot fathom it,” Lestrade admitted. “But the woman is certainly dead, and I do not believe that these details are likely to prove of much importance.”

   “Holmes,” I suggested, “is it possible that this odd garment was draped on some clothier’s dummy or manikin when it was fired at? Or simply held up empty, and the bullet-hole made, with the intention of leaving a totally false clue for the police?”

   My friend shook his head. “It will not do. Would the killer, having put himself to such trouble, then throw into the river the main evidence of his crime, a corpse that might easily have drifted out to sea without ever being discovered? And for whose benefit was the false clue made? For the police? It is only chance that they noticed the rag at all. Was it done to lead me astray? But it is only by chance, again, that I was called in on the investigation. No, Watson. Besides, the indications are that a real man has recently worn this shirt.”

   “Indications?” I asked. “Well, the bloodstains, for example.”

   “Here, now!” Lestrade was beginning to bristle. “You’ve just now told us that the bullet drew no blood.”

   My friend spread out the shirt again in his long fingers—which, I saw unhappily, had just acquired a slight tremor. “That is so. But I shall be very much surprised if these traces here upon the right sleeve, just at the elbow, do not prove to be dried blood. The spots are quite small but they are several in number, as if more than one sample of blood had been drawn from the wearer. Yes, Lestrade, a man has worn this garment recently. But apart from the obvious facts that he is tall, lean, robust though no longer young, and is or was an unwilling patient, there is as yet little that I can say about him.” He crumpled the shirt together in his hands, but continued to stare at it.

   Lestrade opened his