The Three Locks by Bonnie MacBird (learn to read books txt) 📕

is perhaps understandable.’ At my silence, he continued, ‘Watson, as I have said before, I do not exist to supply the deficiencies of the police.’

‘Yes, you do.’

‘In any case, I think I shall leave Madame to them.’

‘Well, it is fortunate for Deacon Buttons that you did not do so in Cambridge. He might have hanged for a crime he did not commit. Or ended up in the clutches of Lamb.’

Holmes smiled and adjusted the cushions. He looked about to doze.

‘Holmes, on another matter. I’ve brought this up twice to no avail. I’m going to pay that Lossop a visit today. With or without you.’

His eyes opened sleepily. ‘Oh, that won’t be necessary, Watson,’ he said. He closed his eyes. ‘That package on the table there. I assisted Mr Lossop last night against a rather formidable threat. He is now safely en route to Peru. But your box … have a look.’

I was already at the table, tearing off the brown paper. Inside was the mysterious silver box! It gleamed attractively in the morning sunlight, its Celtic dragons looking nearly alive. The lock had been sprung and it was open a crack.

‘You have not looked inside, Holmes?’

‘Of course not.’

I paused, staring at the thing. Something kept me from lifting the lid. Something I didn’t expect. A kind of dread.

‘Watson, you hesitate. Perhaps you might consider holding off,’ said Holmes quietly.

‘Then you have seen what is in there!’

‘No. But think of this. You have long since put to rest whatever family drama caused this extraordinary act on the part of your mother. It troubles you greatly. I might have ferreted it out, dear friend, but I have left you your privacy—’

‘You had better!’

‘Consider the difficulty for your mother to procure such a unique and unassailable item as this box. She must have given you or sent you the key.’

‘How could she? She died two days after she gave this to Elspeth Carnachan!’

Holmes sat up, awake now, and looked around for his pipe.

I turned back to my box. Again, I hesitated.

‘The design of this box, the letter to be held for later delivery, all this smacks of planning, detailed planning,’ said he. ‘All the more reason to think she gave you the key. How did she die, Watson? You have never said.’

I put my hands on the box, feeling its cool, smooth surface so lightly engraved.

‘Watson?’

‘Ah? Oh … my mother. She drowned. Oddly very near where Rose had drowned three years earlier.’

I felt his eyes upon me. ‘Rose?’

‘My twin. We were both six when Rose died.’ I said. ‘Drowned as well.’ I felt suddenly naked, exposed. ‘I think I shall ask for more coffee. Would you like some more coffee?’

‘A twin sister!’ He took some time lighting the pipe. ‘Ah, I am sorry for this. But your mother’s death, Watson – was it by her own hand, then?’ he asked gently.

‘We were never sure.’ I felt sick thinking of it. I kept running my fingers over the engraving.

‘Was she despondent? Hysterical? Grieving, perhaps.’

‘No. This was several years after Rose. My mother was not subject to moods, Holmes.’

‘Nor are you, most of the time.’ He paused. ‘This box may have been long in the planning. She must have given you the key. Think! Was there any unique, decorative, mysterious item of metal in anything she gave you before this?’

‘I was only eleven when she died. She would not have entrusted a key to a small child!’

Open the box, a voice inside me shouted. No, don’t open the box, came another. I closed my eyes. My mother’s face, smiling at me. Then my mother’s face, still and white, eyes bulging.

‘Watson, I wager your sterling qualities were well evident to your mother, even during your early childhood. Do you still have that small box of mementos from your youth?

Ah, the one with the wooden soldiers that I had mentioned to Knut Lossop? But why was he asking now, I wondered?

‘Is there nothing metal, oddly shaped, in that box? Nothing that could be a key?’

I snapped back to the present. ‘Well, I – oh!’ There was one thing. It was a small ornate clock puzzle that had never worked to keep time. I had forgotten it when prompted for a ‘treasure’ at Lossop’s and was later glad of it. It was my dearest possession, my mother’s last Christmas gift to me, eight months before her death. I said as much to Holmes.

I limped upstairs, retrieved the small cigar box of childhood treasures, and set the gilded clock puzzle on the table near the silver box. Holmes arose from the settee and faced me across the table, pipe in hand.

‘Go on, Watson. The clock puzzle first.’

I sat down before the box, and because he was so insistent, reluctantly took up the little clock. It was ornate and odd, constructed of several pieces. It had never kept time and was decorative only. But it had pleased me inordinately. I unpacked its pieces. To my amazement, one of them was silver, and filigreed in a style just like the box. I held it up and it was the right size to match the small keyhole below the box’s lock.

This was too damnably easy.

‘I—my God, you may be right!’ I said. I touched it to the edge of the keyhole. ‘It looks like it fits!’

‘Good,’ said Holmes ‘Then your mother planned this for you, as I thought.’ In a sudden move, he snapped the lid of the silver box down, and the lock clicked shut once again.

‘No!’ I leapt to my feet with a shout.

‘Turn it in the lock.’

I inserted the key. I jiggled it. Nothing. Twisted it again. The box opened with a snap. I had had the damned thing all along! I sank into the chair before the box, relieved.

Holmes yawned and ambled back to the settee, collapsing back onto it. ‘I shall leave you to it, Watson. I am a bit tired. Now, off to slumberland.’ He laid his pipe on an errant plate, stretched out, and closed