New Sherlock Holmes Fic: Sherlock Holmes and the Disappearance of Miss Eglantine Diggle
Ask, and you will receive...
This will hopefully be a three-parter, set in London and Devonshire.
In which Holmes and Watson are visited by an oddly dressed young man, concerned for his sister.
“'Mystical nonsense?’” I spluttered in a fury, hurling the letter into the fire with all the strength of my arm. “‘Lurid’? ‘Implausible’? ‘Airy-fairy ramblings better suited to fireside tales for children’? The nerve of the man!”
“Aha,” said my friend Sherlock Holmes from his seat by the window, from whence he was staring down into the street below. “The editor of the Strand magazine has finally deigned to communicate with you on your latest offering, I see. I confess that I am more sorry than surprised, for all that I consider your account of the recovery of the Ravenclaw Codex to be one of your more promising efforts (of its kind). Editors are conventional men: stray just a little beyond the compass of their prosaic mores and they will stop their ears and blind their eyes even to the most obvious chains of cause and effect. I am very much afraid that your tale must join the late Duke of Denver’s vanishing laundress, the despicable Miss Reed’s reign of terror in Thrush Green and the Absent Stag Beetle in your archive of tales for which the world is not yet prepared. But do not lose heart, my dear fellow: continue to cultivate your art for art’s sake, and take comfort in the fact that a day of broader minds and less rigid morals will come, when all may at last be revealed to the waiting world. And I would urge you to assume this attitude of admirable resignation sooner rather than later, for if I am not much mistaken, a case of a somewhat similar nature will present itself before us before so very many minutes have passed.”
At that moment, he was interrupted by a protracted peal on the front door-bell.
“We doctors have a knack for recognizing patients too,” I said. “But how can you know that there is anything uncanny or supernatural about this client?”
“Patience, Watson!” my friend chided me. “All will be made clear.”
As he spoke, there was a peremptory rap on the door.
“Mr Holmes,” said Mrs Hudson in outraged tones, “a young man wishes to see you, and he is dressed as a Cardinal of the Church of Rome! I must remind you, Mr Holmes, that I am a Christian woman! I keep a decent, respectable house, and I really must insist…”
“Very well, Mrs Hudson, show him in,” responded Holmes with a leisurely wave of his hand. “My client is recently arrived from foreign parts, and not yet fully acquainted with our ways. I will set him right presently.”
Our landlady retreated in high dudgeon, leaving the door open to admit a young man in his twenties, clad in a scarlet cassock, over which he wore a snowy white surplice, richly decorated with snowy lace in an elaborate pattern, topped off with a scarlet cape, with an elaborate golden cross studded with glittering gemstones in all the colours of the rainbow. On his hair, which was far too riotously curly for a man of the cloth, was perched a scarlet biretta, topped with a jaunty gold pompom. He looked around him, uncertainly, but his face lit up when he caught sight of Holmes, and he hurriedly doffed his biretta, bowing deeply.
“Mr Sherlock Holmes, I presume?” he said with a foolish but rather appealing smile. “I have heard so much about you - my good friend Giles Weaselby has been singing your praises - quite a miracle worker, he said! - a nonpareil for finding things that are lost! And so I came straight to you as soon as I heard, Mr Holmes, pausing only to don Muggle costume, for there was a never a man who needed your services more.”
“I am Sherlock Holmes,” said my friend, interrupting the flow, “and this is my friend and confidant, Dr John Watson. Our mutual friend Weaselby is too generous by far, though it is true that I have been of some small service to him and Hogwarts School in the past, and I hope that I may assist you with any little problem you may set before me. You have lost something, you say, and hope to recover it. I daresay I may be of some use in that quarter: pray, be seated, and tell me all.”
“You are too kind,” said the young man, “for I have lost something very dear to my heart: my sister Eglantine, a lovely girl not quite nineteen years of age, who left my father’s house half a year ago and has not been seen since…”
Holmes held up a warning hand.
“I think not,” he said. “A young lady can be by no means described as a ‘lost thing’, mere property to be passed around and recovered at anybody’s whim save her own! You speak of a human being with a will of her own who - unlike a simple item of lost property - may be unwilling to have her whereabouts disclosed, once found, or to be returned to the bosom of a family which she may have had the most excellent reasons to leave. It is not my job, sir, to tyrannise over unfortunate young females who have quarreled with their relations. I am afraid that all your efforts at Muggle disguise have been in vain, and your journey wasted, for I must decline to take your case.
“Mr Holmes,” exclaimed the young man, “you misunderstand me - indeed you do - there is not the least question of that! There has been the most frightful misunderstanding, and I wish only to set matters to rights if ever I can. I would never dream of forcing Eglantine to do anything distasteful to her - I wish only to know if she is in want of assistance, for I believe that she may have been seriously wronged.”
“Very well,” replied Holmes, somewhat mollified. “I believe I may undertake at least to ascertain on your behalf whether the young lady is in need of any assistance from her family - the rest must depend entirely on her. On that understanding, pray be so good as to state the facts of the case.”
“You are too kind,” replied our guest. “The facts, then, are these. My name is Daedalus Diggle - of Digglesham Hall in the county of Devonshire, where my father still lives, though I now prefer to call London my home. Eglantine is my only sister, some three years younger than I. This was made just under a year ago, when she first came up to London for the winter season, in the hope of meeting a suitable husband.”
He removed a picture from the pocket of his scarlet robe, and passed it to Holmes. It showed a young woman of about eighteen years of age, elaborately tricked out in velvet, pearls and jet, and seated in front of a spinet. In form and feature she strongly resembled our visitor, but with the plump, rather fatuous features of the brother transfigured into a fresh, innocent beauty.
“A miniature, I see,” my friend said, taking the likeness to the window and examining it closely through a lens. “A photograph would have provided a wealth of circumstantial detail, and even a life-sized painting is not uninformative, but on this scale I can make out very little: only that the young lady is wealthy, romantic, impulsive, loyal, left-handed, not long out of the schoolroom, and an accomplished player on the cor anglais.”
“Merlin’s beard!” exclaimed Diggle. “Weaselby did not exaggerate your powers - how can you possibly know all that?”
“It is perfectly simple,” Holmes replied. “Miss Diggle’s wealth can be deduced from her jewels alone, and the expensive knick-knacks strewn around in the background merely serve to confirm it: no poor girl would be so careless with her belongings. The fact that she commissioned a likeness in the belief that one season of fashionable London life would net her a suitable mate indicates romanticism, and her sudden departure, leaving even her family unable to guess her whereabouts, strongly suggests an unpredictable, impulsive nature. As for the rest, it is plain enough, I believe. That shade of yellow velvet is no friend to Miss Diggle’s colouring, but I have seen that particular hue many times in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, where - particularly combined with yellow and black, as here - it symbolizes Hufflepuff House, whose students are known for their loyalty. Even a short exposure to the fashionable world would have taught her to choose a more flattering colour - which suggests that her schooldays are still a thing of the relatively recent past.”
“Oh, I see!” exclaimed Diggle. “Well, of course, when you put it like that, there is nothing so very remarkable at all! But what of the cor anglais? Eglantine plays very prettily - but there is no such instrument in the picture. And how did you know she was left-handed?”
“The left-handedness is simple enough,” replied my friend. “There is a small sample of Miss Diggle’s handwriting to be seen where she has annotated a sheet of music, and even in so small a picture, the distinctive slant that characterizes much left-handed writing is quite evident. As to the cor anglais, I have made a study of the hands of the players of seventy-five different types of musical instruments. The set of the middle finger - just there - and the pattern of calluses on the finger and thumb are quite unmistakable - though it is interesting to note that there is no evidence of any particular proficiency on the spinet.”
“You are quite right, Mr Holmes - correct in every particular!” exclaimed Diggle. “My poor sister had only just commenced her study of the spinet - indeed you might say that the instrument marked the beginning of this whole wretched business. Oh! How I wish she had never seen it!
“However, I digress. Eglantine is just as you described her: your description lacks only her sunny disposition and loving heart to render it exact in every particular. My sister and I were raised on my father’s estate on the Devonshire coast. As children we were everything to each other, for our father is a widower, and has been something of a recluse since my mother was savaged by a Hippogriff when we were small, but Eglantine is naturally gregarious, and as soon as she was sent to school, she made many friends of her own, some from the very best families. These girls had a great influence on my sister, filling her head with stories of balls, parties and other romantic notions, and by the time she left Hogwarts, nothing would do but that she came to London for a season in the hope of making a good match. Our father was reluctant, but once he became aware that my cousin Fergus was taking more than a casual interest in his daughter, he agreed - Fergus manages the estate for my father, you understand, and he is an excellent fellow, but he hasn’t a knut to his name. Barely three months after she left Hogwarts, Eglantine and my father had taken a house in Grimmauld Place, one of the most select areas in wizarding London, ready to enjoy the delights of the season.
“Eglantine was well received, I believe, but some lingering country mannerisms and tastes were sometimes the cause of merriment to her town friends, who did not care for woodwind instruments, and convinced her that she should learn the spinet. As it happened, I was able to recommend a teacher: when I made my Grand Tour of Europe after leaving Hogwarts I spent some time in Italy, where I stuck up a friendship with a very talented musician called Alessandro Zabini. When I learned that he had come to London to seek his fortune, I did not hesitate to recommend him to my father as a tutor for Eglantine. Zabini has the most charming manners imaginable - my friend Albus used to joke that he could charm plums out of a Christmas pudding, and he did not exaggerate. My father and sister were both quite bowled over by him, and it was not long before he was on a most friendly footing with the entire household.
“My father has always set a great deal of store by family and blood. We are a tolerably eligible family, nothing but wizards for as far back as anyone can remember, and once the family were well established in London, he set about making enquiries for a suitable match for Eglantine. Sure enough, one evening in late February he called us into the drawing-room to make an announcement: he had arranged a most eligible match for my sister with Horace Fudge, a rising politician in the Ministry, recently widowed but with a bright future before him.”
“At which point,” Holmes interrupted him, “Miss Diggle announced that she had made another, quite different choice of husband - am I right?”
“You are quite right, Mr Holmes,” Diggle replied. “Father was outraged, but I was warm in the praises of my friend, and I believe his former affection for Zabini might have brought him round in the end, had he not most unluckily discovered that Zabini’s mother was a Muggle, without so much as a drop of Wizarding blood in her veins! That was that as far as Father was concerned. He left for Digglesham Hall the next day, taking Eglantine with him.”
“Poor young woman!” I exclaimed. “And you did nothing to prevent this? For shame, sir!”
“I did everything in my power to prevent it,” replied Diggle indignantly. “I did all I could to persuade Father not to be so unreasonable - blood, indeed! Stuff and nonsense! In fact, we both became rather heated, and by the time he left we were barely on speaking terms. When reason failed with my father, I spoke privately to Eglantine, and offered her a home for as long as she needed it - a legacy from my mother on my coming of age the previous year had made me independent, and I had digs in north London, nothing to Grimmauld Place or the old Hall, to be sure, but good enough for a few weeks until the wedding. But Eglantine would have none of it - Father was wrong, she said, and she would let him have no peace until he came to see it for himself, and apologise properly for his stubbornness!
“And so they left. I am ashamed to say that by this time I had so little patience with either Father or Eglantine that I was but a poor correspondent after their return to Digglesham Hall: beyond a brief note announcing their safe return on their part, and several cold enquiries after their health on mine, there was almost no communication between us during the next two months. Then, just over half a year ago, three owls came to me in the space of a single afternoon - one from Father, one from cousin Fergus (he manages the farm, as you may remember), and one from Malfoy, the butler, all asking if I knew anything of Eglantine’s whereabouts, and urging me to return to Devonshire at once. I left London within the hour, and came home to find the place in a state of uproar. Eglantine had left in the dead of night, leaving only a note saying that she had gone to be with the man she loved, and that we should forgive her and make no attempt to find her or bring her back.”
“And this is your mystery?” said Holmes incredulously. “Really, Mr Diggle, I would have thought it straightforward enough, even for a wizard! Your sister, having despaired of ever bringing your father round to her way of thinking, decided that enough was enough, pawned her jewelry and eloped with Mr Zabini on the proceeds. Find Mr Zabini, and you will find your sister: that is all. I really am at a loss to understand why it was necessary to come all this way to ask my advice!”
“My story is not over yet, Mr Holmes,” replied Diggle. “We all believed that Eglantine had left with Zabini, and although I was not best pleased that they had not chosen to confide in me, I did all I could to find any trace of their passage. Zabini had left London, apparently heartbroken, about a week after he had received his dismissal from my father, and I could discover no sign of him any time after that date. And of my sister, I could learn nothing at all. She had not taken her broom, a horse, or any other conveyance to be had in the locality, wizard or Muggle. Owls were sent out with messages to her, but they returned unread, the seals unbroken. We cast spells of revelation, and others that should have been able to break any concealing charms; we consulted the most expensive diviners and fortune tellers - we even, with a heavy heart, attempted some of the incantations through which the living may speak to the dead - but all in vain. From that day to this, we have seen or heard nothing whatsoever of my sister. For all we knew to the contrary, Eglantine had vanished from the face of the earth. And there - God forgive me! - I let matters rest, convinced that an ill-used young couple had contrived a well-executed escape from an old man’s tyranny, which they might do with my good will, for in spite of all, I was fond of them both.
“Then, two days ago, an old schoolfriend returned after his own Grand Tour of the Continent. Albus’s travels had taken him to Verona, where he had found all the Wizarding quarter of the town celebrating a most lavish and unusual wedding - the marriage of the youngest son of a great local trading family to a celebrated Moorish sorceress, much older than the groom, but as rich and talented as she was beautiful. Imagine my astonishment, Mr Holmes, when I learned that the groom was none other than my old friend Alessandro Zabini!”
“That charming young man was not as inconsolable, then, as you had been led to suppose,” remarked Holmes with a laugh.
“No, indeed,” said Diggle in tones of considerable chagrin. “It was plain from Albus’s account and the newspaper clippings he showed me that Zabini must have become engaged to that woman barely a month after he was banished from my father’s house! Poor Eglantine! She was such a dear girl, and so fond of him - she deserved to be remembered longer than this!”
“You believe, then, that she is dead?” said Holmes.
“What else?” said Diggle. “She left her father’s protection for a man who abandoned her - she must be either dead… or something worse than that. When my father heard of Zabini’s marriage he was very angry, and said that it would be better for the family name if poor Eglantine were never found. And yet in spite of all that, I cannot believe it - Eglantine is my sister, and I am sure that I would have known, somehow, if she were dead. But what could have happened to her? I am at my wits’ end. Can you help me, Mr Holmes? For if you cannot, I truly believe that no-one can.”
“That rather depends,” said Holmes. “The key to this problem, as is tolerably obvious, is Devonshire, rather than London, where you appear to have concentrated your efforts so far, for it was at Digglesham Hall that your sister felt called upon to make her abrupt departure. I fancy that a brief visit there might teach us much - the question is, will your father allow it?”
“He will allow it,” said Diggle firmly. “He has already lost a daughter this year - he would scarcely risk losing a son also. He may not be the most gracious of hosts, but he will receive you at Digglesham Hall - my word upon it.”
“Very well,” said my friend briskly, “there is little more to be said. Watson and I will take the early train tomorrow. Pray be so good as to have us met at the station. You had better commence your packing, Watson, while I explain to our visitor some of the finer points of ecclesiastical dress.”