The Adventure of the Gibraltar Spy, Part 3
Happy Christmas, everyone! I'm home for the holidays, and it's very nice to see my family. Also, I got lots of shiny presents! Here's the final part of my Sherlock Holmes/AoS crossover fic.
We then returned through the tunnel, while I puzzled over what evidence Holmes could possibly have found. When we reached the Notch again, the soldiers had just arrived, and were unlashing the cannon preparatory to firing them. The General approached a handsome young officer, who was apparently Lieutenant Saxon. He was smartly uniformed, his hair cut short in the modern style, and had a generally frank and friendly demeanor.
“Mr. Saxon, may I have a word with you?” The General asked with steely calmness.
“Tell the men to belay that for the time being,” Holmes added. With the General’s nod of consent, Lieutenant Saxon gave the order, then accompanied us down the passage, out of range of curious ears.
“I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure,” he said agreeably to Holmes.
“Captain Sherlock Holmes. I am investigating the death of Major Algernon Duncan.”
“Indeed? I wish you all the best success, but I’m afraid you may be a little late to shed any fresh light on the matter.”
“On the contrary. I believe you, in fact, may be able to be of some assistance to us.”
“I will do anything in my power.”
If the man was the culprit, I thought, he was certainly brazen enough.
“Perhaps, then, you can explain to us the meaning of this note.”
Lieutenant Saxon read it over, his expression betraying nothing.
“I don’t understand,” he said finally. “Does this purport to have been written by Major Duncan? Why am I so accused?”
“Because you are the spy, Mr. Saxon,” Holmes said coldly. “You have been signaling to the smugglers by using acid to mark the rock, when the battery will be unmanned- a most ingenious device, I may add.”
“Acid? That is quite preposterous!” Saxon laughed.
“Unless you have some very strong evidence unknown to us, Captain, I don’t see how you can substantiate such a claim,” the General said sternly, understandably swayed by his subordinate’s protestations of innocence.
“Pray allow me to demonstrate.” Holmes walked back to the nearest gunport, and we all followed, more or less eagerly. He took from his pocket a small bottle of clear liquid, and, leaning out of the hole in the wall, poured the contents over the outside of the rock. Peering round from the other side of the cannon, I saw that it bubbled on the surface, leaving a smooth swath behind it. There was a similar, older, mark a little to the side of it.
“Now we wait,” Holmes said complacently, and, raising his voice, ordered, “Stand by your guns, men, but don’t run them out yet.”
We waited in increasingly uncomfortable silence for an interminable quarter hour. I was beginning to fear that Holmes’s acute reasoning abilities had failed him for once, when I noticed a flash of white sail near the shoreline.
“It’s those blasted Dago smugglers!” The General cried hoarsely, full of energy at once and striding along the length of the battery. “Wait until they’re fully in range, then fire at will!”
“Marvelous, Holmes!” Lestrade clapped him on the back.
I looked at Lieutenant Saxon, who had swiftly followed the General’s example in encouraging the men at the guns. I thought I detected a hollow ring in his exhortations, however, and a nervous clenching of his jaw. Holmes went after him.
“Come, come, Mr. Saxon. You may as well give in now.” He said calmly.
“You have proved nothing.” Saxon’s eyes flashed, but he kept himself under iron control.
“No? Perhaps you will be so kind as to accompany these gentlemen and myself, then.”
Holmes led us on the long walk back to the officer’s quarters, and into Lieutenant Saxon’s room.
“You have no right to go through my private possessions!” Saxon was becoming angry, his eyes blazing with what seemed to me a hint of desperation. Holmes ignored him.
“This is yours, is it not?” He produced a ceramic vial from a shelf.
“What of it?”
Holmes unstopped the bottle and held it out. “Vinegar, gentlemen- exactly the same as I used to mark the rock just now. And-” He took out the chip of pottery that he had pocketed earlier.
“-this was found by Major Duncan’s body, where you dropped the bottle in your struggle, and it spilled.” With a flourish, he held it up to the chipped lip of the bottle, where it fitted exactly.
Lestrade and I immediately broke into congratulations and exclamations of astonishment, while the General stared dumbly at Saxon, whose open face had twisted into a disdainful sneer.
“A very clever trick, I’m sure. Go ahead and hang me, then, as you killed my brother.”
“What are you talking about?” General Crean asked.
“My elder brother was bos’un on the Hermione in ’97. He led the crew in revolt against their tyrannical captain, and was hung for his efforts when the Navy caught him.”
“That was mutiny, man!” Lestrade exclaimed. “They ruthlessly murdered the captain and other officers and gave the ship up to the Spanish.”
“Your Navy killed my brother. From that moment, I had no more loyalty for a country that would hang its own men in such a manner. My parents saw things differently, and forced me into the army. So I waited for my opportunity. During the peace, I made some contacts in France, so that when I was posted here last year, I was able to make arrangements with their Spanish allies. I got my revenge by helping their ships leave harbor whenever I could. It comforted me to see your fury when you realized that they had sailed past under your noses. And then that prissy sodomite Duncan started getting suspicious. I suppose he caught me in the tunnels one too many times after I had been marking the rock.
"He followed me the night of the New Year’s party, and confronted me. He thought we could discuss my treachery like gentlemen, but I was only too happy to get my hands around his neck. I almost got away with it, too- my clever Lucille stole the incriminating note from his room, though I suppose it was she who betrayed me, too.”
“Doctor Watson, please bring a couple of guards here,” General Crean said, his voice hard. “Lieutenant Harold Saxon, you are to be taken into immediate custody for treason and murder, and you will surely hang.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After the Irena refitted and was ready to leave Gibraltar to return to the cold winds of the Channel, Captain Lestrade invited us to a farewell dinner on board the Flower of Scotland, for his orders were to remain in the Mediterranean with Nelson’s fleet outside Toulon.
“The gossip these days is that Nelson wants Villeneuve to try to slip the blockade, so he can definitively defeat him in a fleet action. That’s why he’s building up our force here as much as he can. For God forbid they make it through the Gut and up the Channel, especially with that invasion force poised on the French coast. All they need is one victory, and next thing you know we’ll have Napoleon as King, and a guillotine in Piccadilly!”
“But we have Nelson,” I said stoutly. “I saw his action at Copenhagen firsthand, and I believe there is not a finer leader of men in the country, let alone the Navy. The fleet would follow him to hell and back- we have no need to fear while he’s in the Mediterranean. Even if it does come to a battle, Nelson will see us through.”
Our conversation ranged over a variety of subjects as we enjoyed what would be, at least for Holmes and I, the last fresh food we would taste for some time. As the steward cleared away the remains of the fine plum duff, however, Lestrade turned purposefully to Holmes.
“Now, pray tell us, how did you discover the truth of the matter at the battery?”
“I confess that I, too, am most curious,” I added, for I had been burning to ask him about it all through the busyness of provisioning and preparing to set sail.
“It was really quite simple,” Holmes said, leaning back in his chair and lighting his pipe. “The first clue I found was the strange indentation in the ground where Major Duncan’s body had been discovered. It had clearly not been produced by natural means, and its presence at that exact spot was too unlikely to be coincidental. I then proceeded to examine the exterior wall of the Notch, on the hypothesis that that would be the most likely location of any sort of signal, where it would be visible from the shore. I noticed the marks similar to that which I had seen on the floor, and became still more convinced of their importance. I was still at a loss, however, as to how they had been produced, and at that point considered Major Duncan as having possibly been involved in the spying.
“When we saw Major Duncan’s room, I was immediately struck by the fact of his pen and ink being out, and strongly suspected, considering the description of his character given by the General, that he had written something just before departing to his death. If he was in a hurry, or in some agitation of mind, then that would readily explain his untidiness.”
“How did he have time to return to his room,” I put in, “if he had followed Lieutenant Saxon from the mess hall?”
“You forget that Saxon would have had to collect the vinegar from his quarters, and the Major most likely ducked into his room to avoid detection. While waiting for Saxon to reemerge, he wisely dashed off his final note.”
“Which the maid Lucille then found when she went in to clean the next morning, saw her lover’s name, and took it.”
“Precisely. She told me that she would have put away the writing implements, but that she heard the uproar at the body’s discovery, and went to see what the matter was. She did not realize the gravity of the situation until then, but was too afraid to return the letter once the room was overrun by officers investigating, so she gave it to Saxon. He was unwise to keep it, but perhaps he wished to gloat over the demise of a man whom he apparently hated.
“But I am getting ahead of myself. I had not the least idea of Saxon’s involvement in the case until Lucille accidentally dropped one of his handkerchiefs at my feet. In picking it up, I caught the strong scent of vinegar. Only then did I recall that limestone is easily corrodible by acid, even of such mildness as ordinary vinegar. My suspicion then fell strongly on Lieutenant Saxon. Combining his affair with the maid, the maid having access to all the officers’ quarters, and the missing last letter, it was easy to bluff Lucille into giving it to me. While in Saxon’s room, I found the vinegar bottle, and any lingering doubt dissolved when I saw the chip in the rim that corresponded exactly with the piece that had been found by the body. I then proceed to put my theories to the test, as you both observed.”
“And it was wonderfully done, Holmes!” I cried.
“I rather think you were questioning my sanity for much of the time,” Holmes said with a dry smile, “particularly when I went into the kitchens to fetch my own vinegar- for of course Saxon’s had to remain in his room, or he’d deny possession of it.”
“I doubted your sanity only for the briefest moment,” I assured him.
“I don’t mind telling you now, I doubted you for more than a moment,” Lestrade put in, “But your funny methods all seem to work out in the end.”
“What do you think of the man’s motivation?” I asked. “It is an abhorrent thing to turn traitor to one’s country, still more to kill a fellow officer, but he showed an admirable devotion to his brother all the same.”
Lestrade shook his head.
“The Hermione mutiny was a bloody business. Those men deserved no more pity than they got- a short drop and a sudden stop.”
“Still,” Holmes gazed contemplatively down the stem of his pipe, “ ‘Judge not, lest ye be judged’. There may come a time when you, too, find that personal loyalty outweighs obedience to the Articles of War, or even to King and country.”
I wondered if Holmes were thinking back on some event in his own life, for of his past before I met him I knew almost nothing. I had, over the course of my association with him, seen him many times take the law into his own hands, and pardon those whom the law would have condemned. Unfortunately for Lieutenant Saxon, but better, I think, for humanity, this was not one of those times.
We sailed from Gibraltar the next morning, at the hour when the hanging was due to take place. As the Irena’s sails caught the wind, the sound of drums drifted down from the gallows at Willis’s Plateau, the peal coming to an abrupt stop as the trapdoor opened, marking the end of an unhappy, vengeful life.
The End
We then returned through the tunnel, while I puzzled over what evidence Holmes could possibly have found. When we reached the Notch again, the soldiers had just arrived, and were unlashing the cannon preparatory to firing them. The General approached a handsome young officer, who was apparently Lieutenant Saxon. He was smartly uniformed, his hair cut short in the modern style, and had a generally frank and friendly demeanor.
“Mr. Saxon, may I have a word with you?” The General asked with steely calmness.
“Tell the men to belay that for the time being,” Holmes added. With the General’s nod of consent, Lieutenant Saxon gave the order, then accompanied us down the passage, out of range of curious ears.
“I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure,” he said agreeably to Holmes.
“Captain Sherlock Holmes. I am investigating the death of Major Algernon Duncan.”
“Indeed? I wish you all the best success, but I’m afraid you may be a little late to shed any fresh light on the matter.”
“On the contrary. I believe you, in fact, may be able to be of some assistance to us.”
“I will do anything in my power.”
If the man was the culprit, I thought, he was certainly brazen enough.
“Perhaps, then, you can explain to us the meaning of this note.”
Lieutenant Saxon read it over, his expression betraying nothing.
“I don’t understand,” he said finally. “Does this purport to have been written by Major Duncan? Why am I so accused?”
“Because you are the spy, Mr. Saxon,” Holmes said coldly. “You have been signaling to the smugglers by using acid to mark the rock, when the battery will be unmanned- a most ingenious device, I may add.”
“Acid? That is quite preposterous!” Saxon laughed.
“Unless you have some very strong evidence unknown to us, Captain, I don’t see how you can substantiate such a claim,” the General said sternly, understandably swayed by his subordinate’s protestations of innocence.
“Pray allow me to demonstrate.” Holmes walked back to the nearest gunport, and we all followed, more or less eagerly. He took from his pocket a small bottle of clear liquid, and, leaning out of the hole in the wall, poured the contents over the outside of the rock. Peering round from the other side of the cannon, I saw that it bubbled on the surface, leaving a smooth swath behind it. There was a similar, older, mark a little to the side of it.
“Now we wait,” Holmes said complacently, and, raising his voice, ordered, “Stand by your guns, men, but don’t run them out yet.”
We waited in increasingly uncomfortable silence for an interminable quarter hour. I was beginning to fear that Holmes’s acute reasoning abilities had failed him for once, when I noticed a flash of white sail near the shoreline.
“It’s those blasted Dago smugglers!” The General cried hoarsely, full of energy at once and striding along the length of the battery. “Wait until they’re fully in range, then fire at will!”
“Marvelous, Holmes!” Lestrade clapped him on the back.
I looked at Lieutenant Saxon, who had swiftly followed the General’s example in encouraging the men at the guns. I thought I detected a hollow ring in his exhortations, however, and a nervous clenching of his jaw. Holmes went after him.
“Come, come, Mr. Saxon. You may as well give in now.” He said calmly.
“You have proved nothing.” Saxon’s eyes flashed, but he kept himself under iron control.
“No? Perhaps you will be so kind as to accompany these gentlemen and myself, then.”
Holmes led us on the long walk back to the officer’s quarters, and into Lieutenant Saxon’s room.
“You have no right to go through my private possessions!” Saxon was becoming angry, his eyes blazing with what seemed to me a hint of desperation. Holmes ignored him.
“This is yours, is it not?” He produced a ceramic vial from a shelf.
“What of it?”
Holmes unstopped the bottle and held it out. “Vinegar, gentlemen- exactly the same as I used to mark the rock just now. And-” He took out the chip of pottery that he had pocketed earlier.
“-this was found by Major Duncan’s body, where you dropped the bottle in your struggle, and it spilled.” With a flourish, he held it up to the chipped lip of the bottle, where it fitted exactly.
Lestrade and I immediately broke into congratulations and exclamations of astonishment, while the General stared dumbly at Saxon, whose open face had twisted into a disdainful sneer.
“A very clever trick, I’m sure. Go ahead and hang me, then, as you killed my brother.”
“What are you talking about?” General Crean asked.
“My elder brother was bos’un on the Hermione in ’97. He led the crew in revolt against their tyrannical captain, and was hung for his efforts when the Navy caught him.”
“That was mutiny, man!” Lestrade exclaimed. “They ruthlessly murdered the captain and other officers and gave the ship up to the Spanish.”
“Your Navy killed my brother. From that moment, I had no more loyalty for a country that would hang its own men in such a manner. My parents saw things differently, and forced me into the army. So I waited for my opportunity. During the peace, I made some contacts in France, so that when I was posted here last year, I was able to make arrangements with their Spanish allies. I got my revenge by helping their ships leave harbor whenever I could. It comforted me to see your fury when you realized that they had sailed past under your noses. And then that prissy sodomite Duncan started getting suspicious. I suppose he caught me in the tunnels one too many times after I had been marking the rock.
"He followed me the night of the New Year’s party, and confronted me. He thought we could discuss my treachery like gentlemen, but I was only too happy to get my hands around his neck. I almost got away with it, too- my clever Lucille stole the incriminating note from his room, though I suppose it was she who betrayed me, too.”
“Doctor Watson, please bring a couple of guards here,” General Crean said, his voice hard. “Lieutenant Harold Saxon, you are to be taken into immediate custody for treason and murder, and you will surely hang.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After the Irena refitted and was ready to leave Gibraltar to return to the cold winds of the Channel, Captain Lestrade invited us to a farewell dinner on board the Flower of Scotland, for his orders were to remain in the Mediterranean with Nelson’s fleet outside Toulon.
“The gossip these days is that Nelson wants Villeneuve to try to slip the blockade, so he can definitively defeat him in a fleet action. That’s why he’s building up our force here as much as he can. For God forbid they make it through the Gut and up the Channel, especially with that invasion force poised on the French coast. All they need is one victory, and next thing you know we’ll have Napoleon as King, and a guillotine in Piccadilly!”
“But we have Nelson,” I said stoutly. “I saw his action at Copenhagen firsthand, and I believe there is not a finer leader of men in the country, let alone the Navy. The fleet would follow him to hell and back- we have no need to fear while he’s in the Mediterranean. Even if it does come to a battle, Nelson will see us through.”
Our conversation ranged over a variety of subjects as we enjoyed what would be, at least for Holmes and I, the last fresh food we would taste for some time. As the steward cleared away the remains of the fine plum duff, however, Lestrade turned purposefully to Holmes.
“Now, pray tell us, how did you discover the truth of the matter at the battery?”
“I confess that I, too, am most curious,” I added, for I had been burning to ask him about it all through the busyness of provisioning and preparing to set sail.
“It was really quite simple,” Holmes said, leaning back in his chair and lighting his pipe. “The first clue I found was the strange indentation in the ground where Major Duncan’s body had been discovered. It had clearly not been produced by natural means, and its presence at that exact spot was too unlikely to be coincidental. I then proceeded to examine the exterior wall of the Notch, on the hypothesis that that would be the most likely location of any sort of signal, where it would be visible from the shore. I noticed the marks similar to that which I had seen on the floor, and became still more convinced of their importance. I was still at a loss, however, as to how they had been produced, and at that point considered Major Duncan as having possibly been involved in the spying.
“When we saw Major Duncan’s room, I was immediately struck by the fact of his pen and ink being out, and strongly suspected, considering the description of his character given by the General, that he had written something just before departing to his death. If he was in a hurry, or in some agitation of mind, then that would readily explain his untidiness.”
“How did he have time to return to his room,” I put in, “if he had followed Lieutenant Saxon from the mess hall?”
“You forget that Saxon would have had to collect the vinegar from his quarters, and the Major most likely ducked into his room to avoid detection. While waiting for Saxon to reemerge, he wisely dashed off his final note.”
“Which the maid Lucille then found when she went in to clean the next morning, saw her lover’s name, and took it.”
“Precisely. She told me that she would have put away the writing implements, but that she heard the uproar at the body’s discovery, and went to see what the matter was. She did not realize the gravity of the situation until then, but was too afraid to return the letter once the room was overrun by officers investigating, so she gave it to Saxon. He was unwise to keep it, but perhaps he wished to gloat over the demise of a man whom he apparently hated.
“But I am getting ahead of myself. I had not the least idea of Saxon’s involvement in the case until Lucille accidentally dropped one of his handkerchiefs at my feet. In picking it up, I caught the strong scent of vinegar. Only then did I recall that limestone is easily corrodible by acid, even of such mildness as ordinary vinegar. My suspicion then fell strongly on Lieutenant Saxon. Combining his affair with the maid, the maid having access to all the officers’ quarters, and the missing last letter, it was easy to bluff Lucille into giving it to me. While in Saxon’s room, I found the vinegar bottle, and any lingering doubt dissolved when I saw the chip in the rim that corresponded exactly with the piece that had been found by the body. I then proceed to put my theories to the test, as you both observed.”
“And it was wonderfully done, Holmes!” I cried.
“I rather think you were questioning my sanity for much of the time,” Holmes said with a dry smile, “particularly when I went into the kitchens to fetch my own vinegar- for of course Saxon’s had to remain in his room, or he’d deny possession of it.”
“I doubted your sanity only for the briefest moment,” I assured him.
“I don’t mind telling you now, I doubted you for more than a moment,” Lestrade put in, “But your funny methods all seem to work out in the end.”
“What do you think of the man’s motivation?” I asked. “It is an abhorrent thing to turn traitor to one’s country, still more to kill a fellow officer, but he showed an admirable devotion to his brother all the same.”
Lestrade shook his head.
“The Hermione mutiny was a bloody business. Those men deserved no more pity than they got- a short drop and a sudden stop.”
“Still,” Holmes gazed contemplatively down the stem of his pipe, “ ‘Judge not, lest ye be judged’. There may come a time when you, too, find that personal loyalty outweighs obedience to the Articles of War, or even to King and country.”
I wondered if Holmes were thinking back on some event in his own life, for of his past before I met him I knew almost nothing. I had, over the course of my association with him, seen him many times take the law into his own hands, and pardon those whom the law would have condemned. Unfortunately for Lieutenant Saxon, but better, I think, for humanity, this was not one of those times.
We sailed from Gibraltar the next morning, at the hour when the hanging was due to take place. As the Irena’s sails caught the wind, the sound of drums drifted down from the gallows at Willis’s Plateau, the peal coming to an abrupt stop as the trapdoor opened, marking the end of an unhappy, vengeful life.
The End