Sherlock Holmes: Repeat Business. Lyn McConchie
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will be able to discover your spy and explain the method by which he communicates.”
Holmes nodded kindly to me. “I shall do my best. Now, Holder, I know the agency you hired and they are an honest and thorough firm. What of their reports on the three employees?”
These too were produced and I can list them as follows.
“Mr. Robert Beldon, married, wife Ethel (nee) Masters. Two children, both too young as yet to be in school. One maid, Janet Wadel, currently walking out with the butchers’ boy. Valet, John Stample, a man of fifty-six with an impeccable record and reputation. Beldon is a careful man who lives within his income, treats his servants well, and is generally liked and trusted by those who know him. Beldon began at the bank as a boy of eighteen and has worked his way up to a senior position. His wife can be a little extravagant in her own dress, but he himself is frugal—and of recent weeks has always taken the ’bus to his home once his day’s work is done. His hobbies are cricket and the writing of Rudyard Kipling. His holidays are often taken at home, but when he can, he also enjoys tramping over some of the areas that appear in the works of Kipling.
“Mr. Gerald Ainstruther. A bachelor of thirty-two who lives in a set of rooms. He has lived there for the past five years and his landlady speaks very highly of him as a man of quiet manners and discriminating tastes. Lives within his income, sole hobby being collecting foreign stamps, and pursuant to which he occasionally dines with fellow collectors or visits their homes. No known female associates. Ainstruther joined the bank at the time he moved to London from Guildford five years ago. However, he has excellent references from the Countries and Midland Bank and upon inquiry they assured me that he was always the soul of discretion. Ainstruther takes a hansom home on some nights and the ’bus on others, but on fine evenings he sometimes walks since his house is not at a great distance from his place of employment.
“Mr. Andrew Mannison. Mannison was originally an officer in the paymaster’s office in India and joined the bank twelve and a half years ago. He is a widower of forty-nine with two adult daughters, Ethne, married to Major Alan Homesby, and Jane, married to Mr. Alan Forester. Neither marriage has children as yet, although Mrs. Homesby is expecting a child in the New Year. All live within their incomes and are well regarded. Mr. Mannison has no live-in servant, but a local couple, Mrs. Culbart and her husband, come in daily. Mannison has no known female associates, lives quietly, and regularly arranges for parties from the bank to attend Shakespearean plays at reduced rates for social groups. His hobby is Shakespeare’s plays on which he is regarded as substantially knowledgeable. His only luxury appears to be his preference for taking a hansom home each night from his place of employment.”
I looked at my friend. “Three paragons of virtue, or so it seems, Holmes. What have you to say to that?”
“Merely that even paragons have been known to fall, Watson. Mr. Mannison, for instance, is of an age when some men may fall prey to an attractive woman and commit foolish acts. If, as it appears, Mr. Belden’s marriage is indeed happy, then is he not all the more susceptible to blackmail? And Mr. Ainstruther may have some dubious secret in his past. No, what is apparently obvious at first glance is not always true.”
He turned to the banker, who was watching us anxiously. “Now, Mr. Holder, this is what must be done to start with. Do you have another false scandal you can use to lure our spy into possible indiscretion?”
”Certainly.”
“Then allow this to be known in exactly three days. On the late afternoon of Monday the 12th you shall allow the information to be overheard. Continue as before; be certain the three speak to no one until they have left the building. You will also allow the three men who bring you my card that afternoon to remain within the bank after your employees have departed. I have no objection to your remaining also, but my men must be permitted to search wherever they will. Do you agree?”
“I will permit anything you wish. Only discover who is it who betrays us, Mr. Holmes, and I shall be forever in your debt.”
We waited, Holmes patiently, as was his wont, but I less so since I could not believe that whichever employee was passing information would not be apprehended on this third occasion. Yet so it was. The third ‘tidbit’ duly appeared from the Tattler’s pen and we seemed to be no further along the road to discovery of the spy than we had been. Holmes’ men appeared that evening to report to him, and I listened eagerly.
“We searched the offices, sir. Mr. Holder, he had the three at a meeting late and bid them go straight home after like, so they never come back into their offices. Me an’ Will an’ Jethro made lists of every single thing in the wastepaper baskets as you suggested. There weren’t nothing but just in case we took any bit o’ paper and put them in this envelope for you along with the lists. We followed our men home and I swear, sir, none o’ them talked to anyone nor passed them anything. I were at Mannison’s shoulder the whole way and I’d ’a seen if he did anything. The others did the same for their men, sir.”
Holmes was perusing the lists, and I saw his eyes gleam with sudden interest, nonetheless his voice as he replied was calm. “I trust you all, and I am sure that had anything been passed you would have noticed it. Pray continue to watch your man, each of you, and come at once to tell me should anything out of the ordinary occur. I would also have you talk to the maid, valet, or others about the men who might be in a position to know, and ask them this question.”
With that he recited it and his men and I regarded him doubtfully. It seemed an odd thing to wish to know, however there was no accounting for the actions Holmes would ask for at times.
I waited until the men had gone then I spoke. “Holmes, it is too bad. I know you have seen some clue, will you not share it?”
“Why not, my dear Watson? Here,” and he held out to me the lists made of assorted rubbish collected from the wastepaper baskets of the three under suspicion. I read them and was none the wiser. I could see no clue, nothing save—ah! I lifted a crumpled tailor’s bill from the envelope and exclaimed.
“I have it, Holmes! It must be Belden, despite Jethro’s certainty that he passed nothing. The man is married with two small children and in need of money. Look at what he is being asked to pay for his wife’s clothing, and see here the date, the bill is long overdue. The man is in dire need of money and has chosen this way to obtain it. I am right, am I not?”
“It is true the bill is both large and overdue, that I cannot deny.”
“Ah,” my cry was triumphant. “Then how shall you bring this miscreant to book?”
Holmes’ look was sober. “I fear that may not be quite so easy, I am certain the man is an accomplished spy; this selling of scandal is a sideline.”
I gasped. “Holmes, you mean that Belden is there to learn what decisions are to be made on the foreign negotiations?”
“I fear our spy may have that in mind. But before that I have made arrangements with Holder to release a fourth scandal so we may again follow the three under suspicion.”
“He must be stopped,” I said resolutely. “Tell me what I may do to assist?”
“I do have a task for you, Watson, I plan to walk the bank’s corridors tonight and study the working background of our spy. It is, however, also essential that I stop all possible rat holes. It is possible that the information is being sent by mail. None of the three men have easy access to a telephone, so that if they are communicating what they learn, then it is most likely to be by letter. I have made arrangements with Lestrade that any letters sent by the men or their families shall be intercepted before they arrive at their destinations. Once these letters are collected, I want you to bring them to me that I may examine them.”
“You may repose your trust in me, Holmes.”
His look softened. “I do, my dear Watson. I do.”
And yet I still felt I had failed him when the letters I had collected showed no sign of anything untoward, but the information still appeared, as we had feared it would. However, to my surprise Holmes did not appear downcast.
“What