The Adventure of the Murdered Midwife Read online

  Copyright © 2020 by Little Elm Press, LLC

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

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  Book cover © 2020 by Killion Publishing.

  Early Praise for “The Adventure of the Murdered Midwife”

  The Adventure of the Murdered Midwife is a great nod to classic Sherlock Holmes. Liese Sherwood-Fabre paints a vivid picture and transports you back in time, in what I'm sure will become a bestseller. Fans of Sherlock Holmes will love this new take and appreciate [Liese’s] attention to detail.

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  A classic in the making!

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  —Gemma Halliday, New York Times and USA Today Bestselling Author

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  [Dr.] Sherwood-Fabre’s attention to detail and vivid prose are on full display in this delightful look at the evolution of a young Sherlock Holmes.

  —Book Life Prize

  To Angelo and Izabella

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Also by Liese Sherwood-Fabre

  Excerpt From “The Adventure of the Murdered Gypsy”

  Chapter One

  They told me the Battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton, and I knew I should have been honored to be at the institution; but at age thirteen, I hated it. The whole bloody place. I remained only because my parents’ disappointment would have been too great a disgrace to bear.

  My aversion culminated about a month after my arrival when I was forced into a boxing match on the school’s verdant side lawn. I had just landed a blow to Charles Fitzsimmons’s nose, causing blood to pour from both nostrils, when the boys crowding around us parted. One of the six-form prefects joined us in the circle’s center.

  After glancing first at Fitzsimmons, he said to me, “Sherlock Holmes, you’re wanted in the Head Master’s office. Come along.”

  Even though I’d been at the school only a few weeks, I knew no one was called to the director’s office unless something was terribly wrong. I hesitated, blinking at the young man in his stiff collar and black suit. He flapped his arms to mark his impatience at my delay and spun about on his heel, marching toward the college’s main building. I gulped, gathered my things, and followed him at a pace that left me puffing to keep up.

  I had no idea what caused such a summons. If it had been the fight, surely Charles would have accompanied me. I hadn’t experienced any controversies in any of my classes, even with my mathematics instructor. True, earlier in the day I’d corrected him, but surely it made sense to point out his mistake? For the most part, the masters seemed pleased with my answers when they called on me.

  I did have problems, however, with most of my classmates—Charles Fitzsimmons was just one example. Except he was the one who’d called me out. Surely, that couldn’t be the basis of this summons?

  Once inside, my sight adjusted slowly to the dark, cool interior, and I could distinguish the stern-faced portraits of past college administrators, masters, and students lining the hallway. As I passed them, I could feel their judgmental stares bearing down on me, and so I focused on the prefect’s back, glancing neither right nor left at these long-dead critics. A cold sweat beaded on my upper lip as I felt certain something very grave had occurred, with me at the center of the catastrophe. Reaching the Head Master’s office, I found myself unable to work the door’s latch, and with an exasperated sigh, the prefect opened it for me and left me to enter on a pair of rather shaky knees.

  My agitation deepened when I entered and found the director examining a letter with my father’s seal clearly visible. He glanced up from the paper with the same severe expression I’d observed in his predecessors’ portraits. Dismissing his appraisal, I concentrated on the details I gathered from the missive in his hand.

  Taking a position on an expansive oriental carpet in front of his massive wooden desk, I drew in my breath and asked, “What happened to my mother?”

  “How did you know this involves your mother?” he asked, pulling back his chin.

  “The letter. That’s my father’s seal.” My words gathered speed as I continued. “It doesn’t bear a black border, which means at least at this point no death is involved. My father’s hand is steady enough to write, so he must be well, that leaves only some problem with my mother.”

  The man raised his eyebrows at my response, then glanced at the letter in his hand before tossing it onto the desk’s polished surface. “As you have surmised, a problem at home requires your return. Your father has requested that we arrange for you and your things to be sent to the rail station. Your brother will be arriving from Oxford to accompany you the rest of the way.”

  My heart squeezed in my chest, dread rushing through my body. Home. Underbyrne, the family estate. And not just for a short visit. Packing all my things meant I was leaving for the remainder of the term. Something terribly wrong had happened. Grievous enough to pull Mycroft out of his third year of studies at Oxford. Blood whooshed in my ears, and I barely heard what followed.

  “I’ve already requested Mrs. Whittlespoon to assist you in your packing.” Head Master turned his attention to the rest of the mail on his desk. He glanced up to add, “She’ll be in your room already.”

  “Thank you, sir. Good day, sir.” I recovered enough to respond to his statement, but not to ask the reason behind Father’s directive.

  With a wave of his hand, I was dismissed before I could inquire. As I closed the door behind me, I heard him mutter, “As much a prig as his brother.”

  For a moment, I considered opening the door and requesting more information about his assessment as well as what else my father had provided in his letter, but social convention restrained me from questioning an elder—and the Head Master at that. I was left to ponder my unspoken concerns as I returned to my chamber.

  By the time I arrived at my room, my trunk had already been brought down from storage, and Mrs. Whittlespoon, the house dame, was placing my belongings in it.

  “There you are, dearie.” She pointed to a set of clothing on my bed. “You go change into your traveling clothes while I finish this up.”

  I paused, considering for a moment to ask her what she knew of the events surrounding my departure, but she had turned her attention to the drawer with my undergarments. Having lost the opportunity for the moment, I retrieved the clothes and carried them to the bathing facilities.

  Since the Head Master was not forthcoming, and Mrs. Whittlespoon might have only limited knowledge, my best hope for additional information as to what had occurred with Mother would be Mycroft—if he was in the mood to share. Knowing my brother, he might not be inclined to discuss this or any other matter on the journey home. He’d been overjoyed to return to university after the summer’s break and pulling him out would definitely sour his mood.

  Mrs. Wh
ittlespoon turned to me when I re-entered the room and placed both her hands on my shoulders for a moment to scrutinize my appearance.

  “You look a right proper young gentleman.” She smoothed out the sleeves of my coat. “You go on down to the carriage, now. I’ll finish up here and have Jarvis take the trunk down to the carriage. I assume you’ll want to carry that yourself.”

  She waved her hand at my violin case lying on the bed. A wave of guilt swept over me. At my mother’s insistence, I’d begun lessons two years before and developed some skill on the instrument. Since entering Eton I hadn’t found the time to practice as promised. How could I report such a failure to her? I swallowed as my next thought rose, unbidden. Assuming, of course, she was in a position to ask—or understand—my answer.

  No sooner had I taken a seat in the awaiting carriage, resting the violin case on my lap, than a loud clomping at the dormitory door announced the arrival of my trunk. The handyman’s back bent low, and he knees splayed outward. The driver helped him take it the final yards to the rear of the carriage with Mrs. Whittlespoon following behind, shouting orders all the way.

  “Mind how you secure it. I didn’t spend all that time laying things neatly just so—here now, watch that strap.”

  The vehicle rocked as the trunk was fastened on. When the movement ceased, Mrs. Whittlespoon stuck her head in the window and passed me a small basket. “Something in case you get hungry on the way.”

  I bobbed my head. “Thank you. It’s quite kind of you.”

  Before either of us could say more, the driver gave a shout, and the house dame stepped back only a second prior to the carriage jerking forward.

  Throughout the trip to the station, I turned over in my mind what little I had gleaned from my exchange with the Head Master. I had assumed the issue lay with her health—although I knew her to be quite hale for a woman of forty-six. What other situation would cause my father to pull both his sons out of school? Scandal possibly. Although, she came from a good family with a stalwart reputation, and my mother was by nature a moral upright person. The most shocking character on either side of her parentage was my grandmother, the sister of Horace Vernet, the artist. Being French and having the patronage of Napoleon III certainly raised eyebrows in some corners, but that would hardly create a scandal worthy of removing Mycroft and myself from school.

  The basket Mrs. Whittlespoon had given me bumped my elbow. To distract myself from the thoughts swirling about my head, I took the opportunity to check its contents. A small apple, two thick slices of bread, and a medium wedge of cheese. I found the thought of food unsettling and closed the basket.

  Soon after the driver deposited me and my trunk on the station platform, a train pulled in spewing a cloud of smoke and dust. I spotted my brother leaning from the window of a first-class compartment at the rear of the train. He pointed to a man pushing a cart toward me, and once free of my baggage, I joined him.

  My brother and father were “cut from the same cloth”—as they say—with thick waists and high foreheads. One had only to examine my father to know how Mycroft would appear thirty years hence. The exception being the eyes. Not in color, but in sharpness. My father’s lacked the keen intellect apparent in my brother’s. While Father was quite an accomplished man—as a squire he served as a justice of the peace and was versed in many subjects, especially entomology—Mycroft’s intensity marked him as our progenitor’s intellectual superior.

  That keenness also gave him little patience with others. Despite being my only sibling, I was never truly comfortable around him. With rare exceptions, I guarded my words and actions carefully in his presence, knowing they would be weighed, and mostly likely found lacking in some aspect. For that reason, when he indicated I should sit in the tufted, blue seat opposite him in the compartment, I didn’t argue. He had taken the backward-facing middle seat because it was less prone to the smoke and dust blown in through the window.

  I plopped down on the cushion, and a small cloud of ash rose from my action, sending me into a brief coughing fit. When a small smile graced his lips, I ignored it and settled Mrs. Whittlespoon’s basket next to me.

  Mycroft jutted his chin at it. “What’s that?”

  “Mrs. Whittlespoon gave it to me. For the trip.”

  “What’d she give you?”

  “You want it? I can’t—I’m not hungry.”

  He took the proffered basket and studied the contents. Putting the cheese between the two slices of bread, he took a bite and caused my stomach to flip yet again. It hadn’t quite settled when the train lurched forward and another wave of nausea swept over me.

  To distract myself, I stared out the window at the passing countryside and summoned the nerve to ask him what had occupied me for the past several hours. “What exactly happened to Mother? I know she’s not dead, but I have no information beyond that. Is she sick? Dying?”

  “She’s fine.”

  “Someone’s not, or we wouldn’t be called home.”

  No reply.

  “I’m going to find out. Wouldn’t it be better for me to learn it from you now, than when we arrive at Underbyrne?”

  Through his cheese sandwich, he said, “You want to know, you little twit? Here it is. Mother’s in gaol, accused of murder.”

  The force with which this pronouncement hit me was the same as if he’d given me a blow to the stomach. The queasiness I’d battled since my fight with Fitzsimmons returned with a vengeance. Bile surged into my throat. The compartment closed around me, and my deepest desire was to flee. I stood, realized there was truly nowhere to go, and dropped back down into my seat.

  “Put your head between your legs.”

  I glanced at Mycroft, but his words sounded as if I were under water.

  “Put your head between your legs.”

  When I remained immobile, he grabbed me by the hair and bent me over.

  “Breathe,” he said.

  After several gulps of air, my hearing improved, and my heartbeat slowed. “You can let go now.”

  He sat back, and I raised my head. “Mother? Wha— How?”

  “I don’t know all the particulars. I gleaned it from my own analysis of the information in the papers.”

  He pulled part of a newspaper out of his breast pocket and passed it to me. Despite the train’s movement, my original agitation subsided enough for me to read the dispatch concerning Mrs. Emma Brown having been found dead on our estate.

  “Mrs. Brown, the midwife?”

  Mycroft nodded. The whole village knew the thin, older woman. She’d been at the delivery of at least half the town. The other half had been seen either by Dr. Farnsworth, the village doctor, or Mr. Harvingsham, the village surgeon. As far as I knew, Mother had little contact with Mrs. Brown. Dr. Farnsworth or Mr. Harvingsham tended us during certain severe illnesses, but my mother relied mostly on her own knowledge of herbs and medicine to treat our ailments.

  He then handed me another newspaper sheaf. This one was from a larger paper and included an editorial decrying the bias in some county judicial systems. In point, the author noted a recent incident of a justice of the peace’s wife whom a local businessman had accused of his wife’s murder and yet the woman still resided at home.

  “You believe that this refers to Father?”

  “How many dead bodies do you think crop up on the property of justices of the peace? Of course, it’s referring to our parents, idiot. And after that editorial appeared, the constable was forced to arrest Mother and put her in gaol.”

  Calmed by the supplied information instead of my own dire speculations, I returned the two papers to him and contemplated this new turn of events. One didn’t argue with Mycroft or his ability to deduce specifics from the barest of details. He had exercised his ability to knit together bits of intelligence from various sources into a whole truth for as long as I’d known him. And he was seldom, if ever, proved wrong.

  All the same, one glaring omission remained.

  “She’s innocent,�
�� I said.

  “I lack enough information to make that assertion.” Mycroft pulled the apple out of the basket. “You sure you don’t want this?”

  When I shook my head, he bit into it and then spit out what he had in his mouth. I could see the apple’s brown inside from across the compartment. Had the circumstances been different, I might have found this comeuppance amusing. Instead, I found no satisfaction in the event, not being able to shift my focus from the idea of Mother as a murderess. Unable to conceive of her in those terms, I returned to my original contention that she had been unjustly accused. And I had to find out what had truly happened—which only Mother could supply.

  At that moment, I resolved to find a way to visit her.

  I knew where the gaol was. The old, square building sat on a corner near the edge of the village center. Did one simply knock on the door and ask to see a prisoner, as when calling upon a neighbor?

  While I wanted to ask Mycroft about the process, he’d already rested his head back against his seat, his eyes closed. I tried to follow my brother’s example but found myself unable to rest. I kept imagining my mother locked in a dank cell and found the only way to keep the vision away was to watch the green countryside pass by my window until dusk fell and all that remained was my own reflection staring back.

  Father stood on the station platform when we arrived. He said little in greeting other than, “Simpson’s waiting with the cart and the footman. Have them bring your trunks out.”

  Before either of us could respond, he spun about on his heel and left us to follow him.