The Reichenbach Problem Read online

  The lower mountains were a deep, ivy green. They were covered above the timberline, where we could discern it, with a thick carpet of alpine plants and grasses. Beyond them lay the great peaks that we could not yet see; the noble mountains that lent the Oberland their majesty.

  Nature’s phenomenal alchemy of mountain vegetation and summer rain meant that as we toiled upwards in the rickety cart, we found ourselves soon enshrouded in heavy mist – or cloud, as Holloway, enthralled, pointed out. A lofty eeriness descended on the place. The silence was all-embracing. Nothing, it would seem, dared make a noise in such stillness, save our brave little cart with its steady rattle and creak. It was as if we were in the castle of a giant king who, although out of sight, nevertheless commanded utmost respect and awestruck whispers.

  After a while, we passed through the occlusion and, it felt to me, entered another dimension; a place where reality took on a different aspect. The mist, which I noticed had gathered only in patches across the valley slopes, had been left behind. Visibility was still restricted, though, as we remained immersed in the serried ranks of proud pines.

  The climb took an hour. Thanks to the cart’s hard seats, its sturdy iron-rimmed wheels and singular lack of any perceivable suspension, I found that I had bruises in places I did not even know I had. But it was all worth it. We turned the final corner of the mountain track, pulled away from the forest, and presently came upon the main thoroughfare of the tiny Alpine village that was to be our home for the next few days.

  It is hard to describe my precise emotions as the village in the mountains unfolded before me. I had last experienced a similar sense of a cleansing breeze blowing away the cobwebs – and timeless peace descending – when, on a walking holiday in the highlands in my student days, I crested the brow of a hill and was treated to the breath-taking vista of a superb plain sweeping away into violet infinity before me.

  The Alpine village sat nestled on a ledge with an area about the size of a dozen rugby football pitches. It was perched on the edge of a sheer drop down into the valley on one side, and had its back braced against a sharp mountain wall which climbed into further cloud on the other.

  The watery early evening sun, only just beginning to burn through the mist, was nevertheless sufficient to give the whole vicinity a cheerful aspect. The terrace was essentially meadow, studded with individual wooden chalets of a type I had noticed on the mountain train. There was a slight rise in the centre, which seemed to contain common land and one or two small barns with haylofts. Everywhere there were balconies – designed to allow the inhabitants of the chalets to sit on the upper levels of their homes and glory in the summer sunshine, or marvel at the winter snows. Each balcony was decorated with plants and flowers in pots and window boxes; geraniums, pink, gold and red, predominantly.

  The main street was barely 150 yards long. There was human activity but it was sedate. It was as if everyone here had all day to get from one end of the village to the other, and nobody was pressing them to behave otherwise – which was very likely the case. On first inspection, I could make out one or two more commercial enterprises, such as a hotel and a bakery. No doubt there were other shops, many of them in what appeared to be private homes, but by far the predominating impression was that of residence. A place of close community, settled and content with its enviable lot.

  The cart added its gentle creaking and rumbling to the discreet hubbub of the village. Again the combination of the flowers, light and colour gave the new arrival the distinct impression that they had just chanced upon an Eden. As we entered the main street, I started to wonder if I shouldn’t simply wire my family and have them come and join me here immediately, never to return to England again.

  Just as my thoughts were starting to warm to this particular theme, an item – very large and very heavy – plummeted past my right ear and landed on the street beside me with a mighty crash.

  Startled, I leapt out of my seat and stood, clutching onto the wrought iron cart rail for balance. This was exceedingly difficult. Although the cart had momentarily stopped, it was now juddering and rocking back and forth on its wheels. The horse was agitated and threatening to bolt. The driver was wrestling with the reins. So I sat down again and clung on. From my seat I looked down onto the road and what it was that had just missed braining me. It was a terracotta flowerpot. Mangled geraniums lay among spilled loam and shards of pottery. I became aware of noises around me. There was some shouting or disturbance going on. The driver, having managed to settle his horse, was now standing, holding the reins and gesticulating at something or someone somewhere above us. He was giving vent to his feelings in no uncertain terms. The possible loss of income, had I been rendered unconscious – or worse – by the missile, no doubt being the motivation. Holloway, too, was looking up and shouting. I raised my own eyes to the apparent source of the descending crockery and saw a woman, with swags of jet black hair, teetering over her balcony, yelling and gesturing in our direction.

  I recognized that she wasn’t gesticulating at us, however. Just to the left and behind the cart was a muscular, stocky fellow, with a broad forehead and heavy jowls. Wearing just a vest, braces, fustian trousers and stout boots, he was bellowing back at the woman. Some of the villagers stopped to observe this altercation for a moment or two, but I noticed that others simply passed by without even concerning themselves. Could this be an everyday occurrence, I wondered?

  Eventually, the woman gave a parting shot, and withdrew. She slammed her shutters, ensuring everyone understood that proceedings for the day had concluded. The aggrieved fellow, whom I assumed was the lady’s husband, stalked off; I imagine to seek solace in something liquid and consoling.

  Our disgusted driver perched himself back on his seat, as did Holloway and I on ours, and we clipped along at a brisk pace, covering the remaining few yards to my hotel in double-quick time.

  Stepping down off the cart, and still somewhat shaken from my close encounter with the flowerpot, I paid the driver in full; an act for which Holloway was again excessively grateful. Holloway followed me into the hotel.

  “Have you booked?” I asked, knowing full well he had made no plans.

  “I’m sure there’ll be a room for me,” he returned.

  “It’s a very small village and a very busy season.” I tried to sound as though I cared for his welfare.

  Before he could respond, a bright young fellow with a milk-and-apples complexion appeared from the back room. He came out from behind the hotel counter, and beamed a welcome.

  “Herr Doctor,” he said, “you have arrived. I am Anton.” He spoke good English and his pleasure at seeing me seemed entirely genuine. We shook hands and then he looked at Holloway. “Oh, I am so sorry,” he said. “I did not realize you were bringing a friend.”

  I winced at the description, but ignored it for propriety’s sake. “It’s quite all right…” I began.

  “No, no, if you have written to us that there were going to be two of you…” Anton left the self-reproachful sentence unfinished, went back behind the counter, and started to leaf through his ledger.

  “That’s quite all right,” I began again. “Mr Holloway was not intending to come until the last moment. We met on the train. I’m sure that since you have no rooms available, Mr Holloway would be more than happy to seek accommodation elsewhere…”

  “No, no, we have rooms, Herr Doctor, do not worry.”

  He turned to a second ledger and ran his fingers down the availability column. I, for my part, silently clenched and re-clenched my fists.

  “Here we are,” he continued. “Will it be two weeks also?” He looked at Holloway.

  “For now, yes,” replied Holloway. “I’m not sure exactly what my plans are yet, to be honest.”

  “Good.” The obliging eyes returned to engage mine. “Will you and your friend be sharing the room, Herr Doctor?”

  “No.” I shuddered, pitched forward and muttered at the young man, “A different floor would be entirely ac
ceptable.” I could not stop myself adding, “And he is not my friend.”

  “As you wish.” He returned to his ledger and, with a few deft flicks of a pencil, assigned us our respective rooms. Mine on the third floor, with balcony, as requested, Holloway’s on the first, at the back.

  “When the cart comes up from the valley with your luggage, I shall ensure it is brought to your rooms.”

  “That’s all right,” Holloway assured him, raising his bag. “This is all I’ve got at the moment, actually.”

  “Then may I show you both to your rooms?”

  At the top of the first set of stairs, he drew Holloway off to inspect his accommodation.

  And away from me.

  At last.

  I extricated my smoking materials from my pocket and filled my pipe. I hung the lighted Vesta over the bowl and sucked on the stem. For the first time since earlier that morning, I began to feel that fate was at last treating me with the respect I deserved.

  My luggage arrived soon after I had been settled into my room, which was comfortable and spacious and had a fine outlook, southeast across the village meadow towards the mountains. Dusk had settled by the time I had unpacked, washed and changed for dinner.

  The dining room, lit by oil lamps and replete with crystal and silverware, was intimate and welcoming. The food was honest and plentiful. Perhaps it was the mountain air, perhaps the exertions and stresses of an eventful day – nevertheless, I did not hold back. I even had a second portion of a dish the Swiss called rösti – shredded and fried potatoes in a marinade – accompanied by some thumb-thick rustic sausages. The wine, again, surprised and delighted.

  Over dinner, I surveyed my fellow guests. There was Holloway, of course, looking about him in the manner of a fox engaged in eating its prey; anxious and alert for predators. Next to him, a Bavarian, Günther Werner, here for the hunting. Apart from exchanging the occasional sentence with Holloway, he tended to keep himself to himself and hummed his way through all four courses. Having said that, I noticed, at one point, the Bavarian’s eyes leap from his plate to look up and across directly at me. I could only guess what it was Holloway had told him. There was a French couple, Monsieur and Madame Marcus Plantin, who appeared to be oblivious of the fact that there was anyone else in the room save each other. It was a while later that I noticed Plantin was in fact confined to a rolling chair. There was a morose middle-aged Dutch couple, the van Engelses. They, it seemed, would rather the others were not there at all. Then there were the two Croats, Tomas and Anna Pivcevic. They had greeted me warmly when I entered the dining room, and insisted I sit between them throughout the meal. They hailed from the Balkans but, owing to the confused situation in that region, currently resided in Bosnia. Being both teachers, they were much-travelled and well educated. We were able to exchange views on a large number of different topics.

  There was one final member of this present company of hotel visitors, I learned, who was not at table that evening. He was an Englishman: Peter Brown. A distant, highbrow fellow, I came to understand, reading between the lines of my fellow guests’ comments. A keen walker, he barely exchanged a word with anyone else and was always striding off with his alpenstock somewhere or other. He had indeed wandered off earlier that afternoon and had not yet returned. The general consensus was that he had walked too far, found that he was unable to return before dark without risking becoming lost, and had sought temporary lodgings in another village for the night. This was not regretted by anyone present. No doubt, the view went, I would encounter him on the morrow and form my own opinion of his evident incivility.

  Providentially, none present, saving Holloway, had ever read any of my stories – or at least, if they had they either didn’t like them or didn’t make the connection. Whatever the reason, we did not discuss them at all. Holloway did attempt to introduce the subject at one point but I managed to deflect him and bring the discussion round to the apparent dearth of internationally renowned Swiss novelists, and why this was the case.

  At the end of the meal, the ladies retired to the hotel withdrawing room, while we gentlemen took to the smoking room, which doubled as the hotel’s library. If, indeed, four shelves of well-thumbed novels in different languages, half a dozen half-baked reference books in Swiss-Deutsch relating to the typography, flora and fauna of the region, plus one shabby Holy Bible in English could be dignified with the term library. The Bavarian, Werner, brought Plantin through in his rolling chair.

  We had all consumed a significant amount of wine at the table, so we were all considerably more relaxed and easy in each other’s company by this time – despite the fact that some of us had only met barely an hour or so earlier. Some of us smoked and some did not. The young Swiss, Anton, who had met us on our arrival, came in and asked if there were anything further we required. We ordered our nightcaps. Werner, eschewing anything so bourgeois as cognac or port, ordered up copious amounts of Swiss beer, and contented himself with that for the rest of the evening.

  Plantin, despite clearly missing his beloved, made a noble attempt to appear content in our company and brought the conversation round, in his faltering English, which was the common tongue for the assembled, to Günther’s beer. He wondered if we realized that the Swiss word for light beer was hell. He found this amusing, he told us, because, of course, hell was the last thing one would associate with “light” unless, of course, it was something to do with fiery furnaces. He looked particularly pleased with himself that he had essayed a joke in English and had plainly managed to carry it off admirably.

  “Is there such a thing as hell, Herr Doctor?” Werner looked at me. “You know – evil, the devil?”

  There was that element in his attitude which I found, alas, all too familiar. I felt sure I was about to discover that my optimism in there being no one who knew of my stories was sadly misplaced.

  “Why ask me?” I replied. “Doctors don’t study evil – they study medicine.”

  “Ah yes,” came the reply, “but you are no ordinary doctor, are you?”

  “Am I not?” I responded, now sure that the inevitable was about to arrive, like watching a train crash.

  “No – you are the author of the Sherlock Holmes stories, are you not?”

  I looked across at Holloway, who appeared delighted that my secret was out, once again. This was possibly because he could now claim an association with me. Reflected glory, to a fellow like him, would be preferable to no glory at all. I also put two and two together and came to the conclusion that he had been instrumental in this whole new development. It was this which he had shared with the Bavarian and had made the other look across at me so sharply earlier. However the subject had raised itself, I now knew that my stock response of “some people think that” would not be employable on this occasion. Doubtless Holloway would only interject and scotch any defensive gambit I may have played.

  “I have written a great deal more than the Holmes stories, you know,” I decided to reply.

  “Sherlock Holmes?” Plantin looked at me in surprise. “I have been to England three times these last two years. You are very famous M’sieu,” he said.

  “I wouldn’t say that,” I replied, not entirely self-deprecatingly; I wasn’t that famous, for goodness’ sake.

  It transpired that the Dutchman, Professor van Engels, had apparently not heard of me and, judging by his behaviour – which involved attempting to lose himself in repeated sips of cognac – he had no wish to rectify this. Tomas Pivcevic admitted that he had seen my name in a bookshop on a rare visit to London, but had not, he apologized, managed yet to read any of my work.

  “So, Herr Doctor,” Werner pursued his question. “Do you believe in evil?”

  “I have come to the conclusion,” I reflected, “that individual humans are capable of being evil. ‘Evil’ as a force other than that which can be brought about by some humans’ deeds may exist. It may be an abyss that lies somewhere beyond our five senses, beyond our comprehension, but you can be sure
that by far the greatest amount of ill that befalls the human race is as a result of its own behaviour. Or, I should say, misbehaviour.”

  “Do you believe, though, in the paranormal?” Holloway asked.

  “I believe that there is much which is beyond our understanding. But you should be clear – I also believe that there are vast tracts of unexplored territory in the mind. We have not even begun to have the faintest inkling as to what the human brain is capable of helping us to believe. Much of ‘reality’ is based upon perception and experience – and these things are notoriously subjective. I am sure that it would be fascinating to explore that uncharted territory, while also venturing out into the unknown beyond our everyday preconceptions and sensual experiences.”

  “The supernatural?” Plantin asked.

  “Perhaps ‘psychic’ would be a better word. It has a meaning related to the human mind, yet also related to matters beyond the present realm.”

  “Are you considering undertaking such an exploration, doctor?” Pivcevic enquired.

  “I have visited large parts of the world. The space inside a man’s imagination is far greater and far more fascinating even than those wonderful far-flung places. I like to think of myself – perhaps a conceit, I’ll grant you – as an explorer. An adventurer, a pioneer. What better place to start than right here?” I tapped Holloway’s head. It was an unconscious act – or perhaps it wasn’t. However, he received it as if a bee had stung him and he cast me a most baleful look.

  “What are you suggesting?” he demanded.

  “Nothing, Holloway. You were simply closest to hand. I didn’t mean to offend…”

  “What’s wrong with your own head?”

  “I’ve often wondered that myself.” The remark achieved the laugh from some of the others that I had intended. But it failed to placate Holloway, who sat brooding in silence for quite a few minutes afterwards.