The Reichenbach Problem Read online

  “Righto! Thanks. Thanks awfully!”

  “Oh, and Holloway…”

  “Yes?”

  “Put a jacket on – there’s a good fellow.”

  “Right you are, Doyle.”

  I reconnoitred the village, to get an idea of the facilities on offer. They were limited but by no means Spartan. I then returned to my hotel. There a young boy met me. He spoke a little broken English. He handed me a calling card. The name embossed on it was Frau Ruth von Denecker.

  “Frau von Denecker,” he began, reciting, “invites that you take tea with her this four o’clock at the afternoon. Hotel Jungfrau.” He paused and narrowed his eyes in an attempt to recollect a postscript to this message. “Please to bring your friend also. Hollow… Hollow-way.”

  I was again irked by this “friendship” assumption. Was this the impression of the whole community? Before long, if I was not careful, we would be invited everywhere together, like husband and wife.

  “Holloway is not my friend.” The youngster smiled but did not comprehend. I dropped a couple of coins into the palm of his grubby hand and growled: “Doch ohne Holloway. Not Holloway.” He grinned, pocketed the money and skipped away.

  I entered my hotel and headed for the stairs. Here I passed our young Swiss host whose parents, I had discovered, owned the establishment.

  “Ah, Anton…”

  “Good morning, Herr Doctor,” he smiled. “How may I help?”

  “Is there anyone you know who may accompany me and my…” I stopped myself in mid-sentence. I refused to allow the word “friend” to pass my lips. “Anyone who may accompany myself and my acquaintance Mr Holloway on a short walk this morning?”

  “Where would you like to go?”

  “Not far. My legs are not up to a long march so early on in my stay. Two hours should be ample.”

  “There and back?”

  “Two hours in total.”

  “Good. You shall meet with my sister…”

  “Your sister?” I was not sure as to the appropriateness of a young woman accompanying two men into the mountains. However, Anton had offered her and, therefore, I supposed it was both acceptable and common practice.

  Anton misunderstood my hesitation. “Oh, don’t worry, Herr Doctor, she is very strong.” He flexed a bicep. “Stronger than me. And she knows all the ways. Very well. She is a… um… a tom.”

  I puzzled over the word for a moment. “Oh – you mean ‘tomboy’?”

  “Ja. Exactly. She can run faster, swim further, climb higher than anyone else in the village. She is the best guide.”

  “Splendid!” I clapped Anton on the shoulder. “I shall look forward very much to meeting her. Shall we say in twenty minutes? Here?”

  “Twenty minutes. Good.”

  He moved off in search of his sister, and I went to my room. I returned a few minutes later in my trusty tweeds, brogues and puttees with the hat and an ice axe I had acquired in Austria. Holloway was already waiting. He had found himself a dark green jacket, which marginally toned down the garish effect of his costume. He hovered on the street.

  Anton arrived immediately and brought with him someone who could only be described as a walking summer’s day. Eva, his sister, was barely twenty. Tall, slim; her blonde hair short and her healthy, tanned features the perfect setting for a pair of shining green eyes. I fell in love with her immediately. Platonically, naturally. My heart warmed to her as an uncle’s towards a favourite niece. Holloway, though, was evidently smitten in a much more powerful and serious way. Having been shifting expectantly from one foot to the other, he now stood stock still. An English setter on point. His hands hung limply at his sides, as though the nerves and sinews had been severed. His eyes were set unblinking beneath his conical black hat.

  Eva, who spoke excellent English like her brother, shook our hands. She wore trousers, boots and a shirt with the cuffs rolled back. She carried a knapsack and an ice axe with its pointed ferrule and the leather wrist strap that kept the owner from losing it down a hillside, should they stumble. While deferential, it was readily understood that she was queen and we were mere courtiers.

  I was still not entirely comfortable for Holloway and me to be alone in the company of a single woman. Anton, however, appeared just as unconcerned as when he had first suggested his sister. Surely he would not have suggested such an arrangement had he not trusted us. I detected, though, perhaps an erosion of that trust in the way that he looked at Holloway and his outlandish garb. But if he had developed any reservations at that point, he did not voice them. Instead he bade us farewell, safe return.

  We set off, three abreast, Eva between Holloway and me. Her joie de vivre soon had all three of us chattering excitedly about the walk, where we should go, what we may see. Schoolchildren on an outing. To any observers, we may just as easily have been long-standing friends, reunited after a period of separation and intent on revisiting the haunts and joyful experiences of our lost youth. A few moments later, I even started to sense, for the first time, a thawing in my attitude towards Holloway. The influence of Eva’s personality, I don’t doubt, creating an atmosphere of unity and conviviality. Despite myself, though, somewhere buried in my psyche I begrudged him his present happiness.

  Within a quarter of an hour, we had scaled a considerable portion of the slopes that provided the backdrop to the village, dwindling to a bauble beneath us. The track was wide enough for us to remain three abreast. The forest, coniferous boreal, had become more dense meanwhile. The smells and sensations were an invigorating experience. Eva explained that the word “alp” actually referred to the high summer pasture and not the peaks themselves. We could feel the heat of the sun drumming down on the pine canopy many yards above our heads. However, beneath, in our secret fairy tale landscape, it was cool, pleasant and intimate. A chough, disturbed, broke cover and flew twisting and twittering into the trees. Everywhere, streams still carried yesterday’s rains switching down through ragged gullies. Occasionally, Holloway and I would miss our footing and skitter unceremoniously on the path. Eva never missed a step and, I am sure, would have comfortably pressed on at twice the pace, had she not diligently remained in our company.

  In due course, the path narrowed and the party split up into two sections, Eva and Holloway in front and me bringing up the rear. Not that I was finding the going difficult. I believe I was more capable of sustaining a brisk pace than Holloway. It was simply courtesy that had brought about this particular succession. I was married, and happily. Eva and Holloway were not, and they had plainly found much in common in such a short space of time. Acting as an impromptu chaperon, I had decided to take the honourable option and haul off to allow the two of them time on their own. Knowing what little I did of Holloway and his erratic character, many may feel that this was irresponsible of me. My brief but entrancing experience of Eva, so far, had already shown me, though, that she was more than capable of looking after herself.

  We were nearing the furthest point in our excursion and were close to turning for home again when we broke free of forest. We stepped out into some Elysian fields; Alpine meadows basking in crisp, clear mountain air and sunshine. Here grew wild blueberries and strawberries, orchid and gentian. Beyond this idyll, presently out of reach but, one hoped, soon to be ventured upon, gratifyingly craggy mountains with tempting crisp linen napkins of snow. Eva pointed out one peak in particular, which she called a widowmaker. The Eiger. Then, all at once, with an exclamation, she fell to her knees. She beckoned to us. We stooped, and then kneeled, to look. It was edelweiss; grey and furry like a moth, or a roebuck’s newly grown antlers. The velvety bracts that served as petals resembled paint splashes; a young child’s first attempts at drawing a sunburst. Within this lay a cluster of a dozen or so tiny bee-yellow pincushions. These constituted the pollen-bearing element of the plant.

  Holloway let out a low whistle and reached his left hand towards the stems. He plucked one.

  “Do not pick them!” Eva cried. “I like th
em to stay on the mountains. Not to be kept indoors like… prisoners. Not to be torn from the earth to die.”

  Holloway looked flustered and, significantly, sharply hurt that he could have disappointed her.

  “I – I’m sorry… I didn’t…” He tailed off, looking as cowed and guilty as a beaten puppy.

  Eva laid a cool hand on his forearm.

  “Don’t worry, you were not to know. Keep it now.” She pressed Holloway’s hand back towards him. Taking it as an absolution, and the newly picked flower as its symbol, he inserted it into his lapel.

  The incident over, Eva leaned forward and placed her nose close to the little huddled plants. She inhaled deeply, held her breath a moment, and then let it out again.

  “Smell,” she motioned to us.

  I leaned in and sniffed. Holloway followed suit.

  “What does it smell of?”

  “I don’t know,” replied Holloway. “Flowers?”

  Eva laughed and turned to me. “Herr Doctor…?”

  “Honey,” I said.

  “Ja!” she cried, and beamed at me. I felt the way I had when I was seven years old and had just won first prize in a school spelling competition.

  It was indeed a subtle scent of honey. I was reminded of the gentle downland, on the south side of the London plain, with its sweeping lavender fields on a dusty summer’s day; bee-loud, and rich with a sea of gently undulating purple rolling away into the distance.

  A fleeting thought drifted across my mind like a cloud’s shadow across a field. Maybe I could retire Holmes. Put him out to pasture? He could keep bees? Then, just as quickly as the thought came, it had gone.

  I looked up and saw that Eva and Holloway had already moved on. They were climbing up the ever-rising path that crossed the meadow towards the Alpine peaks. I set off at a brisk pace to catch them up.

  As I closed in, I saw movement beyond them. It appeared to be a group of walkers approaching from the other direction, away from the peaks. They were a good distance from us. But there was an element not quite right about them. It took me a moment to work out what it was. They were huddled together as they approached. It was hard to understand exactly why this scene was not consonant with the idyll that had been mine to date. Something was definitely amiss.

  Eva had seen the group, too. I could tell by the way she hesitated and tensed that she did not like the look of the approaching group, either. She lengthened her stride, leaving Holloway and me behind. We kept up with her as best we could. As we closed, we began to make out details. There were four people in the group, and between them they carried abaft their shoulders what appeared to be long staves. Between these was a blanket or a tarpaulin. There was a person at each corner. They were carrying something. An animal, perhaps? Were they hunters? Was this their trophy? As they drew closer, we could tell that this was not the case. They did not have the jaunty air of a group of friends who had had fine sport that morning and were now swinging proudly down the mountain track. This group walked with measured step, as if they were mourners; as if what hung between them suspended from the staves was a coffin.

  Soon it became clear that my speculation was not far off the mark. It was, indeed, a funeral procession. But there was no burial at the end of this particular journey. That would come later. At the end of this procession could only lie, to begin with, questions. Between the four men bearing the staves swung, wrapped in a blanket, what could only be the body of a human being.

  As we reached them, they acknowledged Eva, whom they had plainly recognized from some distance away. They set their burden down so that we could inspect the contents of the blanket. These were simple Switzers who worked the high pastures in the summer months. They did not speak English, but Eva translated for us. The body belonged to a man. He had been found at the bottom of a rocky drop near a great cataract. They thought that his neck had been broken.

  Eva, her brow furrowed, took a closer look; we joined her. He was a man about my age, small and wiry. He lay on the coarse blanket, which had been fixed onto the staves by strong hemp cord. It only took her a moment to recognize the face.

  “This is Herr Brown!” she cried. “From my parents’ hotel!”

  So, I thought: Brown, the solitary. Brown, lying there like a dead fledgling on an avenue pavement. Brown looking even lonelier now than I had imagined.

  Someone had retrieved his cloth cap from the vicinity of where he had fallen, and had placed it reverently on his chest.

  “Why did you move him?” squeaked Holloway. His features had grown pallid under his thin tan. “Who told you to move him?”

  Eva translated, but threw him a sidelong glance as she did so. The Switzers looked at each other and shrugged.

  “It is the foremost principle of any suspicious death,” Holloway continued. “You must not disturb the scene until the authorities have inspected it.”

  Eva obligingly translated again, and further unresponsive looks resulted from the bearer-party.

  “You tell them,” Holloway urged me. I must have looked as blank as the Switzers, so he repeated, “You tell them!” Then, seeing that I had no intention of doing any such thing, he addressed the gathering. “This,” he said, waving a wild hand in my general direction, “is the creator of Sherlock Holmes. He is also a brilliant doctor. He will investigate the catastrophe.”

  “Catastrophe? What do you mean?” asked Eva.

  “Yes,” I added my ha’penn’orth. “What do you mean?”

  “Doyle, listen, this may be nothing. It may be exactly what it appears to be. An unfortunate accident. Or it may be something far more sinister…”

  He had no need to complete his thesis. I could quite follow where he was taking this. I, apparently, with my uncanny powers of detection and superb medical skills – as witnessed by my Holmes stories – would leap into action, explore every aspect of this mystery and, no doubt, come up with some startling revelation, to gasps of amazement and admiration from a grateful community. For him it was a natural equation: Here was I, to all intents and purposes a detective. There was a body. Ergo, a mystery had occurred. Quod Erat Demonstrandum.

  On the other hand, my own concern at that precise moment was for the poor unfortunate who lay on that blanket. He was a thousand miles away from his home and his family on some foreign brae. The question was not whether he should have been disturbed from the place at which he had been discovered, but rather, how could we get him down to the village with something resembling dignity?

  Ignoring Holloway, who continued to twitch, I asked Eva if there were anywhere that villagers took people who had had similar unfortunate accidents in the mountains.

  “Yes, we usually bring them to lie in the church. Father Vernon looks after them until they can be brought down into the hospital in the valley.”

  “Father Vernon?”

  “He is the priest of the church. Catholic.” She crossed herself by way of further explanation. The others, not understanding what had been said, but noting the gesture and thinking that a holy exchange had taken place, copied her.

  “Ah,” I replied, “and then…?”

  “And then the body is examined, if it is a sudden death, and when it is time the family can collect the poor man for the funeral. It is very sad.”

  “It is.”

  We both looked down at poor, lonely Brown. “Then that is what must happen next,” I said. “Tell your people that we shall accompany them.”

  “Aren’t you going to examine the scene?” blurted Holloway.

  “Why should I?”

  “In case there’s been a…”

  “A… what… exactly?”

  “An incident. Suspicious. You know…”

  “My dear Holloway, not every untimely death is suspicious. And even if I were concerned, it is frankly no business of mine. The doctors in the valley – whose training, I am sure, was every bit as excellent and thorough, if not more so, than my own – will be more than capable of establishing the cause of death. If they have
any reason to take the matter further, I am positive that the Swiss police are similarly more than capable of pursuing any line of enquiry necessary.”

  “Yes, but…” Holloway’s squall of enthusiasm for the world of the detective was blowing itself out against my implacable resolution.

  “I do understand, Holloway,” I sought to reassure him. “However, we cannot go gallivanting around a foreign country misappropriating every unfathomable incident just on the basis of the fact that I happen to have authored a number of popular mystery tales.”

  Eva laid her gentle hand on his arm.

  “Richard, come…” she said. “It is best if we carry on this discussion at the village. It is not… good… that this poor man lies here. And my friends need to get back to their work.”

  “All right.” Holloway allowed himself to be drawn down the slopes by Eva. Like an errant pony being led to the stables.

  But then, no man could have resisted Eva.

  FOUR

  We accompanied the makeshift bier back down the slope, assisting where necessary when the going became treacherous underfoot. It was a sombre, dispiriting return in stark contrast to the light and joy that had attended the outward leg. When we reached the line of the village’s outlying chalets, we set our burden down, to catch our breath and regain our strength. Holloway was not interested in the whole affair. He had fallen back upon simmering resentment. Eva had attempted to lift his spirits, but this served only to drive him further within himself. Interestingly, however, Eva neither took offence nor rejected his bad humour outright. Sympathy was her watchword. She walked beside him, casting him the occasional solicitous glance. If I were Eva, I thought, I would mark this chap down as a bad lot and find some other fellow. Someone who would more readily respond to her, as a flower opens its petals in the presence of sunshine.

  As soon as he was able, Holloway left our little group with its poignant burden, and struck out into the village. I, too, took my leave. “Requiescat in pace,” I murmured instinctively. The bearer party and Eva began to wend their way towards the spire, on the far side of the community. I turned onto my path back to the hotel. In my room, I rested my ice axe against the little escritoire and hung my hat on the hook at the back of the door. Having changed and washed, I decided that I was hungry. It was well past midday, so this was not an unreasonable conclusion.