Pecunia non olet – Part 3

Sherlock:

It was with a heavy heart, that I left Harriet behind. Through the closed door, I could hear her sob and I was very much tempted to walk back into the room and scoop her up in my arms, holding her tightly. And yet, neither did I want to embarrass her, nor did I want for her to pull herself together again and stop crying, knowing that what she needed at this point was an unabashed weeping. Sighing I walked down the stairs and out of the house, certain that if something serious would happen I would be informed immediately either by Tom or Martha.

Lestrade and I took a hansom to first see Inspector Belcher at Scotland Yard, a man of meagre cerebral capacity for one in his position, who was usually assigned to those cases that were deemed unimportant enough to bother no-one if they were not solved. But the night of the Trenton robbery, he had been the inspector on duty for the area and had ended up with the most important case of the month of December 1893. And against all odds had arrested the murderer shortly after the crime had been committed.

With an astonishing arrogance, considering the enormous rate of his unsolved cases, usually nowhere in the vicinity of what Lestrade, Gregson or even young Hopkins worked on, let alone myself, he bid us sit and I could clearly see that there was no love lost between the two official detectives. Their attitude towards one another was hostile at best, towards me, Belcher's was cautious. It was clear, that he did not like me very much but he was after all intelligent enough to know that it was better to keep on the good side of me.

"So, how can I help you?" he thus asked with polite indifference and I answered him.

"But there is no mystery with the Kershaw case at all, Mr Holmes," he answered testily. "Kershaw admitted to having killed Trenton and that was that. We have done what was to be done and have succeeded and..."

"You would not call the still missing jewels to be a mystery?" I interjected, raising an eyebrow at so much forced ignorance.

"The house is a big one and I'd wager to say it has many a hiding place. The heir will find them eventually, I am certain. Making such a fuss about them was absolutely unnecessary." he waved his hand in indifference.

I had to hold my self back, lest he would close up like an oyster, but as always this man infuriated me far beyond my normal cool, with his most unfortunate combination of stupidity and ignorance.

Smiling forcedly I enquired: "Did Kershaw never say, where he might have hidden his booty?"

I knew he had not, but wanted to hear it from Belcher anyway. And he said so. What impressions he had of Kershaw? – Well, he was a small-time thug who had seized the opportunity and burgled Trenton's villa. No, as far as was known, he had no accomplice, he did not want to kill the old man, he just got scared, claiming he did not expect the man to be at home that night…- and so it went on, nothing new, no impression other than the most common one and certainly no assessment of either man or situation.

After about half an hour I came to the conclusion, that I could have just as well have relied on the second-hand information Lestrade had provided, as on Belcher's self-important squabble.

It was on bidding our good-bye, that the only piece of information I had not come to know yet, was said offhandedly and as a side remark.

"I wish you good luck then, in your quest." Belcher had said in a smug tone of voice before adding in an astonishingly earnest one: "Thinking that if Trenton's friend had not fallen ill, he would not have been home that night, even."

"What friend?" I asked quickly before he could close the door to his office in our faces.

"A Charles Summerton. Lives in Hatfield."

One look at Lestrade showed me, that he had never heard of the man either.

xxx

Again we took a cab, to get to Trenton's address, the rain still pouring down and the frosty wind making a man feel really uncomfortable. Neither of us spoke much. What there was to know, we had already established and the inspector knew, that I would refuse to hypothesize without any sufficient data. We, of course, knew who had burgled the house and who had killed Gilad Trenton, but there our knowledge ended. Kershaw, to his last, had been adamant, that he had not taken the jewellery, even as he was faced with the gallows.

The Trenton Villa was a large square building, modernised recently, but clearly of Georgian origin. From the layout it was clear, that originally the main living area had been on the first floor, admitting more sunlight into the house than the ground level, that had consequently housed the family rooms. Many nooks and crannies bore testimony to the relocation of walls and wall portions and what once had been a clear and elegant layout, was now an architectural hubbub and as such perfect for the construction of secret hiding places. And as it was at this point, that I realised, Belcher had a point in saying that the jewels were most likely hidden inside the building. It certainly was not unlikely.

The door was opened by a pretty young maid with a slightly dishevelled appearance about her and upon laying her eyes on my companion, her practised smile faltered for a moment before it widened, her face looking hopeful.

"Inspector?"

"I am here to speak to Mr Trenton," Lestrade stated, ignoring the maids questioning glance towards me.

"Mr Trenton is currently very busy, Sir," she replied quickly.

"Then we will wait." the inspector smiled back just as sweet.

She hesitated. There spread a decided blush across her pleasant but rather vacant features and I could see how she shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other.

"I will see what I can do." she stammered, attempting to close the door. But I was quicker, wedging my foot between door and door frame, so she had no choice but to leave the door ajar and us hovering on the doorstep.

Ascending the stairs a moment later we could hear her knock and then open the door before receiving an answer. The faint sound of rhythmic banging and of low soft moans now brought colour to our cheeks. It stopped abruptly however and indistinguishable fragments of a low conversation reached our red ears.

"Dear me! Busy indeed..." Lestrade muttered under his breath.

When the maid appeared again, looking more dishevelled than before, I was hard-pressed to keep a straight face and wondered at her real position and purpose in the house. Trenton decidedly seemed to enjoy his inheritance, it would seem.

"Mr Trenton would be there in a moment if you would like to wait in the study." she offered, letting us into the house finally.

xxx

Everett Trenton was an athletic man in his late twenties or early thirties, with light brown hair and an angled face. Certainly a ladies man. From the way, he spoke it was clear that had never received a first-class education, but he was no doubt an intelligent man and there was a hint of cunning about him, that caught my attention.

"Mr Holmes!" he greeted, as he stepped into the dusty and stuffy room about twenty minutes later. "I am very glad, you are looking into the matter. I cannot believe I have not thought of engaging you myself!"

As he closed the door behind him, I could see another woman scurry past it and out the back of the house and a moment later a frilly hat hovered past the window, as the lady made her way around the building and out of the garden gate.

"I am not sure I would have taken your case," I admitted, bowing my head politely. "I have been rather busy these past few months to go on a treasure hunt."

"Oh yes, of course, this is nothing but a trifle for you, Mr Holmes, but you see, I am keen on returning to Argentina and it will be extremely difficult to sort out my affairs from overseas."

"Naturally."

Without asking he poured us all a glass of brandy and then sat down at the desk, that once must have been his cousins. I doubted that a lot had changed during the few months Everett Trenton had spent here.

"Have you property there?" I enquired, wondering, why a man, so fortunate as to inherit a rather valuable house in fairly extensive grounds and a handsome amount of money in a busy metropolis as London, was so eager to leave it again, shortly after having arrived here.

"Yes, I have extensive farmland over there, built it all myself," he answered, unsmiling. Nothing in his behaviour suggested, he was proud of what he had accumulated in another country with the work of his own, bare hands and it had me wonder.

"Have you any other family?" I wondered.

"You mean am I married? No, I am not. From what I have read, just like yourself, I am not a marrying man."

"I must disappoint you there, Mr Trenton, as I, despite appearances, am a family man with a wife waiting for me at home." was my dry, half-muttered reply.

I did not know, why I had felt the urge to correct him thus, but for some reason I did not like the idea of being anywhere close to this man in disposition. It was not his obviously lewd behaviour, that bothered me, he was unmarried, there was no reason he should answer for what he did with whom in the privacy of his own home, and yet there was something unsavoury about him that I could not fathom. Perhaps it was the disparity of what he had said and how he acted.

My statement had taken him by surprise however and he glanced at me to ascertain, whether I had been serious or not. Shrugging his broad shoulders he began chuckling, seemingly having reached the wrong conclusion and thinking I had been joking.

"Anyway, Mr Trenton, I would like to have a look around the house. There has been suggested, that the jewels might never have left the property and I am pretty certain, Kershaw was telling the truth when he said, he had no idea, where they had ended up. It is just unfortunate, that this can mean two things – either he had never known where they were kept, or at the point he had been asked, he did not know, where they had ended up after he had taken them."

"I have never thought about it in this light," Lestrade admitted. "And if he has taken them?"

"Then we will need to find his accomplice."

xxx

Starting with the second theory, I retraced the route Kershaw must have taken around the house up to the point where he had run into Gilad Trenton and had killed him.

From the small window of the scullery, where he had entered I glanced around the various work areas. The basement seemed to have been spared the excessive overhaul that had befallen the rest of the house some thirty years ago, judging by the pattern of the expensive wallpaper. With the exception of a dumbwaiter, that was clearly only built lately.

"You would not happen to know when this was added?" I asked.

The other two men shook their heads. On closer inspection though I found a plaque with the address of the company building it, and it gave a telephone number, indicating that it clearly had been built after 1879, but that did not really help me as such, leaving me still with a time span of fourteen years. I wrote down the number with the intention to ask at their office when Gilad Trenton had engaged them in business and carried on and up the stairs. The ground floor, as already mentioned, had been altered quite considerably, adding nooks and crannies and the one or other orifice that could be easily detected by knocking and listening for any hollow sounds. I found no less than five such hollows, but to neither there seemed to be any access and the state of the wallpaper in each instance showed, it had not been removed or been replaced, being clearly in its place since the mid-1860ies.

Last I searched the dining room, where Trenton had found his end and again, there was nothing. Once more I inspected the dumbwaiter, but it clearly terminated here and there was no way anything could have been hidden within it, without blocking the system. And I had assured myself that is worked perfectly.

The first floor, and with that the floor Kershaw had not reached in his quest, proved to be equally devoid of jewels despite the surplus of possible hiding places. But it was here that several pictures hung, showing the late Mrs Trenton wearing the gems that her husband had given her each Christmas and stunning items they were. I had heard Mrs Trenton being described as a rare beauty and she had been. Fair, with flawless skin and even features she looked much like a porcelain doll, had it not been for the warmth that shone, even in the photograph, from her large eyes.

At last, the attic, unaltered since the erection of the house, was inspected and, again, I came out unsuccessful. For a moment I considered searching the outside, too, but as it had gotten dark and the rain still came down hard, I refrained from it, deciding that thinking the matter over might be more sensible for the time being.

Deep in thought, wondering, what else could be done, for the time being, my contemplations were interrupted by a ring on the door which was duly answered by the maid. A few words were exchanged and then, whoever had wanted to visit, had left again. From the window of the first floor, from which I was about to descend, I saw a short, plump little woman in a practical looking coat with an unadorned hat climb back into her waiting carriage, judging by the state of it obviously a private equipage.

"Miranda Hannigan was just here to see you. As you have told me earlier today, I told her that you were out of the house." the lazy voice of the maid sounded upstairs.

"Thank you, Jenny." was her master's reply, followed by sounds that I assumed stemmed from an intimate kiss.

"You should not do so, Evvy!" the girl giggled and Lestrade and I looked at one another. "I have just sent away your fiancée and you kiss me like this, with those two nosy chaps around. Don't you think this is scandalous?."

"And don't you like it, Jen?"

"That really takes the cake!" Lestrade muttered and I had to agree, docketing this new information for later, scribbling down the name 'Miranda Hannigan' into my notebook.

Dropping off Lestrade at Scotland Yard, I went into a post office and called the number I had written down. It took a while till I was put through, but at last, I explained my suit and with a little persuasion was duly given the answer. The alteration had been made not two years since, meaning that, though it was not very probable since there was no reason Trenton had wanted to hide the gems for all eternity, the jewels still could be tucked away in the foundations of the dumbwaiter.