The Tarleton Murders Read online

  I settled back in the carriage and whispered to Sister Carolina, who was holding her gloved hands over her eyes and barely breathing. “It’s all right. We’re returning to the convent now.” Holmes sat in silence next to the still skittish driver, who turned the carriage round reluctantly and never took his eyes off Holmes all of the way back to our destination.

  Roman police were standing about the entry to the convent as a monumental nun swept shards of glass and stone away from the door, shrieking all the while in unintelligible Italian at no one in particular. We descended from the carriage, I paid the driver (a little extra, for he looked terribly queasy), and he brought down the baggage while the baffled police tried to decide whether to stop us or let us through. One constable with impressive mustaches stepped forward as if to question us, but the nun recognized Holmes.

  “Signore, avanti, avanti.” She ushered Holmes through the door. To the officer she shouted “Via!” and he stumbled backwards. Then noticing us, she gestured us toward the door and cried “Thees-a-way!” Then she slammed the door behind us.

  It was cool and dim inside, for which we, in our hot, sweat-sullied clothes, were most grateful. Holmes introduced us to the giant nun.

  “This is Sister Ugolin. She will see to you.” Abruptly he turned and went back out into the piazza.

  Sister Ugolin snorted. “It is always so with him,” she said in forceful English, took hold of Sister Carolina’s elbow, and guided us through the dark hall toward a reception room.

  “Seester will stay in the ‘ow-you-say cloister, and you, Padre, will be in a cella for the uomini”—she glanced up at my confused face—“thee room for thee men,” she shouted at me as if I were deaf.

  Taking stock of my bedraggled companion, she cooed “Oh la povera seester,” embraced her, released her, and then hugged her even tighter against her vast bulk. I thought she was going to cry. For her part, Sister Carolina was in a daze. It had all been too much.

  Clucking like a plump chicken, shouting promises about tea and riposo mixed with imprecations about la finestra (the broken window), Sister Ugolin herded us along to our rooms. Mine was a yellowish stone cell with a cot, but clean and quiet and supplied with a large white basin of fresh water, which, liberally rubbed on my dusty body, enlivened me considerably. Then I sat on the cot in my drawers and wondered what had just happened to us.

  I had not known what to expect when encountering Holmes again, but this welcome was more striking than anything I had imagined. It’s true that at school I was known as “Tuck.” We often played at Robin Hood and his Merry Men, and because of my liking for food and drink I was “Friar Tuck” (I ran on the sturdy side, so the name fit). Everyone had nicknames, usually ironic—there was “Rhomboid” Fotheringale, so called because he was no good at maths, and “Ickle-Pretty” Gower, as homely a face as the Creator ever made. I believe even Holmes had a nickname for a time—“Soapy,” of course, because of his lack of hygiene.

  But why the elaborate fancy dress, and the exploding window, and the wild dash across the city after a man in a silken gown and a dunce hat? What was all that, then? And where on earth was that giantess with the tea?

  A knock came at my door. It was Holmes, still in his disguise, although he was no longer hunched over with “age.” He put his finger to his lips and motioned for me to follow him. I dressed and we slipped out across the square and behind a decrepit house across from the convent. We glanced up at a rope ladder that hung from the roof, but what really took our attention was a curious machine lying in pieces on the ground. Holmes picked up the pieces and expertly re-assembled them into what looked like a small cannon.

  Holmes murmured, it seemed mostly to himself, “A Girardoni air rifle, created by a Tyrolean clockmaker a century ago and carried by the Americans Lewis and Clark on their famous expedition to the Pacific Ocean. The Germans call it the Windbixel—it is silent, potent, and deadly.”

  I whistled, as much at Holmes’s display of knowledge as at the vile contraption itself. “So someone climbed up on the roof and fired this thing at the stained-glass window? But why?”

  “Because the shooter knew it was my lodging.” Holmes responded quietly.

  “They were trying to kill you?”

  “I don’t believe so.” He hesitated. “The motive is deeper than that.”

  “And that motive would be?”

  Holmes said nothing—he was still examining the gun minutely.

  I became impatient. “Holmes, I find myself bouleversé by all of this. I have my charge to consider, a devoted religious who has come to you for help—who is already frail, dealing with a fearful problem of her own, and now she has been knocked about like a sack of potatoes in a mad chase across Rome. I demand to know what’s going on.”

  As if conscious of me for the first time, he looked up and smiled. “Forgive me, Tuck. I do know I haven’t given you a proper welcome. Let’s toddle back and see what Sister Ugolin has to offer us—if I recall, you’ll be needing your tea about now.”

  The refectory, a small marble-clad room with a folding table, was laid with English tea (Twinings!) and biscuits powdered with sugar. Sister Carolina was already seated, working at her hobby. On our travels she occupied her time crafting rosaries, carrying with her a worn wooden box that contained the charms, beads, and black cord she needed, along with a small silver borer and awl. The effort calmed her nerves. Holmes shut the door behind us and the three of us huddled round the table, for despite the heat outside, the room was chilly.

  “My dear Sister,” Holmes was deferential. “Please forgive my discourtesy in not welcoming you properly. I have no excuse for putting you in danger, but if you understood the reason for my behavior you might think it not so remarkable after all. To my shame, I was not entirely prepared for the attack upon the convent, although I believed it likely, and my rashness in pursuit of the attacker I can explain by the fact that he is one of the most alarming characters in Europe today.”

  I was concerned about frightening Sister Carolina and thought to divert the conversation, but she leaned over the teacups and said, “Please tell us about him.”

  “His name is Stepnyak. He’s a Russian radical, an assassin who has passed the last few years shooting mountain goats and aristocrats in the Balkans. Despite his revolutionary leanings, he has become rather a mercenary.” Holmes waved the air. “Still, we’re not here to talk of my cases. I received your wire, Tuck … er, Padre … but you said so little of your problem. I am truly pleased to see you, and now I am all attention. How may I be of help?”

  Sister Carolina spoke, her soft Georgia cadence barely loud enough to be heard. “I’ve been troubled, Mr. Holmes. Troubled for many a year. And Reverend Grosjean says that you are the most discerning of men, so I am sure you will not find my difficulty too … difficult to solve.”

  “Actually, Holmes, I told her you were the most ignorant of men, except for everything to do with crime,” I said, and turned to Sister. “He is a master at unveiling what people want to keep veiled. He knows every detail of the Gunpowder Plot, but nothing of who discovered America.”

  “Some might say that was a crime,” muttered Holmes.

  “Well, I’m not quite sure how to begin… .” Sister Carolina began, fumbling with the rosary at her belt.

  “Before you tell Holmes your story, Sister, let him deduce it,” I burst in. “Or as much of it as he can. He loves to show off. Rather like a pianist at a party who can’t wait for someone to ask him to play.”

  Holmes gave a little snort of disapproval.

  “Holmes, I’ve told Sister all about your unusual abilities. Such as the time you asked the rector if he had enjoyed sampling the chicken we were about to have for dinner. The rector demanded to know your meaning, and you pointed to the drippings from the spit on his shoes and the sooty bump on his head from hitting it on the hood of the fireplace.”

  “D
on’t forget the smear of chicken fat on his cheek,” Holmes added, and we both laughed out loud. It was odd to hear laughter from Holmes—I don’t believe I had ever heard it before.

  “So what do you make of me?” Sister Carolina asked, looking sideways at Holmes.

  Holmes regarded her with a neutral air. “Besides the obvious accoutrements that declare your calling, I would say that you are a woman who has suffered intensely. You’ve known deprivation and illness, regardless of the fact that you grew up in the American South in a well-to-do household with few cares. Though you have made vows of poverty, you have wealthy friends or relations.”

  Her face hardened just perceptibly.

  “Of these things I am certain. As to your problem, I can only conjecture. Your present vocation is not the first choice of your heart, and from your age and provenance I surmise you lost much in the late American war—perhaps a soldier who was dear to you?”

  He paused. Sister Carolina looked away.

  “Now you have reached a crisis of some kind, and before you go into seclusion for the rest of your life, you must resolve it,” he concluded gently. “Beyond this, I can see nothing.”

  “Reverend Grosjean did not exaggerate your powers, Mr. Holmes,” she replied. “I was the daughter of a prosperous planter in Georgia. I came up with every privilege you could desire. I had frocks and chemisettes for every occasion, tea gowns underlaid with crinoline, lacy shawls, beautifully trimmed bonnets. Servants to answer every need. Balls and races and barbecues … it was at a barbecue that I saw him for the last time.”

  Her voice faded to a sigh.

  “It was just at the commencement of the war. All the young men whooped and hollered and swore they were going to beat the Yankees, and my beau went off with them, but he never came back. None of them returned alive. He and his brothers all died the same day in the same place and they brought their bodies back to us … .” She tried, but could not hold back a sob that swallowed her frail frame.

  I put my hand on her gloved hand, hesitated, then finished her story for her. “It appears that the three men, brothers named Tarleton, were killed within minutes of each other at Gettysburg. She would like to know why it was done, and who might be responsible.”

  “Tarleton. Tarleton, you say?” Holmes looked up, then shook his head. “At Gettysburg. The bloodiest battle of a bloody war—tens of thousands butchered in a matter of hours. What of three men in the midst of that carnage?”

  Sister’s eyes lit with anger and her voice halted. “They were the best men in the world… beautiful men … fighting for their homes and their people …”

  “What’s intriguing, though, Holmes, is that all three men were shot in the back,” I said.

  Holmes considered this. “It happens in the chaos of war—soldiers firing madly all about, through smoke and flame—bound to hit one of their own. I recall the Earl of Kingston who was torn in half by his own cannonball.” He turned to Sister. “He was an unfortunate casualty of our own English civil war.”

  “But three brothers? All at once?” I tried to interest him in the problem.

  “As I recall, the battle was hot and fierce and fought into the night. Imagine men with bloody sweat in their eyes shooting aimlessly at each other in the dark. And of course, there’s the other possibility… .” Holmes gave me a glance full of surmise.

  It took her a moment to catch his meaning, but again she was outraged and on her feet. “Mr. Holmes, no Confederate soldier would turn his back and run. Least of all the Tarleton brothers. Never. Never. It is unthinkable!”

  Waxen with anger, she glided out of the room and shut the door behind her with a force I didn’t think she possessed. We tried to rise, but she was gone in an instant.

  I sighed and shook my head at Holmes. “Is this your way of treating your clients? Then I’m amazed you have clients at all.”

  “Well, Tuck. What did you expect of me? You must admit at least the possibility that the brothers were in, shall we say, retreat?”

  I too was upset with him, but I put on my calmest voice. “It is most unlikely, Holmes. To Southern gentlemen, honor comes before all else, and the field of battle is foremost the field of honor. In the most hopeless battles, they would fight each other for the distinction of taking a bullet square in the breast.”

  Holmes was still gazing at the ceiling.

  “Confound it, Holmes, we’ve come a very long way. How could you be so cruel to the lady? She came to you for help. You never did have any natural feelings.”

  “Forgive me,” said Holmes airily. “I am a brain, Tuck. The rest of me is a mere appendix. You knew that. Her problem simply doesn’t present any features of interest to me.”

  “Well, then, perhaps I can show you a feature of very great interest—a feature that explains why I have come nearly five thousand miles to find you.”

  Chapter 3

  I took from my notecase a folded piece of paper and handed it to him.

  “I received this letter—if that’s what it is—in an unusual way. I found it, unenclosed, on the floor of my room after returning from my duties. It has been some weeks now, and nothing has come of it yet. But, in regard to your opinion of our problem, perhaps you might see things differently if you read this.”

  Holmes sniffed the paper, knelt, and spread it out on the table. “The paper precedes the Fenerty wood-pulp process, so it is rather old stuff. The writer smokes a fine Virginian tobacco. The ink is standard iron-gall, but stale, and the iron pen has been used for many a year—see how the nub has worn down.”

  “I’m sure that’s all true, but what do you make of the contents of the letter?” I asked.

  “Yes, let’s have a read.”

  O.

  LET T.HE TAR LET ON,

  B.eware! Let the Feathers reveal,

  Raging bloody w.ax Fire be set,

  On thy Bans! Awe thy Confessi.onal Seal!

  Thou shalt drink Fate. in Wine, be it distilled Gall!

  Hell’s bread shalt. avenged in Tartarus eat!

  Even Thy Goddess in the d.epths of Acheron shall fall!

  Revenge! T.hou shalt drink the shame of it Sweet!

  Shad.owed Brotherhood! If we Heaven’s will cannot avert, Hell

  Let us move. Charon bring thee o’er his Flood to meet,

  In Ro.bes and burning Cross and Blood Drops to lie,

  Even there. where the Prince of Air forever flames up howling,

  PETIT AND PERDITION! BAP.ST AND BLAZES! STRICKEN AND SEALED!

  CHAOS AND CURSES!

  DO NOT OPEN PANDORAS BOX OR YOU WILL FEEL THE WRATH

  OF THE KU, KLUX, KLAN!

  “A sort of misshapen sonnet? Fourteen lines, but badly executed. It doesn’t scan well at all,” said Holmes.

  “Your opinion of the verse,” I said, “is not pertinent. You’re acquainted with the Ku Klux Klan?”

  “Yes, indeed,” Holmes replied, still contemplating the mysterious text. “One of the most dangerous criminal organizations in the world, all the more so because it doesn’t exist.” He barked a laugh.

  “Doesn’t exist?”

  “The Klan was supposedly ‘disbanded’ years ago, in a ploy that enables some of the most influential men in the South to work their treachery in the dark—at the same time denying that there is any such thing as the Klan.”

  “I know there’s a good deal of anti-Catholic feeling in the country, and the Klan is known for it. Clearly, this letter is a threat against the Church. The allusions to the sacrament of the Eucharist, to the confessional … .”

  Holmes looked up at me from his study. “Oh, surely, it’s more than that.”

  I paused. “Yes. It’s evidently a threat against myself as well. The mentions of Petit and Bapst … .”

  “Who are … ?”

  “Jesuits, like myself. They were Swiss, I believe, posted to America by the order. Fathe
r Benjamin Petit was driven west with the Indians and died on the trail. Bapst was the object of a hideous attack—tarred and feathered by a mob—and now lives with nightmares of it.”

  “So the Klan has nominated you as a candidate for martyrdom. As a Jesuit, that should please you.” Holmes took the paper by the corners and held it to the window. “No watermark. And of course, it’s more than a shocking piece of doggerel. I don’t know if you’re aware, Tuck, that my first case involved a disquieting letter.”

  “Indeed.”

  “Yes. An acquaintance from university invited me down to his father’s estate. The father was an affable, wealthy old man of somewhat mysterious origins. One day he received a letter that sent him into a fit of apoplexy, yet upon our reading it, it seemed innocuous enough. After a bit of study, however, I determined that it was in code. The true message was conveyed by every third word of the text—a message that indicated that the illegitimate source of the old man’s wealth was discovered and that he should fly the country immediately. He died of the shock instead.”

  “What was the source of his wealth?”

  “It is of no matter. Let’s just say the law would not have smiled on him. I rather regret the old man. He was the first to suggest to me that I might make a career of crime—I mean, the detection of it. His suggestion rescued me from a life of unrelieved tedium, and I am grateful to him for that.”

  “I gather then that you see some hidden message in this document?”

  “Yes,” Holmes replied, “and it is so easily deciphered that I gather you see it as well.”

  “I believe I do, but I would like you to confirm it for me”

  “Very well. Take the first two lines: O LET THE TAR LET ON. You’ve told me that the dead brothers lamented by Sister Carolina were named Tarleton. That is easy enough. Then there is a simple acrostic, formed by the first letter of each line thereafter: