“Oh, I have the strength of a madman,” said Renfield. “Haven’t you heard, Mr. Holmes? Madmen are strong! Joe said that, when I told him all about it. I snapped her neck just like I would snap a matchstick.” He smiled gently.
“I see,” said Holmes. “Well, Miss Jekyll, have you ever seen this man before? Could he have any connection with your father?”
Mary looked at him again carefully, trying to imagine what he might have looked like fourteen years ago. Surely the same? “No, Mr. Holmes. I’m afraid I haven’t. As far as I know, he never visited my father’s house. But I was only a child. I wouldn’t have known all his colleagues and confederates.”
Renfield looked at her with blank, innocuous eyes. It was clear that he did not recognize her either.
She thought for a moment. “May I ask him a question?”
“Of course not,” and “Certainly,” said Lestrade and Holmes at the same time.
“Why did you kill those women?” asked Mary.
“Why?” said Renfield. He stared at her, his eyes wide.
“Because he’s a lunatic,” said Lestrade.
“Yes. Yes, that’s right, I’m a lunatic.” Renfield smiled again, that strange, gentle smile, as though he had explained everything. Yet Mary could have sworn that when she had asked the question, he did not have a response.
“Doctor, the wagon has arrived from Newgate.” It was Joe Abernathy. He had opened the door a few inches and was peering through.
“All right,” said Lestrade. “Sergeant, handcuff him and take him down. I think he’ll come quietly.”
Renfield allowed Sergeant Evans to fasten the cuffs on his wrists. “Yes, yes, I’ll come quietly,” Mary heard him mutter to himself. “And then eternal life!” She followed Lestrade, the sergeant leading the handcuffed prisoner, and Holmes, with Dr. Balfour and the two attendants bringing up in the rear. What a strange procession it was, winding its way down the stairs of the asylum! Diana and Dr. Watson were already waiting for them in the entrance hall. “Took you long enough,” said Diana.
At the sound of her voice, the prisoner stopped and jumped back as though startled, so that Holmes and Sergeant Evans had to stop as well. Dr. Balfour and the attendants almost crashed into them. If they had, Mary thought, they would all have gone down like dominoes. She stifled a laugh, then admonished herself to pay attention. This was certainly no time to be laughing! Why had the prisoner stopped so suddenly?
Renfield looked up at Diana and whispered, “Who are you?”
She stared back. “What business is it of yours?”
“This is my sister, Mr. Renfield,” said Mary. “My sister, Diana Hyde.”
At that, Renfield’s face took on a sly, crafty look she had not yet seen on it. Perhaps he had killed those women after all?
“You’re his daughter, you are. When you see your father, tell him I did well. Will you do that for me? Eternal life, that’s what I want. That’s what I was promised. You tell him I did everything I was told.”
Sergeant Evans wrenched the prisoner’s arm, so that he had to step forward not to fall. But as he started walking again at the sergeant’s insistence, he turned back to say, one last time, “Remember!”
“What did he mean by that?” asked Mary.
“Some nonsense,” said Lestrade. “Have you ever seen that man before, Miss Hyde?”
“If I had, I would remember,” said Diana. “He looks like a frog.”
“There you go!” said Lestrade. “A bunch of nonsense. I think this case is closed. I’m sorry, Holmes, that you weren’t able to perform one of your feats of deduction, but it was a simple case after all.”
The prison wagon was waiting in the drive. Mary looked at it and shivered. How forbidding it looked, with its barred windows! Renfield’s face was visible through the bars. He stared at them—no, she realized, it was Diana who had his attention—until the sergeant told him sharply to sit down. Inspector Lestrade locked them both in, then swung himself up beside the driver.
“It’s the train again for us,” said Watson. “Well, Holmes? Was it a simple case after all?”
“Not as simple as Lestrade thinks,” said Holmes. “He’s used to seeing what he expects to see. He expected to see a man who had murdered four women, so that’s what he saw: a dirty lunatic with blood on his clothes. The details Renfield was able to provide confirmed his guilt. Lestrade failed to notice the discrepancies in Renfield’s story—even in his appearance.”
“What discrepancies?” asked Mary.
“There were no bloodstains on his knees. You remember the body of Molly Keane. Her head lay in a pool of blood. How could he have cut her brain out without kneeling on the pavement? I asked if he had a confederate, but he said no. And I scarcely think Renfield was carrying a pocket watch. The asylum uniform has no pockets. That leaves the fob in Molly Keane’s hand unexplained. She might have torn it from someone else’s watch chain, but why? Surely she was defending herself against her attacker. And what of the man with the low, whispering voice Kate Bright-Eyes described? Finally, if Lestrade had looked more carefully at Renfield’s hands, he would have seen that although they were dirty, there was no dirt under his fingernails. After sleeping outdoors in London for a week, after scavenging for food in heaps of refuse, his nails should have been filthy. And how did he kill those women without getting blood under his nails? No, he washed his hands, and recently. The dirt was added later.”
“You didn’t mention any of this to Lestrade,” said Watson.
“He would not have listened to me, just as he paid no attention to the exchange between Renfield and Miss Hyde.”
“Yes, what do you make of that?” asked Mary.
“I don’t know what to make of it, yet. Unless Miss Hyde can enlighten us?”
“Not me,” said Diana. “I have no idea what he was on about. But I’ve got something else to show you. When that muscleman—Abercrombie, Aberwhatsit—left the office to let you know the wagon had arrived, we had a bit of a look around. It was Watson’s idea as much as mine, so don’t you go blaming me! And in a pile of letters, we found this.”
Out of her coat pocket, she drew an envelope. Affixing the flap was a red wax seal stamped S.A.
CHAPTER IX
A Rescue at Night
While they were talking, they had come to the train station.
“We’re in luck,” said Watson. “There is a train in fifteen minutes. We can be in London in an hour. By the time we’ve had dinner, it will be dark, and we can reconnoiter around Miss Rappaccini’s home. Remember that we have a lady in distress to rescue, although I have no idea how it is to be accomplished.”
“Diana, put that letter away until we get on the train,” said Mary. “Then we can look at it properly. You do know that stealing is wrong, don’t you?”
“Yes,” said Diana. “And you can thank me later.”
Once they were seated in the first-class compartment, Diana produced the letter out of her pocket.
Holmes held out his hand.