The Ghost of the Mary Celeste (34 page)

Perhaps Myers was right, and his white crow had always meant to fly away.

At some signal they alone apprehended, the belligerent congregation outside his window burst into the air and swooped off
toward the town in a squawking black swarm. Doyle returned his attention to his letter, scribbling a few last lines about his brother’s shoulder injury. If she wouldn’t come to see his house, perhaps the temptation of Innes in a sling would bring her round. Or did she really prefer spending Christmas in her cottage on Bryan Waller’s estate, fussing over his Christmas pudding until it was just as he liked it?

He didn’t write this last bit. Instead he signed himself
devotedly
, folded the page, and slipped it into the envelope, which he had already addressed. This he placed atop another, larger envelope, in which was secreted a square card bearing a message that began,
My own darling girl
. She would be in London in three days, and so, incidentally, would he. The dreamy thoughts that ensued were interrupted by a timid knock at the study door. Irritation sounded firmly in his command, “Come in.”

It was Vanderhoek, his little Dutch page, as he liked to call him, begging, as always, his pardon, but there was a lady calling and she’d sent in her card.

“A lady?” he said. He wasn’t expecting a visit from a lady. The young man handed over the card, stepping back at once in his eagerness to appear unassuming. “What manner of lady is she?” Doyle asked, turning over the card, on which the name
Matilda Briggs
was printed in square black letters.

“A tall lady,” replied the servant. “Most elegant in her dress and refined in her manner. But I believe she is a foreigner.”

“But?” said Doyle.

“She has an accent, sir. I don’t identify it.”

“Could it be German or Austrian?”

“I think I could tell that, sir. I believe she is not a German.”

Doyle dropped the card negligently upon his blotter. “The name means nothing to me,” he said. “Did she state her business?”

“She said she had information on a matter she believed to be of interest to you, sir.”

Doyle chuckled. “Elegant in her dress?” he repeated.

“Yes, sir.”

“Well,” he said, “show her in. I like to keep up with the fashions.”

The Dutchman went out and Doyle busied himself in taking up a few books stacked on a table between the fireplace chairs and stowing them on the mantel. Then he returned to his desk, drew out a sheet of paper from the drawer, took up his pen, and wrote the words “a foreign lady calls.” He could hear the familiar, always encouraging sound of skirts rustling against the parquet in the hall, coming steadily closer, but he kept his eyes on his page, starting a doodle of a horse, until Vanderhoek announced, “Miss Briggs to see you, sir,” at which point he laid the pen down with just the finest shade of reluctance, and, narrowing his eyes, looked up at the shimmering form hesitating in the doorway.

Now
this
is elegance, he thought. Miss Briggs was a column of heliotrope, silver, and gold, from the gleaming crown of ash-gold hair fastened in a love knot with a silver comb to the tips of her embroidered kid boots peeking out from beneath a full gored skirt of deep purple silk with a sheen to it that called to mind the surface of a mirror. Her pouched bodice, high-necked and long-waisted, was of heliotrope satin with a complex of tucks, each tacked into place with a running stitch of deep orange, a pattern repeated in the folds of the tight muslin sleeves from elbow to wrist, and at the inset of the gigot bulge at the shoulder, which was not so full as some he had seen. Doyle was not a fan of the gored skirt, it so often resembled a bell, but this one fit like wax over the hips, cascaded in folds to a full base, and gathered at the back to give the illusion of the now unfashionable bustle—how he missed the bustle. Furtively he noted the details of this costume—he would give a full account of it to his sister Lottie—but he stood up at the same time, coming out from behind his desk with a pleasant surprised smile, such as he didn’t doubt this lady was accustomed to seeing. Her face was lovely, though not English. Her complexion was fair, her eyes deep set, hawkish, dark, almost black, her chin was a little heavy and her nose rather sharp. Her full, lightly rouged lips looked designed to bestow fond kisses. French, he thought from the look of her, and now he was eager to hear her accent. He had only a moment of anticipation,
for as he took her hand she said, “Dr. Doyle. I so appreciate your willingness to see me, as I’m sure you have many demands upon your time.”

Not French. “Not so many,” he said. “And, in fact, I was just thinking of having a break for tea. Will you join me?” He indicated the chairs before the empty grate. She nodded agreeably, gliding past him, and perched like a fluttering dove on the indicated cushion, her long back stretched forward into the room. “With pleasure,” she said. She placed a silvery beaded bag he hadn’t noticed on the table next her.

“You do me honor,” he said, stepping into the hall to signal the hovering Vanderhoek and send him off in search of tea.

Miss Briggs didn’t move, though her eyes followed him as he closed the door and crossed the carpet to take the seat opposite her.

“Now,” he said. “I’m curious to hear the reason for your visit, Miss Briggs.” He noted two details as she replied. First, she lowered her eyes when he said her name, second, that she had a scar on her forehead, descending from the hairline, an old wound that had undoubtedly required stitches.

“I’m by way of a messenger,” she replied. When she hit the double
ss
she turned it into
sh
, which gave a shushing sound to the word. Not Italian, certainly. “I’ve come at the behest of a friend who must remain nameless. She is in possession of an object she believes will be of interest to you.”

“I see,” said Doyle. “What sort of object is it?”

“I believe it’s a book.”

“But you don’t have it with you.”

“No,” she admitted. “My friend wouldn’t entrust it to me. She wants to put it in your hands herself.”

“Is it extremely valuable?”

“You may think so.”

There was a tap at the door. “Here’s our tea,” said Doyle, rising to let in Mrs. Corrie, who bustled about, taking in the pretty visitor with surreptitious glances and giving Doyle a curt nod as she went
out. He returned to his chair, smiling to himself. The servants were working out wonderfully well. He’d hired them all in London and hadn’t regretted for a moment the expense of bringing them down to Hindhead. They were city-bred and knew what was what. He resumed his seat and poured out tea. There were oat biscuits on the tray and marmalade, his favorite, put up by his sister Dodo from the shipment of Seville oranges he’d sent his mother. “Does your friend think I would be interested in purchasing the volume? Sugar?”

She accepted the cup, holding it out for one lump of sugar. “I believe she means to give it to you. She has a great respect for your work.”

Doyle sat back in his chair, stirring his cup, looking thoughtful. He was thinking about several things at once: the revelation, when Miss Briggs moved her legs to cross them at the ankles, that her petticoat was of mauve silk shot with gold, the impenetrability of her accent, the clearly spurious “friend” for whom she pretended to be acting, the likelihood that Matilda Briggs was not her real name. “I really must ask you,” he said. “I hope you won’t take it amiss, but you speak with a charming accent that I fail to identify, and I flatter myself that I’m good at that sort of thing, so I’m wondering where you might have learned your English.”

She smiled, revealing strong white teeth packed in so tightly that the canines were twisted. “I’m from the island of Madeira.”

“Of course,” he said. “Portuguese is your native tongue.”

She nodded but made no comment.

“I have a fond memory of Funchal Bay,” he said. “I was a surgeon on an old steamer bound for Africa. We’d had a week of heavy weather, so the harbor lights—this was years ago, and I was very young—were a welcome sight, as you can imagine. I remember the pretty town; the hills rising behind it, and over all there stretched a lunar rainbow—quite a magical phenomenon I had never seen before. Nor have I since. Have you ever seen a lunar rainbow, Miss Briggs?”

“No,” she said indifferently. “I grew up in Santana, in the north.”

So much for reminiscence, he thought, and natural wonders. “Is it your first visit to our shores?” he asked.

“Oh no,” she replied. “I’ve been here often. I have family connections in Sussex and a few friends in London.”

“You are staying with your friend, then. The one who has the book.”

“I always stay at Morley’s when I’m in London,” she said.

“Yes, it’s the best,” he agreed. “When we go down as a family, we always stay there. It’s comfortable and unpretentious.”

“Yes,” she said.

He was conscious that his interest in his attractive guest had faded. She was too immobile, too monosyllabic, and he hadn’t much interest in her mission, which evidently involved his going to some unknown woman’s house to receive the last thing he needed in the world—another book. He wished he could simply tell her to go away now, but rudeness to ladies was not in his character.

“Will you have a biscuit?” he asked, purposefully leaving the next conversational gambit to her.

“No, thank you,” she said. She sipped her tea, her dark eyes flashing over the cup rim momentarily, and he thought, Is it possible that she’s as bored as I am? She set the cup down and slid her beaded bag into her lap. “I won’t take up any more of your time,” she said. “My friend asked me to deliver this message to you.” She snapped open the bag and extracted a folded envelope. “I believe it contains information about the book. You may decide for yourself if you wish to pursue it. She will make no further attempt to contact you, you may be assured.”

He raised himself from the chair, reached out to take the envelope, sank back down, then came up again, this time to his feet, as she stood before him, slipping the chain of the bag over her wrist. “It was so kind of you to invite me to tea,” she said. “Truly, I expected to be turned away at the door, and I’ve left the cab waiting. But now I can tell my friend I’ve had tea with Dr. Arthur Conan Doyle and put her message into his hands. She will be immensely gratified.”

He made for the door, as she evidently expected to pass through it, and pulled it open before her. Relief and gloom vied for dominance as he followed her into the hall. He felt like a rejected suitor in his own home. “Let me see you out,” he said. As they passed the billiard room, he thought to say, “Here is the billiard room,” because he was fond of pointing out the delights of his house to visitors, but as she didn’t so much as glance at the open doorway, he decided against it. In a moment they were upon the gravel drive, where the cab was indeed waiting, the driver napping in his box in the afternoon sun. Doyle was alongside Miss Briggs now and hastened ahead to open the carriage door and hand her in. “I apologize for interrupting you again,” she said. “My friend isn’t able to go out, and she was so certain her book would interest you, I couldn’t refuse her. I gather it has some bearing on a long unsolved mystery.”

He felt a chill about the heart. “Did she write the book?” he asked.

Miss Briggs laughed. “Oh no. I don’t think she could write a book. She’s nearly blind.” She slipped her hand into his and lifted her boot to the step. “It was such a pleasure to meet you here at your beautiful home.”

At last, a remark he could entertain. “You are most welcome,” he said. Then, as she settled herself in the interior of the cab, he closed the door and spoke sternly to the driver, who was rubbing his eyes with his fists. “Look sharp,” he said. “This lady is going to Morley’s Hotel.”

When he got back to his study, he found he had the folded envelope in his coat pocket. “An unsolved mystery,” he muttered, tearing open the flap impatiently. It occurred to him that Miss Briggs had not once mentioned Sherlock Holmes—a point decidedly in her favor. He drew out the folded page and flapped it open. It took scarcely a moment to read it. He carried it to his desk and laid it open on the blotter, staring down upon it with a knitted brow. In the center was a simple line drawing of a fish, with a hook and line stretching up from the protruding lip. Neatly printed in the fish’s
body were the initials
A.C.D.
At the bottom of the page, two words writ large in red ink with a calligraphic pen comprised the message:
MARY CELESTE
.

“Not that again,” he said softly.

At supper he failed to mention his unexpected visitor. His wife, having slept in the afternoon and finished a bit of needlework, felt well enough to join the family at the table, and she drew the children out about the events of their day, so the subject of his didn’t arise. He had slipped the cryptic message into his desk and out of his mind, reproving himself for having wasted time better spent on his new novel. This was the best, the most original, work of his life, and he was already anxious about its critical reception. It concerned a man who is tempted by an old liaison to betray a gentle, loving wife of many years—a domestic drama—and as such, utterly new terrain. He only wanted the children to stop chattering and his wife to ascend to her aerie so that he could get back to it.

In the next few days Miss Briggs and her heliotrope imposition crossed his mind lightly, and with it the name of the ship, and with that the recollection of his own connection to the
Mary Celeste
. It was fifteen years ago that he’d written the story in South-sea, hoping to bring in a little money. He’d placed a few stories, one in
Bow Bells
and a few in
All the Year Round
, making two pounds here, five there, then he’d written a ghost story based on his Artic adventure, “The Captain of the Polestar,” and sold it to
Temple Bar
for … ten pounds, was it? So he thought to try another spooky tale. The public, he knew, demanded a strong plot, adventures at sea went well, also ghosts and mysteries of all kinds. Why not put them all together? A ghost ship. The
Mary Celeste
. A survivor’s tale. Through the shifting mists of his imagination, the image of the ship hove into view, a few of her sails torn away, but otherwise in perfect trim, coming into the wind, then falling away, at the mercy of the currents and the wind, and no one aboard. When the trial at Gibraltar was in the news, there wasn’t a schoolboy in Britain
who hadn’t asked himself the unanswerable question: Why did the crew leave the ship?