"Yes indeed, that was absolutely riveting," I said, nodding for the hundredth time as Mrs. Bellamy sipped on her fourth glass of champagne.
I was at my wits' end. I had been at this for what seemed an eternity, and was no closer to accomplishing my goal. Although Mrs. Bellamy appeared to be perfectly happy to let me hand her drinks and tell her lies until the sun rose, I had no idea how I was going to get her out of that salon and into a room where it might be possible to get that brooch off. She did not suggest withdrawing to a private room, and I had not acquired sufficient brazenness to do so myself. Lord Bexbrough was still gaming at the card table, although I had observed him, out of the corner of one eye, looking at his watch and then glaring at me.
"It's all in the eyes, you see," she said, trying to flash me a seductive glance, and succeeding fairly well considering how far along she had already traveled on the road to inebriety. "The greenhorns always say no one can see your face from so far away, but they're wrong."
I was not exactly pleased to see Lord Bexbrough slipping out of the room. I had been half hoping he would come over and claim his property, but he on the contrary seemed glad to escape unnoticed.
Moments later, while I was wondering just how much champagne a woman could drink in an evening and remain conscious, I was inexpressibly relieved to feel a tap on the shoulder. I turned around to see one of the waiters holding a folded square of paper.
"Message for you, sir," he said, and disappeared.
I unfolded the paper. It read, "Forget Cheveley. Meet me outside street door. S.H."
"Excuse me, Madam," I said. "I am just going to step out for a moment. I shall return."
"I'll wait for you, darling," she said, lying down on the sofa in an attiude of negligent langour.
She wouldn't wait long. By the time I was on my way out, a young man with chestnut hair was heading in her direction with a glass of champagne and a flattering smile.
I was never more glad in my life to make an escape. When I hurried through the street door I felt Holmes's hand on my wrist. He pulled me into the shadows, hissing into my ear.
"Up at the corner, just outside the lamplight," he whispered. "Bexbrough and Norton."
I looked. Indeed, there they were, Lord Bexbrough and Godfrey Norton, conducting in low voices a conversation that looked much like a quarrel.
One reached for the other, and there was a tussle between them. I saw the glitter of something white and bright flashing in their joined hands.
"Come, Watson!" Holmes called, leaping into the street.
The two men stared at us, and flew in opposite directions.
"Follow Bexbrough!" Holmes shouted, haring off after Norton.
Bexbrough had decided to run back to the hotel. I followed him in. Hanging back at first, I let him look round, and imagine that he had shaken me. When he was satisfied, I saw him reenter the salon. He glanced around and noticed, as I did, that Mrs. Bellamy was nowhere to be seen. Neither was the lad with the chestnut hair.
Glad that I had had the opportunity of observing Holmes, I shadowed Lord Bexbrough up the stairs to the fifth floor, where he barreled down the hallway in high temper and flung open the door.
The imprecation he shrieked out made my hair stand on end.
"Of all the devils in hell!" he shouted, dashing his hat from his head onto the corridor floor, and stamping upon it.
I could not stand not to see what he was shouting at. I tiptoed up the corridor behind him. He was effectively distracted by the spectacle inside the suite and did not notice my movement. I could not blame him.
Mrs. Bellamy reclined upon the chaise longue in a state of semi-nakedness and complete intoxication. And rising from the chaise, wearing nothing but a pair of men's trousers, was a young lad that I was shocked to recognize as Violet Hunter.
"Good evening, Lord Bexbrough," she said, getting to her feet and facing him--and me--bare-breasted and with her hands on her hips. "Did you enjoy the show?"
"Tramp--demon--I--I'll have you sacked--this instant--"
"And how will you explain that to Lady Bexbrough?" Miss Hunter said. "'My dear, I am sacking your governess because I surprised her making love to my mistress, who was unfortunately too inebriated to distinguish her from anything else in trousers?'"
"I'll tell her--"
"Ah, Lord Bexbrough," said Miss Hunter, in tones of gentle disappointment. "You could tell her anything, but would she believe you? It pains me to say this, but I don't think Lady Bexbrough trusts you, completely. I can't think why."
"She certainly wouldn't take the word of a--a--"
"Of course I suppose she might not," Miss Hunter agreed. "But I'm sure she would accept the word of the great Sherlock Holmes--and I'm quite sure that he would accept the word of the loyal and trustworthy Dr. Watson. Wouldn't he, Dr. Watson?"
She leaned past him to address me. Lord Bexbrough spun around, and nearly jumped out of his skin.
"He usually does," I answered.
He turned back to her, stammering incoherently.
"In fact," she said, "I'll wager that she would be very interested to know, both how you happened to have taken out a suite at this hotel for the two of you, and why Mrs. Bellamy is wearing her brooch."
Lord Bexbrough let out a stricken gasp.
"But Mrs. Bellamy is not wearing her brooch," said Holmes.
Now it was my turn to turn around. Holmes had appeared behind me, and was holding out a glittering rope of diamonds.
"Her brooch passed long ago into the possession of one Mr. Godfrey Norton, who had directions to sell it for the highest price he could find. Unfortunately the piece is unique, and would be very easy to trace; and consequently Mr. Norton had difficulty finding a buyer."
"But Holmes," I said, trying to pay as little attention to Miss Hunter's unclothed form as he was. "If he gave it to Norton to sell, how came Mrs. Bellamy to be wearing it in the play?"
"Mrs. Bellamy may have worn the original in rehearsal, and perhaps on opening night," Holmes said, holding his gems up to the gaslight in the hallway. "It must have taken Lord Bexbrough some time to find a jeweler who could copy it. It was his idea to have her use it as a prop in the production," he said, rounding on the astonished Bexbrough. "Of course it was highly possible that Lady Bexbrough would find it missing, since she keeps it with the rest of her jewelry. But if the gem was on display in front of a crowded house every night on the arm of Mrs. Cheveley, she could not help but hear, through one channel or another, about where it had gone--likely before she discovered the theft herself. Being naturally humiliated at this callous and coldhearted disregard for her feelings," he went on, with a glare in Bexbrough's direction, "she would no doubt prefer to let the brooch go rather than risk the shame and exposure involved in getting it back."
Holmes stepped into the room and took the brooch from Miss Hunter's hand, exchanging it for the one he held. Miss Hunter smiled at him in something like wonder.
"Fortunately, Miss Violet Hunter has taken it upon herself to spare her mistress the pain you have inflicted on her, and recover the jewel before she realizes that her husband has first given it to his mistress, then stolen it back from her in order to sell it to pay his illicit debts." He bowed a little stiffly in her direction. "I think, Miss Hunter, that you may consider your position safe, for as long as you want it; and that you may safely return the jewel to your mistress. As for your mistress," Holmes replied, turning on Bexbrough, "you had better advertise for a replacement, since she is wanted in six counties for theft, embezzlement and indecent conduct."
"How dare you, sir, take such liberties!" Lord Bexbrough stormed.
"I dare, sir, because you dare not speak a word against me," he said. "You dare not even leave the house, if this story is once noised abroad. Already your unpaid gambling debts are beginning to close doors for you. If to this we add thievery and fraud... well, there are limits to every society's patience, and I doubt the courts would allow you a very generous settlement once your marriage was dissolved."
Lord Bexbrough set off down the hall, huffing to himself under his breath.
"Well, Miss Hunter," Holmes said, as we all looked at each other over the insensible form of Mrs. Bellamy. "I am glad we could help bring things to a satisfactory conclusion. But I do think you might have told me what you were planning."
Miss Hunter smiled.
"I don't know that you would have believed it, Mr. Holmes."
"Next time," Holmes said, closing his fist on the false bracelet with a mischievous and yet menacing smile, "try me."
"Good evening, Miss Hunter," I said, lifting my hat as I turned to follow Holmes out.
"Oh, Mr. Holmes?" Miss Hunter called.
"Yes?" Holmes turned on his heel.
"Since I'll be returning this to Lady Bexbrough," she said, "they'll need the copy for the play."
Holmes fixed her with an exasperated gaze, and then tossed it at her.
"Tell Miss Adler when you see her," said Holmes, "that I have never admired her more."
"I will," said Miss Hunter, and shut the door.
"Come, Watson," he said, leading me down the hallway.
"Holmes," I said. "I don't understand. Miss Hunter was acting on her own intiative, trying to recover the brooch before Lady Bexbrough noticed it was gone?"
"Of course not. I said that purely for Lord Bexbrough's benefit. Miss Hunter is intrepid, but even she would not go as far as she has without the sanction of her mistress. But if Lord Bexbrough believes that this is something that has been kept from his wife, it will give her--and us--a hold over him that may compel him to restrain himself in future." He sighed. "She obviously will never divorce him no matter what he does. But it is better that he not know that."
I nodded.
"But... you knew Mrs. Bellamy was wearing was the copy?"
"She did not know that, of course. Lord Bexbrough would not have wanted her to suspect that he was palming a paste copy off on her. But I was almost entirely certain."
"Then why did you ask me to--"
"My dear Watson, do you think I have no respect for your upstanding moral character? Or that I am entirely insensible to the venom of the green-eyed monster?" he said, puckishly, as we started down the steps. "I would never have given you such an assignment if I thought you would actually succeed. I merely wanted you to occupy Mrs. Bellamy so that Lord Bexbrough and Mr. Norton would have an opportunity to conduct their transaction."
"I suppose I should not find this at all surprising," I muttered.
"Oh, Watson," he said, ruffling my hair with infuriating confidence. "I am sure you will find a way to punish me for it somehow."
I glanced at him. It was dark outside the hotel, but I thought I could see him smiling.
"Congratulations, Watson," Holmes said, settling back against the cushions in the box. "I see 'Copper Beeches' is finally in print."
"Yes, there was some difficulty about the ending, but that's all sorted out now," I said.
"I was surprised to learn that Miss Hunter is the headmistress of a girls' school," he observed, as the curtain rose on the third act. "It must be very demanding. How does she find the time to do that, and still appear on the stage every night?"
"Holmes, if you had seen the commentary scrawled all over the ending when the editor returned it to me--" I said, a little warmly.
"I suppose an artist is entitled to some license," he said. "Certainly you have taken it before."
"The amount of blue pencil that I found defacing the original conclusion would shock you, Holmes. And my editor told me in private that if I ever again attempted to fob him off with such a filthy compound of outrageous falsehood and moral turpitude he would stop printing me."
"Truth is stranger than fiction," Holmes sighed. "And yet, it is a shame you can't further her career. She makes an excellent Mrs. Cheveley, don't you think?"
"Perfection itself," I answered.
They mention it in the newspaper notices; but of course they don't understand.
I wait for it every night. The moment when Irene Adler, splendid in Lord Goring's clothes, turns on me under the lights, and speaks with all the passion her voice can muster a criminal's defense of love.
"Your transaction with Robert Chiltern may pass as a loathsome commercial transaction of a loathsome commercial age," she says, with all of Lord Goring's fury at Mrs. Cheveley's corruption burning in those eyes. "But you seem to have forgotten that you came here to-night to talk of love. You whose lips desecrated the word love, you to whom the thing is a book closely sealed, went this afternoon to the house of one of the most noble and gentle women in the world to degrade her husband in her eyes, to try and kill her love for him, to put poison in her heart, and bitterness in her life, to break her idol, and, it may be, spoil her soul. That I cannot forgive you... That was horrible. For that there can be no forgiveness."
I always stand there a moment, as if stunned. And the truth is that I am stunned. That even if it didn't work for the part I would still stand there for that moment, unable immediately to fly into Mrs. Cheveley's defense of her actions, to say that no, I had no such idea, I only came to the house to inquire about a brooch I had misplaced.
And the tremble in my limbs when I feel that bracelet click around my wrist--that's not acting, either. Not entirely. Because I know, in every fiber of my body, that I am caught, trapped inside the glittering circlet of Irene Adler's beauty. And that I am happier trembling in that soft but strong grip than I have ever been, anywhere.
The play's run must end, eventually. But I won't care. I have, I am, an ideal husband. And no matter what the church or the law may say, I have, I am, a real wife.