Chapter Eleven

I admit, I lost my temper at the Police Station. In later years, Scarlett would tell me that my behavior toward Detective Gates is what cemented her good opinion of me, but it is an episode I recount with some embarrassment.

Pastor Lestrade had attempted to restrain me, telling me to be quiet and do what the Police said and not to make a fuss. I could not understand at the time the peril that he was in, and made the fuss I felt the situation deserved. Scarlett stood in a corner, watching everything, like a scientist observing the rats set in the maze.

“Perhaps we were disturbing the police…” the placating tone in the Pastor’s voice only served to further grate on my nerves.

“Yes, capturing a murderer. So sorry we couldn’t do that a little bit more neatly.” I retorted.

“If I had my way you’d all hang just to be safe,” Detective Gates said, “now be silent, woman.”

“You are being obtuse!”

“What did you call me?” Gates stepped toward me, attempting to intimidate me by staring down menacingly.  I probably should not have laughed in his face.

“Ha! I didn’t call you anything. Though now I think I understand why you can’t grasp the basic facts of this case. We were trying to SAVE the man who died. You lack the mental faculties to do your job. If it wasn’t for Pastor Lestrade…”

“Please, Mrs. Watson, don’t defend me...” Pastor Lestrade pleaded, poor man. I had ‘built up a head of steam’ as Leo used to say, and barrelled forward.

“...you would have never apprehend the real murderer!” I finished, with an undignified shout.

“One more word outta you and there’ll be one more dead body we’ve gotta deal with.” Gates took a deep breath through his nose, and blew it out again, like a snorting bull. “Ma’am.” He managed to turn the honorific into a curse.

For a moment I was taken aback at the direct threat, and in the silent second Scarlett’s clear, strong voice broke in, a clarion call, a declaration of truth that turned all eyes to her.

“I have solved this mystery. The man at the Inn was killed for revenge.”

“What?  So, you admit, you killed him? Revenge for what?” Gates said.

Again, the frustration rose and I could not hold my tongue. “We were trying to save him, you stupid boob.”

“That’s it, solitary confinement!”

Gates grabbed me roughly by the arm, and spun me so that I faced away from him. 

I did not see what happened next. One moment, I heard the metallic clink of handcuffs, and expected to feel their cold bite on my wrists, but the sensation never came. When I turned, Scarlett was beside me, her hands raised in a fighter’s guard position. Gates was tugging at one end of his metal cuffs, the other end clamped tightly to the belt loop of his own trousers.  As he tugged, the pants pulled high and taught, exposing his spindly ankles.  He spun as he tugged, and I thought of the clowns in the travelling circus. All that was missing was the makeup. I stifled a giggle.

“Detective!” 

A commanding voice cut through the chaos, and we all froze in place. I recognized police Captain White instantly, from the various fundraisers that the Society had hosted, although we were not well-acquainted. He was a tall, handsome man with grey streaks in his hair, his uniform impeccable. He carried himself like a general, and I could sense the gravitas that Leo admired in him. He looked at Gates, who had frozen with one hand held aloft, his trousers hitched to his armpits, his socks broken free of their garters and slumping down upon his shoes.  

“What are you doing, Gates?” Captain White raised an eyebrow, and the weight of his displeasure fell so heavily upon the hapless Detective, that I briefly felt sorry for him.

Gates lowered his arm slowly, and straightened his uniform and posture.  His face was one big blush, and he stammered incoherence. The Captain turned to look at the rest of us, finally resting his serious gaze on me.

“Mrs. Watson, isn’t it? And Pastor Lestrade? I apologize for this…” he gestured toward Gates, who was using a key to free his cuffs from his pants. “...irregularity. Will someone please tell me what is going on?”

Before Gates or Lestrade or I could utter a syllable, Scarlett stepped forward, and addressed the Police Captain.

“Captain White, it is good you are here. With your permission, I think I can wrap up this case rather neatly, and get us all home for a late supper.”

Captain White looked Scarlett up and down, with a look on his face that I instantly recognized and disliked. It was the same look the new Head Doctor at the field hospital had given me, and only me, when he had met the other doctors upon arrival.  Condescending.  Patronizing. There was a little extra added for Scarlett, though. Curiosity. 

“And you are?” Captain White said. 

Before she could answer, Gates replied, in a mutter that everyone in the room could still hear. “Just some crow we picked up along with this lot, Captain.”

Captain White turned to face Gates again, and said coldly “When I want your statement, Detective, I will ask for it.” 

With a gesture of his hand, Captain White bade Scarlett to speak.

“I am Scarlett Holmes, Captain. And my colleagues and I,” here she gestured to Lestrade an I,”have apprehended the man who murdered Pierce Drebber and Butler Stangerson.”

She let her pronouncement hang in the room, and in that time, pointedly affixed her dark eyes on the one person in the room who had yet to make a sound.  Everyone turned their attention on him.

He was sitting on a wooden bench. His hands were in cuffs,which were then shackled to a chain that reached to another larger set of manacles that bound his ankles. His head was laid back against the wall, eyes closed. He was not asleep. 

Captain White looked puzzled, and directed the next question at Detective Gates. “I thought you said we had the man who committed this crime in custody this morning.”

Before Gates could reply, Scarlett reasserted herself, “Poor Nathan is only guilty of catching an unlucky fare.”

“Don’t listen to this...person...Captain. It’s a waste of your time.  If you’d just let me have them all taken back to the cells, I’ll explain everything.” Gates had apparently decided that the situation called for his smarmy brand of charm, and he was smiling at Captain Gates as though he expected the Captain to agree.

I did enjoy the look on Gates’s face when the Captain did not.

Instead, he looked to me and the Pastor. “You have proof?” Both the Pastor and I directed our gazes back to Scarlett.

Scarlett crossed the room, and to my shock, sat down next to the murderer on the wooden bench, and spoke in a voice more gentle than I thought possible from her.

“This will go easier if you confess.” she said.

At that the man straightened his head and opened his eyes to meet Scarlett’s gaze.  He said nothing in reply to her, but there seemed to be an understanding reached between them, regardless.  

“Very well. Based on my observations and deductions, I will unravel this mystery myself.”