The Thief of Twelfth Night

Carole Nelson Douglas

Nothing is more sinister, Watson," mused my friend Sherlock Holmes from the lofty prow of the bow window overlooking Baker Street, "than the city of London under a fresh coverlet of new-fallen snow."

I lowered my Globe to consider his remark. Christmas had come and gone, yet I still wallowed in the luxury of post-seasonal sloth, just as children sated on festivities, gifts, and plum pudding often do. My own laziness, however, had been abetted by rounds of adult conviviality centering on mulled wine, brandy, and other "spirits" of the season.

Holmes, however, did not much keep Christmas, being impatient with this annual enforced holiday from havoc, and keen for more adventurous pursuits the new year might bring.

"Sinister?" I repeated, hoping to gain the time to dust off my brain. Mrs. Hudson remained mistress of inventive post-holiday repasts, and I had hoped to digest my generous portion in peace. "What an odd way to describe a London that is the very image of a  cosy   Dickensian   Christmas.   I   still   expect  to   see  moppets wrapped in red mufflers peering into snow-glazed shop windows."

"Is it odd?" Holmes took up my challenge by snapping his attention from the serene white scene outside to my innocent, half-drowsing form indoors.

"Perhaps you mean to say"—I was still rousing my brain for the effort that Holmes's apparently tangential remarks always required—"that fresh-fallen snow not only covers traces of soot and cinder, but the tracks of criminal doings. Even sharp-nosed Toby might baffle at a cold, white trail."

"Perhaps I do mean that." The mysterious twinkle in Holmes's eyes boded no good for any further dozing behind an unfurled newspaper.

"I have never known a man so unswayed by common sentiments," I remarked.

"Perhaps what leaves me cold, Watson, is not the sentiments, but the commonality of them. Or perhaps I have bittersweet memories of the season."

"Ah, yes. The small disappointments of childhood can rankle decades later." Despite our association of more than two decades, I missed no opportunity to probe my old friend's decidedly unspoken past.

"Not of my childhood, Watson, which I assure you was unremarkable." He turned to the window again. "Consider how Christmas snow, like a whited sepulchre, muffles not only the evildoer's tracks, but all sorts of the most unseasonal emotions. Insincerity is often the true hallmark of the holiday. How rare indeed is a holiday happy ending when crime is involved at this supposedly joyous time of year." Again he spun to confront me. "Have you forgotten our long-ago Twelfth Night dinner at Belleforest?"

"Of course I remember! I am not in my dotage yet, though we were younger then, and I was less stout. Fine house, splendid people, a delightful and traditional meal, if I recall rightly, crown roast of pork and Twelfth Night cake. .. . You were Bean King! And most oddly tolerant of the silly custom, considering your usual indifference to tomfoolery."

"The dinner would have delighted you more, Watson, had you realized that this occasion also served as the climax to one of my early cases. Or perhaps the anticlimax."

This had me sitting up and crinkling my paper as I hastened to set it aside. "I always wondered what your connection to the Oliver family of Belleforest might be. Now you say that more was happening there than I realized?''

Holmes's thin lips pressed together to forestall an additional comment, which no doubt would have been that such was often the case with me.

"And the Pea Queen!" Memory came tumbling toward me like a fresh-packed snowball. '"As Bean King you were obligated to choose her... and you selected that dreadfully common music-hall creature! What an awkward bit, the eldest son insisting that his most unsuitable fiancée attend a family affair, especially with strangers like ourselves present/'

"That 'dreadfully common music-hall creature' was the most beautiful woman I have ever seen."

Now I had him! "Oh? I thought that the late Irene Adler held that honour." I glanced with mock reverence to the photograph of the stunning American opera singer, which Holmes kept in an honoured place among his memorabilia.

He smiled. "Much to your chagrin, Watson."

"Irene Adler was exceptionally beautiful, I give you that—"

"Yes. Beautiful and clever. You will notice that I did not call her... Twelfth Night predecessor clever, merely beautiful."

"Yet you can call that... hussy ... more beautiful than Miss Adler, who for all her adventuring was certainly the soul of culture and refinement?"

"If steel is a standard of refinement, I agree, for the King of Bohemia himself said that Madam Irene's soul was thus constituted. As for the other woman, was she as fair? Assuredly so, Watson. Younger, but fair to the same measure that Mother Nature is unfair in bestowing such comeliness upon a single person. I am surprised that she did not strike you so; you are the connoisseur of feminine charms."

"As one, I must tell you, Holmes, that your powers of observation betrayed you on that occasion, or perhaps your memory does now. I recall that evening, and no 'case' came to its conclusion! As for the young woman, I admit that she had possibilities, else why was she on the popular stage, especially after hearing her sing 'Handsome Dick, the Muffin Man' at the family spinet after dinner? But that patently dyed parrot red hair. .. that dreadful tangerine-and-sky blue satin evening gown ... and her lamentable vocal tone, like a violin sawed by an orang-utan, not to mention her broad Bow Street diction."

Holmes shuddered slightly as I evoked the creature's raucous rendition of the old Cockney favourite.

"She was very young, not much past twenty, and a trifle obvious, I admit. Yet one must look beyond surfaces, Watson. Unfortunately, in the case of Miss Viola DeVere, I was a bit better than you at that. But we both were considerably younger then."

"Youth is no excuse, Holmes. Certainly it did not excuse Miss DeVere's lack of talent. Who has ever heard of her again?"

"Hmmm," Holmes agreed with maddening vagueness.

"What has occasioned this Twelfth Night reverie?" I demanded.

"I encountered young Sebastian Oliver in Pall Mall yesterday. Actually he is more nearly 'old' Oliver now. You will be relieved to know that he did not marry Miss Viola DeVere, but rather a lady of good family who is now the mother of his children."

My eyes narrowed. "Was that your 'case,' Holmes? That desperate family engaged you to uncloak the ... er, memorable Miss DeVere as a fortune-huntress?"

"No. Young Mr. Sebastian Oliver sprung his shocking mesalliance on the family just after Christmas Day. They had no time to react to that disaster in the face of a far greater one. That fact alone should have led me instantly to the truth."

"Do not toy with me, Holmes! I am too old and cranky for holiday games."

"The 'case,' as you call it so dubiously, was indeed so inconsequential that I never found it necessary to mention. Your little Strand stories prefer to masticate more sensational meat. This minor matter had elements of both the beryl coronet and blue carbuncle cases without any larger aspect of political ruin, or at least the curiosity of grown men stalking Christmas geese through London to cut their throats aforetime."

"Yet this Twelfth Night dinner was part of a case?"

Holmes nodded, pausing at the mantel to shake some tobacco from the Persian slipper toe into his pipe bowl. Soon smoke was swirling about his head, the familiar, sharp features little aged from that evening decades ago. I eyed the paper I had set aside, startled to note the date: January 5, 1903: the Eve of the Feast of the Epiphany, observing the arrival of the Three Wise Men at Bethlehem. Twelfth Night.

Since medieval times, traditional rituals had celebrated Epiphany Eve. A song commemorated the Twelve Days of Christmas with both geese and golden rings. The Twelfth Night cake traditionally concealed a single almond, coin, or bean. This last, Holmes had been lucky, or unlucky, enough to find in his slice of cake that long-ago Twelfth Night, which made him Lord of Misrule for the evening. He might have relished that ancient title, but nowadays it was put in far less grandiose terms. Sherlock Holmes, the world's first and finest consulting detective, King of the Bean! I had forgotten that crowning indignity of the evening.

No wonder my friend happily let this case sink into the dark side of my memory. This Twelfth Night "cake of kings" bestowed temporary sovereignty on whoever found the baked-in trinket— along with the right to choose a consort for the night, in Holmes's case a Queen of the Pea. Kings and princes had bowed to this custom, so it was an honour. Still, I chuckled to recall my tall, dignified, intellectual giant of a friend meekly accepting his folderol kingship. In fact, I was relieved to hear that more had been going on that night. I had not known Holmes for very long in 1883; in retrospect, his behaviour on that Twelfth Night had been most peculiar.

"It was called the 'Epiphany Emerald.' " His reflective voice emerged from a Vesuvius of smoke over the velvet-covered lounge chair. "Found on a warm January 6 in Brazil almost a century ago. Not an enormous stone, but truly fine emeralds rarely reach great size. Still, it was sufficiently impressive to become a family prize. The emerald was always brought from the vault for display during the Twelve Days of Christmas. Under a bell jar on the dining room sideboard, Watson, can you believe it? In the beak of a stuffed partridge in a pear tree. Around it day by day would gather the 'two turtledoves, three calling birds, four French hens, and five golden rings' of the song."

"Also the 'six geese a-laying, seven swans a-swimming, eight maids a-milking, ten lords a-leaping,' etcetera. I remember now; these were all represented by small silver figures ... except for the five golden rings, of course, which were of real gold. A costly custom."

Holmes shrugged. He never judged motives unless they were criminal. "The children loved it, and that is all the parents considered. Except that year, on Christmas Day, the emerald was missing from the partridge's beak. The Olivers were prosperous, but not wealthy. They had standards to uphold, but no governments would topple or suicides result should the Epiphany Emerald vanish. Yet they were disturbed to their souls, because the thief had to be a member of the household. Even the servants were on their second generation with the family."

"Why a household member? Presumably these convivial Olivers entertained mightily at Christmas, and many a guest saw the emerald on display."

"It was never identified as a true jewel, and easily would have been taken for paste. If you recall, the home was pleasant but not so grand as many we have entered during the course of our investigations."

In these latter years Holmes gracefully included me in the lustrous roll call of his cases, a courtesy that never failed to give me a glow of pride.

His points were unarguable. I remembered the display on the dining room sideboard, the usual shining Christmas clutter people set out in those days.

"I can't say that I even noticed the theme, just a lot of brassy gleam and a stuffed bird under a bell jar dome that collected dust, not emeralds, one would assume."

"Assumptions are the hobgoblins of a mediocre mind, Watson, as we well know by now. I must admit that I did not mention my real reason for being there to you. By the time you joined us for the Twelfth Night dinner, the matter was as good as solved. Only the Olivers' festive gratitude and dogged sense of hospitality encouraged me to join them for dinner and to bring a companion as well, for they insistently observed all Christmas traditions, and the table lacked the required twelve to consume the cake."

"That was my entire use in .the affair? As a . . . receptacle for Twelfth Night cake? Aha, that is why the awful DeVere woman was tolerated at table that night! Her mouth was needed for more than so-called singing. But.. .she must have done it! Taken the Epiphany Emerald. She was the only outsider—"

"Keenly noted, Watson."

"Then why was she allowed at dinner? They were all at dinner, the entire family. A servant, then, must have been unveiled and quietly removed by then."

"No." Holmes huffed on his neglected pipe to relight it, aggravating my patience. "I doubt that you could call the culprit a servant."

"Holmes, I warn you! I shall take notes and write a story if you are not more direct."

"Heavens, Watson, I am utterly cowed. I will not be portrayed as 'King of the Bean' in the popular press at this late stage of my career and life! Recall our cast of characters again, as if it were a play you witnessed years ago."

I nodded, my ruminative mind evoking a gracious home lit by the flicker of hearth fires and candles, a domestic landscape bristling with Christmas folderol, from Yule log to towering pine tree draped in paper flowers and tin soldiers.

Mr. and Mrs. Barnaby Oliver were the kindly, portly pater-and mater-familias so often found in domestic paintings. Their children were grown, except for the treasured moppet, Miss Antonia Oliver, all of eight and well pampered for it. Now, let me see, there had been twelve at table, including Holmes and myself: the Olivers; their eldest son Sebastian and his unspeakably unsuitable fiancée with a most pretentious name, likely a stage appellation, Miss Viola DeVere ... and Miss DeVere's friend. Another outsider! I remember nothing of her, since unlike her companion she was quiet in every respect. Also present were the elder daughter, Olivia, and her husband, one Valentine Feste, if I recall correctly; the grandmother, the senior Mrs. Oliver; young Antonia on her most demure company manners; the younger son, Andrew, all of twenty. Indeed a dramatis personae one would hate to accuse, save for the forward stranger, Viola DeVere.

I reported my conclusions to Holmes, who nodded approvingly. "I assure you that I remember their names very well, Watson, for I had the advantage of you. I was first called to the house on twenty-eight December, and had investigated the entire family inside and out by five January."

"A rather commonplace set of suspects, Holmes, who had opportunity to steal the jewel for years. Except for Miss DeVere. I would have looked first among the servants, no matter how long they had been in service with the Olivers."

"Oh, I overlooked nobody, not even little Antonia's pet monkey, Curio."

"A monkey?"

"Like certain birds, they have an eye for things that glitter and, unlike certain birds, have clever little hands that could tip open a bell jar."

"What about the scene of the crime, Holmes? Surely you gave it your first attention?"

"Indeed, from which I deduced that Maria, the under-housemaid, is myopic; that the elderly butler, Fabian, suffers from Reynaud's Syndrome; that a ginger cat is resident in the house and often engages in games of chase when that rapscallion Curio escapes his cage in Antonia's bedchamber. Also evident was the fact that Mrs. Valentine Feste was undertaking a severe diet, and that kindly, silver-haired Grandmother Oliver is a kleptomaniac."

"Goodness! One lowly sideboard told you all that?"

"Recall, Watson, that every family member, and nearly every servant, would approach a display on the dining room sideboard daily, whether at breakfast, luncheon, dinner, tea, or dusting-up time. You, of course, realize that I detected a trail of orange and black hairs along the sideboard cloth: cat and monkey at play. The butler's problem was evident in wax droppings on the same cloth around the candleholders. I diagnosed failing circulation in the fingertips, which would prevent him from feeling the warm wax as it dripped. Correct, Doctor? The housemaid's myopia is obvious. Not a smudge or a speck of dust besmirched the bell jar, yet the wax just inches away on the Chinese sateen was not removed. She obviously cleans each object at close range, but fails to observe the larger picture. Likely Mrs. Oliver overlooks her failings out of kindness. Also, the twelve lords a-leaping were only nine, three replaced by a fragrant brown shaving that identified itself to my nose as clove remnants. In her rooms I found the fresh orange pomanders the old lady studs with fragrant cloves for the holidays, the three absent leaping lords, a handkerchief embroidered with the scarlet letter A for Antonia, and a twenty-pound note folded to fit in a gentleman's wallet.

"The family swiftly excused the old dear, claiming the absent-mindedness of old age. Young Mr. Andrew Oliver's manner as he reclaimed the twenty-pound note was almost obsequious; he is obviously very short of funds and unwilling to tell his father why. As for the married daughter's regime of self-denial, so at odds with a holiday famed for the riches of the table, I found a crumpled handkerchief tucked between the wall and the sideboard, filled with crumbling fruitcake. No doubt her mother had pressed it upon her on Christmas Day, and she disposed of it as quickly as possible ... her personal handkerchief was embroidered with the royal blue letter 0. Doubtless she was responsible for Antonia's rococo A as well. God bless these merry embroiderers who must initial every piece of fabric within range; a child—nay, a monkey!—could have followed this trail."

"Then your conclusion was immediately forthcoming. I cannot understand why it had to wait until January fifth to be fully resolved. And I still say that the sudden introduction of the lovely but loud Miss DeVere into the family scene is most suspicious."

"Excellent, Watson! For one who went only to eat, not to observe, you showed early promise of deductive potential. I admit that for all my admiration of the lady's looks, I found her presence terribly wrong. But there was another instance of the younger Oliver's out-of-character behaviour that Christmas. When the family solicitor was kind enough to suggest my services on the day after Christmas, Andrew Oliver insisted that they should engage the Pinkertons instead, and Sebastian seconded him."

"The Pinkertons are an American detective enterprise!" I objected in indignant British defence of my friend, "and cannot hold a Christmas candle to you."

"Thank you, Watson, but the Pinkertons did then—and do even more today—have agents at work in England and on the Continent. The Americans are everywhere nowadays, as you know. Yet such an unlikely source as young Andrew recommending this . .. rival investigation firm struck me as significant."

"Because he had good reason to discourage the use of a truly astute operative."

"Exactly, Watson, and my investigations beyond the family circle soon turned up a story older than Christmas: the prodigal son. Young Andrew, although not consorting with music hall wenches, had managed to amass staggering gambling debts."

"That, besides opportunity, Holmes, might explain the fact that the emerald disappeared on such a festive holiday. Gambling debts wait for nothing and no man. I cannot help but wonder if the puzzle had something to do with the Oliver family's mania for Christmas. From what you said, they did not omit a tradition. I even remember cut pine boughs twining the newel post and banister."

"Indeed. You remember more with every moment, Watson. We shall soon have you solving this case from the comfort of your easy chair, as I have been known to do."

"Pshaw, Holmes! Your conclusion is foregone. No point in my muddling my brains over something that is no longer an issue. Just tell me who the blasted culprit is."

"That which is not worked for is not worth the having."

"Oh, very well. If it amuses you. I still say some Christmas custom must be at the heart of it. What are there ... Yule logs, trees . . . that's it! The jewel was not removed immediately from the house, but strung up like a piece of tinsel in plain sight on the tree!"

Holmes leapt up, puffing away like a great Western locomotive. "Wonderful, Watson!"

I leapt up myself, much regretting the shock to my settling dinner. "That is the solution, then?"

"No, my dear fellow, but it is a fine and devious suggestion. Where do you hide a jewel at Christmas? On a decorated pine tree. I of course examined every branch, which held only the traditional decorations, I fear. No Epiphany Emerald, no Koh-i-noor Diamond."

I had reseated myself. "Not on the tree. Humph. That's where I would have hidden it, removing it after the holiday spirit had tarnished and nobody paid much attention to the tree."

"What other ideas have you?" Holmes posed by the mantel, enjoying himself immensely.

"Christmas cheer. I assume they had a wassail bowl."

"The wrong colour, Watson."

"What?"

"Wassail is made from ale, wine, and spiced cider. One could have hidden a large topaz, or even a ruby, in the amber red fluid, but an emerald would visibly muddy the waters, so to speak. Green is too contrasting a colour to hide in the holiday punch. Besides, given the Olivers' unrelenting hospitality, I'm sure the ladle often scraped the bottom of the bowl. I did look, Watson, finding the punch bowl tasty, but bare of bounty."

"So you considered that, too." I was encouraged by treading so closely in the master's footsteps. "What else? Snow? Sleigh rides? Carolers at the door—carolers invited in for a hot toddy!"

Holmes nodded slowly. "An invading, high-spirited group. A trip to the dining room wassail bowl. A stealthily removed mitten and a rosy-cheeked thief carries home a unique and valuable palm warmer. Possible indeed. Young Andrew clearly showed signs of living far beyond his means. Perhaps a confederate among the carolers had been alerted to the gem. Excellent theory, Watson. Quite . .. sophisticated."

"Were there carolers, Holmes?"

"Unfortunately, no. The first thing I asked. This was the infamous homegrown crime. I fear. One of our delightful Twelfth Night dinner partners was responsible."

"What of the son-in-law?"

"There you have touched upon an interesting history! Mr. Valentine Feste. I made discreet enquiries, of course, of the servants. A tall, nervous sort of two-and-thirty. Sandy hair, pale eyes. Thin as Master Andrew's wallet. Apparently a banker, but tight with his money, say the staff. Tightwads often have secret vices involving money, but I could uncover no gambling."

"A banker would have the connections to sell such a significant stone abroad."

"So would a banker's wife."

"You suspected Olivia? A plump, dark-favoured woman, I recall, with an aging, sour look upon her face."

"Perhaps from her concealment of the fruitcake, and other delicacies before that."

"Exactly! You yourself pointed out that the woman was adept at hiding uneaten sweets, and such edibles are much larger than one gemstone. She would have mastered the skills to take and conceal the Epiphany Emerald."

Holmes drew his pipe from his lips and stared at me. "That did not occur to me, Watson, I must admit."

"You see! A simple family is never simple. Perhaps her pinch-penny husband had deprived Olivia of too much, such as money for a proper wardrobe, so that she resorted to collecting the family emerald as a consolation prize. Don't smile, Holmes. Any physician will tell you: diets drive women to strange extremes."

"And the taking of the absent emerald, after a placid history of untouched display for many years, certainly was a strange extreme."

"What other Christmas folderol? Plum pudding, I suppose."

"Oh, yes, the Oliver ladies—Grandmother, Mrs. Barnaby, and Mrs. Valentine—spent a full day before Christmas demonstrating the concoction and storing of these culinary Christmas jewels to young Antonia. On hearing this, I immediately hied to the cellar with a fencing foil from Barnaby's library wall to skewer these plump, bagged puddings on their pegs into Swiss cheese. I confess to a trifling excitation when I plunged in my point and pulled out a large greenish gold nugget—an exceptionally overgrown Turkish raisin. 1 also speared a quantity of Greek currants and candied fruit peel. Nothing so tasty as a missing emerald however."

"You destroyed the ladies' winter hoard of plum puddings! That is barbaric, Holmes. What did they have for dessert after you left?"

"Just desserts, Watson. Just desserts."

My stomach was protesting the massacre of the plum puddings with soft and, I hoped, undetectable growls. My body as well as my mind was growing keen on the guessing game. I changed my tactics.

"I take it that the culprit was revealed."

"Yes."

"And the Epiphany Emerald was found?"

"Indeed."

"And both before my arrival Epiphany Eve for the Twelfth Night dinner?"

Holmes paused, frowning. "Yes, so to speak."

"Then how can / say who took it, when I was only present on that occasion? If some under-servant was missing, how would I know?"

"I already said it was not a servant. It was someone at that table."

"Someone who was not being publicly challenged as the culprit. Why?"

"You were there, Watson! You have eyes and ears as well as an appetite. Think, and you will see the answer."

"Very well." I shut those eyes.

Now that we had talked so much about that blasted evening, I could evoke the scene as clearly as a painting on my wall. I had grown adept at marking details for my small excursions into print.

I saw old Fabian hunched over the sideboard, and nearsighted Maria dodging between us to lay precariously swaying soup bowls on our chargers. Neither had been dismissed, though both's duties revolved around the scene of the crime, so I dismissed them, as Holmes urged.

The elder Olivers occupied head and foot of table, with the capped, silver-haired grandmother on her son's right. I, and then Holmes, were seated next along the sideboard-facing length of the table; no accident, I do not doubt.

Across from us sat Olivia and Valentine, the very image of Jack Sprat and his wife, then Andrew. The disgraceful Viola DeVere was next to him, then Antonia, at her mother's right, which meant that the forward hussy sat nearly opposite Holmes. Perhaps that was why he named her Pea Queen; she was most convenient.

On Mrs. Oliver's left sat Miss DeVere's friend, who had been introduced, but whose name I did not recall, and whose appearance was even more of a mystery, since it was blocked by Holmes and Sebastian Oliver, who sat beside Holmes and opposite his lady love.

Viola DeVere was radiant—nay, as luminous as a Halloween pumpkin in her tangerine satin gown fresh from the music-hall stage. A cheap violet cologne could not cover the odour of stale smoke and ale.

Young Antonia seemed a bit subdued by her gaudy and reeking neighbour, barely lifting her head from her plate unless offered some new course. Even a child could appreciate how unfit that DeVere woman was for this refined company. Her mother and brother were most solicitous of the child, both of what she ate and of her mood. Perhaps Antonia was not used to so many strangers at the family table, and certainly she was unaccustomed to the booming tones of Miss DeVere's Bow Bells voice.

"I'll 'ave some of that wine," she sang out to Fabian as he made his solemn rounds with the sherry that accompanied our soup. "Oooh, w'at a empty bowl of soupers we 'ave 'ere! All broth and no barley, just these ever-so-strange floating brown-like things. Look like button slices, they do."

"Mushrooms." Mrs. Oliver used the same martyred tone in which she might explain exotica to little Antonia.

"Fancy that! Not'ing more 'an cellar-sprouts, but cut so thin a body could starve on 'em. Well, bot'oms up!" With that she lifted a perilously full spoon to her painted lips and slurped consommé with the same bold musicality with which she sang. Even the slurp was off key.

I glanced at Holmes, expecting his keen musical sense to show mortal offense, but he regarded this performance with a certain amusement. I knew him to be a frequenter of the concert hall; at that moment I wondered if he harboured a secret taste for the music hall.

In the usual awkward silence that prevailed after one of Miss DeVere's pronouncements, I noticed that all present at the table— except the newcomer, who was thankfully silent if she sounded like her friend Viola—appeared oddly on edge. I had tried to peer around Holmes and Sebastian to view her, but she remained a silent and unseen dinner partner. No doubt she plied the stage, and her first name was Mignonette or some such nonsense. Could she be more than friend ... a confederate? This I wondered in retrospect. Holmes had investigated the entire family and, while all were able and possibly motivated to take the emerald, this stranger I had little noticed could be the key to the crime! If so, it was most unfair of Holmes to imply that I could name the culprit.

"Miss DeVere's friend," I mentioned, opening my eyes to find Holmes back by the window, meditating on the snow-muffled street. "I barely recall her."

"An invisible woman," he agreed. "In marked contrast to Madam Viola. But she and you were the only total strangers present."

I bristled. "Are you saying that I was as nondescript as she on that occasion?"

"Nondescript? Never, Watson! But she was. A day later I could barely remember her face." His eyes narrowed. "What a fool I was in those days. At times, Watson, just at times."

"Yes. well, you were most unlike yourself that night. Not only did you not raise an eyebrow at the gauche Miss DeVere, yet you did raise a cry when you found the bean in the Twelfth Night cake, but you immediately named her Queen of the Pea, when almost any other woman present would have been far more suitable. It would have been gentlemanly, for instance, to give the honour to old Grandmother Oliver, or Mrs. Barnaby, or Mrs. Valentine, or even young Antonia."

"Yes, it would have been gentlemanly, but poor misjudged Miss DeVere deserved some credit for her role in unraveling the mystery."

"She betrayed young Andrew?"

"She betrayed no one but the thief, but I anticipated her. I got the credit, and she was Queen of the Pea, apt compensation for a theatrical personality, no doubt. Besides, she was the most beautiful woman I have ever seen, this was my only opportunity to crown a queen ... and I was not yet thirty then."

"Holmes, this is so unlike you! You admit that another was a step ahead in solving the problem. You seem to admire this awful woman. And you still have not said who took the emerald and where it had gone to."

"I will say that Viola DeVere was the key."

So the woman was significant! Holmes had just let that fact slip. "Holmes, I have it. The DeVere woman was introduced to the family after the emerald had been stolen, and that is the key, is it not?"

He nodded, looking somewhat startled.

"And your manner indicates that some last piece of the puzzle was put into place at the Twelfth Night dinner.¹'

Another nod.

"Then it is simple. The Epiphany Emerald was not stolen on Christmas Day."

"Indeed?"

"No. It was taken by Sebastian, not Andrew, and merely concealed somewhere. Sebastian, after all, was as eager as Andrew to avoid your services. Perhaps he put his younger brother up to suggesting other investigators. Then Sebastian introduced this appalling hussy to distract his family from your investigation. This Viola DeVere was not a serious fiancée to a love-besotted young Romeo. She was exactly what she appeared to be and acted completely in character. Sebastian had hired her in the role, but his real lady-love was Viola's supposed "friend," to whom he planned to slip the emerald at dinner, so she could vanish into the anonymous night from whence she came. Later, they would rendezvous, exchange the jewel, which he would sell and no doubt buy the doxy some trinket. And his family would rest easy and unsuspicious when he suddenly came to his senses and jilted Miss DeVere in favour of this more sedate female."

"Why would such a 'sedate' female be a music-hall performer?"

"I don't know; this is simply a theory. But I don't recall you unmasking the plot at the dinner. Was the byplay too subtle for my unsuspecting, and much misled, mind?"

Holmes laughed as he seldom did, in his odd, hearty, soundless fashion, coming over to collapse in the chair opposite me, still speechless with mirth.

"On my word, Watson," he finally managed to sober up enough to say. "You are the supreme fiction writer; in the past I have complained of this, of your embellishments to fact, but now to this I bow. A quite fabulous plot and, alas, wasted on this simple problem. Why need I bother solving cases, when you can resolve them in such an inventive manner, replete with embroideries of Lewis Carroll logic?"

"Then cease tormenting me and tell me what really happened. No doubt it was the footsteps of a gigantic hound on the sideboard scarf that led you to the family dog in conspiracy with the monkey, Curio, who was actually a trained accomplice to a thieving organ grinder from Ceylon!" "Not so sour, Watson."

"You still have not said who took the emerald and where it had gone to."

"Gone to the cellar with the plum puddings, of course." "But you skewered the blasted plum puddings, for nothing!" "I was on the right trail, though. The Twelfth Night cake, remember the cake."

"How could I forget it? For dessert, first the cheese, riddled with 'portholes,' so to speak, the port wine in its many holes, was born in. 'Stilton,' Mrs. Oliver announced proudly, 'precedes the crowning cake of the evening.' At which your queen-to-be cried out, 'Dessert without cheese is the kiss without the squeeze.' A most lascivious performance for a family dinner table. And then she winked! Luckily, she could not compete with the Queen of Cakes when it arrived. A lofty affair with thick sugar frosting and marzipan roses; it would take a dozen mouths to consume it at one go, and that is the point of a Twelfth Night cake, to be eaten fully at once so the trinket is discovered."

"This 'trinket' was emerald green and the size of a Brazil nut." "The emerald? But how? And I did not see it." "You were too busy eating your cake and trying to ignore my foolish new title and deliciously ridiculous consort. The only remaining question at that point was whose teeth would strike the Epiphany Emerald. Oddly enough, that honour fell to me, and then resulted in other, even more ludicrous honours, such as the title of Bean King."

"And, after that, you went to the sideboard to fetch the wine and personally refill everyone's glass, a most upstart social behaviour, but I supposed then that a Lord of Misrule could do whatever he liked. You replaced the emerald at that time, didn't you, Holmes? And the family knew it. Why did no one remark upon the finding and restoration? Why was I left in utter ignorance for two decades?"

"No one wished to further upset the thief."

"Who was—?"

"Whose feelings would require sparing."

"Old Mrs. Oliver, the kleptomaniac, then. You said the family made excuses for her."

"Yes, but it was not she."

"Young Andrew? Prodigal sons are famous for being forgiven."

"Perhaps, but I doubt the Olivers could forgive the theft of the Epiphany Emerald. This case was child's play, quite literally. Who is traditionally excused of all mischief at Christmas?"

"Why ... children, I suppose. Holmes! Not Antonia!?"

Holmes nodded in satisfaction. "You have found the right bean at last, Watson. Antonia had witnessed the women toss the raisins into the plum puddings and was duly impressed. When she heard about the hidden surprise in the Twelfth Night cake, she decided to cook up a surprise of her own. She took the emerald amid the Christmas Day flurry and kept it in her apron pocket until the cake batter was prepared some days after Christmas and stored in the cool cellar. A child's presence in a busy holiday kitchen is both tolerated and ignored."

"How was she able to take it without leaving a trace?"

"First, she was clever enough to do it before Maria dusted the dining room. She used a dining room chair, but needed to pull it out only the distance someone would to seat himself, so no telltale scratches marred the floor. And she did leave a clue: the clove flakes, but I attributed them to the maker rather than to one of the recipients."

"Surely Antonia heard the consternation about the emerald and would have confessed."

"The family wanted to spare her their suspicions of each other, so they kept her in the dark as much as possible."

"But when you arrived—"

"More holiday hullabaloo and strangers, as was Miss DeVere's presence. Antonia accepted the uproar; it was still the holiday, wasn't it, especially among the celebratory Olivers? Besides, the emerald was supposed to be a surprise. If she did realize the problem, her young mind only anticipated their greater surprise when the emerald was found."

"So that was why she was subdued at dinner! All had been discovered and she knew that her 'surprise' was a serious matter."

"Indeed. And that is why my discovery was so discreet; no one wanted to inadvertently reward her innocent childish mischief."

"And Viola DeVere was—"

Holmes chuckled again, like a rather young man. "Andrew's Pinkerton, grafted onto Sebastian. And a true performer as well, who couldn't resist taking the name of 'Viola' from Shakespeare's Twelfth Night for her impersonation in honour of the season."

"Then she was not as she seemed." My mind peeled away the gaudy gown, tawdry red hair, clownish face paint, and above all, the atrocious accent. The scales fell from my eyes. "You are right, Holmes, she was a beautiful woman, quite the most beautiful woman we have ever encountered, save for. . . Holmes! She was not...?!"

"Let me just say that we have encountered the lady before, in another case... or, to be perfectly accurate, Watson, after." Holmes rose and rubbed his hands together, case closed. "Well, Watson, I believe that our mental exertions have by now exhausted Mrs. Hudson's splendid repast. Let us brave the fresh winter's day to view London's rare, pristine semblance. Then we may visit Simpsons-in-the-Strand for our own just desserts. I crave some Twelfth Night cake after all these years, and a splendid sherry."

I agreed with alacrity, but once I had donned my coat, paused at the door. "What of Miss DeVere's mousy friend, Holmes? Apparently she was no music-hall performer, after all."

"A true friend and an innocent, ignorant witness, present only to account for a slice of cake, like yourself, Watson. Unlike yourself, she was a personage of no importance, who has truly not been heard from again in our time. A respectable parson's daughter. A Miss Penelope Huxleigh, in fact. You will not find her in my index, Watson, I assure you."

And with that, Holmes hurtled down Mrs. Hudson's dark stairs with a young man's agility.