Part One can be read here:
The Scrapbook of Sherlock Holmes, 6/6: The Giant Rat of Sumatra. Part 1 of 2
The following afternoon, replete with Mrs Hudson’s game pie and gooseberry fool, we found ourselves on a train from Paddington station to Blackwater. As we passed through the straggling suburbs on the western edge of the city, Holmes remarked, ‘We have little idea of the nature of this creature, if creature there be and the whole affair is not some elaborate presentation for a purpose of which we are yet in ignorance. The popular papers often have stories of large and dangerous animals at large in the English countryside, usually big cats of some kind. Some of these stories may be true, as eccentric folk have often been known to keep private menageries from which animals can escape. You will have heard of the motley collection kept in Chelsea by the artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti, which included a zebu and a wombat.’
Indeed I had heard of Rossetti’s favourite wombat named ‘Top’, which used to climb on to the table at his dinner parties and go to sleep in the flower arrangements as the guests caroused, and I had read his sister Christina’s Italian poem praising the creature, ‘O oummitbatto’.
‘However,’ he continued, most of these rumours have no more substance than the common tales of giant apes in the Himalayas or the wilder parts of North America, or the aquatic creature that Mr Mackenzie reportedly saw in Loch Ness ten years ago, recalling a tale of St Columba in the sixth century. Legends persist on a basis of the scantiest of observations. We will keep our eyes open, and can do no more.’
‘Do you not think,’ I asked, ‘that this whole affair has been staged by the elder Mr Raptor for some purpose?’
‘It is the most obvious explanation. But one must always avoid jumping to conclusions. Hasty action in such an investigation can have unfortunate consequences.’
I was to remember that remark with regret. But for the present, we soon arrived at Blackwater. On enquiry at the station we found that the Ely inn was two miles down the road from London and, rather than hauling our impedimenta over that distance on a hot day, we engaged a cab to take us there. Having secured two rooms, we established ourselves in the downstairs parlour to await the arrival of Frank Raptor and his mother.
They were punctual to the minute. Mrs Raptor, small and delicate, seemed lost in the foaming sea of her elaborate western garments, and was clearly in a state of great agitation. Her son seemed almost equally disturbed. Holmes suggested, ‘Do you not think that we should go out into the garden to discuss this delicate matter, and retire to a corner where we will not be overheard?’
They assented gratefully, and retired to a bench which the proprietors had thoughtfully situated under a shady tree. I ordered a supply of brandy and soda to be brought out and followed them over. The refreshments arrived with commendable speed, and as soon as the servant had departed Frank Raptor, who had clearly been desperate to disclose his news, began to speak, his arm protectively encircling his mother.
‘It is as I had feared,’ he said. ‘The monster is no figment of the imagination. I saw it with my own eyes last night, and it is a dreadful thing, worse than I could have imagined. It was a huge creature like a monstrous rat — I could see it quite clearly in the moonlight — with glowing red eyes! And yet I did not run like a rat, for it seemed crippled and moved in an awkward jerky manner. But worst of all was the sound it made, a sort of screeching babble that I cannot begin to describe.’
His mother was weeping piteously as she recalled the event, but between sobs she said brokenly, ‘It is true. Evil has come upon us — and yet I do not know why.’
Further questioning of the young man, as delicately as Holmes could manage, elicited the information that they had seen the apparition from Mrs Raptor’s room on the first floor, which overlooked the lawn. Its window faced north so that they would have had the benefit of the light of the moon, which was coming up to full.
‘Take courage,’ said Holmes. ‘We will come quietly to the house when the people have settled down for the night, let us say at ten, and will watch with you. Whatever this thing may be, you can be sure that we will deal with it.’
After some discussion we agreed to meet Frank Raptor at the main gate of the premises at that time, when he would lead us quietly into the house without attracting attention. They left us, somewhat cheered by the prospect of action.
‘Before we meet them,’ said Holmes, ‘we must examine the ground as thoroughly as we can. As a great general said, time spent in reconnaissance is seldom wasted.’ He produced from his pocket a small leather case, from which he took a device resembling a tiny telescope that was somehow folded up in the middle in a Z shape. He rotated one end of it through a quarter turn and handed it to me. ‘Look through that,’ he said. ‘I had it from the workshop of Carl Zeiss of Jena, who is developing miniature telescopic sights for marksmen’s rifles which use prisms rather than lenses to correct the inverted image of a simple telecope.’
I put it to my eye and was astonished at the magnification and clarity of the image. Holmes added, ‘There is nothing like this from any English maker, and Herr Zeiss has by no means finished the development of his invention.’
After a quick supper at the inn we set off for the house. Holmes carried nothing but his stick and the Zeiss telescope, and my revolver and a dozen spare cartridges were bumping uncomfortably in the side pocket of my coat. We reached the house with two hours left before sunset, and a short cut through a field enabled us to examine the house from the concealment of a hedge. It was isolated from its neighbours by several hundred yards and surrounded by woodland. The lawn on the north side sloped down to a lake, where there was a boathouse with a small jetty, against which a punt was tied. It carried a stout wooden tripod on which a punt gun, a monstrous large-bore shotgun with a long barrel, was mounted. Evidently Sir Vere Raptor enjoyed wildfowling on a grand scale, as the weapon would have downed a dozen ducks with a single shot.
There were bushes on either side of the lawn in which a creature of any size could conceal itself; indeed the whole place resembled a theatre stage with wings from which the cast could appear. Nothing more could be seen, even with Holmes’s device, so we sat quietly under a hedge until it was time to meet Frank Raptor at the gate.
The young man, punctual to the minute, met us at the gate. ‘My mother awaits us in her room,’ he said, ‘and my father is well into his second bottle of port and will not trouble us. But let us be as quiet as we can, in case any of the servants are still awake.’
We entered by a side door and crept upstairs to the room overlooking the lawn. Mrs Raptor, cowering miserably on a sofa, managed a wan smile at our appearance. It was a warm night and the lower pane of the sash window was fully raised. We doused the light and waited in slience. The moon had already risen and was faintly illuminating the lawn.
We did not have long to wait. Barely half an hour after our arrival there was a stir in the bushes beside the lawn, and a grotesque creature emerged. Indeed it seemed to be a rat with its long snout and ears, but behind them its body was oddly hunched and its feet did not seem fitted to carry it as it staggered awkardly across the lawn, slackly trailing a long tail. As the young man had described, its eyes glowed red in the moonlight.
It limped towards the window, at the same time emitting a horrible high-pitched warbling sound. It was more than I could bear. Pulling the revolver from my pocket, I emptied all six chambers into the thing. It screamed and fell.
But worse was to come. Alerted by the sound, a man came staggering unsteadily on to the lawn, brandishing a pistol. ‘It is my father!’ Frank Raptor exclaimed. As he stared at the fallen creature, we could see that the rat’s head had come away from the body, revealing the head of a woman with tumbled yellow hair. ‘Miss Strapping!’ the young man cried in shock.
It did not matter whether Sir Vere heard us. Lost in a paroxysm of grief, he turned his pistol on his own head, fired once, and fell beside her.
I looked round at his wife and son, expecting them to be submerged in horror and misery at the grisly spectacle; but to my astonishment they were hugging each other and laughing, not in hysteria but with relief, as if a heavy burden had fallen from them. Mrs Raptor, noticing my gaze, burst out, ‘The snake woman is dead, and the old monster who tormented me for so long is dead too! Never did I expect to see this!’
Frank Raptor added, ‘Yes, it may seem strange to you, even barbaric, to exult at this moment. He was my own father, but truly he was a monster, and a heavy burden is lifted. As for that woman, she dressed as a rat and died like one.’
We went down to the bodies on the lawn. There was not doubt that both were dead: I had struck Miss Strapping in the heart, and the back of Sir Vere’s head was blown off. The dummy head of the rat, constructed of papier-mâché, lay on the ground, and I observed that its eyes were fitted with small acetylene lamps such as one might use on a bicycle, with red lenses and still glowing. ‘A most ingenious touch,’ Holmes remarked. Whether it was Sir Vere or Miss Strapping who constructed this thing, it is a considerable achievement of its kind.’
It was time to interject a practical note. I remarked, ‘Yes indeed, but now we have two bodies, both of them shot, and we cannot just conceal them. When people die suddenly there must be investigations and inquests.’
Holmes replied, ‘After this play-acting, I think it is time to do a little of our own. Let us now go down to the boathouse. We are going to stage an accident. Those large punt guns are notorious for blowing up, and with the heavy charge they carry their victims are ripped to shreds — which is exactly what we need here. Mr Raptor and Miss Strapping will have been on an early morning shoot of the waterfowl on the lake when they were overtaken by disaster.’
I thought about the plan for a moment, and remarked, ‘If these bodies are exploded post mortem, the deception will be obvious, as there will not be much blood on the scene.’
‘A good point,’ said Holmes. ‘But if we can ensure that the boat sinks it will not matter. We are only dealing with the local police here, and there will not be a thorough investigation of our charade.’
The gun on the punt proved to be an antique muzzle-loading flintlock, rusty and pitted, but shining signs of wear on the action showed that it had been fired recently. In the boathouse we found supplies of gunpowder, wads for its wide barrel with a bore of at least an inch and a half, and lead shot. There was also a coil of fishing line hanging on a peg to dry, and Holmes pocketed this.
He loaded the gun with what, from my experience of the primitive muskets of the Afghans, was at least three times as much powder as was wise, and added a wad and a handful of shot. Next, he picked up some sodden dead leaves from the edge of the lake and inserted these in the barrel, ramming them down well with the ramrod which he then cast into the bottom of the boat along with the remainder of the ammunition.
Holmes now tied the end of the fishing line to the trigger of the gun, checked that the flint was in place, put a little powder into the priming pan, and cocked the action. This done, we carried the two bodies to the punt and propped them on the thwarts, draped over the gun with Sir Vere at the butt end and Miss Strapping beside him.
We retired to what seemed a safe distance as Holmes pushed the boat out into the lake, carefully paying out the fishing line as it receded. When it had come to rest some twenty yards from the shore, he joined us and tugged at the line. There was a tremendous detonation and a piece of something whirred past my ear, but luckily no one was injured. When the smoke from the old-fashioned black powder drifted from the scene we could see that the bodies had been hurled back from the exploded gun, their upper parts shredded beyond recognition. The boat was already filling, and within a few seconds it sank.
‘I think that will do,’ Holmes remarked coolly. Mr Raptor, will you drag the remains of that vile costume off into the wood? It can be burnt later. After that it is time for you to go into Blackwater and call the police. I am sure they will consider the event an unfortunate shooting accident into which there is no reason to enquire too closely. We will be away on the first train to London, as if we had never been here.’
‘Well, my dear Watson,’ he confided once we were aboard and rattling home,’that was hardly a desirable conclusion to the case. You have committed manslaughter, and I have perverted the course of what a lawyer would call justice. But in a wild and rough way, I feel that justice has been done.’
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