Enola Holmes and the Mark of the Mongoose by Nancy Springer

Author:Nancy Springer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group

Chapter the Tenth

Early the next day, Wednesday, the maid brought in, along with matutinal hot water, a replying telegram from Sherlock:

NO JOY STOP NO POLICE REPORTS OF CANINE INSANITY STOP MOST PERPLEXING

“No joy”? I wondered if Sherlock had ever, even once in his life actually ridden with a fox hunt. I also considered that it was high time for “tally ho.” It had been almost a week since Wolcott Balestier disappeared. I must, simply must, track down Mary Erasmus today, because she knew something! Why else would she have given me a false name? Ethel Etheridge, my eye.

Skipping breakfast (not something I would normally do!), I clothed myself simply, with a scarf tied over my head in lieu of a hat, and set forth quite early. I reached the Covent Garden Flower Market at the height of morning bustle, went directly to the vendors of day-old flowers at the bottom of the market, and started asking, “Excuse me, have you seen Mary Erasmus?”

The fifth vendor I asked, a harried and rather hairy woman of uncertain age, answered without even looking up to see what I was about, “She should be here any minute.”

And so she was.

I watched Mary Erasmus, stoutly corseted and looking upholstered as before, approach through the crowd with a big, empty basket on her arm and what looked like a genuine smile on her flat face. Rather than confronting her, I thought, I would learn more from her if I could keep her smiling, so when I stepped forwards to intercept her, I greeted her lightly, almost in jest. “Ethel Etheridge, you are a sobriquet!”

Startled only slightly, she acknowledged, “An incognito.”

“An alias!”

Playfully sparring with vocabulary, we stood like two rocks in the middle of a flowery flow, people from all directions parting to pass us.

“A pseudonym.”

“An anonym.”

“A nom de guerre.”

“A name of war? I admit defeat,” said I with a smile. “Pray tell, how did you come to acquire your victorious vocabulary?” Anything I might learn of her could do me only good.

She replied amiably enough, “My mother was a ragged schoolteacher.”

Ragged school! From such struggling beginnings came the scholars of the streets, and sometimes the leaders, or the rebels.

“And she was the proud owner of a dictionary,” added “Ethel Etheridge.”

I cocked my head. “Was there a bit of a competition with your mother?” I inquired, remembering my own illustrious mum.

“A bit,” she conceded.

Yes. I knew I had recognised something in her.

“Are your parents still alive?”

“No.” Her amiability vanished.

But I persisted. “So, you are on your own? Can you support yourself by selling boutonnieres?”

“Hardly. By day, I am an artisan in fingernail lacquer.” Interesting! A recent fad, nail lacquer was much in demand among the wealthy, although why any woman should want to glorify her fingernails only to hide them in multi-button gloves was beyond my understanding. “I concoct, sell, and apply my own product,” continued Mary Erasmus with a proud lift of the head. “I am as much of an entrepreneur as any factory owner.”

I heard heavy scorn in those last words.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.