The Bruce Partington Plans pt 2
Last time, we had a very full complement of characters with both Mycroft and Lestrade involved. And a man was found dead on the underground with top secret papers in his pocket, some of which were missing.
I really do wonder why only some of them were missing. It takes more time to go through them and choose some than to just grab the lot and go. Or maybe he had the most important ones out and was showing them to his killer. It's weird.
“Have the carriages been examined for any sign of violence?”
“There are no such signs, and no ticket has been found.”
“No record of a door being found open?”
“None.”
Ghost train...?
I mean, no, this is probably the most spurious supernatural possibility I have thus far suggested. But if he got a ghost ticket from a ghost ticket seller and had it checked by a ghost person at the turnstile and then the ghost train he got on evaporated into thin air after leaving the station?
No?
Fine.
“And a curve, too. Points, and a curve. By Jove! if it were only so.”
...Hm. Well the train would have to slow down for the curve, but also if it's unexpected and he had the door open, I guess the points might cause a bit of a jolt, the curve sets him off balance and out the door he goes. Maybe losing a few papers along the way?
Other than that, and my previous idea that there should be maintenance access particularly to spots where there are points, I can't see what Holmes is getting at here.
“I fear not, Mr. Holmes. The train has been broken up before now, and the carriages redistributed.”
Was this standard practice? It seems very inefficient to separate every carriage of every train and mix them around all the time. Why not just keep them going as they are unless you absolutely need to change them?
'Meanwhile, please send by messenger, to await return at Baker Street, a complete list of all foreign spies or international agents known to be in England, with full address.'
That doesn't seem very secure. I feel like that information should also probably not be sent out to random residences.
Why does Holmes insist on referring to his brother as 'Brother Mycroft' in this story, as well? Has he taken up holy orders and become a monk since we last saw him? We know he's your brother, Sherlock, you don't need to keep repeating it. I know not everyone is as clever as you, but you don't need to keep beating us around the head. We get it.
“The end is dark to me also, but I have hold of one idea which may lead us far. The man met his death elsewhere, and his body was on the roof of a carriage.”
Ah, yes, the curve and the points dislodged him, just off the roof, not out of the door. So he was accosted on a bridge and thrown over the side? Also there'd be less blood from a postmortem injury from falling onto the tracks, or alternatively the blood from the original injury would be elsewhere.
(Although I have no trust in anyone's pathology skills in these stories anymore because... well...🐇🐇)
“Sir James, sir!” said he with solemn face. “Sir James died this morning.”
Oooh, the plot thickens. If this is not related then it is very coincidental.
“Good heavens!” cried Holmes in amazement. “How did he die?”
“Perhaps you would care to step in, sir, and see his brother, Colonel Valentine?”
Look... I've been trying not to say 'it must be the Colonel' because I feel like at this point, the joke is too obvious. But now we have the Colonel's brother dead and Colonel Valentine is right there and...
Guys.
Guys.
If the Colonel turns out to be a dick again...
...an instant later we were joined by a very tall, handsome, light-beared man of fifty, the younger brother of the dead scientist. His wild eyes, stained cheeks, and unkempt hair all spoke of the sudden blow which had fallen upon the household. He was hardly articulate as he spoke of it.
Well, this is not a typical Watsonian description of a bad guy. It's a very flattering description, actually. And he seems upset by his brother's death. But is that just put on? Have all of ACD's previous creepy colonels been a long-con mislead for this one Colonel who is good?
“It was this horrible scandal,” said he. “My brother, Sir James, was a man of very sensitive honour, and he could not survive such an affair. It broke his heart. He was always so proud of the efficiency of his department, and this was a crushing blow.”
I had assumed brain fever, but no... broken heart. Not even brandy could have saved him. Just terrible.
“I know nothing myself save what I have read or heard. I have no desire to be discourteous, but you can understand, Mr. Holmes, that we are much disturbed at present, and I must ask you to hasten this interview to an end.”
I know he's grieving, but trying to end the interview early is a bit suspicious. Not a lot suspicious, but still a bit. I mean, he's a colonel.
"Arthur was the most single-minded, chivalrous, patriotic man upon earth. He would have cut his right hand off before he would sell a State secret confided to his keeping. It is absurd, impossible, preposterous to anyone who knew him.”
Hey... his name's Arthur? I had kind of assumed that he just had the first name Cadogan, but no. Double surname. This has happened before. Arthur is a far more boring name than Cadogan. Pity.
New theory, to explain why he only had some of the papers on him. He knew that the plans were stolen and went to recover them, but was murdered by the real bad guys (maybe a colonel? who can say) and then they slipped the unimportant papers into his pocket and threw him off the bridge onto the top of the train to frame him for the theft and ensure no one was looking for another mole.
“No; his needs were very simple and his salary ample. He had saved a few hundreds, and we were to marry at the New Year.”
Nowhere is inflation more apparent than the line 'he had saved a few hundreds'. Lolol! Although even with inflation this would be a few ten thousands, which won't last you very long today. Especially with a wedding coming up.
“Yes,” she said at last, “I had a feeling that there was something on his mind.”
“For long?”
“Only for the last week or so. He was thoughtful and worried."
As you would be if you knew there was a spy and you were worried about confronting them and stopping treason. Perfectly reasonable.
“He said that we were slack about such matters—that it would be easy for a traitor to get the plans.”
It's official, the only competent person in the government has been killed trying to cover for everyone else's incompetence. I mean, he still failed to protect the secret, but still. The Colonel's all 'my brother was so proud of his department's efficiency', when his department was as leaky as a sieve.
RIP Arthur. I believe in you.
"We walked, and our way took us close to the office. Suddenly he darted away into the fog.”
Impressed that he managed to witness the crime when the smog was so thick people couldn't even see a body fall off the roof of a train in a tunnel. But sure. This would have been earlier in the day. Although in November the sun would be setting at, what? 4:30/4pm? Unless they were going to the matinee, there wouldn't have been daylight.
“It was black enough before against this young man, but our inquiries make it blacker”
I assume Holmes must be thinking along the same lines as me. Also suddenly dashing off in the middle of the fog and leaving your fiancee as witness would be a terrible heist. If he's been planning this for so long, surely he'd come up with something better than that.
Mr. Sidney Johnson, the senior clerk, met us at the office and received us with that respect which my companion's card always commanded.
Ooh, a new suspect. Or has he been mentioned before. I don't remember him, though. But he has the potential means and opportunity.
He isn't a colonel, though, so clearly that's a mark against him in the suspect pool.
“The place is disorganized. The chief dead, Cadogan West dead, our papers stolen. And yet, when we closed our door on Monday evening, we were as efficient an office as any in the government service."
I feel like there might be a disconnect here between 'efficient' and 'secure'. Clearly they're cutting corners on security to get things done more quickly.
“Only Sir James Walter and you had those keys?”
“I had no keys of the doors—only of the safe.”
You know who has access to Sir James' keys? His brother the colonel! Well, and Sir James himself. Maybe he did it and then died from the shame and guilt.
Or it was the Colonel
(Is it going to be the Colonel? Seriously?)
"One other point: if a clerk in this office desired to sell the plans, would it not be simply to copy the plans for himself than to take the originals, as was actually done?”
I mean, yeah.
“It would take considerable technical knowledge to copy the plans in an effective way.”
Would it? Would it really? I can copy out a sentence in Korean so that people can read it. I can't read or write Korean, but I can copy it. I feel like copying things doesn't require a lot of technical knowledge. A photocopier can do it, after all. You just have to have a steady hand and an eye for detail.
"The double valves with the automatic self-adjusting slots are drawn in one of the papers which have been returned."
... did you have to be that specific. These are secret plans, right? Maybe don't go talking about the details of them with people?
Finally he asked the chief clerk to close the iron shutters, and he pointed out to me that they hardly met in the centre, and that it would be possible for anyone outside to see what was going on within the room.
In the smog? In the dark? I guess the dark would help, because whoever was in there would have to light a lamp, but still. Arthur and Violet must have walked really close to the building. Super secure building.
"Why did he not do so? Could it have been an official superior who took the papers?"
Or a Colonel?
Or Sir James, I guess... or Mr Johnson. We shouldn't stereotype colonels just because almost all the ones we've met so far have been dicks. They weren't all the bad guy. Some of them were just dicks.
It's possible there's one good colonel left in London.
'There are numerous small fry, but few who would handle so big an affair.'
It's so amusing to me that Mycroft just knows this about the spies. He's just like 'these are the important spies' and Mycroft just has a list of their addresses ready to go. They have a real 'I know that you know that I know that you know, but no one is saying anything because that would cause an international incident and we have no proof we can actually use' vibe going on here. Espionage is so weird, guys.
'Am dining at Goldini's Restaurant, Gloucester Road, Kensington. Please come at once and join me there. Bring with you a jemmy, a dark lantern, a chisel, and a revolver.'
Well that's certainly a place to end the section.
Sounds like next time will be a lot of fun.
But is the Colonel the culprit? He doesn't seem to have any sort of implication towards him at this point. It's far more heavily weighted towards his brother being overcome by remorse.
But... he is a colonel.
31 notes
·
View notes