‘It appears you know this young lady quite well, Mr Buttons,’ said my friend. ‘Then you must also know how she may strike out when she feels cornered. You worry about her, don’t you?’

Buttons was silent. He looked down at his feet. I noticed that Father Lamb was staring at his young disciple unhappily.

Holmes turned to go, then suddenly turned back.

‘What did the writing on the doll say?’

The boy looked embarrassed. ‘I don’t know it by heart. But …’ He reached into a pocket and removed a small folded paper ‘It was a stanza by someone or other. Something about a lock.’’

He handed it to Holmes, who glanced at it, ‘The Rape of the Lock. Pope.’ Holmes snorted. ‘Pope’s poem is a parody. A classicist would recognize it. The lock. Your humour eludes me. What of this missing arm?’

‘I did not pull off the arm. Or throw the doll into the lock. I just sat her there on the footbridge. Dillie walks there most mornings. But I did not throw it in.’

‘Peregrine, my boy,’ said Father Lamb, ‘perhaps Dillie herself threw it in, rejecting the message upon it. Consider that, my son.’

And even though the girl hadn’t mentioned such an act, it seemed to fit.

Holmes’s eyes bored into the young man. ‘Deacon Buttons, I think it is time for you to think carefully about your commitments, your promises, and perhaps your own sense of what is right and proper. This is certainly a question for each man to ask himself. Gentlemen, you have your work cut out for you. Good day.’

Holmes exited the room. Father Lamb followed us out. At the gate leading from the rose garden to the street, Holmes paused and faced the priest. ‘Good luck with the re-establishment of your church, Father Lamb,’ he said.

Without further comment, he strode out into the lane and down the road. As I followed, I glanced back at Father Lamb, standing forlornly at the entrance to the garden.

While not a religious man myself, I nevertheless felt a pang of sympathy for him. And I rather liked Buttons, for reasons I could not explain. Despite the younger man’s subterfuge, I wished them both well.

CHAPTER 19

Those Men! Those Women!

I convinced Holmes shortly after to stop at a café for a sandwich and lemonade. The temperature remained oppressive, but the bright sun was now occluded by dark thunderclouds. I was sweating even in my linen suit. We sat at an outdoor table amongst a small crowd of animated students, who were arguing philosophical problems which were so much gibberish to me. I ordered a ham sandwich and lemonade, but Holmes abstained. He sat reading the paper from Buttons, then handed it to me. I read:

Say what strange motive, Goddess! could compel

A well-bred Lord t’ assault a gentle Belle?

O say what stranger cause, yet unexplor’ d,