The House Of Silk

hours work and then an hour of leisure before tea. Our day finishes at eight o’clock with prayers and then bed.’
    He set off again, his short legs working hard to propel himself forward, this time leading us upstairs to show us a dormitory, a touch spartan but decidedly clean and airy, with beds lined up like soldiers, each one a few feet apart. We saw the kitchens, the dining room, a workshop and finally came to a classroom with a lesson in progress. It was a square room with a single, small stove in one corner, a chalk board on one wall and an embroidered text with the first line of a psalm on another. There were a few books neatly stacked on shelves, an abacus and a scattering of objects – pine cones, rocks and animal bones – which must have been collected from field trips. A young man sat marking a copybook while a twelve-year-old boy, acting as the class monitor, stood reading to his fellows from a well-worn Bible. The boy stopped the moment we walked in. Fifteen students had been sitting in three rows, listening intently, and once again they stood up respectfully, gazing at us with pale, serious faces.
    ‘Sit down, please!’ exclaimed the reverend. ‘Forgive the interruption, Mr Weeks. Was that the Book of Job I heard just now, Harry? “
Naked I came out of my mother’s womb and naked shall I return
…” ’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    ‘Very good. A fine choice of text.’ He gestured at the teacher who alone had remained seated. He was in his late twenties, with a strange, twisted face and a tangle of brown hair that sprawled lopsidedly on one side of his head. ‘This is Robert Weeks, a graduate of Balliol College. Mr Weeks was building a successful career in the city but has chosen to join us for a year to help those less fortunate than himself. Do you remember the boy, Ross, Mr Weeks?’
    ‘Ross? He was the one who ran away.’
    ‘This gentleman here is none other than Mr Sherlock Holmes, the well-known detective.’ This caused a certain tremor of recognition among some of the boys. ‘He is afraid that Ross may have got himself into trouble.’
    ‘Not surprising,’ muttered Mr Weeks. ‘He was not an easy child.’
    ‘Were you a companion of his, Harry?’
    ‘No, sir,’ the monitor replied.
    ‘Well, surely there must have been someone in this room who befriended him and who perhaps spoke with him and can now help us find him? You will recall, boys, that we talked a great deal after Ross left here. I asked you all where he might have gone and you were unable to tell me anything. I beseech you all to consider the matter one last time.’
    ‘My desire is only to help your friend,’ Holmes added.
    There was a brief silence. Then a boy in the back row put up his hand. He was fair-haired and very fragile and I guessed about eleven. ‘Are you the man in the stories?’ he asked.
    ‘That’s right. And this is the man who writes them.’ It was rare for me to hear Holmes introduce me in this manner and I have to say I was extremely pleased to hear it. ‘Do you read them?’
    ‘No, sir. There are too many long words. But sometimes Mr Weeks reads them to us.’
    ‘We must let you return to your studies,’ Fitzsimmons said and began to usher us towards the door.
    But the boy at the back had not finished yet. ‘Ross has a sister, sir,’ he said.
    Holmes turned. ‘In London?’
    ‘I think so. Yes. He spoke about her once. Her name is Sally. He said that she worked at a public house, The Bag of Nails.’
    For the first time, the Reverend Fitzsimmons looked angry, a dull red patch spreading into the round of his cheeks. ‘This is very wrong of you, Daniel,’ he said. ‘Why did you not tell me before?’
    ‘I had forgotten, sir.’
    ‘Had you remembered, we might have been able to find him, to protect him from whatever trouble has come his way.’
    ‘I’m sorry, sir.’
    ‘We’ll say no more of it. Come, Mr Holmes.’
    The three of us walked back towards the main door of the school. Holmes had paid the cab driver to wait for us and I was glad to see he was there, for it was still raining heavily.
    ‘The school does you credit,’ Holmes said. ‘I find it remarkable how quiet and well disciplined the boys seem to be.’
    ‘I am very grateful to you,’ returned Fitzsimmons, relaxing once again into his more congenial self. ‘My methods are very simple, Mr Holmes. The stick and the carrot – quite literally so. When the boys misbehave, I flog them. But if they work hard and abide by