The Plague of Thieves Affair by Marcia Muller Read Free Book Online Page B

information. He knew nothing of Charles Percival Fairchild II or matters regarding his estate, nor of an attorney named Roland W. Fairchild.
    Sabina was almost but not quite satisfied. It wasn’t that she doubted Roland Fairchild’s story, but her years with Stephen and the Pinkertons and her time with John had taught her to accept no one and nothing at face value and to always be as thorough as possible. So she walked back to Market Street and the telegraph office near the agency, where she composed a wire to Leland Hazelton at Hazelton and Bean, Chicago, requesting verification that Roland W. Fairchild had been empowered to engage Carpenter and Quincannon, Professional Detective Services, to locate Charles Percival Fairchild III.
    She debated whether or not to wait for a reply before beginning the hunt. No need, she decided. The direct starting point she’d decided upon earlier was something of a long shot, and in any case committed her to no other action just yet.
    *   *   *
    Dr. Caleb Axminster was one of the city’s more successful physicians, his practice catering almost exclusively to the upper strata of society. Sabina had never been to his medical offices on Sutter Street, but she expected them to be large and rather elaborate and so they were. The reception room was not quite as sumptuously furnished as the Axminster mansion atop Russian Hill, but nonetheless tastefully appointed; his office would be likewise, she was sure, and his examining room and surgery were certain to contain only the most up-to-date equipment.
    A white-uniformed nurse and an expensively dressed matron occupied the reception room. Sabina handed the nurse one of her cards and requested a brief audience with Dr. Axminster on a private matter. She was a personal acquaintance of the doctor’s, she said, stretching the truth only a little, and promised to take up no more than five minutes of his time. The nurse seemed dubious, the more so after she’d examined the card, but she had been trained to be deferential; she agreed to do as asked when the doctor finished with his current patient.
    Sabina sat down to wait. The matron, heavily corseted, her obviously dyed hair partially covered by a rather silly, flower-decorated bonnet, glared at her and grumbled irritably, “The nerve of some people. Why couldn’t you have made a proper appointment as I did?”
    â€œA business matter, madam. My apologies, but surely you won’t mind waiting an extra five minutes.”
    â€œSurely I do mind. Do you know who I am?”
    â€œNo. Do you know who I am?”
    â€œNo, and I don’t care.”
    Sabina smiled sweetly. “My sentiments exactly.”
    The woman muttered something rude under her breath, which Sabina ignored. She focused her thoughts on Dr. Axminster and the man he still considered, so far as she knew, to be the genuine Sherlock Holmes.
    It was at the doctor’s mansion that John had first encountered the bogus Sherlock, during his investigation into the series of home burglaries that had developed into the Bughouse Affair. The man she now knew to be Charles Percival Fairchild III had been Dr. Axminster’s houseguest at that time, courtesy of a mutual acquaintance in the south of France; he had beguiled the physician and his wife and small coterie of friends into believing his outlandish claim that after miraculously surviving his battle with archenemy Professor Moriarty at Reichenbach Falls, he’d decided to remain “deceased” instead of returning to his practice in London and eventually made his way to San Francisco on some sort of secret mission. He had stayed with the Axminsters throughout his involvement in the Bughouse Affair and for a short period afterward. He may or may not have had recent contact with the doctor; anything was possible where “that conceited crackbrained popinjay,” one of John’s more colorful descriptions, was