Adventure of the Copper Beeches, Beginning

 

As this book cover may suggest, Adventure of the Copper Beeches is Arthur Conan Doyle's attempt to involve Sherlock Holmes in a Gothic novel.  It has many of the usual conventions -- the innocent governess in a sinister mansion, the creepy wing where no one may go, and the brooding sense of danger and terror.  In this case, the sinister mansion is Cooper Beeches -- not beaches, but beech trees.

The story begins with Holmes rather nonplused at receiving a letter from Miss Violet Hunter asking his advice on whether to accept a job offer as a governess.  It seems beneath his talents, but as she unfolds the circumstances, he becomes intrigued.  Miss Hunter has no family.  Her former employer has moved overseas, and she is in desperate financial straits.  She seeks work at an employment agency for governesses.  A fat, good-natured man named Jephro Rucastle jumps in his chair and immediately says she is just what he is looking for.  Her last employer paid 4 pounds a month (48 a year), but Rucastle says nothing less than 100* will do for a lady of her "accomplishments."  When she tried to discuss her actual accomplishments, Rucastle dismisses them as less important than her "bearing" and "deportment."  He even offers her an advance.  Her job will consist of coming to his country house and caring for his son, age 6, who has great enthusiasm (shared by his father) for killing cockroaches.  She will also have to obey the little commands of his wife, like wearing a particular dress, or sitting in a particular seat.  Miss Hunter has no objections, but when Rucastle insists that she must also cut her hair short, she refuses. That seems to be the end, but it is not.  Mr. Rucastle obtains Miss Hunter's address and writes to offer her 120 pounds a year (10 per month) if she will cut her hair and come to work for him.  His wife is fond of a particular shade of electric blue and wants Miss Hunter to wear it indoors in the morning.  They will lend her an electric blue dress belonging to Alice, Mr. Rucastle's daughter by his first marriage, now living in Philadelphia.  

Holmes finds the whole thing most suspicious, especially the inordinate salary and says he would not want any sister of his take such a job.  But he does not have enough information to form a specific hypothesis.  Miss Hunter suggests that Mrs. Rucastle is insane, and that her husband indulges her to keep her quiet and prevent her from being institutionalized.  Holmes agrees that seems the most likely explanation, although it is not clear whether he actually believes that or is simply humoring her.  Because it does not seem like the most likely explanation to me.

Maybe I am unduly influenced by the Me Too generation, but consider the circumstances.  Mr. Rucastle decided he wanted Miss Hunter at a glance.  He showed no interest whatever in her actual accomplishments, but a rather creepy fascination for her clothing and hairstyles.  Clearly he is hiring her for her looks.  And given that he is offering an unheard-of salary to accompany him to an isolated country house, it seems most likely he wants to do more than just look.  In short, the most likely answer for Mr. Rucastle's not-so-strange behavior as that he has lecherous designs on his governess.  Watch the above video (starting about 8:55) and see if any other explanation is remotely plausible.

Violet Hunter meets Rucastle

Two objections offer themselves.  First of all, what about his wife?  Won't she interfere?  But we have never seen his wife and have only Rucastle's word that she even exists. And even assuming that she does, remember that a governess is a full-time, live-in caretaker.  Mrs. Rucastle can hardly be on her guard at all times.  Sooner or later, Mr. Rucastle will catch Violet Hunter alone.  Second, what about the hair?  Wouldn't cutting her hair make Violet Hunter less attractive, rather than more?  That one is a bit more puzzling.  Maybe Mrs. Rucastle actually does exist and insists that all governesses cut their hair short to make themselves less attractive, but her husband is not so easily deterred.

So why doesn't Holmes point out the obvious?  Did Victorian delicacy prevent such a subject from even arising in fiction?  I have to assume not, because a country gentleman with lecherous designs on the governess is a major plot point in Crime and Punishment.  Maybe Doyle was just more squeamish about such things than Dostoevsky.  And certainly Victorian delicacy may not have allowed Holmes to point this out too directly.  But couldn't he at least delicately hint at it (rather as I have done)?  Wouldn't that be enough to discourage her?

But Holmes does not point out the obvious, and Miss Hunter decides the take the job, with the proviso that she can summon him for help at any time.  In about two weeks they receive a telegram late at night.  "Please be at the Black Swan Hotel at Winchester at midday to-morrow," it said. "Do come! I am at my wit's end. HUNTER."  As they head out on the train, Holmes comments that Miss Hunter is in greater danger in an isolated country house than she would be in a urban area where it would be a simple matter to flee or summon help,** although there does not appear to be any immediate danger if she can meet them at the train station.  He also says, "I have devised seven separate explanations, each of which would cover the facts as far as we know them. But which of these is correct can only be determined by the fresh information which we shall no doubt find waiting for us."

What could those seven explanations be?

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*Point of contrast: In A Case of Identity, Holmes comments that a single lady can get on very nicely on a sum of 60 pounds, and that 100 is enough to "travel a little and indulge yourself in every way.").  

**He goes a bit far in saying that rural areas in general are scenes of greater depravity than the most squalid slum in London -- because there are no neighbors at hand to intervene.  Given that all statistics indicate that crime rates per capita are higher the denser the population, and given that Jack the Ripper had been operating in the squalid slums of London just a few years earlier, this seems extreme.  But in this case, the danger of an isolated country house seems real enough.