The Case of the Stationmaster's Strongbox

It was the third Monday of November 1893 when Mr Hollis, stationmaster at Earlsfield Halt on the Great Surrey line, came to us by an early train in a state of slow, careful unhappiness.

"Two shillings the week, Mr Holmes, missing from my strongbox these six months. I had not noticed at first; the takings were small, the discrepancy steady. I had thought it a long miscount of my own. But the auditor came down on Saturday and the deficit is fifty-two shillings."

His Halt was a small thing in a slow Surrey village, an hour out of Waterloo, and we took a hansom from the rank to the up-platform. From the four o'clock up-train alighted a thickset man in iron-grey, broad-shouldered, with a once-broken nose and scarred knuckles upon the gloved hand at the carriage-door; he walked off down the village road without looking back.

Mr Hollis showed us into the office above the booking-hall. The strongbox was upon a shelf behind his desk; the key was on a chain at his waistcoat; and the rooms above the booking-hall were his own - for himself, his wife, and a niece who lived with them.

The Scene

Hand-drawn case map for The Case of the Stationmaster's Strongbox, showing Earlsfield Halt, a small Surrey junction on the Great Surrey line. — The ground in question.

Setting: Earlsfield Halt, a small Surrey junction on the Great Surrey line
Time: Monday afternoon, third Monday of November 1893
Weather: Cool; damp; the November light low on the up-platform
Atmosphere: A booking-hall scented with coal-smoke and wet wool; the strongbox upon its shelf; the up-line's signal arms visible through the window.

The Suspects

Mr Hollis

Stationmaster, fifteen years at Earlsfield

A spare, deliberate man of fifty, who held the strongbox-key on a chain at his waistcoat. He had not had a holiday in three years; his quarterly leave was due in February.
Mrs Hollis

Wife of the stationmaster, lived above the booking-hall

A composed, careful woman of forty-eight, twenty-three years married. She kept her husband's chatelaine of small keys and had her own daily rhythm of morning chores within the booking-hall.
Mr Lapworth

Porter, three years at Earlsfield

A heavy young man of twenty-six, with a small standing debt at the village inn and a Friday evening's habit there. His pay was modest; his lodgings cheaper.
Mr Brewster

Commercial traveller, regular weekly lodger at the station-inn

A bluff, obliging man of forty in haberdashery, who took the inn's first-floor room every Tuesday night and was the only outsider to the village familiar with the Halt's takings-day. He had business in Haslemere on the Wednesday morning and back to Waterloo by Thursday's noon.

The Evidence

The intact strongbox

The strongbox bore no mark of forcing; no scratch upon the lock-plate; no key-mark within the wards. The box had been opened with the proper key and shut again, time after time, through the half-year.
Mrs Hollis's chatelaine

Mrs Hollis carried, by long habit, a chatelaine at her waist with the small keys of the booking-hall larder, the upstairs press, and the porter's locker. Holmes asked, with a quiet courtesy, to see the chatelaine; the strongbox-key, he observed, hung from a small ring at one end of the chatelaine, beside the larder-key, in the polished brass of long use.
Mr Lapworth's standing debt

The porter's standing debt at the Three Foxes was three pounds two by the inn-keeper's slate. He had not paid down anything of it since Easter.
Mr Hollis's overdue holiday

Mr Hollis's leave-record showed him three years without a holiday. Mrs Hollis had spoken to him, more than once at the kitchen-table, of a fortnight at Brighton in February for their silver-wedding anniversary.
A small private savings-book

Holmes asked Mrs Hollis, with the rector of the parish present, whether she kept any private savings of her own. She produced a small post-office savings-book in her own name with a balance of forty-nine shillings and threepence - accumulated, the entries showed, at two shillings a week from May.

Statements & Testimony

Mr Hollis Reliable

Stationmaster

“"The key has not left my fob, Mr Holmes. The box is in my office; the office is mine. The takings are counted on Saturday and locked away. I have noticed the discrepancy these six months and I have blamed it upon my own miscount. The takings are not large; the loss is steady."”
Mrs Hollis Reliable

Wife of the stationmaster

“"Of course, sir. The chatelaine has the larder-key, the upstairs press, the porter's locker - and the strongbox-key, which my husband had cut for me at his last leave four years ago, that I might take down a sovereign for the doctor in the night if it were needed."”

The Scene

The Suspects

The Evidence

The intact strongbox

Mrs Hollis's chatelaine

Mr Lapworth's standing debt

Mr Hollis's overdue holiday

A small private savings-book

Statements & Testimony

Your Verdict