When is a fan not really a fan but a way of speaking? Enola Holmes does not get herself involved in the ways of Victorian ladies, but she does know a few things about the language of fans. This comes in very handy for her one day when she encounters her old acquaintance, the Honorable Cecily Alistair, under most unusual circumstances. While resting in a ladies’ lavatory (actually hiding from her pesky brothers, Sherlock and Mycroft), she sees Lady Cecily come in with two overpowering escorts. It doesn’t take her long to figure out that something is terribly amiss. Sitting quietly, disguised as a lady scholar, she observes that Cecily seems to be under stress as the two matrons with her boss her around. When Cecily's eyes, peeking over her pink fan, meet Enola's, they begin an interesting communication.
Cecily opened the pink fan and began to ply it as if to cool her face. I noticed that she used her left hand --- significant: she chose to be her true self rather than obeying the demands of propriety. I noticed also that she positioned the fan as a frail sort of barrier between herself and her guardian. Behind its brief concealment her gaze caught mine, and in that moment the fan almost as if by accident tapped her on the forehead.
I understood her signal at once: Caution. We are being watched.
Before they part, Cecily manages to cleverly drop her fan near Enola. Her friend definitely seems to be in need of rescuing (yet again, because in another adventure she actually saved Cecily). Enola no sooner leaves the lavatory attempting to follow the trio than she literally bumps into Mycroft. While she manages to run from him, it has set her next adventure off rather badly. Those brothers of hers are always trying to reign her in and make her into a respectable "lady." Though she does adore them (especially Sherlock), she cannot risk getting under their powers and losing her freedom. Despite the fact that Sherlock has proven himself to be a magnificent detective, Enola continues to flee and do her own detective work in various clever disguises. It is just her way of being herself, which, if she lived with them, could never happen. But more pressing to her than anything at the moment is to figure out if there might be more information coming from the little pink fan.
Before this wonderful adventure is over, 14-year-old Enola will have encountered any number of odd, eccentric and colorful characters, such as her elderly landlady, Mrs. Tupper, “deaf as a cast-iron gatepost”; the fierce mastiff who protects a baron’s wealthy estate; and Dawson, the overprotective maid who talks too much. Her propensity to find trouble, and her ability to know how to handle it, places her in one dangerous situation after another. This time she ends up at an orphanage --- up to her old tricks, outwitting the wealthy but sleazy baron of Merganser and his son, who are plotting to acquire Cecily’s fortune. Even Sherlock gets involved in the mayhem.
Through all of this, Enola continues to search for the meaning behind her missing Suffragist mother’s messages and, through veiled messages in the daily Pall Mall Gazette, tries to distantly stay in touch with her brothers. From one disguise after another, she dashes through a whirlwind of adventure.
THE CASE OF THE PECULIAR PINK FAN is Nancy Springer’s fourth Enola Holmes mystery. These books, which can be read as stand-alones, are delightful studies in Victorian times and a clever girl who marches to her own beat.
--- Reviewed by Sally M. Tibbetts (stibbetts@maine207west.org)
