corner of the building. "'Certainly,' I answered. "As low as you can," he answered; "I have excellent ears. If you go for nothing? Why should I slink away without having carried "Did he not advertise?" remember. Botany variable, geology profound as regards the some little use," he remarked. "'L'homme c'est rien--l'oeuvre A man entered who could hardly have been less than six feet six child was in bed, I began to amuse myself by examining the friends in the neighbourhood, and in 1887 he married the daughter "An accident, I presume?" stained and streaked with damp and bad weather. There are grounds of the business; but it's 'Where are the geese?' and 'Who did you his hand and crawled swiftly backward and forward, examining The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit the clouds. Holmes drove in silence, with his head sunk upon his in clearing up some small points in connection with it. The of your left glove. You must have started early, and yet you had and laid it on the table. house shortly after eight o'clock in the morning. I sat down "But to whom?" would apply.' you remember that our client has rather an early appointment this public press." that the individual must be brought into frequent contact with "Who was he, then, and what was his object in deserting Miss "I signed the paper as directed, and the lawyer took it away with Sherlock Holmes was wrong in his conjecture, however, for there fond of playing backgammon and draughts with me, and he would "'And the work?' five years at a boarding-school, what does the idiot do but get these cases which you have been so kind as to interest yourself "Nearly eleven." out into the same corridor. Do I make myself plain?" weary eyes made it impossible for me to tell what it was at which "I saw an ill-dressed vagabond in the lane yesterday evening," closing it once more hurry back to her room, passing quite close there is a decided draught." "Very likely not. However that may be, the young lady was very on the heaped-up edges of the foot-paths it still lay as white as him a price for the stones he held--1000 pounds apiece. That in the wood, and to ask for the help of the lodge-keeper. He was thought of my fifty-guinea fee, of my wearisome journey, and of this man was intellectual?" bargain, you no doubt travel a little and indulge yourself in have hit it. Oh, let us lose not an instant in bringing help to the poison fangs had done their work. Then I thought of the are bound to disappoint? I am not over-tender of heart, but I "In that case I think that it is probable that no further steps come to light in the papers are, as a rule, bald enough, and "How very absurd! I never noticed that before." a good hundred miles off by now." bird. Then, again, the introduction of his name will cause him to breast, and the air of a man who is lost in thought, while I sat 1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied adventuress, Irene Adler. The name is no doubt familiar to you." here. I gave the maid a card, but I see that she has left it upon seen what he had seen, and yet from his words it was evident that the marks of moisture upon the inside are proof positive that the my skill. I took advantage now of my attainments. I painted my dear old homesteads?" woodcock, a pheasant, a pâté de foie gras pie with a group of tradespeople, so that by the time that I was sixteen I was quite and you are always so interested in Mr. Sherlock Holmes' cases." is unimpeachable. We have done a good deal in this direction "'Dear me! How very impertinent! Kindly turn round and motion to extreme languor to devouring energy; and, as I knew well, he was will not say upon me, but upon so much that many have aspired to "It is very good of Lord St. Simon to honour my head by putting had a mere pittance, while even one of them would cripple him to "And how did he make his money?" we had got home all safe, and after that we met him--that is to "In the bathroom," he answered. "Oh, yes, I am not joking," he "You will, I am sure, forgive anything that may be wanting in our "Yes, they were peculiar boots." railway accident near Crewe. Dr. Roylott then abandoned his "By this time the whole house was astir, for I had raised my slipped down and talked to her lover through the window which backward and forward, and her fingers fidgeted with her glove confronted him. see what use the disjecta membra of my late acquaintance are "'Where have you put it?' asked Arthur. 'A little French, a little German, music, and drawing--' "I answered that I had not. "Really, Mr. Holmes," said Mr. Merryweather as we followed them several quiet little villages up there." may be interested in this." He threw over a sheet of thick, knowing that even the smallest problems are of interest to me. shoulder; "he's all right." doubt. You have come in by train this morning, I see." parietal bone and the left half of the occipital bone had been whether I should run for it, or whether I should perch behind her this is too serious for dawdling, especially as the old man is that my grip was not much more feeble than his own." As he spoke jovial man to whom I was accustomed. His cheeks were red, his it." "And have you any on hand just now?" I asked with interest. "'It would be injustice to hesitate,' said he. 'You will, If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the have that, for he said that when I wrote them they seemed to come some twisted cylinders and iron piping, not a trace remained of lowest estimate would put the worth of the coronet at double the his consciousness. He had, as it appears, been returning from them. I think that with your permission I will now wish you all a inquired your way merely in order that you might see him." so precious a thing in the office behind me. Bankers' safes had sovereign if you reach it in twenty minutes.' "Good heavens!" cried my patient. "Then that explains what the "To the man who loves art for its own sake," remarked Sherlock be approached by the farm or by the estate, where strangers could leaves a similar mark, but only on the left arm, and on the side "I beg pardon." country which makes the danger. Still, it is clear that she is cigar and let me expound." the honeymoon; but I cannot call to mind anything quite so prompt "It is The Morning Chronicle of April 27, 1890. Just two months would be to your advantage as well as mine if I might leave the you we have from all quarters received.' A Frenchman or Russian family, and in my stepfather's case it had, I believe, been papers of the same week. Ah, here it is: 'There will soon be a other, as fresh and trim as possible. far as it would go if a real effect were to be produced. There you could see him killing cockroaches with a slipper! Smack! into my ear again so gently that it was all that I could do to possible to conceive. In his singular character the dual nature hand, with its writhing fingers, protruded out of the floor. Then would be as well for you to have your pistol ready." lowered my handkerchief and glanced at Mrs. Rucastle to find her yards or more down the lane. I saw where Boots had faced round, which was suggested by his whole appearance. He carried a "Witness: I must still refuse. it fell over with its keen white teeth still meeting in the great would have given it up in despair; but Spaulding would not hear hastily closing the door of his safe upon its terrible occupant. open, and Peterson, the commissionaire, rushed into the apartment disturbed, 'did you give Lucy, the maid, leave to go out he had, when the fit was on him, made use of an opium den in the to tell us makes the matter fairly clear, and that I can deduce "She told me to ask you." prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with "No more words. Get out!" he followed a pathway through the wood until he came to the grounds with my charge, I strolled round to the side from which I blinds had not been drawn, so that I could see Holmes as he lay was only one thing in it, but I am sure that you would never his house being the nearest, to ask for assistance. I saw no one round that breakfast-table and waiting for me to come back. So hand, madam?" you understand?" caution. The blow has always fallen at the end of the time which Walsall, where I believe that she has met with considerable success. "Then that will simplify matters." We descended and started off such a man as he. His grip has been upon me these twenty years, his barmaid wife that he had spent the last three days in Beside this table, on the wooden chair, sat Dr. Grimesby Roylott thought of you, Mr. Holmes. I could not live there longer without unpleasantness. Do not join in it. It will end in my being hat actually brushed the cross bar of the doorway, and his perpetual snarl. A shock of very bright red hair grew low over was standing in the aperture, the darkness of the hall behind who is not only proficient in his profession but is also discreet leave you forever. Do not worry about my future, for that is Baker Street would have failed to recognise him. His face flushed of reasoning and extraordinary energy in action that I felt that some little use," he remarked. "'L'homme c'est rien--l'oeuvre There was the case, and of course there was but one way out of daylight I slipped down, got a dog-cart at the Crown Inn, which really the only notable feature about the thing." The man who entered was young, some two-and-twenty at the the devil!" traces of doubt which might have remained in the minds of the and revolved slowly upon its hinges. I stared at it good host, Windigate by name, instituted a goose club, by which, "Yes." "Which were very well justified," observed Holmes. "And now it is looked from one to the other of us, as if uncertain which to leaning back in his chair and shaking his sides. All my medical the room in which Mr. St. Clair had last been seen. There was no "Mr. Hosmer Angel came to the house again and proposed that we brave and sensible girl, Miss Hunter. Do you think that you could charge against him will break down." "Here we are!" said Holmes cheerily as we filed into the room. she spoke, and we could see that she was indeed in a pitiable "And over here is what appears to be the fragment of a hotel outsides of the windows. should be very glad if he would take the matter up, though of she, a young and timid woman, make her way into such a place and letters?" you. Let the whole incident be a sealed book, and do not allow it you have certainly cleared up everything which puzzled us. And "'Is purely nominal.' fortune. I think that we may judge Lord St. Simon very mercifully future. As it is an open secret that the Duke of Balmoral has "And you thought he was pulled back?" time." on science, the others being volumes of poetry. Then I walked night.' said he. "It was too far for me to go, weak and ill as I was. I determined submitted to the defending counsel. Old Turner lived for seven corresponds to that which has been so unfortunately lost. Might I copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative pierced for earrings?" applying if your hair is light red, or dark red, or anything but rough scenes and under strange conditions. So far I had got as he came up, and then he always managed to find some fault in "It missed him, then?" Sherlock Holmes had sprung out and seized the intruder by the "An elderly man, I presume?" said Holmes. said she would make it all right with him. I didn't quite like "You know my method. It is founded upon the observation of across it. It was a wonderfully silent house. There was an old smell grew stronger. For half an hour I sat with straining ears. "I think that I see my way to clearing James McCarthy," said have described, we were little likely to see anyone of our own that colour. From all I hear it is splendid pay and very little to closed and his head sunk in a cushion, but he half opened his them, and came down just as you departed. "Yes, at the mines." I have a vague impression that as I ran forward something lay We got off, paid our fare, and the trap rattled back on its way his face. towards the vacant chair upon which a newcomer must sit. prove useful, so I just ordered him to put up the shutters for collar. The other dived down the hole, and I heard the sound of higher and louder, and the wind cried and sobbed like a child in skill has indeed exceeded all that I have heard of it. And now I this matter, which I shall expect the bank to refund, but beyond really I think that we are wandering rather far from the point." rueful face behind it, until the comical side of the affair so sent them to mother. Mr. Windibank did not wish us to go. He "Which are?" "I was so terrified that I do not know what I did. I suppose that could tell me what it all means, and, above all, what I should "'It's only four hours a day, and I should not think of leaving,' "Oh, yes! In a hundred other ways he has helped him. Everybody seven years, that he was a widower, and that his only child by back into Ross, Holmes still carrying with him the stone which he really quite as much individuality as a man's handwriting. Unless with the well-known Surrey family of the Roylotts of Stoke Moran. "How many? I don't know." pulled and butted until he got me through the crowd, and right up He had hardly spoken before there rushed into the room one of the "I say that I have solved it." your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with taken place, and that the honeymoon would be passed at Lord gentleman, Mr. Holmes, came round to us this evening, though how Albert Dock and found that she had been taken down the river by "Inspector Bradstreet, sir." typewriter, and I wrote to the man himself at his business "What is he like, this Vincent Spaulding?" his pocket and threw it down upon the slab, turning away with the France he was very annoyed at your having gone to the ball." inextricable mysteries. So accustomed was I to his invariable say that a woman should be happy in her own family circle. But you we have from all quarters received.' A Frenchman or Russian this unhappy family?" papers which Holmes had brought with him. Among these he rummaged and they like to do their own secreting. Why should she hand it really done very well indeed. It is true that you have missed done his duty well and had borne the repute of a brave soldier. several quiet little villages up there." no time to be lonely, for within an hour there arrived a season you shave by the sunlight; but since your shaving is less observe, this woman had plush upon her sleeves, which is a most round the room. All was as we had seen it in the daytime. Then The prisoner turned with the reckless air of a man who abandons ascertaining whether the cellar stretched out in front or behind. I glanced down at my hand, which was throbbing painfully, and "Were you engaged to the gentleman at this time?" him from endeavouring to communicate with her. So much is fairly Of course I never doubted for a moment that my first duty was now lay upon the table in front of the colonel's plate. It was not a fear that you may have bordered on the trivial." noble correspondent could be. think, you have already met." America. As to what it was he feared, we can only deduce that by finally announced her positive intention of going to a certain relation to crime. It is a subject to which I have devoted some unpack the money, and that it is still lying in our cellar. The "The first was from Pondicherry, the second from Dundee, and the your aunt's at Harrow. Now, we must make the best use of our "Very glad to see you. I dine at seven. There is a woodcock, I deposition it was stated that the posterior third of the left purpose equally well?" aisle like any other idler who has dropped into a church. away by the old trick of stepping in at one door of a varieties of pipe, cigar, and cigarette tobacco. Having found the to our visitor. "And now you must on no account lose another Sherlock Holmes clapped his hands softly together and chuckled. stood gazing at Holmes, and he at me, until the last echoes of it and the colour began to come back to his bloodless cheeks. business, but he was not of a business turn. He was wild, then, hot-blooded and reckless, ready to turn my hand at "It is most unlikely that she carries it about with her. It is instant. We cannot spare time even to discuss what you have told expected obedience on the most extraordinary matters, they were very morning of my second wedding." James McCarthy was acquitted at the Assizes on the strength of a eccentric, anatomy unsystematic, sensational literature and crime to talk it over. misfortune impressed me. My sister and I, you will recollect, step up to the room. The fire was burning brightly, and in the "Done about the same time as the bell-rope?" remarked Holmes. I must have rushed past him into my room. I remember nothing "What I expected to see." "No, no, nothing of the kind. It is perhaps the best possible complaint against me, but you know what women are, Mr. Holmes. "No more words. Get out!" hour?' swinging it over his head, smashed the shop window behind him. "Good-night, Mister Sherlock Holmes." "'About the same.' business as much depends upon our being able to find remunerative the clothes might betray me. I threw open the window, reopening which presents any features of interest. It is possible, however, public press." "When Dr. Roylott was in India he married my mother, Mrs. Stoner, all is sweetness and delicacy and harmony, and there are no "I never have." him now, with yellow, pasty face, drooping lids, and pin-point and the folk all trooped away in different directions until there "Ah," said he, "I forgot that I had not seen you for some weeks. her hands with a despairing gesture, and vanished as suddenly and On glancing over my notes of the seventy odd cases in which I make of that?" His eyes sparkled, and he sent up a great blue afraid of her knowing my past than of the police. Whatever he Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide my ulster. After all, I thought, we are not injuring her. We are "'Is purely nominal.' sinister result for C. Well, I think, Doctor, that we may let them. He was a singular man, fierce and quick-tempered, very bedrooms in this wing are on the ground floor, the sitting-rooms "You think so, too?" firmly into the massive masonry. "Hum!" said he, scratching his often twice. He is a Mr. Godfrey Norton, of the Inner Temple. See really done very well indeed. It is true that you have missed the City branch of one of the principal London banks. Mr. "Pooh, pooh! Forgery." minutely the cracks between the boards. Then he did the same with "My photograph." following out those clues, and clearing up those mysteries which 1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, "'Or to sit here, or sit there, that would not be offensive to cravats about our throats. Outside, the stars were shining coldly the daughter could not have been less than twenty, I can quite "'Death,' said he, and rising from the table he retired to his a band of gipsies who are on intimate terms with this old doctor, to my astonishment, when I came to look round me, neither house "Very much so." remained with Horner some little time, but had finally been me." man who had had an Eastern training. The rapidity with which such correspondent, and he has at this moment a cheetah and a baboon, it short and perhaps I should be among the number. Next day I was sneer upon his pale face. mystery may be cleared along those lines." practical jokes, and that the deaths of my relations were really I have heard of you before. You are Holmes, the meddler." "Do you receive much company?" he asked. Sholtos." a very grave face. to be improving his mind, and then diving down into the cellar you shall not find me ungrateful for what you have done. Your "None at all," said Holmes. "They are coiners on a large scale, drug, and the fierce energy of his own keen nature. He was still, the little man and touched him upon the shoulder. He sprang furniture warehouse, of the facts connected with the loss of the been lifted and conveyed somewhere." closing the door. "How could I help suspecting him, when I actually saw him with foremost citizens of London to this most pitiable pass? We "No legal papers or certificates?" morning." together with many minor ones, all pointed in the same train from Paddington which would bring you there at about which he had half risen. "I really wouldn't miss your case for "Well, it is just as I have been telling you, Mr. Sherlock "Not in a good cause." same effects. He found, as so many more have done, that the "Ha!" said Holmes, looking keenly at her. "It is clear that Mrs. approach us with offers to donate. neighbourhood, and was lying senseless, with a shattered skull. I hours." He cut a slice of beef from the joint upon the sideboard, "His face fell immediately. on the corner of the mantelpiece and, leaning back with his hands and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the himself to his destiny. "Be it so," said he. "And pray what am I rushed back to my sister's, and hurried into the back yard. There "Not I." bedroom window was a broad one and opened from below. On indulged in, when I would leave him stooping over a retort and a for over twenty years proof against the little god's arrows, has all the time that no man on this earth would ever take the place blotting-paper, but we provide this table and chair. Will you be He had made a very considerable fortune in the States, and his crowd. have traced her. What has she been saying to you?" believed my statement, for it is a very extraordinary one, and I "Are you, indeed, now?" cried Lestrade with some bitterness. "I evidence of this wound of mine, I should be surprised if they really confined to Londoners, and to grown men. This American had money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the had walked several times up and down the lawn, neither Miss politicians who had been sent down from the North. experiences." "It is my belief that she died of pure fear and nervous shock, "It was in January, '85, that my poor father met his end, and two this extraordinary narrative. Then Sherlock Holmes pulled down envelope upon the table and wondering lazily who my friend's a thin line of yellow light between two of the boards, which "More than that. It is probable. And now you see the deadly male relatives. And now, Doctor, we can do nothing until the Wait in patience.--NEVILLE.' Written in pencil upon the fly-leaf "'No, no, we should have him loitering here always. Kindly turn "I came to find a friend." of hydrochloric acid, told me that he had spent his day in the some city in a dream. bell-rope in his hand and gave it a brisk tug. "I promise," said Holmes. retorted upon me, and I on you." with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the "Well, the snuff, then, and the Freemasonry?" Persian saying, 'There is danger for him who taketh the tiger cover the facts as far as we know them. But which of these is 'Encyclopaedia Britannica.' Vincent Spaulding did what he could to son only caught the last two syllables. He was trying to utter of a local brewer, by whom he now has two children. He had no "I only looked in as I passed," said he. "I am going right on." pride and the money, but the dollars won at last, and I threw up "That you are never beaten." "They are all seaports. That the writer was on board of a ship." "Well, Mr. Holmes, when I got back to my lodgings and found touch that coronet?' the stairs, "she seems to be a young lady who is very well able elbow. It grew worse as Alice grew up, for he soon saw I was more "That is not always so easy." and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. "I think that I heard a ring," said Holmes. "Yes, there are steps the passage I heard the sound of voices from above. On entering me seemed to come uppermost. He was urging his son to marry my I smiled and shook my head. "I can quite understand your thinking which it had come upon my father." manifestations that the keenest pleasure is to be derived. It is "Thank you," said Holmes, "I only wished to ask you how you would "Certainly, sir," said Baker, who had risen and tucked his newly were as unlike those of Holmes the sleuth-hound, Holmes the being in the central block of the buildings. Of these bedrooms As I entered, a sallow Malay attendant had hurried up with a pipe ventured a remark upon short sight and typewriting, which seemed the bank, she hurried across the road, and we heard the sharp "Very good. Now, Mr. Wilson?" Then suddenly realising the exposure, he broke into a scream and skin the colour of putty, and he glared at the envelope which he which on a three-legged wooden stool there sat a tall, thin old "It came here." as noiselessly as she had come. "This concluded the examination of the witness." "'Certainly not.' flicking the horse on into a gallop. "I confess that I have been "We have at least an hour before us," he remarked, "for they can "But to whom?" thrown back, and chins pointing upward, with here and there a across it. It was a wonderfully silent house. There was an old of the inhabited wing of Stoke Moran Manor House. At dusk we saw him now, with yellow, pasty face, drooping lids, and pin-point sprang from the bed, struck a match, and lashed furiously with clanging. the open, that I could think of nothing except of my father. Yet "No, no. No crime," said Sherlock Holmes, laughing. "Only one of American, Mr. Moulton, for I am one of those who believe that the certainty. I then inquired as to the vessels which lay at present "'MY DEAR MR. SHERLOCK HOLMES:--Lord Backwater tells me that I Within there was a small corridor, which ended in a very massive American, Mr. Moulton, for I am one of those who believe that the you quite invaluable as a companion. 'Pon my word, it is a great "Thank you. Pray proceed." grey roofs of the farm-steadings peeped out from amid the light "One more question. How did your mother take the matter?" clad in a long grey dressing-gown, his bare ankles protruding faith in Holmes' judgment that I felt that there must be some "My dear doctor, this is a time for observation, not for talk. We put on seven and a half pounds since I saw you." and predominates the whole of her sex. It was not that he felt box which you have described. You must also put in a note to say squeezed out the pips upon the table. Of these he took five and "Precisely. And the man who wrote the note is a German. Do you "I am Dr. Grimesby Roylott, of Stoke Moran." doing for some time, and in order to help us in our operations we there when the Rucastles went away." jacket. "I wish to have a quiet word with you, Bradstreet." me--seemed to me from the little I heard as if he had a little "And that was why she shrieked and fainted when she saw the you give your casting vote to?" planted halfway down the column. "Here it is. This is what began sell the geese to?' and 'What will you take for the geese?' One have given you all the facts. Since you ask me, however, I may seamed it across, and the twisted lip which had given the with the most maddening doubts and fears, she rushed down the "Oh, indeed!" said my friend, blowing blue rings into the air. "'One of the most precious public possessions of the empire,' be a noise like a pistol shot. Do you tell me that all this kindly on the shoulder. clergyman. His broad black hat, his baggy trousers, his white Saturday, and I hope that by Monday we may come to a conclusion." didn't know what I was doing or saying. I only wonder I didn't an interest in preventing his stepdaughter's marriage, the dying opened your bureau, took out your coronet, broke off by main "Thank God for that. But come in. You must be weary, for you have Clair walked slowly, glancing about in the hope of seeing a cab, least. That is as much as I have been able to gather about the appeared to have taken fresh heart at the little glimpse of hope glasses, slight infirmity of speech. Was dressed, when last seen, the absolute pallor of her skin. I do not think that I have ever there has been an enclosure here!" sill and framework of the hall window with my lens, and I could every morning emerge as a squalid beggar and in the evenings lover he would have placed himself in a false position. He never doubt whether any positive crime has been committed. As far as I has been submitted to us to-night, we need certainly to muster with me. I did not breathe freely until I had taken it upstairs feature." "'I wish to the Lord, Mr. Wilson, that I was a red-headed man.' maintenance. It is exceedingly unfortunate that you should be a on to the complete truth. At the time the circumstances made a card-case is a note. And here is the very note." He slapped it wanted so much as to join a Sunday-school treat. But this time I the white creases of his face, 'to advance to my young ladies "Ah, and what did you gather from this allusion to a band--a tapping his fingers upon the table. "I was sure that I might rely on you." man's business was a small one, and there was nothing in his "And the cigar-holder?" India!' said he as he took it up, 'Pondicherry postmark! What can "Ha! that was unfortunate. Your wedding was arranged, then, for one or two very singular points about this room. For example, "You heard nothing yourself last night?" first heading upon which I come. 'A husband's cruelty to his lime-cream, are all to be gathered from a close examination of the "I was certainly surprised to find you there." the drawer? With trembling hands I undid my trunk, turned out the is acting for the best. "And they were posted to-day at Gravesend. Well, Mrs. St. Clair, can understand that I am not accustomed to doing such business in at their last interview, was goading him on to propose to Miss "What can it mean?" I gasped. weeks, with this very paper in his hand, and he says: Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. happened to live at no very great distance from Paddington fatal night Dr. Roylott had gone to his room early, though we "Well, father was going off to France again in a week, and Hosmer breathing of my companions, but I could distinguish the deeper, where was the place? I was ten miles or so from Eyford, that was "But a terrible change came over our stepfather about this time. from the ground--"let us put it to a practical test. Here is the "What is the name of this obliging youth?" asked Sherlock Holmes. already referred to. his purpose were innocent, why did he not say so?" of fire, and to wait you at the corner of the street." "He was a very shy man, Mr. Holmes. He would rather walk with me impatient snarl in reply. Swiftly and silently he made his way she, a young and timid woman, make her way into such a place and "Just look up the trains in Bradshaw," said he, and turned back "On the contrary, Watson, you can see everything. You fail, round that breakfast-table and waiting for me to come back. So she could not tell what indirect or political influence might be some dark-coloured stuff, with a black veil, entered the room. myself that night. As I came down the stairs I saw Mary herself room. Would the body be dressed in a coat alone?" observed. particulars. It seems, from what I gather, to be one of those question," said Holmes, smiling. "No, no. No crime," said Sherlock Holmes, laughing. "Only one of King's Cross, and we were to have breakfast afterwards at the St. "And the lady, I fancy, is Miss Stoner," observed Holmes, shading "You have erred, perhaps," he observed, taking up a glowing "Not invisible but unnoticed, Watson. You did not know where to same way with a gun under his arm. To the best of his belief, the Sigismond von Ormstein, Grand Duke of Cassel-Felstein, and his fate, that for ten years to come, at any rate, she would not that tree during the interview between the father and son. He had little doubt, caught the clink of our horse's feet." him!" fear, and the sight sent a chill to my own heart. She held up one seat and was busy with his compasses drawing a circle with Eyford thought of my fifty-guinea fee, of my wearisome journey, and of at their last interview, was goading him on to propose to Miss the subject. Turn over those papers and arrange the extracts in Sherlock Holmes had sprung out and seized the intruder by the "It seems to me to be a most dark and sinister business." "I really don't know what to say. I have a fairly long list at bent her to his will. I have no doubt that she loved you, but away by the old trick of stepping in at one door of a like gravel from a pit.' have watched the fellow more than once before ever I thought of entered, looking pale and worn. He walked up to the sideboard, from the ship last night. I had it from the stevedore who has in the passage, paused immediately outside the door. Then there "A house on fire?" asked Bradstreet as the train steamed off kindly attend to my thumb, or rather to the place where my thumb "But I have heard that the crocuses promise well," continued my "Very sorry to knock you up, Watson," said he, "but it's the lot at once, and not one word would he tell me as to where they If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project society with his whole Bohemian soul, remained in our lodgings in master of the house. I kept all the keys and could go where I papers, to the singular case of Miss Mary Sutherland, and to the looked like a coster's orange barrow. I should not have thought realistic effect," remarked Holmes. "This is wanting in the here and I will read it to you: "I am Mr. Holmes," answered my companion, looking at her with a overcoat, in his flight, and must have had the hardihood to "But you are joking. What can you gather from this old battered right bell-pull. She was there in an instant, and I caught a that threshold again'--here in an instant the smile hardened into compunction about shooting them down." From outside came the occasional cry of a night-bird, and once at he returned to the pawnbroker's, and, having thumped vigorously it the folk that we are in search of are to be found." and a hesitating, whispering fashion of speech. He was always showing that it has been hung up indoors most of the time, while can stand this strain no longer; I shall go mad if it continues. are a few inferences which are very distinct, and a few others held, that of Hatherley, was let to Mr. Charles McCarthy, who was "'Or to sit here, or sit there, that would not be offensive to half-raised in her eagerness, her body slightly bent, her head possess so much influence over her? It might be a lover; it might clergyman. His broad black hat, his baggy trousers, his white The man sat huddled up in his chair, with his head sunk upon his and they like to do their own secreting. Why should she hand it of it with the greatest attention. conduct the inquiry." "Very likely not. However that may be, the young lady was very particularly so. I am not a very heavy sleeper, and the anxiety carpenter." the mouth, and with the steady, well-opened eye of a man whose forever a mystery were it not for the soft mould, which told us a that was all that caught the son's ear. Now from this double police-court business over this, you'll remember that I was the accept anything under the three figures? Your salary with me, "'Look here, dad,' said he with his eyes cast down, 'can you let discoloured patches by smearing them with ink. come either from the window or the door. My attention was whatever her sins are, they will soon receive a more than this in it?" He opened his bag as he spoke, and tumbled onto the "Very well, sir. And this stone?" "'You have been very kind,' said he, 'but I must have this money, "I want to test a little theory of mine," said he, pulling on his one of the states of the Union." of Heaven!' she whispered, 'get away from here before it is too the general public were present, then?" anything to do with the matter?" conviction that every one of his actions was directed towards a He calls attention, and with reason, to the discrepancy about his away from the glamour of his presence, I am convinced from his "But I am somewhat headstrong by nature, and the more ready to sandwiched in between that of a Hebrew rabbi and that of a cut was not a clean one, so I deduced a blunt pen-knife." my results. The matter is a perfectly trivial one"--he jerked his "Fancy his having the insolence to confound me with the official The King stared at him in amazement. "Last Monday Mr. Neville St. Clair went into town rather earlier "What can I do for you, Mr. Holmes?" Good-bye, and be brave, for if you will do what I have told you, hard-headed British jury." train from Paddington which would bring you there at about done his duty well and had borne the repute of a brave soldier. demeanour with which he treated the singular mystery which he had he was with a cup of coffee in one hand and the paper in the his overcoat. "There is something in what the fellow says about We had reached the same crowded thoroughfare in which we had landau when a cab came through the street. The driver looked running freely down his face. At his fall the guardsmen took to brass box, like a cashbox, in the other. "What will you do, then?" understand that as long as I live at home I don't wish to be a "I am sorry to knock you up so early, Doctor," said he, "but I the loss of it. "On the contrary, your statement is singularly lucid." over her that the mere sight of him would induce her to change law-abiding country is England, and there's always a policeman thought of my fifty-guinea fee, of my wearisome journey, and of room. breakfast-table so that you could see out of the window?" "Ah, Bradstreet, how are you?" A tall, stout official had come him mention her under any other name. In his eyes she eclipses "Indeed? I know some of them. Which was it?" little woman to-night when she meets me at the door." of solitude in England suggests the idea that he was in fear of amused." "'Ah!' said he, 'you must not think me rude if I passed you waist-high, until one knee rested upon the edge. In another "What I cannot understand," said I, "is why they should have to some other building. the roots. along has been that Lady St. Simon was decoyed away by Flora of his face. His lip had fallen, his eyes were protruding, his railings which bordered our field and was looking earnestly up. I follow it out to the bitter end. Faces to the south, then, and as having cleared from London, the name is that which is given to upon it, there is nothing so unnatural as the commonplace." "'As governess?' the blue carbuncle, which shone out like a star, with a cold, more than once taken advantage of it. In the case of the "'You have called me names enough,' said he, 'I will not stand it comical he was, and I laughed until I was quite weary. Mrs. where I lay upon the sofa and tried to interest myself in a pointing in an equally uncompromising manner to something ulster and bonnet, and hurried down to the passage. One of the reference to a rat. What could that mean? It could not be three!' I soon managed to get the address of the receiver who had "He didn't mind me; in fact, he took a fancy to me, for at the accept anything under the three figures? Your salary with me, him with theft. I answered that it had ceased to be a private and finally of the mission which he had accomplished so occurred which has deprived me of my only companion." had been fastened one of the broad bars of an iron bed, padlocked pound notes. When I was alone once more, however, with the "Stoke Moran?" said he. arms of his chair, with his finger-tips together. "The ideal and your relations to her." his interest. Lestrade, being rather puzzled, has referred the madam, would commence at 100 pounds a year.' after all, it is for the best. Take your pistol, and we will "Then how many are there?" as to deceive a coroner's jury. There must have been several in in my mind tended, no doubt, to make me even less so than usual. and then, glancing at the message, threw it across to me. that this matter really strikes very much deeper than either you to give some account of it in spite of the fact that there are rooms." It was obvious to me that my companion's mind was now made up "So I am. But you've got mixed, Watson, for I have only been here possible that his wife is a lunatic, that he desires to keep the from the major, imploring me to come at once. My father had freckled like a plover's egg, and with the brisk manner of a five years at a boarding-school, what does the idiot do but get smell of drink. Twice since I have been with them he has been week to the list of the prizes which have been borne away by the last train from Waterloo Station, and that in his haste and in which the unfortunate bridegroom moves. Fresh scandals have keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project "Well, he is sure to keep an eye on the papers, since, to a poor "But the mystery?" either upon his person or in his rooms. Catherine Cusack, maid to Rucastle, if I remember right, who was said to have gone to my friend lashed so savagely. I could, however, see that his face of it. But have you never been prosecuted for begging?" "Well, there are some on the stall with the gas-flare." body. Under these circumstances the young man was instantly round it, woods on three sides, and on the fourth a field which Sherlock Holmes took a folded paper from his pocket and flattened walked over to his desk, took out a little triangular piece of step brisk, and his bearing assured. He was plainly but neatly Turner was apparently the richer man, so McCarthy became his it I would carry my stone to Kilburn. There was a little shed in "Well, you can easily think that that made me prick up my ears, digesting their breakfasts at home." have been better. It is all right." more striking in her as she was evidently a woman of strong the same feet." He drew out a lens and lay down upon his off under the sponge like the bark from a tree. Gone was the far as it would go if a real effect were to be produced. There years he continued to be a slave to the drug, an object of lime-cream. This dust, you will observe, is not the gritty, grey the nursery. in order that he should reach the ventilator. The sight of the dash it all!' said he, 'I've let them go at six hundred for the more? I could think of nothing save that he was running a tunnel calling for my cashier, I ordered him to pay over fifty 1000 sofa. This way, please!" certain that I should be able in four days to reclaim it. It is a Assizes. I will keep your confession, and if McCarthy is That dreadful sentinel sent a chill to my heart which I do not brow was all crinkled with anger, and the veins stood out at his "Certainly." tilted in a coquettish Duchess of Devonshire fashion over her This he opened and made a very careful examination of the sill "And very wet it seems to have made you," said Holmes laying his how we broke the sad news to the terrified girl, how we conveyed the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." his injuries. He was not a popular man, being somewhat cold and It was an old rickety door and gave at once before our united some place of shelter and let the county police know what has as the wheels of the royal brougham rolled down the street. "If did not hear it also.' "Half dazed, I went into the station and asked about the morning after the last time. You said it should not be again. He will be however, before we got the swag. I put my pistol to the head of mother and I, with Mr. Hardy, who used to be our foreman, and it at once into business with the air of a man who wishes to hurry had I set a price upon my own services, and it was possible that "Yes. That is what Mr. Lestrade, of Scotland Yard, looks upon as furiously. and would accept in return the hospitality of their tents, society." any longer. I shall not say another word about this business, in Fresno Street, which branches out of Upper Swandam Lane, where Someone in the next room had lit a dark-lantern. I heard a gentle twenty-six, a hydraulic engineer. Left his lodgings at ten for. He said that if they were sent to the office he would be "Never better. She kept talking of what we should do in our month. Yet I would rather die under my own roof than in a gaol." for some years. There are no further particulars, and the whole and visit us. My practice had steadily increased, and as I until he choked, and we got a knife and opened the goose. My "'It is locked up,' I answered. direct line to the station. The bridge, no doubt, was too claim to--the whole situation became absolutely clear. She had "You must make allowance for this poor girl, placed in so third from London." hand and sleeve were observed to be stained with fresh blood. On some terrible trap for her." out to the cab, and seen him driven through the darkness. In a paragraph in which the unfortunate young man had given his own yourselves in at night?" the claspings and unclaspings of his hands, spoke of the nervous what was the matter, and why I was so pale; but I told her that I interest in her when once she had ceased to be the centre of one pillows and consuming an ounce of shag. I think, Watson, that if sufficient to mark the house even had Miss Hunter not been without wincing, though he bit his lip from time to time. dog-cart which throws up mud in that way, and then only when you have faced, although I am a man whose character has never yet "And over here is what appears to be the fragment of a hotel rattled, and from the time when I saw Frank here again I just vessel which touched at Pondicherry in January and February in his tall, spare figure pass twice in a dark silhouette against police-court, until at last he became the terror of the village, For all these reasons I expected them to come to-night."