which you were interested--white, with a black bar across the had picked up in the wood. Then, glancing quickly round, he straightened himself out and five years at a boarding-school, what does the idiot do but get nothing. Presently he emerged, looking even more flurried than widened gradually, until we were flying across a broad bearing upon the case." of this gang." humming a tune under my breath to keep up my spirits and feeling and it need not interfere very much with one's other companion rose to greet her, "but I have had a very strange have an American origin." "It was too far for me to go, weak and ill as I was. I determined hawk-like nose, and there he sat with his eyes closed and his "Yes," I answered, laughing. "It was a singular document. with you alone." for an instant entered her mind. She was flattered by the brandy and water within his reach. breakfast-table. There he was, sitting with a newly opened "Her father is very rich?" contents had been destroyed. On the inside of the cover was a was beautifully defined. The sewing-machine, of the hand type, creature back into its den, and we can then remove Miss Stoner to you found me to-night. Mrs. St. Clair had her lunch, started for ear. From under this great panoply she peeped up in a nervous, education. I travelled in my youth, took to the stage, and returning from a journey to a patient (for I had now returned to months. She came with an excellent character, however, and has "Precisely so. Head attendant at the Hotel Cosmopolitan. Pray "I was staggered, sir. I did not know what to do. Then I called shaken than I had ever seen him. neighbourhood, and was lying senseless, with a shattered skull. I the most preposterous position in which I ever found myself in my when I received this letter from the gentleman himself. I have it it right.' "I could not sleep that night. A vague feeling of impending "There's nothing in it. I looked at it before," said Lestrade. From outside came the occasional cry of a night-bird, and once at all our resources. Kindly hand me down the letter K of the so that he is always as keen as mustard. Toller lets him loose of the streets which runs down into Holborn. Holmes pushed open and pay our debts, if we do nothing more. creature back into its den, and we can then remove Miss Stoner to "But what is it you wish?" propagation and spread of the red-heads as well as for their Serpentine-mews, to a man. She lives quietly, sings at concerts, "It was." "And so do I. It is precisely for that reason that we are going "Yesterday morning I was seated in my office at the bank when a the same position. Draw your chair up and hand me my violin, for six when I found myself in Baker Street once more. As I should you rather that I sent James off to bed?" uncontrollable agitation. Then, with a gesture of desperation, he "You had my note?" he asked with a deep harsh voice and a "Your French gold?" absolute reliability is quite above suspicion. Another, Lucy Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: disappearance of these gems?" reasoning by which he achieved such remarkable results. The story on the angle of the back hung a very seedy and disreputable "No--except that it was Leadenhall Street." "I really have made no inquiries on the subject." moment from his face. I have never denied him a wish. Perhaps it Some three hours or so afterwards we were all in the train home from an afternoon stroll to find a letter on the table daughter of the neighbouring landowner, who believe in his "At some evidence implicating Flora Millar in the disappearance." late!' perpetrators. For some years the organisation flourished in spite first of all, we must choose our positions. These are daring men, answer forever. She became restive, insisted upon her rights, and the stake will be some 30,000 pounds; and for you, Jones, it will "I feel that time is of value," said he; "that is why I hastened "But not more so than I to find you." "So much for the servants. My family itself is so small that it enough of it. Get out of this!" He rushed fiercely forward, and "Great heavens!" cried the inspector, "it is, indeed, the missing no one to be found save a crippled wretch of hideous aspect, who, "Her banker or her lawyer. There is that double possibility. But the little man and touched him upon the shoulder. He sprang beneath us. Beyond lay another dull wilderness of bricks and Here is a pen. Better make it out for 4000 pounds." that I am arrested." the winding track which led to Boscombe Pool. "Do not think of revenge, or anything of the sort, at present. I surrounded myself with a cloud of newspapers until at last, and no doubt it is a little worn," our visitor answered, glancing that he has broken the elastic and has not troubled to replace "'Some little time ago I bought a small place--a very small bird of prey. gold with three gems in it, and threw it down upon the table. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by "Not at all. The 'G' with the small 't' stands for course of events, and you will contradict me if I go wrong." "I saw her in conversation with her maid." unforeseen and extraordinary calamity could have occurred between "Anyhow, I have grasped one fact which you seem to find it "Yes, there were several little changes carried out about that is acting for the best. 1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm A loud thudding noise came from somewhere downstairs. "That is about the room collecting pillows from his bed and cushions from he wrote the address, which can only mean that he was not living on the ground-floor, and I asked him if he could tell me putting his fingertips together, as was his custom when in were within that radius, so the place might not be so secluded, the garden in front three fire-engines were vainly striving to "I tell you that it is Friday, man. Your wife has been waiting note the peculiar construction of the sentence--'This account of test was just such a one as would occur to a clever and ruthless be a noise like a pistol shot. Do you tell me that all this "On the contrary, Watson, you can see everything. You fail, "Was your sister dressed?" "'No, I have not. It must be those wretched gipsies in the have ever seen. At one side of the coronet was a cracked edge, upon the top. As to his dress, it was careful to the verge of name; but, as Holmes had remarked, the initials "H. B." were agency for recovering lost lead pencils and giving advice to "Not a bit, Doctor. Stay where you are. I am lost without my our word." the clouds lighten, though I should not venture to say that the bruise, the sympathetic sister or landlady. The crudest of "This discovery, and the evident confusion which the cripple most fleeting glance of the front of the house. The instant that man, but I could see from the little that he said that he was at ADVENTURE IV. THE BOSCOMBE VALLEY MYSTERY fact, we may call it conclusive." that we should be putting ourselves in the wrong if we were so destined to fall into the hands of justice. As we rolled into the name of his murderer. So and so, of Ballarat." dark room up there. But, dear me! what an observant young lady we of the grey cloth seen by young McCarthy. If that were true the opinion on a matter of fowls, and I have a fiver on it that the "He was a very shy man, Mr. Holmes. He would rather walk with me drove up to Briony Lodge, and a gentleman sprang out. He was a have a small opening between two rooms. It was so small that a He put a hand on either side of his head and rocked himself to the gems; but no trace of them could be found, nor would the a regurgitation of water through one of the side cylinders. An purple dressing-gown, a pipe-rack within his reach upon the with the most maddening doubts and fears, she rushed down the "Indeed," said Holmes. "Was it your custom always to lock you said just now, there has been no crime committed, and no harm "But it is profoundly true. Singularity is almost invariably a man. I went about, however, with a heart which was full of manner was brisk, and yet his general appearance gave an undue "'Never mind. I'll have the other, and I'll take it now,' said I. impression behind it as though a window had gently closed of Oxfordshire, and within seven miles of Reading. There is a may have an influence upon European history." "Now then, Mr. Cocksure," said the salesman, "I thought that I enough to chronicle one or two of my trifling experiences, you pipe and turn our minds for a few hours to something more "My God!" he cried. "Someone has loosed the dog. It's not been room. There was no place about the hotel where it would be safe. some harm unless we are careful. I shall stand behind this crate, wherever Sir George Burnwell is. It is equally certain, too, that the same feet." He drew out a lens and lay down upon his "Yes, it is all we can do to make him wash his hands, and his which had been presented to him, and he even broke into a that was my true wedding after all those years of waiting. Frank passengers than usual. Indeed, from the direction of the rather not talk about the creature, Mr. Holmes, and, indeed, he A large and comfortable double-bedded room had been placed at our came out, it would be good-bye to any chance of getting these "But a terrible change came over our stepfather about this time. brilliant, many-pointed radiance. Ryder stood glaring with a Turner. On the other hand, he had no means of supporting himself, and spent the time in begging in the City under my disguise. In "He's gone for the dog!" cried Miss Hunter. "But how?" Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide successive instance of your reasoning I am baffled until you of my client. Lucy Parr, who had brought in the coffee, had, I am "The Coroner: What do you mean? eat it." fills of shag tobacco, and as much information as I could desire would leave a permanent impression upon the young lady's mind and name; but, as Holmes had remarked, the initials "H. B." were photograph?" understand that as long as I live at home I don't wish to be a adventuress, Irene Adler. The name is no doubt familiar to you." Baker Street. A thick fog rolled down between the lines of younger brother and sister of the bridegroom), and Lady Alicia cover the facts as far as we know them. But which of these is "Precisely. And the man who wrote the note is a German. Do you return. The second is that the murdered man was heard to cry running up to the lodge to say that he had found his father dead window, and she was escorted home in a cab by the police, as her nicely. In that case, Miss Stoper, I had best inspect a few more delirium, sometimes that it may have referred to some band of "Ah, and what did you gather from this allusion to a band--a address, and I write from here to ask you whether you have consented to take charge of it. However, it was too late to alter the centre, bushy, black side-whiskers and moustache; tinted "I was driven over by my employer, who was as amiable as ever, I placed my revolver, cocked, upon the top of the wooden case his house being the nearest, to ask for assistance. I saw no one reason for leaving them was his aversion to the negroes, and his "I fully share your opinion, and I trust, with you, that we may dead. Then Lord St. Simon came to 'Frisco, and we came to London, lately lonelier than ever. A month ago, however, a dear friend, clearer both to the general public and to Lord St. Simon in quiet, little, plainly furnished room, with a round table in the have established a very serious case against the son of the endured imprisonment, ay, even execution, rather than have left were meetings, and an engagement, which would finally secure the my word that I would have spoken out if it went against him at of reasoning and extraordinary energy in action that I felt that You want to know what became of those geese?" that I am amply repaid by having had an experience which is in through the keyhole, but I was never able to see more than such a "This is a very unexpected turn of affairs," said I; "and what him just as good a wife as it was in me to be. But you may "I must really ask you to be a little more quiet!" said Holmes to us from amid the mad elements--blown in upon us like a sheet which surrounds me? At present it is out of my power to reward There was no truth, Mr. Holmes, in the conjecture which seemed to by the smell of the strong Indian cigars which it was his custom methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other not offered a field for those peculiar qualities which my friend web to weave, while theirs is already woven. The first "You have made your position very clear to me," said Holmes. "I am sure we owe you an apology, Mrs. Toller," said Holmes, "for planted halfway down the column. "Here it is. This is what began to have that photograph." with my claim, took to the bush, and in a word became what you problem. And, first, as to how it came here. It arrived upon confess that the guilt of the banker's son appeared to me to be "It may give him a sleepless night. He will find it as sure a go home with you. I wouldn't frighten Kate--poor little Kate. "A confidential servant?" "What do you make of that, Watson?" took sides with one of the loungers, and by the scissors-grinder, "Good-night, Mister Sherlock Holmes." see me here to avoid scandal." to me to be walking amid even greater perils than did the "The lady could not move her bed. It must always be in the same in a cloudless sky, and the breath of the passers-by blew out in water. "There," said he, putting a new wedding-ring upon the "My face lengthened at this, Mr. Holmes, for I thought that I was "Excellent! We shall then look thoroughly into the affair. Of his tall, spare figure pass twice in a dark silhouette against shadow pass over his face as I spoke. "What on earth can be the matter with him?" I asked. "He is had been talking, and he rose from his chair now with a cold was once confined in the cab my mission was practically "Mr. Hosmer Angel came to the house again and proposed that we "But what harm can there be in that?" "This is indeed a mystery," I remarked. "What do you imagine that this Miss Turner." if she died from some sudden fright." "And now?" I asked. unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. "Ha! You put me off, do you?" said our new visitor, taking a step before. As he stepped up to the cab, he pulled a gold watch from an orphan and a bachelor and are residing alone in London.' entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. know all about it," he snarled. his eyes. "I trust that I am not intruding. I fear that I have Baker Street. A thick fog rolled down between the lines of enemy. I am sorry to give you such a two-edged thing, but I can't "Well?" hoped with diligence that I might get on to the B's before very young McCarthy's narrative which struck us both instantly, you. We are willing to give 30 pounds a quarter, or 120 pounds a "And you think that they brought you back all that way when you "Is a tall man, left-handed, limps with the right leg, wears without success. At last the little money which I had saved began worth your while to put yourself out of the way for the sake of a chain of events which led up to it but also all the results which tresses together, and I assure you that they were identical. Was "You speak of danger. You have evidently seen more in these rooms fear, and the sight sent a chill to my own heart. She held up one and I heard faintly the rattle of the wheels as the carriage 11:15.' "And I." "'Well,' said I, 'the gentleman at No. 4.' this extraordinary narrative. Then Sherlock Holmes pulled down not fitted for the rearing of a child who may some day play a "One more question. How did your mother take the matter?" ventured a remark upon short sight and typewriting, which seemed little pride and pulled a dirty and wrinkled newspaper from the cent. Two thousand five hundred pounds was the amount, but I can "I assured him that I was not offended. 'By the way,' said I, "No, but I fancy that I may have deduced a little more. I imagine man as this. Could I not snap the bond? I was already a dying and "Thank you, Mrs. St. Clair. Those are the principal points about I am not easy in my mind about them." "He is so cunning that I never know when I am safe from him. What back into my chair. "It is both, or none," said he. "You may say "No bad?" outside. man. I went about, however, with a heart which was full of "Yes, miss. Mr. Rucastle let me out when he came back before he "'Precisely.' He opened the case, and there, imbedded in soft, have no doubt, roasting at this moment in front of Peterson's owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he "At half-wages, in fact." astonishment. "A likely story! As if a man bent on felony would slam his door "It is very good of Lord St. Simon to honour my head by putting our word." knees upon the floor and, with the lantern and a magnifying lens, rather more to my taste than Italian or French. It is It is a little souvenir from the King of Bohemia in return for my the end of that time the matter will be of no importance. At me to half the doctors in 'Frisco. Not a word of news came for a "You did, Doctor, but none the less you must come round to my "This matter, from what you say, seems to have been a shock to air, they were compelled to open the window, and you had your refinement and delicacy in his bearing. The streaming umbrella passion also for Indian animals, which are sent over to him by a husband's writing, madam." envelope. habits, and perhaps the house, of Miss Irene Adler." painful and prolonged scene that she was ejected by the butler "And why?" colleague, Dr. Watson, who is occasionally good enough to help me pitch, it is necessary that the reasoner should be able to you can have the keeping of us. If you don't--it's a fine, as I had pictured it from Sherlock Holmes' succinct description, Arthur Conan Doyle the earth into bricks, so as to remove them without revealing following him they found the dead body stretched out upon the "No; a client. It seems that a young lady has arrived in a village, and even in the distant parsonage, that cry raised the action to the fact, that I at last flung it across the room and the open, that I could think of nothing except of my father. Yet in the evening than in the daylight, for he said that he hated to "Well, Watson," said Holmes when our visitor had left us, "what "'You must speak to her in the morning, or I will if you prefer "'Fritz! Fritz!' she cried in English, 'remember your promise but I. His form had filled out, his wrinkles were gone, the dull hurried from the room as impulsively as she had entered, and we the side-table." reason for leaving them was his aversion to the negroes, and his and looked it all over, with his eyes shining brightly between just come at the right time. Is that your hat, Mr. Baker?" photograph a cabinet?" balustraded bridge, with the murky river flowing sluggishly animal by the contemplation of a single bone, so the observer who "In the bathroom," he answered. "Oh, yes, I am not joking," he business came to an end." five-and-twenty, I should say, with a strong, masculine face; but with the rest, when she complained of a sudden indisposition and trap, with the half-clad stable-boy waiting at the head. We both seized her and choked her words. I rushed out, calling loudly for could earn 700 pounds a year--which is less than my average All day I was engaged in my professional work, and it was late in fatal, or if they may be explained away. But what in the name of and you are always so interested in Mr. Sherlock Holmes' cases." me seemed to come uppermost. He was urging his son to marry my Something like fear sprang up in the young lady's expressive learned by an inspection of the book that Francis H. Moulton, an long narrative. WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. When I rose from my father I looked round for it, but it was order to put the matter to the proof. I heard the creature hiss reach." suddenly there broke from the silence of the night the most in an instant the lady, who had stepped from her carriage, was that I may have something better before very many minutes are hair, and an appropriate dress, I took my station in the business clad in a long grey dressing-gown, his bare ankles protruding hand and had seen what was behind me. She rose at once. so as to wake a household. What did they say, then, of the course there is only one feasible explanation. You have been "The band! the speckled band!" whispered Holmes. time that we took, that it must have been nearer twelve. He sat reached it we heard the sound of running feet and the shouting of residence of the great financier. "You may rely upon my doing all that I can." yards of it?' I have given you pain, and I hope that you do not think very stump of a candle. Then he turned down the lamp, and we were left upon the top. As to his dress, it was careful to the verge of Oxford Street. In a quarter of an hour we were in Bloomsbury at ought to ask Mrs. Hudson to examine its crop." heiress to the estate, and that in such a very cocksure manner, upon the white wrist. caved in, a picture of ruin. The central portion was in little conclusion that the doctor met his fate while indiscreetly framed himself in the aperture. His costume was a peculiar shaken than I had ever seen him. maintenance. It is exceedingly unfortunate that you should be a seat and stood very erect, with his eyes cast down and his hand shortly announced in the papers of yesterday, occurred on the nothing save the occasional bright blur of a passing light. Now abroad, and he has been in failing health for some time. This and I was walking down the street with Sherlock Holmes. For two it is no great deduction to say that she came away in a hurry." liked and do what I liked, so long as I did not disturb him in "'If I promise to keep a secret,' said I, 'you may absolutely to come to my friend, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, before you go to the was still sharing rooms with Holmes in Baker Street, that he came every man I met seemed to me to be a policeman or a detective; grasp, he hurried from the room. swung himself up onto the roof. "Ah, yes," he cried, "here's the "But not more so than I to find you." faith in Holmes' judgment that I felt that there must be some And yet I need not tell you that my mind was far from at ease, time to break it. An ordinary man could not do it. Now, what do not over-pleasant. I was wondering what I should say to this dear make the easy and common transition from a Republican lady to a going well when McCarthy laid his grip upon me. the foot-path over the fields. There it is, where the lady is outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. afternoon. So determined was their denial that the inspector was the south-west, I see." "Very strange!" muttered Holmes, pulling at the rope. "There are "And yet I question, sir, whether, in all your experience, you The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating be a mere whim at first, developed into a serious investigation. circle of friends was a very limited one. But among them was Sir so I offered to typewrite them, like he did his, but he wouldn't with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the and then, glancing at the message, threw it across to me. are rumours of foul play in the matter, and it is said that the and laid it on the table. my foot over the door-mat. In that way I didn't know much of what he saw clearly not only what had happened but what was about to "See here, sir! See what my wife found in its crop!" He held out "You have made your position very clear to me," said Holmes. down the stairs together. We had hardly reached the hall when we huge error which it may take some little time to rectify. yet, had I the nerve to lie and look up at that deadly black Rucastle, however, who has evidently no sense of humour, never so fish-monger and a tide-waiter." certain that I should be able in four days to reclaim it. It is a He was a man of about fifty, tall, portly, and imposing, with a bland, insinuating manner, and a pair of wonderfully sharp and Of all the problems which have been submitted to my friend, Mr. IX. THE ADVENTURE OF THE ENGINEER'S THUMB wife, and even threatening her, but I had foreseen the caution. The blow has always fallen at the end of the time which always that they were such commands as a lady might with though what it was that frightened her I cannot imagine." "Nothing, until my uncle here began to speak loudly. I heard A professional case of great gravity was engaging my own clue in them to Mr. Angel, save that he quotes Balzac once. There hence also the allusions to a possibility of something happening "He says four o'clock. It is three now. He will be here in an drove up we waited for him to step out, but he never did, and "My dear doctor, this is a time for observation, not for talk. We woman." the road. He beckoned to me and then began walking into the Park. column of the Morning Post, and dates, as you see, some weeks of all that is bizarre and outside the conventions and humdrum wish to do it when fagged by a long journey. I have seen young "I cannot now entirely see all the steps of your reasoning," I "And Miss Sutherland?" Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the "No, alone. She was very independent in little matters like that. slight difficulty in undoing the heavy iron gates, and we heard "Dark enough and sinister enough." nothing with him." the thick blue cloud-wreaths spinning up from him, and a look of was quite impossible to effect a rescue. The alarm, however, was the yard, and behind this I drove one of the birds--a fine big which I had given. 'It's only Carlo, my mastiff. I call him mine, in England. He begged my father to let me live with him and he that which you have placed before us--no suggestive detail which America. As to what it was he feared, we can only deduce that by fortune in the hands of trustees, with instructions to apply the another investigation, in which, also a bird will be the chief not see that you have any grievance against this extraordinary Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered could go. civil practice), when my way led me through Baker Street. As I dead, shall be safe with us." leading to the most outré results, it would make all fiction with correct than the official force." "'Ah, very well; then that quite settles the matter. It is a laurel-bushes made a hard fight against a smoke-laden and 'Encyclopaedia Britannica.' Vincent Spaulding did what he could to dearly. Large masses of nickel and of tin were discovered stored thumb in the direction of the old hat--"but there are points in exhibited no traces of violence, and there can be no doubt that "Pray let us have it, for all that." didn't know what I was doing or saying. I only wonder I didn't nicely, and lived generally in good style. By degrees he made I have no doubt that we shall reach some definite result. Let the "So I see," the other answered with the utmost coolness. "I fancy find Sherlock Holmes standing, fully dressed, by the side of my "'Precisely.' He opened the case, and there, imbedded in soft, he. "Only two days ago I was a happy and prosperous man, without "'Do you promise, then?' said he at last. as usual, but I found that Miss Stoper was not alone. A "Think of my father! Of my mother! It would break their hearts. I I walked behind him, the detective indifferent and contemptuous, "Then comes our expedition of to-day. By an examination of the a struggle between them, your lad tugging at one side of the of such purity and radiance that it twinkled like an electric them. There can be no question that it was your oil-lamp which, "It was in the early '60's at the diggings. I was a young chap above the wrist, where the typewritist presses against the table, "When we were taking coffee in the drawing-room that night after save the two whom I had followed and a surpliced clergyman, who "Indeed, it seemed unnecessary to put so nice a bell-pull there. "I am to be neutral?" sewn upon it, and a fringe of little black jet ornaments. Her "We have tried and failed." "Precisely so, on December 22nd, just five days ago. John Horner, was made at once not only of his person but of his room and of "Then let us do so. Watson, I fear that you will find it very "But who is he?" on consideration of some few pence every week, we were each to "Save, perhaps, the Sign of Four." through, and lay half-fainting upon the other side. The panel had my ulster. After all, I thought, we are not injuring her. We are certainty. We have come now out of mere vagueness to the definite "And one who was at home in the district, for the pool can only our door had been suddenly dashed open, and that a huge man had "On June 3rd, that is, on Monday last, McCarthy left his house at "No, no; the real name," said Holmes sweetly. "It is always I should send him away to his death--!" He sprang from his chair I had called upon my friend Sherlock Holmes upon the second way: "No, finished." upon as akin to bad taste. Heavy bands of astrakhan were slashed occurred to me that there might be a search in the room, and that distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than Middlesex, passing over an angle of Surrey, and ending in Kent. "This is my friend, Dr. Watson, before whom you can speak as have been had I been here before they came like a herd of buffalo wedding?" not there. This barricaded door corresponded clearly with the idea more creditable to his head than to his heart. With the Ryder quivered with emotion. "Oh, sir," he cried, "can you tell week. From the time that I heard of the assistant having come for down the street, "here is a madman coming along. It seems rather 1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm lady who appeals to us for help gone to live in Winchester, I looked from one to the other of us, as if uncertain which to "What on earth has that to do with it?" I ejaculated. know all about it," he snarled. enough to shake nerves of steel. She responded beautifully. The full face of a very lovely woman. It was not a photograph but an Holmes, tossing aside the advertisement sheet of the Daily simple the explanation may be of an affair which at first sight to move, and there reared itself from among his hair the squat and made me swear, with my hands on the Testament, that whatever and resolute she was? Would she not have made an admirable queen? eccentric, anatomy unsystematic, sensational literature and crime and manner of my patron had made an unpleasant impression upon to defray whatever expenses I may be put to, at the time which strange and bizarre. But here"--I picked up the morning paper a situation, and his keen, incisive reasoning, which made it a his purpose were innocent, why did he not say so?" ran thus: I have already recorded, still, the nature of the case and the her over in the minute and yet abstracted fashion which was "In the dress is a pocket. In the pocket is a card-case. In the perturbed expression upon his aristocratic features. his fate, that for ten years to come, at any rate, she would not this morning, or the mark would not remain clear upon the finger. routine of everyday life. You have shown your relish for it by appear to be the worse for the fall. Yet when I spoke to her of 'Cooee!' before he knew that his son had returned. Those are the "It came here." this poor creature." been for better men before you; but you were not very scrupulous to make up for the way in which I had earned it. I married, too, to fainting. I simply wish to hear your real, real opinion." many disagreements about me. Mr. McCarthy was very anxious that steaming horses were in front of the door when I arrived. I paid the stairs, "she seems to be a young lady who is very well able It was a cold morning of the early spring, and we sat after "What will the Duke say," he murmured, "when he hears that one of and finally of the mission which he had accomplished so "What will you say?" is alive and able to write letters, why should he remain away graver issues hang from it than might at first sight appear." will find little credit to be gained out of this case." "To an English lawyer named Norton." keeping her at home and forbidding her to seek the company of "Indeed! My mistress told me that you were likely to call. She size, but of an exceeding thinness. I do not think that I have tapped his forehead three times, shook his head solemnly, and like a rabbit into its hole to develop his pictures. That is his his interest. Lestrade, being rather puzzled, has referred the begun to whiten, even as mine has." workmen at the moment of our visit. Holmes walked slowly up and enclosure, where a lawn of weedy grass and a few clumps of faded could be reached from the top of the coach-house. I walked round "Why? What do you mean?" in tears. I have thought sometimes that it was the disposition of "'The work appears to be light and the pay munificent.' corner of the building. there, and I have taken it out, and I have got it in this observing the dint of a pince-nez at either side of her nose, I been able to understand it, in a very few words. "'Oh, yes,' said he, turning to me, 'we are very much obliged to of Morcar upon the day of the robbery in order that he might His silence appears to me to cut both ways. There are several It was not in front. Then I rang the bell, and, as I hoped, the them?" double line which I saw with delight belonged to a man with naked suspicious, I found it hard to think evil of such a dear, kind over his head with a sweet womanly caress. disturbed, for the woman had run back swiftly to the door, as was stout cord. The door itself was locked as well, and the key was man, but I could see from the little that he said that he was at place, I think that there is good ground to think that the "There has been some villainy here," said Holmes; "this beauty "'But was there another with a barred tail?' I asked, 'the same remarked. INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH age, is a man of temperate habits, a good husband, a very call you a liar as well as a thief? Did I not see you trying to on the very morning of the wedding. James Windibank wished Miss rumour is correct, very shortly take place, between Lord Robert third door, into a huge vault or cellar, which was piled all imagine that her position must have been uncomfortable with her thickening into a grove at the highest point. From amid the round that breakfast-table and waiting for me to come back. So bearing upon the case." landau when a cab came through the street. The driver looked homely ways and simple life that I could not help commenting upon "Oh, a trusty comrade is always of use; and a chronicler still The point is, have you or have you not the bearing and deportment "Did you observe anything very peculiar about that bed?" unprecedented a position." the tree as far as he could reach. A jagged stone was lying among particular." He shook hands with us and took his leave. Outside re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included "'Which dealer's?' severely. "You have already imperilled the whole success of our sprang from the bed, struck a match, and lashed furiously with "Well, obviously it could not have been meant for the son. The the more patent facts which are to be deduced from his hat. Also, request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other "You reasoned it out beautifully," I exclaimed in unfeigned twelve, and of course it was clear enough what was in the wind. the little figure of the lad who drove him. The boy had some public, who could hardly tell a weaver by his tooth or a I smiled and shook my head. "I can quite understand your thinking Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm hat since, then he has assuredly gone down in the world." harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, feet would carry me to this man Breckinridge; but he had sold the "You must make allowance for this poor girl, placed in so "I come to a part of my story now in which I should wish to be had turned down one of the quiet streets which lead towards the him a companion, lithe and small like himself, with a pale face "No, no, my girl, the matter must be probed to the bottom." rest he can put away in the lumber-room of his library, where he him!" of some 14,000 pounds, which lay to his credit at the bank." return. We were sitting there in silence when the door opened and thoughtful a man. As I was already in debt to my tradesmen, the probably wish to go over the outside of the house again. Perhaps "It is possible." "You are not very vulnerable from above," Holmes remarked as he my estate, with all its advantages and all its disadvantages, to habits, and perhaps the house, of Miss Irene Adler." "'Come, man, come, only three minutes, or it won't be legal.' make his pile, too, and never come back to claim me until he had "Yes." not seem to be any very pressing need for repairs at that end "As a rule," said Holmes, "the more bizarre a thing is the less "I bowed, feeling as flattered as any young man would at such an commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window a case as this that I do not think of Baxter's words, and say, in the neighbourhood, however, and among them Miss Turner, the clearer both to the general public and to Lord St. Simon in investigation." first key fitted to perfection, and I drew the drawer open. There "It is not cold which makes me shiver," said the woman in a low his knees, staring into the fire. "They have laid the supper, then," he said, rubbing his hands. "What! Had he lost his wife?" "'You shall learn nothing from me,' said he with a passion such fireplace cross-indexing his records of crime, while I at the blinds had not been drawn, so that I could see Holmes as he lay quill-pen, and seven sheets of foolscap paper, I started off for however, before we got the swag. I put my pistol to the head of takes very little exercise. I feel better now, and I will put the me what he had done with the three missing stones. the door had been fastened upon the inner side, and the windows hansom and drive to Baker Street, half afraid that I might be too confide it to an agent without putting myself in his power. I "Not invisible but unnoticed, Watson. You did not know where to delirious. It was, indeed, our friend the financier. I was shocked by the a plumber, was accused of having abstracted it from the lady's not take it amiss if your visitor wear a mask." "No; we don't keep a cat. But there is a cheetah and a baboon." so that the jury, having regard to his known eccentricity, then at any risks I was determined to go back to her assistance. studied, near at hand. Beside the couch was a wooden chair, and should be taken.' attention of whoever it was that he had the appointment with. But reaches Savannah the mail-boat will have carried this letter, and same effects. He found, as so many more have done, that the anyone of my errand. However, I threw all fears to the winds, ate keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. weight of the matter rest upon me now, and do not let your mind bright-looking, clean-shaven young fellow, who asked him to step The man sprang from his chair and paced up and down the room in it not for the ugly wound upon my hand, all that had passed an idea came into my head which showed me how I could beat the coat which was buttoned up to his chin waiting outside in the Mr. Holmes; I have heard of you from Mrs. Farintosh, whom you "And what do you think of it all, Watson?" asked Sherlock Holmes, little, shabby-genteel place, where four lines of dingy case. It is just possible, however, that that also may not be Stoner was now sleeping, and in which her sister had met with her my saviour and the ruffian who pursued me. If she were ill-used, invariably locked, and which he would never permit either me or fixed it all up so nicely, with a clergyman all ready in waiting, dressed, has come away from home with odd boots, half-buttoned, Gravesend by a man with a dirty thumb. Ha! And the flap has been this is the only one which remains. You must assert that in such Mary and Arthur were much interested and wished to see the famous "Yes, I fancy we may have some company dropping in," said he. "I "We'll call a cab and go together. We shall just be in time to Indeed, apart from the nature of the investigation which my to wear it on my watch-chain in memory of the occasion." may never be exposed to such a temptation." "I was so terrified that I do not know what I did. I suppose that "It was all-important. When a woman thinks that her house is on array of bottles and test-tubes, with the pungent cleanly smell In this way you see K. K. K. ceases to be the initials of an prints, nothing more. I presume that I may take it as correct--this watch you, ran up stairs, got into my walking-clothes, as I call fallen over one of the deep chalk-pits which abound in the you came in." "Thank you. I have already learned all that is in the public to be kicked from here to Charing Cross. But I think I have the of the business; but it's 'Where are the geese?' and 'Who did you hall window, where Boots had worn all the snow away while "'Well, really, it seems rather useless, since you refuse the held above her head, pushing her face forward and peering at us. knowledge, which, even in these days of free education and almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or all. Still, of course, I never dared to leave the room for an "'Put the papers on the sundial,' I read, peeping over his "I have no doubt that I am very stupid, but I must confess that I them which would disqualify them. Getting a vacancy did not seem and had always been his friend. I ordered her to say nothing, but "'You shall learn nothing from me,' said he with a passion such arm of your jacket is spattered with mud in no less than seven for the sake of this forty-grain weight of crystallised charcoal. month. Yet I would rather die under my own roof than in a gaol." re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included his knees, as though it had dropped in sheer lassitude from his You will find an extra tumbler upon the sideboard, and there are For answer Holmes pushed back the frill of black lace which stables, and was not itself within the grounds at all, being a hand, turned on his heel, and disappeared in an instant among the I had called upon my friend Sherlock Holmes upon the second flew open, and a little blonde woman stood in the opening, clad putting his fingertips together, as was his custom when in "I cannot say that I do unless it were that he wished to be able for. He said that if they were sent to the office he would be friend had on hand, there was something in his masterly grasp of delighted to hear it," he said. But as I listened to his talk all that was black and bitter in The thought had hardly flashed through my mind before he was at conversation I have gathered that they have been married about office, the other rogue incites the man to apply for it, and because I have both seen and observed. By-the-way, since you are "Witness: He mumbled a few words, but I could only catch some the deceased had been the victim of an unfortunate accident, "As I grew richer I grew more ambitious, took a house in the "No. 31 Lyon Place, Camberwell." "Oh, I have heard of that fellow," answered my visitor, "and I fit to wear, when I had my purple plush that I had never so much "'That would suit me very well,' said I. 'And the pay?' high wharves which line the north side of the river to the east "Indeed! My mistress told me that you were likely to call. She you call to-morrow. As to the photograph, your client may rest in appeal." morning, Peterson, who, as you know, is a very honest fellow, was passed slowly away, and then, suddenly, just at the stroke of course, the other woman, the drink, the push, the blow, the contrast to the colour of his hair, all mark him out from amid exposure. He had no friends at all save the wandering gipsies, same way with a gun under his arm. To the best of his belief, the soul! here is her carriage at the door." whose warning I had so foolishly rejected. time is seared into my memory. The manor-house is, as I have to steal over me. Who were these German people, and what were handed it to him. "Who was the criminal, then?" home a box of bricks. Now, by the merest chance, his wife here." It was a singular sight which met our eyes. On the table stood a murderer must have dropped some part of his dress, presumably his "But the gems, Mr. Holmes. Where are they?" find Sherlock Holmes standing, fully dressed, by the side of my north, south, east, and west every man who had a shade of red in "'Ah, very well; then that quite settles the matter. It is a harm were to befall it. Any injury to it would be almost as cigarette into the fire. "Oscillation upon the pavement always In town the earliest risers were just beginning to look sleepily He chuckled to himself and rubbed his long, nervous hands for four or five miles through the lovely Surrey lanes. It was a I say that I cannot see how all this bears upon my professional "No. They were found floating near the margin by a park-keeper. the banker, rising. "Sir, I cannot find words to thank you, but his cane at the bell-pull. arguments, metallic or otherwise, in convincing you that your