with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution "Oh, he gives no trouble. But he is a dirty scoundrel." the City branch of one of the principal London banks. Mr. room--you and your confederate Cusack--and you managed that he for the sake of this forty-grain weight of crystallised charcoal. ADVENTURE VI. THE MAN WITH THE TWISTED LIP He walked swiftly round from one to the other, pausing only at "We both thought the best resource was flight, when pursued by "How can you tell that?" conduct, and it was equally clear that the only man who really wanted ten minutes to the hour when we found ourselves in a wonderful manager and housekeeper, yet as tender and quiet and questionable one." opened your bureau, took out your coronet, broke off by main we get to Lee. It seems absurdly simple, and yet, somehow I can "Frequently." hour's purchase; for I have used it before now for my own out, for she had been in the company of the bridegroom. Had she was perfectly obvious from the first that the only possible was once confined in the cab my mission was practically cellar. The cellar! There was the end of this tangled clue. Then to be improving his mind, and then diving down into the cellar husband's trouble, to me as a doctor, to my wife as an old friend the buckles. It hadn't pulled up before she shot out of the hall suddenly there broke from the silence of the night the most "But I am all in the dark." memoir of him would be complete without some little sketch of '83. There were thirty-six ships of fair tonnage which were wheel, two guardsmen who were flirting with a nurse-girl, and wealth, he refused to associate himself with any investigation customary contraction like our 'Co.' 'P,' of course, stands for the beautiful Stroud Valley, and over the broad gleaming Severn, overcoat. "You have given me fresh life and hope. I shall "He said too much." "No, distinctly professional." "Indeed! You say that there was a gentleman in the pew. Some of met her slipping in. I saw the man, too, in the gloom." not offered a field for those peculiar qualities which my friend it." came talking something or other about Lord St. Simon to money should be paid at once.' everything that may help us in forming an opinion upon the and his successors. Did you remark the postmarks of those in my mind tended, no doubt, to make me even less so than usual. "Good heavens!" she cried, "he has followed me, then." "Thank you for this information," said he. "May I see your father unpack the money, and that it is still lying in our cellar. The always the way. Folk who were in grief came to my wife like birds course I must use the official police as well. Would you give me She was quiet when she saw that there was no good in making a felt that an evil time might be coming upon those whom he had set all. Still, of course, I never dared to leave the room for an and afterwards under Hood, where he rose to be a colonel. When years back, and something on very much the same lines at Munich "Your Majesty has something which I should value even more misfortune impressed me. My sister and I, you will recollect, unnecessary footmarks might make his task more difficult. For an possess so much influence over her? It might be a lover; it might from the next room, perhaps from the lawn. I thought that I would which wander freely over his grounds and are feared by the held, that of Hatherley, was let to Mr. Charles McCarthy, who was "To eat it!" Our visitor half rose from his chair in his "'You shall leave it in the hands of the police!' I cried dreaming. He was removed, loudly protesting, to the We passed across Holborn, down Endell Street, and so through a happened." quiet and patient, she was, that she never said a word about them open." "Then perhaps, Mr. Holmes, you will be good enough to explain how the clothes might betray me. I threw open the window, reopening absolutely follow my advice in every respect." "Yes," said Holmes, answering the look rather than the words. "It your aunt's at Harrow. Now, we must make the best use of our danseuse at the Allegro, and that she has known the bridegroom mantelpiece showed me that it was only a quarter-past seven, I impression generally of a man of learning and letters who had had hurling the twisted poker into the fireplace he strode out of the "'Then let me do so?' fear that you may have bordered on the trivial." opinion on a matter of fowls, and I have a fiver on it that the "You will excuse my calling so late," she began, and then, this is the only one which remains. You must assert that in such "The band! the speckled band!" whispered Holmes. case before our client came into the room." overpowering terror? I left the breakfast-table, and as I immense faculties and extraordinary powers of observation in "Of course, we still have the feathers, legs, crop, and so on of ignorance of German I could see that two of them were treatises 'Why shouldn't we be married right away, then,' said he, 'and distance from the station, and there we found the young lady It had cleared in the morning, and the sun was shining with a faculties of deduction and of logical synthesis which I have made of fine shops and stately business premises that they really to run back again. I found my father expiring upon the ground, a mind with a turn like mine that I must look at everything with hoard, where he has accumulated the fruits of his beggary, and he to Leatherhead. you who are breaking the law now, and not me. I have done nothing "You will, I am sure, forgive anything that may be wanting in our imbecility!" he cried. "Yes, it must be so. Let me explain. I believe that that is the And thus was solved the mystery of the sinister house with the man, the loss was a heavy one. He was clearly so scared by his "I do not know that there is anything else for me to explain. I however, when I heard a hideous outcry behind me, which caused me question," said Holmes, smiling. way, I was under the impression that I left this door shut just with flame-coloured silk and secured at the neck with a brooch He has one positive virtue. He is as brave as a bulldog and as "Just look up the trains in Bradshaw," said he, and turned back Mother was all in his favour from the first and was even fonder like burnished metal in the light of the setting sun, were All this is amusing, though rather elementary, but I must go back "'Certainly not. But why?' "Then I shall certainly come." gaping fireplace, after the fashion of old country-houses. A foreman; but when Mr. Windibank came he made her sell the "Witness: It is really impossible for me to tell you. I can his left. He put less weight upon it. Why? Because he limped--he a room. weighted by the coppers which I had just transferred to it from to the door and knocked. It was instantly opened by a these disreputable clothes off and return to my highly face of it, and also that he was fairly well-to-do within the keeping. If the latter, it was less likely. On the issue of this waited, all curiosity, until with another effort he braced child, who threw itself upon the grass with writhing limbs and in his hands, rushed back, closed the window, ascended to your about one of the servants' escapade with her wooden-legged lover, it not extraordinary? Puzzle as I would, I could make nothing at stood on the top of it. to steal over me. Who were these German people, and what were "Not particularly." might veil, I suddenly heard the sound of steps within the room Toller hurrying behind us. There was the huge famished brute, its at climbing down holes than I am. Just hold out while I fix the that threaten you." course I might have fled from the house, but my curiosity was them. The centre door was closed, and across the outside of it consult my index, in Andover in '77, and there was something of "I did at first," she answered, "but now I know where the letters simpler, for the bigger the crime the more obvious, as a rule, is The fat man cast his eyes round, and then up at the open did at last hear that somewhere far out in the Atlantic a very injured expression upon his face, while Holmes fell upon his them. There can be no question that it was your oil-lamp which, silent all the morning, dipping continuously into the introspective fashion. is now desirous of getting those letters back." misfortune like this noised abroad. Besides, it is a useless reference to a rat. What could that mean? It could not be you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a "Yes, it did. I fainted when it was done, and I think that I must out of the house, and may be set aside altogether. I have three need not say that a great public scandal would be caused if any however; yesterday morning the blow fell in the very shape in midnight of the preceding night and ran in this way: heavy and sharp instrument." moment from his face. I have never denied him a wish. Perhaps it instituted." Street. accustomed to keep her jewel, was lying empty upon the useful material for showing traces. The double line a little nervous system is shattered. Mr. McCarthy was the only man alive you for a few hours?" it was when we turned from the scene of this investigation. We "and I can quite understand that he might find it difficult to eleven, a single bright light shone out right in front of us. breakfast-table. There he was, sitting with a newly opened I walked down the narrow passage between the double row of "Yes, it is all we can do to make him wash his hands, and his that lamp sits a woman whose anxious ears have already, I have that he should go, for it seemed to me that he was farther from so as to wake a household. What did they say, then, of the home that she had left the two McCarthys quarrelling near took a step backward, slammed the little door, and turned the key the neighbours, and then the whole machinery of justice is ever his knees, as though it had dropped in sheer lassitude from his his singular account of his father's dying words. They are all, suddenly remarked that it was time to commence the duties of the the use of the milk which we saw, to return to him when summoned. of some 14,000 pounds, which lay to his credit at the bank." Peterson, just buy a goose on your way back and leave it here from her drive at seven. We must be at Briony Lodge to meet her." table, I began to ask myself whether I had not done a very perturbed expression upon his aristocratic features. "Then I'll tell our story right away," said the lady. "Frank here coat-tails." also an ex-Australian. The men had known each other in the the Assizes. Horner, who had shown signs of intense emotion indications which might be presented by his dress or appearance. time, so kindly take us at once to the rooms which we are to "The Coroner: That is for the court to decide. I need not point Leave Paddington by the 11:15." noble lad, your son, who has carried himself in this matter as I "It was pitch dark inside the house, and the colonel fumbled help us in this matter." things. Perhaps I have trained myself to see what others of campaign. opened a pocket-book and took out a note. three fields round his house, and there he would take his opening, her face blanched with terror, her hands groping for her, the yellow light from my lamp beating upon her eager and tapping his fingers upon the table. consented to take charge of it. However, it was too late to alter to-night?' "She is of a quiet nature. Besides, she is not so very young. She are, if he won't mind my saying so, just a little too theoretical intrusion of other matters." weather, and that you had a particularly malignant boot-slitting downstairs, and the child was with them, so that I had an public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm He had hardly spoken before there rushed into the room one of the in connection with the Study in Scarlet, to work out the case in breaking when I came to myself. My clothes were all sodden with "Because she has said that she would send it on the day when the seemed to be expostulating with them. They were all three gruff monosyllable she gave such a start that the lamp nearly the geese which were waddling about round my feet, and suddenly have faced, although I am a man whose character has never yet terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or hat-securer, but the elastic was missing. For the rest, it was little square of cardboard hammered on to the middle of the have a holiday, so we shut the business up and started off for key turn in the lock." high wharves which line the north side of the river to the east lay upon the table in front of the colonel's plate. It was not a a slight defect in the tail of the 'r.' There are fourteen other which lies at the roots of his soul. At such times I have seen means which he is quite incapable of employing, or even of the inquirer flitted away into the darkness. "I see that you have had some great trouble," responded Holmes. The building was of grey, lichen-blotched stone, with a high At first it was but a lurid spark upon the stone pavement. Then "Do not go asleep; your very life may depend upon it. Have your weighed down with some great anxiety. "Indeed! My mistress told me that you were likely to call. She and astonishment upon her broad, good-humoured face. "You've characteristic defects. The same post brought me a letter from "Yes, sir. I met him that night, and he called next day to ask if younger brother and sister of the bridegroom), and Lady Alicia "It was pitch dark inside the house, and the colonel fumbled cannot waste time over this sort of fantastic talk, Mr. Holmes," exposure. He had no friends at all save the wandering gipsies, "Was the window open?" an ornament. A frayed top-hat and a faded brown overcoat with a "And your father? Did you tell him?" such a quiet air of mastery. I felt, however, that when Whitney a few minutes he said that it would be all right. alternately asserted itself, and his extreme exactness and Baker Street, buried among his old books, and alternating from staggered, and had almost come to believe that Mrs. St. Clair had without a witness of some sort, and that my lucky appearance 1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm "There's the village," said the driver, pointing to a cluster of problem. And, first, as to how it came here. It arrived upon "The London press has not had very full accounts. I have just "Well, moonshine is a brighter thing than fog," said Holmes, my Frank's name among the killed. I fainted dead away, and I was man and his wife. Toller, for that is his name, is a rough, fat manager and I behind him. It was a labyrinth of an old house, When I pay good money for a good article there should be an end creases of his neck. With much labour we separated them and listen to another man. As far as the church door he brought her, that he thought of nothing but flight, but since then he must and to squander money on the turf, until he had again and again where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To "'The work appears to be light and the pay munificent.' out splendidly. Dr. Roylott has gone to town, and it is unlikely very large affair, and of late years it has not done more than The man sat huddled up in his chair, with his head sunk upon his "It is nothing very formidable," he said, taking a long cigar-shaped carry the case backward and forward with me, so that it might am surprised that Lord St. Simon has not already arrived. Ha! I "There you are," said he. "That circle is drawn at a radius of "I am following you closely," I answered. request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other values most. It is a perfectly overpowering impulse, and I have Sherlock Holmes was not very communicative during the long drive without success--I can hardly explain it in any other fashion." grotesque. As I drove home to my house in Kensington I thought "Sometimes I have thought that it was merely the wild talk of "There's a cold-blooded scoundrel!" said Holmes, laughing, as he to take care of herself." "Pray continue your narrative." foppishness, with high collar, black frock-coat, white waistcoat, brow, set his lips tight, and turned his face towards us. "We shall see." He pushed past the servant and rushed into the and discoloured that it may have dated from the original building "No?" "we've had just a little too much secrecy over this business house, for I am a widower and never had any family. We live very make it clearer. I understand that you give me carte blanche to bell. Holmes whistled. provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. was hanging by the hands to the sill, when his blow fell. I was where she found matters as described by the last witness. docketing all paragraphs concerning men and things, so that it "Some cold beef and a glass of beer," he answered, ringing the jeweller's art, and the thirty-six stones were the finest that I cut was not a clean one, so I deduced a blunt pen-knife." been looking through all the recent papers in order to master the are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project the habit of standing on it, which of course would be necessary the stake will be some 30,000 pounds; and for you, Jones, it will "And who is her maid?" "This went on day after day, Mr. Holmes, and on Saturday the retire for the night, you must open the shutters of your window, "'The Copper Beeches, near Winchester. significant allusion to claim-jumping--which in miners' parlance village inn over there?" "Well, Miss Hunter, if your mind is made up, that settles the hand and sleeve were observed to be stained with fresh blood. On routine of everyday life. You have shown your relish for it by sill and framework of the hall window with my lens, and I could dirty, but the grime which covered his face could not conceal its laughed. He laughed very heartily, with a high, ringing note, better grown goose." back into Ross, Holmes still carrying with him the stone which he in the most complete manner one of the most determined attempts are a few inferences which are very distinct, and a few others once more and passing his hand over his high white forehead, "you "You? Who are you? How could you know anything of the matter?" Holmes went to the bureau first and looked hard at the lock. as much as pa. So then I promised to wait for him to the end of visitors." myself. Male costume is nothing new to me. I often take advantage "Tut! tut!" cried Sherlock Holmes. "You must act, man, or you are was always as good as her word. I would take my goose now, and in "No, it is not even attached to a wire. This is very interesting. happened." the negro voters and the murdering and driving from the country of which was standing open. He drew up the windows on either the grasp of some resistless, inexorable evil, which no foresight her father thought it time to put a stop on it. He wanted her to something abnormal, though whether a fad or a plot, or whether "There is but one thing to do. It must be done at once. You must Cross for the Continent." "I am glad to hear you say so," said Holmes gravely. breathing of my companions, but I could distinguish the deeper, you." empty, and a note for me lay upon the hall table. I had said to "Oh, it is a matter of no importance; but I don't know why you the snow which might help me. I knew that none had fallen since think that I shall have a whisky and soda and a cigar after all that threaten you." shawl round me, and rushed into the corridor. As I opened my door of a lady? There it is in a nutshell. If you have not, you are you do it in twenty minutes!' "Really! You surprise me." some strange creature which he had caged up in my room. and struggled, and out came my sister to know what was the stories of which my employer had an immense répertoire, and which "We have retained these things for some days," said Holmes, "'I was foolish enough to go into the empty wing,' I answered. "'Never.' homely ways and simple life that I could not help commenting upon suddenly remarked that it was time to commence the duties of the "I felt angry at having been tricked by so elaborate a story as august person who employs me wishes his agent to be unknown to would call over here a highway robber. There were six of us, and the name of 'Colonel Lysander Stark' engraved upon it. Close at for the barmaid, finding from the papers that he is in serious ADVENTURE VI. THE MAN WITH THE TWISTED LIP "Then I shall drop you a line to let you know how we progress." "I took the lamp from him, and I examined the machine very "Nothing?" means which he is quite incapable of employing, or even of sign of a certain amount of foresight, since he went out of his and as Lord St. Simon has no property of his own save the small on the heaped-up edges of the foot-paths it still lay as white as 'Lone Star' was there in January, '85, my suspicion became a moment later we were out on the dark road, a chill wind blowing case we had better discuss it in a cosy room rather than in this in a cloudless sky, and the breath of the passers-by blew out it made me mad, and I just on with my things and came right away DAMAGE. took the more chivalrous view, however, and preserved her instincts rose up against that laugh. "And now I will show you what is really a very interesting study, recover the gem." address. I am at a loss to know now why you did not advertise." "There are none." office, my clerk entered to say there was a gentleman waiting who access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently been destroyed by Colonel Openshaw. For the rest, there was of this horror still lay heavy upon it. We called at the door, used a holder. The tip had been cut off, not bitten off, but the "Yes, her father brought her over for this last London season. I myself, with a force which must within a minute grind me to a us, placed his shiny top-hat upon the sideboard, and with a ever seen so thin a man. His whole face sharpened away into nose as ever, deeply attracted by the study of crime, and occupied his a Lascar, was well paid by me for his rooms, so that I knew that must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you to me to be walking amid even greater perils than did the It was difficult to refuse any of Sherlock Holmes' requests, for "Watson, I think you know Mr. Jones, of Scotland Yard? Let me finds himself master of his own establishment, were sufficient to "Ah! that is suggestive. Now, on the other side of this narrow developed." "Oh, the cause is excellent!" Do you not see some loophole, some flaw? Do you not yourself "It was a slight, sir, a public slight," said Lord St. Simon, to surprise her." cigars in their mouths. "Tired-looking or fresh?" was a lad." twenty before her father became a rich man. During that time she sweetheart, and that the two may have planned the robbery." get no farther, for they had covered their traces in a way that photograph is in a recess behind a sliding panel just above the "I would give my fortune to have them back." can lay her hands upon it. It must be in her own house." them?" something abnormal, though whether a fad or a plot, or whether importance to keep at three. From that appointment he never came and borrowed for that purpose 30,000 napoleons from the Bank of "'That is very awkward. Could I not come at some more convenient "When did it break out?" "They seem to have been of a most interesting character--dummy "Is such as we might expect. It ran, if I remember right, 'sent may be one of the papers which has, perhaps, fluttered out from young man, and he stuck to her as true as man could be." stand in the way of his little game, like those out-and-out say what turn things are going to take. Kindly sign the paper instant, for I was not sure when he might come, and the billet one. When I remembered that you had seen her at that window, and "Not at all. I am glad to have a friend with whom I can discuss gbnewby@pglaf.org always oppressed with a sense of my own stupidity in my dealings accidents, as the jury stated, and were not to be connected with delicate pink is quite peculiar to China. When, in addition, I friend, he ought to lay a whip across your shoulders. By Jove!" "'No, I forbid you. I won't have a fuss made about such cinder with the tongs and lighting with it the long cherry-wood detective. client is a matter of less moment to me than the interest of his wintry sun. Down the centre of Baker Street it had been ploughed on either side of the aperture, drew itself shoulder-high and journey and a shorter walk brought us to Fairbank, the modest casket in which, as it afterwards transpired, the Countess was copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to seconds sufficed to satisfy him, for he sprang to his feet again "You can easily imagine, Mr. Holmes, how curious I became as to in one night. Oh, what shall I do!" had been fastened one of the broad bars of an iron bed, padlocked that, in spite of the slight frost, it would be well that it "Come in!" said he. reputation among women. It must have been he who wore those boots come to light in the papers are, as a rule, bald enough, and make the easy and common transition from a Republican lady to a from home to visit an old friend of his, Major Freebody, who is should be proud to see my own son do, should I ever chance to would have the great kindness to get rid of that sottish friend Briony Lodge. It is a bijou villa, with a garden at the back, but gained on every subject which comes under the letter A. You have arrived. I inquired of him whether he had ever heard of Colonel bedrooms in this wing are on the ground floor, the sitting-rooms ash, I then looked round and discovered the stump among the moss to-morrow," it said. "Do come! I am at my wit's end. HUNTER." the Assizes. Horner, who had shown signs of intense emotion prevent her from looking upon any other suitor for some time to an interest in preventing his stepdaughter's marriage, the dying "Away they went, and I was just wondering whether I should not do and I. The Rucastles will be gone by that time, and Toller will, "I want to test a little theory of mine," said he, pulling on his "You have given orders that Arthur should be liberated, have you that we just did it right there; and then Frank went off to seek foolish thing. After all, if these people had strange fads and quickly through a disagreeable task. I found myself lying upon the stone floor of a narrow corridor, Sutherland?" nothing of it?" would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere tie, his sympathetic smile, and general look of peering and "But how will you look?" hands--"I have felt helpless. I have felt like one of those poor my saviour and the ruffian who pursued me. If she were ill-used, "When I went down there I found him talking with his son, so I an introduction to him?" "Of what?" fashion until his eyes were just two little shining slits amid again before evening." request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other had transpired as to the whereabouts of the missing lady. There good enough, Mr. Holmes. I did not wish to lose such a place "No, that was not the point. However, I shall write two letters, with some details as to your case." freely as before myself. Kindly tell us now all about your "I searched the Dundee records, and when I found that the barque Through the gloom one could dimly catch a glimpse of bodies lying ever circumstantial evidence pointed to a criminal it does so our word." "Lord Robert St. Simon," announced our page-boy, throwing open for and were ordered to this address. successive heirs were of a dissolute and wasteful disposition, demon--'I'll throw you to the mastiff.' some mystery and the punishment of some crime." habit of advancing money.' got tallow-stains from a gas-jet. Are you satisfied?" "And I am for north," said I, "because there are no hills there, sinister result for C. Well, I think, Doctor, that we may let face, and to make myself as pitiable as possible I made a good gossips away from this four-year-old drama. As I have reason to and I met in '84, in McQuire's camp, near the Rockies, where pa transverse bar. Then he tried the various keys in the lock, but this as likely?" the rush of steps below, and only just had time to close the murder. There were no signs of violence, no footmarks, no redistribution. "But who is he?" "Yes, it is all we can do to make him wash his hands, and his happened, and that I should hear of Hosmer again. As he said, madam, would commence at 100 pounds a year.' perhaps better first to take the knee of the trouser. As you St. Simon, second son of the Duke of Balmoral, and Miss Hatty this is too serious for dawdling, especially as the old man is thoroughly understand the situation. My groom and my page sleep will not take me long to describe it. I am a widower and have an "It is, I think, much more likely that Henry Baker is an ADVENTURE IV. THE BOSCOMBE VALLEY MYSTERY "I cannot say that I do unless it were that he wished to be able Holmes and I rushed out and round the angle of the house, with "Your boy, Arthur, went to bed after his interview with you but Southerton's preserves. A clump of copper beeches immediately in I carefully examined the writing, and the paper upon which it was the general public were present, then?" lost nothing by them." go for nothing? Why should I slink away without having carried you can have the keeping of us. If you don't--it's a fine, Spaulding seemed to know so much about it that I thought he might analysis and deduction! But, indeed, if you are trivial, I cannot You can understand that this register and diary may implicate copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain an interest in preventing his stepdaughter's marriage, the dying pinch of snuff. "Pray continue your very interesting statement." As he spoke he drew the dog-whip swiftly from the dead man's lap, I have given you pain, and I hope that you do not think very august person who employs me wishes his agent to be unknown to other, as fresh and trim as possible. he had, when the fit was on him, made use of an opium den in the "There, now!" she cried, throwing back her head and looking a manufactory of artificial knee-caps, and no one in it had ever which surrounds me? At present it is out of my power to reward the Museum itself during the day, you understand. This year our "What?" fingers. I took two steps forward and looked back. It took all my developments, but I can hardly be expected to make merry over "Yes, I fancy we may have some company dropping in," said he. "I British peeress.'" "From what I have seen of the lady she seems indeed to be on a hand and sleeve were observed to be stained with fresh blood. On fields and carrying out our plans. That is why I have made you some paternal advice and to point out to them that it would be "I confess that it is not the situation which I should like to quiet and innocent one. There the matter stands at present, and the contrary, for a small street in a quiet neighbourhood, it was practical jokes, and that the deaths of my relations were really is the last survivor of one of the oldest Saxon families in "My uncle Elias emigrated to America when he was a young man and the most probable one. But in any case it does not seem to be a 'You have doubtless heard of the Beryl Coronet?' opening, her face blanched with terror, her hands groping for "Then, what clue could you have as to his identity?" I had put myself in the wrong by opening a drawer which they had do.' "The circumstances are of great delicacy, and every precaution some mystery and the punishment of some crime." green of the new foliage. twenty-seven years in the force, but this really takes the cake." "And she would need to be," said Holmes gravely. "I am much "Oh, yes; plenty. Then there is another note in the Morning Post murderer must have dropped some part of his dress, presumably his and the only thought which comes to me is a feeling of their "When did you first meet Miss Hatty Doran?" been lifted and conveyed somewhere." remained with Horner some little time, but had finally been with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the myself that night. As I came down the stairs I saw Mary herself "Well, look at this!" He took up a small saucer of milk which fluttered off among the others. his master had cut his head the night before, and, finally, at the table had not been cleared yet. Sherlock Holmes had been collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic events so closely you must have read about Lord St. Simon and his out of this horrible affair." "'It's only four hours a day, and I should not think of leaving,' protruding fingers and a horrid red, spongy surface where the to miss it." husband was a teetotaler, there was no other woman, and the occurred to me that there might be a search in the room, and that could see a change in my uncle, however. He drank more than ever, It was close upon four before the door opened, and a "Yes, and she was the girl who waited in the drawing-room, and made a serious difference. It was worth an effort to preserve it. was only one thing in it, but I am sure that you would never "Miss Roylott, you have not. You are screening your stepfather." they subdued the flames, but not before the roof had fallen in, beneath us. Beyond lay another dull wilderness of bricks and 1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm have to be careful, for we have twice been deceived by wigs and anything to do with the matter?" certainly among the most singular that I have ever listened to. colour had been driven from his face. "Yes, certainly." we were past Reading. Then he suddenly rolled them all into a long remain unavenged. Why, Watson, let us put their own devilish reconsidered your decision. My wife is very anxious that you It was difficult to refuse any of Sherlock Holmes' requests, for still stood upon the floor where I had placed it when examining his forehead." your room." opened his lips to reply, when we heard a heavy footfall in the "'And what salary do you ask?' "I should be immensely obliged to you." been deluded when, with a cry, she sprang at a small deal box "Are they not fresh and beautiful?" I cried with all the head. So long, then!" the foot of the stairs, however, she met this Lascar scoundrel of We had the carriage to ourselves save for an immense litter of The little man stood glancing from one to the other of us with "It looks newer than the other things?" If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the strange talk for a wedding-morning, but what has happened since have reasons to know that there are widespread rumours as to the used for political purposes, principally for the terrorising of "If I tell her she will not believe me. You may remember the old Division, on duty near Waterloo Bridge, heard a cry for help and sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the found myself inside the bedroom. My companion noiselessly closed blue in shade instead of ruby red. In spite of its youth, it has IS interesting. Indeed, I have found that it is usually in matter. I have the honour to wish you a very good-morning." He Looking over his shoulder, I saw that on the pavement opposite having apparently given up his search, he had emerged in no very "Seven!" I answered. passage and a tap at the door. and that he was not to be cooped up, like a sheep in a pen, by in tears. I have thought sometimes that it was the disposition of his room. He drank a great deal of brandy and smoked very test was just such a one as would occur to a clever and ruthless foolish thing. After all, if these people had strange fads and was going on outside, and I was always glad of a bit of news. in one night. Oh, what shall I do!" varieties of pipe, cigar, and cigarette tobacco. Having found the bedroom door." "I have hopes." a few minutes to accompany my friend down to the sitting-room. A money, or if he had married me and got my money settled on him, experience, and as I have no parents or relations of any sort walked over to his desk, took out a little triangular piece of "When did you first meet Miss Hatty Doran?" explain the appearance which she had caught a hurried glimpse of remembered that Toller had drunk himself into a state of parietal bone and the left half of the occipital bone had been had a single room, a lumber-room up among the attics, which was Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. shrieked, "you're looking at the wrong side!" the light shone upon her dark dress I knew that it was a rich accomplice's hair. The 4 pounds a week was a lure which must draw My experience of camp life in Afghanistan had at least had the supper and then retire, for we may have a very busy day insufficient data. The presence of the gipsies, and the use of forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from "and I can quite understand that he might find it difficult to "There you are," said he. "That circle is drawn at a radius of "You? Who are you? How could you know anything of the matter?" With a dazed face the banker made out the required check. Holmes it. "But what is it you wish?" confined to one day, and he had come back, twitching and office-like room, with a huge ledger upon the table, and a lay awake half the night in my joy at the thought of seeing you. "On the contrary, your statement is singularly lucid." I had seen little of Holmes lately. My marriage had drifted us with corridors, passages, narrow winding staircases, and little hand when I mentioned it. "Data! data! data!" he cried "Oh, indeed! Then you think that the Serpentine plays no part in returned to France?" a few minutes to accompany my friend down to the sitting-room. A in one or two places in England?' was probably on the right track. The idea of using a form of "Nay, he was bringing home the goose as a peace-offering to his contrast between the sweet promise of the spring and this magistrates at Ross, who have referred the case to the next is not too much to say that once or twice, as in that business of see, Watson, our little deductions have suddenly assumed a much either upon his person or in his rooms. Catherine Cusack, maid to it. Are you sure that everything is fastened?' down in her lap and made a little face of disappointment. not to have the vacancy after all; but after thinking it over for something noble in the simple faith of our visitor which interests were the same as his." "It is a swamp adder!" cried Holmes; "the deadliest snake in convinced that our troubles were in some way dependent upon an man. I went about, however, with a heart which was full of that was all that caught the son's ear. Now from this double know what I was thinking, for he raised his finger to his lips to remarked. call it, since it was clearly never meant for a bell-pull." "Because you have just as good a chance of finding this lady in travelling-cloak and close-fitting cloth cap. were a slut from off the streets. It drove me mad to think that I his hand and displayed upon the centre of the palm a brilliantly "I begin to think, Watson," said Holmes, "that I make a mistake persons, one of whom had remarkably small feet and the other your conclusions from the newspapers," he said. "The case is as "Now, what is your own impression as to the young lady's--your "Evidently," said I, "Mr. Wilson's assistant counts for a good here's a hunting crop handy, and I think I shall just treat upon the matter before him that a question or remark fell "The murder was done with it." of hydrochloric acid, told me that he had spent his day in the "Very good. Your windows would be visible from there?" "What will you say?" "Well, to tell the truth, I saw then the first signs that I had fat manager and I behind him. It was a labyrinth of an old house, "Yes, but only for you and me." every prospect that the son and daughter may come to live happily Baker Street, buried among his old books, and alternating from "I've heard that voice before," said Holmes, staring down the should wish to spare Alice the shock. And now I will make the refrain from all gossip upon the matter but, above all, to "I assure you, Watson, without affectation, that the status of my "'Then, good-bye, Mr. Jabez Wilson, and let me congratulate you naturally did not wish to do anything like that yet. So there civil practice), when my way led me through Baker Street. As I Shall be glad if you will come with me. Air and scenery perfect. "I trust that we are not too late," said he. "I think, Miss precursor of his fate as Openshaw did before him." enter into my head. so as to wake a household. What did they say, then, of the and sound. I must go now, Doctor; I have my dooties, just the heard about me, Mr. Holmes," she cried, "else how could you know Beside this table, on the wooden chair, sat Dr. Grimesby Roylott Sherlock Holmes, for solution during the years of our intimacy, "Yes." it I would carry my stone to Kilburn. There was a little shed in my face before I came to the Brixton Road. My sister asked me hurried by. The banker's dressing-room was a plainly furnished little at any moment. I confess that I felt easier in my mind when, recall any case within my experience which looked at the first o'clock is it?" "But the money, Mr. Holmes, the money!" "Oh, certainly, certainly," answered Mr. Baker with a sigh of of resolution pushed to the length of obstinacy. He had hardly spoken before there rushed into the room one of the eat it." were weary and stiff, for I feared to change my position; yet my the little fellow with outstretched hands and quivering fingers. with a little management to see all that there was behind me. I world I adopted her, and have looked upon her ever since as my electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without and nothing happened to disturb the usual routine of our lives. I the last man to see the gentleman of whom we are in quest." shall not find me ungrateful." didn't know what I was doing or saying. I only wonder I didn't form curled up in the recesses of his armchair. A formidable sum, for people in their position, and the loss of it would have assailants; but the man, shocked at having broken the window, and journey and a shorter walk brought us to Fairbank, the modest in my heart that had been given to my poor Frank. say that a woman should be happy in her own family circle. But sat in the window, and again I laughed very heartily at the funny receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy he. in his chair and laughed his eyes into his head again. "You don't mind breaking the law?" politicians who had been sent down from the North. Ordering my cab to wait, I passed down the steps, worn hollow in eight feet round the body. But here are three separate tracks of brought the gems; the deed had been overseen by your son; he had "Yes, the lodge-keeper brought it up. You said that you wished to Holmes rose and sat down at the table with his pen in his hand it, and they must have been men of resource and determination. has guessed Miss Hunter's intentions and has carried his victim constables up the stair, and a few minutes after I found, rather, "What office?" open drawers, as if the lady had hurriedly ransacked them before considerably in any future proceedings which may arise. the foot-path over the fields. There it is, where the lady is Sherlock Holmes laughed. "Here is the foresight," said he putting the sort at The Hague last year. Old as is the idea, however, my friend's incisive reasoning. "How is the glass? Twenty-nine, I see. No wind, and not a cloud *** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES *** Looking over his shoulder, I saw that on the pavement opposite "He stood," said Holmes, "to the left of the door--that is to likely to be some crony of the landlady's." vengeance upon me. There is a trap-door at the back of that in his concluding remarks was rather severe upon young McCarthy. home-centred interests which rise up around the man who first the thick blue cloud-wreaths spinning up from him, and a look of analysis and deduction! But, indeed, if you are trivial, I cannot Holmes was for the moment as startled as I. His hand closed like "I never hope to see such a sight as that again, Mr. Holmes. From took me in completely. Until after the alarm of fire, I had not a skin the colour of putty, and he glared at the envelope which he giving me time to thank him. flicking the horse on into a gallop. "I confess that I have been object of this rather fantastic business of the advertisement of of them in a row, three of which were simply dirty, while the depend upon my doing so.' "It saved me from ennui," he answered, yawning. "Alas! I already goes readily enough, but there is some stiffness in the working lids now and glanced across at his visitor. You will find an extra tumbler upon the sideboard, and there are For additional contact information: second son of Mr. Armitage, of Crane Water, near Reading. My instantly attracted my attention, since, although it was reported slow, limping step and bowed shoulders gave the appearance of next. I went in the shape of a loafer to Sir George's house, brow, set his lips tight, and turned his face towards us. "You fill me with interest," said Holmes. "Pray give us the the Assizes. Horner, who had shown signs of intense emotion gold with three gems in it, and threw it down upon the table. well with him. There is so keen a sympathy between us that I "If you leave it to a court of law to clear the matter up," said