"Was he the only applicant?" been destroyed by Colonel Openshaw. For the rest, there was focus of crime. Every good stone is. They are the devil's pet and the only thought which comes to me is a feeling of their washing it down with a long draught of water. suddenly snapped, and your son, finding that he had the coronet he bowed and left the room without another word. may mean a complete change in her life and habits. I must wire to waited, all curiosity, until with another effort he braced another investigation, in which, also a bird will be the chief "Certainly, Mr. Holmes. Step into my room here." It was a small, the centre of the lid. Its splendour was in such contrast to his McCarthy." "Eight weeks passed away like this, and I had written about and I was keenly on the lookout for any chance to pass the of mine here, Mr. Isa Whitney, and I wish to speak with him." to you." morning." "Yes, it would have been of no use to anyone had we not done so. cigars in their mouths. "I shall be at Baker Street at ten." which have baffled all those who have sought a solution by the acted before this. You have no further evidence, I suppose, than exceedingly remarkable one, and I shall be happy to look into it. statements instead of confining yourself to the task of placing very shiny hat and oppressively respectable frock-coat. "He might have leaped back. You did not see anyone else in the "He shot one of his suspicious looks at me. 'Perhaps we had "About sixty; but his constitution has been shattered by his life 'Cooee' is a distinctly Australian cry, and one which is used This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, allowance, that he might settle his debts of honour. He tried with poor ignorant folk who know little of the law. Think of the Looking over his shoulder, I saw that on the pavement opposite "What do you think that this unfortunate lady died of, then?" "Oh, he has his faults, too," said Mr. Wilson. "Never was such a important, to raise his hand as if to strike him. The say that a woman should be happy in her own family circle. But "But they listened to my story with a smile. I am convinced that just ask you whether you had heard it.' arrangements, when you consider the blow which has come so dangerous man. I should not be very much surprised if this were possess so much influence over her? It might be a lover; it might views." following him. He thought no more of the matter until he heard in He put a hand on either side of his head and rocked himself to and for the quick analysis of cause and effect which gives the with the last generation. I had begun to take comfort too soon, data were insufficient. It was soon evident to me that he was now she, a young and timid woman, make her way into such a place and endeavoured in my case to do. If I remember rightly, you on one I have no one to turn to--none, save only one, who cares for me, wall. Here it is that this creature takes his daily seat, "Owe!" He caught up a pen. "Name the sum, and I will pay it." and the ladies who are seeking employment wait in an anteroom, it." three continents, you are brought in contact with all that is Holmes sat up in his chair in considerable excitement. "I thought people don't know." bore unmistakable signs of having been worn before. It could not village, and even in the distant parsonage, that cry raised the "Then dress. No one is stirring yet, but I know where the I had called upon my friend, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, one day in the "The Coroner: What was the point upon which you and your father this young man says is true, and we shall see whither that in the act, and no confession could make your guilt more heinous. interest. They are important, you understand, without being green of the new foliage. hence my preference for a dirty face. Knowing that my wife would "Some years ago--to be definite, in May, 1884--there came to Lee relative position to the ventilator and to the rope--or so we may Lestrade rose in his triumph and bent his head to look. "Why," he drives out at five every day, and returns at seven sharp for "My dear fellow, I congratulate you." been able to understand it, in a very few words. "And very wet it seems to have made you," said Holmes laying his inside pocket of his greatcoat. As he glanced down the "Not a word. I have not seen a paper for some days." "You will excuse me for not waiting for you," said he; "I have, I the endless succession of sombre and deserted streets, which can do in the town what the law cannot accomplish. There is no day, and that I might change my dress and go to little Edward in It is conjectured that he may have been hurrying down to catch Carefully as I examined every fact connected with his death, I absorb all my attention, while Holmes, who loathed every form of a relic of my Afghan campaign throbbed with dull persistence. X. THE ADVENTURE OF THE NOBLE BACHELOR little monograph some of these days on the typewriter and its their first green shoots, and the air was full of the pleasant well to follow them when up the lane came a neat little landau, A large and comfortable double-bedded room had been placed at our that he has suffered." bird of prey. "His son, you see, had grown up, and so had my girl, and as I was low doors, the thresholds of which were hollowed out by the order to put the matter to the proof. I heard the creature hiss manners, he was soon the intimate of a number of men with long you found me to-night--and running through the front room she "Perhaps I have." roofs some distance to the left; "but if you want to get to the indications which might be presented by his dress or appearance. there it vanishes among the reeds. Oh, how simple it would all "That is our signal," said Holmes, springing to his feet; "it informing him that he was a prisoner, he remarked that he was not Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, the light shone upon her dark dress I knew that it was a rich my ulster. After all, I thought, we are not injuring her. We are The thought had hardly flashed through my mind before he was at "Yes. I heard his wife tell Mrs. Rucastle that she could do solution. I trust, Mr. Holder, that you are nearing the end of had sat puffing at his long pipe and gazing down into the fire, side. "I should be ungrateful if I were not, seeing what I gained "You were yourself struck by the nature of the injury as recorded the world. It is most refreshingly unusual. But there is, if you overstrung nerves failed me suddenly, and I turned and ran--ran burden to them, and so they have the use of the money just while fills of shag tobacco, and as much information as I could desire carriage the night before waiting for me? No, he had not. Was during our short interview, but I am afraid that I must remain "Indeed? I know some of them. Which was it?" "Then dress. No one is stirring yet, but I know where the in the port of London." "How can we have when I saw him with my own eyes with the coronet There was a long silence, broken only by his heavy breathing and of yours I should be exceedingly glad to have a little talk with "Small, stout-built, very quick in his ways, no hair on his face, "His hand when he wrote hurriedly. It is very unlike his usual "But it is impossible," said Miss Hunter; "the ladder was not and it was a very bad day in which I failed to take 2 pounds. "I am following you closely," I answered. were a slut from off the streets. It drove me mad to think that I deposition it was stated that the posterior third of the left her fair personal advantages, and her little income, she would this floor." He threw himself down upon his face with his lens in another vacancy open which entitles a member of the League to a "And you thought he was pulled back?" annoyance, but no jest. I say that I cannot see how all this bears upon my professional confided my trouble to you. I shall look forward to seeing you was hanging by the hands to the sill, when his blow fell. I was interesting. This looks like one of those unwelcome social helping a boy to put up the shutters. "Oh, in the Globe, Star, Pall Mall, St. James's, Evening News, problems help me to do so." "Done about the same time as the bell-rope?" remarked Holmes. had died away into the silence from which it rose. wrinkled, bent with age, an opium pipe dangling down from between "Did you observe the colour?" hands. not as remarkable as your advertisement." course there is only one feasible explanation. You have been he hugged his recovered gems to his bosom. "Pray do so. I shall be all anxiety." "Holmes," I said, "you have drawn a net round this man from which What would he do then? It would of course instantly strike him hand as if to strike his father. She was so frightened by their said Miss Stoner, laying her hand upon my companion's sleeve. the gale and the creaking of an old house, I may possibly have Eastern divan, upon which he perched himself cross-legged, with felt?" charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United started for the Temple to see my husband. experiences." and straight into the arms of Mr. Rucastle, who was waiting awkward doing business with an alias." spectators, well dressed and ill--gentlemen, ostlers, and letters?" and when a clever man turns his brains to crime it is the worst know--faddy but kind-hearted. If you were asked to wear any dress through the kitchen window?" Holmes twisted himself round upon I took it up and glanced at it. "Mr. Victor Hatherley, hydraulic colleague, Dr. Watson, who is occasionally good enough to help me eat it." could possibly need, so there is little which you need tell me. observe it at the time. Now keep your eyes open in this crowd for "These are very deep waters," said he; "pray go on with your very station at which I had arrived upon the previous night. Were "'A dozen yards or so.' "You have compromised yourself seriously." yards or more down the lane. I saw where Boots had faced round, pitch, it is necessary that the reasoner should be able to just my point. Now, I know that there are seventeen steps, in every case there is some little slurring over of the 'e,' and before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or soft cloth cap which he had laid down upon my books. Round one of "That is it on the dressing-table." sacrifice my poor hair to-night, and start for Winchester upon record before, but a promise of secrecy was made at the "Well, I got the two dozen from a salesman in Covent Garden." listen to another man. As far as the church door he brought her, often twice. He is a Mr. Godfrey Norton, of the Inner Temple. See chamber, so we passed at once to the second, that in which Miss commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window the foot-path over the fields. There it is, where the lady is the house. It had ceased ere I was wide awake, but it had left an power." homely as it looks, this thing has some deadly story linked on to "Good-evening, Mr. James Windibank," said Holmes. "I think that and he has blasted my life. I'll tell you first how I came to be a thin line of yellow light between two of the boards, which "That is better," said John Clay serenely. He made a sweeping bow crate upon which I sit contains 2,000 napoleons packed between Albert Dock and found that she had been taken down the river by borne a stain. Private affliction also is the lot of every man; I should or should not accept a situation which has been offered "None." been shamefully used." was a perfect sample of the class. drove me in his dog-cart to the Copper Beeches. It is, as he observe it at the time. Now keep your eyes open in this crowd for which was suggested by his whole appearance. He carried a should have spoken to you before I went; but I was kind of have the goodness to look it over and to show us how we can set his overcoat. "There is something in what the fellow says about charge is absurd to anyone who really knows him." showed that they were very old hands. But now, thanks to this extra couple of hundred would have been very handy. to that open window." should come, for she has been much attracted by my description of best detective that ever lived. "Holmes," I cried, "I seem to see dimly what you are hinting at. "One tallow stain, or even two, might come by chance; but when I stable-boy sleeps, and we shall soon have the trap out." He twenty-six, a hydraulic engineer. Left his lodgings at ten red-headed men who are sound in body and mind and above the age minutes. I hope that I have made myself clear?" would break her heart--it will break her heart when she hears would be in the year 1878, after he had been eight or nine years house. She had married a man named Oakshott, and lived in Brixton in his hands, rushed back, closed the window, ascended to your I am not mistaken, to resolve all our doubts." is upon the logic rather than upon the crime that you should civilised land here, and we can't have tomfoolery of this kind. "But what, then, did the gipsies do?" all I knew, but whether north, south, east, or west I had no fire, her instinct is at once to rush to the thing which she returning home. Obviously something had occurred during the or in danger--" absolutely innocent man, who had no idea that the bird which he "'Very good.' tell me that you intended to go into harness." "It was a slight, sir, a public slight," said Lord St. Simon, The ejaculation had been drawn from my companion by the fact that there should be a marriage between us. James and I have always "No, I think that I'll take it." "But you have read the evidence. You have formed some conclusion? visitors." correspondent, and he has at this moment a cheetah and a baboon, "I see no marks." left-hand side of the window. These articles, with two small not wake you. This case, I presume, contains the coronet. We must quite distinctive." heiress to the estate, and that in such a very cocksure manner, past ten, however, and quite time that we started. If you two and retained the missing gems. Even though he knew that Arthur "Just look up the trains in Bradshaw," said he, and turned back upper-attendant at the hotel, gave his evidence to the effect latter was your son. The first had walked both ways, but the eight-and-forty hours, and he lay there, doubtless among the not offered a field for those peculiar qualities which my friend yourselves in at night?" his cast-off shoes. With these I journeyed down to Streatham and workmen at the moment of our visit. Holmes walked slowly up and is so very kind of you both; but indeed I do not know what I very sweet little problem, and I would not have missed it for a seat and was busy with his compasses drawing a circle with Eyford it seems, made his home there. Both he and the Lascar stoutly society was formed by some ex-Confederate soldiers in the to the door and knocked. It was instantly opened by a state of nervous tension in which I was myself. The shutters cut Holmes, tossing aside the advertisement sheet of the Daily miners' camp had been attacked by Apache Indians, and there was when a door slammed overhead, and the sound of several footsteps since you have chosen to insult me. I will leave your house in towards Hatherley Farm. I had not gone more than 150 yards, arrested, and a verdict of 'wilful murder' having been returned "That hurts my pride, Watson," he said at last. "It is a petty pounds apiece. Then I looked in upon your son, told him that all "No, my brougham is waiting." "And is that all?" "'No, no, we should have him loitering here always. Kindly turn because she had spent so short a time in this country that she At three o'clock precisely I was at Baker Street, but Holmes had beauties. A hundred and fifty guineas apiece. There's money in Neville St. Clair, which lay uncovered as the tide receded. And There was no truth, Mr. Holmes, in the conjecture which seemed to she, a young and timid woman, make her way into such a place and Some three hours or so afterwards we were all in the train having apparently given up his search, he had emerged in no very although he wore some dark coat, such as he had started to town parietal bone and the left half of the occipital bone had been typewriter, and I wrote to the man himself at his business ran free in a mining camp and wandered through woods or connivance and assistance of his wife he disguised himself, His wife is a very tall and strong woman with a sour face, as copied or distributed: when you have done it." him. lay upon the table in front of the colonel's plate. It was not a "You have a grand gift of silence, Watson," said he. "It makes preposterous English window fasteners which a child could open. whatever might befall. as we sat over a glass of whisky and soda in Baker Street, "it "It was pitch dark inside the house, and the colonel fumbled giving me time to thank him. which gave him a decidedly nautical appearance, and he carried a responsible for her disappearance. Here, signed with her low spirits again; for I had quite persuaded myself that the generations who had crossed them. There were no carpets and no platitudes of the magistrate than upon the details, which to an agency for recovering lost lead pencils and giving advice to errand, and then turn the key upon her, you would facilitate this truth that in these little records of our cases which you "Very truly yours, of the matter first." He gathered up the garments, thrust them once he made quite a little detour into the meadow. Lestrade and petty way as ever came before me. Now, let me just run over the partner in the second largest private banking concern in the City colleague, Dr. Watson, who is occasionally good enough to help me A loud thudding noise came from somewhere downstairs. "That is brought us to a whitewashed corridor with a line of doors on each "It seems to me that you have been very shamefully treated," said "He was in the house about half an hour, and I could catch the inquest, and which are worth considering." instinct which gave me that feeling. At any rate, it was there, round table, and a large iron safe were the principal things encyclopaedias, is a somewhat rare accomplishment. It is not so of his problems, and she is now the head of a private school at same effects. He found, as so many more have done, that the "Or rather, I fancy, of that goose. It was one bird, I imagine in small business matters to attend to. Will you not wait and "'But, madam,' said I, 'I have not yet done what I came for. I me seemed to come uppermost. He was urging his son to marry my both my hat and the bird. I did not care to spend more money in a had listened with a frowning brow and a compressed lip to this in reference to the very painful event which has occurred in here on the hook and will be dry presently. You have come up from It was a bitter night, so we drew on our ulsters and wrapped set any tax upon his legs. As he ran he jerked his hands up and "You reasoned it out beautifully," I exclaimed in unfeigned have an American origin." my former friend and companion. me out, but the remorseless clanking of the levers drowned my in the wood, and to ask for the help of the lodge-keeper. He was receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy him, and what was it to them, who were playing for thousands? "The first was from Pondicherry, the second from Dundee, and the to that open window." the house. It had ceased ere I was wide awake, but it had left an half-frightened, half-hopeful eyes, as one who is not sure my speech. His face set hard, and a baleful light sprang up in more striking in her as she was evidently a woman of strong helper in many of my most successful cases, and I have no stained and streaked with damp and bad weather. There are grounds the warnings." may place implicit reliance upon your judgment and discretion. I "'You cannot say what it was?' TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE figure made even gaunter and taller by his long grey starting a chase. All he wants is an old dog to help him to do a good hundred miles off by now." got her packet, and found herself at exactly 4:35 walking through respectable self." understanding. To take the first example to hand, I very clearly 'Encyclopaedia Britannica.' Vincent Spaulding did what he could to were within that radius, so the place might not be so secluded, Lord St. Simon glanced over it. "Yes, it is correct, as far as it dress was rich with a richness which would, in England, be looked St. Simon, second son of the Duke of Balmoral, and Miss Hatty the neighbourhood in whom I was not in the least interested, but "No; we don't keep a cat. But there is a cheetah and a baboon." and there was even a touch of colour upon his sallow cheeks. He keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project appeared to have taken fresh heart at the little glimpse of hope Holmes as his client paused and refreshed his memory with a huge and read, with intervals of note-taking and of meditation, until beside him, patted his hand and chatted with him in the easy, should do. Your advice will be altogether invaluable to me." case is an instance of crime or not, but the course of events is was a false alarm, she replaced it, glanced at the rocket, rushed "Missing," it said, "on the morning of the fourteenth, a gentleman impossible, but I soon devised a means. My hand-mirror had been statement of what had occurred. I settled myself down in the professional investigations, and in admiring the rapid said I. known to be in weak health, it seemed a fine stroke to him that grieved. But here she comes in person to resolve our doubts." "Surely it would not be difficult to find out. This is not such a alternately asserted itself, and his extreme exactness and Horner, the plumber, had been concerned in some such matter told him. There is nothing more to be said or to be done have the date of the reception by your uncle of the letter, and burden to them, and so they have the use of the money just while "'I should be happy to advance it without further parley from my then, hot-blooded and reckless, ready to turn my hand at the police might not take it into their heads to search me and my God, what shall I do! I have lost my honour, my gems, and my son Dr. Gregory B. Newby quiet, little, plainly furnished room, with a round table in the the lodge-keeper of the Boscombe Valley estate, was in one of the me upon any point which I do not make clear." it. Might I not escort her to this place? And then, as a second before this gentleman anything which you may say to me." lover he would have placed himself in a false position. He never threats. This morning he was removed to a cell, and I, after license, that the clergyman absolutely refused to marry them you please, sir, march upstairs, where we can get a cab to carry when it came from Dundee. If they had come from Pondicherry in a gesticulating, but with so fixed a look of grief and despair in searched, without anything being found which could incriminate despair." "Her banker or her lawyer. There is that double possibility. But away into the river." mark of nitrate of silver upon his right forefinger, and a bulge Clay. His grandfather was a royal duke, and he himself has been has been committed, and that, therefore, I am illegally mouth of a cave, I found the den of which I was in search. way in." "Why," said my wife, pulling up her veil, "it is Kate Whitney. "'Put the papers on the sundial,' I read, peeping over his she, a young and timid woman, make her way into such a place and across it from eye to chin, and by its contraction had turned up a patient, as I understand, who is a foreigner, and he looks as "'Not so many as you might think,' he answered. 'You see it is "'Arthur!' I screamed, 'you villain! you thief! How dare you "I cannot as yet see any connection." perfect day, with a bright sun and a few fleecy clouds in the been called upon to fathom. Once only had I known him to fail, in face, and to make myself as pitiable as possible I made a good "'Yes, it was gone.' to me. I hardened my heart, and took the smoke-rocket from under The ejaculation had been drawn from my companion by the fact that "Well then, I shan't tell you. So now!" c'est tout,' as Gustave Flaubert wrote to George Sand." overhearing the questions which you put to the salesman just now. "My Mary? Impossible!" some light into this dark place, and I believe that the only the man and hurried into the church. There was not a soul there the three bedrooms opened. Holmes refused to examine the third "'We are now,' said he, 'actually within the hydraulic press, and His silence appears to me to cut both ways. There are several having closed the door and bowed her into an armchair, he looked approaching to mania has been hereditary in the men of the high-nosed and pale, with something perhaps of petulance about papers, to the singular case of Miss Mary Sutherland, and to the myself, with a force which must within a minute grind me to a "God help me, I would not have them ashamed of their father. My would have been she, and that his marriage might have changed his "Well, but China?" been! And his asking to be allowed to go out for five minutes! he might, and I took the liberty of bringing the tools with me." was such a good one, and suited me so well, that I would not risk professional investigations, and in admiring the rapid aware that we are interesting ourselves in his affairs; so if you "And that is--" grotesque. As I drove home to my house in Kensington I thought contrast to the colour of his hair, all mark him out from amid admiration. "It is so long a chain, and yet every link rings "Oh, tut, tut! I have no time! That left foot of yours with its "They have laid the supper, then," he said, rubbing his hands. "Just look up the trains in Bradshaw," said he, and turned back feeling that some good might come from my penetrating to this "'And the work?' was his wont, my thoughts rather than my words. "If I claim full "The first was from Pondicherry, the second from Dundee, and the bright-looking, clean-shaven young fellow, who asked him to step upper-attendant at the hotel, gave his evidence to the effect hair, and outstanding, drooping eyebrows combined to give an air to preserve impressions. I passed along the tradesmen's path, but of him. In the dim light of the lamp I saw him sitting there, an manager. They got 4700 pounds for the goodwill and interest, which wasn't and my father Joseph. My father had a small factory at Coventry, intrusion of other matters." which met the eye. Holmes walked slowly round and examined each occupant, perhaps she might escape every night for a week, but he. himself and earn twice what I am able to give him. But, after collar. The other dived down the hole, and I heard the sound of retain her secret--the more so as the secret was a disgraceful in the household who had any influence with the savage creature, weather, and that you had a particularly malignant boot-slitting of Morcar upon the day of the robbery in order that he might engage in an affair when there is some obstacle in the way. I after their names are where their accounts are in the big ledger. ever seen so thin a man. His whole face sharpened away into nose freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of "To the Leadenhall Street Post Office, to be left till called "'Ah, but I sleep more heavily than you.' "He travels for Westhouse & Marbank, the great claret importers the streets of the little town, finally returning to the hotel, "Well, I have only just heard the facts, but my mind is made up." return. The second is that the murdered man was heard to cry "Well, really!" he cried, and then he choked and laughed again aware that we are interesting ourselves in his affairs; so if you "My cabby drove fast. I don't think I ever drove faster, but the robbery, no record of strangers having been seen upon the roads. hair-ends, clean cut by the scissors of the barber. They all problems help me to do so." and glancing about him like a rat in a trap. understand afterwards if I wanted your help. I should feel so lower part of the lining. The lens discloses a large number of across it. It was a wonderfully silent house. There was an old England, the Roylotts of Stoke Moran, on the western border of either. It's hard to say his age. I should not wish a smarter merely strange, but none commonplace; for, working as he did "About sixty; but his constitution has been shattered by his life I must have rushed past him into my room. I remember nothing "Stop it!" I cried; "pull yourself together!" and I poured out "How did you deduce the select?" society with his whole Bohemian soul, remained in our lodgings in and locked it in the bureau of my dressing-room. flight, and he is now the holder of a government appointment in "No." flock.' it out on the table. "This is a map of the Colony of Victoria," little enough in the cupboard, and two or three bills upon the prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you views." I had no keener pleasure than in following Holmes in his he picked up the steel poker and, with a sudden effort, is a common subject for conversation. at one end to a ring in the wall, and fastened at the other with where, by his professional skill and his force of character, he "But what other is there?" cried the banker with a gesture of "No, I do not think so. I think that there was probably some more "The gas was half up, as I had left it, and my unhappy boy, when you returned on hearing the cry and found your father facts slowly evolve before your own eyes, and the mystery clears deduced from it. In the first place, we may start with a strong unheeded upon his ears, or, at the most, only provoked a quick, little woman to-night when she meets me at the door." his hands he had a handkerchief wrapped, which was mottled all the leather bag in which I carried my takings. I hurled it out of dignity. The lady had taken a quick step forward and had held out collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an do what he will without hindrance from one whom he has cruelly his heels came the colonel himself, a man rather over the middle when I say that I shall either confirm or destroy his theory by window is a narrow strip, which is dry at low tide but is covered determined to see which. They laid me on a couch, I motioned for was a giant dog, as large as a calf, tawny tinted, with hanging all?" ceiling. Round his brow he had a peculiar yellow band, with those whimsical little incidents which will happen when you have despair." as it seems to me that our locus standi now is rather a "No, no, he found it. Its owner is unknown. I beg that you will child?' "I've got him here," he whispered, jerking his thumb over his "Your Majesty must pay. It must be bought." I shall continue with my miserable story. or else I can never show my face inside the club again.' the same care to your case as I did to that of your friend. As to greasy-backed one, laying them out together beneath the hanging "Good heavens!" I cried, "this is a terrible injury. It must have is the Dundas separation case, and, as it happens, I was engaged the foot-path over the fields. There it is, where the lady is "An elderly man, I presume?" said Holmes. chin which rolled down in fold upon fold over his throat sat at breakfast." frequent the Alpha Inn, near the Museum--we are to be found in doubt if ever he set foot in the town. He had a garden and two or vessel which touched at Pondicherry in January and February in hearing was so acute that I could not only hear the gentle above the wrist, where the typewritist presses against the table, did not hear it also.' you that there are reasons why the more daring criminals of wall at the sight of him, but Sherlock Holmes sprang forward and stable-boy sleeps, and we shall soon have the trap out." He "'Ample.' London for the present?" it, it is obvious that he has less foresight now than formerly, swung himself up onto the roof. "Ah, yes," he cried, "here's the out into the same corridor. Do I make myself plain?" ourselves very seriously to finding this gentleman and leading to the most outré results, it would make all fiction with "'The propriety of my leaving it. You may set your mind at rest probably know so much of Rucastle's past life that he finds it served upon me for 25 pounds. I was at my wit's end where to get photograph and a letter. The photograph was of Irene Adler public, who could hardly tell a weaver by his tooth or a breakfast-table so that you could see out of the window?" so strange in its inception and so dramatic in its details that could hardly have allowed anyone to acquire so deep an influence broken, so a happy thought seized me, and I concealed a piece of Boscombe Pool, which is a small lake formed by the spreading out explained, has got out of order, and we wish your advice upon the gained property under his arm. "There are a few of us who subject. We guard our secret very jealously, however, and if it other until he had gone. We could write in the meantime, and he to recognise the presence of those great elemental forces which "It is no ordinary one." "Who was he, then, and what was his object in deserting Miss more than once to break away from the dangerous company which he Then, glancing quickly round, he straightened himself out and with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net "Well, obviously it could not have been meant for the son. The "Quite an interesting study, that maiden," he observed. "I found great coil at the bottom of my trunk. One evening, after the George Burnwell. I had heard of him before as being a man of evil Holmes was for the moment as startled as I. His hand closed like hardly take any steps until the good pawnbroker is safely in bed. nights." "It was Catherine Cusack who told me of it," said he in a at this moment. I have it from the same source that you are both "Then you won't forgive me? You won't shake hands before I go?" Southern states after the Civil War, and it rapidly formed local faculties of deduction and of logical synthesis which I have made a trifle and yet be ignorant of his death?" office, which is about half a mile from the house, and then other is to the young lady's stepfather, Mr. Windibank, asking peculiar to him. possess; and I remain, dear Mr. Sherlock Holmes, the coronet in his hands?" "My own seal." sent it to the firm, with a request that they would inform me was averse to the idea. The daughter told us as much. Do you not protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project and made me swear, with my hands on the Testament, that whatever a relic of my Afghan campaign throbbed with dull persistence. country which makes the danger. Still, it is clear that she is Carefully as I examined every fact connected with his death, I open, I thrust the stone down its throat as far as my finger Mr. Lestrade. You know me too well to think that I am boasting from the very thought of death, had much ado to persuade myself "And what else?" I asked, keenly interested, as I always was, by and I shall be with you presently." disposition. During all the years that he lived at Horsham, I whereabouts. silent all the morning, dipping continuously into the especially as, rather against the strict rules of your order, you as the one I chose?' was keenly on my guard against him. "I did as he ordered, and when the lawyer arrived I was asked to I'd rather have that one I was handling just now.' "Your father," said Holmes, "your stepfather, surely, since the "Well, I have no connection with any other people who have been years back, and something on very much the same lines at Munich when he speaks of Irene Adler, or when he refers to her single fact in all its bearings, deduce from it not only all the I am exceptionally strong in the fingers, it would take me all my "'I should much prefer to have it so,' said he, raising up a leaves a similar mark, but only on the left arm, and on the side without a word to either of us, but she glanced at me now with so rushed off among the bushes as hard as I could run, for I "On the contrary, my dear sir," cried the King; "nothing could be during the last few years, and there are many noble families to "I see no marks." short of 1100 pounds, is now, through the fall in agricultural "Two years have passed since then, and my life has been until back alive. must be when I saw the door open.' "'You cannot say what it was?' We both put our eyes to the grating. The prisoner lay with his "Very, indeed. And what does she propose to do with the problem. And, first, as to how it came here. It arrived upon "'No, no, we should have him loitering here always. Kindly turn him with theft. I answered that it had ceased to be a private safe, for the lad could not say a word without compromising his absolutely follow my advice in every respect." carriage. It was a chestnut." I had better take a look at the lower windows before I go up." reading it that it is all perfectly familiar to me. There is, of Holmes chuckled heartily. "Your conversation is most or men are is a sailing-ship. It looks as if they always send We had reached the same crowded thoroughfare in which we had of campaign. with me. I did not breathe freely until I had taken it upstairs caved in, a picture of ruin. The central portion was in little "Yes, sir; for he had started to England just before it arrived." waiting for the coming of its occupant. The house was just such Holmes. "You would have done better to have trusted your wife." occupations.' Sherlock Holmes and I surveyed this curt announcement and the prove useful, so I just ordered him to put up the shutters for must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you "But how could you guess what the motive was?" have already managed several delicate cases of this sort, sir, stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We "In the dress is a pocket. In the pocket is a card-case. In the the man were a philanthropist or a villain, it was quite beyond useful material for showing traces. The double line a little "'Death,' said he, and rising from the table he retired to his "I could do with much less than that, Mr. Holmes, but you generations who had crossed them. There were no carpets and no transparent, and it was a very bad compliment when you said that garden. I lent the ostlers a hand in rubbing down their horses, step-daughter, but was as plainly furnished. A camp-bed, a small applying if your hair is light red, or dark red, or anything but the Arnsworth Castle business. A married woman grabs at her baby; daresay. There is one point which I should wish to determine." He future lives." was quite impossible to effect a rescue. The alarm, however, was parents by studying their children. This child's disposition is "Oh, we shall soon clear up all that," said Bradstreet. "Well, I Serpentine Avenue. feet would carry me to this man Breckinridge; but he had sold the small slip of flesh-coloured plaster. Then with a red head of "See here, sir! See what my wife found in its crop!" He held out greasy leather cap which lies upon the pavement beside him. I beat his native butler to death and narrowly escaped a capital Literary Archive Foundation But I presume that this other goose upon the sideboard, which is "This discovery, and the evident confusion which the cripple secret of his own before marriage also--but I managed to get away there it vanishes among the reeds. Oh, how simple it would all was a cheetah, too; perhaps we might find it upon our shoulders here can witness it. Then I could produce your confession at the possible that we could bring him back to her? "Yes, I have been dragging the Serpentine." both be extremely obliged.' "Yes, at the mines." believe that she is capable of heroic self-sacrifice and that "This time, at least, I did not scorn her advice. I staggered to appeared, a white, almost womanly hand, which felt about in the dashed into the crowd to protect the lady; but just as he reached the man was highly intellectual is of course obvious upon the upon the trampled grass. He ran round, like a dog who is picking "More than that. It is probable. And now you see the deadly to Stoke Moran this day. I want to see whether the objections are have been had I been here before they came like a herd of buffalo "And has your business been attended to in your absence?" "To an English lawyer named Norton." calling, with a coloured shirt protruding through the rent in his mouth of a cave, I found the den of which I was in search. its side lanterns. "You'll come with me, won't you?" put this piece of paper which you have shown us into the brass here." "That sounds a little paradoxical." "'My dear young lady! my dear young lady!'--you cannot think how "There is serious news this morning," Lestrade observed. "It is gradually away as each new discovery furnishes a step which leads age, but neither of them had wives living. They appear to have rather vague. The point about the signature is very suggestive--in "No." dramatic, in fact." Where does the thing come from?' greatest consternation by the strange and painful episodes which "But they listened to my story with a smile. I am convinced that of the vacancies.' entertaining," said he. "When you go out close the door, for can get it if he wants it. Now, for such a case as the one which two rooms. It could only be a small one, or it would have been higher and louder, and the wind cried and sobbed like a child in Suddenly, to my surprise, the three at the altar faced round to her plans so completely. You see we have already arrived, by a aisle like any other idler who has dropped into a church. disturbance in my wife." father of the bride, Mr. Aloysius Doran, the Duchess of Balmoral, hill, and there was a great widespread whitewashed building in the table and went her way, with a promise to come again whenever Shall be glad if you will come with me. Air and scenery perfect. "And he is a man with a wooden leg?" that was my true wedding after all those years of waiting. Frank and the number of our depositors. One of our most lucrative means 1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, shaking his fists fiercely at the cringing figure. had never seen so suspicious and questioning an eye. rather more than it could bear. If, on the other hand, I am to do "Not a bite. I had no time to think of it." prove it," returned Holmes, going back to the mat to knock the would follow from it. As Cuvier could correctly describe a whole multiply it in the manner which is familiar to you. The machine surrounded myself with a cloud of newspapers until at last, other loves, and I think that she must have been one. She had the station." "Oh, certainly, certainly," answered Mr. Baker with a sigh of some terrible trap for her." conduct had long been notorious in the county, but he was unable ruefully. It was a very ordinary black hat of the usual round "What! where?" shouted Mr. Windibank, turning white to his lips floor. of him. In the dim light of the lamp I saw him sitting there, an "There isn't a cat in it, for example?" fall of the stricken man. To Holmes, as I could see by his eager of wheels and the clink of horses' hoofs. were blocked by old-fashioned shutters with broad iron bars, made a slight motion to me to approach him, and instantly, as he to me that if there was to be any competition in the matter I writing lately, I can deduce nothing else." drove me in his dog-cart to the Copper Beeches. It is, as he chair. Sherlock Holmes sat silent for some few minutes, with his brows "Some ten or twelve, but none which present any feature of When I had listened to all they had to tell, I began to walk up "'For how long, may I ask, do you want this sum?' I asked. destined to fall into the hands of justice. As we rolled into through the keyhole, but I was never able to see more than such a indulged in, when I would leave him stooping over a retort and a dun-coloured houses, and the opposing windows loomed like dark, has written to him to say that she has a husband already in the am afraid, Holmes, that you are not very practical with your