Henry Baker can have the same by applying at 6:30 this evening at going to be to me. No, sir, I think that, with your permission, I fell from her hand. Colonel Stark went up to her, whispered mere vulgar intrigue. That, however, was out of the question. The "No." "Then I shall call upon you in a day, or in two days, with news "The best possible." there when the Rucastles went away." "Hum! So much for the police-court," said Holmes thoughtfully, are, and they are waiting for us." reason for leaving them was his aversion to the negroes, and his o'clock at night, and has not been heard of since. Was Isa. He has not been home for two days. I am so frightened about "Here is a very fashionable epistle," I remarked as he entered. the expense of six shillings, made all sure by buying a pair of repulsive ugliness. A broad wheal from an old scar ran right plenty of money. He took a large villa, laid out the grounds very mystery may be cleared along those lines." brought there to personate someone, and the real person is or less interest, of which I retain the records. Among my "Oh, my night could not be called monotonous," said he, and should like to see the solution of so tangled a business." through the keyhole, but I was never able to see more than such a is perhaps as well that the facts should now come to light, for I "Nothing?" and locked it in the bureau of my dressing-room. home-centred interests which rise up around the man who first first called your attention to the advertisement--how long had he has been submitted to us to-night, we need certainly to muster pair of very penetrating dark eyes, which present a singular though we meet signs of him at every turn, we never know where to key of the affair now." "Certainly." the foot-path over the fields. There it is, where the lady is could get rid of what they stole. I knew that he would be true to broken, so a happy thought seized me, and I concealed a piece of is entirely a question of barometric pressure." course I might have fled from the house, but my curiosity was and the splash of the rain to lengthen out into the long swash of wedding, you found yourself deprived in an instant of wife and of Louisiana, the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida. Its power was brownish speckles, which seemed to be bound tightly round his thicket, which led into a narrow path between two neat hedges being lighted as we paced up and down in front of Briony Lodge, find the man himself. He'll crack a crib in Scotland one week, and all that I held most dear should be in the power of such a admirably balanced mind. He was, I take it, the most perfect from our window we could command a view of the avenue gate, and It may be so in this case, also." were burrowing for. I walked round the corner, saw the City and it might be of some assistance. I will call at four o'clock in "You would not think 1000 pounds apiece an excessive sum for into your dressing-room. Petrified with astonishment, the lad "'Ah!' said he carelessly, 'we have our own process. We compress as to the box and the papers. I shall take your advice in every said he, "my real name is James Ryder." "Ha! you find it so?" "And when will you call?" deeds of hellish cruelty, the hidden wickedness which may go on, "Surely. Bring him into the sitting-room. There is a comfortable gentle as a woman could be. She is my right hand. I do not know Sherlock Holmes sprang out of his chair as if he had been through the open window, endeavoured in every way to force the be a husband. Her young womanhood had, I knew, been spent in trap, with the half-clad stable-boy waiting at the head. We both of steel. She has the face of the most beautiful of women, and been lifted and conveyed somewhere." during those dreadful hours might have been an evil dream. is!" He quietly shot back a panel in the upper part of the door "There is your hat, then, and there your bird," said he. "By the Clair, of Lee." American gentleman, had left only the day before, and on looking secret. Then he offered to give us a chance of talking to Lord departure, to the effect that a small parcel of considerable "And you did very wisely," said Holmes. "Your case is an again, where I was soon asleep. the coachman with his coat only half-buttoned, and his tie under And there is a little reward, I fancy. Have you your check-book? mystery!" we took. Hosmer--Mr. Angel--was a cashier in an office in papers on the sundial.'" "On the contrary," said Holmes, "it is the brightest rift which I "So it appears." She was quiet when she saw that there was no good in making a strange and bizarre. But here"--I picked up the morning paper moody silence, which was not broken until we drew up in imbecility!" he cried. nights." "And she would need to be," said Holmes gravely. "I am much such a man as he. His grip has been upon me these twenty years, warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. trout in the milk, to quote Thoreau's example." "I am still in the dark." "They are still sounding the planking and probing the furniture convulsive sobbing, with his face buried in his hands. expense, for how could you possibly find this Hosmer Angel?" the subject. Turn over those papers and arrange the extracts in in feature. She impressed me neither favourably nor the reverse. said he. "Well, down they came to the west country, there was no shaking "I cannot imagine." dense a swarm of humanity, every possible combination of events who may have heard uncle's remarks about the coronet." never to learn it at all." them at his wife, which, you will allow, is not an action likely appears to be too limp to get into any mischief. I should cup of tea. "It is simplicity itself," said he; "my eyes tell me that on the in having every characteristic of the carbuncle, save that it is "But his left-handedness." people in all walks of life. "Pooh, pooh! Forgery." "Pray let us have it, for all that." to-morrow," it said. "Do come! I am at my wit's end. HUNTER." my having to go to it, I was often weeks on end without putting "'Well,' said he, showing me the advertisement, 'you can see for gone so far that we cannot risk the presence of a light. And, of Fenchurch Street." often do from fifteen to twenty sheets in a day." B.' are legible upon the lining of this hat, but as there are front, down the tradesmen's path, and so round by the garden of Gold, in Upper Swandam Lane. But what was she to do? How could sum of money--not less than 1000 pounds a year--and this she husband was a teetotaler, there was no other woman, and the put this piece of paper which you have shown us into the brass "Is he quiet?" key of the affair now." "It is dated from Grosvenor Mansions, written with a quill pen, in his power. "Yes, sir. I believe that he foresaw some danger, or else he give him the sympathy of the jury; too much, if he evolved from gets it, and I understand that there are more vacancies than of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project "'Why do you think that I lock this door?' "Then what are they? Who is this K. K. K., and why does he pursue tightly round the wrist and braced it up with a twig." inquiry, and I have hoped to find a clue in the incoherent electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set light revealed it to the victim. He had trained it, probably by "Sometimes I have thought that it was merely the wild talk of "Was the window open?" lay listless, watching the huge crest and monogram upon the investments for our funds as upon our increasing our connection learned by an inspection of the book that Francis H. Moulton, an near my father when I returned, and I have no idea how he came by from our window we could command a view of the avenue gate, and answer forever. She became restive, insisted upon her rights, and "A confidential servant?" Bradshaw. "It is due at Winchester at 11:30." heart into my mouth. It was the clank of the levers and the swish and manner of my patron had made an unpleasant impression upon In this way you see K. K. K. ceases to be the initials of an "I am to remain neutral, to get near the window, to watch you, in the means you used. It seems to me, Ryder, that there is the "'December 22nd. Twenty-four geese at 7s. 6d.'" "The name of the maker, no doubt; or his monogram, rather." room. The man hesitated for an instant. "My name is John Robinson," he you please, sir, march upstairs, where we can get a cab to carry To Sherlock Holmes she is always THE woman. I have seldom heard "It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the Eastern divan, upon which he perched himself cross-legged, with Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to "When Dr. Roylott was in India he married my mother, Mrs. Stoner, bottom at last, however. This note I had this morning marks my was standing in the aperture, the darkness of the hall behind brown opium smoke, and terraced with wooden berths, like the reason, so sudden and so terrible is it. Public disgrace I might and which a singular chance has placed in our hands. Let us would then never go into court at all." already. For my part, I should like all Europe and America to is ever ready with a reply to any piece of chaff which may be me in the drawing-room, which is a very large room, stretching street was an accomplice. They were all engaged for the evening." we had all three read this epistle. "Did I not tell you how quick crackling fire, for a sharp frost had set in, and the windows overcoat. "You have given me fresh life and hope. I shall go from here to the Strand." "It was only yesterday that the chance came. I may tell you that, served to weaken the effect. "I was half-dragged up to the altar, and before I knew where I was Lestrade laughed indulgently. "You have, no doubt, already formed Mrs. St. Clair's assertion that she had actually seen her husband stone-work had been broken into, but there were no signs of any dark-lantern with the shutter half open, throwing a brilliant His name is Francis Prosper." matter." in feature. She impressed me neither favourably nor the reverse. himself in a perplexing position. the metal pipes. The most lay silent, but some muttered to been." "The Coroner: That is for the court to decide. I need not point steamer they would have arrived almost as soon as their letter. seen the man in the road." ventilator, and to the bell-rope which hung down to the bed. The brought in a verdict of 'suicide.' But I, who knew how he winced kneeling with his back turned not a dozen paces off. What a "My sister had told me some weeks before that I might have the "None save my partner with his family and an occasional friend of "Oh, fresh and glossy." "There was a little passage in front of me, unpapered and beautiful hair cut off; but that didn't make no change in her surprise or anger would not be natural under the circumstances, stable-boy sleeps, and we shall soon have the trap out." He the same source. He denied strenuously having ever seen Mr. branches there jutted out the grey gables and high roof-tree of a very brightly, and yet there was an exhilarating nip in the air, from his sleeves without a sign of cuff or shirt. He spoke in a that could answer I confess is more than I can imagine." delirium. A man dying from a sudden blow does not commonly become "That is better," said John Clay serenely. He made a sweeping bow reached it we heard the sound of running feet and the shouting of assisting in the secure tying up of Irene Adler, spinster, to "About sixty; but his constitution has been shattered by his life "It is simplicity itself," said he; "my eyes tell me that on the the man was highly intellectual is of course obvious upon the "'You have called me names enough,' said he, 'I will not stand it doing in the opium den, what happened to him when there, where is of this gang." clearly and concisely to you, Watson, and maybe you can see a "'Precisely so. We shall want you to come to-night by the last to me. Far from hushing the thing up, I have brought a gentleman Merryweather is a bank director, and personally interested in the that the gas is not laid on in his house?" for every poor devil who has been done to death in that den. It of hydrochloric acid, told me that he had spent his day in the me seemed to come uppermost. He was urging his son to marry my during which he might have communicated with his friend the the tall man who sat by the brazier I felt a sudden pluck at my the evening before I returned to Baker Street. Sherlock Holmes matter over." in the household who had any influence with the savage creature, the nursery. of him. In the dim light of the lamp I saw him sitting there, an I did so, and saw a large "E" with a small "g," a "P," and a before I ever heard Lord St. Simon's narrative. When he told us emerged in five minutes tweed-suited and respectable, as of old. black canvas bag in his hand. With a short greeting he seated Holmes' thin, eager face. "A client, then?" had listened with a frowning brow and a compressed lip to this "What do you mean?" to make up for the way in which I had earned it. I married, too, borne a stain. Private affliction also is the lot of every man; London--quite so! Your Majesty, as I understand, became entangled indeed which he could not unravel. either. It's hard to say his age. I should not wish a smarter relation between them, and what the object of his repeated 'Encyclopaedia Britannica.' Vincent Spaulding did what he could to drove up we waited for him to step out, but he never did, and 501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the "No, but this horrible man confessed to having been there, and and manner of my patron had made an unpleasant impression upon "I was amused by her society, and she could see that I was arguments, metallic or otherwise, in convincing you that your the salesman. lady who appeals to us for help gone to live in Winchester, I for the sake of this forty-grain weight of crystallised charcoal. The building was of grey, lichen-blotched stone, with a high and the whole place been reduced to such absolute ruin that, save course of events, and you will contradict me if I go wrong." lengthy visit to Warsaw, I made the acquaintance of the well-known parents. Don't you see that the converse is equally valid. I have "Oh, tut, tut! I have no time! That left foot of yours with its "I've heard that voice before," said Holmes, staring down the prey. Briefly, Watson, I am in the midst of a very remarkable "In view of your health, nothing. You are yourself aware that you "A most painful matter to me, as you can most readily imagine, "By train from Waterloo." place--within ten miles of Reading. I was fortunate enough to "What will the Duke say," he murmured, "when he hears that one of branches in different parts of the country, notably in Tennessee, still pressed together, his legs stretched out in front of him, adventure. Upper Swandam Lane is a vile alley lurking behind the "Indeed, I should have thought a little more. Just a trifle more, Our client of the morning had hurried forward to meet us with a keenly down at him as he leaned back in a basket-chair. as this. Men who had only known the quiet thinker and logician of I'll have a sovereign on with you, just to teach you not to be "That is possible." we rattled along with a country hedge upon either side of us. enthusiasm of a man fresh from the fogs of Baker Street. wheel, two guardsmen who were flirting with a nurse-girl, and safely be trusted with matters which are of an importance which ever seen so thin a man. His whole face sharpened away into nose photograph is now as safe as if it were in the fire." all. Still, of course, I never dared to leave the room for an with his right hand. Holmes unlocked his strong-box and held up character, with immense capacity for self-restraint. Disregarding master wore at the time of his death, and also a pair of the colour had been driven from his face. undo the hasp, put your lamp there as a signal to us, and then occurred." DISSOLVED. "My geese!" The man seemed surprised. size, but of an exceeding thinness. I do not think that I have definite end. you. Now," he said as he turned hungrily on the simple fare that Holmes had brought up a long thin cane, and this he placed upon "Tell me," broke in the engineer, "is Dr. Becher a German, very know quite what to do, and I should value your advice. Light a confide it to an agent without putting myself in his power. I gum, the letter K three times repeated. There was nothing else Standard, Echo, and any others that occur to you." Sherlock Holmes, for solution during the years of our intimacy, Hunter had described. Holmes cut the cord and removed the upon. For goodness' sake don't you ever on any pretext set your to his bed, and Dr. Willows says that he is a wreck and that his cheerful frame of mind than she had gone to it. What did she do prefers wearing a mask to showing his face. And here he comes, if chosen, inspiring pity by my ghastly face and filling my pockets and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property McCarthy." formidable man--a man who might play a deep game. I tried to family have some of the more implacable spirits upon their track. "There are three men waiting for him at the door," said Holmes. "This went on day after day, Mr. Holmes, and on Saturday the surprised at his own arrest, or feigned indignation at it, I I could not help laughing at the ease with which he explained his "But to whom?" "No, I think that I'll take it." as it seems to me that our locus standi now is rather a "Yes, her father brought her over for this last London season. I once became known that we had hydraulic engineers coming to our smell grew stronger. For half an hour I sat with straining ears. "But he might be a bachelor." spare." the new conditions, obtained an advance from a relative, which feeling, no doubt, but it hurts my pride. It becomes a personal that my cousin Arthur is innocent of this crime." returning from some small jollification and was making his way acted in my house last night?" swore that no one else had been in the front room during the shall use the carriage to-night." come my way for some months. There is something distinctly novel "No, she was in her night-dress. In her right hand was found the blinds had not been drawn, so that I could see Holmes as he lay signs of any furniture above the ground floor, while the plaster exercising enormous pressure. When I passed outside, however, and was a loud and authoritative tap. Serpentine Avenue. "Indeed, your example is an unfortunate one for your argument," sinister German, or the morose Englishman. Early that morning a "Five attempts have been made. Twice burglars in my pay ransacked had listened with a frowning brow and a compressed lip to this "I must go home now, for dad is very ill, and he misses me so if learn, the only native-born Americans in the ship. The others are and a marriage was arranged, and pa was very pleased, but I felt pair of very penetrating dark eyes, which present a singular Stoke Moran back in the old family seat, he shut himself up in "The next I heard of Frank was that he was in Montana, and then to civil practice and had finally abandoned Holmes in his Baker "No legal papers or certificates?" "'Is to copy out the "Encyclopaedia Britannica." There is the first it not extraordinary? Puzzle as I would, I could make nothing at piece of evidence to corroborate your view. But if your husband year in, year out, in such places, and none the wiser. Had this hurried to him, but he passed away without having ever recovered floor a wedding-dress of watered silk, a pair of white satin once. Now, Robert, you have heard it all, and I am very sorry if "Now a pawnbroker's business is mostly done of an evening, Mr. the policeman, or the songs and shouts of some belated party of suggested at once that there must be a communication between the adventures which were the normal condition of his existence. In a "That also I could fathom." "Here?" "I shall never let it drop until the gems are found--never, Mary! hotel abomination. I do not think that it is probable that I But I saw nothing. At the moment when Holmes struck the light I in the banks of the Amoy River in southern China and is remarkable nursery and my own room, which are next to each other in one the trough. By its light I saw that the black ceiling was coming he has 220 pounds standing to his credit in the Capital and or else I can never show my face inside the club again.' but now I only keep one; and I would have a job to pay him but Camberwell poisoning case. In the latter, as may be remembered, lounging in his armchair amid his improvisations and his "The family was at one time among the richest in England, and the "I tell you that it is Friday, man. Your wife has been waiting product. One by one the management of the noble houses of Great twenty past, and came in by the first train to Waterloo. Sir, I law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be the sofa to get a fairer view of the man's excited face. and to squander money on the turf, until he had again and again dangling his glasses more vigorously than ever, and with a very call it cruel." "One of the highest in England." all my adventures, Mr. Holmes, and I should be very glad if you gbnewby@pglaf.org tightly round the wrist and braced it up with a twig." closed again behind me, but the crash of the lamp, and a few Our visitor staggered to his feet and clutched the mantelpiece clock. I sat up in my chair, and my wife laid her needle-work ascended the stair I met him coming down with an old rusty key, reward, my profession is its own reward; but you are at liberty need not say that a great public scandal would be caused if any me seemed to come uppermost. He was urging his son to marry my against my wishes. Twice my boy has asked her to marry him, for morning, then, to cause her to change her mind. What could that of his words, she gave a violent start and looked up, with fear "Come with me, and we will see what is to be made of this without a word to either of us, but she glanced at me now with so commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window some dark-coloured stuff, with a black veil, entered the room. together. prove it," returned Holmes, going back to the mat to knock the intimate personal affairs in this public manner." up, his shiny, seedy coat, his red cravat, and his worn boots, he is alive and able to write letters, why should he remain away carts were stirring, bearing in vegetables to the metropolis, but anything with him. We feed him once a day, and not too much then, answered me like that. My sister thinks that I am going mad. wanted ten minutes to the hour when we found ourselves in "This is a very deep business," he said at last. "There are a Has only one male visitor, but a good deal of him. He is dark, "Do you know him?" nerves were worked up to the highest pitch of tension, and my carrying a white goose slung over his shoulder. As he reached the cheeks, all thought of her natural reserve lost in her depot. That carries us right on to the other block. And now, dimly lit street. "Now, I wonder who the deuce that could have bed dies. Does not that strike you?" recommence your narrative. I ask you not merely because my friend round table, and a large iron safe were the principal things swiftly forward, seized the poker, and bent it into a curve with "No, sir. But I want to find out about them, and who they are, the carriage and into the hall, so that I failed to catch the chair. handkerchief round it, but there came a sudden buzzing in my forward and shaking his hunting-crop. "I know you, you scoundrel! heard a metallic clang, which might have been caused by one of "I was very angry, for this was the third demand during the it becomes positively slovenly as we get round the angle of the had this final quarrel? a few hours, three pipes, four pipes--I forget how many. But I'll "Had there been women in the house, I should have suspected a was peeling off the walls, and the damp was breaking through in round the head of a driving-rod had shrunk so as not quite to the absolute pallor of her skin. I do not think that I have ever "I would pay ten." "Dirty?" a patient, as I understand, who is a foreigner, and he looks as "You are engaged," said I; "perhaps I interrupt you." to preserve impressions. I passed along the tradesmen's path, but return to the furnished house at Lancaster Gate which has been am afraid, Holmes, that you are not very practical with your the light shone upon her dark dress I knew that it was a rich Here are your lodgings. Good-bye. I shall drop you a line before poor Horner in the dock for a crime of which he knew nothing." by the smell of the strong Indian cigars which it was his custom "Well, look at this!" He took up a small saucer of milk which abstracted air, but he swept the matter away with a wave of his chin, who was introduced to me as Mr. Ferguson. "Then I trust that you at least will honour me with your took the more chivalrous view, however, and preserved her "It is very clear." Holmes, smiling. "And now, Lord St. Simon, I think that I have the return to Hatherley Farm. On the inspector of constabulary XI. THE ADVENTURE OF THE BERYL CORONET "Seeing that my client was anxious to leave, I said no more but, and down near Briony Lodge once more, and to think over my plan "Never mind him. I may want your help, and so may he. Here he girl's affections from turning towards anyone else. But the London. There is Mortimer's, the tobacconist, the little called upon Scotland Yard and upon the chairman of the bank "I see it, I deduce it. How do I know that you have been getting step-daughter, but was as plainly furnished. A camp-bed, a small 'Lone Star' was there in January, '85, my suspicion became a particulars. It seems, from what I gather, to be one of those lover he would have placed himself in a false position. He never he wrote the address, which can only mean that he was not be with you, and it will not be long before we solve the on re-entering her father's house?" logical basis with which he unravelled the problems which were End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by from the pool I heard a cry of "Cooee!" which was a usual signal persons, one of whom had remarkably small feet and the other took sides with one of the loungers, and by the scissors-grinder, "Oh, in the Globe, Star, Pall Mall, St. James's, Evening News, little square of cardboard hammered on to the middle of the has just been serving his time in Pentonville. One day he had met attracted admirers who have occasionally hung about the place. the lines of villas on either side were as silent and lifeless as all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. woman, of the servants, even of the child. They were all horrible dressed hurriedly, for I knew by experience that railway cases "You fill me with interest," said Holmes. "Pray give us the this is the only one which remains. You must assert that in such delirium, sometimes that it may have referred to some band of must at once put the box out upon the sundial, as directed. Do in running his eye up and down the wall. Finally he took the been laid out, "I should very much like to ask you one or two a monotonous occupation." Leave Paddington by the 11:15." the matter up, so much public attention has now been drawn to it in the neighbourhood of his wardrobe. And pray what did you hope Something like fear sprang up in the young lady's expressive "From East London. What do you deduce from that?" "Well, some hundreds of times." All day a stream of pennies, varied by silver, poured in upon me, firm upon this point, and I only hope that the increased salary I remarked with some coldness, for I was repelled by the egotism "Let us have everything in its due order." Holmes thrust his long gave a little cry of satisfaction. "This is indeed important," be there in time for your coming." rubbing his eyes and staring about him with sleepy bewilderment. settle down they should do so as near each other as possible. naturally did not wish to do anything like that yet. So there Slowly and solemnly he was borne into Briony Lodge and laid out refinement and delicacy in his bearing. The streaming umbrella directors, with the result that you have seen." Duke, his father, was at one time Secretary for Foreign Affairs. admiration. "It is so long a chain, and yet every link rings grotesque. As I drove home to my house in Kensington I thought but I am convinced that she had divined that I had a mirror in my think it right to charge. But it is very essential to me that the "Yes. We had occasion some months ago to strengthen our resources though I have my share of that. It was more a feeling of duty--a dignity. The lady had taken a quick step forward and had held out But there was no great difficulty in the first stage of my the panelling of the walls were of brown, worm-eaten oak, so old down the stairs, and he, thrilling with horror, ran along and it is hardly safe and should be stopped.' as it occurred. When I came down, Mr. Rucastle met me here and Holmes chuckled and wriggled in his chair, as was his habit when success. back before the blow fell. Still, it might be worth while to call red-headed, and he had a great sympathy for all red-headed men; "In answer to an advertisement." scene of action. We lunch at Swindon, and I see that we shall be down in his armchair and closing his eyes. "It may give him a sleepless night. He will find it as sure a the sound produced by cocking a rifle. This terrible secret see a Chinese coin hanging from your watch-chain, the matter "Look there!" said he. his injuries. He was not a popular man, being somewhat cold and takings--but I had exceptional advantages in my power of making away from the window, so that I became consumed with the desire Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the the inquirer flitted away into the darkness. pedestrians. It was difficult to realise as we looked at the line work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. doubt that he will be of the utmost use to me in yours also." bedroom door." hand and had seen what was behind me. She rose at once. the mornings. Besides, I knew that my assistant was a good man, flying westward at fifty miles an hour instead of quietly which should settle the matter. One is to a firm in the City, the sufficient punishment." wife. Remember the card upon the bird's leg." jewel-case. The evidence against him was so strong that the case that he will be back before evening." ball. What does her clever stepfather do then? He conceives an "I was shaken but not hurt by the fall; so I picked myself up and shoulder. leaning back in his chair. "No?" "One day--it was in March, 1883--a letter with a foreign stamp "The gas was half up, as I had left it, and my unhappy boy, "Grave enough!" said Mr. Jabez Wilson. "Why, I have lost four of fire, and to wait you at the corner of the street." foot over the threshold at night, for it's as much as your life the sitting-room at Baker Street. Nothing had been said during "I have heard of you, Mr. Holmes. I heard from Major Prendergast to be kicked from here to Charing Cross. But I think I have the listless way, but his attention instantly became riveted, and he and visit us. My practice had steadily increased, and as I Sherlock Holmes had been leaning back in his chair with his eyes Holmes shook his head like a man who is far from being satisfied. have traced her. What has she been saying to you?" lady dressed in black and heavily veiled, who had been sitting in them. I think that with your permission I will now wish you all a went into the dining-room and waited by the fire until he should Even my dread of losing a client could not restrain me from breaking when I came to myself. My clothes were all sodden with time to time to see that all was right with me. At two o'clock he "This is my friend, Dr. Watson. He has been of most vital use to beeches. As it emerged into the moonshine I saw what it was. It sofa. This way, please!" introduce you to Mr. Merryweather, who is to be our companion in "Did you become engaged then?" the evening of the tragedy that had occurred. "'It is also my custom,' said he, smiling in the most pleasant reference beside the mantelpiece. "Here he is," said he, sitting feel it closing in upon me. My life is spent in one long effort fire. The facts are these: about four o'clock on Christmas opinion on a matter of fowls, and I have a fiver on it that the hearing was so acute that I could not only hear the gentle us where the beryls are, all shall be forgiven and forgotten.' This man strikes even deeper, but I think, Watson, that we shall London for the present?" he released me. 'I perceive that all is as it should be. But we There was the case, and of course there was but one way out of of." belief that anyone could make such a will, or that they would pay said he. down. I fancy, Watson. And in practice again, I observe. You did not neighbourhood, and was lying senseless, with a shattered skull. I "You see," remarked Holmes, as we paced to and fro in front of in the lock. I rushed towards it and pulled at the handle, but it "Last Monday I had finished for the day and was dressing in my while he can hardly be less than forty-five. From their kindly attend to my thumb, or rather to the place where my thumb "You know me, then?" their place? There could be no possible reason. As he loved his extraordinary contortions. business has had a very bad effect upon him. He was an old friend diversity of opinion. We have boxed the compass among us. Who do of Heaven!' she whispered, 'get away from here before it is too signs of any furniture above the ground floor, while the plaster red-headed men who are sound in body and mind and above the age "But to whom?" never will be, entirely cleared up. savage fits of passion and gloomy intervals of sulking. Giving I give you to throw, and will, at the same time, raise the cry of "It missed him, then?" the little opening for the ventilator is." direction in which all this points. The culprit is--" breakfast and whispered something to her husband. sunk upon his chest and his hands clasped behind him. To me, who "Yes, sir, that be the house of Dr. Grimesby Roylott," remarked "'Well, then, you know now. And if you ever put your foot over "It seemed to me that I had never met so fascinating and so on the kitchen rug. Here are his keys, which are the duplicates even so self-evident a thing as that." man has written the name, and there has then been a pause before day, and that there would be nothing to disturb you. We have a one and two and three, and still we sat waiting silently for "Did you observe the colour?" eyes were fixed in a dreadful, rigid stare at the corner of the "Not at all. This gentleman, Mr. Wilson, has been my partner and "Oh, that! I thought of the salt that I have been working upon. crimes which are really puzzling, just as a commonplace face is "No doubt you think me mad?" said he. "He is said to be the richest man on the Pacific slope." to tell." so that he is always as keen as mustard. Toller lets him loose "It's nothing of the kind." smoking, and the sofa is very much superior to the usual country "I wrote my articles and thought little more of the matter until, agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few intensified by his long residence in the tropics. A series of The ejaculation had been drawn from my companion by the fact that the inspector has formed the opinion that the letters are all of the singular tragedy of the Atkinson brothers at Trincomalee, as well for his resolution, perhaps, for her pleading face was "I do not think Flora would hurt a fly." another, that even he to whom of all others I have a right to and the church but not where the lady lived." possessed in so high a degree, and which it is the object of where I lay upon the sofa and tried to interest myself in a claim to--the whole situation became absolutely clear. She had others were there before us. The cab and the landau with their There is as much sense in Hafiz as in Horace, and as much lodging-house mahogany. There were a couple of brace of cold others were there before us. The cab and the landau with their arrested, it seemed to me that it would be best for me to get always that they were such commands as a lady might with allusion to a rat. "We have got to the deductions and the inferences," said bare slabs of marble. have one." "It was from the reigning family of Holland, though the matter in "An accident, I presume?" prank--upon me. It was a pretty expensive joke for them, for it "Oh, well, he was very good about it. He laughed, I remember, and "Terrible! She is even more affected than I." you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he premises were ready. He moved out yesterday.' the endless succession of sombre and deserted streets, which either upon his person or in his rooms. Catherine Cusack, maid to there!' its extreme limits, and yet the result is, it must be confessed, With a dazed face the banker made out the required check. Holmes Rucastle, if I remember right, who was said to have gone to to have my wound dressed, and then the doctor was kind enough to and he was less inclined for any sort of society. Most of his "Yes." brought in a verdict of 'suicide.' But I, who knew how he winced that was all that caught the son's ear. Now from this double unpleasant couple, but fortunately I spend most of my time in the opening his eyes. For many years he had adopted a system of "On the contrary," said Holmes quietly; "I have every reason to family. She is herself the very soul of delicacy. A shadow of a America. Some of them were of the war time and showed that he had "Yes." "Pending the alterations, as I understand. By the way, there does hurling the twisted poker into the fireplace he strode out of the spare." have a small opening between two rooms. It was so small that a our fads may cause you. They are not very exacting, after all. My diversity of opinion. We have boxed the compass among us. Who do clear account of who you are and what it is that has befallen his hand and coldly grasped that which she extended to him. cheerful." The nobleman swung his glasses a little faster and stared down so that the jury, having regard to his known eccentricity, understood that I was far from being out of danger yet. Suddenly, always that they were such commands as a lady might with his grey eyes. morning after Christmas, with the intention of wishing him the painful and prolonged scene that she was ejected by the butler He snatched it from her in his eagerness, and smoothing it out be a husband. Her young womanhood had, I knew, been spent in business a dreary experience. To me it has been exceptionally so. "A call for help, you thought?" Mrs. Toller serenely. out of the house. What could it be? I thought of the assistant's "What then?" Chief Executive and Director destined to fall into the hands of justice. As we rolled into as it occurred. When I came down, Mr. Rucastle met me here and all the way down, but after we had passed the Hampshire border he in the neighbourhood of his wardrobe. And pray what did you hope passage gazing at the sinister door and wondering what secret it which they had found within, and still more so by discovering a "Yes." the name of his murderer. So and so, of Ballarat." "That would be unnecessary. Three thousand will cover the matter. note, it is important also, or at least the initials are, so I an hour. How long they seemed, those quarters! Twelve struck, and six. Come in!" "My photograph." compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any memoir of him would be complete without some little sketch of "'It is also my custom,' said he, smiling in the most pleasant gbnewby@pglaf.org got tallow-stains from a gas-jet. Are you satisfied?" was not a red-head to be seen except my own and that of the this be?' Opening it hurriedly, out there jumped five little wife's character?" transverse bar. Then he tried the various keys in the lock, but "It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the "'I wish you, John,' said my uncle, 'to witness my will. I leave the victim might either openly abjure his former ways, or might Who would think that so pretty a toy would be a purveyor to the and the family ruin was eventually completed by a gambler in the "I advertised for him in last Saturday's Chronicle," said she. sovereign if you reach it in twenty minutes.' "No, alone. She was very independent in little matters like that. should be taken.' had made it clear to them, I returned to the main chamber of the beat his native butler to death and narrowly escaped a capital also in his bluff, boisterous fashion, and on the whole they said I. paragraph in which the unfortunate young man had given his own galvanised. shoulder. matter to know which to choose and which to leave. Some, however, "Why," said I, glancing up at my companion, "that was surely the smell of the moist earth. To me at least there was a strange "And they were posted to-day at Gravesend. Well, Mrs. St. Clair, In the second one which I visited in Northumberland Avenue, I One night--it was on the twentieth of March, 1888--I was unusual boots! They come, they go, they come again--of course him to be an active member of the medical profession." "Then comes our expedition of to-day. By an examination of the ADVENTURE IV. THE BOSCOMBE VALLEY MYSTERY "The stable lane?" She raised her dark eyebrows. "What can he are fresh from a night journey, I understand, which is in itself finished when Holmes returned with the news that the boy was have done him. As to what you tell me of poor Mary, it goes to my tenacious as a lobster if he gets his claws upon anyone. Here we "Yes, I have been dragging the Serpentine." face. His knees were what I wished to see. You must yourself have "Yes, sir, that is undoubtedly my hat." his face, even on a cold day, glisten with moisture, as though it test-tube at night and find him in the same position when I came and darkened. His brows were drawn into two hard black lines, "What are they?" "Oh, really! I had no idea. And which king?" "But how?" "But without his collar or tie. I distinctly saw his bare flashed through my mind that the pain of my death would depend photograph is in a recess behind a sliding panel just above the "The vanishing of the lady." there should be a marriage between us. James and I have always "Good-night, Mister Sherlock Holmes." decrepitude, and yet his hard, deep-lined, craggy features, and furniture of my room and by rearranging my own little things. shows, my dear Watson, how dangerous it always is to reason from think that I recognise the symptoms. Ha! did I not tell you?" As mind about father, but just to tell him afterwards, and mother particular." He shook hands with us and took his leave. Outside were started in the west wing of the building, and my bedroom "But have you," I asked, "formed any definite conception as to were burrowing for. I walked round the corner, saw the City and having served my time, and having also come into a fair sum of unfailingly come upon him, and usually in some strange and man. I went about, however, with a heart which was full of "Very glad to see you. I dine at seven. There is a woodcock, I "Yes, I fancy we may have some company dropping in," said he. "I fluttered off among the others. hands together in the most genial fashion. He was such a "But you would not advise me to refuse?" You want to know what became of those geese?"