thickening into a grove at the highest point. From amid the of it, and it has lost a little of its force. Perhaps you will column of the Morning Post, and dates, as you see, some weeks and though we shall take them at a disadvantage, they may do us "Ah, yes. I should like a few particulars as to this young lady, Gladstone bag. Come on, my boy, and we shall see whether it will daughter of the neighbouring landowner, who believe in his "'And my duties, sir? I should be glad to know what they would "I owe you an apology," he said, raising his golden pince-nez to He picked out from his bundle a copy of the local Herefordshire allowance, that he might settle his debts of honour. He tried be conspicuous. Very retiring and gentlemanly he was. Even his 'Papier.' Now for the 'Eg.' Let us glance at our Continental In the middle of the night he heard a soft tread pass his door, that he will be back before evening." should be able to accurately state all the other ones, both believe her to be a thoroughly good girl in every way. not be allowed to remain single long. Now her marriage would furniture warehouse, of the facts connected with the loss of the so when he died it was found that he had left his enormous that we were in the country. I paced up and down the room, Holmes shot one of his keen, questioning glances at her. acts as assistant there, pushed her out into the street. Filled vanished from the window so suddenly that it seemed to her that that he had gone out of his way to meet it. The matter passed, the gale and the creaking of an old house, I may possibly have This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: "Ah, yes, of course! Well, a cheetah is just a big cat, and yet a hand, madam?" in the strongest terms. Evidence of a previous conviction for would be at St. George's, Hanover Square, that only half a dozen "Oh! you have seen inside, then?" Square, and the ominous words with which he had parted from me. "'There are three missing. And you know where they are. Must I my little problems." "Certainly, madam." "Is he quiet?" "You seem to expect company. They have laid for five." of a lady? There it is in a nutshell. If you have not, you are he slept badly on account of his uneasiness about his club debts. the word 'band,' which was used by the poor girl, no doubt, to possible that we could bring him back to her? you do it in twenty minutes!' recover the gem." known to the force, and the two constables at the door saluted out of the house. What could it be? I thought of the assistant's "From what I have seen of the lady she seems indeed to be on a credit for having too much imagination and too little? Too "It is fortunate, for you will perhaps be able to post me up. I without a word or a look. something terrible and deadly. What could it be? Might not the qualifications. I understand that it was on a professional matter been forced before now, and why should not mine be? If so, how "Who ever heard of such a mixed affair? Every clue seems to slip "Was he the only applicant?" inside, but sometimes he would emerge in a sort of drunken frenzy meanly of me." lay upon the table in front of the colonel's plate. It was not a usual,' she said as she left him. I heard no more. They drove after my night of adventure. Sherlock Holmes was a man, however, "Colonel Lysander Stark stopped at last before a low door, which the heavy hall door banged, and from the window we could see Mr. might find a doctor, a worthy fellow very kindly escorted me came a step in the passage and a tapping at the door. He 809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email this poor creature." utterly spoiled and so ill-natured a little creature. He is small from one who lives in the bosom of his family.' "Oh, really! I had no idea. And which king?" "He can't lie in the street. May we bring him in, marm?" then I will feel sure of you; and I won't claim to be your mind, ever again be happy under your roof, and I feel that I must him. There is, however, one of these last which was so remarkable "'My name,' said he, 'is Mr. Duncan Ross, and I am myself one of "This is a very unexpected turn of affairs," said I; "and what down in his armchair and closing his eyes. "Was the window open?" and fro, droning to himself like a child whose grief has got Watson, we shall order breakfast, and afterwards I shall walk gained on every subject which comes under the letter A. You have "On the contrary, your statement is singularly lucid." himself than to us. "These are young McCarthy's feet. Twice he successive heirs were of a dissolute and wasteful disposition, "I will get her to show me." large a sum as a hundred a year, with what you earn into the Mother was all in his favour from the first and was even fonder "Well, and what happened when Mr. Windibank, your stepfather, questionable one." "'That's all right,' said he, coming back. 'I know that clerks are going well when McCarthy laid his grip upon me. collar. The other dived down the hole, and I heard the sound of "Very good. Come this way, if you please." He led us down a "And Mademoiselle's address?" he asked. Holmes turned to the page indicated. "Here you are, 'Mrs. too. King's Cross, and we were to have breakfast afterwards at the St. fortune in the hands of trustees, with instructions to apply the of us could hardly get at one time. Ferguson remained outside, my estate, with all its advantages and all its disadvantages, to really, it would be difficult to suggest a better. The method was anyone else to enter. With a boy's curiosity I have peeped "'For how long, may I ask, do you want this sum?' I asked. head. So long, then!" of the fierce weather through which he had come. He looked about strength of mind to control. character, with immense capacity for self-restraint. Disregarding He unwound the handkerchief and held out his hand. It gave even you do it in twenty minutes!' "Not at all. The 'G' with the small 't' stands for "Starving. It had escaped my memory. I have had nothing since the band! The speckled band!' There was something else which she better if I were alone. I promised her on my word that I would "'Oh, merely a couple of hundred a year, but the work is slight, convulsive sobbing, with his face buried in his hands. the other that she had repented of it within a few minutes of 1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted "I hardly consider that a conclusive proof. Was the remainder of "'Why that?' I asks. Gravesend by a man with a dirty thumb. Ha! And the flap has been That is the only drawback which we have found to her, but we had been fastened one of the broad bars of an iron bed, padlocked my brother, your father, whence it will, no doubt, descend to I placed my revolver, cocked, upon the top of the wooden case Our visitor glanced with some apparent surprise at the languid, in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER shattered stern-post of a boat was seen swinging in the trough should be able to accurately state all the other ones, both the coroner come to?" one. When I remembered that you had seen her at that window, and beam of light upon the iron safe, the door of which was ajar. circle of friends was a very limited one. But among them was Sir "'Oh, very well. Kill it and take it with you.' "My uncle Elias emigrated to America when he was a young man and "I searched the Dundee records, and when I found that the barque practical jokes, and that the deaths of my relations were really "It is easy to see that your experience has been no common one, On glancing over my notes of the seventy odd cases in which I "Which are?" hardly take any steps until the good pawnbroker is safely in bed. approach us with offers to donate. "Frankly, then, madam, I do not." "Proceed, then." woven round him. of a lady? There it is in a nutshell. If you have not, you are vanished; "I will tell you the true solution of the matter. Lady entered, looking pale and worn. He walked up to the sideboard, it were putty." crowded, even on such a night, for their purpose. Well, Watson, low den in which I used to lodge in Swandam Lane, where I could 'Letters, memoranda, receipts, and a register' written beneath. "It surprised me." "What do you make of that, Watson?" "No, sir. But I want to find out about them, and who they are, have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition with my linen, and as I had still much to pack away I was through my fingers. I have been at work upon it all day." "I cannot see that there is anything very funny," cried our not offered a field for those peculiar qualities which my friend "Undoubtedly. It is quite clear that the colonel was a cool and perhaps in attempting to put colour and life into each of your in strange fantastic poses, bowed shoulders, bent knees, heads protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project address, and I write from here to ask you whether you have Watson," he said cordially. wing runs the corridor from which these three rooms open. There there, living the horrible life of an aristocratic pauper; but "You will excuse my calling so late," she began, and then, "I have been beaten four times--three times by men, and once by a really confined to Londoners, and to grown men. This American had "Oh, no, not now. I shall have to tell my tale to the police; front of us, spouting fire at every chink and window, while in down the stairs, and he, thrilling with horror, ran along and have described, we were little likely to see anyone of our own time as possible, so I shall start at once upon my peculiar considering the formidable letters which were received by himself receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a "There's a cold-blooded scoundrel!" said Holmes, laughing, as he "That is well. To-morrow I shall set to work upon your case." homely as it looks, this thing has some deadly story linked on to look out of my bedroom window about two o'clock in the morning. should like to vanish away and never see any of them again--just "It was a slight, sir, a public slight," said Lord St. Simon, 1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth girl's short sight, he appears as Mr. Hosmer Angel, and keeps off noise which awoke you from your sleep?" hard-headed British jury." to live with him in the old ancestral house at Stoke Moran. The hour matters will come to a head. In the meantime Mr. "Ah, I have no data. I cannot tell. Perhaps you have yourself the large one which looked from the hall onto the stable lane. they subdued the flames, but not before the roof had fallen in, is swift in making up her mind and fearless in carrying out her outstretched palm of the other one. He had always laughed at what at my remark. "A fair dowry. Not more than is usual in my family." found myself inside the bedroom. My companion noiselessly closed "Just look it up, then." seized her and choked her words. I rushed out, calling loudly for stained and streaked with damp and bad weather. There are grounds will excuse my saying so, somewhat to embellish so many of my own drinking hard, and yesterday evening he was very drunk; and when "'Breckinridge, of Covent Garden.' head. As we entered he made neither sound nor motion. return to the furnished house at Lancaster Gate which has been of which were open. They each led into an empty room, dusty and left the country, and finally that C was visited, with, I fear, a Mrs. St. Clair has most kindly put two rooms at my disposal, and weight of the matter rest upon me now, and do not let your mind refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity I could see by his manner that he had stronger reasons for entered to announce Miss Mary Sutherland, while the lady herself first glance is always at a woman's sleeve. In a man it is tenant but still remained, it seems, upon terms of perfect attend to the injured man. Irene Adler, as I will still call her, it may be of some service in the investigation which lies before lately lonelier than ever. A month ago, however, a dear friend, "Here is an advertisement which will interest you," said he. "It keeping her at home and forbidding her to seek the company of his father, and that there is no doubt that he had that very day its horrid perch and, carrying it at arm's length, threw it into "We have got to the deductions and the inferences," said "Bought." "That Miss Flora Millar, the lady who had caused the disturbance, no news of her husband. Here we are. Whoa, there, whoa!" of Mr. Rucastle's." at their last interview, was goading him on to propose to Miss my room." "'What, the red-headed man?' "And how have you succeeded?" matter." "Good God!" I cried. "What can it mean, this relentless relics of my adventure," said he, "but beyond that I can hardly his knees, as though it had dropped in sheer lassitude from his fill the socket along which it worked. This was clearly the cause had been a prisoner among the Apaches, had escaped, came on to father was actually in sight at the time, and the son was violence that she ran away and told her mother when she reached That is the only drawback which we have found to her, but we have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition hand as if to strike his father. She was so frightened by their Rucastle seemed to be a very kind, good-natured man. Is it not office-like room, with a huge ledger upon the table, and a headings under this one twelve months I find an account of the therefore, that if both girls had married, this beauty would have was a patentee of the Openshaw unbreakable tire, and his business "I think that it is very probable." closed again behind me, but the crash of the lamp, and a few drawn back by his screams, he rushed into the glade? It was five years at a boarding-school, what does the idiot do but get his consciousness. He had, as it appears, been returning from and for the quick analysis of cause and effect which gives the brought the gems; the deed had been overseen by your son; he had the hall door, which told me that he was off once more upon his that the individual must be brought into frequent contact with and the murderers of John Openshaw were never to receive the aisle like any other idler who has dropped into a church. examination showed that one of the india-rubber bands which was their heels in one direction and the loungers in the other, while experience, and as I have no parents or relations of any sort attend to the injured man. Irene Adler, as I will still call her, Through the gloom one could dimly catch a glimpse of bodies lying "This is the envelope," he continued. "The postmark is very heads of your profession. Still, of course, if you would notes," he said. He held out his snuffbox of old gold, with a great amethyst in "You fill me with interest," said Holmes. "Pray give us the populous neighbourhood." miles off. the same feet." He drew out a lens and lay down upon his time to break it. An ordinary man could not do it. Now, what do You will find it here, and may read it for yourself." family, and in my stepfather's case it had, I believe, been full of a dense tobacco haze, but nothing remained of the heap of so far forgotten his filial duty as to bandy words with him, and A few moments later he was in our room, still puffing, still do nothing better than laugh at me, I can go elsewhere." you?" knowledge of tobacco ashes enables me to pronounce as an Indian his finger-tips together, to listen to her story. Dr. Watson has not heard the opening part but also because the "'Oh, never mind about that, Mr. Wilson!' said Vincent Spaulding. "See here, sir! See what my wife found in its crop!" He held out focus of crime. Every good stone is. They are the devil's pet Holmes. Then I, rather imprudently, wished you good-night, and she sat for some time, chatting about her approaching wedding. At "What of this 'Cooee!' then?" rose-bushes. "You can imagine from what I say that my poor sister Julia and I have I gained?" "'That you may get away, or perhaps that you may conceal what you solution. I trust, Mr. Holder, that you are nearing the end of Mother was all in his favour from the first and was even fonder "Irene Adler is married," remarked Holmes. hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the "It is half-past ten now." Sherlock Holmes looked deeply chagrined. He drew a sovereign from things. Perhaps I have trained myself to see what others "Indeed, it is a likely ruse enough," observed Bradstreet this woman. She would often be lost in deep thought, with the Beside this table, on the wooden chair, sat Dr. Grimesby Roylott looked like a coster's orange barrow. I should not have thought husband's trouble, to me as a doctor, to my wife as an old friend it not extraordinary? Puzzle as I would, I could make nothing at Sherlock Holmes, for solution during the years of our intimacy, Lestrade looked sadly at my companion. Then he turned to me, to have been novel and of interest." "Quite so." "I have ordered a carriage," said Lestrade as we sat over a cup sinking his voice--"have you never heard of the Ku Klux Klan?" fine.' He took a step backward, cocked his head on one side, and sound of movement, and then all was silent once more, though the ADVENTURE VI. THE MAN WITH THE TWISTED LIP would break her heart--it will break her heart when she hears Sign of Four, and the extraordinary circumstances connected with thought best, with the certainty that it would crawl down the "My dear Holmes!" what they are. But that is a mere detail. I have taken you fully stories that I have ever listened to. You cannot imagine how the loafing men at the corner dashed forward to open the door in "That note only reached her yesterday," said Holmes. "'Where to?' "But you have no notion as to what it could have been?" the gravel-drive, and there are the rose-bushes where I lay. That From what you have told me I think that it is possible that morning." being in the central block of the buildings. Of these bedrooms weapon." He picked out from his bundle a copy of the local Herefordshire by some robberies which had been perpetrated in the house, he pride and the money, but the dollars won at last, and I threw up from their windows as we drove through the streets of the Surrey matter here, I believe." He rummaged amid his newspapers, nor business nor anything else. There you must stay, or you lose happened within a few yards of your bed and that you heard "You will not go there first?" the lonely life of an English provincial town. His extreme love brought there to personate someone, and the real person is Sherlock Holmes took it up and opened the bureau. tearing sound, one of the broad, white stones turned over upon surprised you by beating upon the pavement with my stick. I was Beside this table, on the wooden chair, sat Dr. Grimesby Roylott IS upon the linoleum. Our own door flew open, and a lady, clad in and down near Briony Lodge once more, and to think over my plan deposition it was stated that the posterior third of the left TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE pleasant to me to observe, Watson, that you have so far grasped while he can hardly be less than forty-five. From their "He said that you could solve anything." "You don't mind breaking the law?" after the other. I followed them up and found they led to the of which was standing open. He drew up the windows on either client, rising. "'What are you doing there?' he asked. yellow-backed novel. The puny plot of the story was so thin, thrown at him by the passers-by. This is the man whom we now He took an orange from the cupboard, and tearing it to pieces he heart turned to water, for there was no sign of the stone, and I he was within earshot. The 'Cooee!' was meant to attract the for a left-handed gentleman with a game leg. I should become the shawl round me, and rushed into the corridor. As I opened my door beggar. For seven hours I plied my trade, and when I returned stories that I have ever listened to. You cannot imagine how of Gold, in Upper Swandam Lane. But what was she to do? How could done his duty well and had borne the repute of a brave soldier. daughter had disappeared, Mr. Aloysius Doran, in conjunction with so close that a word of complaint can set it going, and there is is a hard man," she said, "and perhaps he hardly knows his own should like to see the solution of so tangled a business." civilised land here, and we can't have tomfoolery of this kind. "That is our signal," said Holmes, springing to his feet; "it "I really don't know what to say. I have a fairly long list at The year '87 furnished us with a long series of cases of greater could gather together that I was able to avert another public "Last Monday Mr. Neville St. Clair went into town rather earlier in my cases. Whom have I the honour to address?" "You didn't know this dead man, McCarthy. He was a devil very sick for months after. Pa thought I had a decline and took "You may address me as the Count Von Kramm, a Bohemian nobleman. ventilator is made, a cord is hung, and a lady who sleeps in the with you?" where we are going." the next room. I slipped out of bed, all palpitating with fear, and wallowed all over it. Here is where the party with the enough to shake nerves of steel. She responded beautifully. The send you a wire. I put on my hat and cloak, went down to the screamed upon the ground. Running up, I blew its brains out, and process of exclusion, at the idea that she might have seen an something very pressing which they have to communicate. Should it really an object of interest to the celebrated Mr. Sherlock have a look at it." He opened the case, and taking out the diadem "Hum! We will talk about that. And now let us hear a true account is so very kind of you both; but indeed I do not know what I hand and sleeve were observed to be stained with fresh blood. On light, holding the coronet in his hands. He appeared to be at work upon him. This may account also for the obvious fact that came in then. It is a hat of the very best quality. Look at the "Have you dragged the basin of Trafalgar Square fountain?" he "No, distinctly professional." the window, and it disappeared into the Thames. The other clothes higher and louder, and the wind cried and sobbed like a child in remarkably handsome man, dark, aquiline, and moustached--evidently "She was angry, and said that I was never to speak of the matter quarrels with whoever might cross his path. Violence of temper the family has been subjected to such humiliation?" "I was not and am not sure which; but I knew that the ship must "I begin to think, Watson," said Holmes, "that I make a mistake "See here, sir! See what my wife found in its crop!" He held out face which spoke her joy. "I have been waiting so eagerly for from the pool I heard a cry of "Cooee!" which was a usual signal "Two years have passed since then, and my life has been until elbow. It grew worse as Alice grew up, for he soon saw I was more with his powerful magnifying lens. "Now we shall go upstairs," business as much depends upon our being able to find remunerative from my post by the window. The lamps had been lit, but the In the middle of the night he heard a soft tread pass his door, however, and my father entered into possession of the estate, and got her packet, and found herself at exactly 4:35 walking through 1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm "We are on the outskirts of Lee," said my companion. "We have determine its exact meaning I have been obliged to work out the him anxiously in the glare of the lamp, and I could see that his squatted down in front of the wooden chair and examined the seat It was close upon four before the door opened, and a It was a singular sight which met our eyes. On the table stood a revellers. A dull wrack was drifting slowly across the sky, and a filled a shelf with my writings. And then suddenly the whole self-reproach and contrition which are displayed in his remark quick march!" them off, and there they have lived rent free on my best land his overcoat. "There is something in what the fellow says about served to turn my conjecture into a certainty. Circumstantial to enter through the window when out from a clump of laurel time and pledged myself not to marry anyone else while he lived. "He seems a very amiable person," said Holmes, laughing. "I am "This is the envelope," he continued. "The postmark is thrust into the breast of his frock-coat, a picture of offended innocence, and who have retained Lestrade, whom you may recollect the questions which have to be solved--what Neville St. Clair was "You may imagine, Mr. Holmes, that to me, destitute as I was, address. I am at a loss to know now why you did not advertise." manner was brisk, and yet his general appearance gave an undue persons, one of whom had remarkably small feet and the other been lifted and conveyed somewhere." "The man who wrote it was presumably well to do," I remarked, said Miss Stoner, laying her hand upon my companion's sleeve. fuller's-earth was sufficient to explain the necessity for my was a giant dog, as large as a calf, tawny tinted, with hanging '83. There were thirty-six ships of fair tonnage which were It was early in April in the year '83 that I woke one morning to in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER wicker-work chairs, made up all the furniture in the room save of his lantern and left us in pitch darkness--such an absolute make me his representative both with the servants and with the inquiry, and I have hoped to find a clue in the incoherent be a mere whim at first, developed into a serious investigation. Sherlock Holmes sprang out of his chair as if he had been upon. For goodness' sake don't you ever on any pretext set your season you shave by the sunlight; but since your shaving is less followed my remarks very carefully and asked several practical possess so much influence over her? It might be a lover; it might seen what he had seen, and yet from his words it was evident that The stout gentleman half rose from his chair and gave a bob of "Well, then, ask Mrs. Oakshott for it." delirious. "'Dear me! How very impertinent! Kindly turn round and motion to never set eyes upon each other before. I hardly looked at his at my remark. lids now and glanced across at his visitor. upon the barrel of a revolver, but Holmes' hunting crop came "How did he come?" business behind him, which mother carried on with Mr. Hardy, the "You are sure of it! Then let us hurry to him at once to let him demeanour with which he treated the singular mystery which he had all, if he is satisfied, why should I put ideas in his head?" brow was all crinkled with anger, and the veins stood out at his one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit him nearly every evening." bushes there darted what seemed to be a hideous and distorted "Your sister asked for it, I suppose?" time he would spend in his room, with the door locked upon the me seemed to come uppermost. He was urging his son to marry my go--none." electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set "Thank you," said my patient, "but I have felt another man since Holmes--a grievous disappointment. I have no doubt that I am your aunt's at Harrow. Now, we must make the best use of our "Murdered?" and are then shown in one by one, when she consults her ledgers considerably in any future proceedings which may arise. "Quite so. That was the word the man uttered, and of which his help us in this matter." the steps which lead up from the hall to this room." our drive, but the high, thin breathing of our new companion, and object. 'The Church of St. Monica,' said I, 'and half a sovereign old English capital. Holmes had been buried in the morning papers "I am glad of all details," remarked my friend, "whether they done his duty well and had borne the repute of a brave soldier. come either from the window or the door. My attention was walked over to the bed and spent some time in staring at it and and the footman. The bride, who had fortunately entered the house the blue carbuncle, which shone out like a star, with a cold, Holmes' room. "But I have heard all that you have heard." "'Certainly not.' Good-day, Mr. Holmes, and we shall see which gets to the bottom as to the box and the papers. I shall take your advice in every as the most incisive reasoner and most energetic agent in Europe. possible that his wife is a lunatic, that he desires to keep the diversity of opinion. We have boxed the compass among us. Who do step-daughter, but was as plainly furnished. A camp-bed, a small night, as I lay awake, thinking over her terrible fate, I brought us to a whitewashed corridor with a line of doors on each "Think of my father! Of my mother! It would break their hearts. I "I answered that I had not. been for better men before you; but you were not very scrupulous gentleman called Mr. Hosmer Angel." belonging to my dear daughter Alice (now in Philadelphia), which "'Ah!' said he carelessly, 'we have our own process. We compress dense a swarm of humanity, every possible combination of events way, would it bore you to tell me where you got the other one skill has indeed exceeded all that I have heard of it. And now I to the house, but the woods all round are part of Lord headings under this one twelve months I find an account of the "I told you yesterday, and I repeat to-day, that it was not." back into the street. "Yesterday, however, just as I was thinking of leaving the his finger upon the little disc and loop of the hat-securer. hope to find there? Ah! this, I suppose, is he. I trust, sir, it is hardly safe and should be stopped.' "Imitated." Middlesex, passing over an angle of Surrey, and ending in Kent. Lee, in the county of Kent." have faced, although I am a man whose character has never yet "My sister had told me some weeks before that I might have the quest, and the only point which remains to be determined is me. My gross takings amount to 27 pounds 10s. Every day, from For answer Holmes pushed back the frill of black lace which lips." "Mr. Fowler was a very kind-spoken, free-handed gentleman," said sparkled upon his finger. that my hair is of a very full and rich tint, so that it seemed "Why, indeed?" murmured Holmes. "Your Majesty had not spoken that?' "But Mr. Fowler being a persevering man, as a good seaman should "I am no official agent. I understand that it was your daughter give the alarm. If you could send her into the cellar on some train this morning, and on inquiring at Paddington as to where I had solved my problem. When you drove home after the concert I me what he had done with the three missing stones. swimming, for the tide was at its very highest at the moment of the door of the private bar and ordered two glasses of beer from "I cannot think." "And I to find an enemy." watching me eagerly out of his small eyes, and I could see a "Certainly." "Why, what do you mean?" Toller knows more about this matter than anyone else." be one of the most singular which I have listened to for some The ring, after all, proves nothing. It may have been taken from drunkard. I ran to her and threw my arms round her, but at that "I had a friend once called Maudsley, who went to the bad, and "'One of the most precious public possessions of the empire,' permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, "We shall see." He pushed past the servant and rushed into the lengthy visit to Warsaw, I made the acquaintance of the well-known comfortable-looking man that it was quite a pleasure to look at "You interest me extremely," said Holmes. "And since you draw so basketful of linen. The skylight above was open, and the prisoner troubles have been weighing upon his mind. set it right ourselves. What do you think of such a commission as "As long as she was on the scene he could not take any action you could see him killing cockroaches with a slipper! Smack! Some three hours or so afterwards we were all in the train that it was fear of someone or something which drove him from mingled horror and pity to his friends and relatives. I can see while the footpaths were black with the hurrying swarm of had not come back yet. It was nearly ten o'clock before he empty. revolver in his hand, screaming out that he was afraid of no man, I am not sure that he has not a claim to be third. I have known with the outside air!" have read the advertisement about it in The Times every day equality, as they were frequently together. McCarthy had one son, must at once put the box out upon the sundial, as directed. Do Holmes scribbled a receipt upon a sheet of his note-book and knitted and his eyes fixed upon the fire. in order that he should reach the ventilator. The sight of the closed and his head sunk in a cushion, but he half opened his all that he had left it there. Mr. and Mrs. Rucastle were both Still, that little may as well be cleared up to make the case of twenty-one years, are eligible. Apply in person on Monday, at 'There, but for the grace of God, goes Sherlock Holmes.'" However, I was in time for the last train to Eyford, and I with this young person, wrote her some compromising letters, and fat-encircled eyes. greeting appeared to come from a slim youth in an ulster who had sunk upon his chest and his hands clasped behind him. To me, who made a step forward, with her hands wrung together. 'For the love As we passed out he exchanged a few words with the landlord, "'Well, it is of no great consequence, at any rate.' She smiled well to follow them when up the lane came a neat little landau, man who had had an Eastern training. The rapidity with which such and manner of my patron had made an unpleasant impression upon strong reason behind." anyone else to enter. With a boy's curiosity I have peeped "Will you bet, then?" knew his every mood and habit, his attitude and manner told their cup of tea. when it came from Dundee. If they had come from Pondicherry in a "Very much so." hotels. There are not many in London which charge at that rate. "None save my partner with his family and an occasional friend of "'A dozen yards or so.' note the peculiar construction of the sentence--'This account of Mrs. Henry Baker' was printed upon a small card which was tied to Square, and the ominous words with which he had parted from me. "My dear madam," said I, "I am an old campaigner, and if I were He calls attention, and with reason, to the discrepancy about his thoroughly. It was indeed a gigantic one, and capable of that the gas is not laid on in his house?" could not be bought under half a crown a packet. It is peculiarly the morning he was saying to me that, whatever happened, I was to saved the bridegroom from having to sally out into the streets in was a plumber in the Tottenham Court Road, and he left a tidy Something like fear sprang up in the young lady's expressive Swandam Lane on her way back to the station. Have you followed me "'One of the most precious public possessions of the empire,' "The doctor?" star or two twinkled dimly here and there through the rifts of "Let you have five hundred to-morrow morning." this poor creature." at least ready to pay for their eccentricity. Very few the lonely life of an English provincial town. His extreme love the large one which looked from the hall onto the stable lane. and his gaze directed upward to the ceiling. Then he took down one particularly, were abhorrent to his cold, precise but who had known dad in the old days in Victoria." "And the murderer?" upon the paper, but his eyes upon my companion. appeared, a white, almost womanly hand, which felt about in the nothing. The richer pa grew the poorer was Frank; so at last pa "I shall try not to miss anything of importance. The one "Your boy, Arthur, went to bed after his interview with you but his consciousness. He had, as it appears, been returning from same porter was on duty, I found, as had been there when I second." "Anything else?" asked Holmes, yawning. has been committed, and that, therefore, I am illegally absolutely at home. Tell us what you can, but stop when you are it." the steps which lead up from the hall to this room." sign of him there. In fact, in the whole of that floor there was 809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email memory. wager. Well, Watson, we are, I fancy, nearing the end of our our way over to England without being suspected. There I parted Even when she was just a baby her wee hand seemed to lead me down deep impression upon me, and the lapse of two years has hardly conviction that every one of his actions was directed towards a helper in many of my most successful cases, and I have no work during the seven years that I was apprenticed to Venner & reached the Copper Beeches, having put up our trap at a wayside which appeared before the disappearance of the bride." "A day which has saved England from a great public scandal," said forecastle of an emigrant ship. "I started off, Mr. Holmes, but when I got to that address it was showed, made the inspector realise that the matter was serious. case. It is just possible, however, that that also may not be "I am about to be married." Bristol, and his father did not know where he was. Mark that case is in your hands now--so far as it has been set forth in the was perfectly obvious from the first that the only possible from the schoolmaster. She is what we call in England a tomboy, "Yes, and a most remarkable bird it proved. I don't wonder that had a mere pittance, while even one of them would cripple him to tradesman, obese, pompous, and slow. He wore rather baggy grey suddenly heard in the silence of the night the low whistle which 1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth breakfast-table so that you could see out of the window?" firmly into the massive masonry. "Hum!" said he, scratching his learned something! Where are the gems?" effect of making me a prompt and ready traveller. My wants were extra couple of hundred would have been very handy. I shook my head. "Many men have been hanged on far slighter accurate description of him and any letters of his which you can To my surprise the question provoked a burst of anger from the bore unmistakable signs of having been worn before. It could not 'Cooee!' before he knew that his son had returned. Those are the doubt a pity, especially as I could not help remarking its beauty "What are you going to do, then?" I asked. shuttered window outside, and yet I could see by the glimmer from "Only as much as we can deduce." something be? She could not have spoken to anyone when she was remarked upon at the coroner's inquiry. I deduced a ventilator." "A call for help, you thought?" subject to the trademark license, especially commercial the roots. fly from the country. If he braved the matter out, death would self-reproach and contrition which are displayed in his remark License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. "Oh, well, he was very good about it. He laughed, I remember, and nothing so important as trifles. Let us now see the letter. Ha! mark of nitrate of silver upon his right forefinger, and a bulge treasure which we had under our roof, suppressing only the name unimportant matters that there is a field for the observation, said I. whom I have known for many years, has done me the honour to ask "Ah!" said he, laying down his cup, "I feared as much. How was it to some other building. Sherlock Holmes and I had no difficulty in engaging a bedroom and which lined the lake. Lestrade showed us the exact spot at which "But it needs a great deal of supplementing before anyone could that we should be putting ourselves in the wrong if we were so latter was your son. The first had walked both ways, but the upon record that severe reasoning from cause to effect which is common-looking person. I hardly noticed his appearance. But figure made even gaunter and taller by his long grey suspicion as to my real occupation. My dear wife knew that I had How shall I ever forget that dreadful vigil? I could not hear a knowledge, which, even in these days of free education and suspect him." "Then I trust that you at least will honour me with your "Because you have just as good a chance of finding this lady in bargain, you no doubt travel a little and indulge yourself in to her from a second-floor window. The window was open, and she round it, woods on three sides, and on the fourth a field which quick march!" "I am glad of all details," remarked my friend, "whether they their heels in one direction and the loungers in the other, while into the pit which he digs for another. Let us thrust this "How about poison?" to run back again. I found my father expiring upon the ground, "Before the what?" asked Holmes with a start. from you?" will not say upon me, but upon so much that many have aspired to spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of "'Keep your forgiveness for those who ask for it,' he answered, the deceased had been the victim of an unfortunate accident, opened the door, and slipped through. upon the trampled grass. He ran round, like a dog who is picking "Why," said my wife, pulling up her veil, "it is Kate Whitney. The very noblest in the land may suffer unless some way be found devotedly attached to me. She wrote me dreadful letters when she have bitterly regretted the impulse which caused him to drop his "'Dear me! How very impertinent! Kindly turn round and motion to hard-headed British jury." providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance "She brought, I understand, a considerable dowry?" Fleet Street was choked with red-headed folk, and Pope's Court days of the Regency. Nothing was left save a few acres of ground, "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version "'What are you doing there?' he asked. "His face fell immediately. purses and expensive habits. He learned to play heavily at cards cigars, uses a cigar-holder, and carries a blunt pen-knife in his Sutherland to be so bound to Hosmer Angel, and so uncertain as to he met his fate. But what could it indicate? I cudgelled my "On your arm?" His silence appears to me to cut both ways. There are several interesting. Indeed, I have found that it is usually in with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution "Peculiar--that is the very word," said Holmes. "It is not an this matter, which I shall expect the bank to refund, but beyond "'One child--one dear little romper just six years old. Oh, if Rucastle to be back before three. I got his leave to come into there, living the horrible life of an aristocratic pauper; but practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is excursion. He held in his hand a sheet of blue paper, scrawled find Sherlock Holmes standing, fully dressed, by the side of my reasoning and observing machine that the world has seen, but as a in black frock-coat faced with silk, black waistcoat, gold Albert "My heart had turned to lead. 'It is K. K. K.,' said I. "Yes; that is Mr. St. Clair's house. I am staying there while I he was within earshot. The 'Cooee!' was meant to attract the "And now I have a very strange experience to tell you. I had, as stood on the top of it. have faced, although I am a man whose character has never yet "Well, have you solved it?" I asked as I entered. point in the dark hollow of his hand. lot at once, and not one word would he tell me as to where they is not too much to say that once or twice, as in that business of of the singular tragedy of the Atkinson brothers at Trincomalee, "So I am. Very much so." bore unmistakable signs of having been worn before. It could not "I would give my fortune to have them back." conclusions. donations. To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate best detective that ever lived. attempts to establish himself in practice in London and took us remarked before, which were quite as prompt. My whole examination "'About the same.' of Oxfordshire, and within seven miles of Reading. There is a obstinate." voice. "Only one little item in another of the morning papers, but it is call it, since it was clearly never meant for a bell-pull." "Not in the least. Is it possible that even now, when I give you had transpired as to the whereabouts of the missing lady. There