The Hound of the Baskervilles Part 24 (2/2)
”That hat I wished you to think”
”Then you use me, and yet do not trust me!” I cried with some bitterness ”I think that I have deserved better at your hands, Holmes”
”My dear fellow, you have been invaluable tothat you will forgive me if I have seemed to play a trick upon you In truth, it was partly for your own sake that I did it, and it was er which you ran which led me to come down and examine the matter for myself Had I been with Sir Henry and you it is confident that my point of vieould have been the same as yours, and my presence would have warned our very foruard As it is, I have been able to get about as I could not possibly have done had I been living in the Hall, and I remain an unknown factor in the business, ready to throw in all ht at a critical moment”
”But why keep me in the dark?”
”For you to know could not have helped us and ht possibly have led to , or in your kindness you would have brought me out some comfort or other, and so an unnecessary risk would be run I brought Cartwright doith me--you remember the little chap at the express office--and he has seen after my simple wants: a loaf of bread and a clean collar What does iven me an extra pair of eyes upon a very active pair of feet, and both have been invaluable”
”Then my reports have all been wasted!”--My voice trembled as I recalled the pains and the pride hich I had composed them
Holmes took a bundle of papers from his pocket
”Here are your reports, my dear fellow, and very well thuements, and they are only delayed one day upon their way I ence which you have shown over an extraordinarily difficult case”
I was still rather raw over the deception which had been practised upon er froht in what he said and that it was really best for our purpose that I should not have known that he was upon thethe shadow rise from my face ”And now tell me the result of your visit to Mrs Laura Lyons--it was not difficult for one, for I am already aware that she is the one person in Cooht be of service to us in the ly probable that I should have gone to over the moor The air had turned chill and ithdrew into the hut for warht, I told Holmes of my conversation with the lady So interested was he that I had to repeat some of it twice before he was satisfied
”This is most iap which I had been unable to bridge in this most complex affair You are aware, perhaps, that a close intimacy exists between this lady and the man Stapleton?”
”I did not know of a close intimacy”
”There can be no doubt about the matter Theybetween them Now, this puts a very powerful weapon into our hands If I could only use it to detach his wife--”
”His wife?”
”I a you soiven me The lady who has passed here as Miss Stapleton is in reality his wife”
”Good heavens, Holmes! Are you sure of what you say? How could he have permitted Sir Henry to fall in love with her?”
”Sir Henry's falling in love could do no harm to anyone except Sir Henry He took particular care that Sir Henry did not make love to her, as you have yourself observed I repeat that the lady is his wife and not his sister”
”But why this elaborate deception?”
”Because he foresaw that she would be very much more useful to him in the character of a free woue suspicions, suddenly took shape and centred upon the naturalist In that impassive colourless man, with his straw hat and his butterfly-net, I see terrible--a creature of infinite patience and craft, with a s face and a murderous heart
”It is he, then, who is our eneed us in London?”
”So I read the riddle”
”And the warning--it must have come from her!”
”Exactly”