The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Part 49 (2/2)

”Is it possible?” gasped the banker

”You then roused his anger by calling him names at a moment when he felt that he had deserved your warmest thanks He could not explain the true state of affairs without betraying one who certainly deserved little enough consideration at his hands He took the more chivalrous vieever, and preserved her secret”

”And that hy she shrieked and fainted when she saw the coronet,” cried Mr Holder ”Oh,to be allowed to go out for fivepiece were at the scene of the struggle How cruelly I have ed him!”

”When I arrived at the house,” continued Holmes, ”I at once went very carefully round it to observe if there were any traces in the snohichbefore, and also that there had been a strong frost to preserve i the tradesuishable Just beyond it, however, at the far side of the kitchen door, a woman had stood and talked with a man, whose round i I could even tell that they had been disturbed, for the woman had run back swiftly to the door, as was shown by the deep toe and light heel one away I thought at the tiht be the maid and her sweetheart, of whom you had already spoken to arden without seeing anything more than randoot into the stable lane a very long and complex story ritten in the snow in front of me

”There was a double line of tracks of a booted ed to a man with naked feet I was at once convinced from what you had told me that the latter was your son The first had walked both ways, but the other had run swiftly, and as his tread was marked in places over the depression of the boot, it was obvious that he had passed after the other I followed them up and found they led to the hall here Boots had worn all the snohile waiting Then I walked to the other end, which was a hundred yards or more down the lane I sahere Boots had faced round, where the snoas cut up as though there had been a struggle, and, finally, where a few drops of blood had fallen, to show me that I was not mistaken Boots had then run down the lane, and another little se of blood showed that it was he who had been hurt When he cahroad at the other end, I found that the pavement had been cleared, so there was an end to that clue

”On entering the house, however, I examined, as you remember, the sill and framework of the hall ith my lens, and I could at once see that souish the outline of an instep where the wet foot had been placed in co to be able to form an opinion as to what had occurred A ems; the deed had been overseen by your son; he had pursued the thief; had struggled with hith causing injuries which neither alone could have effected He had returned with the prize, but had left a fragrasp of his opponent So far I was clear The question noho was the ht him the coronet?

”It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth Now, I knew that it was not you who had brought it down, so there only remained your niece and the maids But if it were the maids, why should your son allow himself to be accused in their place? There could be no possible reason As he loved his cousin, however, there was an excellent explanation why he should retain her secret--the raceful one When I remembered that you had seen her at that , and how she had fainted on seeing the coronet again, my conjecture became a certainty

”And who could it be as her confederate? A lover evidently, for who else could outweigh the love and gratitude which she must feel to you? I knew that you went out little, and that your circle of friends was a very lie Burnwell I had heard of hi women It must have been he ore those boots and retained the h he knew that Arthur had discovered hiht still flatter himself that he was safe, for the lad could not say a ithout coood sense will suggest what measures I took next I went in the shape of a loafer to Sir George's house, ed to pick up an acquaintance with his valet, learned that his ht before, and, finally, at the expense of six shi+llings,a pair of his cast-off shoes With these I journeyed down to Streatham and saw that they exactly fitted the tracks”

”I saw an ill-dressed vagabond in the lane yesterday evening,”

said Mr Holder

”Precisely It was I I found that I had ed my clothes It was a delicate part which I had to play then, for I saw that a prosecution must be avoided to avert scandal, and I knew that so astute a villain would see that our hands were tied in the matter I went and saw hiave him every particular that had occurred, he tried to bluster and took down a life-preserver from the wall I knew my man, however, and I clapped a pistol to his head before he could strike Then he becaive him a price for the stones he held--1000 pounds apiece That brought out the first signs of grief that he had shown 'Why, dash it all!' said he, 'I've let theet the address of the receiver who had the him that there would be no prosecution Off I set to hiot our stones at 1000 pounds apiece Then I looked in upon your son, told hiot to my bed about two o'clock, after what I may call a really hard day's work”

”A day which has saved England fro ”Sir, I cannot find words to thank you, but you shall not find rateful for what you have done Your skill has indeed exceeded all that I have heard of it And now Iwhich I have done hioes to my very heart Not even your skill can inform me where she is now”

”I think that we may safely say,” returned Hole Burnwell is It is equally certain, too, that whatever her sins are, they will soon receive a more than sufficient punishment”

XII THE ADVENTURE OF THE COPPER BEECHES

”To the man who loves art for its own sake,” re aside the advertiseraph, ”it is frequently in its least important and lowliest manifestations that the keenest pleasure is to be derived It is pleasant to rasped this truth that in these little records of our cases which you have been good enough to draw up, and, I aiven prominence not so much to the many causes celebres and sensational trials in which I have figured but rather to those incidents which iven rooical synthesis which I have , ”I cannot quite hold e of sensationalisainst my records”

”You have erred, perhaps,” he observed, taking up a glowing cinder with the tongs and lighting with it the long cherry-wood pipe which ont to replace his clay when he was in a disputatious rather than ato put colour and life into each of your state upon record that severe reasoning from cause to effect which is really the only notable feature about the thing”

”It seems to me that I have done you full justice in the matter,”

I reotis factor in ular character

”No, it is not selfishness or conceit,” said he, answering, as was his wont, hts rather than my words ”If I claim full justice forbeyond ic is rare Therefore it is upon the logic rather than upon the criraded what should have been a course of lectures into a series of tales”

It was a cold , and we sat after breakfast on either side of a cheery fire in the old roo rolled down between the lines of dun-coloured houses, and the opposing s looh the heavy yelloreaths Our gas was lit and shone on the white cloth and glimmer of china and metal, for the table had not been cleared yet Sherlock Hol continuously into the advertise apparently given up his search, he had eed in no very sweet tes

”At the sa which he had sat puffing at his long pipe and gazing down into the fire, ”you can hardly be open to a charge of sensationalism, for out of these cases which you have been so kind as to interest yourself in, a fair proportion do not treat of crial sense, at all The s of Boheular experience of Miss Mary Sutherland, the problem connected with the man with the twisted lip, and the incident of the noble bachelor, were allthe sensational, I fear that you may have bordered on the trivial”

”The end may have been so,” I answered, ”but the methods I hold to have been novel and of interest”

”Pshaw, reat unobservant public, who could hardly tell a weaver by his tooth or a compositor by his left thumb, care about the finer shades of analysis and deduction! But, indeed, if you are trivial, I cannot blareat cases are past Man, or at least criinality As to ency for recovering lost lead pencils and giving advice to young ladies fro-schools I think that I have touched botto marks my zero-point, I fancy Read it!” He tossed a crumpled letter across to me