The Adventures and Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (49 page)

‘What is your plan, then?' asked Holmes, as we walked down the dark, tree-lined road.

‘I am going to force my way in and see for myself who is in the house. I wish you both to be there as witnesses.'

‘You are quite determined to do this, in spite of your wife's warning that it is better that you should not solve the mystery?'

‘Yes, I am determined.'

‘Well, I think that you are in the right. Any truth is better than indefinite doubt. We had better go up at once. Of course, legally we are putting ourselves hopelessly in the wrong, but I think that it is worth it.'

It was a very dark night and a thin rain began to fall as we turned from the high-road into a narrow lane, deeply rutted, with hedges on either side. Mr Grant Munro pushed impatiently forward, however, and we stumbled after him as best we could.

‘There are the lights of my house,' he murmured, pointing to a glimmer among the trees, ‘and here is the cottage which I am going to enter.'

We turned a corner in the lane as he spoke, and there was the building close beside us. A yellow bar falling across the black foreground showed that the door was not quite closed, and one window in the upper storey was brightly illuminated. As we looked we saw a dark blur moving across the blind.

‘There is that creature,' cried Grant Munro; ‘you can see for yourselves that someone is there. Now follow me, and we shall soon know all.'

We approached the door, but suddenly a woman appeared out of the shadow and stood in the golden track of the lamp-light. I could not see her face in the darkness, but her arms were thrown out in an attitude of entreaty.

‘For God's sake, don't, Jack!' she cried. ‘I had a presentiment that you would come this evening. Think better of it, dear! Trust me again, and you will never have cause to regret it.'

‘I have trusted you too long, Effie!' he cried sternly. ‘Leave go of me! I must pass you. My friends and I are going to settle this matter once and for ever.' He pushed her to one side and we followed closely after him. As he threw the door open an elderly woman ran out in front of him and tried to bar his passage, but he thrust her back, and an instant afterwards we were all upon the stairs. Grant Munro rushed into the lighted room at the top, and we entered it at his heels.

It was a cosy, well-furnished apartment, with two candles burning upon the table and two upon the mantelpiece. In the corner, stooping
over a desk, there sat what appeared to be a little girl. Her face was turned away as we entered, but we could see that she was dressed in a red frock, and that she had long white gloves on. As she whisked round to us I gave a cry of surprise and horror. The face which she turned towards us was of the strangest livid tint, and the features were absolutely devoid of any expression. An instant later the mystery was explained. Holmes, with a laugh, passed his hand behind the child's ear, a mask peeled off from her countenance, and there was a little coal-black negress with all her white teeth flashing in amusement at our amazed faces. I burst out laughing out of sympathy with her merriment, but Grant Munro stood staring, with his hand clutching at his throat.

‘My God!' he cried, ‘what can be the meaning of this?'

‘I will tell you the meaning of it,' cried the lady, sweeping into the room with a proud, set face. ‘You have forced me against my own judgement to tell you, and now we must both make the best of it. My husband died at Atlanta. My child survived.'

‘Your child!'

She drew a large silver locket from her bosom. ‘You have never seen this open.'

‘I understood that it did not open.'

She touched a spring, and the front hinged back. There was a portrait within of a man, strikingly handsome and intelligent, but bearing unmistakable signs upon his features of his African descent.

‘That is John Hebron, of Atlanta,' said the lady, ‘and a nobler man never walked the earth. I cut myself off from my race in order to wed him;
¹³
but never once while he lived did I for one instant regret it. It was our misfortune that our only child took after his people rather than mine. It is often so in such matches, and little Lucy is darker far than ever her father was. But, dark or fair, she is my own dear little girlie, and her mother's pet.' The little creature ran across at the words and nestled up against the lady's dress.

‘When I left her in America,' she continued, ‘it was only because her health was weak, and the change might have done her harm. She was given to the care of a faithful Scotchwoman who had once been our servant. Never for an instant did I dream of disowning her as my
child. But when chance threw you in my way, Jack, and I learned to love you, I feared to tell you about my child. God forgive me, I feared that I should lose you, and I had not the courage to tell you. I had to choose between you, and in my weakness I turned away from my own little girl. For three years I have kept her existence a secret from you, but I heard from the nurse, and I knew that all was well with her. At last, however, there came an overwhelming desire to see the child once more. I struggled against it, but in vain. Though I knew the danger I determined to have the child over, if it were but for a few weeks.I sent a hundred pounds to the nurse, and I gave her instructions about this cottage, so that she might come as a neighbour without my appearing to be in any way connected with her. I pushed my precautions so far as to order her to keep the child in the house during the day-time, and to cover up her little face and hands, so that even those who might see her at the window should not gossip about there being a black child in the neighbourhood. If I had been less cautious I might have been more wise, but I was half crazy with fear lest you should learn the truth.

‘It was you who told me first that the cottage was occupied. I should have waited for the morning, but I could not sleep for excitement, and so at last I slipped out, knowing how difficult it is to awaken you. But you saw me go, and that was the beginning of my troubles. Next day you had my secret at your mercy, but you nobly refrained from pursuing your advantage. Three days later, however, the nurse and child only just escaped from the back door as you rushed in at the front one. And now tonight you at last know all, and I ask you what is to become of us, my child and me?' She clasped her hands and waited for an answer.

It was a long two minutes before Grant Munro broke the silence, and when his answer came it was one of which I love to think. He lifted the little child, kissed her, and then, still carrying her, he held his other hand out to his wife, and turned towards the door.

‘We can talk it over more comfortably at home,' said he. ‘I am not a very good man, Effie, but I think that I am a better one than you have given me credit for being.'

Holmes and I followed them down to the lane, and my friend
plucked at my sleeve as we came out. ‘I think,' said he, ‘that we shall be of more use in London than in Norbury.'

Not another word did he say of the case until late that night when he was turning away, with his lighted candle, for his bedroom.

‘Watson,' said he, ‘if it should ever strike you that I am getting a little over-confident in my powers, or giving less pains to a case than it deserves, kindly whisper “Norbury” in my ear, and I shall be infinitely obliged to you.'

Shortly after my marriage
¹
I had bought a connection in the Paddington district.
²
Old Mr Farquhar, from whom I purchased it, had at one time an excellent general practice, but his age, and an affliction of the nature of St Vitus's Dance
³
from which he suffered, had very much thinned it. The public, not unnaturally, goes upon the principle that he who would heal others must himself be whole, and looks askance at the curative powers of the man whose own case is beyond the reach of his drugs. Thus, as my predecessor weakened, his practice declined, until when I purchased it from him it had sunk from twelve hundred to little more than three hundred a year. I had confidence, however, in my own youth and energy, and was convinced that in a very few years the concern would be as flourishing as ever.

For three months after taking over the practice I was kept very closely at work, and saw little of my friend Sherlock Holmes, for I was too busy to visit Baker Street, and he seldom went anywhere himself save upon professional business. I was surprised, therefore, when one morning in June, as I sat reading the
British Medical Journal
after breakfast, I heard a ring at the bell followed by the high, somewhat strident, tones of my old companion's voice.

‘Ah, my dear Watson,' said he, striding into the room, ‘I am very delighted to see you. I trust that Mrs Watson has entirely recovered from all the little excitements connected with our adventure of the Sign of Four?
⁴

‘Thank you, we are both very well,' said I, shaking him warmly by the hand.

‘And I hope also,' he continued, sitting down in the rocking-chair,
‘that the cares of medical practice have not entirely obliterated the interest which you used to take in our little deductive problems.'

‘On the contrary,' I answered; ‘it was only last night that I was looking over my old notes and classifying some of our past results.'

‘I trust that you don't consider your collection closed?'

‘Not at all. I should wish nothing better than to have some more of such experiences.'

‘Today, for example?'

‘Yes; today, if you like.'

‘And as far off as Birmingham?'
⁵

‘Certainly, if you wish it.'

‘And the practice?'

‘I do my neighbour's when he goes. He is always ready to work off the debt.'

‘Ha! Nothing could be better!' said Holmes, leaning back in his chair and looking keenly at me from under his half-closed lids. ‘I perceive that you have been unwell lately. Summer colds are always a little trying.'

‘I was confined to the house by a severe chill for three days last week. I thought, however, that I had cast off every trace of it.'

‘So you have. You look remarkably robust.'

‘How, then, did you know of it?'

‘My dear fellow, you know my methods.'

‘You deduced it, then?'

‘Certainly.'

‘And from what?'

‘From your slippers.'

I glanced down at the new patent leathers which I was wearing. ‘How on earth—?' I began, but Holmes answered my question before it was asked.

‘Your slippers are new,' he said. ‘You could not have had them more than a few weeks. The soles which you are at this moment presenting to me are slightly scorched. For a moment I thought they might have got wet and been burned in the drying. But near the instep there is a small circular wafer of paper with the shopman's hieroglyphics upon it. Damp would of course have removed this. You
had then been sitting with your feet outstretched to the fire, which a man would hardly do even in so wet a June as this if he were in his full health.'

Like all Holmes's reasoning the thing seemed simplicity itself when it was once explained. He read the thought upon my features, and his smile had a tinge of bitterness.

‘I am afraid that I rather give myself away when I explain,' said he. ‘Results without causes are much more impressive. You are ready to come to Birmingham, then?'

‘Certainly. What is the case?'

‘You shall hear it all in the train. My client is outside in a four-wheeler. Can you come at once?'

‘In an instant.' I scribbled a note to my neighbour, rushed upstairs to explain the matter to my wife, and joined Holmes upon the doorstep.

‘Your neighbour is a doctor?' said he, nodding at the brass plate.

‘Yes. He bought a practice as I did.'

‘An old-established one?'

‘Just the same as mine. Both have been ever since the houses were built.'

‘Ah, then you got hold of the better of the two.'

‘I think I did. But how do you know?'

‘By the steps, my boy. Yours are worn three inches deeper than his. But this gentleman in the cab is my client, Mr Hall Pycroft. Allow me to introduce you to him. Whip your horse up, cabby, for we have only just time to catch our train.'

The man whom I found myself facing was a well-built, fresh-complexioned young fellow with a frank, honest face and a slight, crisp, yellow moustache. He wore a very shiny top-hat and a neat suit of sober black, which made him look what he was – a smart young City man, of the class who have been labelled Cockneys,
⁶
but who give us our crack Volunteer regiments,
⁷
and who turn out more fine athletes and sportsmen than any body of men in these islands. His round, ruddy face was naturally full of cheeriness, but the corners of his mouth seemed to me to be pulled down in a half-comical distress. It was not, however, until we were all in a first-class carriage and well
started upon our journey to Birmingham, that I was able to learn what the trouble was which had driven him to Sherlock Holmes.

‘We have a clear run here of seventy minutes,' Holmes remarked. ‘I want you, Mr Hall Pycroft, to tell my friend your very interesting experience exactly as you have told it to me, or with more detail if possible. It will be of use to me to hear the succession of events again. It is a case, Watson, which may prove to have something in it, or may prove to have nothing, but which at least presents those unusual and
outré
features which are as dear to you as they are to me. Now, Mr Pycroft, I shall not interrupt you again.'

Our young companion looked at me with a twinkle in his eye.

‘The worst of the story is,' said he, ‘that I show myself up as such a confounded fool. Of course, it may work out all right, and I don't see that I could have done otherwise; but if I have lost my crib
⁸
and get nothing in exchange, I shall feel what a soft Johnny I have been. I'm not very good at telling a story, Dr Watson, but it is like this with me.