"All right," said Jones with a stare and a snigger. "Well, wouldyou please, sir, march upstairs, where we can get a cab to carryyour Highness to the police-station?"
"That is better," said John Clay serenely. He made a sweeping bowto the three of us and walked quietly off in the custody of thedetective.
"Really, Mr. Holmes," said Mr. Merryweather as we followed themfrom the cellar, "I do not know how the bank can thank you orrepay you. There is no doubt that you have detected and defeatedin the most complete manner one of the most determined attemptsat bank robbery that have ever come within my experience."
"I have had one or two little scores of my own to settle with Mr.John Clay," said Holmes. "I have been at some small expense overthis matter, which I shall expect the bank to refund, but beyondthat I am amply repaid by having had an experience which is inmany ways unique, and by hearing the very remarkable narrative ofthe Red-headed League."
"You see, Watson," he explained in the early hours of the morningas we sat over a glass of whisky and soda in Baker Street, "itwas perfectly obvious from the first that the only possibleobject of this rather fantastic business of the advertisement ofthe League, and the copying of the 'Encyclopaedia,' must be to getthis not over-bright pawnbroker out of the way for a number ofhours every day. It was a curious way of managing it, but,really, it would be difficult to suggest a better. The method wasno doubt suggested to Clay's ingenious mind by the colour of hisaccomplice's hair. The 4 pounds a week was a lure which must drawhim, and what was it to them, who were playing for thousands?They put in the advertisement, one rogue has the temporaryoffice, the other rogue incites the man to apply for it, andtogether they manage to secure his absence every morning in theweek. From the time that I heard of the assistant having come forhalf wages, it was obvious to me that he had some strong motivefor securing the situation."
"But how could you guess what the motive was?"
"Had there been women in the house, I should have suspected amere vulgar intrigue. That, however, was out of the question. Theman's business was a small one, and there was nothing in hishouse which could account for such elaborate preparations, andsuch an expenditure as they were at. It must, then, be somethingout of the house. What could it be? I thought of the assistant'sfondness for photography, and his trick of vanishing into thecellar. The cellar! There was the end of this tangled clue. ThenI made inquiries as to this mysterious assistant and found that Ihad to deal with one of the coolest and most daring criminals inLondon. He was doing something in the cellar--something whichtook many hours a day for months on end. What could it be, oncemore? I could think of nothing save that he was running a tunnelto some other building.
"So far I had got when we went to visit the scene of action. Isurprised you by beating upon the pavement with my stick. I wasascertaining whether the cellar stretched out in front or behind.It was not in front. Then I rang the bell, and, as I hoped, theassistant answered it. We have had some skirmishes, but we hadnever set eyes upon each other before. I hardly looked at hisface. His knees were what I wished to see. You must yourself haveremarked how worn, wrinkled, and stained they were. They spoke ofthose hours of burrowing. The only remaining point was what theywere burrowing for. I walked round the corner, saw the City andSuburban Bank abutted on our friend's premises, and felt that Ihad solved my problem. When you drove home after the concert Icalled upon Scotland Yard and upon the chairman of the bankdirectors, with the result that you have seen."
"And how could you tell that they would make their attemptto-night?" I asked.
"Well, when they closed their League offices that was a sign thatthey cared no longer about Mr. Jabez Wilson's presence--in otherwords, that they had completed their tunnel. But it was essentialthat they should use it soon, as it might be discovered, or thebullion might be removed. Saturday would suit them better thanany other day, as it would give them two days for their escape.For all these reasons I expected them to come to-night."
"You reasoned it out beautifully," I exclaimed in unfeignedadmiration. "It is so long a chain, and yet every link ringstrue."
"It saved me from ennui," he answered, yawning. "Alas! I alreadyfeel it closing in upon me. My life is spent in one long effortto escape from the commonplaces of existence. These littleproblems help me to do so."
"And you are a benefactor of the race," said I.
He shrugged his shoulders. "Well, perhaps, after all, it is ofsome little use," he remarked. "'L'homme c'est rien--l'oeuvrec'est tout,' as Gustave Flaubert wrote to George Sand."
ADVENTURE III. A CASE OF IDENTITY
"My dear fellow," said Sherlock Holmes as we sat on either sideof the fire in his lodgings at Baker Street, "life is infinitelystranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. Wewould not dare to conceive the things which are really merecommonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that windowhand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove theroofs, and peep in at the queer things which are going on, thestrange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, thewonderful chains of events, working through generations, andleading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction withits conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale andunprofitable."
"And yet I am not convinced of it," I answered. "The cases whichcome to light in the papers are, as a rule, bald enough, andvulgar enough. We have in our police reports realism pushed toits extreme limits, and yet the result is, it must be confessed,neither fascinating nor artistic."
"A certain selection and discretion must be used in producing arealistic effect," remarked Holmes. "This is wanting in thepolice report, where more stress is laid, perhaps, upon theplatitudes of the magistrate than upon the details, which to anobserver contain the vital essence of the whole matter. Dependupon it, there is nothing so unnatural as the commonplace."
I smiled and shook my head. "I can quite understand your thinkingso," I said. "Of course, in your position of unofficial adviserand helper to everybody who is absolutely puzzled, throughoutthree continents, you are brought in contact with all that isstrange and bizarre. But here"--I picked up the morning paperfrom the ground--"let us put it to a practical test. Here is thefirst heading upon which I come. 'A husband's cruelty to hiswife.' There is half a column of print, but I know withoutreading it that it is all perfectly familiar to me. There is, ofcourse, the other woman, the drink, the push, the blow, thebruise, the sympathetic sister or landlady. The crudest ofwriters could invent nothing more crude."
"Indeed, your example is an unfortunate one for your argument,"said Holmes, taking the paper and glancing his eye down it. "Thisis the Dundas separation case, and, as it happens, I was engagedin clearing up some small points in connection with it. Thehusband was a teetotaler, there was no other woman, and theconduct complained of was that he had drifted into the habit ofwinding up every meal by taking out his false teeth and hurlingthem at his wife, which, you will allow, is not an action likelyto occur to the imagination of the average story-teller. Take apinch of snuff, Doctor, and acknowledge that I have scored overyou in your example."
He held out his snuffbox of old gold, with a great amethyst inthe centre of the lid. Its splendour was in such contrast to hishomely ways and simple life that I could not help commenting uponit.
"Ah," said he, "I forgot that I had not seen you for some weeks.It is a little souvenir from the King of Bohemia in return for myassistance in the case of the Irene Adler papers."
"And the ring?" I asked, glancing at a remarkable brilliant whichsparkled upon his finger.
"It was from the reigning family of Holland, though the matter inwhich I served them was of such delicacy that I cannot confide iteven to you, who have been good enough to chronicle one or two ofmy little problems."
"And have you any on hand just now?" I asked with interest.
"Some ten or twelve, but none which present any feature ofinterest. They are important, you understand, without beinginteresting. Indeed, I have found that it is usually inunimportant matters that there is a field for the observation,and for the quick analysis of cause and effect which gives thecharm to an investigation. The larger crimes are apt to be thesimpler, for the bigger the crime the more obvious, as a rule, isthe motive. In these cases, save for one rather intricate matterwhich has been referred to me from Marseilles, there is nothingwhich presents any features of interest. It is possible, however,that I may have something better before very many minutes areover, for this is one of my clients, or I am much mistaken."
He had risen from his chair and was standing between the partedblinds gazing down into the dull neutral-tinted London street.Looking over his shoulder, I saw that on the pavement oppositethere stood a large woman with a heavy fur boa round her neck,and a large curling red feather in a broad-brimmed hat which wastilted in a coquettish Duchess of Devonshire fashion over herear. From under this great panoply she peeped up in a nervous,hesitating fashion at our windows, while her body oscillatedbackward and forward, and her fingers fidgeted with her glovebuttons. Suddenly, with a plunge, as of the swimmer who leavesthe bank, she hurried across the road, and we heard the sharpclang of the bell.
"I have seen those symptoms before," said Holmes, throwing hiscigarette into the fire. "Oscillation upon the pavement alwaysmeans an affaire de coeur. She would like advice, but is not surethat the matter is not too delicate for communication. And yeteven here we may discriminate. When a woman has been seriouslywronged by a man she no longer oscillates, and the usual symptomis a broken bell wire. Here we may take it that there is a lovematter, but that the maiden is not so much angry as perplexed, orgrieved. But here she comes in person to resolve our doubts."
As he spoke there was a tap at the door, and the boy in buttonsentered to announce Miss Mary Sutherland, while the lady herselfloomed behind his small black figure like a full-sailedmerchant-man behind a tiny pilot boat. Sherlock Holmes welcomedher with the easy courtesy for which he was remarkable, and,having closed the door and bowed her into an armchair, he lookedher over in the minute and yet abstracted fashion which waspeculiar to him.
"Do you not find," he said, "that with your short sight it is alittle trying to do so much typewriting?"