The Essential Sherlock Holmes: 4 Novels & 44 Short Stories in One Edition. Arthur Conan Doyle
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his mystified expression. “I went back to the gate and sounded my whistle. That brought Murcher and two more to the spot.”
“Was the street empty then?”
“Well, it was, as far as anybody that could be of any good goes.”
“What do you mean?”
The constable’s features broadened into a grin. “I’ve seen many a drunk chap in my time,” he said, “but never anyone so cryin’ drunk as that cove. He was at the gate when I came out, a-leanin’ up agin the railings, and a-singin’ at the pitch o’ his lungs about Columbine’s New-fangled Banner, or some such stuff. He couldn’t stand, far less help.”
“What sort of a man was he?” asked Sherlock Holmes.
John Rance appeared to be somewhat irritated at this digression. “He was an uncommon drunk sort o’ man,” he said. “He’d ha’ found hisself in the station if we hadn’t been so took up.”
“His face—his dress—didn’t you notice them?” Holmes broke in impatiently.
“I should think I did notice them, seeing that I had to prop him up—me and Murcher between us. He was a long chap, with a red face, the lower part muffled round—”
“That will do,” cried Holmes. “What became of him?”
“We’d enough to do without lookin’ after him,” the policeman said, in an aggrieved voice. “I’ll wager he found his way home all right.”
“How was he dressed?”
“A brown overcoat.”
“Had he a whip in his hand?”
“A whip—no.”
“He must have left it behind,” muttered my companion. “You didn’t happen to see or hear a cab after that?”
“No.”
“There’s a half-sovereign for you,” my companion said, standing up and taking his hat. “I am afraid, Rance, that you will never rise in the force. That head of yours should be for use as well as ornament. You might have gained your sergeant’s stripes last night. The man whom you held in your hands is the man who holds the clue of this mystery, and whom we are seeking. There is no use of arguing about it now; I tell you that it is so. Come along, Doctor.”
We started off for the cab together, leaving our informant incredulous, but obviously uncomfortable.
“The blundering fool,” Holmes said, bitterly, as we drove back to our lodgings. “Just to think of his having such an incomparable bit of good luck, and not taking advantage of it.”
“I am rather in the dark still. It is true that the description of this man tallies with your idea of the second party in this mystery. But why should he come back to the house after leaving it? That is not the way of criminals.”
“The ring, man, the ring: that was what he came back for. If we have no other way of catching him, we can always bait our line with the ring. I shall have him, Doctor—I’ll lay you two to one that I have him. I must thank you for it all. I might not have gone but for you, and so have missed the finest study I ever came across: a study in scarlet, eh? Why shouldn’t we use a little art jargon. There’s the scarlet thread of murder running through the colourless skein of life, and our duty is to unravel it, and isolate it, and expose every inch of it. And now for lunch, and then for Norman-Neruda. Her attack and her bowing are splendid. What’s that little thing of Chopin’s she plays so magnificently: Tra-la-la-lira-lira-lay.”
Leaning back in the cab, this amateur bloodhound carolled away like a lark while I meditated upon the many-sidedness of the human mind.
OUR ADVERTISEMENT BRINGS A VISITOR
Our morning’s exertions had been too much for my weak health, and I was tired out in the afternoon. After Holmes’ departure for the concert, I lay down upon the sofa and endeavoured to get a couple of hours’ sleep. It was a useless attempt. My mind had been too much excited by all that had occurred, and the strangest fancies and surmises crowded into it. Every time that I closed my eyes I saw before me the distorted baboon-like countenance of the murdered man. So sinister was the impression which that face had produced upon me that I found it difficult to feel anything but gratitude for him who had removed its owner from the world. If ever human features bespoke vice of the most malignant type, they were certainly those of Enoch J. Drebber, of Cleveland. Still I recognized that justice must be done, and that the depravity of the victim was no condonement in the eyes of the law.
The more I thought of it the more extraordinary did my companion’s hypothesis, that the man had been poisoned, appear. I remembered how he had sniffed his lips, and had no doubt that he had detected something which had given rise to the idea. Then, again, if not poison, what had caused the man’s death, since there was neither wound nor marks of strangulation? But, on the other hand, whose blood was that which lay so thickly upon the floor? There were no signs of a struggle, nor had the victim any weapon with which he might have wounded an antagonist. As long as all these questions were unsolved, I felt that sleep would be no easy matter, either for Holmes or myself. His quiet self-confident manner convinced me that he had already formed a theory which explained all the facts, though what it was I could not for an instant conjecture.
He was very late in returning—so late, that I knew that the concert could not have detained him all the time. Dinner was on the table before he appeared.
“It was magnificent,” he said, as he took his seat. “Do you remember what Darwin says about music? He claims that the power of producing and appreciating it existed among the human race long before the power of speech was arrived at. Perhaps that is why we are so subtly influenced by it. There are vague memories in our souls of those misty centuries when the world was in its childhood.”
“That’s rather a broad idea,” I remarked.
“One’s ideas must be as broad as Nature if they are to interpret Nature,” he answered. “What’s the matter? You’re not looking quite yourself. This Brixton Road affair has upset you.”
“To tell the truth, it has,” I said. “I ought to be more case-hardened after my Afghan experiences. I saw my own comrades hacked to pieces at Maiwand without losing my nerve.”
“I can understand. There is a mystery about this which stimulates the imagination; where there is no imagination there is no horror. Have you seen the evening paper?”
“No.”
“It gives a fairly good account of the affair. It does not mention the fact that when the man was raised up, a woman’s wedding ring fell upon the floor. It is just as well it does not.”
“Why?”
“Look at this advertisement,” he answered. “I had one sent to every paper this morning immediately after the affair.”
He threw the paper across to me and I glanced at the place indicated. It was the first announcement in the “Found” column. “In Brixton Road, this morning,” it ran, “a plain gold wedding ring, found in the roadway between the ‘White Hart’ Tavern and Holland Grove. Apply Dr. Watson, 221B, Baker Street, between eight and nine this evening.”
“Excuse my using your name,” he said. “If I used my own some of these dunderheads would recognize it, and want to meddle in the affair.”
“That is all right,” I answered. “But supposing anyone applies, I have no ring.”
“Oh yes, you have,” said he, handing me one. “This will do very well. It is almost a facsimile.”
“And who do you expect will answer this advertisement.”
“Why, the man in the brown