that you won’t speak to me for fifty minutes.” He curled himself up
in his chair, with his thin knees drawn up to his hawk-like nose, and
there he sat with his eyes closed and his black clay pipe thrusting out
like the bill of some strange bird. I had come to the conclusion that
he had dropped asleep, and indeed was nodding myself, when he suddenly
sprang out of his chair with the gesture of a man who has made up his
mind, and put his pipe down upon the mantel-piece.
“Sarasate plays at the St. James’s Hall this afternoon,” he remarked.
“What do you think, Watson? Could your patients spare you for a few
hours?”
“I have nothing to do to-day. My practice is never very absorbing.”
“Then put on your hat and come. I am going through the city first, and
we can have some lunch on the way. I observe that there is a good deal
of German music on the programme, which is rather more to my taste than
Italian or French. It is introspective, and I want to introspect. Come
along!”
We travelled by the Underground as far as Aldersgate; and a short walk
took us to Saxe-Coburg Square, the scene of the singular story which we
had listened to in the morning. It was a pokey, little, shabby-genteel
place, where four lines of dingy two-storied brick houses looked out
into a small railed-in enclosure, where a lawn of weedy grass and
a few clumps of faded laurel-bushes made a hard fight against a
smoke-laden and uncongenial atmosphere. Three gilt balls and a brown
board with “JABEZ WILSON” in white letters, upon a corner
house, announced the place where our red-headed client carried on his
business. Sherlock Holmes stopped in front of it with his head on one
side, and looked it all over, with his eyes shining brightly between
puckered lids. Then he walked slowly up the street, and then down again
to the corner, still looking keenly at the houses. Finally he returned
to the pawnbroker’s, and, having thumped vigorously upon the pavement
with his stick two or three times, he went up to the door and knocked.
It was instantly opened by a bright-looking, clean-shaven young fellow,
who asked him to step in.
“Thank you,” said Holmes, “I only wished to ask you how you would go
from here to the Strand.”
“Third right, fourth left,” answered the assistant, promptly, closing
the door.
“Smart fellow, that,” observed Holmes, as we walked away. “He is, in my
judgment, the fourth smartest man in London, and for daring I am not
sure that he has not a claim to be third. I have known something of him
before.”
“Evidently,” said I, “Mr. Wilson’s assistant counts for a good deal in
this mystery of the Red-headed League. I am sure that you inquired your
way merely in order that you might see him.”
“Not him.”
“What then?”
“The knees of his trousers.”
“And what did you see?”
“What I expected to see.”
“Why did you beat the pavement?”
“My dear doctor, this is a time for observation, not for talk. We are
spies in an enemy’s country. We know something of Saxe-Coburg Square.
Let us now explore the parts which lie behind it.”
The road in which we found ourselves as we turned round the corner
from the retired Saxe-Coburg Square presented as great a contrast to
it as the front of a picture does to the back. It was one of the main
arteries which convey the traffic of the city to the north and west.
The roadway was blocked with the immense stream of commerce flowing
in a double tide inward and outward, while the foot-paths were black
with the hurrying swarm of pedestrians. It was difficult to realize
as we looked at the line of fine shops and stately business premises
that they really abutted on the other side upon the faded and stagnant
square which we had just quitted.
“Let me see,” said Holmes, standing at the corner, and glancing along
the line, “I should like just to remember the order of the houses here.
It is a hobby of mine to have an exact knowledge of London. There is
Mortimer’s, the tobacconist, the little newspaper shop, the Coburg
branch of the City and Suburban Bank, the Vegetarian Restaurant, and
McFarlane’s carriage-building depot. That carries us right on to the
other block. And now, doctor, we’ve done our work, so it’s time we had
some play. A sandwich and a cup of coffee, and then off to violin-land,
where all is sweetness and delicacy and harmony, and there are no
red-headed clients to vex us with their conundrums.”
My friend was an enthusiastic musician, being himself not only a
very capable performer, but a composer of no ordinary merit. All the
afternoon he sat in the stalls wrapped in the most perfect happiness,
gently waving his long, thin fingers in time to the music, while his
gently smiling face and his languid, dreamy eyes were as unlike those
of Holmes, the sleuth-hound, Holmes the relentless, keen-witted,
ready-handed criminal agent, as it was possible to conceive. In his
singular character the dual nature alternately asserted itself, and
his extreme exactness and astuteness represented, as I have often
thought, the reaction against the poetic and contemplative mood which
occasionally predominated in him. The swing of his nature took him from
extreme languor to devouring energy; and, as I knew well, he was never
so truly formidable as when, for days on end, he had been lounging in
his arm-chair amid his improvisations and his black-letter editions.
Then it was that the lust of the chase would suddenly come upon him,
and that his brilliant reasoning power would rise to the level of
intuition, until those who were unacquainted with his methods would
look askance at him as on a man whose knowledge was not that of other
mortals. When I saw him that afternoon so enrapt in the music at St.
James’s Hall I felt that an evil time might be coming upon those whom
he had set himself to hunt down.
“You want to go home, no doubt, doctor,” he remarked, as we emerged.
“Yes, it would be as well.”
“And I have some business to do which will take some hours. This
business at Coburg Square is serious.”
“Why serious?”
“A considerable crime is in contemplation. I have every reason to
believe that we shall be in time to stop it. But to-day being Saturday
rather complicates matters. I shall want your help to-night.”
“At what time?”
“Ten will be early enough.”
“I shall be at Baker Street at ten.”
“Very well. And, I say, doctor, there may be some little danger, so
kindly put your army revolver in your pocket.” He waved his hand,
turned on his heel, and disappeared in an instant among the crowd.
[Illustration: “ALL AFTERNOON HE SAT IN THE STALLS”]
I trust that I am not more dense than my neighbors, but I was always
oppressed with a sense of my own stupidity in my dealings with Sherlock
Holmes. Here I had heard what he had heard, I had seen what he had
seen, and yet from his words it was evident that he saw clearly not
only what had happened, but what was about to happen, while to me the
whole business was still confused and grotesque. As I drove home to
my house in Kensington I thought over it all, from the extraordinary
story of the red-headed copier of the “Encyclopædia” down to the visit
to Saxe-Coburg Square, and the ominous words with which he had parted
from me. What was this nocturnal expedition, and why should I go armed?
Where were we going, and what were we to do? I had the hint from Holmes
that this smooth-faced pawnbroker’s assistant was a formidable man—a
man who might play a deep game. I tried to puzzle it out, but gave it
up in despair, and set the matter aside until night should bring an
explanation.
It was a quarter past nine when I started from home and made my way
across the Park, and so through Oxford Street to Baker Street. Two
hansoms were standing at the door, and, as I entered the passage, I
heard the sound of voices from above. On entering his room I found
Holmes in animated conversation with two men, one of whom I recognized
as Peter Jones, the official police agent, while the other was a long,
thin, sad-faced man, with a very shiny hat and oppressively respectable
frock-coat.
“Ha! our party is complete,” said Holmes, buttoning up his pea-jacket,
and taking his heavy hunting crop from the rack. “Watson, I think
you know Mr. Jones, of Scotland Yard? Let me introduce you to Mr.
Merryweather, who is to be our companion in to-night’s adventure.”
“We’re hunting in couples again, doctor, you see,” said Jones, in his
consequential way. “Our friend here is a wonderful man for starting a
chase. All he wants is an old dog to help him to do the running down.”
“I hope a wild goose may not prove to be the end of our chase,”
observed Mr. Merryweather, gloomily.
“You may place considerable confidence in Mr. Holmes, sir,” said the
police agent, loftily. “He has his own little methods, which are, if he
won’t mind my saying so, just a little too theoretical and fantastic,
but he has the makings of a detective in him. It is not too much to
say that once or twice, as in that business of the Sholto murder and
the Agra treasure, he has been more nearly correct than the official
force.”
“Oh, if you say so, Mr. Jones, it is all right,” said the stranger,
with deference. “Still, I confess that I miss my rubber. It is the
first Saturday night for seven-and-twenty years that I have not had my
rubber.”
“I think you will find,” said Sherlock Holmes, “that you will play for
a higher stake to-night than you have ever done yet, and that the play
will be more exciting. For you, Mr. Merryweather, the stake will be
some £30,000; and for you, Jones, it will be the man upon whom you wish
to lay your hands.”
“John Clay, the murderer, thief, smasher, and forger. He’s a young man,
Mr. Merryweather, but he is at the head of his profession, and I would
rather have my bracelets on him than on any criminal in London. He’s a
remarkable man, is young John Clay. His grandfather was a royal duke,
and he himself has been to Eton and Oxford. His brain is as cunning as
his fingers, and though we meet signs of him at every turn, we never
know where to find the man himself. He’ll crack a crib in Scotland one
week, and be raising money to build an orphanage in Cornwall the next.
I’ve been on his track for years, and have never set eyes on him yet.”
“I hope that I may have the pleasure of introducing you to-night. I’ve
had one or two little turns also with Mr. John Clay, and I agree with
you that he is at the head of his profession. It is past ten, however,
and quite time that we started. If you two will take the first hansom,
Watson and I will follow in the second.”
Sherlock Holmes was not very communicative during the long drive,
and lay back in the cab humming the tunes which he had heard in the
afternoon. We rattled through an endless labyrinth of gas-lit streets
until we emerged into Farringdon Street.
“We are close there now,” my friend remarked. “This fellow Merryweather
is a bank director, and personally interested in the matter. I thought
it as well to have Jones with us also. He is not a bad fellow, though
an absolute imbecile in his profession. He has one positive virtue. He
is as brave as a bull-dog, and as tenacious as a lobster if he gets his
claws upon any one. Here we are, and they are waiting for us.”
We had reached the same crowded thoroughfare in which we had found
ourselves in the morning. Our cabs were dismissed, and, following
the guidance of Mr. Merryweather, we passed down a narrow passage
and through a side door, which he opened for us. Within there was a
small corridor, which ended in a very massive iron gate. This also was
opened, and led down a flight of winding stone steps, which terminated
at another formidable gate. Mr. Merryweather stopped to light a
lantern, and then conducted us down a dark, earth-smelling passage, and
so, after opening a third door, into a huge vault or cellar, which was
piled all round with crates and massive boxes.
“You are not very vulnerable from above,” Holmes remarked, as he held
up the lantern and gazed about him.
“Nor from below,” said Mr. Merryweather, striking his stick upon the
flags which lined the floor. “Why, dear me, it sounds quite hollow!” he
remarked, looking up in surprise.
“I must really ask you to be a little more quiet,” said Holmes,
severely. “You have already imperilled the whole success of our
expedition. Might I beg that you would have the goodness to sit down
upon one of those boxes, and not to interfere?”
The solemn Mr. Merryweather perched himself upon a crate, with a very
injured expression upon his face, while Holmes fell upon his knees
upon the floor, and, with the lantern and a magnifying lens, began to
examine minutely the cracks between the stones. A few seconds sufficed
to satisfy him, for he sprang to his feet again, and put his glass in
his pocket.
“We have at least an hour before us,” he remarked; “for they can
hardly take any steps until the good pawnbroker is safely in bed.
Then they will not lose a minute, for the sooner they do their work
the longer time they will have for their escape. We are at present,
doctor—as no doubt you have divined—in the cellar of the city branch
of one of the principal London banks. Mr. Merryweather is the chairman
of directors, and he will explain to you that there are reasons why the
more daring criminals of London should take a considerable interest in
this cellar at present.”
“It is our French gold,” whispered the director. “We have had several
warnings that an attempt might be made upon it.”
“Your French gold?”
“Yes. We had occasion some months ago to strengthen our resources, and
borrowed, for that purpose, 30,000 napoleons from the Bank of France.
It has become known that we have never had occasion to unpack the
money, and that it is still lying in our cellar. The crate upon which
I sit contains 2000 napoleons packed between layers of lead foil. Our
reserve of bullion is much larger at present than is usually kept in a
single branch office, and the directors have had misgivings upon the
subject.”
“Which were very well justified,” observed Holmes. “And now it is time
that we arranged our little plans. I expect that within an hour matters
will come to a head. In the mean time, Mr. Merryweather, we must put
the screen over that dark lantern.”
“And sit in the dark?”
“I am afraid so. I had brought a pack of cards in my pocket, and I
thought that, as we were a _partie carrée_, you might have your rubber
after all. But I see that the enemy’s preparations have gone so far
that we cannot risk the presence of a light. And, first of all, we must
choose our positions. These are daring men, and though we shall take
them at a disadvantage, they may do us some harm unless we are careful.
I shall stand behind this crate, and do you conceal yourselves behind
those. Then, when I flash a light upon them, close in swiftly. If they
fire, Watson, have no compunction about shooting them down.”
I placed my revolver, cocked, upon the top of the wooden case behind
which I crouched. Holmes shot the slide across the front of his
lantern, and left us in pitch darkness—such an absolute darkness
as I have never before experienced. The smell of hot metal remained
to assure us that the light was still there, ready to flash out at
a moment’s notice. To me, with my nerves worked up to a pitch of
expectancy, there was something depressing and subduing in the sudden
gloom, and in the cold, dank air of the vault.
“They have but one retreat,” whispered Holmes. “That is back through
the house into Saxe-Coburg Square. I hope that you have done what I
asked you, Jones?”
“I have an inspector and two officers waiting at the front door.”
“Then we have stopped all the holes. And now we must be silent and
wait.”
What a time it seemed! From comparing notes afterwards it was but an
hour and a quarter, yet it appeared to me that the night must have
almost gone, and the dawn be breaking above us. My limbs were weary and
stiff, for I feared to change my position; yet my nerves were worked
up to the highest pitch of tension, and my hearing was so acute that I
could not only hear the gentle breathing of my companions, but I could
distinguish the deeper, heavier in-breath of the bulky Jones from the
thin, sighing note of the bank director. From my position I could look
over the case in the direction of the floor. Suddenly my eyes caught
the glint of a light.
At first it was but a lurid spark upon the stone pavement. Then it
lengthened out until it became a yellow line, and then, without any
warning or sound, a gash seemed to open and a hand appeared; a white,
almost womanly hand, which felt about in the centre of the little area
of light. For a minute or more the hand, with its writhing fingers,
protruded out of the floor. Then it was withdrawn as suddenly as it
appeared, and all was dark again save the single lurid spark which
marked a chink between the stones.
Its disappearance, however, was but momentary. With a rending, tearing
sound, one of the broad, white stones turned over upon its side, and
left a square, gaping hole, through which streamed the light of a
lantern. Over the edge there peeped a clean-cut, boyish face, which
looked keenly about it, and then, with a hand on either side of the
aperture, drew itself shoulder-high and waist-high, until one knee
rested upon the edge. In another instant he stood at the side of the
hole, and was hauling after him a companion, lithe and small like
himself, with a pale face and a shock of very red hair.
“It’s all clear,” he whispered. “Have you the chisel and the bags.
Great Scott! Jump, Archie, jump, and I’ll swing for it!”
Sherlock Holmes had sprung out and seized the intruder by the collar.
The other dived down the hole, and I heard the sound of rending cloth
as Jones clutched at his skirts. The light flashed upon the barrel of a
revolver, but Holmes’s hunting crop came down on the man’s wrist, and
the pistol clinked upon the stone floor.
“It’s no use, John Clay,” said Holmes, blandly. “You have no chance at
all.”
“So I see,” the other answered, with the utmost coolness. “I fancy that
my pal is all right, though I see you have got his coat-tails.”
“There are three men waiting for him at the door,” said Holmes.
“Oh, indeed! You seem to have done the thing very completely. I must
compliment you.”
“And I you,” Holmes answered. “Your red-headed idea was very new and
effective.”
“You’ll see your pal again presently,” said Jones. “He’s quicker at
climbing down holes than I am. Just hold out while I fix the derbies.”
“I beg that you will not touch me with your filthy hands,” remarked
our prisoner, as the handcuffs clattered upon his wrists. “You may not
be aware that I have royal blood in my veins. Have the goodness, also,
when you address me always to say ‘sir’ and ‘please.’”
“All right,” said Jones, with a stare and a snigger. “Well, would you
please, sir, march up-stairs, where we can get a cab to carry your
highness to the police-station?”
“That is better,” said John Clay, serenely. He made a sweeping bow to
the three of us, and walked quietly off in the custody of the detective.
“Really Mr. Holmes,” said Mr. Merryweather, as we followed them from
the cellar, “I do not know how the bank can thank you or repay you.
There is no doubt that you have detected and defeated in the most
complete manner one of the most determined attempts at 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 over this
matter, which I shall expect the bank to refund, but beyond that I am
amply repaid by having had an experience which is in many ways unique,
and by hearing the very remarkable narrative of the Red-headed League.”
* * * * *
“You see, Watson,” he explained, in the early hours of the morning,
as we sat over a glass of whiskey-and-soda in Baker Street, “it was
perfectly obvious from the first that the only possible object of this
rather fantastic business of the advertisement of the League, and the
copying of the ‘Encyclopædia,’ must be to get this not over-bright
pawnbroker out of the way for a number of hours every day. It was a
curious way of managing it, but, really, it would be difficult to
suggest a better. The method was no doubt suggested to Clay’s ingenious
mind by the color of his accomplice’s hair. The £4 a week was a lure
which must draw him, and what was it to them, who were playing for
thousands? They put in the advertisement, one rogue has the temporary
office, the other rogue incites the man to apply for it, and together
they manage to secure his absence every morning in the week. From
the time that I heard of the assistant having come for half wages,
it was obvious to me that he had some strong motive for securing the
situation.”
“But how could you guess what the motive was?”
“Had there been women in the house, I should have suspected a mere
vulgar intrigue. That, however, was out of the question. The man’s
business was a small one, and there was nothing in his house which
could account for such elaborate preparations, and such an expenditure
as they were at. It must, then, be something out of the house. What
could it be? I thought of the assistant’s fondness for photography,
and his trick of vanishing into the cellar. The cellar! There was the
end of this tangled clue. Then I made inquiries as to this mysterious
assistant, and found that I had to deal with one of the coolest
and most daring criminals in London. He was doing something in the
cellar—something which took many hours a day for months on end. What
could it be, once more? I could think of nothing save that he was
running a tunnel to some other building.
“So far I had got when we went to visit the scene of action. I
surprised you by beating upon the pavement with my stick. I was
ascertaining whether the cellar stretched out in front or behind.
It was not in front. Then I rang the bell, and, as I hoped, the
assistant answered it. We have had some skirmishes, but we had never
set eyes upon each other before. I hardly looked at his face. His
knees were what I wished to see. You must yourself have remarked how
worn, wrinkled, and stained they were. They spoke of those hours of
burrowing. The only remaining point was what they were burrowing for. I
walked round the corner, saw that the City and Suburban Bank abutted on
our friend’s premises, and felt that I had solved my problem. When you
drove home after the concert I called upon Scotland Yard, and upon the
chairman of the bank directors, with the result that you have seen.”
“And how could you tell that they would make their attempt to-night?” I
asked.
“Well, when they closed their League offices that was a sign that they
cared no longer about Mr. Jabez Wilson’s presence—in other words,
that they had completed their tunnel. But it was essential that they
should use it soon, as it might be discovered, or the bullion might
be removed. Saturday would suit them better than any 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 unfeigned
admiration. “It is so long a chain, and yet every link rings true.”
“It saved me from ennui,” he answered, yawning. “Alas! I already feel
it closing in upon me. My life is spent in one long effort to escape
from the commonplaces of existence. These little problems 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 of some
little use,” he remarked. “‘L’homme c’est rien—l’oeuvre c’est
tout,’ as Gustave Flaubert wrote to Georges Sand.”
Adventure III
A CASE OF IDENTITY
“My dear fellow,” said Sherlock Holmes, as we sat on either side
of the fire in his lodgings at Baker Street, “life is infinitely
stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would
not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of
existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over
this great city, gently remove the roofs, and peep in at the queer
things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings,
the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through
generations, and leading to the most _outré_ results, it would make all
fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale
and unprofitable.”
“And yet I am not convinced of it,” I answered. “The cases which come
to light in the papers are, as a rule, bald enough, and vulgar enough.
We have in our police reports realism pushed to its extreme limits,
and yet the result is, it must be confessed, neither fascinating nor
artistic.”