A Case of Identity - Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

<v Speaker 1>A case of identity, my dear fellow, said Sherlock Holmes,
<v Speaker 1>as we sat on either side of the fire in
<v Speaker 1>his lodgings at Baker Street. Life is infinitely stranger than
<v Speaker 1>anything which the mind of man could invent. We would
<v Speaker 1>not dare to conceive the things which are really mere
<v Speaker 1>commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that
<v Speaker 1>window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently
<v Speaker 1>remove the roofs, and peep in at the queer things
<v Speaker 1>which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the
<v Speaker 1>cross purposes, the wonderful chains of events working through generations
<v Speaker 1>and leading to the most utra results. It would make
<v Speaker 1>all fiction, with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions, most stale
<v Speaker 1>and unprofitable. And yet I am not convinced of it,
<v Speaker 1>I answered. The cases which come to light in the
<v Speaker 1>papers are, as a rule bald enough and vulgar enough.
<v Speaker 1>We have in our police reports realism pushed to its
<v Speaker 1>extreme limits, and yet the result is it must be
<v Speaker 1>confessed neither fascinating nor artistic. A certain selection and discretion
<v Speaker 1>must be used in producing a realistic effect. Remarked Holmes.
<v Speaker 1>This is wanting in the police report, where more stress
<v Speaker 1>is laid perhaps upon the platitudes of the magistrate, than
<v Speaker 1>upon the details, which to an observer contain the vital
<v Speaker 1>essence of the whole matter depend upon it. There is
<v Speaker 1>nothing so unnatural as the commonplace. I smiled and shook
<v Speaker 1>my head. I can quite understand your thinking, so I said.
<v Speaker 1>Of course, in your position of unofficial adviser and helper
<v Speaker 1>to everybody who is absolutely puzzled throughout the three continents,
<v Speaker 1>you are brought in contact with all that is strange
<v Speaker 1>and bizarre. But here I picked up the morning paper
<v Speaker 1>from the ground. Let us put it to a practical test.
<v Speaker 1>Here is the first heading upon which I come, A
<v Speaker 1>husband's cruelty to his wife. There is half a column
<v Speaker 1>of print, but I know without reading it that it
<v Speaker 1>is all perfectly familiar to me. There is, of course
<v Speaker 1>the other woman, the drink, the push, the blow, the bruise,
<v Speaker 1>the sympathetic sister or landlady. The crudest of writers could
<v Speaker 1>invent nothing more crude. Indeed, your example is an unfortunate
<v Speaker 1>one for your argument, said Holmes, taking the paper and
<v Speaker 1>glancing his eye down it. This is the dundass separation case.
<v Speaker 1>And as it happens, I was engaged in clearing up
<v Speaker 1>some small points in connection with it. The husband was
<v Speaker 1>a teetotaler, and there was no other woman, And the
<v Speaker 1>conduct complained of was that he had drifted into the
<v Speaker 1>habit of winding up every meal by taking out his
<v Speaker 1>false teeth and hurling them at his wife, which you
<v Speaker 1>will allow is not an action likely to occur to
<v Speaker 1>the imagination of the average story teller. Take a pinch
<v Speaker 1>of snuff, doctor, and acknowledge that I have scored over
<v Speaker 1>you in your example. He held out his snuff box
<v Speaker 1>of old gold with a great amethyst in the center
<v Speaker 1>of the lid. Its splendor was in such contrast to
<v Speaker 1>his homely ways and simple life that I could not
<v Speaker 1>help commenting upon it, Ah said he. I forgot that
<v Speaker 1>I had not seen you for some weeks. It is
<v Speaker 1>a little souvenir from the King of Bohemia, in return
<v Speaker 1>for my assistance in the case of the irene Adler
<v Speaker 1>papers and the ring. I asked, glancing at a remarkable
<v Speaker 1>brilliant which sparkled upon his finger. It was from the
<v Speaker 1>reigning family of Holland. Though the matter in which I
<v Speaker 1>served them was of such delicacy that I cannot confide
<v Speaker 1>it even to you, who have been good enough to
<v Speaker 1>chronicle one or two of my little problems. And have
<v Speaker 1>you any on hand just now? I asked, with interest,
<v Speaker 1>some ten or twelve, but none which present any feature
<v Speaker 1>of interest. They are important, you understand, without being interesting. Indeed,
<v Speaker 1>I have found that it is usually in unimportant matters
<v Speaker 1>that there is a field for the observation and for
<v Speaker 1>the quick analysis of cause and effect, which gives the
<v Speaker 1>charm to an investigation. The larger crimes are apt to
<v Speaker 1>be the simpler, for the bigger the crime, the more obvious.
<v Speaker 1>As a rule is the motive. In these cases. Save
<v Speaker 1>for one rather intricate matter, which has been referred to
<v Speaker 1>me from Marseilles, there is nothing which presents any features
<v Speaker 1>of interest. It is possible, however, that I may have
<v Speaker 1>something better before or very many minutes are over, for
<v Speaker 1>this is one of my clients, or I am much mistaken.
<v Speaker 1>He had risen from his chair and was standing between
<v Speaker 1>the parted blinds, gazing down into the dull, neutral tinted
<v Speaker 1>London street. Looking over his shoulder, I saw that on
<v Speaker 1>the pavement opposite there stood a large woman with a
<v Speaker 1>heavy fur boa round her neck and a large curling
<v Speaker 1>red feather in a broad brimmed hat, which was tilted
<v Speaker 1>in a coquettish Duchess of Devonshire fashion over her ear.
<v Speaker 1>From under this great panoply, she peeped up in a nervous,
<v Speaker 1>hesitating fashion at our windows, while her body oscillated backward
<v Speaker 1>and forward, and her fingers fidgeted with her glove buttons. Suddenly,
<v Speaker 1>with a plunge, as of the swimmer who leaves the bank,
<v Speaker 1>she hurried across the road, and we heard the sharp
<v Speaker 1>clang of the bell. I have seen those symptoms before,
<v Speaker 1>said Holmes, throwing his cigarette into the fire. Oscillation upon
<v Speaker 1>the pavement always means an affere de cours. She would
<v Speaker 1>like advice, but she is not sure that the matter
<v Speaker 1>is not too delicate for communication. And yet even here
<v Speaker 1>we may discriminate. When a woman has been seriously wronged
<v Speaker 1>by a man, she no longer oscillates, and the usual
<v Speaker 1>symptom is a broken bell wire. Here we may take
<v Speaker 1>it that there is a love matter, but that the
<v Speaker 1>maiden is not so much angry as perplexed or grieved.
<v Speaker 1>But here she comes in person to resolve our doubts.
<v Speaker 1>As he spoke, there was a tap at the door,
<v Speaker 1>and the boy in buttons entered to announce miss Mary Sutherland,
<v Speaker 1>while the lady herself loomed behind his small black figure,
<v Speaker 1>like a full sailed merchantman behind a tiny pilot boat.
<v Speaker 1>Sherlock Holmes welcomed her with the easy courtesy for which
<v Speaker 1>he was remarkable, and having closed the door and bowed
<v Speaker 1>her into an arm chair, he looked her over in
<v Speaker 1>the minute and yet abstracted fashion which was peculiar to him.
<v Speaker 1>Do you not find? He said, that with your short sight,
<v Speaker 1>it is a little trying to do so much typewriting.
<v Speaker 1>I did it first, she answered, but now I know
<v Speaker 1>where the letters are without looking. Then, suddenly realizing the
<v Speaker 1>full purport of his words, she gave a violent start
<v Speaker 1>and looked up with fear and astonishment upon her broad,
<v Speaker 1>good humored face. You've heard about me, mister Holmes, she cried. Else,
<v Speaker 1>how could you know all that? Never mind, said Holmes, laughing,
<v Speaker 1>it is my business to know things. Perhaps I have
<v Speaker 1>trained myself to see what others overlook. If not, why
<v Speaker 1>should you come to consult me. I came to you, sir,
<v Speaker 1>because I heard of you from missus Ethridge, whose husband
<v Speaker 1>you found so easy when the police and ever one
<v Speaker 1>had given him up for dead. Oh, mister Holmes, I
<v Speaker 1>wish you would do as much for me. I'm not rich,
<v Speaker 1>but still I have a hundred a year in my
<v Speaker 1>own right, besides the little that I make by the machine,
<v Speaker 1>and I would give it all to know what has
<v Speaker 1>become of mister Hosmer Angel. Why did you come away
<v Speaker 1>to consult me in such a hurry, asked Sherlock Holmes,
<v Speaker 1>with his finger tips together and his eyes to the ceiling. Again,
<v Speaker 1>A startled look came over the somewhat vacuous face of
<v Speaker 1>Miss Mary Sutherland. Yes, I did bang out of the house,
<v Speaker 1>she said, for it made me angry to see the
<v Speaker 1>easy way in which mister Windebank, that is my father,
<v Speaker 1>took it all. He would not go to the police,
<v Speaker 1>and he would not go to you, and so at last,
<v Speaker 1>as he would do nothing and kept on saying that
<v Speaker 1>there was no harm done. It made me mad, and
<v Speaker 1>I just on with my things and came right away
<v Speaker 1>to you. Your father, said Holmes, your stepfather, surely, since
<v Speaker 1>the name is different, Yes, my stepfather, I call him father,
<v Speaker 1>though it sounds funny too, for he is only five
<v Speaker 1>years and two months older than myself. And your mother
<v Speaker 1>is alive. Oh, yes, mother is alive and well. I
<v Speaker 1>wasn't best pleased mister Holmes when she married again so
<v Speaker 1>soon after father's death, and a man who was nearly
<v Speaker 1>fifteen years younger than herself. Father was a plumber in
<v Speaker 1>the Tottenham Court Road, and he left a tidy business
<v Speaker 1>behind him, which mother carried on with mister Hardy, the foreman.
<v Speaker 1>But when mister Windebank came he made her sell the business,
<v Speaker 1>for he was very superior, being a traveler in wines.
<v Speaker 1>They got forty seven hundred pounds for the good will
<v Speaker 1>and interest, which wasn't near as much as father could
<v Speaker 1>have got if he had been alive. I had expected
<v Speaker 1>to see Sherlock Holmes impatient under this rambling and inconsequential narrative,
<v Speaker 1>but on the contrary, he had listened with the greatest
<v Speaker 1>concentration of attention. Your own little income, he asked, does
<v Speaker 1>it come out of the business. Oh no, sir, it
<v Speaker 1>is quite separate and was left me by my uncle
<v Speaker 1>ned in Auckland. It is in New Zealand, stock paying
<v Speaker 1>four and a half percent. Two thousand, five hundred pounds
<v Speaker 1>was the amount. But I can only touch the interest.
<v Speaker 1>You interest me extremely, said Holmes. And since you draw
<v Speaker 1>so large a sum as a hundred a year, with
<v Speaker 1>what you earn into the bargain, you no doubt travel
<v Speaker 1>a little and indulge yourself in every way. I believe
<v Speaker 1>that a single lady can get on very nicely upon
<v Speaker 1>an income of about sixty pounds. I could do with
<v Speaker 1>much less than that, mister Holmes. But you understand that
<v Speaker 1>as long as I live at home, I don't wish
<v Speaker 1>to be a burden to them, and so they have
<v Speaker 1>the use of the money just while I am staying
<v Speaker 1>with them. Of course, that is only just for the time.
<v Speaker 1>Mister Windebank draws my interest every quarter and pays it
<v Speaker 1>over to mother. And I find that I can do
<v Speaker 1>pretty well with what I earn at typewriting. It brings
<v Speaker 1>me twopence a sheet, and I can often do from
<v Speaker 1>fifteen to twenty sheets in a day. You have made
<v Speaker 1>your position very clear to me, said Holmes. This is
<v Speaker 1>my friend, doctor Watson, before whom you can speak as
<v Speaker 1>freely as before myself. Kindly tell us now all about
<v Speaker 1>your connection with mister Hosmer. Angel a flush stole over,
<v Speaker 1>Miss Sutherland's face, and she picked nervously at the fringe
<v Speaker 1>of her jacket. I met him first at the gas
<v Speaker 1>Futter's ball. She said. They used to send Father tickets
<v Speaker 1>when he was alive, and then afterwards they remembered us
<v Speaker 1>and sent them to mother. Mister Windebank did not wish
<v Speaker 1>us to go. He never did wish us to go anywhere.
<v Speaker 1>He would get quite mad if I wanted so much
<v Speaker 1>as to join a Sunday school treat. But this time
<v Speaker 1>I was set on going, and I would go. For
<v Speaker 1>what right had he to prevent? He said the folk
<v Speaker 1>were not fit for us to know when all father's
<v Speaker 1>friends were to be there. And he said that I
<v Speaker 1>had nothing fit to wear when I had my purple plush,
<v Speaker 1>that I had never so much as taken out of
<v Speaker 1>the drawer. At last, when nothing else would do, he
<v Speaker 1>went off to France upon the business of the firm.
<v Speaker 1>But we went, Mother and I with mister Hardy, who
<v Speaker 1>used to be our foreman, and it was there I
<v Speaker 1>met mister Hosmer angel. I suppose, said Holmes, that when
<v Speaker 1>mister Windebank came back from France, he was very annoyed
<v Speaker 1>at your having gone to the oh well, he was
<v Speaker 1>very good about it. He laughed, I remembered, and shrugged
<v Speaker 1>his shoulders and said, there was no use denying anything
<v Speaker 1>to a woman, for she would have her way. I see. Then,
<v Speaker 1>at the Gasford's ball, you met, as I understand, a
<v Speaker 1>gentleman called mister Hosmer Angel. Yes, sir, I met him
<v Speaker 1>that night, and he called next day to ask if
<v Speaker 1>we had got home all safe. And after that we
<v Speaker 1>had met him, that is to say, mister Holmes, I
<v Speaker 1>met him twice for walks. But after that Father came
<v Speaker 1>back again, and mister Hosmer Angel could not come to
<v Speaker 1>the house any more. No, Well, you know, Father didn't
<v Speaker 1>like anything of the sort. He wouldn't have any visitors
<v Speaker 1>if he could help it. And he used to say
<v Speaker 1>that a woman should be happy in her own family circle.
<v Speaker 1>But then, as I used to say to mother, a
<v Speaker 1>woman wants her own circle to begin with, and I
<v Speaker 1>had not got mine yet. But how about mister Hosmer Angel.
<v Speaker 1>Did he make no attempt to see you? Well? Father
<v Speaker 1>was going off to France again in a week, and
<v Speaker 1>Hosmer wrote and said that it would be safer and
<v Speaker 1>better not to see each other until he had gone.
<v Speaker 1>We could write in the meantime, and he used to
<v Speaker 1>write every day. I took the letters in in the morning,
<v Speaker 1>so there was no need for father to know. Were
<v Speaker 1>you engaged to the gentleman at this time? Oh, yes,
<v Speaker 1>mister Holmes, we were engaged after the first walk that
<v Speaker 1>we took, Holsmer. Mister Angel was a cashier in an
<v Speaker 1>office in Leadenhall Street. And what office. That's the worst
<v Speaker 1>of it, mister Holmes. I don't know where did he live?
<v Speaker 1>Then he slept on the premises, and you don't know
<v Speaker 1>his address, no, except that it was Leadenhall Street. Where
<v Speaker 1>did you address your letters? Then to the Luddenhall Street
<v Speaker 1>post Office to be left till called for. He said
<v Speaker 1>that if they were sent to the office, he would
<v Speaker 1>be chafed by all the other clerks about having letters
<v Speaker 1>from a lady. So I offered to typewrite them like
<v Speaker 1>he did his, but he wouldn't have that, for he
<v Speaker 1>said that when I wrote them they seemed to come
<v Speaker 1>from me, but when they were typewritten, he always felt
<v Speaker 1>that the machine had come between us. That will just
<v Speaker 1>show you how fond he was of me, mister Holmes,
<v Speaker 1>and the little things that he would think of it
<v Speaker 1>was most suggestive, said Holmes. It has long been an
<v Speaker 1>axiom of mine that the little things are infinitely the
<v Speaker 1>most important. Can you remember any other little things about
<v Speaker 1>mister Hosmer Angel. He was a very shy man, mister Holmes.
<v Speaker 1>He would rather walk with me in the evening than
<v Speaker 1>in the daylight, for he said that he hated to
<v Speaker 1>be conspicuous, very retiring, and gentlemanly. He won even his
<v Speaker 1>voice was gentle. He'd had the quinsy and swollen glands
<v Speaker 1>when he was young, he told me, and it had
<v Speaker 1>left him with a weak throat and a hesitating, whispering
<v Speaker 1>fashion of speech. He was always well dressed, very neat
<v Speaker 1>and plain, but his eyes were weak, just as mine are,
<v Speaker 1>and he wore tinted glasses against the glare. Well, and
<v Speaker 1>what happened when mister Windebank, your stepfather returned to France.
<v Speaker 1>Mister Hosmer Angel came to the house again and proposed
<v Speaker 1>that we should marry before father came back. He was
<v Speaker 1>in dreadful earnest and made me swear with my hands
<v Speaker 1>on the testament that whatever happened, I would always be
<v Speaker 1>true to him. Mother said he was quite right to
<v Speaker 1>make me swear, and that it was a sign of
<v Speaker 1>his passion. Mother was all in his favor from the
<v Speaker 1>first and was even fonder of him than I was. Then,
<v Speaker 1>when they talked of marrying within the week, I began
<v Speaker 1>to ask about Father, but they both said never to
<v Speaker 1>mind about Father, but just to tell him afterwards, and
<v Speaker 1>Mother said she would make it all right with him.
<v Speaker 1>I didn't quite like that, mister Holmes. It seemed funny
<v Speaker 1>that I should ask his leave, as he was only
<v Speaker 1>a few years older than me. But I didn't want
<v Speaker 1>to do anything on the sly, so I wrote to
<v Speaker 1>Father at Bordeaux, where the company has its French offices.
<v Speaker 1>But the letter came back to me on the very
<v Speaker 1>morning of the wedding. It missed him, then, yes, sir,
<v Speaker 1>for he had started to England just before it arrived. Huh,
<v Speaker 1>that was unfortunate. Your wedding was arranged then for the Friday.
<v Speaker 1>Was it to be in church, Yes, sir, but very quietly.
<v Speaker 1>It was to be at Saint Savior's near King's Cross,
<v Speaker 1>and we were to have breakfast afterwards at the Saint
<v Speaker 1>Pancras hotel. Hosmer came for us in a hansom, but
<v Speaker 1>as there were two of us. He put us both
<v Speaker 1>into it and stepped himself into a four wheeler, which
<v Speaker 1>happened to be the only other cab in the street.
<v Speaker 1>We got to the church first, and when the four
<v Speaker 1>wheeler drove up, we waited for him to step out,
<v Speaker 1>but he never did, and when the cabman got down
<v Speaker 1>from the box and looked, there was no one there.
<v Speaker 1>The cabman said that he could not imagine what had
<v Speaker 1>become of him, for he had seen him get in
<v Speaker 1>with his own eyes. That was last Friday, mister Holmes,
<v Speaker 1>and I have never seen or heard anything since then
<v Speaker 1>to throw any light upon what became of him. It
<v Speaker 1>seems to me that you have been very shamefully treated,
<v Speaker 1>said Holmes. Oh no, sir, he was too good and
<v Speaker 1>kind to leave me. So why all the morning he
<v Speaker 1>was saying to me that whatever happened I was to
<v Speaker 1>be true, and that even if something quite unforeseen occurred
<v Speaker 1>to separate us, I was always to remember that I
<v Speaker 1>was pledged to him, and that he would claim his
<v Speaker 1>pledge sooner or later. It seemed strange talk for a
<v Speaker 1>wedding morning, But what has happened since gives a meaning
<v Speaker 1>to it. Most certainly it does your own opinion is
<v Speaker 1>then that some unforeseen catastrophe has occurred to him? Yes, sir,
<v Speaker 1>I believe that he foresaw some danger, or else he
<v Speaker 1>would not have talked so. And then I think that
<v Speaker 1>what he foresaw happened, But you have no notion as
<v Speaker 1>to what it could have been? None. One more question?
<v Speaker 1>How did your mother take the matter? She was angry
<v Speaker 1>and said that I was never to speak of the
<v Speaker 1>matter again. And your father did you tell him? Yes?
<v Speaker 1>And he seemed to think with me that something had happened,
<v Speaker 1>and that I should hear of Hosmer again, as he said,
<v Speaker 1>what interest could anyone have in bringing me to the
<v Speaker 1>doors of the church and then leaving? Now, if he
<v Speaker 1>had borrowed my money, or if he had married me
<v Speaker 1>and got my money settled on him, there might be
<v Speaker 1>some reason. But Hosemer was very independent about money, and
<v Speaker 1>never would look at a shilling of mine. And yet
<v Speaker 1>what could have happened? And why could he not write? Oh?
<v Speaker 1>It drives me half mad to think of it, and
<v Speaker 1>I can't sleep a wink at night. She pulled a
<v Speaker 1>little handkerchief out of her muff and began to sob
<v Speaker 1>heavily into it. I shall glance into the case for you,
<v Speaker 1>said Holmes, rising, and I have no doubt that we
<v Speaker 1>shall reach some definite result. Let the weight of the
<v Speaker 1>matter rest upon me now, and do not let your
<v Speaker 1>mind dwell upon it. Further, above all, try to let
<v Speaker 1>mister Hosmer Angel vanish from your memory as he has
<v Speaker 1>done from your life. Then you don't think I'll see
<v Speaker 1>him again? I fear not. Then what has happened to him?
<v Speaker 1>You will leave that question in my hand. I should
<v Speaker 1>like an accurate description of him, and any letters of
<v Speaker 1>his which you can spare. I advertised for him in
<v Speaker 1>last Saturday's chronicle, said she Here is the slip, and
<v Speaker 1>here are four letters from him. Thank you, and your
<v Speaker 1>address thirty one Lyons Place, Camberwell, mister Angel's address you
<v Speaker 1>never had. I understand. Where is your father's place of business?
<v Speaker 1>He travels for Westhouse and Marbank, the Great Claret importers
<v Speaker 1>of Fenchurch Street. Thank you. You have made your statement
<v Speaker 1>very clearly. You will leave the papers here and remember
<v Speaker 1>the advice which I have given you. Let the whole
<v Speaker 1>incident be a sealed book and do not allow it
<v Speaker 1>to affect your life. You are very kind mister Holmes.
<v Speaker 1>But I cannot do that. I shall be true to Hosmer.
<v Speaker 1>He shall find me ready when he comes back. For
<v Speaker 1>all the preposterous and the vacuous face, there was something
<v Speaker 1>noble in the simple faith of our visitor which compelled
<v Speaker 1>our respect. She laid her little bundle of papers upon
<v Speaker 1>the table and went her way, with a promise to
<v Speaker 1>come again whenever she might be summoned. Sherlock Holmes sat
<v Speaker 1>silent for a few minutes, with his finger tips still
<v Speaker 1>pressed together, his legs stretched out in front of him,
<v Speaker 1>and his gaze directed upward to the ceiling. Then he
<v Speaker 1>took down from the rack the old and oily clay pipe,
<v Speaker 1>which was to him as a counselor, and having lit it,
<v Speaker 1>he leaned back in his chair, with the thick blue
<v Speaker 1>cloud wreathed spinning up from him, and a look of
<v Speaker 1>infinite languor upon his face. Quite an interesting study that maiden,
<v Speaker 1>he observed. I found her more interesting than her little problem,
<v Speaker 1>which by the way, is rather a trite one. You
<v Speaker 1>will find parallel cases if you consult my index in
<v Speaker 1>andover in seventy seven, and there was something of the
<v Speaker 1>sort at the Hague last year, old as is the idea. However,
<v Speaker 1>there were one or two details which were new to me.
<v Speaker 1>But the maiden herself was most instructive. You appeared to
<v Speaker 1>read a good deal upon her, which was quite invisible
<v Speaker 1>to me, I remarked, not invisible but unnoticed. Watson, you
<v Speaker 1>did not know where to look, and so you missed
<v Speaker 1>all that was important. I can never bring you to
<v Speaker 1>realize the importance of sleeves, the suggestiveness of thumbnails, or
<v Speaker 1>the great issues that may hang from a bootlace. Now
<v Speaker 1>what did you gather from that woman's appearance? Describe it well?
<v Speaker 1>She had a slate colored, broad brimmed straw hat with
<v Speaker 1>a feather of a brickish red. Her jacket was black,
<v Speaker 1>with black beads sewn upon it and a fringe of
<v Speaker 1>little black jet ornaments. Her dress was brown, rather darker
<v Speaker 1>than coffee color, with a little purple plush at the
<v Speaker 1>neck and sleeves. Her gloves were grayish and were worn
<v Speaker 1>through at the right forefinger. Her boots I didn't observe.
<v Speaker 1>She had small, round hanging gold earrings, and her general
<v Speaker 1>air of being fairly well to do in a vulgar, comfortable,
<v Speaker 1>easy going way. Sherlock Holmes clapped his hands softly together
<v Speaker 1>and chuckled upon my word, Watson, you are coming along wonderfully.
<v Speaker 1>You have really done very well. Indeed, it is true
<v Speaker 1>that you have missed everything of importance, but you have
<v Speaker 1>hit upon the method, and you have a quick eye
<v Speaker 1>for color. Never trust to general impressions, my boy, but
<v Speaker 1>concentrate yourself upon details. My first glance is always at
<v Speaker 1>a woman's sleeve. In a man, it is perhaps better
<v Speaker 1>first to take the knee of the trouser. As you observe,
<v Speaker 1>this woman had plushed upon her sleeves, which is a
<v Speaker 1>most useful material for showing traces. The double line a
<v Speaker 1>little above the wrist where the typewritist presses against the
<v Speaker 1>table was beautifully defined. The sewing machine of the hand
<v Speaker 1>type leaves a similar mark, put only on the left
<v Speaker 1>arm and on the right of it farthest from the thumb,
<v Speaker 1>instead of being right across the broadest part. As this was,
<v Speaker 1>I then glanced at her face, and, observing the dint
<v Speaker 1>of a pince nez at either side of her nose,
<v Speaker 1>I ventured a remark upon short sight and typewriting, which
<v Speaker 1>seemed to surprise her. It surprised me, but surely it
<v Speaker 1>was obvious. I was then much surprised and interested on
<v Speaker 1>glancing down to observe that, though the boots which she
<v Speaker 1>was wearing were not unlike each other, they were really
<v Speaker 1>odd ones, the one having a slightly decorated toe cap
<v Speaker 1>and the other a plain one. One was buttoned only
<v Speaker 1>in the two lower buttons out of five, and the
<v Speaker 1>other at the first, third and fifth. Now, when you
<v Speaker 1>see that a young lady, otherwise neatly dressed, has come
<v Speaker 1>away from home with odd boots half buttoned, it is
<v Speaker 1>no great deduction to say that she came away in
<v Speaker 1>a hurry. And what else? I asked, keenly interested as
<v Speaker 1>I always was, by my friend's incisive reasoning. I noted
<v Speaker 1>in passing that she had written a note before leaving home.
<v Speaker 1>But after being fully dressed, you observed that her right
<v Speaker 1>glove was torn at the forefinger. But you did not
<v Speaker 1>apparently see that both glove and finger were stained with
<v Speaker 1>violet ink. She had written in a hurry and dipped
<v Speaker 1>her pen too deep. It must have been this morning,
<v Speaker 1>or the mark would not remain clear upon the finger.
<v Speaker 1>All this is amusing, though rather alimentary, But I must
<v Speaker 1>go back to business. Watson, would you mind reading me
<v Speaker 1>the advertised description of mister Hosmer Angel. I held the
<v Speaker 1>little printed slip to the light, missing it said, on
<v Speaker 1>the morning of the fourteenth a gentleman named Hosmer Angel,
<v Speaker 1>about five feet seven inches in height, strongly built, sallow complexion,
<v Speaker 1>black hair, a little bald in the center, bushy black side,
<v Speaker 1>whiskers and mustache, tinted glasses, slight infirmity of speech was
<v Speaker 1>dressed when last scene in black frock coat faced with silk,
<v Speaker 1>black waistcoat, gold Albert chain and gray Harris tweed trousers
<v Speaker 1>with brown gaiters over a last excited boots known to
<v Speaker 1>have been employed in an office in Leadenhall Street. Anybody
<v Speaker 1>bringing that will do, said Holmes. As to the letters,
<v Speaker 1>he canntinued glancing over them. They are a very commonplace.
<v Speaker 1>Absolutely no clue in them to mister Angel, say that
<v Speaker 1>he quotes Balzac once. There is a remarkable point, however,
<v Speaker 1>which will no doubt strike you. They are typewritten, I remarked.
<v Speaker 1>Not only that, but the signature is typewritten. Look at
<v Speaker 1>the neat little Hosmer Angel. At the bottom there is
<v Speaker 1>a date you see, but no superscription except Leadenhall Street
<v Speaker 1>which is rather vague. The point about the signature is
<v Speaker 1>very suggestive. In fact, we may call it conclusive. Of what,
<v Speaker 1>my dear fellow, is it possible you do not see
<v Speaker 1>how strongly it bears upon the case. I cannot say
<v Speaker 1>that I do unless it were that he wished to
<v Speaker 1>be able to deny signature if an action for breach
<v Speaker 1>of promise were instituted. No, that was not the point. However,
<v Speaker 1>I shall write two letters which should settle the matter.
<v Speaker 1>One is to affirm in the city, the others to
<v Speaker 1>the young lady's stepfather, mister Windebank, asking him whether he
<v Speaker 1>can meet us here at six o'clock to morrow evening.
<v Speaker 1>It is just as well that we should do business
<v Speaker 1>with the male relatives, and now, doctor, we can do
<v Speaker 1>nothing until the answers to those letters come, so we
<v Speaker 1>may put our little problem upon the shelf for the interim.
<v Speaker 1>I had had so many reasons to believe in my
<v Speaker 1>friends subtle powers of reasoning and extraordinary energy and action,
<v Speaker 1>that I felt that he must have some solid grounds
<v Speaker 1>for the assured and easy demeanor with which he treated
<v Speaker 1>the singular mystery which he had been called upon to
<v Speaker 1>fathom once. Only had I known him to fail in
<v Speaker 1>the case of the King of Bohemia and of the
<v Speaker 1>Irene Adler photograph. But when I looked back to the
<v Speaker 1>weird business of the Sign of four, and the extraordinary
<v Speaker 1>circumstances connected with the study in Scarlet, I felt the
<v Speaker 1>it would be a strange tangle, indeed, which he could
<v Speaker 1>not unravel. I left him then, still puffing at his
<v Speaker 1>black clay pipe, with the conviction that when I came
<v Speaker 1>again on the next evening, I would find that he
<v Speaker 1>held in his hands all the clues which would lead
<v Speaker 1>up to the identity of the disappearing bridegroom of Miss
<v Speaker 1>Mary Sutherland. A professional case of great gravity was engaging
<v Speaker 1>my own attention at the time, and the whole of
<v Speaker 1>next day I was busy at the bedside of the sufferer.
<v Speaker 1>It was not until close upon six o'clock that I
<v Speaker 1>found myself free and was able to spring into a
<v Speaker 1>hansom and drive to Baker Street, half afraid that I
<v Speaker 1>might be too late to assist at the denoument of
<v Speaker 1>the little mystery, I found Sherlock Holmes alone, however, half asleep,
<v Speaker 1>with his long, thin form curled up in the recesses
<v Speaker 1>of his arm chair. A formidable ray of bottles and
<v Speaker 1>test tubes with the pungent, cleanly smell of hydrochloric acid.
<v Speaker 1>Told me that he had spent his day in the
<v Speaker 1>chemical work which was so dear to him. Well have
<v Speaker 1>you solved it, I asked as I entered. Yes, it
<v Speaker 1>was the bisulfate of Burta. No. No, the mystery, I cried,
<v Speaker 1>Oh that I thought of the salt that I have
<v Speaker 1>been working upon. There was never any mystery in the matter, though,
<v Speaker 1>as I said yesterday, some of the details are of interest.
<v Speaker 1>The only drawback is that there is no law I
<v Speaker 1>fear that can touch the scoundrel. Who was he then?
<v Speaker 1>And what was his object in deserting miss Sutherland? The
<v Speaker 1>question was hardly out of my mouth, and Holmes had
<v Speaker 1>not yet opened his lips to reply when we heard
<v Speaker 1>a heavy footfall in the passage and a tap at
<v Speaker 1>the door. This is the girl's stepfather, mister James Windeby,
<v Speaker 1>said Holmes. He has written to me to say that
<v Speaker 1>he would be here at six. Come in. The man
<v Speaker 1>who entered was a sturdy, middle sized fellow, some thirty
<v Speaker 1>years of age, clean shaven and sallow skin, with a
<v Speaker 1>bland insinuating manner and a pair of wonderfully sharp and
<v Speaker 1>penetrating gray eyes. He shot a questioning glance at each
<v Speaker 1>of us, placed his shiny top hat upon the sideboard,
<v Speaker 1>and with a slight bow, sidled down into the nearest chair.
<v Speaker 1>Good evening, mister James Windebank, said Holmes. I think that
<v Speaker 1>this typewritten letter is from you, in which you made
<v Speaker 1>an appointment with me for six o'clock. Yes, sir, I
<v Speaker 1>am afraid that I am a little late, but I
<v Speaker 1>am not quite my own master, you know. I am
<v Speaker 1>sorry that miss Sutherland has troubled you about this little matter,
<v Speaker 1>for I think it is far better not to wash
<v Speaker 1>Linden of the sort in public. It was quite against
<v Speaker 1>my wishes that she came, but she is a very excitable,
<v Speaker 1>impulsive girl, as you may have noticed, and she is
<v Speaker 1>not easily controlled when she has made up her mind.
<v Speaker 1>On a point of course, I did not mind you
<v Speaker 1>so much as you are not connected with the official police.
<v Speaker 1>But it is not pleasant to have a family misfortune
<v Speaker 1>like this noised abroad. Besides, it is a useless expense,
<v Speaker 1>for how could you possibly find this hosemer Angel. On
<v Speaker 1>the contrary, said Holmes quietly, I have every reason to
<v Speaker 1>believe that I will succeed in discovering mister Hosemer Angel.
<v Speaker 1>Mister Windebank gave a violent start and dropped his gloves.
<v Speaker 1>I am delighted to hear it, he said. It is
<v Speaker 1>a curious thing, remarked Holmes, that a typewriter has really
<v Speaker 1>quite as much individuality as a man's handwriting. Unless they
<v Speaker 1>are quite new. No two of them write exactly alike.
<v Speaker 1>Some letters get more worn than others, and somewhere only
<v Speaker 1>on one side. Now you remark in this note of yours,
<v Speaker 1>mister Windebank, that in every case there is some little
<v Speaker 1>slurring over of the e and a slight defect in
<v Speaker 1>the tale of the R. There are fourteen other characteristics,
<v Speaker 1>but those are the most obvious. We do all our
<v Speaker 1>correspondence with this machine at the office, and no doubt
<v Speaker 1>it is a little worn, our visitor answered, glancing keenly
<v Speaker 1>at Holmes with his bright little eyes. And now I
<v Speaker 1>will show you what is really a very interesting study,
<v Speaker 1>mister Windebank. Holmes continued, I think of writing another little
<v Speaker 1>monograph some of these days, and the typewriter and its
<v Speaker 1>relation to crime. It is a subject to which I
<v Speaker 1>have devoted some little attention. I have here four letters
<v Speaker 1>which purpet to come from the missing man. They are
<v Speaker 1>all type written. In each case. Not only are the
<v Speaker 1>ease slurred and the r's tail less. But you will observe,
<v Speaker 1>if you care to use my magnifying lens, that the
<v Speaker 1>other fourteen characteristics to which I have alluded are there
<v Speaker 1>as well. Mister Windebank sprang out of his chair and
<v Speaker 1>picked up his hat. I cannot waste time over this
<v Speaker 1>sort of fantastic talk, mister Holmes, he said. If you
<v Speaker 1>can catch the man, catch him, then let me know
<v Speaker 1>when you have done it. Certainly, said Holmes, stepping over
<v Speaker 1>and turning the key in the door. I let you
<v Speaker 1>know then that I have caught him. What where, shouted
<v Speaker 1>mister Windebank, turning white to his lips and glancing about
<v Speaker 1>him like a rat in a trap. Oh it won't do, really,
<v Speaker 1>it won't, said Holmes suavely. There is no possible getting
<v Speaker 1>out of it, mister Windebank. It is quite too transparent.
<v Speaker 1>And it was a very bad compliment when you said
<v Speaker 1>that it was impossible for me to solve so simple
<v Speaker 1>a question. That's right, Sit down and let us talk
<v Speaker 1>it over. Our visitor collapsed into a chair with a
<v Speaker 1>ghastly face and a glitter of moisture on his brow.
<v Speaker 1>It's it's not actionable, he stammered. I am very much
<v Speaker 1>afraid that it is not. But between ourselves, Windebank, it
<v Speaker 1>was as cruel and selfish and heartless a trick in
<v Speaker 1>a petty way as ever came before me. Now let
<v Speaker 1>me just run over the course of events, and you
<v Speaker 1>will contradict me if I go wrong. The man sat
<v Speaker 1>huddled up in his chair with his head sunk upon
<v Speaker 1>his breast, like one who was utterly crushed. Holmes stuck
<v Speaker 1>his feet up on the corner of the mantelpiece, and,
<v Speaker 1>leaning back, with his hands in his pockets, began talking
<v Speaker 1>rather to himself, as it seemed, than to us. The
<v Speaker 1>man married a woman very much older than himself for
<v Speaker 1>her money, said he, and he enjoyed the use of
<v Speaker 1>the money of the daughter as long as she lived
<v Speaker 1>with them. It was a considerable sum for people in
<v Speaker 1>their position, and the loss of it would have made
<v Speaker 1>a serious difference. It was worth an effort to preserve it.
<v Speaker 1>The daughter was of a good, amiable disposition, but affectionate
<v Speaker 1>and warm hearted in her ways, so that it was
<v Speaker 1>evident that, with her fair personal advantages and her little income,
<v Speaker 1>she would not be allowed to remain single long. Now
<v Speaker 1>her marriage would mean, of course, the loss of a
<v Speaker 1>hundred a year. So what does her stepfather do to
<v Speaker 1>prevent it? He takes the obvious course of keeping her
<v Speaker 1>at home and forbidding her to seek the company of
<v Speaker 1>people her own age. But soon he found that that
<v Speaker 1>would not answer forever. She became restive, insisted upon her rights,
<v Speaker 1>and finally announced her positive intention of going to a
<v Speaker 1>certain ball. What does her clever stepfather do? Then, he
<v Speaker 1>conceives an idea more creditable to his head than to
<v Speaker 1>his heart. With the connivance and assistance of his wife,
<v Speaker 1>he disguised himself, covered those keen eyes with tinted glasses,
<v Speaker 1>masked the face with a mustache, and a pair of
<v Speaker 1>bushy whiskers, sunk that clear voice into an insinuating whisper,
<v Speaker 1>and doubly secure on account of the girl's short sight,
<v Speaker 1>he appears as mister Hosmer Angel and keeps off other
<v Speaker 1>lovers by making love himself. It was only a joke
<v Speaker 1>at first, groaned our visitor. We never thought that she
<v Speaker 1>would have been so carried away. Very likely not, however,
<v Speaker 1>that may be the young lady was very decidedly carried away,
<v Speaker 1>and having quite made up her mind that her stepfather
<v Speaker 1>was in France, the suspicion of treachery never for an
<v Speaker 1>instant entered her mind. She was flattered by the gentleman's attentions,
<v Speaker 1>and the effect was increased by the loudly expressed admir
<v Speaker 1>of her mother. Then mister Angel began to call for
<v Speaker 1>it was obvious that the matter should be pushed as
<v Speaker 1>far as it would go if a real effect were
<v Speaker 1>to be produced. There were meetings and an engagement which
<v Speaker 1>would finally secure the girl's affections from turning towards any
<v Speaker 1>one else. But the deception could not be kept up forever.
<v Speaker 1>These pretended journeys to France were rather cumbrous. The thing
<v Speaker 1>to do was clearly to bring the business to an
<v Speaker 1>end in such a dramatic manner that it would leave
<v Speaker 1>a permanent impression upon the young lady's mind and prevent
<v Speaker 1>her from looking upon any other suitor for some time
<v Speaker 1>to come. Hence those vows of fidelity exacted upon a testament,
<v Speaker 1>and hence also the allusions to a possibility of something happening.
<v Speaker 1>On the very morning of the wedding. James Windebank wished
<v Speaker 1>miss Sutherland to be so bound to Hosmer Angel, and
<v Speaker 1>so uncertain as to his fate, that for ten years
<v Speaker 1>to come, at any rate, she would not listen to
<v Speaker 1>another man. As far as the church door he brought her,
<v Speaker 1>and then as he could go no farther he conveniently
<v Speaker 1>vanished away by the old trick of stepping in at
<v Speaker 1>one door of a four wheeler and out at the other.
<v Speaker 1>I think that was the chain of events. Mister Windebank,
<v Speaker 1>our visitor had recovered something of his assurance while Holmes
<v Speaker 1>had been talking, and he rose from his chair now
<v Speaker 1>with a cold sneer upon his pale face. It may
<v Speaker 1>be so, or it may not, mister Holmes, said he.
<v Speaker 1>But if you are so very sharp, you ought to
<v Speaker 1>be sharp enough to know that it is you who
<v Speaker 1>are breaking the law now and not me. I have
<v Speaker 1>done nothing actionable from the first. But as long as
<v Speaker 1>you keep that door locked, you lay yourself open to
<v Speaker 1>an action for assault and illegal constraint. The law cannot,
<v Speaker 1>as you say, touch you, said Holmes, unlocking and throwing
<v Speaker 1>open the door. Yet there never was a man who
<v Speaker 1>deserved punishment more. If the young lady has a brother
<v Speaker 1>or a friend, he ought to lay a whip across
<v Speaker 1>your shoulders. By jove, he continued, flushing up at the
<v Speaker 1>sight the bitter sneer upon the man's face. It is
<v Speaker 1>not part of my duties to my client. But here's
<v Speaker 1>a hunting crop handy, and I think I shall just
<v Speaker 1>treat myself to He took two swift steps to the whip,
<v Speaker 1>but before he could grasp it, there was a wild
<v Speaker 1>clatter of steps upon the stairs. The heavy hall door banged,
<v Speaker 1>and from the window we could see mister James Windebank
<v Speaker 1>running at the top of his speed down the road.
<v Speaker 1>There's a cold blooded scoundrel, said Holmes, laughing as he
<v Speaker 1>threw himself down into his chair once more. That fellow
<v Speaker 1>will rise from crime to crime until he does something very,
<v Speaker 1>very bad and ends on a gallows. The case has,
<v Speaker 1>in some respects been not entirely devoid of interest. I
<v Speaker 1>cannot now entirely see all the steps of your reasoning,
<v Speaker 1>I remarked, Well, of course, it was obvious from the
<v Speaker 1>first that this mister Hosmer Angel must have some strong
<v Speaker 1>object for his curious conduct, and it was equally clear
<v Speaker 1>that the only man who really profited by the incident,
<v Speaker 1>as far as we could see, was the stepfather. Then,
<v Speaker 1>the fact that the two men were never together, but
<v Speaker 1>that the one always appeared when the other was away,
<v Speaker 1>was suggestive. So were the tinted spectacles and the curious voice,
<v Speaker 1>which both hinted at a disguise, as did the bushy whiskers.
<v Speaker 1>My suspicions were all confirmed by his peculiar action in
<v Speaker 1>typewriting his signature, which of course inferred that his handwriting
<v Speaker 1>was so familiar to her that she would recognize even
<v Speaker 1>the smallest sample of it. You see, all these isolated facts,
<v Speaker 1>together with many minor ones, all pointed in the same direction,
<v Speaker 1>And how did you verify them? Having once spotted my man,
<v Speaker 1>it was easy to get corroboration. I knew the firm
<v Speaker 1>for which this man worked. Having taken the printed description,
<v Speaker 1>I eliminated everything from it which could be the result
<v Speaker 1>of disguise, the whiskers, the glasses, the voice, and I
<v Speaker 1>sent it to the firm with a request that they
<v Speaker 1>would inform me whether it answered to the description of
<v Speaker 1>any of their travelers. I had already noticed the peculiarities
<v Speaker 1>of the typewriter, and I wrote to the man himself
<v Speaker 1>at his business address, asking him if he would come
<v Speaker 1>here as I expected. His reply was typewritten and revealed
<v Speaker 1>the same trivial but characteristic defects. The same post brought
<v Speaker 1>me a letter from west House and Marbank of Fenchurch Street,
<v Speaker 1>to say that the description tallied in every respect with
<v Speaker 1>that of their employee, James Windebank. Voila tout and Miss Sutherland,
<v Speaker 1>if I tell her, she will not believe me. You
<v Speaker 1>may remember the old Persian saying there is danger for
<v Speaker 1>him who taketh the tiger cub, and danger also for
<v Speaker 1>whoso snatches a delusion from a woman. There is as
<v Speaker 1>much sense in Hafiz as in Horace, and as much
<v Speaker 1>knowledge of the world.