A Study in Sherlock. Raymond G. Farney
at Baker St., Small tells them the story of the Arga Treasure and his past history, and then Inspector Jones takes him to Scotland Yard.
Story Conclusion:“A very remarkable account,” said Sherlock Holmes. “A fitting windup to an extremely interesting case. There is nothing at all new to me in the latter part of your narrative except that you brought your own rope. That I did not know. By the way, I had hoped that Tonga had lost all his darts; yet he managed to shoot one at us in the boat.”“He had lost them all, sir, except one which was in his blow-pipe at the time.”“Ah, of course,” said Holmes. “I had not thought of that.”“Is there any other point which you would like to ask about?” asked the convict affably.“I think not, thank you,” my companion answered.“Well, Holmes,” said Athelney Jones, “you are a man to be honoured, and we all know that you are a connoisseur of crime; but duty is duty, and I have gone rather far in doing what you and your friend asked me. I shall feel more at ease when we have our story-teller here safe under lock and key. The cab still waits, and there are two inspectors downstairs. I am much obligated to you both for your assistance. Of course you will be wanted at the trial. Good-night to you.”“Good-night, gentleman both,” said Jonathan Small.“You first, Small,” remarked the wary Jones as they left the room. “I’ll take particular care that you don’t club me with your wooden leg, whatever you may have done to the gentleman at the Andaman Isles.”“Well, and there is the end of our little drama,” I remarked, after we had sat some time smoking in silence. “I fear that it may be the last investigation in which I shall have the chance of studying your methods. Miss Morstan has done me the honuor to accept me as a husband in prospective.”He gave me a most dismal groan.“I feared as much,” said he. “I really cannot congratulate you.”I was a little hurt.“Have you any reason to be dissatisfied with my choice?” I asked.“Not at all. I think she is one of the most charming young ladies I ever met and might have been most useful in such work as we have been doing. She had a decided genius that way: witness the way in which she preserved the Agra plan from all the other papers of her father. But love is an emotional thing and whatever is emotional is opposed to the true cold reason which I place above all things. I should never marry myself, lest I bias my judgment.”“I trust,” said I, laughing, “that my judgment may survive the ordeal. But you look weary.”“Yes, the reaction is already upon me. I shall be as limp as a rag for a week.”“Strange,” said I, “how terms of what in another man I shall call laziness alternate with your fits of splendid energy and vigour.”“Yes,” he answered, “there are in me the makings of a very fine loafer, and also of a pretty spry sort of fellow. I often think of those lines of old Goethe:Schade dass die Natur nur einen Mensch aus dir schuf, Denn zum wurdigen Mann war und zum Schelman der stoff.“By the way, apropos of this Norwood business, you see that they had, as I surmised, a confederate in the house, who could be none other than Lal Rao, the butler: so Jones actually has the undivided honour of having caught one fish in his great haul.”“The division seems rather unfair,” I remarked. “You have done all the work in this business. I get a wife out of it, Jones gets the credit, pray what remains for you?”“For me,” said Sherlock Holmes, “there still remains the cocaine-bottle.” And he stretched his long white hand up for it.
Weather:“See how the yellow fog swirls down the street and drifts across the dun-coloured houses.”“It was a September evening and not yet seven o’clock, but the day had been a dreary one, and a dense drizzly fog lay low upon the great city. Mud-coloured clouds drooped sadly over the muddy street. Down the Strand the lamps were but misty splotches of diffused light which threw a feeble circular glimmer upon the slimy pavement. The yellow glare from the shop-windows streamed out into the steamy, vaporous air and threw a murky, shifting radiance across the crowded thoroughfare.”“Arriving at Pondicherry Lodge, the night air was fairly fine. A warm wind blew from the westward, and heavy clouds moved slowly across the sky, with a half moon peeping occasionally through the rifts.”Night before Bartholomew’s murder. “It rained a little last night.”“We have had no very heavy rain since yesterday.”“How sweet the morning air is! See that one little cloud floats like a pink feather from some gigantic flamingo. Now the red rim of the sun pushes itself over the London cloud-bank.”3rd Day “It is very hot for the time of year.”“It will be a clear night,” Holmes remarked as they waited on the police launch for the Aurora.
Payment:“The division seems rather unfair,” I remarked. “You have done all the work in this business. I get a wife out of it, Jones gets the credit, pray what remains for you?”“For me,” said Sherlock Holmes, “there still remains the cocaine-bottle.” And he stretched his long white hand up for it.“But you must put yourself under my orders. You are welcome to all the official credit, but you must act on the lines that I point out. Is that agreed?”“The only unofficial consulting detective,” he answered. “I am the last highest court of appeal in detection. When Gregson, or Lestrade, or Athelney Jones are out of their depths—which, by the way is their normal state—the matter is laid before me. I examine the data, as an expert, and pronounce a specialist’s opinion. I claim no credit in such cases. My name figures in no newspaper. The work itself, the pleasure of finding a field for my peculiar powers, is my highest reward. But you have yourself had some experience in my methods of work in the Jefferson Hope case.”
Quotes:Holmes“You have an extraordinary genius for the minutiae,” I remarked.“What a very attractive woman!” I exclaimed, turning to my companion. He had lit his pipe again and was leaning back with drooping eyelids. “Is she?” he said languidly; “I did not observe.”“You really are an automaton—a calculating machine,” I cried. “There is something positively inhuman in you at times.”“It is of the first importance,” he cried, “not to allow your judgment to be biased by personal qualities. A client is to me a mere unit, a factor in a problem. The emotional qualities are antagonistic to clear reasoning. I assure you that the most winning woman I ever knew was hanged for poisoning three little children for their insurance-money, and the most repellent man of my acquaintance is a philanthropist who has spent nearly a quarter of a million upon the London poor.”“I never make exceptions. An exception disproves the rule.”“It was half-past five before Holmes returned. He was bright, eager, and in excellent spirits, a mood which in his case alternated with fits of the blackest depression.”“Well, Holmes,” said Athelney Jones, “you are a man to be honoured, and we all know that you are a connoisseur of crime.”“Sherlock Holmes leaned back in his chair and with an abstracted expression and the lids drawn low over his glittering eyes. As I glanced at him I could not help but think how on that very day he had complained bitterly of the commonplaceness of life.”“On the contrary,” Holmes answered, “it clears every instant. I only require a few missing links to have an entirely connected case.”“You will not apply my precept,” he said, shaking his head. “How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth”“My dear Watson, try a little analysis yourself,” said he with a touch of impatience. “You know my methods. Apply them, and it will be instructive to compare results.”“He whipped out his lens and a tape measure and hurried about the room on his knees measuring, comparing, examining, with his long thin nose only a few inches from the planks and beady eyes gleaming and deep-set like those of a bird. So swift, silent, and furtive were his movements, like those of a trained bloodhound picking out a scent, that I could not but think what a terrible criminal he would have made had he turned his energy and sagacity against the law instead of exerting them in its defense. As he hunted about, he kept muttering to himself, and finally he broke out into a loud crow of delight.”“There are features of interest about this ally (Tonga). He lifts the case from the regions of the commonplace. I fancy that this ally breaks fresh ground in the annals of crime in this country.”“It’s Mr. Sherlock Holmes, the theorist. Remember you! I’ll never forget how you lectured us all on the causes and inferences and effects in the Bishopgate jewelry case.”—“It’s true you set us on the right track; but you’ll own now that it was more by good luck than good guidance.” —“It was a piece of very simple reasoning.”“Your presence will be a great service to me,” he answered. “We shall work the case out independently and leave this fellow Jones to exult over any mare’s-nest which he may choose to construct.”“Sherlock Holmes was on the roof, and I could see him like an enormous glow-worm crawling very