text
stringlengths
0
74
"In short, that she had become suddenly deranged?"
"Well, really, when I consider that she has turned her back--I will
not say upon me, but upon so much that many have aspired to without
success--I can hardly explain it in any other fashion."
"Well, certainly that is also a conceivable hypothesis," said Holmes,
smiling. "And now, Lord St. Simon, I think that I have nearly all my
data. May I ask whether you were seated at the breakfast-table so
that you could see out of the window?"
"We could see the other side of the road and the Park."
"Quite so. Then I do not think that I need to detain you longer. I
shall communicate with you."
"Should you be fortunate enough to solve this problem," said our
client, rising.
"I have solved it."
"Eh? What was that?"
"I say that I have solved it."
"Where, then, is my wife?"
"That is a detail which I shall speedily supply."
Lord St. Simon shook his head. "I am afraid that it will take wiser
heads than yours or mine," he remarked, and bowing in a stately,
old-fashioned manner he departed.
"It is very good of Lord St. Simon to honour my head by putting it on
a level with his own," said Sherlock Holmes, laughing. "I think that
I shall have a whisky and soda and a cigar after all this
cross-questioning. I had formed my conclusions as to the case before
our client came into the room."
"My dear Holmes!"
"I have notes of several similar cases, though none, as I remarked
before, which were quite as prompt. My whole examination served to
turn my conjecture into a certainty. Circumstantial evidence is
occasionally very convincing, as when you find a trout in the milk,
to quote Thoreau's example."
"But I have heard all that you have heard."
"Without, however, the knowledge of pre-existing cases which serves
me so well. There was a parallel instance in Aberdeen some years
back, and something on very much the same lines at Munich the year
after the Franco-Prussian War. It is one of these cases--but, hullo,
here is Lestrade! Good-afternoon, Lestrade! You will find an extra
tumbler upon the sideboard, and there are cigars in the box."
The official detective was attired in a pea-jacket and cravat, which
gave him a decidedly nautical appearance, and he carried a black
canvas bag in his hand. With a short greeting he seated himself and
lit the cigar which had been offered to him.
"What's up, then?" asked Holmes with a twinkle in his eye. "You look
dissatisfied."
"And I feel dissatisfied. It is this infernal St. Simon marriage
case. I can make neither head nor tail of the business."
"Really! You surprise me."
"Who ever heard of such a mixed affair? Every clue seems to slip
through my fingers. I have been at work upon it all day."
"And very wet it seems to have made you," said Holmes laying his hand
upon the arm of the pea-jacket.
"Yes, I have been dragging the Serpentine."
"In heaven's name, what for?"
"In search of the body of Lady St. Simon."
Sherlock Holmes leaned back in his chair and laughed heartily.
"Have you dragged the basin of Trafalgar Square fountain?" he asked.
"Why? What do you mean?"
"Because you have just as good a chance of finding this lady in the
one as in the other."
Lestrade shot an angry glance at my companion. "I suppose you know
all about it," he snarled.
"Well, I have only just heard the facts, but my mind is made up."
"Oh, indeed! Then you think that the Serpentine plays no part in the
matter?"
"I think it very unlikely."