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ElapticAI-512

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a candle in her right. It was the same good friend whose warning I had
so foolishly rejected.
“‘Come! come!’ she cried breathlessly. ‘They will be here in a moment.
They will see that you are not there. Oh, do not waste the so-precious
time, but come!’
“This time, at least, I did not scorn her advice. I staggered to my
feet and ran with her along the corridor and down a winding stair. The
latter led to another broad passage, and just as we reached it we heard
the sound of running feet and the shouting of two voices, one answering
the other from the floor on which we were and from the one beneath. My
guide stopped and looked about her like one who is at her wit’s end.
Then she threw open a door which led into a bedroom, through the window
of which the moon was shining brightly.
“‘It is your only chance,’ said she. ‘It is high, but it may be that
you can jump it.’
“As she spoke a light sprang into view at the further end of the
passage, and I saw the lean figure of Colonel Lysander Stark rushing
forward with a lantern in one hand and a weapon like a butcher’s
cleaver in the other. I rushed across the bedroom, flung open the
window, and looked out. How quiet and sweet and wholesome the garden
looked in the moonlight, and it could not be more than thirty feet
down. I clambered out upon the sill, but I hesitated to jump until I
should have heard what passed between my saviour and the ruffian who
pursued me. If she were ill-used, then at any risks I was determined to
go back to her assistance. The thought had hardly flashed through my
mind before he was at the door, pushing his way past her; but she threw
her arms round him and tried to hold him back.
“‘Fritz! Fritz!’ she cried in English, ‘remember your promise after the
last time. You said it should not be again. He will be silent! Oh, he
will be silent!’
“‘You are mad, Elise!’ he shouted, struggling to break away from her.
‘You will be the ruin of us. He has seen too much. Let me pass, I say!’
He dashed her to one side, and, rushing to the window, cut at me with
his heavy weapon. I had let myself go, and was hanging by the hands to
the sill, when his blow fell. I was conscious of a dull pain, my grip
loosened, and I fell into the garden below.
“I was shaken but not hurt by the fall; so I picked myself up and
rushed off among the bushes as hard as I could run, for I understood
that I was far from being out of danger yet. Suddenly, however, as I
ran, a deadly dizziness and sickness came over me. I glanced down at my
hand, which was throbbing painfully, and then, for the first time, saw
that my thumb had been cut off and that the blood was pouring from my
wound. I endeavoured to tie my handkerchief round it, but there came a
sudden buzzing in my ears, and next moment I fell in a dead faint among
the rose-bushes.
“How long I remained unconscious I cannot tell. It must have been a
very long time, for the moon had sunk, and a bright morning was
breaking when I came to myself. My clothes were all sodden with dew,
and my coat-sleeve was drenched with blood from my wounded thumb. The
smarting of it recalled in an instant all the particulars of my night’s
adventure, and I sprang to my feet with the feeling that I might hardly
yet be safe from my pursuers. But to my astonishment, when I came to
look round me, neither house nor garden were to be seen. I had been
lying in an angle of the hedge close by the high road, and just a little
lower down was a long building, which proved, upon my approaching it,
to be the very station at which I had arrived upon the previous night.
Were it not for the ugly wound upon my hand, all that had passed during
those dreadful hours might have been an evil dream.
“Half dazed, I went into the station and asked about the morning train.
There would be one to Reading in less than an hour. The same porter was
on duty, I found, as had been there when I arrived. I inquired of him
whether he had ever heard of Colonel Lysander Stark. The name was
strange to him. Had he observed a carriage the night before waiting for
me? No, he had not. Was there a police-station anywhere near? There was
one about three miles off.
“It was too far for me to go, weak and ill as I was. I determined to
wait until I got back to town before telling my story to the police. It
was a little past six when I arrived, so I went first to have my wound
dressed, and then the doctor was kind enough to bring me along here. I
put the case into your hands and shall do exactly what you advise.
We both sat in silence for some little time after listening to this
extraordinary narrative. Then Sherlock Holmes pulled down from the
shelf one of the ponderous commonplace books in which he placed his
cuttings.
“Here is an advertisement which will interest you, said he. “It
appeared in all the papers about a year ago. Listen to this: ‘Lost, on
the 9th inst., Mr. Jeremiah Hayling, aged twenty-six, a hydraulic
engineer. Left his lodgings at ten o’clock at night, and has not been
heard of since. Was dressed in,’ etc., etc. Ha! That represents the
last time that the colonel needed to have his machine overhauled, I
fancy.
“Good heavens! cried my patient. “Then that explains what the girl
said.
“Undoubtedly. It is quite clear that the colonel was a cool and
desperate man, who was absolutely determined that nothing should stand
in the way of his little game, like those out-and-out pirates who will