He could talk English perfectly well. His reasons fordestroying the busts were still unknown, and he refused to answerany questions upon the subject, but the police had discovered thatthese same busts might very well have been made by his own hands,since he was engaged in this class of work at the establishment ofGelder & Co. To all this information, much of which we alreadyknew, Holmes listened with polite attention, but I, who knew himso well, could clearly see that his thoughts were elsewhere, and Idetected a mixture of mingled uneasiness and expectation beneaththat mask which he was wont to assume. At last he started in hischair, and his eyes brightened. There had been a ring at the bell. Aminute later we heard steps upon the stairs, and an elderly red-facedman with grizzled side-whiskers was ushered in. In his right hand hecarried an old-fashioned carpet-bag, which he placed upon the table.
“Is Mr. Sherlock Holmes here?”
My friend bowed and smiled. “Mr. Sandeford, of Reading, Isuppose?” said he.
“Yes, sir, I fear that I am a little late, but the trains were awkward.
You wrote to me about a bust that is in my possession.”
“Exactly.”
“I have your letter here. You said, ‘I desire to possess a copy ofDevine’s Napoleon, and am prepared to pay you ten pounds forthe one which is in your possession.’ Is that right?”
“Certainly.”
“I was very much surprised at your letter, for I could notimagine how you knew that I owned such a thing.”
“Of course you must have been surprised, but the explanation isvery simple. Mr. Harding, of Harding Brothers, said that they hadsold you their last copy, and he gave me your address.”
The Return of Sherlock Holmes 995
“Oh, that was it, was it? Did he tell you what I paid for it?”
“No, he did not.”
“Well, I am an honest man, though not a very rich one. I onlygave fifteen shillings for the bust, and I think you ought to knowthat before I take ten pounds from you.
“I am sure the scruple does you honour, Mr. Sandeford. But Ihave named that price, so I intend to stick to it.”
“Well, it is very handsome of you, Mr. Holmes. I brought thebust up with me, as you asked me to do. Here it is!” He openedhis bag, and at last we saw placed upon our table a completespecimen of that bust which we had already seen more than oncein fragments.
Holmes took a paper from his pocket and laid a ten-pound noteupon the table.
“You will kindly sign that paper, Mr. Sandeford, in thepresence of these witnesses. It is simply to say that you transferevery possible right that you ever had in the bust to me. I am amethodical man, you see, and you never know what turn eventsmight take afterwards. Thank you, Mr. Sandeford; here is yourmoney, and I wish you a very good evening.”
When our visitor had disappeared, Sherlock Holmes’s movementswere such as to rivet our attention. He began by taking a cleanwhite cloth from a drawer and laying it over the table. Then heplaced his newly acquired bust in the centre of the cloth. Finally,he picked up his hunting-crop and struck Napoleon a sharp blowon the top of the head. The figure broke into fragments, andHolmes bent eagerly over the shattered remains. Next instant,with a loud shout of triumph he held up one splinter, in which around, dark object was fixed like a plum in a pudding.
“Gentlemen,” he cried, “let me introduce you to the famousblack pearl of the Borgias.”
Lestrade and I sat silent for a moment, and then, with aspontaneous impulse, we both broke at clapping, as at the wellwroughtcrisis of a play. A flush of colour sprang to Holmes’spale cheeks, and he bowed to us like the master dramatist whoreceives the homage of his audience. It was at such moments thatfor an instant he ceased to be a reasoning machine, and betrayedhis human love for admiration and applause. The same singularlyproud and reserved nature which turned away with disdain frompopular notoriety was capable of being moved to its depths byspontaneous wonder and praise from a friend.
“Yes, gentlemen,” said he, “it is the most famous pearl nowexisting in the world, and it has been my good fortune, by aconnected chain of inductive reasoning, to trace it from thePrince of Colonna’s bedroom at the Dacre Hotel, where it was996 The Complete Sherlock Holmes.
lost, to the interior of this, the last of the six busts of Napoleonwhich were manufactured by Gelder & Co., of Stepney. You willremember, Lestrade, the sensation caused by the disappearanceof this valuable jewel and the vain efforts of the London police torecover it. I was myself consulted upon the case, but I was unableto throw any light upon it. Suspicion fell upon the maid of thePrincess, who was an Italian, and it was proved that she had abrother in London, but we failed to trace any connection betweenthem. The maid’s name was Lucretia Venucci, and there is nodoubt in my mind that this Pietro who was murdered two nightsago was the brother. I have been looking up the dates in the oldfiles of the paper, and I find that the disappearance of the pearlwas exactly two days before the arrest of Beppo, for some crimeof violence—an event which took place in the factory of Gelder& Co., at the very moment when these busts were being made.
Now you clearly see the sequence of events, though you see them,of course, in the inverse order to the way in which they presentedthemselves to me. Beppo had the pearl in his possession. He mayhave stolen it from Pietro, he may have been Pietro’s confederate,he may have been the go-between of Pietro and his sister. It is ofno consequence to us which is the correct solution.
“The main fact is that he had the pearl, and at that moment,when it was on his person, he was pursued by the police. He madefor the factory in which he worked, and he knew that he had onlyfew minutes in which to conceal this enormously valuable prize,which would otherwise be found on him when he was searched.