MacDonald pointed ruefully to his heap of correspondence.
“He is at present reported from Leicester, Nottingham, Southampton,Derby, East Ham, Richmond, and fourteen other places. In threeof them—East Ham, Leicester, and Liverpool—there is a clearcase against him, and he has actually been arrested. The countryseems to be full of the fugitives with yellow coats.”
“Dear me!” said Holmes sympathetically. “Now, Mr. Mac andyou, Mr. White Mason, I wish to give you a very earnest piece ofadvice. When I went into this case with you I bargained, as youwill no doubt remember, that I should not present you with halfprovedtheories, but that I should retain and work out my ownideas until I had satisfied myself that they were correct. For thisreason I am not at the present moment telling you all that is in mymind. On the other hand, I said that I would play the game fairlyby you, and I do not think it is a fair game to allow you for oneunnecessary moment to waste your energies upon a profitless task.
Therefore I am here to advise you this morning, and my advice toyou is summed up in three words—abandon the case.”
MacDonald and White Mason stared in amazement at theircelebrated colleague.
“You consider it hopeless!” cried the inspector.
“I consider your case to be hopeless. I do not consider that it ishopeless to arrive at the truth.”
“But this cyclist. He is not an invention. We have his description,his valise, his bicycle. The fellow must be somewhere. Why shouldwe not get him?”
“Yes, yes, no doubt he is somewhere, and no doubt we shall gethim; but I would not have you waste your energies in East Ham orLiverpool. I am sure that we can find some shorter cut to a result.”
“You are holding something back. It’s hardly fair of you, Mr.
Holmes.” The inspector was annoyed.
“You know my methods of work, Mr. Mac. But I will hold it backfor the shortest time possible. I only wish to verify my details in oneway, which can very readily be done, and then I make my bow andreturn to London, leaving my results entirely at your service. I oweyou too much to act otherwise; for in all my experience I cannotrecall any more singular and interesting study.”
“This is clean beyond me, Mr. Holmes. We saw you when wereturned from Tunbridge Wells last night, and you were in generalagreement with our results. What has happened since then to giveyou a completely new idea of the case?”
“Well, since you ask me, I spent, as I told you that I would,some hours last night at the Manor House.”
“Well, what happened?”
“Ah, I can only give you a very general answer to that for themoment. By the way, I have been reading a short but clear andinteresting account of the old building, purchasable at the modestsum of one penny from the local tobacconist.”
Here Holmes drew a small tract, embellished with a rudeengraving of the ancient Manor House, from his waistcoat pocket.
“It immensely adds to the zest of an investigation, my dearMr. Mac, when one is in conscious sympathy with the historicalatmosphere of one’s surroundings. Don’t look so impatient; forI assure you that even so bald an account as this raises somesort of picture of the past in one’s mind. Permit me to give youa sample. ‘Erected in the fifth year of the reign of James I, andstanding upon the site of a much older building, the Manor Houseof Birlstone presents one of the finest surviving examples of themoated Jacobean residence—’ ”
“You are making fools of us, Mr. Holmes!”
“Tut, tut, Mr. Mac! —the first sign of temper I have detectedin you. Well, I won’t read it verbatim, since you feel so stronglyupon the subject. But when I tell you that there is some accountof the taking of the place by a parliamentary colonel in 1644, ofthe concealment of Charles for several days in the course of theCivil War, and finally of a visit there by the second George, youwill admit that there are various associations of interest connectedwith this ancient house.”
“I don’t doubt it, Mr. Holmes; but that is no business of ours.”
“Is it not? Is it not? Breadth of view, my dear Mr. Mac, is oneof the essentials of our profession. The interplay of ideas and theoblique uses of knowledge are often of extraordinary interest.
You will excuse these remarks from one who, though a mereconnoisseur of crime, is still rather older and perhaps moreexperienced than yourself.”
“I’m the first to admit that,” said the detective heartily. “Youget to your point, I admit; but you have such a deuced round-thecornerway of doing it.”
“Well, well, I’ll drop past history and get down to presentdayfacts. I called last night, as I have already said, at the ManorHouse. I did not see either Barker or Mrs. Douglas. I saw nonecessity to disturb them; but I was pleased to hear that the ladywas not visibly pining and that she had partaken of an excellentdinner. My visit was specially made to the good Mr. Ames, withwhom I exchanged some amiabilities, which culminated in hisallowing me, without reference to anyone else, to sit alone for atime in the study.”
“What! With that?” I ejaculated.
“No, no, everything is now in order. You gave permission forthat, Mr. Mac, as I am informed. The room was in its normalstate, and in it I passed an instructive quarter of an hour.”
“What were you doing?”
“Well, not to make a mystery of so simple a matter, I waslooking for the missing dumb-bell. It has always bulked ratherlarge in my estimate of the case. I ended by finding it.”
“Where?”
“Ah, there we come to the edge of the unexplored. Let me go alittle further, a very little further, and I will promise that you shallshare everything that I know.”
“Well, we’re bound to take you on your own terms,” said theinspector; “but when it comes to telling us to abandon the case—why in the name of goodness should we abandon the case?”
“For the simple reason, my dear Mr. Mac, that you have not gotthe first idea what it is that you are investigating.”
“We are investigating the murder of Mr. John Douglas ofBirlstone Manor.”