“I beg your pardon,” said he, with some embarrassment, “Isuppose I should have knocked. Yes, of course I should haveknocked. The fact is that I am a little upset, and you must put itall down to that.” He passed his hand over his forehead like a manwho is half dazed, and then fell rather than sat down upon a chair.
“I can see that you have not slept for a night or two,” saidHolmes, in his easy, genial way. “That tries a man’s nerves morethan work, and more even than pleasure. May I ask how I can helpyou?”
“I wanted your advice, sir. I don’t know what to do and mywhole life seems to have gone to pieces.”
“You wish to employ me as a consulting detective?”
“Not that only. I want your opinion as a judicious man—as aman of the world. I want to know what I ought to do next. I hopeto God you’ll be able to tell me.”
He spoke in little, sharp, jerky outbursts, and it seemed to methat to speak at all was very painful to him, and that his will allthrough was overriding his inclinations.
“It’s a very delicate thing,” said he. “One does not like to speakof one’s domestic affairs to strangers. It seems dreadful to discussthe conduct of one’s wife with two men whom I have never seenbefore. It’s horrible to have to do it. But I’ve got to the end of mytether, and I must have advice.”
“My dear Mr. Grant Munro——” began Holmes.
Our visitor sprang from his chair. “What!” he cried, “you knowmy name?”
“If you wish to preserve your incognito,” said Holmes, smiling, “Iwould suggest that you cease to write your name upon the liningof your hat, or else that you turn the crown towards the personwhom you are addressing. I was about to say that my friend and Ihave listened to a good many strange secrets in this room, and thatwe have had the good fortune to bring peace to many troubledsouls. I trust that we may do as much for you. Might I beg you, astime may prove to be of importance, to furnish me with the factsof your case without further delay?”
Our visitor again passed his hand over his forehead, as if hefound it bitterly hard. From every gesture and expression I couldsee that he was a reserved, self-contained man, with a dash ofpride in his nature, more likely to hide his wounds than to exposethem. Then suddenly, with a fierce gesture of his closed hand, likeone who throws reserve to the winds, he began:
“The facts are these, Mr. Holmes,” said he. “I am a marriedman, and have been so for three years. During that time my wifeand I have loved each other as fondly and lived as happily as anytwo that ever were joined. We have not had a difference, not one,in thought or word or deed. And now, since last Monday, there hassuddenly sprung up a barrier between us, and I find that there issomething in her life and in her thought of which I know as littleas if she were the woman who brushes by me in the street. We areestranged, and I want to know why.
“Now there is one thing that I want to impress upon you beforeI go any further, Mr. Holmes. Effie loves me. Don’t let there beany mistake about that. She loves me with her whole heart andsoul, and never more than now. I know it. I feel it. I don’t wantto argue about that. A man can tell easily enough when a womanloves him. But there’s this secret between us, and we can never bethe same until it is cleared.”
“Kindly let me have the facts, Mr. Munro,” said Holmes, withsome impatience.
“I’ll tell you what I know about Effie’s history. She was a widowwhen I met her first, though quite young—only twenty-five. Hername then was Mrs. Hebron. She went out to America when shewas young, and lived in the town of Atlanta, where she marriedthis Hebron, who was a lawyer with a good practice. They had onechild, but the yellow fever broke out badly in the place, and bothhusband and child died of it. I have seen his death certificate. Thissickened her of America, and she came back to live with a maidenaunt at Pinner, in Middlesex. I may mention that her husband hadleft her comfortably off, and that she had a capital of about fourthousand five hundred pounds, which had been so well investedby him that it returned an average of seven per cent. She had onlybeen six months at Pinner when I met her; we fell in love witheach other, and we married a few weeks afterwards.
“I am a hop merchant myself, and as I have an income of sevenor eight hundred, we found ourselves comfortably off, and tooka nice eighty-pound-a-year villa at Norbury. Our little place wasvery countrified, considering that it is so close to town. We hadan inn and two houses a little above us, and a single cottage at theother side of the field which faces us, and except those there wereno houses until you got half way to the station. My business tookme into town at certain seasons, but in summer I had less to do,and then in our country home my wife and I were just as happy ascould be wished. I tell you that there never was a shadow betweenus until this accursed affair began.
“There’s one thing I ought to tell you before I go further. Whenwe married, my wife made over all her property to me—ratheragainst my will, for I saw how awkward it would be if my businessaffairs went wrong. However, she would have it so, and it wasdone. Well, about six weeks ago she came to me.
“ ‘Jack,’ said she, ‘when you took my money you said that if everI wanted any I was to ask you for it.’
“ ‘Certainly,’ said I. ‘It’s all your own.’
“ ‘Well,’ said she, ‘I want a hundred pounds.’
“I was a bit staggered at this, for I had imagined it was simply anew dress or something of the kind that she was after.
“ ‘What on earth for?’ I asked.
“ ‘Oh,’ said she, in her playful way, ‘you said that you were onlymy banker, and bankers never ask questions, you know.’
“ ‘If you really mean it, of course you shall have the money,’ said I.
“ ‘Oh, yes, I really mean it.’
“ ‘And you won’t tell me what you want it for?’
“ ‘Some day, perhaps, but not just at present, Jack.’