THE COMPLETE SHERLOCK HOLMES HIS LAST BOW THE ADVENTURE OF THE RED CIRCLE

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$Title{HIS LAST BOW; The Adventure of the Red Circle}

$Author{Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan}

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                         THE COMPLETE SHERLOCK HOLMES

                                 HIS LAST BOW

                       THE ADVENTURE OF THE RED CIRCLE

"WELL, Mrs. Warren, I cannot see that you have any particular cause for

uneasiness, nor do I understand why I, whose time is of some value, should

interfere in the matter.  I really have other things to engage me."  So spoke

Sherlock Holmes and turned back to the great scrapbook in which he was

arranging and indexing some of his recent material.

     But the landlady had the pertinacity and also the cunning of her sex.

She held her ground firmly.

     "You arranged an affair for a lodger of mine last year," she said--"Mr.

Fairdale Hobbs."

     "Ah, yes--a simple matter."

     "But he would never cease talking of it--your kindness, sir, and the way

in which you brought light into the darkness.  I remembered his words when I

was in doubt and darkness myself.  I know you could if you only would."

     Holmes was accessible upon the side of flattery, and also, to do him

justice, upon the side of kindliness.  The two forces made him lay down his

gum-brush with a sigh of resignation and push back his chair.

     "Well, well, Mrs. Warren, let us hear about it, then.  You don't object

to tobacco, I take it?  Thank you, Watson--the matches!  You are uneasy, as I

understand, because your new lodger remains in his rooms and you cannot see

him.  Why, bless you, Mrs. Warren, if I were your lodger you often would not

see me for weeks on end."

     "No doubt, sir; but this is different.  It frightens me, Mr. Holmes.  I

can't sleep for fright.  To hear his quick step moving here and moving there

from early morning to late at night, and yet never to catch so much as a

glimpse of him--it's more than I can stand.  My husband is as nervous over it

as I am, but he is out at his work all day, while I get no rest from it.  What

is he hiding for?  What has he done?  Except for the girl, I am all alone in

the house with him, and it's more than my nerves can stand."

     Holmes leaned forward and laid his long, thin fingers upon the woman's

shoulder.  He had an almost hypnotic power of soothing when he wished.  The

scared look faded from her eyes, and her agitated features smoothed into their

usual commonplace.  She sat down in the chair which he had indicated.

     "If I take it up I must understand every detail," said he.  "Take time to

consider.  The smallest point may be the most essential.  You say that the man

came ten days ago and paid you for a fortnight's board and lodging?"

     "He asked my terms, sir.  I said fifty shillings a week.  There is a

small sitting-room and bedroom, and all complete, at the top of the house."

     "Well?"

     "He said, 'I'll pay you five pounds a week if I can have it on my own

terms.'  I'm a poor woman, sir, and Mr. Warren earns little, and the money

meant much to me.  He took out a ten-pound note, and he held it out to me then

and there.  'You can have the same every fortnight for a long time to come if

you keep the terms,' he said.  'If not, I'll have no more to do with you.'"

     "What were the terms?"

     "Well, sir, they were that he was to have a key of the house.  That was

all right.  Lodgers often have them.  Also, that he was to be left entirely to

himself and never, upon any excuse, to be disturbed."

     "Nothing wonderful in that, surely?"

     "Not in reason, sir.  But this is out of all reason.  He has been there

for ten days, and neither Mr. Warren, nor I, nor the girl has once set eyes

upon him.  We can hear that quick step of his pacing up and down, up and down,

night, morning, and noon; but except on that first night he has never once

gone out of the house."

     "Oh, he went out the first night, did he?"

     "Yes, sir, and returned very late--after we were all in bed.  He told me

after he had taken the rooms that he would do so and asked me not to bar the

door.  I heard him come up the stair after midnight."

     "But his meals?"

     "It was his particular direction that we should always, when he rang,

leave his meal upon a chair, outside his door.  Then he rings again when he

has finished, and we take it down from the same chair.  If he wants anything

else he prints it on a slip of paper and leaves it."

     "Prints it?"

     "Yes, sir; prints it in pencil.  Just the word, nothing more.  Here's one

I brought to show you--SOAP.  Here's another--MATCH.  This is one he left the

first morning--DAILY GAZETTE.  I leave that paper with his breakfast every

morning."

     "Dear me, Watson," said Holmes, staring with great curiosity at the slips

of foolscap which the landlady had handed to him, "this is certainly a little

unusual.  Seclusion I can understand; but why print?  Printing is a clumsy

process.  Why not write?  What would it suggest, Watson?"

     "That he desired to conceal his handwriting."

     "But why?  What can it matter to him that his landlady should have a word

of his writing?  Still, it may be as you say.  Then, again, why such laconic

messages?"

     "I cannot imagine."

     "It opens a pleasing field for intelligent speculation.  The words are

written with a broad-pointed, violet-tinted pencil of a not unusual pattern.

You will observe that the paper is torn away at the side here after the

printing was done, so that the 'S' of 'SOAP' is partly gone.  Suggestive,

Watson, is it not?"

     "Of caution?"

     "Exactly.  There was evidently some mark, some thumbprint, something

which might give a clue to the person's identity.  Now, Mrs. Warren, you say

that the man was of middle size, dark, and bearded.  What age would he be?"

     "Youngish, sir--not over thirty."

     "Well, can you give me no further indications?"

     "He spoke good English, sir, and yet I thought he was a foreigner by his

accent."

     "And he was well dressed?"

     "Very smartly dressed, sir--quite the gentleman.  Dark clothes--nothing

you would note."

     "He gave no name?"

     "No, sir."

     "And has had no letters or callers?"

     "None."

     "But surely you or the girl enter his room of a morning?"

     "No, sir; he looks after himself entirely."

     "Dear me! that is certainly remarkable.  What about his luggage?"

     "He had one big brown bag with him--nothing else."

     "Well, we don't seem to have much material to help us.  Do you say

nothing has come out of that room--absolutely nothing?"

     The landlady drew an envelope from her bag; from it she shook out two

burnt matches and a cigarette-end upon the table.

     "They were on his tray this morning.  I brought them because I had heard

that you can read great things out of small ones."

     Holmes shrugged his shoulders.

     "There is nothing here," said he.  "The matches have, of course, been

used to light cigarettes.  That is obvious from the shortness of the burnt

end.  Half the match is consumed in lighting a pipe or cigar.  But, dear me!

this cigarette stub is certainly remarkable.  The gentleman was bearded and

moustached, you say?"

     "Yes, sir."

     "I don't understand that.  I should say that only a clean-shaven man

could have smoked this.  Why, Watson, even your modest moustache would have

been singed."

     "A holder?" I suggested.

     "No, no; the end is matted.  I suppose there could not be two people in

your rooms, Mrs. Warren?"

     "No, sir.  He eats so little that I often wonder it can keep life in

one."

     "Well, I think we must wait for a little more material.  After all, you

have nothing to complain of.  You have received your rent, and he is not a

troublesome lodger, though he is certainly an unusual one.  He pays you well,

and if he chooses to lie concealed it is no direct business of yours.  We have

no excuse for an intrusion upon his privacy until we have some reason to think

that there is a guilty reason for it.  I've taken up the matter, and I won't

lose sight of it.  Report to me if anything fresh occurs, and rely upon my

assistance if it should be needed.

     "There are certainly some points of interest in this case, Watson," he

remarked when the landlady had left us.  "It may, of course, be trivial--

individual eccentricity; or it may be very much deeper than appears on the

surface.  The first thing that strikes one is the obvious possibility that the

person now in the rooms may be entirely different from the one who engaged

them."

     "Why should you think so?"

     "Well, apart from this cigarette-end, was it not suggestive that the only

time the lodger went out was immediately after his taking the rooms?  He came

back--or someone came back--when all witnesses were out of the way.  We have

no proof that the person who came back was the person who went out.  Then,

again, the man who took the rooms spoke English well.  This other, however,

prints 'match' when it should have been 'matches.'  I can imagine that the

word was taken out of a dictionary, which would give the noun but not the

plural.  The laconic style may be to conceal the absence of knowledge of

English.  Yes, Watson, there are good reasons to suspect that there has been a

substitution of lodgers."

     "But for what possible end?"

     "Ah! there lies our problem.  There is one rather obvious line of

investigation."  He took down the great book in which, day by day, he filed

the agony columns of the various London journals.  "Dear me!" said he, turning

over the pages, "what a chorus of groans, cries, and bleatings!  What a

rag-bag of singular happenings!  But surely the most valuable hunting-ground

that ever was given to a student of the unusual!  This person is alone and

cannot be approached by letter without a breach of that absolute secrecy which

is desired.  How is any news or any message to reach him from without?

Obviously by advertisement through a newspaper.  There seems no other way, and

fortunately we need concern ourselves with the one paper only.  Here are the

Daily Gazette extracts of the last fortnight.  'Lady with a black boa at

Prince's Skating Club'--that we may pass.  'Surely Jimmy will not break his

mother's heart'-- that appears to be irrelevant.  'If the lady who fainted in

the Brixton bus'-- she does not interest me.  'Every day my heart longs-- --'

Bleat, Watson-- unmitigated bleat!  Ah, this is a little more possible.

Listen to this:  'Be patient.  Will find some sure means of communication.

Meanwhile, this column. G.'  That is two days after Mrs. Warren's lodger

arrived.  It sounds plausible, does it not?  The mysterious one could

understand English, even if he could not print it.  Let us see if we can pick

up the trace again.  Yes, here we are-- three days later.  'Am making

successful arrangements.  Patience and prudence.  The clouds will pass.  G.'

Nothing for a week after that.  Then comes something much more definite:  'The

path is clearing.  If I find chance signal message remember code agreed--one

A, two B, and so on.  You will hear soon.  G.'  That was in yesterday's paper,

and there is nothing in to-day's.  It's all very appropriate to Mrs. Warren's

lodger.  If we wait a little, Watson, I don't doubt that the affair will grow

more intelligible."

     So it proved; for in the morning I found my friend standing on the

hearthrug with his back to the fire and a smile of complete satisfaction upon

his face.

     "How's this, Watson?" he cried, picking up the paper from the table.

"'High red house with white stone facings.  Third floor.  Second window left.

After dusk.  G.'  That is definite enough.  I think after breakfast we must

make a little reconnaissance of Mrs. Warren's neighbourhood.  Ah, Mrs. Warren!

what news do you bring us this morning?"

     Our client had suddenly burst into the room with an explosive energy

which told of some new and momentous development.

     "It's a police matter, Mr. Holmes!" she cried.  "I'll have no more of it!

He shall pack out of there with his baggage.  I would have gone straight up

and told him so, only I thought it was but fair to you to take your opinion

first.  But I'm at the end of my patience, and when it comes to knocking my

old man about-- --"

     "Knocking Mr. Warren about?"

     "Using him roughly, anyway."

     "But who used him roughly?"

     "Ah! that's what we want to know!  It was this morning, sir.  Mr. Warren

is a timekeeper at Morton and Waylight's, in Tottenham Court Road.  He has to

be out of the house before seven.  Well, this morning he had not gone ten

paces down the road when two men came up behind him, threw a coat over his

head, and bundled him into a cab that was beside the curb.  They drove him an

hour, and then opened the door and shot him out.  He lay in the roadway so

shaken in his wits that he never saw what became of the cab.  When he picked

himself up he found he was on Hampstead Heath; so he took a bus home, and

there he lies now on the sofa, while I came straight round to tell you what

had happened."

     "Most interesting," said Holmes.  "Did he observe the appearance of these

men--did he hear them talk?"

     "No; he is clean dazed.  He just knows that he was lifted up as if by

magic and dropped as if by magic.  Two at least were in it, and maybe three."

     "And you connect this attack with your lodger?"

     "Well, we've lived there fifteen years and no such happenings ever came

before.  I've had enough of him.  Money's not everything.  I'll have him out

of my house before the day is done."

     "Wait a bit, Mrs. Warren.  Do nothing rash.  I begin to think that this

affair may be very much more important than appeared at first sight.  It is

clear now that some danger is threatening your lodger.  It is equally clear

that his enemies, lying in wait for him near your door, mistook your husband

for him in the foggy morning light.  On discovering their mistake they

released him.  What they would have done had it not been a mistake, we can

only conjecture."

     "Well, what am I to do, Mr. Holmes?"

     "I have a great fancy to see this lodger of yours, Mrs. Warren."

     "I don't see how that is to be managed, unless you break in the door.  I

always hear him unlock it as I go down the stair after I leave the tray."

     "He has to take the tray in.  Surely we could conceal ourselves and see

him do it."

     The landlady thought for a moment.

     "Well, sir, there's the box-room opposite.  I could arrange a

looking-glass, maybe, and if you were behind the door-- --"

     "Excellent!" said Holmes.  "When does he lunch?"

     "About one, sir."

     "Then Dr. Watson and I will come round in time.  For the present, Mrs.

Warren, good-bye."

     At half-past twelve we found ourselves upon the steps of Mrs. Warren's

house--a high, thin, yellow-brick edifice in Great Orme Street, a narrow

thoroughfare at the northeast side of the British Museum.  Standing as it does

near the corner of the street, it commands a view down Howe Street, with its

more pretentious houses.  Holmes pointed with a chuckle to one of these, a row

of residential flats, which projected so that they could not fail to catch the

eye.

     "See, Watson!" said he.  "'High red house with stone facings.'  There is

the signal station all right.  We know the place, and we know the code; so

surely our task should be simple.  There's a 'to let' card in that window.  It

is evidently an empty flat to which the confederate has access.  Well, Mrs.

Warren, what now?"

     "I have it all ready for you.  If you will both come up and leave your

boots below on the landing, I'll put you there now."

     It was an excellent hiding-place which she had arranged.  The mirror was

so placed that, seated in the dark, we could very plainly see the door

opposite.  We had hardly settled down in it, and Mrs. Warren left us, when a

distant tinkle announced that our mysterious neighbour had rung.  Presently

the landlady appeared with the tray, laid it down upon a chair beside the

closed door, and then, treading heavily, departed.  Crouching together in the

angle of the door, we kept our eyes fixed upon the mirror.  Suddenly, as the

landlady's footsteps died away, there was the creak of a turning key, the

handle revolved, and two thin hands darted out and lifted the tray from the

chair.  An instant later it was hurriedly replaced, and I caught a glimpse of

a dark, beautiful, horrified face glaring at the narrow opening of the

box-room.  Then the door crashed to, the key turned once more, and all was

silence.  Holmes twitched my sleeve, and together we stole down the stair.

     "I will call again in the evening," said he to the expectant landlady.

"I think, Watson, we can discuss this business better in our own quarters."

     "My surmise, as you saw, proved to be correct," said he, speaking from

the depths of his easy-chair.  "There has been a substitution of lodgers.

What I did not foresee is that we should find a woman, and no ordinary woman,

Watson."

     "She saw us."

     "Well, she saw something to alarm her.  That is certain.  The general

sequence of events is pretty clear, is it not?  A couple seek refuge in London

from a very terrible and instant danger.  The measure of that danger is the

rigour of their precautions.  The man, who has some work which he must do,

desires to leave the woman in absolute safety while he does it.  It is not an

easy problem, but he solved it in an original fashion, and so effectively that

her presence was not even known to the landlady who supplies her with food.

The printed messages, as is now evident, were to prevent her sex being

discovered by her writing.  The man cannot come near the woman, or he will

guide their enemies to her.  Since he cannot communicate with her direct, he

has recourse to the agony column of a paper.  So far all is clear."

     "But what is at the root of it?"

     "Ah, yes, Watson--severely practical, as usual!  What is at the root of

it all?  Mrs. Warren's whimsical problem enlarges somewhat and assumes a more

sinister aspect as we proceed.  This much we can say:  that it is no ordinary

love escapade.  You saw the woman's face at the sign of danger.  We have

heard, too, of the attack upon the landlord, which was undoubtedly meant for

the lodger.  These alarms, and the desperate need for secrecy, argue that the

matter is one of life or death.  The attack upon Mr. Warren further shows that

the enemy, whoever they are, are themselves not aware of the substitution of

the female lodger for the male.  It is very curious and complex, Watson."

     "Why should you go further in it?  What have you to gain from it?"

     "What, indeed?  It is art for art's sake, Watson.  I suppose when you

doctored you found yourself studying cases without thought of a fee?"

     "For my education, Holmes."

     "Education never ends, Watson.  It is a series of lessons with the

greatest for the last.  This is an instructive case.  There is neither money

nor credit in it, and yet one would wish to tidy it up.  When dusk comes we

should find ourselves one stage advanced in our investigation."

     When we returned to Mrs. Warren's rooms, the gloom of a London winter

evening had thickened into one gray curtain, a dead monotone of colour, broken

only by the sharp yellow squares of the windows and the blurred haloes of the

gas-lamps.  As we peered from the darkened sitting-room of the lodging-house,

one more dim light glimmered high up through the obscurity.

     "Someone is moving in that room," said Holmes in a whisper, his gaunt and

eager face thrust forward to the window-pane.  "Yes, I can see his shadow.

There he is again!  He has a candle in his hand.  Now he is peering across.

He wants to be sure that she is on the lookout.  Now he begins to flash.  Take

the message also, Watson, that we may check each other.  A single flash--that

is A, surely.  Now, then.  How many did you make it?  Twenty.  So did I.  That

should mean T.  AT--that's intelligible enough!  Another T.  Surely this is

the beginning of a second word.  Now, then--TENTA.  Dead stop.  That can't be

all, Watson?  ATTENTA gives no sense.  Nor is it any better as three words AT,

TEN, TA, unless T. A. are a person's initials.  There it goes again!  What's

that?  ATTE--why, it is the same message over again.  Curious, Watson, very

curious!  Now he is off once more!  AT--why, he is repeating it for the third

time.  ATTENTA three times!  How often will he repeat it?  No, that seems to

be the finish.  He has withdrawn from the window.  What do you make of it,

Watson?"

     "A cipher message, Holmes."

     My companion gave a sudden chuckle of comprehension.  "And not a very

obscure cipher, Watson," said he.  "Why, of course, it is Italian!  The A

means that it is addressed to a woman.  'Beware!  Beware!  Beware!'  How's

that, Watson?"

     "I believe you have hit it."

     "Not a doubt of it.  It is a very urgent message, thrice repeated to make

it more so.  But beware of what?  Wait a bit; he is coming to the window once

more."

     Again we saw the dim silhouette of a crouching man and the whisk of the

small flame across the window as the signals were renewed.  They came more

rapidly than before--so rapid that it was hard to follow them.

     "PERICOLO--pericolo--eh, what's that, Watson?  'Danger,' isn't it?  Yes,

by Jove, it's a danger signal.  There he goes again!  PERI.  Halloa, what on

earth-- --"

     The light had suddenly gone out, the glimmering square of window had

disappeared, and the third floor formed a dark band round the lofty building,

with its tiers of shining casements.  That last warning cry had been suddenly

cut short.  How, and by whom?  The same thought occurred on the instant to us

both.  Holmes sprang up from where he crouched by the window.

     "This is serious, Watson," he cried.  "There is some devilry going

forward!  Why should such a message stop in such a way?  I should put Scotland

Yard in touch with this business--and yet, it is too pressing for us to

leave."

     "Shall I go for the police?"

     "We must define the situation a little more clearly.  It may bear some

more innocent interpretation.  Come, Watson, let us go across ourselves and

see what we can make of it."

                                      2

     As we walked rapidly down Howe Street I glanced back at the building

which we had left.  There, dimly outlined at the top window, I could see the

shadow of a head, a woman's head, gazing tensely, rigidly, out into the night,

waiting with breathless suspense for the renewal of that interrupted message.

At the doorway of the Howe Street flats a man, muffled in a cravat and

greatcoat, was leaning against the railing.  He started as the hall-light fell

upon our faces.

     "Holmes!" he cried.

     "Why, Gregson!" said my companion as he shook hands with the Scotland

Yard detective.  "Journeys end with lovers' meetings.  What brings you here?"

     "The same reasons that bring you, I expect," said Gregson.  "How you got

on to it I can't imagine."

     "Different threads, but leading up to the same tangle.  I've been taking

the signals."

     "Signals?"

     "Yes, from that window.  They broke off in the middle.  We came over to

see the reason.  But since it is safe in your hands I see no object in

continuing the business."

     "Wait a bit!" cried Gregson eagerly.  "I'll do you this justice, Mr.

Holmes, that I was never in a case yet that I didn't feel stronger for having

you on my side.  There's only the one exit to these flats, so we have him

safe."

     "Who is he?"

     "Well, well, we score over you for once, Mr. Holmes.  You must give us

best this time."  He struck his stick sharply upon the ground, on which a

cabman, his whip in his hand, sauntered over from a four-wheeler which stood

on the far side of the street.  "May I introduce you to Mr. Sherlock Holmes?"

he said to the cabman.  "This is Mr. Leverton, of Pinkerton's American

Agency."

     "The hero of the Long Island cave mystery?" said Holmes.  "Sir, I am

pleased to meet you."

     The American, a quiet, businesslike young man, with a clean-shaven,

hatchet face, flushed up at the words of commendation.  "I am on the trail of

my life now, Mr. Holmes," said he.  "If I can get Gorgiano-- --"

     "What!  Gorgiano of the Red Circle?"

     "Oh, he has a European fame, has he?  Well, we've learned all about him

in America.  We know he is at the bottom of fifty murders, and yet we have

nothing positive we can take him on.  I tracked him over from New York, and

I've been close to him for a week in London, waiting some excuse to get my

hand on his collar.  Mr. Gregson and I ran him to ground in that big tenement

house, and there's only the one door, so he can't slip us.  There's three folk

come out since he went in, but I'll swear he wasn't one of them."

     "Mr. Holmes talks of signals," said Gregson.  "I expect, as usual, he

knows a good deal that we don't."

     In a few clear words Holmes explained the situation as it had appeared to

us.  The American struck his hands together with vexation.

     "He's on to us!" he cried.

     "Why do you think so?"

     "Well, it figures out that way, does it not?  Here he is, sending out

messages to an accomplice--there are several of his gang in London.  Then

suddenly, just as by your own account he was telling them that there was

danger, he broke short off.  What could it mean except that from the window he

had suddenly either caught sight of us in the street, or in some way come to

understand how close the danger was, and that he must act right away if he was

to avoid it?  What do you suggest, Mr. Holmes?"

     "That we go up at once and see for ourselves."

     "But we have no warrant for his arrest."

     "He is in unoccupied premises under suspicious circumstances," said

Gregson.  "That is good enough for the moment.  When we have him by the heels

we can see if New York can't help us to keep him.  I'll take the

responsibility of arresting him now."

     Our official detectives may blunder in the matter of intelligence, but

never in that of courage.  Gregson climbed the stair to arrest this desperate

murderer with the same absolutely quiet and businesslike bearing with which he

would have ascended the official staircase of Scotland Yard.  The Pinkerton

man had tried to push past him, but Gregson had firmly elbowed him back.

London dangers were the privilege of the London force.

     The door of the left-hand flat upon the third landing was standing ajar.

Gregson pushed it open.  Within all was absolute silence and darkness.  I

struck a match and lit the detective's lantern.  As I did so, and as the

flicker steadied into a flame, we all gave a gasp of surprise.  On the deal

boards of the carpetless floor there was outlined a fresh track of blood.  The

red steps pointed towards us and led away from an inner room, the door of

which was closed.  Gregson flung it open and held his light full blaze in

front of him, while we all peered eagerly over his shoulders.

     In the middle of the floor of the empty room was huddled the figure of an

enormous man, his clean-shaven, swarthy face grotesquely horrible in its

contortion and his head encircled by a ghastly crimson halo of blood, lying in

a broad wet circle upon the white woodwork.  His knees were drawn up, his

hands thrown out in agony, and from the centre of his broad, brown, upturned

throat there projected the white haft of a knife driven blade-deep into his

body.  Giant as he was, the man must have gone down like a pole-axed ox before

that terrific blow.  Beside his right hand a most formidable horn-handled,

two-edged dagger lay upon the floor, and near it a black kid glove.

     "By George! it's Black Gorgiano himself!" cried the American detective.

"Someone has got ahead of us this time."

     "Here is the candle in the window, Mr. Holmes," said Gregson.  "Why,

whatever are you doing?"

     Holmes had stepped across, had lit the candle, and was passing it

backward and forward across the window-panes.  Then he peered into the

darkness, blew the candle out, and threw it on the floor.

     "I rather think that will be helpful," said he.  He came over and stood

in deep thought while the two professionals were examining the body.  "You say

that three people came out from the flat while you were waiting downstairs,"

said he at last.  "Did you observe them closely?"

     "Yes, I did."

     "Was there a fellow about thirty, black-bearded, dark, of middle size?"

     "Yes; he was the last to pass me."

     "That is your man, I fancy.  I can give you his description, and we have

a very excellent outline of his footmark.  That should be enough for you."

     "Not much, Mr. Holmes, among the millions of London."

     "Perhaps not.  That is why I thought it best to summon this lady to your

aid."

     We all turned round at the words.  There, framed in the doorway, was a

tall and beautiful woman--the mysterious lodger of Bloomsbury.  Slowly she

advanced, her face pale and drawn with a frightful apprehension, her eyes

fixed and staring, her terrified gaze riveted upon the dark figure on the

floor.

     "You have killed him!" she muttered.  "Oh, Dio mio, you have killed him!"

Then I heard a sudden sharp intake of her breath, and she sprang into the air

with a cry of joy.  Round and round the room she danced, her hands clapping,

her dark eyes gleaming with delighted wonder, and a thousand pretty Italian

exclamations pouring from her lips.  It was terrible and amazing to see such a

woman so convulsed with joy at such a sight.  Suddenly she stopped and gazed

at us all with a questioning stare.

     "But you!  You are police, are you not?  You have killed Giuseppe

Gorgiano.  Is it not so?"

     "We are police, madam."

     She looked round into the shadows of the room.

     "But where, then, is Gennaro?" she asked.  "He is my husband, Gennaro

Lucca.  I am Emilia Lucca, and we are both from New York.  Where is Gennaro?

He called me this moment from this window, and I ran with all my speed."

     "It was I who called," said Holmes.

     "You!  How could you call?"

     "Your cipher was not difficult, madam.  Your presence here was desirable.

I knew that I had only to flash 'Vieni' and you would surely come."

     The beautiful Italian looked with awe at my companion.

     "I do not understand how you know these things," she said.  "Giuseppe

Gorgiano--how did he-- --"  She paused, and then suddenly her face lit up with

pride and delight.  "Now I see it!  My Gennaro!  My splendid, beautiful

Gennaro, who has guarded me safe from all harm, he did it, with his own strong

hand he killed the monster!  Oh, Gennaro, how wonderful you are!  What woman

could ever be worthy of such a man?"

     "Well, Mrs. Lucca," said the prosaic Gregson, laying his hand upon the

lady's sleeve with as little sentiment as if she were a Notting Hill hooligan,

"I am not very clear yet who you are or what you are; but you've said enough

to make it very clear that we shall want you at the Yard."

     "One moment, Gregson," said Holmes.  "I rather fancy that this lady may

be as anxious to give us information as we can be to get it.  You understand,

madam, that your husband will be arrested and tried for the death of the man

who lies before us?  What you say may be used in evidence.  But if you think

that he has acted from motives which are not criminal, and which he would wish

to have known, then you cannot serve him better than by telling us the whole

story."

     "Now that Gorgiano is dead we fear nothing," said the lady.  "He was a

devil and a monster, and there can be no judge in the world who would punish

my husband for having killed him."

     "In that case," said Holmes, "my suggestion is that we lock this door,

leave things as we found them, go with this lady to her room, and form our

opinion after we have heard what it is that she has to say to us."

     Half an hour later we were seated, all four, in the small sitting-room of

Signora Lucca, listening to her remarkable narrative of those sinister events,

the ending of which we had chanced to witness.  She spoke in rapid and fluent

but very unconventional English, which, for the sake of clearness, I will make

grammatical.

     "I was born in Posilippo, near Naples," said she, "and was the daughter

of Augusto Barelli, who was the chief lawyer and once the deputy of that part.

Gennaro was in my father's employment, and I came to love him, as any woman

must.  He had neither money nor position--nothing but his beauty and strength

and energy--so my father forbade the match.  We fled together, were married at

Bari, and sold my jewels to gain the money which would take us to America.

This was four years ago, and we have been in New York ever since.

     "Fortune was very good to us at first.  Gennaro was able to do a service

to an Italian gentleman--he saved him from some ruffians in the place called

the Bowery, and so made a powerful friend.  His name was Tito Castalotte, and

he was the senior partner of the great firm of Castalotte and Zamba, who are

the chief fruit importers of New York.  Signor Zamba is an invalid, and our

new friend Castalotte has all power within the firm, which employs more than

three hundred men.  He took my husband into his employment, made him head of a

department, and showed his good-will towards him in every way.  Signor

Castalotte was a bachelor, and I believe that he felt as if Gennaro was his

son, and both my husband and I loved him as if he were our father.  We had

taken and furnished a little house in Brooklyn, and our whole future seemed

assured when that black cloud appeared which was soon to overspread our sky.

     "One night, when Gennaro returned from his work, he brought a

fellow-countryman back with him.  His name was Gorgiano, and he had come also

from Posilippo.  He was a huge man, as you can testify, for you have looked

upon his corpse.  Not only was his body that of a giant but everything about

him was grotesque, gigantic, and terrifying.  His voice was like thunder in

our little house.  There was scarce room for the whirl of his great arms as he

talked.  His thoughts, his emotions, his passions, all were exaggerated and

monstrous.  He talked, or rather roared, with such energy that others could

but sit and listen, cowed with the mighty stream of words.  His eyes blazed at

you and held you at his mercy.  He was a terrible and wonderful man.  I thank

God that he is dead!

     "He came again and again.  Yet I was aware that Gennaro was no more happy

than I was in his presence.  My poor husband would sit pale and listless,

listening to the endless raving upon politics and upon social questions which

made up our visitor's conversation.  Gennaro said nothing, but I, who knew him

so well, could read in his face some emotion which I had never seen there

before.  At first I thought that it was dislike.  And then, gradually, I

understood that it was more than dislike.  It was fear--a deep, secret,

shrinking fear.  That night--the night that I read his terror--I put my arms

round him and I implored him by his love for me and by all that he held dear

to hold nothing from me, and to tell me why this huge man overshadowed him so.

     "He told me, and my own heart grew cold as ice as I listened.  My poor

Gennaro, in his wild and fiery days, when all the world seemed against him and

his mind was driven half mad by the injustices of life, had joined a

Neapolitan society, the Red Circle, which was allied to the old Carbonari.

The oaths and secrets of this brotherhood were frightful, but once within its

rule no escape was possible.  When we had fled to America Gennaro thought that

he had cast it all off forever.  What was his horror one evening to meet in

the streets the very man who had initiated him in Naples, the giant Gorgiano,

a man who had earned the name of 'Death' in the south of Italy, for he was red

to the elbow in murder!  He had come to New York to avoid the Italian police,

and he had already planted a branch of this dreadful society in his new home.

All this Gennaro told me and showed me a summons which he had received that

very day, a Red Circle drawn upon the head of it telling him that a lodge

would be held upon a certain date, and that his presence at it was required

and ordered.

     "That was bad enough, but worse was to come.  I had noticed for some time

that when Gorgiano came to us, as he constantly did, in the evening, he spoke

much to me; and even when his words were to my husband those terrible,

glaring, wild-beast eyes of his were always turned upon me.  One night his

secret came out.  I had awakened what he called 'love' within him--the love of

a brute-- a savage.  Gennaro had not yet returned when he came.  He pushed his

way in, seized me in his mighty arms, hugged me in his bear's embrace, covered

me with kisses, and implored me to come away with him.  I was struggling and

screaming when Gennaro entered and attacked him.  He struck Gennaro senseless

and fled from the house which he was never more to enter.  It was a deadly

enemy that we made that night.

     "A few days later came the meeting.  Gennaro returned from it with a face

which told me that something dreadful had occurred.  It was worse than we

could have imagined possible.  The funds of the society were raised by

blackmailing rich Italians and threatening them with violence should they

refuse the money.  It seems that Castalotte, our dear friend and benefactor,

had been approached.  He had refused to yield to threats, and he had handed

the notices to the police.  It was resolved now that such an example should be

made of him as would prevent any other victim from rebelling.  At the meeting

it was arranged that he and his house should be blown up with dynamite.  There

was a drawing of lots as to who should carry out the deed.  Gennaro saw our

enemy's cruel face smiling at him as he dipped his hand in the bag.  No doubt

it had been prearranged in some fashion, for it was the fatal disc with the

Red Circle upon it, the mandate for murder, which lay upon his palm.  He was

to kill his best friend, or he was to expose himself and me to the vengeance

of his comrades.  It was part of their fiendish system to punish those whom

they feared or hated by injuring not only their own persons but those whom

they loved, and it was the knowledge of this which hung as a terror over my

poor Gennaro's head and drove him nearly crazy with apprehension.

     "All that night we sat together, our arms round each other, each

strengthening each for the troubles that lay before us.  The very next evening

had been fixed for the attempt.  By midday my husband and I were on our way to

London, but not before he had given our benefactor full warning of his danger,

and had also left such information for the police as would safeguard his life

for the future.

     "The rest, gentlemen, you know for yourselves.  We were sure that our

enemies would be behind us like our own shadows.  Gorgiano had his private

reasons for vengeance, but in any case we knew how ruthless, cunning, and

untiring he could be.  Both Italy and America are full of stories of his

dreadful powers.  If ever they were exerted it would be now.  My darling made

use of the few clear days which our start had given us in arranging for a

refuge for me in such a fashion that no possible danger could reach me.  For

his own part, he wished to be free that he might communicate both with the

American and with the Italian police.  I do not myself know where he lived, or

how.  All that I learned was through the columns of a newspaper.  But once as

I looked through my window, I saw two Italians watching the house, and I

understood that in some way Gorgiano had found out our retreat.  Finally

Gennaro told me, through the paper, that he would signal to me from a certain

window, but when the signals came they were nothing but warnings, which were

suddenly interrupted.  It is very clear to me now that he knew Gorgiano to be

close upon him, and that, thank God! he was ready for him when he came.  And

now, gentlemen, I would ask you whether we have anything to fear from the law,

or whether any judge upon earth would condemn my Gennaro for what he has

done?"

     "Well, Mr. Gregson," said the American, looking across at the official,

"I don't know what your British point of view may be, but I guess that in New

York this lady's husband will receive a pretty general vote of thanks."

     "She will have to come with me and see the chief," Gregson answered.  "If

what she says is corroborated, I do not think she or her husband has much to

fear.  But what I can't make head or tail of, Mr. Holmes, is how on earth you

got yourself mixed up in the matter."

     "Education, Gregson, education.  Still seeking knowledge at the old

university.  Well, Watson, you have one more specimen of the tragic and

grotesque to add to your collection.  By the way, it is not eight o'clock, and

a Wagner night at Covent Garden!  If we hurry, we might be in time for the

second act."