THE RETURN OF SHERLOCK HOLMES.

By Arthur Conan Doyle.



Contents:

     The Adventure of the Empty House.
     The Adventure of the Norwood Builder.
     The Adventure of the Dancing Men.
     The Adventure of the Solitary Cyclist.
     The Adventure of the Priory School.
     The Adventure of Black Peter.
     The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton.
     The Adventure of the Six Napoleons.
     The Adventure of the Three Students.
     The Adventure of the Golden Pince-Nez.
     The Adventure of the Missing Three-Quarter.
     The Adventure of the Abbey Grange.
     The Adventure of the Second Stain.]





                     THE STRAND MAGAZINE
                   Vol. 26  OCTOBER, 1903
                THE RETURN OF SHERLOCK HOLMES.
                    By ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE.




I.--The Adventure of the Empty House.


IT was in the spring of the year 1894 that all London was interested,
and the fashionable world dismayed, by the murder of the Honourable
Ronald Adair under most unusual and inexplicable circumstances. The
public has already learned those particulars of the crime which came out
in the police investigation; but a good deal was suppressed upon that
occasion, since the case for the prosecution was so overwhelmingly
strong that it was not necessary to bring forward all the facts. Only
now, at the end of nearly ten years, am I allowed to supply those
missing links which make up the whole of that remarkable chain. The
crime was of interest in itself, but that interest was as nothing to
me compared to the inconceivable sequel, which afforded me the greatest
shock and surprise of any event in my adventurous life. Even now,
after this long interval, I find myself thrilling as I think of it, and
feeling once more that sudden flood of joy, amazement, and incredulity
which utterly submerged my mind. Let me say to that public which has
shown some interest in those glimpses which I have occasionally given
them of the thoughts and actions of a very remarkable man that they
are not to blame me if I have not shared my knowledge with them, for I
should have considered it my first duty to have done so had I not been
barred by a positive prohibition from his own lips, which was only
withdrawn upon the third of last month.

It can be imagined that my close intimacy with Sherlock Holmes had
interested me deeply in crime, and that after his disappearance I never
failed to read with care the various problems which came before
the public, and I even attempted more than once for my own private
satisfaction to employ his methods in their solution, though with
indifferent success. There was none, however, which appealed to me like
this tragedy of Ronald Adair. As I read the evidence at the inquest,
which led up to a verdict of wilful murder against some person or
persons unknown, I realized more clearly than I had ever done the loss
which the community had sustained by the death of Sherlock Holmes. There
were points about this strange business which would, I was sure, have
specially appealed to him, and the efforts of the police would have been
supplemented, or more probably anticipated, by the trained observation
and the alert mind of the first criminal agent in Europe. All day as
I drove upon my round I turned over the case in my mind, and found no
explanation which appeared to me to be adequate. At the risk of telling
a twice-told tale I will recapitulate the facts as they were known to
the public at the conclusion of the inquest.

The Honourable Ronald Adair was the second son of the Earl of Maynooth,
at that time Governor of one of the Australian Colonies. Adair's mother
had returned from Australia to undergo the operation for cataract, and
she, her son Ronald, and her daughter Hilda were living together at
427, Park Lane. The youth moved in the best society, had, so far as was
known, no enemies, and no particular vices. He had been engaged to Miss
Edith Woodley, of Carstairs, but the engagement had been broken off by
mutual consent some months before, and there was no sign that it had
left any very profound feeling behind it. For the rest the man's life
moved in a narrow and conventional circle, for his habits were quiet and
his nature unemotional. Yet it was upon this easy-going young aristocrat
that death came in most strange and unexpected form between the hours of
ten and eleven-twenty on the night of March 30, 1894.

Ronald Adair was fond of cards, playing continually, but never for such
stakes as would hurt him. He was a member of the Baldwin, the Cavendish,
and the Bagatelle card clubs. It was shown that after dinner on the day
of his death he had played a rubber of whist at the latter club. He had
also played there in the afternoon. The evidence of those who had played
with him--Mr. Murray, Sir John Hardy, and Colonel Moran--showed that
the game was whist, and that there was a fairly equal fall of the cards.
Adair might have lost five pounds, but not more. His fortune was a
considerable one, and such a loss could not in any way affect him. He
had played nearly every day at one club or other, but he was a cautious
player, and usually rose a winner. It came out in evidence that in
partnership with Colonel Moran he had actually won as much as four
hundred and twenty pounds in a sitting some weeks before from Godfrey
Milner and Lord Balmoral. So much for his recent history, as it came out
at the inquest.

On the evening of the crime he returned from the club exactly at ten.
His mother and sister were out spending the evening with a relation. The
servant deposed that she heard him enter the front room on the second
floor, generally used as his sitting-room. She had lit a fire there, and
as it smoked she had opened the window. No sound was heard from the room
until eleven-twenty, the hour of the return of Lady Maynooth and her
daughter. Desiring to say good-night, she had attempted to enter her
son's room. The door was locked on the inside, and no answer could be
got to their cries and knocking. Help was obtained and the door forced.
The unfortunate young man was found lying near the table. His head had
been horribly mutilated by an expanding revolver bullet, but no weapon
of any sort was to be found in the room. On the table lay two bank-notes
for ten pounds each and seventeen pounds ten in silver and gold, the
money arranged in little piles of varying amount. There were some
figures also upon a sheet of paper with the names of some club friends
opposite to them, from which it was conjectured that before his death he
was endeavouring to make out his losses or winnings at cards.

A minute examination of the circumstances served only to make the case
more complex. In the first place, no reason could be given why the
young man should have fastened the door upon the inside. There was the
possibility that the murderer had done this and had afterwards escaped
by the window. The drop was at least twenty feet, however, and a bed of
crocuses in full bloom lay beneath. Neither the flowers nor the earth
showed any sign of having been disturbed, nor were there any marks
upon the narrow strip of grass which separated the house from the road.
Apparently, therefore, it was the young man himself who had fastened the
door. But how did he come by his death? No one could have climbed up to
the window without leaving traces. Suppose a man had fired through the
window, it would indeed be a remarkable shot who could with a
revolver inflict so deadly a wound. Again, Park Lane is a frequented
thoroughfare, and there is a cab-stand within a hundred yards of the
house. No one had heard a shot. And yet there was the dead man, and
there the revolver bullet, which had mushroomed out, as soft-nosed
bullets will, and so inflicted a wound which must have caused
instantaneous death. Such were the circumstances of the Park Lane
Mystery, which were further complicated by entire absence of motive,
since, as I have said, young Adair was not known to have any enemy, and
no attempt had been made to remove the money or valuables in the room.

All day I turned these facts over in my mind, endeavouring to hit upon
some theory which could reconcile them all, and to find that line
of least resistance which my poor friend had declared to be the
starting-point of every investigation. I confess that I made little
progress. In the evening I strolled across the Park, and found myself
about six o'clock at the Oxford Street end of Park Lane. A group of
loafers upon the pavements, all staring up at a particular window,
directed me to the house which I had come to see. A tall, thin man with
coloured glasses, whom I strongly suspected of being a plain-clothes
detective, was pointing out some theory of his own, while the others
crowded round to listen to what he said. I got as near him as I could,
but his observations seemed to me to be absurd, so I withdrew again in
some disgust. As I did so I struck against an elderly deformed man,
who had been behind me, and I knocked down several books which he was
carrying. I remember that as I picked them up I observed the title of
one of them, "The Origin of Tree Worship," and it struck me that the
fellow must be some poor bibliophile who, either as a trade or as a
hobby, was a collector of obscure volumes. I endeavoured to apologize
for the accident, but it was evident that these books which I had so
unfortunately maltreated were very precious objects in the eyes of their
owner. With a snarl of contempt he turned upon his heel, and I saw his
curved back and white side-whiskers disappear among the throng.

My observations of No. 427, Park Lane did little to clear up the problem
in which I was interested. The house was separated from the street by
a low wall and railing, the whole not more than five feet high. It was
perfectly easy, therefore, for anyone to get into the garden, but the
window was entirely inaccessible, since there was no water-pipe or
anything which could help the most active man to climb it. More puzzled
than ever I retraced my steps to Kensington. I had not been in my study
five minutes when the maid entered to say that a person desired to
see me. To my astonishment it was none other than my strange old
book-collector, his sharp, wizened face peering out from a frame of
white hair, and his precious volumes, a dozen of them at least, wedged
under his right arm.

"You're surprised to see me, sir," said he, in a strange, croaking
voice.

I acknowledged that I was.

"Well, I've a conscience, sir, and when I chanced to see you go into
this house, as I came hobbling after you, I thought to myself, I'll just
step in and see that kind gentleman, and tell him that if I was a bit
gruff in my manner there was not any harm meant, and that I am much
obliged to him for picking up my books."

"You make too much of a trifle," said I. "May I ask how you knew who I
was?"

"Well, sir, if it isn't too great a liberty, I am a neighbour of yours,
for you'll find my little bookshop at the corner of Church Street,
and very happy to see you, I am sure. Maybe you collect yourself, sir;
here's 'British Birds,' and 'Catullus,' and 'The Holy War'--a bargain
every one of them. With five volumes you could just fill that gap on
that second shelf. It looks untidy, does it not, sir?"

I moved my head to look at the cabinet behind me. When I turned again
Sherlock Holmes was standing smiling at me across my study table. I rose
to my feet, stared at him for some seconds in utter amazement, and then
it appears that I must have fainted for the first and the last time
in my life. Certainly a grey mist swirled before my eyes, and when it
cleared I found my collar-ends undone and the tingling after-taste of
brandy upon my lips. Holmes was bending over my chair, his flask in his
hand.

"My dear Watson," said the well-remembered voice, "I owe you a thousand
apologies. I had no idea that you would be so affected."

I gripped him by the arm.

"Holmes!" I cried. "Is it really you? Can it indeed be that you are
alive? Is it possible that you succeeded in climbing out of that awful
abyss?"

"Wait a moment," said he. "Are you sure that you are really fit to
discuss things? I have given you a serious shock by my unnecessarily
dramatic reappearance."

"I am all right, but indeed, Holmes, I can hardly believe my eyes. Good
heavens, to think that you--you of all men--should be standing in my
study!" Again I gripped him by the sleeve and felt the thin, sinewy arm
beneath it. "Well, you're not a spirit, anyhow," said I. "My dear chap,
I am overjoyed to see you. Sit down and tell me how you came alive out
of that dreadful chasm."

He sat opposite to me and lit a cigarette in his old nonchalant manner.
He was dressed in the seedy frock-coat of the book merchant, but the
rest of that individual lay in a pile of white hair and old books upon
the table. Holmes looked even thinner and keener than of old, but there
was a dead-white tinge in his aquiline face which told me that his life
recently had not been a healthy one.

"I am glad to stretch myself, Watson," said he. "It is no joke when a
tall man has to take a foot off his stature for several hours on end.
Now, my dear fellow, in the matter of these explanations we have, if
I may ask for your co-operation, a hard and dangerous night's work in
front of us. Perhaps it would be better if I gave you an account of the
whole situation when that work is finished."

"I am full of curiosity. I should much prefer to hear now."

"You'll come with me to-night?"

"When you like and where you like."

"This is indeed like the old days. We shall have time for a mouthful of
dinner before we need go. Well, then, about that chasm. I had no serious
difficulty in getting out of it, for the very simple reason that I never
was in it."

"You never were in it?"

"No, Watson, I never was in it. My note to you was absolutely genuine.
I had little doubt that I had come to the end of my career when I
perceived the somewhat sinister figure of the late Professor Moriarty
standing upon the narrow pathway which led to safety. I read an
inexorable purpose in his grey eyes. I exchanged some remarks with him,
therefore, and obtained his courteous permission to write the short note
which you afterwards received. I left it with my cigarette-box and my
stick and I walked along the pathway, Moriarty still at my heels. When
I reached the end I stood at bay. He drew no weapon, but he rushed at me
and threw his long arms around me. He knew that his own game was up, and
was only anxious to revenge himself upon me. We tottered together upon
the brink of the fall. I have some knowledge, however, of baritsu, or
the Japanese system of wrestling, which has more than once been very
useful to me. I slipped through his grip, and he with a horrible scream
kicked madly for a few seconds and clawed the air with both his hands.
But for all his efforts he could not get his balance, and over he went.
With my face over the brink I saw him fall for a long way. Then he
struck a rock, bounded off, and splashed into the water."

I listened with amazement to this explanation, which Holmes delivered
between the puffs of his cigarette.

"But the tracks!" I cried. "I saw with my own eyes that two went down
the path and none returned."

"It came about in this way. The instant that the Professor had
disappeared it struck me what a really extraordinarily lucky chance Fate
had placed in my way. I knew that Moriarty was not the only man who
had sworn my death. There were at least three others whose desire for
vengeance upon me would only be increased by the death of their leader.
They were all most dangerous men. One or other would certainly get me.
On the other hand, if all the world was convinced that I was dead they
would take liberties, these men, they would lay themselves open, and
sooner or later I could destroy them. Then it would be time for me to
announce that I was still in the land of the living. So rapidly does
the brain act that I believe I had thought this all out before Professor
Moriarty had reached the bottom of the Reichenbach Fall.

"I stood up and examined the rocky wall behind me. In your picturesque
account of the matter, which I read with great interest some months
later, you assert that the wall was sheer. This was not literally
true. A few small footholds presented themselves, and there was some
indication of a ledge. The cliff is so high that to climb it all was
an obvious impossibility, and it was equally impossible to make my way
along the wet path without leaving some tracks. I might, it is true,
have reversed my boots, as I have done on similar occasions, but the
sight of three sets of tracks in one direction would certainly have
suggested a deception. On the whole, then, it was best that I should
risk the climb. It was not a pleasant business, Watson. The fall roared
beneath me. I am not a fanciful person, but I give you my word that
I seemed to hear Moriarty's voice screaming at me out of the abyss. A
mistake would have been fatal. More than once, as tufts of grass came
out in my hand or my foot slipped in the wet notches of the rock, I
thought that I was gone. But I struggled upwards, and at last I reached
a ledge several feet deep and covered with soft green moss, where I
could lie unseen in the most perfect comfort. There I was stretched when
you, my dear Watson, and all your following were investigating in the
most sympathetic and inefficient manner the circumstances of my death.

"At last, when you had all formed your inevitable and totally erroneous
conclusions, you departed for the hotel and I was left alone. I had
imagined that I had reached the end of my adventures, but a very
unexpected occurrence showed me that there were surprises still in store
for me. A huge rock, falling from above, boomed past me, struck the
path, and bounded over into the chasm. For an instant I thought that
it was an accident; but a moment later, looking up, I saw a man's head
against the darkening sky, and another stone struck the very ledge upon
which I was stretched, within a foot of my head. Of course, the meaning
of this was obvious. Moriarty had not been alone. A confederate--and
even that one glance had told me how dangerous a man that confederate
was--had kept guard while the Professor had attacked me. From a
distance, unseen by me, he had been a witness of his friend's death and
of my escape. He had waited, and then, making his way round to the
top of the cliff, he had endeavoured to succeed where his comrade had
failed.

"I did not take long to think about it, Watson. Again I saw that grim
face look over the cliff, and I knew that it was the precursor of
another stone. I scrambled down on to the path. I don't think I could
have done it in cold blood. It was a hundred times more difficult than
getting up. But I had no time to think of the danger, for another stone
sang past me as I hung by my hands from the edge of the ledge. Halfway
down I slipped, but by the blessing of God I landed, torn and bleeding,
upon the path. I took to my heels, did ten miles over the mountains
in the darkness, and a week later I found myself in Florence with the
certainty that no one in the world knew what had become of me.

"I had only one confidant--my brother Mycroft. I owe you many apologies,
my dear Watson, but it was all-important that it should be thought I
was dead, and it is quite certain that you would not have written so
convincing an account of my unhappy end had you not yourself thought
that it was true. Several times during the last three years I have taken
up my pen to write to you, but always I feared lest your affectionate
regard for me should tempt you to some indiscretion which would betray
my secret. For that reason I turned away from you this evening when
you upset my books, for I was in danger at the time, and any show of
surprise and emotion upon your part might have drawn attention to my
identity and led to the most deplorable and irreparable results. As to
Mycroft, I had to confide in him in order to obtain the money which
I needed. The course of events in London did not run so well as I had
hoped, for the trial of the Moriarty gang left two of its most dangerous
members, my own most vindictive enemies, at liberty. I travelled for
two years in Tibet, therefore, and amused myself by visiting Lhassa
and spending some days with the head Llama. You may have read of the
remarkable explorations of a Norwegian named Sigerson, but I am sure
that it never occurred to you that you were receiving news of your
friend. I then passed through Persia, looked in at Mecca, and paid a
short but interesting visit to the Khalifa at Khartoum, the results of
which I have communicated to the Foreign Office. Returning to France I
spent some months in a research into the coal-tar derivatives, which I
conducted in a laboratory at Montpelier, in the South of France. Having
concluded this to my satisfaction, and learning that only one of my
enemies was now left in London, I was about to return when my movements
were hastened by the news of this very remarkable Park Lane Mystery,
which not only appealed to me by its own merits, but which seemed to
offer some most peculiar personal opportunities. I came over at once to
London, called in my own person at Baker Street, threw Mrs. Hudson into
violent hysterics, and found that Mycroft had preserved my rooms and my
papers exactly as they had always been. So it was, my dear Watson, that
at two o'clock to-day I found myself in my old arm-chair in my own old
room, and only wishing that I could have seen my old friend Watson in
the other chair which he has so often adorned."

Such was the remarkable narrative to which I listened on that April
evening--a narrative which would have been utterly incredible to me had
it not been confirmed by the actual sight of the tall, spare figure and
the keen, eager face, which I had never thought to see again. In some
manner he had learned of my own sad bereavement, and his sympathy was
shown in his manner rather than in his words. "Work is the best antidote
to sorrow, my dear Watson," said he, "and I have a piece of work for us
both to-night which, if we can bring it to a successful conclusion, will
in itself justify a man's life on this planet." In vain I begged him
to tell me more. "You will hear and see enough before morning," he
answered. "We have three years of the past to discuss. Let that suffice
until half-past nine, when we start upon the notable adventure of the
empty house."

It was indeed like old times when, at that hour, I found myself seated
beside him in a hansom, my revolver in my pocket and the thrill of
adventure in my heart. Holmes was cold and stern and silent. As the
gleam of the street-lamps flashed upon his austere features I saw that
his brows were drawn down in thought and his thin lips compressed. I
knew not what wild beast we were about to hunt down in the dark jungle
of criminal London, but I was well assured from the bearing of this
master huntsman that the adventure was a most grave one, while the
sardonic smile which occasionally broke through his ascetic gloom boded
little good for the object of our quest.

I had imagined that we were bound for Baker Street, but Holmes stopped
the cab at the corner of Cavendish Square. I observed that as he stepped
out he gave a most searching glance to right and left, and at every
subsequent street corner he took the utmost pains to assure that he was
not followed. Our route was certainly a singular one. Holmes's knowledge
of the byways of London was extraordinary, and on this occasion he
passed rapidly, and with an assured step, through a network of mews and
stables the very existence of which I had never known. We emerged at
last into a small road, lined with old, gloomy houses, which led us into
Manchester Street, and so to Blandford Street. Here he turned swiftly
down a narrow passage, passed through a wooden gate into a deserted
yard, and then opened with a key the back door of a house. We entered
together and he closed it behind us.

The place was pitch-dark, but it was evident to me that it was an empty
house. Our feet creaked and crackled over the bare planking, and my
outstretched hand touched a wall from which the paper was hanging in
ribbons. Holmes's cold, thin fingers closed round my wrist and led me
forwards down a long hall, until I dimly saw the murky fanlight over the
door. Here Holmes turned suddenly to the right, and we found ourselves
in a large, square, empty room, heavily shadowed in the corners, but
faintly lit in the centre from the lights of the street beyond. There
was no lamp near and the window was thick with dust, so that we could
only just discern each other's figures within. My companion put his hand
upon my shoulder and his lips close to my ear.

"Do you know where we are?" he whispered.

"Surely that is Baker Street," I answered, staring through the dim
window.

"Exactly. We are in Camden House, which stands opposite to our own old
quarters."

"But why are we here?"

"Because it commands so excellent a view of that picturesque pile. Might
I trouble you, my dear Watson, to draw a little nearer to the window,
taking every precaution not to show yourself, and then to look up at our
old rooms--the starting-point of so many of our little adventures? We
will see if my three years of absence have entirely taken away my power
to surprise you."

I crept forward and looked across at the familiar window. As my eyes
fell upon it I gave a gasp and a cry of amazement. The blind was down
and a strong light was burning in the room. The shadow of a man who
was seated in a chair within was thrown in hard, black outline upon the
luminous screen of the window. There was no mistaking the poise of the
head, the squareness of the shoulders, the sharpness of the features.
The face was turned half-round, and the effect was that of one of
those black silhouettes which our grandparents loved to frame. It was a
perfect reproduction of Holmes. So amazed was I that I threw out my
hand to make sure that the man himself was standing beside me. He was
quivering with silent laughter.

"Well?" said he.

"Good heavens!" I cried. "It is marvellous."

"I trust that age doth not wither nor custom stale my infinite
variety,'" said he, and I recognised in his voice the joy and pride
which the artist takes in his own creation. "It really is rather like
me, is it not?"

"I should be prepared to swear that it was you."

"The credit of the execution is due to Monsieur Oscar Meunier, of
Grenoble, who spent some days in doing the moulding. It is a bust in
wax. The rest I arranged myself during my visit to Baker Street this
afternoon."

"But why?"

"Because, my dear Watson, I had the strongest possible reason for
wishing certain people to think that I was there when I was really
elsewhere."

"And you thought the rooms were watched?"

"I KNEW that they were watched."

"By whom?"

"By my old enemies, Watson. By the charming society whose leader lies
in the Reichenbach Fall. You must remember that they knew, and only
they knew, that I was still alive. Sooner or later they believed that I
should come back to my rooms. They watched them continuously, and this
morning they saw me arrive."

"How do you know?"

