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Page 123
"My practice--" I began.
"Oh, if you find your own cases more interesting than
mine--" said Holmes, with some asperity.
"I was going to say that my practice could get along
very well for a day or two, since it is the slackest
time in the year."
"Excellent," said he, recovering his good-humor.
"Then we'll look into this matter together. I think
that we should begin by seeing Forbes. He can
probably tell us all the details we want until we know
from what side the case is to be approached."
"You said you had a clue?"
"Well, we have several, but we can only test their
value by further inquiry. The most difficult crime to
track is the one which is purposeless. Now this is
not purposeless. Who is it who profits by it? There
is the French ambassador, there is the Russian, there
is whoever might sell it to either of these, and
there is Lord Holdhurst."
"Lord Holdhurst!"
"Well, it is just conceivable that a statesman might
find himself in a position where he was not sorry to
have such a document accidentally destroyed."
"Not a statesman with the honorable record of Lord
Holdhurst?"
"It is a possibility and we cannot afford to disregard
it. We shall see the noble lord to-day and find out
if he can tell us anything. Meanwhile I have already
set inquiries on foot."
"Already?"
"Yes, I sent wires from Woking station to every
evening paper in London. This advertisement will
appear in each of them."
He handed over a sheet torn from a note-book. On it
was scribbled in pencil: "L10 reward. The number of
the cab which dropped a fare at or about the door of
the Foreign Office in Charles Street at quarter to ten
in the evening of May 23d. Apply 221 B, Baker
Street."
"You are confident that the thief came in a cab?"
"If not, there is no harm done. But if Mr. Phelps is
correct in stating that there is no hiding-place
either in the room or the corridors, then the person
must have come from outside. If he came from outside
on so wet a night, and yet left no trace of damp upon
the linoleum, which was examined within a few minutes
of his passing, then it is exceeding probable that he
came in a cab. Yes, I think that we may safely deduce
a cab."
"It sounds plausible."
"That is one of the clues of which I spoke. It may
lead us to something. And then, of course, there is
the bell--which is the most distinctive feature of the
case. Why should the bell ring? Was it the thief who
did it out of bravado? Or was it some one who was
with the thief who did it in order to prevent the
crime? Or was it an accident? Or was it--?" He sank
back into the state of intense and silent thought from
which he had emerged; but it seemed to me, accustomed
as I was to his every mood, that some new possibility
had dawned suddenly upon him.
It was twenty past three when we reached our terminus,
and after a hasty luncheon at the buffet we pushed on
at once to Scotland Yard. Holmes had already wired to
Forbes, and we found him waiting to receive us--a
small, foxy man with a sharp but by no means amiable
expression. He was decidedly frigid in his manner to
us, especially when he heard the errand upon which we
had come.
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