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Page 35
They had come to the place. The road bent round to the right,
but they kept straight on over a broad grass path for twenty
yards, and there in front of them was the green. A dry ditch,
ten feet wide and six feet deep, surrounded it, except in the one
place where the path went forward. Two or three grass steps led
down to the green, on which there was a long wooden beach for the
benefit of spectators.
"Yes, it hides itself very nicely," said Antony. "Where do you
keep the bowls?"
"In a sort of summer house place. Round here."
They walked along the edge of the green until they came to it a
low wooden bunk which had been built into one wall of the ditch.
"H'm. Jolly view."
Bill laughed.
"Nobody sits there. It's just for keeping things out of the
rain."
They finished their circuit of the green "Just in case anybody's
in the ditch," said Antony and then sat down on the bench.
"Now then," said Bill, "We are alone. Fire ahead."
Antony smoked thoughtfully for a little. Then he took his pipe
out of his mouth and turned to his friend.
"Are you prepared to be the complete Watson?" he asked.
"Watson?"
"Do-you-follow-me-Watson; that one. Are you prepared to have
quite obvious things explained to you, to ask futile questions,
to give me chances of scoring off you, to make brilliant
discoveries of your own two or three days after I have made them
myself all that kind of thing? Because it all helps."
"My dear Tony," said Bill delightedly, "need you ask?" Antony
said nothing, and Bill went on happily to himself, "I perceive
from the strawberry-mark on your shirt-front that you had
strawberries for dessert. Holmes, you astonish me. Tut, tut,
you know my methods. Where is the tobacco? The tobacco is in
the Persian slipper. Can I leave my practice for a week? I
can."
Antony smiled and went on smoking. After waiting hopefully for a
minute or two, Bill said in a firm voice:
"Well then, Holmes, I feel bound to ask you if you have deduced
anything. Also whom do you suspect?"
Antony began to talk.
"Do you remember," he said, "one of Holmes's little scores over
Watson about the number of steps up to the Baker Street lodging?
Poor old Watson had been up and down them a thousand times, but
he had never thought of counting them, whereas Holmes had counted
them as a matter of course, and knew that there were seventeen.
And that was supposed to be the difference between observation
and non-observation. Watson was crushed again, and Holmes
appeared to him more amazing than ever. Now, it always seemed to
me that in that matter Holmes was the ass, and Watson the
sensible person. What on earth is the point of keeping in your
head an unnecessary fact like that? If you really want to know
at any time the number of steps to your lodging, you can ring up
your landlady and ask her. I've been up and down the steps of
the club a thousand times, but if you asked me to tell you at
this moment how many steps there are I couldn't do it. Could
you?"
"I certainly couldn't," said Bill.
"But if you really wanted to know," said Antony casually, with a
sudden change of voice, "I could find out for you without even
bothering to ring up the hall-porter."
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