The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: reference groups

Witnesses saw the father walk alone to the pool, followed shortly by his son carrying a gun.

A girl saw father and son quarrelling violently; the son then ran for help with blood on his hands, and the dead father's wounds fit his gun; he was arrested.

The investigator notes the son said at his arrest that it was no more than he deserved, which the jury took as guilt.

The son's statement: he heard his father's call, found him by the pool, quarrelled, walked off, heard a cry and found him dying.

The garment vanished while his back was turned; the coroner calls every point in his account suspicious.

The beggar was arrested with blood on his sleeve which he blamed on a cut, denied all, and called the wife mad; the missing man's coat turned up in the mud.

The report: a hotel attendant testified he left a workman with a previous conviction alone in the room; the workman protested his innocence and fainted.

The arrested woman is an old acquaintance of the groom; the proud, foppish client arrives.

At night he found his son holding the damaged treasure, and accused him of theft; the son denied anything was missing.

At the inquest the son refused to say what the quarrel was about, reported odd dying words, and thought he saw a grey garment that later vanished.

Seen at the window by his wife, he disguised himself, threw out his weighted coat, and was arrested for his own murder.

The son refuses to say more; the niece faints; the police come and the son asks to leave the house for five minutes.

The son sneers at forgiveness and is arrested; nothing is found; the banker has lost honour, gems and son in one night.

He chased the thief, struggled and recovered most of it; he kept silent to protect the woman he loved, even under arrest.

The client wrote compromising letters and had himself photographed with the woman; five attempts to steal the picture back have failed.

The woman threatens to send the photograph to his bride's family when the betrothal is announced; he gives the investigator a free hand and money.

The witness blackmailed him for twenty years, living off him, and at last demanded the man's daughter marry his son.

He overheard the blackmailer urging his son to marry the daughter, and struck him down in desperation; the investigator refuses to judge him.

A woman claiming a hold on the groom tried to force her way in; the bride left in a hurry; the intruding woman has been arrested.

The client admits a long, close attachment to the arrested woman, who wrote threatening letters; he doubts she would hurt anyone.

A letter arrived holding five dried seeds and three initials; the uncle turned grey with terror, said his sins had caught him up, and fetched a box from the attic.

After that the uncle drank more, locked himself in, and sometimes rushed out armed, screaming he feared no one.

The father found the box's label; two years later he received the same token with an order to leave the papers on the sundial.

The father dismissed it as a joke and forbade the son to go to the police for fear of ridicule.

After nearly three quiet years the son received the same token; the police laughed at him and he felt helplessly doomed.

The investigator is angry he waited; the son produces a surviving diary page recording warnings sent and victims cleared.

Her fears are so vague that even her fiancé thinks them nerves; she lives with her stepfather in an old ruined family house.

The night of her death her sister asked if she had heard a whistle at night; they locked their doors for fear of the animals.

She is now engaged; forced by repairs to sleep in her dead sister's bed, she heard the same whistle and fled at dawn.

He fears the police will not believe his strange story or be able to act; the narrator takes him to the investigator.

The assistant tells the stay-at-home client about a fund paying easy money to men with his colouring, and says he is eligible.

The assistant explains the eccentric benefactor's fund and hints it is hardly worth the effort, drawing the client further in.

The man at the office rejects everyone else but greets the client warmly and declares him perfectly suited.

The manager tests the hair by pulling it, fills the post, then feigns doubt because the client is unmarried before letting it pass.

The client agrees to strict hours copying an encyclopedia, forbidden to leave the room, while the assistant offers to mind the shop.

That night he suspects a hoax, but next day finds everything as promised, and is set to copying and locked out at two.

A strange, gaunt foreign client calls, having heard he is discreet, an orphan, a bachelor, and lives alone.

The client demands absolute secrecy, checks the passage for listeners, and offers a large fee for a night's work.

The job is to inspect a machine at a remote country house late at night; the engineer hesitates but accepts for the money.

He claims he is secretly digging a valuable mineral to buy his neighbours' land cheaply before they know its worth.

The engineer finds the story odd and the client repellent, but decides the fee is worth it and goes, telling no one.

Out of work and running out of money, she was spotted at an agency by a stout, genial man who declared her perfect.

He offered far more than her usual pay, and an advance, insisting a lady of her bearing deserved it.

He said the duties were light, caring for a cruel little child, and she must humour his wife by wearing chosen dresses and sitting where told.

He demanded she cut her hair short; she refused and lost the post, to the agent's annoyance.

Short of money and in debt, she regretted refusing; then a letter came from the man renewing the offer.

He raised the pay further, explaining the dress and the hair as his wife's fancies; she has decided to accept but asks for advice.

At a lonely country station the client hurries him into a closed carriage; the investigator asks about the horse.

A long drive with frosted windows and a silent, staring companion ends at a house he cannot see.

A frightened woman appears with a lamp, is pushed back, and he is left alone in a small room.

He waits uneasily in the silent barred room; the woman returns, sick with fear, and signals silence.

The client, suspicious, brings a morose associate and leads him through a decaying house to the machine.

The client shows him into the machine itself, remarking how unpleasant it would be if someone turned it on.

She says she has not been mistreated but cannot understand her employers; she describes the damp, isolated house.

The two servants are unpleasant, the man often drunk; she is asked to put on a blue dress.

Wearing a dress that has been worn before, she is seated with her back to the window while the man tells funny stories.

The performance is repeated; she reads aloud, carefully positioned, then is told to stop and change.

She was shown a starved guard dog set loose each night and warned never to go out after dark.

At night she saw the huge dog pacing the lawn.

The uncle took to the boy and made him master of the house, except for one attic room he always kept locked.

He rashly lets on he knows the story is false; the client locks him in the machine.

The porter knows nothing of the client; the investigator reads out a notice for an engineer who vanished a year earlier.

She saw the man emerge angrily from a locked wing and asked about its shuttered window.

He claimed it was his darkroom with no jest in his eyes; later, finding the key left by the drunk servant, she slipped in.

She found a barred, padlocked door and a shadow moving behind it; she ran in terror straight into her employer.

He soothed her too sweetly, then threatened to throw her to the dog if she ever went in again.

They put out the light and hide behind crates, armed, waiting for thieves who may shoot.

After a long, tense wait a light appears and a hand gropes up through a crack in the floor.

They enter the grounds; a wild animal startles them; inside they sit in the dark, armed, in silence.

After hours of waiting a lantern gleams through the ventilator and a hiss is heard; the investigator strikes at the rope.

A terrible scream rings out from the next room; the investigator says it is all over.

The investigator tells him to leave the surviving page in the box on the sundial with a note saying the rest were burned, and to take great care.

The young man leaves armed into the storm; the investigator says the danger is greater than any they have faced.

He deduces the senders are on a sailing ship, that the blow falls when they arrive, and that this time there will be no delay.

The stepfather bursts in, demanding what his stepdaughter said; the investigator answers with small talk.

He bends a poker and threatens the investigator, who straightens it after he leaves and worries for the young woman.

The young woman is terrified to learn her stepfather followed her; the investigator promises to protect her.

The investigator, grim, tells her to signal them from her window, then hide in her old room.

The investigator says no sister of his should take it; the pay is suspiciously high; he promises to come if she is in danger.

She leaves cheerfully; the narrator and investigator wonder for a fortnight whether the man is a crank or a villain.

The investigator asks whether the narrator will break the law and risk arrest; he agrees, and is told to stand at a window and throw something in at a signal.

He is given a smoke device and instructions, and the investigator disguises himself as a mild, simple-minded clergyman.

The kind woman has the injured man brought in; the narrator feels ashamed as she tends him, but hardens his heart to play his part.

He asks the narrator to come armed; the narrator goes home puzzled, sensing the assistant is a dangerous man.

The investigator explains he deduced the ventilator and notes the bed is clamped to the floor.

The investigator asks if she can lock the female servant in the cellar that evening; she agrees.

The client praises his assistant, who works for half wages and spends hours in the cellar, and recalls how the assistant first showed him the notice.

The assistant's description excites the investigator; after the client leaves he says the case needs prompt action.

She was engaged at once and wrote daily, but never learned where he worked or lived; he insisted her letters be handwritten and his were typed.

The suitor was shy, whispered, wore tinted glasses and preferred to walk after dark.

The suitor pressed a quick wedding while her stepfather was away, made her swear fidelity, and her mother backed him; her letter to her stepfather missed him.

The friend is fascinating but untrustworthy; his adopted niece is his loving right hand, though she twice refused the son.

The banker is saved, but is told he owes his son an apology; the niece has fled with the son's dangerous friend.

The investigator reveals the friend was a ruined, heartless gambler who seduced the niece into handing out the treasure.

A huge, richly dressed man in a mask enters and asks to be heard, unsure which of the two men to address.

The visitor gives a false title, binds both men to secrecy and admits he acts for someone great; the investigator coolly says he already knew.

The investigator overtakes the little man, who is terrified, then eager for help; he gives a false name.

The investigator names the man as the hotel attendant; in his rooms he says the goose laid a blue egg.

The visitor tears off his mask and admits he is himself the royal client; years ago he became entangled with a famous adventuress.

The client pays heavily in advance and leaves; next day the narrator waits for the investigator, confident he will not fail.

The noble client writes asking for an urgent meeting about a painful event at his wedding; the police are already involved.

The client feels cut to the quick; the investigator refuses to discuss other clients and begins questioning him.

A client of the very highest rank asked for a large, urgent loan, preferring business to asking favours of friends.

They reach the bank's vault; the banker thumps the hollow floor and is sharply told to sit down and not interfere.

The investigator checks the floor and explains they are in a bank vault holding a large reserve of borrowed gold.

The finder's wife found a famous stolen gem in the goose's crop, worth a huge reward; a workman has been charged with stealing it.

He keeps the stone, calling it a lure for crime, and doubts both the accused man's guilt and the goose owner's involvement.

As security he left a priceless national treasure, promising to reclaim it in four days.

The client stressed discretion and that any damage would cause a great public scandal; the banker regretted taking it.

Fearing burglary, he carried it home and locked it in his bureau; he describes his trusted servants and a newer maid with admirers.

The thieves climb up; the investigator seizes the leader and knocks his pistol away, while the accomplice flees into waiting arms.

The captured criminal insists on being addressed with respect; the banker thanks the investigator, who asks only for his expenses.

The smooth stepfather says the girl should not have come and doubts the missing man can be found; he starts when told he will be.

The investigator shows the stepfather's typed letters match the suitor's machine; the man tries to leave and the door is locked on him.

The stepfather collapses, stammers that it is not a crime, and the investigator agrees but calls it heartless.

He staged a vanishing to bind her to a phantom for years; recovering, the stepfather sneers.

He washes the prisoner's face and reveals the missing man; the man claims that since no crime occurred he is illegally held.

Shown the gem, the attendant nearly collapses; the investigator says the game is up.

The investigator reveals the attendant framed the workman; the thief begs for mercy for his parents' sake and offers to flee.

The investigator says the matter is solved but no law can touch the culprit; the stepfather arrives.

He warns the investigator he is the one breaking the law by locking the door; the investigator reaches for a whip and the man flees.

The investigator, not bound to the police, takes a signed confession to use only if needed; the old man begins his story of being in the dead man's power.

The investigator decides to keep the confession secret unless the son is condemned; the son is acquitted and the old man dies months later.

The man groans that he hid for his children's sake; the investigator offers to keep it out of court and the papers.

He sent a note to his wife that was delayed; the police agree to hush it up if he gives up begging for good.

The goose held no stone; the flock was sold on and he could not trace it; he sobs that he is a thief with nothing; the investigator tells him to get out.

The investigator reasons the case against the workman will collapse, and that jail would make the thief a criminal for life.

He confronted the thief at gunpoint, promised no prosecution, and bought the stones back from a receiver.

The investigator startles the woman by reading her work from her hands; she says she would give her income to know what became of her missing fiancé, and that her stepfather would do nothing.

On the wedding morning the groom vanished from a closed cab; she believes some danger took him and that he will claim her.

The wife saw her husband at the den's upper window, agitated and half-dressed, before he was pulled or leapt back.

She was thrown out of the den, fetched the police, and found only a crippled beggar there, until she found the toy her husband had promised.

The wife runs out hoping for news and is told there is none, good or bad; she greets them warmly.

She asks for his honest opinion, and he says her husband is dead; she then produces a letter from him received that day.

The quiet wedding took place, but the bride vanished during the wedding breakfast.

He suggests the social strain unbalanced his wife; the investigator says he has solved the case, and the client is sceptical.

Next morning the banker, aged by grief, reports his niece has deserted him.

Her note says she brought trouble on him and has gone; the investigator produces the missing stones for a fee.

Her mother forbade her to speak of it; her stepfather agreed something happened; she sobs, and the investigator advises her to forget the man.

She refuses to forget and swears to stay true; the investigator says the case is trite but the woman herself was interesting.

The officer thinks the case plain; the accused's childhood friend bursts in insisting he is innocent.

The young woman reveals the quarrel was about the father's wish that the two marry, which neither the son nor her own father wanted.

The note asks her to wait in patience; he warns it may be forged or old; she insists she would sense if he were dead.

She explains her young stepfather, her mother's remarriage and the sale of her father's business; she has a separate income of her own.

She lets her family draw her income while she lives at home, and supports herself by her own work.

Against her stepfather's wishes she went to a ball while he was abroad and met a shy suitor, who then could not call once her stepfather returned.

The investigator explains the stepfather courted the girl in disguise to keep her unmarried and keep her income; he pleads it began as a joke.

The mother's money passes to the stepfather unless the daughters marry; he has become a violent recluse, feared by the village.

The will shows each daughter's marriage would cut the stepfather's income badly, giving him a strong motive.

The servant explains the daughter's father wanted control of her money and imprisoned her when a suitor appeared.

The narrator thinks the case damning; the investigator warns circumstantial evidence can point two ways, and that a young woman believes the son innocent.

The investigator reads the remark as the natural self-reproach of an innocent son who had quarrelled with his father.

The investigator says the odd details favour the son and resolves to assume his story is true; at the country town a sly police officer meets them.

The investigator finds it odd the poor tenant expected to marry his son to his rich patron's heiress; the officer mocks theories.

He tells the officer the stone was the weapon and describes the killer in detail; the officer scoffs at theories.

The officer refuses to hunt for such a man; the investigator is troubled and asks the narrator's advice.

The coat's pockets were stuffed with coins; the police theorise the beggar weighted it to sink with the body.

A police officer arrives having dragged a lake for the bride's body; the investigator laughs at him.

The officer produces the wedding dress and ring found in the water, and says they implicate the arrested woman.

A note in the dress, signed with initials, seems to prove a lure; the investigator is interested in the hotel bill on the back.

The officer storms off; the investigator tells him the bride never existed as the client's wife, and goes out; a lavish supper for five is delivered.

The investigator doubts the son's guilt, noting his silence cuts both ways and the police theory makes no sense.

He lays out how implausible the father's theory is and proposes going to the house.

A large, nervous woman hesitates on the pavement before hurrying to the door; the investigator reads it as a perplexed love affair.

A pale, anxious young man arrives from the country, asking for help and noting the investigator's reputation; he is told the investigator has been beaten four times.

The narrator recalls an addicted friend; late one night the addict's wife bursts in, veiled and sobbing, to the narrator's wife.

The wife explains her husband has been missing in a drug den for two days, and she cannot go in after him herself.

A terrified young woman in black has arrived early; she says she shivers not from cold but fear.

She has no one to help her but a fiancé who can do little; she offers to pay once she marries and controls her own money.

A pale young engineer with a bloodied hand explains he had an accident, then breaks into hysterical laughter.

The man bursts in, beats his head against the wall in despair, and is calmed by the investigator.

He is a leading banker; public disgrace and private grief have struck together, and people of the highest rank may suffer.

The young woman asks whether she should accept a post; she has no family to advise her.

Passing his friend's old rooms, the narrator calls in on impulse; the investigator greets him quietly and reads from his looks that he has married and gone back to work.

The investigator explains how he knew the narrator had been out in bad weather and has a careless servant, and that he is back in practice.

The narrator can read nothing from the commonplace client; the investigator lists his past labour, his lodge, his travels and his recent writing.

The investigator explains his reasoning, and the client decides it was nothing clever after all; he produces the newspaper notice that began it all.

Her face is haggard and grey; the investigator reads her early journey from her ticket and mud splashes.

The narrator admits he sees but does not observe; the investigator hands him an anonymous note that arrived by the last post.

The investigator asks the narrator what he noticed about her dress; the narrator lists colours and details.

The investigator praises the method but notes what was missed: her work marks, short sight, and odd, half-buttoned boots that show haste.

The narrator sees nothing; the investigator infers the owner is clever, fallen on hard times, perhaps drinking, and no longer loved by his wife.

He adds the owner is sedentary, middle-aged, recently barbered, and explains the hat's size and age.

He explains the wife and candle inferences; the narrator calls it wasted effort, when the finder bursts in about the goose.

The investigator returns disguised as a drunken stable-hand and collapses laughing at how his morning ended.

Disguised as an out-of-work groom, he studied the woman's house and gathered gossip from the stablemen.

A staged street brawl breaks out as she arrives; the disguised investigator falls, apparently bleeding, while defending her.

An old man by the brazier whispers to him; it is the investigator in disguise, who asks him to get rid of his friend.

The investigator explains the den's owner has sworn revenge on him, and that a missing man may have been murdered there.

He gets a free hand to recover the gems at any cost, and goes out disguised as a loafer.

He identified her lover as the dangerous friend, confirmed it through the friend's servant and cast-off shoes.

The son had secretly married unwisely, so could not propose to the woman he loved; that secret wife has now abandoned him.

He robbed a gold convoy but spared a driver who memorised his face, then went home rich, reformed and raised a daughter.

He confesses that as a journalist he posed as a beggar for a story, then used it to pay a debt.

Begging paid far better than honest work, so he gave up his trade, married and lived well, his wife never knowing.

She explains she was secretly married years ago to a poor prospector her rich father rejected, and pledged to wait for him.

The dying rich neighbour arrives and admits he knows why; he would have spoken if the son were convicted, but fears for his daughter.

He confesses he took the stone to his sister's house, terrified of being searched on the way.

He checked the treasure; his niece, closing a window, reported that a maid had slipped out to meet someone.

She insists the son is innocent and asks that the matter be dropped; the investigator agrees he is innocent.

She confirms the maid's meeting with a man; the investigator surprises her by knowing he has a wooden leg.

The family fortune is gone; the stepfather made a career abroad but killed a servant in rage and was imprisoned.

He threw a smith into a stream; the daughter paid to hush it up; he keeps wild animals and wanderers on his land, and the sisters lived in fear.

The investigator reveals bruises on her wrist; she excuses her stepfather; they plan to inspect the rooms while he is away.

Terrified, she telegraphed the investigator, and came to town while her employers go out that evening.

The uncle was found drowned in a shallow garden pool; the verdict was suicide, though the nephew doubted it; his father inherited.

The father died days later in a fall into an unfenced pit, ruled an accident; the son inherited, convinced it was murder but unable to prove it.

The inquiry found the room sealed and no cause of death; she believes her sister died of fright.

At the house they learn she has fled abroad with her husband; the hiding place holds only a portrait of her and a letter.

The newspaper reports the young man drowned near the river that night, ruled an accident.

The investigator's pride is hurt; he vows to catch the gang himself without the police, and returns late, starved but successful.

On arrival they find the house ablaze; the engineer recognises it.

The lamp crushed in the machine started the fire; the gang has fled without a trace.

The room is empty, the prisoner taken through the skylight; the employer returns, calls them thieves and runs for the dog.

He reasons the proof must be in her own house and says he will not search but make her show him.

The false alarm made the woman rush to the hiding place; the investigator saw it but did not take the proof, since her servant was watching him.

He inspects the shop, raps the pavement and asks the assistant for directions, only to look at the knees of his trousers.

He thinks the goose's owner innocent; that evening the man arrives and claims his hat.

The dealer is sick of questions about the geese; the investigator draws him with a bet that the birds were country bred.

The dealer's books show the geese came from a woman in town; the investigator pays up and laughs.

Weeks pass with pay every Saturday until one morning the door is locked with a notice saying the fund is dissolved.

The client is stung by their laughter; he describes chasing the vanished manager through false names and addresses.

The client wants to know who played this trick on him; the investigator questions him closely about how his assistant came to him.

He finds the fault, but sees the story was false and scrapes at a metal crust on the floor; the client catches him.

With a hidden mirror she sees a man on the road watching; the wife sees her and has her wave him away.

In a locked drawer she found a coil of hair exactly like her own cut hair.

He reasons she was hired to impersonate the daughter, who is imprisoned, so her faithful suitor will think she no longer wants him.

She begs him to leave before it is too late; he refuses because of the fee; footsteps come and she vanishes.

The woman opens a panel and pulls him out; they run as the pursuers shout.

At a window she holds back the client, begging him to spare the engineer; the client cuts at him as he drops, severing his thumb.

Footprints suggest the woman and the quieter associate carried the engineer to safety; he laments his losses.

The suitor bribed the servants to help the daughter escape; the investigator leaves, their standing there doubtful.

The narrator introduces the one woman the cold reasoner ever respected, a woman of doubtful memory who once got the better of him.

Marriage has drawn the narrator away from his old friend, who has been living alone between drugs and bursts of work on cases the police gave up.

The unsigned note announces a masked visitor with a matter of the deepest importance; the investigator refuses to theorise and reads the paper's watermark instead.

The investigator works out that the writer is a wealthy foreigner; a rich carriage arrives, and he makes the narrator stay to help.

He learns she lives quietly with one frequent male visitor, a lawyer, and must decide whether that man holds the proof.

The lawyer rushes out of the house and orders his cab to a church; the woman follows moments later in a hurry.

The investigator follows them to the church and is suddenly dragged forward by the bridegroom, who needs a witness at once.

He finds himself the witness at the woman's hasty wedding, then plans to act before the pair can leave, and asks the narrator's help.

Waiting outside the house, the investigator reasons that the woman's marriage makes the proof a danger to her as well, and wonders where she keeps it.

At the signal the narrator throws in the smoke device and cries fire; the investigator later explains the whole street crowd was hired.

A passing youth wishes him good night by name; next morning the client arrives eager, and the investigator tells him the woman has married.

Her letter says she saw through the disguise, followed him home, and will keep the photograph only to protect herself from the client.

The client is relieved and offers a ring; the investigator asks only for her portrait and pointedly ignores the client's hand.

The narrator finds the investigator with a stout red-haired client and is pulled in to hear the case, with a reminder that real life outdoes invention.

The investigator asks the client to repeat his unusual story, saying odd small affairs are often more telling than great crimes.

The notice offers a well-paid post for nominal work to red-haired men; the client explains his small, struggling business and cheap assistant.

The client and assistant go to the office through a vast crowd of applicants; the assistant forces a way through for him.

The investigator smokes on the problem in silence, then abruptly proposes an afternoon concert.

He surveys the busy street behind the shop, noting the buildings that back onto it, then turns to play.

After the concert he tells the narrator a serious crime is planned for that night and asks for his help.

The narrator meets a police officer and a gloomy banker who doubts the expedition, while the officer patronises the investigator.

The investigator promises the banker a large stake and the officer a notorious, well-born criminal he has never managed to catch.

The investigator explains that the fund was a lure to get the shopkeeper out of the way every day.

He explains how the assistant's cellar habits, worn knees and the bank next door revealed the tunnel.

He explains how he knew the attempt would come that night, then complains that ordinary life bores him.

By the fire the investigator argues that real life is stranger than fiction; the narrator doubts it, finding reported crimes dull.

The narrator picks a newspaper case to prove his point; the investigator, who worked on it, shows its details were stranger than any invention.

The investigator shows gifts from grateful royal clients and says his current cases are important but dull, then spots a client in the street.

He notes her inky glove, then reads the missing man's description and points out that even the signatures on his letters were typed.

He writes to the stepfather's employer and to the stepfather himself, asking the latter to call.

The investigator explains how the suitor and stepfather never appeared together, and how he checked the description and the typewriter.

The narrator's wife urges him to accept the investigator's telegram asking him to come on a country murder case; he joins him at the train.

On the train the investigator explains that a son is accused of his father's murder, a simple case that is hard for that reason.

He describes two former colonists who settled near each other, one rich, one his tenant, and the tenant's walk to an appointment he never returned from.

The investigator hands over the local paper carrying the son's own statement at the inquest.

Her father, who knew the dead man in the colonies, has collapsed with illness; the officer rebukes the investigator for raising false hopes.

Alone, the narrator studies the inquest report and notes the fatal blow came from behind, and ponders the dying word and grey cloth.

The investigator returns: the son knows nothing more, and is honest but slow.

The investigator stresses the father had an appointment and called out before he knew his son was near; the rich neighbour is said to be dying.

At the farm the investigator measures the boots of the dead man and his son, then follows the path to the pool.

The investigator follows the trail like a hound, ignoring questions, while the officer watches with contempt.

At the pool he reads the trampled ground and knows the officer has been raking in the water.

He finds the son's tracks, the father's, and a third person's odd tiptoe tracks behind a tree, and gathers ash and a stone.

The investigator explains that the call was one used by colonists and that the dying word named a place in the colony.

He explains how he read the killer's height, lameness, left hand and habits from tracks and ash; the narrator sees who it must be.

The old man confesses that as a young man in the colony he became a highway robber.

The narrator explains he is choosing, from many cases, one that was startling but never fully cleared up.

He lists other cases from that year before turning to the strangest of them.

On a stormy night a bell rings; the investigator, who has no friends but the narrator, guesses only a serious case would bring anyone out.

The visitor explains the trouble is inherited, beginning with his father's successful business and his uncle.

His uncle made a fortune abroad, fought in a war, then came home and lived as a fierce, drinking recluse.

The uncle burned the box's papers and made the nephew witness a will leaving the estate to his father, warning it was a double-edged gift.

The investigator speaks of reasoning from one fact to a whole chain of events, and of needing all useful knowledge.

He reasons the uncle fled abroad in fear, and asks the narrator to note the letters' postmarks.

He concludes the killers are a group determined to recover the papers, and names a secret society.

The encyclopedia describes a secret society that sent warning tokens before killing those who defied it.

He reasons the uncle's papers could implicate powerful men, so the society will stop at nothing; next morning he starts inquiries.

He sends the killers' own token to the ship's master, and explains how he traced the ship through shipping registers.

The ship had sailed; he has cabled for the men's arrest at their home port, but the ship is lost at sea with all hands.

The narrator offers to go alone and bring the man home; he descends into the den by the docks.

Among the stupefied smokers he finds his friend, who has lost track of the days and weeps.

The addict agrees to go home and asks the narrator to settle his debt.

The narrator sends the addict home and joins the investigator, who was there hunting an enemy.

They drive into the country; the investigator dreads facing the missing man's wife without news.

He explains the missing man was a respectable, prosperous husband and father with no debts.

The man went to town promising his son a toy; by chance his wife was called to an office near the den the same day.

Blood on the window, the man's clothes hidden, and the high tide suggest he was killed and thrown into the river.

The den keeper, a known villain, claims to know nothing of his lodger's doings or the missing man's clothes.

The investigator describes the lodger, a well-known scarred beggar with a quick wit, the last man to see the missing man.

The narrator doubts a cripple could overpower a strong man; the investigator says he is powerful apart from his limp.

No questions are answered; they arrive at the missing man's country home, where his wife is waiting.

The investigator examines the envelope and the note, written in her husband's hurried hand and enclosing his ring.

He questions her closely about what she saw at the window and whether her husband ever took drugs.

The investigator sits up all night smoking and thinking on a heap of cushions.

At dawn he calls himself a fool, says he has the key in his bag, and drives to town.

At the police station he asks after the beggar, whom the officer calls filthy and refusing to wash.

They look into the cell at the sleeping, scarred beggar; the investigator produces a sponge.

After the holiday the narrator finds the investigator studying a battered old hat, which he says is trivial but instructive.

The investigator says no crime is involved, only one of the odd incidents a crowded city throws up; the hat belongs to a finder.

A man carrying a goose was set upon by roughs, broke a window with his stick, and fled when a uniformed passer-by ran up, leaving hat and bird.

The goose's tag and hat bear a common name, so the owner cannot be traced; the investigator challenges the narrator to read the hat.

He explains the foresight, the neglect and the attempt to hide stains as signs of a weakening but proud man.

The investigator resolves to trace the path from the jewel case to the goose, and advertises for the hat's owner.

The shabby, learned man explains he could not afford to advertise, and happily accepts a substitute goose.

He shows no interest in the original bird's remains, proving his innocence, and names the inn where he got it.

They go to the inn; the landlord says he bought the geese from a market dealer.

The investigator reminds the narrator an innocent man faces prison; the dealer angrily refuses to say where he bought the geese.

He notes others are asking about the geese; a frightened little man is driven off by the dealer, demanding a goose that was his.

He planned to take it to a criminal friend, and hit on the idea of hiding it in a goose.

He fed the stone to a goose, which escaped among the flock; he insisted on taking the bird he thought it was.

The narrator explains he was sworn to secrecy until the client's death; early one morning the investigator wakes him.

Her twin sister died two years ago, a fortnight before her wedding; she describes the three bedrooms along one corridor.

She heard her sister scream, a whistle and a clang; the sister staggered out, cried about a speckled band, pointed toward the stepfather's room, and died.

After she leaves, the investigator lays out a tentative theory involving the wanderers and a falling bar; both see objections.

They travel into the country and see the old house; a driver points them to the young woman on the path.

He examines the outside; she believes the repairs were an excuse to move her into her sister's room.

The shutters cannot be forced from outside; inside, he studies the room and a new bell-rope by the bed.

The bell-rope is a dummy fixed near a ventilator that opens into the stepfather's room; both were added recently.

In the stepfather's room he finds a safe, a saucer of milk, a chair stood on, and a lash tied in a loop.

He will not name the cause yet; from the inn they watch the stepfather return in a rage.

The narrator begins to see a horrible plan; at the signal they set out in the dark.

The stepfather sits dead, bitten by the snake he trained; the investigator returns it to the safe.

They take the young woman to her aunt; the inquiry blames a dangerous pet.

The investigator admits he first reasoned wrongly, then explains how the snake was trained to crawl down the rope.

He explains the rest, and admits he is indirectly responsible for the stepfather's death, without regret.

The narrator introduces one of only two cases he brought to the investigator, a dramatic one already told badly in the papers.

Early one morning a grateful railway guard brings a new patient to the narrator's door so that he cannot slip away.

He shows that his thumb was hacked off, calls it a murderous attack, and the narrator dresses the wound.

The investigator feeds him breakfast and settles him on the sofa to hear his story.

The engineer explains he is an orphan who set up alone and had almost no work in two years.

The client begins to explain why the secrecy is necessary, checking again they cannot be overheard.

The machine starts and the ceiling descends; he begs, then sees a gleam of hope.

He runs, faints, and wakes at dawn by the road near the station, the house gone from sight.

The investigator calls the client a ruthless man; they travel with the police, puzzled why the victim was spared.

Each guesses a direction; the investigator says the house is in the middle, and names them counterfeiters the police have hunted.

The narrator recalls an old society scandal whose full facts were never told; a letter with a grand crest awaits the investigator.

The investigator says the letter is professional, from a very highly placed client, and asks the narrator to summarise the newspapers.

The investigator looks the client up and finds him middle-aged, from a great but impoverished family.

A notice announced the client's engagement to the only daughter of a rich foreign mine owner.

A society paper sneers that the heiress's huge dowry will rescue the impoverished noble family.

A newspaper confirms the family's consternation as rumours spread despite attempts to hush them up.

The client describes his wife as a wild, fearless woman raised in a mining camp before her father's sudden fortune.

The bride was cheerful until after the ceremony, when she dropped her bouquet into a pew and grew agitated.

She talked privately to her maid about a prior claim, left the breakfast, and was seen walking in the park with the arrested woman.

The client arrives, humiliated and angry; the investigator asks him to make allowance for a motherless girl.

The investigator brings in the bride and her companion; she apologises for her treatment of the client.

She heard her first husband had been killed, grieved for a year, then accepted the arranged match.

At the altar she saw her first husband alive in a pew; he slipped her a note, and she knew her duty was to him.

She slipped away to join him, too ashamed to face the grand guests; he had escaped captivity and followed her.

Ashamed, she wanted to vanish; the investigator persuaded them to be open; the client coldly shakes her hand.

The client refuses to stay for supper; the investigator says the case shows how simple the strangest-seeming affairs can be.

The investigator explains he reasoned the bride saw someone from her past who had a prior claim.

He traced the man through the expensive hotel bill and persuaded the couple to face the client.

The investigator asks the narrator to judge the deserted client mercifully, having lost wife and fortune at once.

From the window the narrator sees a dignified man running and grimacing in the snow, checking house numbers; the investigator guesses he is coming to them.

His only son, spoiled after his mother's death, has fallen into gambling debts through a charming older friend.

He told his son and niece about the treasure; the son warned the lock was weak, then begged for money to pay a gambling debt and was refused.

The banker begs his son to reveal where the missing stones are, promising forgiveness.

They travel to the banker's house; the narrator still thinks the son guilty but trusts the investigator.

The investigator walks round the house; the pale, grieving niece asks the banker to free the son.

The investigator examines a window sill and the bureau, and asks the banker to break off a corner of the treasure.

He shows breaking it would make a loud noise; he searches outside alone and says only that his opinion is unchanged.

He returns in good spirits with an old boot, then goes out again.

The son saw his cousin carry the treasure out and hand it through a window to someone.

The investigator explains he read the maid's meeting and the lane's story in the snow.

The tracks showed a booted man waiting and a barefoot man chasing him, a struggle, and blood.

He reasoned only the niece could have brought the treasure, since the son would only shield her.

The banker thanks him and goes to apologise to his son; the investigator predicts the niece will be punished enough by her lover.

The investigator complains that the narrator's accounts dwell on colour rather than reasoning; the narrator bristles at his egotism.

The investigator insists his art is impersonal and that the narrator has turned lectures into tales; he is in a bad temper after a fruitless search.

He laments that great cases are over and his work has sunk to trifles, and shows a letter from a young woman as proof.

An urgent telegram asks them to come; they travel by train through spring countryside.

The narrator admires the scenery; the investigator says isolated houses fill him with horror.

He explains that in lonely places cruelty goes unnoticed; they meet the young woman at an inn.

The wife is not mad but silent and young; the man's grown daughter supposedly left because she disliked her stepmother.

The wife is devoted but secretly sad; the child is spoiled and delights in cruelty to small creatures.

They arrive; she has locked the servant in the cellar; they break the barred door.

The starving dog attacks its master; the narrator shoots it; the female servant arrives, ready to tell what she knows.

The master survives broken; the daughter married her suitor; the young woman went on to success.