bluff, genial inspector as my companion. A quarter of an hour's
drive brought us to Mrs. Cecil Forresters. The servant seemed
surprised at so late a visitor. Mrs. Cecil Forrester was out for the
evening, she explained, and likely to be very late. Miss Morstan,
however, was in the drawing-room; so to the drawing-room I went, box
in hand, leaving the obliging inspector in the cab.
She was seated by the open window, dressed in some sort of white
diaphanous material, with a little touch of scarlet at the neck and
waist. The soft light of a shaded lamp fell upon her as she leaned
back in the basket chair, playing over her sweet grave face, and
tinting with a dull, metallic sparkle the rich coils of her
luxuriant hair. One white arm and hand drooped over the side of the
chair, and her whole pose and figure spoke of an absorbing melancholy.
At the sound of my footfall she sprang to her feet, however, and a
bright flush of surprise and of pleasure coloured her pale cheeks.
"I heard a cab drive up," she said. "I thought that Mrs. Forrester
had come back very early, but I never dreamed that it might be you.
What news have you brought me?"
"I have brought something better than news," said I, putting down
the box upon the table and speaking jovially and boisterously,
though my heart was heavy within me. "I have brought you something
which is worth all the news in the world. I have brought you a
fortune."
She glanced at the iron box.
"Is that the treasure then?" she asked, coolly enough.
"Yes, this is the great Agra treasure. Half of it is yours and
half is Thaddeus Sholto's. You will have a couple of hundred
thousand each. Think of that! An annuity of ten thousand pounds. There
will be few richer young ladies in England. Is it not glorious?"
I think I must have been rather over-acting my delight, and that she
detected a hollow ring in my congratulations, for I saw her eyebrows
rise a little, and she glanced at me curiously.
"If I have it," said she, "I owe it to you."
"No, no," I answered, "not to me but to my friend Sherlock Holmes,
With all the will in the world, I could never have followed up a
clue which has taxed even his analytical genius. As it was, we very
nearly lost it at the last moment."
"Pray sit down and tell me all about it, Dr. Watson," said she.
I narrated briefly what had occurred since I had seen her last.
Holmes's new method of search, the discovery of the Aurora, the
appearance of Athelney Jones, our expedition in the evening, and the
wild chase down the Thames. She listened with parted lips and
shining eyes to my recital of our adventures. When I spoke of the dart
which had so narrowly missed us, she turned so white that I feared
that she was about to faint.
"It is nothing," she said as I hastened to pour her out some
water. "I am all right again. It was a shock to me to hear that I
had placed my friends in such horrible peril."
"That is all over," I answered. "It was nothing. I will tell you
no more gloomy details. Let us turn to something brighter. There is
the treasure. What could be brighter than that? I got leave to bring
it with me, thinking that it would interest you to be the first to see
it."
"It would be of the greatest interest to me," she said. There was no
eagerness in her voice, however. It had struck her, doubtless, that it
might seem ungracious upon her part to be indifferent to a prize which
had cost so much to win.
"What a pretty box!" she said, stooping over it. "This is Indian
work, I suppose?"
"Yes; it is Benares metal-work."
"And so heavy!" she exclaimed, trying to raise it. "The box alone
must be of some value. Where is the key?"
"Small threw it into the Thames," I answered. "I must borrow Mrs.
Forrester's poker."
There was in the front a thick and broad hasp, wrought in the
image of a sitting Buddha. Under this I thrust the end of the poker
and twisted it outward as a lever. The hasp sprang open with a loud
snap. With trembling fingers I flung back the lid. We both stood
gazing in astonishment. The box was empty!
No wonder that it was heavy. The ironwork was two-thirds of an
inch thick all round. It was massive, well made, and solid, like a
chest constructed to carry things of great price, but not one shred or
crumb of metal or jewellery lay within it. It was absolutely and
completely empty.
"The treasure is lost," said Miss Morstan calmly.
As I listened to the words and realized what they meant, a great
shadow seemed to pass from my soul. I did not know how this Agra
treasure had weighed me down until now that it was finally removed. It
was selfish, no doubt, disloyal, wrong, but I could realize nothing
save that the golden barrier was gone from between us.
"Thank God!" I ejaculated from my very heart.
She looked at me with a quick, questioning smile.
"Why do you say that?" she asked.
"Because you are within my reach again," I said, taking her hand.
She did not withdraw it. "Because I love you, Mary, as truly as ever a
man loved a woman. Because this treasure, these riches, sealed my
lips. Now that they are gone I can tell you how I love you. That is
why I said, `Thank God.'"
"Then I say `Thank God,' too she whispered as I drew her to my side.
Whoever had lost a treasure, I knew that night that I had gained
one.
Chapter 12
THE STRANGE STORY OF JONATHAN SMALL
A very patient man was that inspector in the cab, for it was a weary
time before I rejoined him. His face clouded over when I showed him
the empty box.
"There goes the reward!" said he gloomily. "Where there is no
money there is no pay. This night's work would have been worth a
tenner each to Sam Brown and me if the treasure had been there."
"Mr. Thaddeus Sholto is a rich man," I said; "he will see that you
are rewarded, treasure or no."
The inspector shook his head despondently, however.
"It's a bad job," he repeated; "and so Mr. Athelney Jones will
think."
His forecast proved to be correct, for the detective looked blank
enough when I got to Baker Street and showed him the empty box. They
had only just arrived, Holmes, the prisoner, and he, for they had
changed their plans so far as to report themselves at a station upon
the way. My companion lounged in his armchair with his usual
listless expression, while Small sat stolidly opposite to him with his
wooden leg cocked over his sound one. As I exhibited the empty box
he leaned back in his chair and laughed aloud.
"This is your doing, Small," said Athelney Jones angrily.
"Yes, I have put it away where you shall never lay hand upon it," he
cried exultantly. "It is my treasure, and if I can't have the loot
I'll take damed good care that no one else does. I tell you that no
living man has any right to it, unless it is three men who are in
the Andaman convict-barracks and myself. I know now that I cannot have
the use of it, and I know that they cannot. I have acted all through
for them as much as for myself. It's been the sign of four with us
always. Well, I know that they would have had me do just what I have
done, and throw the treasure into the Thames rather than let it go
to kith or kin of Sholto or Morstan. It was not to make them rich that
we did for Achmet. You'll find the treasure where the key is and where
little Tonga is. When I saw that your launch must catch us, I put
the loot away in a safe place. There are no rupees for you this
journey."
"You are deceiving us, Small," said Athelney Jones sternly; "if
you had wished to throw the treasure into the Thames, it would have
been easier for you to have thrown box and all."
"Easier for me to throw and easier for you to recover," he
answered with a shrewd, side-long look. "The man that was clever
enough to hunt me down is clever enough to pick an iron box from the
bottom of a river. Now that they are scattered over five miles or
so, it may be a harder job. It went to my heart to do it though. I was
half mad when you came up with us. However, there's no good grieving
over it. I've had ups in my life, and I've had downs, but I've learned
not to cry over spilled milk."
"This is a very serious matter, Small," said the detective. "If
you had helped justice, instead of thwarting it in this way, you would
have had a better chance at your trial."
"Justice!" snarled the ex-convict. "A pretty justice! Whose loot
is this, if it is not ours? Where is the justice that I should give it
up to those who have never earned it? Look how I have earned it!
Twenty long years in that fever-ridden swamp, all day at work under
the mangrove-tree, all night chained up in the filthy convict-huts,
bitten by mosquitoes, racked with ague, bullied by every cursed
black-faced policeman who loved to take it out of a white man. That
was how I earned the Agra treasure, and you talk to me of justice
because I cannot bear to feel that I have paid this price only that
another may enjoy it! I would rather swing a score of times, or have
one of Tonga's darts in my hide, than live in a convict's cell and
feel that another man is at his ease in a palace with the money that
should be mine."
Small had dropped his mask of stoicism, and all this came out in a
wild whirl of words, while his eyes blazed, and the handcuffs
clanked together with the impassioned movement of his hands. I could
understand, as I saw the fury and the passion of the man, that it
was no groundless or unnatural terror which had possessed Major Sholto
when he first learned that the injured convict was upon his track.
"You forget that we know nothing of all this," said Holmes
quietly. "We have not heard your story, and we cannot tell how far
justice may originally have been on your side."
"Well, sir, you have been very fair-spoken to me, though I can see
that I have you to thank that I have these bracelets upon my wrists.
Still, I bear no grudge for that. It is all fair and above-board. If
you want to hear my story, I have no wish to hold it back. What I
say to you is God's truth, every word of it. Thank you, you can put
the glass beside me here, and I'll put my lips to it if I am dry.
"I am a Worcestershire man myself, born near Pershore. I dare say
you would find a heap of Smalls living there now if you were to
look. I have often thought of taking a look round there, but the truth
is that I was never much of a credit to the family, and I doubt if
they would be so very glad to see me. They were all steady,
chapel-going folk, small farmers, well known and respected over the
countryside, while I was always a bit of a rover. At last, however,
when I was about eighteen, I gave them no more trouble, for I got into
a mess over a girl and could only get out of it again by taking the
Queen's shilling and joining the Third Buffs, which was just
starting for India.
"I wasn't destined to do much soldiering, however. I had just got
past the goose-step and learned to handle my musket, when I was fool
enough to go swimming in the Ganges. Luckily for me, my company
sergeant, John Holder, was in the water at the same time, and he was
one of the finest swimmers in the service. A crocodile took me just as
I was halfway across and nipped off my right leg as clean as a surgeon
could have done it, just above the knee. What with the shock and the
loss of blood, I fainted, and should have been drowned if Holder had
not caught hold of me and paddled for the bank. I was five months in
hospital over it, and when at last I was able to limp out of it with
this timber toe strapped to my stump, I found myself invalided out
of the Army and unfitted for any active occupation.
"I was, as you can imagine, pretty down on my luck at this time, for
I was a useless cripple, though not yet in my twentieth year. However,
my misfortune, soon proved to be a blessing in disguise. A man named
Abel White, who had come out there as an indigo-planter, wanted an
overseer to look after his coolies and keep them up to their work.
He happened to be a friend of our colonel's, who had taken an interest
in me since the accident. To make a long story short, the colonel
recommended me strongly for the post, and, as the work was mostly to
be done on horseback, my leg was no great obstacle, for I had enough
thigh left to keep a good grip on the saddle. What I had to do was
to ride over the plantation, to keep an eye on the men as they worked,
and to report the idlers. The pay was fair, I had comfortable
quarters, and altogether I was content to spend the remainder of my
life in indigo-planting. Mr. Abel White was a kind man, and he would
often drop into my little shanty and smoke a pipe with me, for white
folk out there feel their hearts warm to each other as they never do
here at home.
"Well, I was never in luck's way long. Suddenly, without a note of
warning, the great mutiny broke upon us. One month India lay as
still and peaceful, to all appearance, as Surrey or Kent; the next
there were two hundred thousand black devils let loose, and the
country was a perfect hell. Of course you know all about it,
gentlemen- a deal more than I do, very like, since reading is not in
my line. I only know what I saw with my own eyes. Our plantation was
at a place called Muttra, near the border of the Northwest
Provinces. Night after night the whole sky was alight with the burning
bungalows, and day after day we had small companies of Europeans
passing through our estate with their wives and children, on their way
