"A good deal, Mr. Holmes. I have several fresh dancing men pictures
for you to examine, and, what is more important, I have seen the
fellow."
"What, the man who draws them?"
"Yes, I saw him at his work. But I will tell you everything in order.
When I got back after my visit to you, the very first thing I saw
next morning was a fresh crop of dancing men. They had been drawn in
chalk upon the black wooden door of the tool-house, which stands
beside the lawn in full view of the front windows. I took an exact
copy, and here it is." He unfolded a paper and laid it upon the
table. Here is a copy of the hieroglyphics:--
"Excellent!" said Holmes. "Excellent! Pray continue."
"When I had taken the copy I rubbed out the marks; but two mornings
later a fresh inscription had appeared. I have a copy of it here":--
Holmes rubbed his hands and chuckled with delight.
"Our material is rapidly accumulating," said he.
"Three days later a message was left scrawled upon paper, and placed
under a pebble upon the sun-dial. Here it is. The characters are, as
you see, exactly the same as the last one. After that I determined to
lie in wait; so I got out my revolver and I sat up in my study, which
overlooks the lawn and garden. About two in the morning I was seated
by the window, all being dark save for the moonlight outside, when I
heard steps behind me, and there was my wife in her dressing-gown.
She implored me to come to bed. I told her frankly that I wished to
see who it was who played such absurd tricks upon us. She answered
that it was some senseless practical joke, and that I should not take
any notice of it.
"'If it really annoys you, Hilton, we might go and travel, you and I,
and so avoid this nuisance.'
"'What, be driven out of our own house by a practical joker?' said I.
'Why, we should have the whole county laughing at us.'
"'Well, come to bed,' said she, 'and we can discuss it in the
morning.'
"Suddenly, as she spoke, I saw her white face grow whiter yet in the
moonlight, and her hand tightened upon my shoulder. Something was
moving in the shadow of the tool-house. I saw a dark, creeping figure
which crawled round the corner and squatted in front of the door.
Seizing my pistol I was rushing out, when my wife threw her arms
round me and held me with convulsive strength. I tried to throw her
off, but she clung to me most desperately. At last I got clear, but
by the time I had opened the door and reached the house the creature
was gone. He had left a trace of his presence, however, for there on
the door was the very same arrangement of dancing men which had
already twice appeared, and which I have copied on that paper. There
was no other sign of the fellow anywhere, though I ran all over the
grounds. And yet the amazing thing is that he must have been there
all the time, for when I examined the door again in the morning he
had scrawled some more of his pictures under the line which I had
already seen."
"Have you that fresh drawing?"
"Yes; it is very short, but I made a copy of it, and here it is."
Again he produced a paper. The new dance was in this form:--
"Tell me," said Holmes--and I could see by his eyes that he was much
excited--"was this a mere addition to the first, or did it appear to
be entirely separate?"
"It was on a different panel of the door."
"Excellent! This is far the most important of all for our purpose. It
fills me with hopes. Now, Mr. Hilton Cubitt, please continue your
most interesting statement."
"I have nothing more to say, Mr. Holmes, except that I was angry with
my wife that night for having held me back when I might have caught
the skulking rascal. She said that she feared that I might come to
harm. For an instant it had crossed my mind that perhaps what she
really feared was that he might come to harm, for I could not doubt
that she knew who this man was and what he meant by these strange
signals. But there is a tone in my wife's voice, Mr. Holmes, and a
look in her eyes which forbid doubt, and I am sure that it was indeed
my own safety that was in her mind. There's the whole case, and now I
want your advice as to what I ought to do. My own inclination is to
put half-a-dozen of my farm lads in the shrubbery, and when this
fellow comes again to give him such a hiding that he will leave us in
peace for the future."
"I fear it is too deep a case for such simple remedies," said Holmes.
"How long can you stay in London?"
"I must go back to-day. I would not leave my wife alone all night for
anything. She is very nervous and begged me to come back."
"I dare say you are right. But if you could have stopped I might
possibly have been able to return with you in a day or two. Meanwhile
you will leave me these papers, and I think that it is very likely
that I shall be able to pay you a visit shortly and to throw some
light upon your case."
Sherlock Holmes preserved his calm professional manner until our
visitor had left us, although it was easy for me, who knew him so
well, to see that he was profoundly excited. The moment that Hilton
Cubitt's broad back had disappeared through the door my comrade
rushed to the table, laid out all the slips of paper containing
dancing men in front of him, and threw himself into an intricate and
elaborate calculation. For two hours I watched him as he covered
sheet after sheet of paper with figures and letters, so completely
absorbed in his task that he had evidently forgotten my presence.
Sometimes he was making progress and whistled and sang at his work;
sometimes he was puzzled, and would sit for long spells with a
furrowed brow and a vacant eye. Finally he sprang from his chair with
a cry of satisfaction, and walked up and down the room rubbing his
hands together. Then he wrote a long telegram upon a cable form. "If
my answer to this is as I hope, you will have a very pretty case to
add to your collection, Watson," said he. "I expect that we shall be
able to go down to Norfolk to-morrow, and to take our friend some
very definite news as to the secret of his annoyance."
I confess that I was filled with curiosity, but I was aware that
Holmes liked to make his disclosures at his own time and in his own
way; so I waited until it should suit him to take me into his
confidence.
But there was a delay in that answering telegram, and two days of
impatience followed, during which Holmes pricked up his ears at every
ring of the bell. On the evening of the second there came a letter
from Hilton Cubitt. All was quiet with him, save that a long
inscription had appeared that morning upon the pedestal of the
sun-dial. He inclosed a copy of it, which is here reproduced:--
Holmes bent over this grotesque frieze for some minutes, and then
suddenly sprang to his feet with an exclamation of surprise and
dismay. His face was haggard with anxiety.
"We have let this affair go far enough," said he. "Is there a train
to North Walsham to-night?"
I turned up the time-table. The last had just gone.
"Then we shall breakfast early and take the very first in the
morning," said Holmes. "Our presence is most urgently needed. Ah!
here is our expected cablegram. One moment, Mrs. Hudson; there may be
an answer. No, that is quite as I expected. This message makes it
even more essential that we should not lose an hour in letting Hilton
Cubitt know how matters stand, for it is a singular and a dangerous
web in which our simple Norfolk squire is entangled."
So, indeed, it proved, and as I come to the dark conclusion of a
story which had seemed to me to be only childish and bizarre I
experience once again the dismay and horror with which I was filled.
Would that I had some brighter ending to communicate to my readers,
but these are the chronicles of fact, and I must follow to their dark
crisis the strange chain of events which for some days made Ridling
Thorpe Manor a household word through the length and breadth of
England.
We had hardly alighted at North Walsham, and mentioned the name of
our destination, when the station-master hurried towards us. "I
suppose that you are the detectives from London?" said he.
A look of annoyance passed over Holmes's face.
"What makes you think such a thing?"
"Because Inspector Martin from Norwich has just passed through. But
maybe you are the surgeons. She's not dead--or wasn't by last
accounts. You may be in time to save her yet--though it be for the
gallows."
Holmes's brow was dark with anxiety.
"We are going to Ridling Thorpe Manor," said he, "but we have heard
nothing of what has passed there."
"It's a terrible business," said the station-master. "They are shot,
both Mr. Hilton Cubitt and his wife. She shot him and then
herself--so the servants say. He's dead and her life is despaired of.
Dear, dear, one of the oldest families in the County of Norfolk, and
one of the most honoured."
Without a word Holmes hurried to a carriage, and during the long
seven miles' drive he never opened his mouth. Seldom have I seen him
so utterly despondent. He had been uneasy during all our journey from
town, and I had observed that he had turned over the morning papers
with anxious attention; but now this sudden realization of his worst
fears left him in a blank melancholy. He leaned back in his seat,
lost in gloomy speculation. Yet there was much around to interest us,
for we were passing through as singular a country-side as any in
England, where a few scattered cottages represented the population of
to-day, while on every hand enormous square-towered churches bristled
up from the flat, green landscape and told of the glory and
prosperity of old East Anglia. At last the violet rim of the German
Ocean appeared over the green edge of the Norfolk coast, and the
driver pointed with his whip to two old brick and timber gables which
projected from a grove of trees. "That's Ridling Thorpe Manor," said
he.
As we drove up to the porticoed front door I observed in front of it,
beside the tennis lawn, the black tool-house and the pedestalled
sun-dial with which we had such strange associations. A dapper little
man, with a quick, alert manner and a waxed moustache, had just
descended from a high dog-cart. He introduced himself as Inspector
Martin, of the Norfolk Constabulary, and he was considerably
astonished when he heard the name of my companion.
"Why, Mr. Holmes, the crime was only committed at three this morning.
How could you hear of it in London and get to the spot as soon as I?"
"I anticipated it. I came in the hope of preventing it."
"Then you must have important evidence of which we are ignorant, for
they were said to be a most united couple."
"I have only the evidence of the dancing men," said Holmes. "I will
explain the matter to you later. Meanwhile, since it is too late to
prevent this tragedy, I am very anxious that I should use the
knowledge which I possess in order to ensure that justice be done.
Will you associate me in your investigation, or will you prefer that
I should act independently?"
"I should be proud to feel that we were acting together, Mr. Holmes,"
said the inspector, earnestly.
"In that case I should be glad to hear the evidence and to examine
the premises without an instant of unnecessary delay."
Inspector Martin had the good sense to allow my friend to do things
in his own fashion, and contented himself with carefully noting the
results. The local surgeon, an old, white-haired man, had just come
down from Mrs. Hilton Cubitt's room, and he reported that her
injuries were serious, but not necessarily fatal. The bullet had
passed through the front of her brain, and it would probably be some
time before she could regain consciousness. On the question of
whether she had been shot or had shot herself he would not venture to
express any decided opinion. Certainly the bullet had been discharged
at very close quarters. There was only the one pistol found in the
room, two barrels of which had been emptied. Mr. Hilton Cubitt had
been shot through the heart. It was equally conceivable that he had
shot her and then himself, or that she had been the criminal, for the
revolver lay upon the floor midway between them.
"Has he been moved?" asked Holmes.
"We have moved nothing except the lady. We could not leave her lying
wounded upon the floor."
"How long have you been here, doctor?"
"Since four o'clock."
"Anyone else?"
"Yes, the constable here."
"And you have touched nothing?"
"Nothing."
"You have acted with great discretion. Who sent for you?"
"The housemaid, Saunders."
