Adventure XXIV: The Adventure of the Final Problem
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The Strand Magazine
December, 1893
It is with a heavy heart that I take up my pen to write these
the last words in which I shall ever record the singular gifts by which
my friend Mr. Sherlock Holmes was distinguished. In an incoherent and,
as I deeply feel, an entirely inadequate fashion, I have endeavoured to
give some account of my strange experiences in his company from the
chance which first brought us together at the period of the "Study in
Scarlet," up to the time of his interference in the matter of the
"Naval Treaty" -- an interference which had the unquestionable effect
of preventing a serious international complication. It was my intention
to have stopped there, and to have said nothing of that event which has
created a void in my life which the lapse of two years has done little
to fill. My hand has been forced, however, by the recent letters in
which Colonel James Moriarty defends the memory of his brother, and I
have no choice but to lay the facts before the public exactly as they
occurred. I alone know the absolute truth of the matter, and I am
satisfied that the time has come when no good purpose is to be served
by its suppression. As far as I know, there have been only three
accounts in the public press: that in the Journal de Geneve on May 6th, 1891, the Reuter's dispatch in
the English papers on May 7th, and finally the recent letters to which
I have alluded. Of these the first and second were extremely condensed,
while the last is, as I shall now show, an absolute perversion of the
facts. It lies with me to tell for the first time what really took
place between Professor Moriarty and Mr. Sherlock Holmes.
It
may be remembered that after my marriage, and my subsequent start in
private practice, the very intimate relations which had existed between
Holmes and myself became to some extent modified. He still came to me
from time to time when he desired a companion in his investigations,
but these occasions grew more and more seldom, until I find that in the
year 1890 there were only three cases of which I retain any record.
During the winter of that year and the early spring of 1891, I saw in
the papers that he had been engaged by the French government upon a
matter of supreme importance, and I received two notes from Holmes,
dated from Narbonne and from Nimes, from which I gathered that his stay
in France was likely to be a long one. It was with some surprise,
therefore, that I saw him walk into my consulting room upon the evening
of April 24th. It struck me that he was looking even paler and thinner
than usual.
"Yes,
I have been using myself up rather too freely," he remarked, in answer
to my look rather than to my words; "I have been a little pressed of
late. Have you any objection to my closing your shutters?"
The only light in the room came from the lamp upon the table at which I
had been reading. Holmes edged his way round the wall, and, flinging
the shutters together, he bolted them securely.
"You are afraid of something?" I asked.
"Well, I am."
"Of what?"
"Of air-guns."
"My dear Holmes, what do you mean?"
"I think that you know me well enough, Watson, to understand
that I am by no means a nervous man. At the same time, it is stupidity
rather than courage to refuse to recognize danger when it is close upon
you. Might I trouble you for a match?" He drew in the smoke of his
cigarette as if the soothing influence was grateful to him.
"I must apologize for calling so late," said he, "and I must
further beg you to be so unconventional as to allow me to leave your
house presently by scrambling over your back garden wall."
"But what does it all mean?" I asked.
He held out his hand, and I
saw in the light of the lamp that two of his knuckles were burst and
bleeding.
"It's not an airy nothing, you see," said he, smiling. "On the
contrary, it is solid enough for a man to break his hand over. Is Mrs.
Watson in?"
"She is away upon a visit."
"Indeed! You are alone?"
"Quite."
"Then it makes it the easier for
me to propose that you should come away with me for a week to the
Continent."
"Where?"
"Oh, anywhere. It's all the same to me."
There was something very strange in all this. It was not Holmes's
nature to take an aimless holiday, and something about his pale, worn
face told me that his nerves were at their highest tension. He saw the
question in my eyes, and, putting his finger-tips together and his
elbows upon his knees, he explained the situation.
"You have probably never heard of
Professor Moriarty?" said he.
"Never."
"Ay, there's the genius and the wonder of the thing!" he cried.
"The man pervades London, and no one has heard of him. That's what puts
him on a pinnacle in the records of crime. I tell you Watson, in all
seriousness, that if I could beat that man, if I could free society of
him, I should feel that my own career had reached its summit, and I
should be prepared to turn to some more placid line in life. Between
ourselves, the recent cases in which I have been of assistance to the
royal family of Scandinavia, and to the French republic, have left me
in such a position that I could continue to live in the quiet fashion
which is most congenial to me, and to concentrate my attention upon my
chemical researches. But I could not rest. Watson, I could not sit
quiet in my chair, if I thought that such a man as Professor Moriarty
were walking the streets of London unchallenged."
"What has he done, then?"
"His career has been an extraordinary one. He is a man of good
birth and excellent education, endowed by nature with a phenomenal
mathematical faculty. At the age of twenty-one he wrote a treatise upon
the binomial theorem, which has had a European vogue. On the strength
of it he won the mathematical chair at one of our smaller universities,
and had, to all appearances, a most brilliant career before him. But the man had hereditary tendencies of the most diabolical kind.
A criminal strain ran in his blood, which, instead of being modified, was increased and rendered infinitely more dangerous by his extraordinary mental powers.
Dark rumours gathered round him in the university town, and eventually
he was compelled to resign his chair and to come down to London, where
he set up as an army coach. So much is known to the world, but what I
am telling you now is what I have myself discovered.
"As you
are aware, Watson, there is no one who knows the higher criminal world
of London so well as I do. For years past I have continually been conscious of some power behind the
malefactor, some deep organizing power which forever stands in the way
of the law, and throws its shield over the wrong-doer. Again and
again in cases of the most varying sorts -- forgery cases, robberies,
murders -- I have felt the presence of this force, and I have deduced
its action in many of those undiscovered crimes in which I have not
been personally consulted. For years I have endeavoured to break
through the veil which shrouded it, and at last the time came when l
seized my thread and followed it, until it led me, after a thousand
cunning windings, to ex-Professor Moriarty, of mathematical celebrity.
"He is the Napoleon of crime, Watson.
He is the organizer of half that is evil and of nearly all that is
undetected in this great city. He is a genius, a philosopher, an
abstract thinker. He has a brain of the first order. He sits
motionless, like a spider in the centre of its web, but that web has a
thousand radiations, and he knows well every quiver of each of them. He
does little himself. He only plans. But his agents are numerous and
splendidly organized. If there a crime to be done, a paper to be
abstracted, we will say, a house to be rifled, a man to be removed --
the word is passed to the professor, the matter is organized and
carried out. The agent may be caught. In that case money is found for
his bail or his defense. But the central power which uses the agent is
never caught -- never so much as suspected. This was the organization
which I deduced, Watson, and which I devoted my whole energy to
exposing and breaking up.
"But the professor was fenced
round with safeguards so cunningly devised that, do what I would, it
seemed impossible to get evidence which would convict in a court of
law. You know my powers, my dear Watson, and yet at the end of three
months I was forced to confess that I had at last met an antagonist who
was my intellectual equal. My horror at his crimes was lost in my
admiration at his skill. But at last he made a trip -- only a little, little trip, but
it was more than he could afford when I was so close upon him. I had my
chance, and, starting from that point, I have woven my net round him
until now it is all ready to close. In three days -- that is to say, on
Monday next -- matters will be ripe, and the professor, with all the
principal members of his gang, will be in the hands of the police. Then
will come the greatest criminal trial of the century, the clearing up
of over forty mysteries, and the rope for all of them; but if we move
at all prematurely, you understand, they may slip out of our hands even
at the last moment.
"Now, if I could have done this without
the knowledge of Professor Moriarty, all would have been well. But he
was too wily for that. He saw every step which I took to draw my toils
round him. Again and again he strove to break away, but I as often
headed him off. I tell you, my friend, that if a detailed account of
that silent contest could be written, it would take its place as the
most brilliant bit of thrust-and-parry work in the history of
detection. Never have I risen to such a height, and never have I been
so hard pressed by an opponent. He cut deep, and yet I just undercut
him. This morning the last steps were taken, and three days only were
wanted to complete the business. I was sitting in my room thinking the matter over when the door opened and Professor Moriarty stood before me.
"My
nerves are fairly proof, Watson, but I must confess to a start when I
saw the very man who had been so much in my thoughts standing there on
my threshold. His appearance was quite familiar to me. He is extremely
tall and thin, his forehead domes out in a white curve, and his two
eyes are deeply sunken in his head. He is clean-shaven, pale, and
ascetic-looking, retaining something of the professor in his features.
His shoulders are rounded from much study, and his face protrudes
forward and is forever slowly oscillating from side to side in a
curiously reptilian fashion. He peered at me with great curiosity in
his puckered eyes.
" 'You have less frontal development
than I should have expected,' said he at last. 'It is a dangerous habit
to finger loaded firearms in the pocket of one's dressing-gown.'
"The fact is that upon his entrance I had instantly recognized
the extreme personal danger in which I lay. The only conceivable escape
for him lay in silencing my tongue. In an instant I had slipped the
revolver from the drawer into my pocket and was covering him through
the cloth. At his remark I drew the weapon out and laid it cocked upon
the table. He still smiled and blinked, but there was something about
his eyes which made me feel very glad that I had it there.
" 'You evidently don't know me,' said he.
" 'On the contrary,' I answered, 'I think it is fairly evident
that I do. Pray take a chair. I can spare you five minutes if you have
anything to say.'
" 'All that I have to say has already crossed your mind,' said he.
" 'Then possibly my answer has crossed yours,' I replied.
" 'You stand fast?'
" 'Absolutely. '
"He clapped his hand into his pocket, and I raised the pistol
from the table. But he merely drew out a memorandum-book in which he
had scribbled some dates.
" 'You crossed my path on the fourth of January,' said he. 'On
the twenty-third you incommoded me; by the middle of February I was
seriously inconvenienced by you; at the end of March I was absolutely
hampered in my plans; and now, at the close of April, I find myself
placed in such a position through your continual persecution that I am
in positive danger of losing my liberty. The situation is becoming an
impossible one.'
" 'Have you any suggestion to make?' I asked.
" 'You must drop it, Mr. Holmes,'
said he, swaying his face about. 'You really must, you know.'
" 'After Monday,' said I.
" 'Tut, tut!' said he. 'I am quite sure that a man of your
intelligence will see that there can be but one outcome to this affair.
It is necessary that you should withdraw. You have worked things in
such a fashion that we have only one resource left. It has been an
intellectual treat to me to see the way in which you have grappled with
this affair, and I say, unaffectedly, that it would be a grief to me to
be forced to take any extreme measure. You smile, sir, but I assure you
that it really would.
" 'Danger is part of my trade,' I remarked.
" 'This is not danger,' said he. 'It is inevitable destruction.
You stand in the way not merely of an individual but of a mighty
organization, the full extent of which you, with all your cleverness,
have been unable to realize. You must stand clear, Mr. Holmes, or be
trodden under foot.'
" 'I am afraid,' said I, rising, 'that in the pleasure of this
conversation I am neglecting business of importance which awaits me
elsewhere.'
"He rose also and looked at me in silence, shaking his head sadly.
" 'Well, well,' said he at last. 'It seems a pity, but I have done what I could.
I know every move of your game. You can do nothing before Monday. It
has been a duel between you and me, Mr. Holmes. You hope to place me in
the dock. I tell you that I will never stand in the dock. You hope to
beat me. I tell you that you will never beat me. If you are clever
enough to bring destruction upon me, rest assured that I shall do as
much to you.'
" 'You have paid me several compliments, Mr. Moriarty,' said I.
'Let me pay you one in return when I say that if I were assured of the
former eventuality I would, in the interests of the public, cheerfully
accept the latter.'
" 'I can promise you the one, but not the other,' he snarled,
and so turned his rounded back upon me and went peering and blinking
out of the room.
"That was my singular interview with Professor Moriarty. I
confess that it left an unpleasant effect upon my mind. His soft,
precise fashion of speech leaves a conviction of sincerity which a mere
bully could not produce. Of course, you will say: 'Why not take police
precautions against him?' The reason is that I am well convinced that
it is from his agents the blow would fall. I have the best of proofs
that it would be so."
"You have already been assaulted?"
"My
dear Watson, Professor Moriarty is not a man who lets the grass grow
under his feet. I went out about midday to transact some business in
Oxford Street. As I passed the corner which leads from Bentinck Street
on to the Welbeck Street crossing a two-horse van furiously driven
whizzed round and was on me like a flash. I sprang for the foot-path
and saved myself by the fraction of a second. The van dashed round by
Marylebone Lane and was gone in an instant. I kept to the pavement
after that, Watson, but as I walked down Vere Street a brick came down
from the roof of one of the houses and was shattered to fragments at my
feet. I called the police and had the place examined. There were slates
and bricks piled up on the roof preparatory to some repairs, and they
would have me believe that the wind had toppled over one of these. Of
course I knew better, but I could prove nothing. I took a cab after
that and reached my brother's rooms in Pall Mall, where I spent the
day. Now I have come round to you, and on my way I was attacked by a
rough with a bludgeon. I knocked him down, and the police have him in
custody; but I can tell you with the most absolute confidence
that no possible connection will ever be traced between the gentleman
upon whose front teeth I have barked my knuckles and the retiring
mathematical coach, who is, I daresay, working out problems upon a
black-board ten miles away. You will not wonder, Watson, that my first
act on entering your rooms was to close your shutters, and that I have
been compelled to ask your permission to leave the house by some less
conspicuous exit than the front door."
I had often admired my friend's courage, but never more than
now, as he sat quietly checking off a series of incidents which must
have combined to make up a day of horror.
"You will spend the night here?" I said.
"No, my friend, you might find me a dangerous guest. I have my
plans laid, and all will be well. Matters have gone so far now that
they can move without my help as far as the arrest goes, though my
presence is necessary for a conviction. It is obvious, therefore, that
I cannot do better than get away for the few days which remain before
the police are at liberty to act. It would be a great pleasure to me,
therefore, if you could come on to the Continent with me."
"The practice is quiet," said I, "and I
have an accommodating neighbour. I should be glad to come."
"And to start to-morrow morning?"
"If necessary."
"Oh,
yes, it is most necessary. Then these are your instructions, and I beg,
my dear Watson, that you will obey them to the letter, for you are now
playing a double-handed game with me against the cleverest rogue and
the most powerful syndicate of criminals in Europe. Now listen! You
will dispatch whatever luggage you intend to take by a trusty messenger
un-addressed to Victoria to-night. In the morning you will send for a
hansom, desiring your man to take neither the first nor the second
which may present itself. Into this hansom you will jump, and you will
drive to the Strand end of the Lowther Arcade, handing the address to
the cabman upon a slip of paper, with a request that he will not throw
it away. Have your fare ready, and the instant that your cab stops,
dash through the Arcade, timing yourself to reach the other side at a
quarter-past nine. You will find a small brougham waiting close to the
curb, driven by a fellow with a heavy black cloak tipped at the collar
with red. Into this you will step, and you will reach Victoria in time
for the Continental express."
"Where shall I meet you?"
"At the station. The second
first-class carriage from the front will be reserved for us."
"The carriage is our rendezvous, then?"
"Yes."
It was in vain that I asked Holmes to remain for the evening.
It was evident to me that he thought he might bring trouble to the roof
he was under, and that that was the motive which impelled him to go.
With a few hurried words as to our plans for the morrow he rose and
came out with me into the garden, clambering over the wall which leads
into Mortimer Street, and immediately whistling for a hansom, in which
I heard him drive away.
In the morning I obeyed Holmes's injunctions to the letter. A
hansom was procured with such precautions as would prevent its being
one which was placed ready for us, and I drove immediately after
breakfast to the Lowther Arcade, through which I hurried at the top of
my speed. A brougham was waiting with a very massive driver wrapped in
a dark cloak, who, the instant that I had stepped in, whipped up the
horse and rattled off to Victoria Station. On my alighting there he
turned the carriage, and dashed away again without so much as a look in
my direction.
So
far all had gone admirably. My luggage was waiting for me, and I had no
difficulty in finding the carriage which Holmes had indicated, the less
so as it was the only one in the train which was marked "Engaged." My
only source of anxiety now was the non-appearance of Holmes. The
station clock marked only seven minutes from the time when we were due
to start. In vain I searched among the groups of travellers and
leave-takers for the lithe figure of my friend. There was no sign of
him. I spent a few minutes in assisting a venerable Italian priest, who
was endeavouring to make a porter understand, in his broken English,
that his luggage was to be booked through to Paris. Then, having taken
another look round, I returned to my carriage, where I found that the
porter, in spite of the ticket, had given me my decrepit Italian friend
as a travelling companion. It was useless for me to explain to him that
his presence was an intrusion, for my Italian was even more limited
than his English, so I shrugged my shoulders resignedly, and continued
to look out anxiously for my friend. A chill of fear had come over me,
as I thought that his absence might mean that some blow had fallen
during the night. Already the doors had all been shut and the whistle
blown, when --
"My dear Watson," said a voice,
"you have not even condescended to say good-morning."
I turned in uncontrollable astonishment. The aged ecclesiastic
had turned his face towards me. For an instant the wrinkles were
smoothed away, the nose drew away from the chin, the lower lip ceased
to protrude and the mouth to mumble, the dull eyes regained their fire,
the drooping figure expanded. The next the whole frame collapsed again,
and Holmes had gone as quickly as he had come.
"Good heavens!" I cried, "how you startled me!"
"Every precaution is still necessary," he whispered. "I have
reason to think that they are hot upon our trail. Ah, there is Moriarty
himself."
The train had already begun to move as Holmes spoke. Glancing
back, I saw a tall man pushing his way furiously through the crowd, and
waving his hand as if he desired to have the train stopped. It was too
late, however, for we were rapidly gathering momentum, and an instant
later had shot clear of the station.
"With all our precautions, you see that we have cut it rather
fine," said Holmes, laughing. He rose, and throwing off the black
cassock and hat which had formed his disguise, he packed them away in a
hand-bag.
"Have you seen the morning paper, Watson?"
"No."
"You haven't seen about Baker Street, then?"
"Baker Street?"
"They set fire to our rooms last night. No great harm was done."
"Good heavens, Holmes, this is intolerable!"
"They must have lost my track completely after their
bludgeonman was arrested. Otherwise they could not have imagined that I
had returned to my rooms. They have evidently taken the precaution of
watching you, however, and that is what has brought Moriarty to
Victoria. You could not have made any slip in coming?"
"I did exactly what you advised."
"Did you find your brougham?"
"Yes, it was waiting."
"Did you recognize your coachman?"
"No."
"It was my brother Mycroft. It is an advantage to get about in
such a case without taking a mercenary into your confidence. But we
must plan what we are to do about Moriarty now."
"As this is an express, and as the boat runs in connection with
it, I should think we have shaken him off very effectively."
"My dear Watson, you evidently did not realize my meaning when I
said that this man may be taken as being quite on the same intellectual
plane as myself. You do not imagine that if I were the pursuer I should
allow myself to be baffled by so slight an obstacle. Why, then, should
you think so meanly of him?"
"What will he do?"
"What I should do."
"What would you do, then?"
"Engage a special."
"But it must be late."
"By no means. This train stops at Canterbury; and there is
always at least a quarter of an hour's delay at the boat. He will catch
us there."
"One would think that we were the
criminals. Let us have him arrested on his arrival."
"It would be to ruin the work of three months. We should get the
big fish, but the smaller would dart right and left out of the net. On
Monday we should have them all. No, an arrest is inadmissible."
"What then?"
"We shall get out at Canterbury."
"And then?"
"Well, then we must make a cross-country journey to Newhaven,
and so over to Dieppe. Moriarty will again do what I should do. He will
get on to Paris, mark down our luggage, and wait for two days at the
depot. In the meantime we shall treat ourselves to a couple of
carpet-bags, encourage the manufactures of the countries through which
we travel, and make our way at our leisure into Switzerland, via
Luxembourg and Basle."
At Canterbury, therefore, we alighted, only to find that we
should have to wait an hour before we could get a train to Newhaven. I
was still looking rather ruefully after the rapidly disappearing
luggage-van which contained my wardrobe, when Holmes pulled my sleeve
and pointed up the line.
"Already, you see," said he.
Far away, from among the Kentish woods there rose a thin spray
of smoke. A minute later a carriage and engine could be seen flying
along the open curve which leads to the station. We had hardly time to
take our place behind a pile of luggage when it passed with a rattle
and a roar, beating a blast of hot air into our faces.
"There he goes," said Holmes, as we watched the carriage swing
and rock over the points. "There are limits, you see, to our friend's
intelligence. It would have been a coup-de-maitre had he deduced what I
would deduce and acted accordingly."
"And what would he have done had he overtaken us?"
"There cannot be the least doubt that he would have made a
murderous attack upon me. It is, however, a game at which two may play.
The question now is whether we should take a premature lunch here, or
run our chance of starving before we reach the buffet at Newhaven."
We made our way to Brussels that night and spent two days there,
moving on upon the third day as far as Strasbourg. On the Monday
morning Holmes had telegraphed to the London police, and in the evening
we found a reply waiting for us at our hotel. Holmes tore it open, and
then with a bitter curse hurled it into the grate.
"I might have known it!" he groaned. "He has escaped!"
"Moriarty?"
"They have secured the whole gang with the exception of him. He
has given them the slip. Of course, when I had left the country there
was no one to cope with him.But I did think that I had put the game in
their hands. I think that you had better return to England, Watson."
"Why?"
"Because you will find me a dangerous companion now. This man's
occupation is gone. He is lost if he returns to London. If I read his
character right, he will devote his whole energies to revenging himself
upon me. He said as much in our short interview, and I fancy that he
meant it. I should certainly recommend you to return to your practice."
It was hardly an appeal to be successful with one who was an old
campaigner as well as an old friend. We sat in the
Strasbourgsalle-a-manger arguing the question for half an hour, but the
same night we had resumed our journey and were well on our way to
Geneva.
For a charming week we wandered up the valley of the Rhone, and
then, branching off at Leuk, we made our way over the Gemmi Pass, still
deep in snow, and so, by way of Interlaken, to Meiringen. It was a
lovely trip, the dainty green of the spring below, the virgin white of
the winter above; but it was clear to me that never for one instant did
Holmes forget the shadow which lay across him. In the homely Alpine
villages or in the lonely mountain passes, I could still tell by his
quick glancing eyes and his sharp scrutiny of every face that passed
us, that he was well convinced that, walk where we would, we could not
walk ourselves clear of the danger which was dogging our footsteps
Once, I remember, as we passed over the Gemmi, and walked along
the border of the melancholy Daubensee, a large rock which had been
dislodged from the ridge upon our right clattered down and roared into
the lake behind us. In an instant Holmes had raced up on to the ridge,
and, standing upon a lofty pinnacle, craned his neck in every
direction. It was in vain that our guide assured him that a fall of
stones was a common chance in the springtime at that spot. He said
nothing, but he smiled at me with the air of a man who sees the
fulfillment of that which he had expected.
And yet for all his watchfulness he was never depressed. On the
contrary, I can never recollect having seen him in such exuberant
spirits. Again and again he recurred to the fact that if he could be
assured that society was freed from Professor Moriarty he would
cheerfully bring his own career to a conclusion.
"I think that I may go so far as to say, Watson, that I have
not lived wholly in vain," he remarked. "If my record were closed
to-night, I could still survey it with equanimity. The air of London is
the sweeter for my presence. In over a thousand cases I am not aware
that I have ever used my powers upon the wrong side. Of late I have
been tempted to look into the problems furnished by nature rather than
those more superficial ones to which our artificial state of society is
responsible. Your memoirs will draw to an end, Watson, upon the day
that I crown my career by the capture or extinction of the most
dangerous and capable criminal in Europe."
I shall be brief, and yet exact, in the little which remains for
me to tell. It is not a subject on which I would willingly dwell, and
yet I am conscious that a duty devolves upon me to omit no detail.
It
was on the third of May that we reached the little village of
Meiringen, where we put up at the Englischer Hofthen kept by Peter
Steiler the elder. Our landlord was an intelligent man and spoke
excellent English, having served for three years as waiter at the
Grosvenor Hotel in London. At his advice, on the afternoon of the
fourth we set off together, with the intention of crossing the hills
and spending the night at the hamlet of Rosenlaui. We had strict
injunctions, however, on no account to pass the falls of
Reichenbach, which are about halfway up the hills, without making a small detour to see them.
It
is, indeed, a fearful place. The torrent, swollen by the melting snow,
plunges into a tremendous abyss, from which the spray rolls up like the
smoke from a burning house. The shaft into which the river hurls itself
is an immense chasm, lined by glistening coal-black rock, and narrowing
into a creaming, boiling pit of incalculable depth, which brims over
and shoots the stream onward over its jagged lip. The long sweep of
green water roaring forever down, and the thick flickering curtain of
spray hissing forever upward, turn a man giddy with their constant
whirl and clamour. We stood near the edge peering down at the gleam of
the breaking water far below us against the black rocks, and listening
to the half-human shout which came booming up with the spray out of the
abyss.
The
path has been cut halfway round the fall to afford a complete view, but
it ends abruptly, and the traveler has to return as he came. We had
turned to do so, when we saw a Swiss lad come running along it with a
letter in his hand. It bore the mark of the hotel which we had just
left and was addressed to me by the landlord. It appeared that within a
very few minutes of our leaving, an English lady had arrived who was in
the last stage of consumption. She had wintered at Davos Platz and was
journeying now to join her friends at Lucerne, when a sudden hemorrhage
had overtaken her. It was thought that she could hardly live a few
hours, but it would be a great consolation to her to see an English
doctor, and, if I would only return, etc. The good Steiler assured me
in a postscript that he would himself look upon my compliance as a very
great favour, since the lady absolutely refused to see a Swiss
physician, and he could not but feel that he was incurring a great
responsibility.
The appeal was one which could not be
ignored. It was impossible to refuse the request of a
fellow-countrywoman dying in a strange land. Yet I had my scruples
about leaving Holmes. It was finally agreed, however, that he should
retain the young Swiss messenger with him as guide and companion while
I returned to Meiringen. My friend would stay some little time at the
fall, he said, and would then walk slowly over the hill to Rosenlaui,
where I was to rejoin him in the evening. As I turned away I saw
Holmes, with his back against a rock and his arms folded, gazing down
at the rush of the waters. It was the last that I was ever destined to
see of him in this world.
When I was near the bottom of the descent I looked back. It was
impossible, from that position, to see the fall, but I could see the
curving path which winds over the shoulder of the hills and leads to
it. Along this a man was, I remember, walking very rapidly.
I could see his black figure clearly outlined against the green
behind him. I noted him, and the energy with which he walked, but he
passed from my mind again as I hurried on upon my errand.
It may have been a little over an hour before I reached
Meiringen. Old Steiler was standing at the porch of his hotel.
"Well," said I, as I came hurrying up, "I trust that she is no worse?"
A look of surprise passed over his face, and at the first quiver
of his eyebrows my heart turned to lead in my breast.
"You did not write this?" I said, pulling the letter from my pocket.
"There is no sick Englishwoman in the hotel?"
"Certainly not!" he cried. "But it has the hotel mark upon it!
Ha, it must have been written by that tall Englishman who came in after
you had gone. He said --"
But I waited for none of the landlord's explanation. In a tingle
of fear I was already running down the village street, and making for
the path which I had so lately descended. It had taken me an hour to
come down. For all my efforts two more had passed before I found myself
at the fall of Reichenbach once more. There was Holmes's Alpine-stock
still leaning against the rock by which I had left him. But there was
no sign of him, and it was in vain that I shouted. My only answer was
my own voice reverberating in a rolling echo from the cliffs around me.
It was the sight of that Alpine-stock which turned me cold and
sick. He had not gone to Rosenlaui, then. He had remained on that
three-foot path, with sheer wall on one side and sheer drop on the
other, until his enemy had overtaken him. The young Swiss had gone too.
He had probably been in the pay of Moriarty and had left the two men
together. And then what had happened? Who was to tell us what had
happened then?
I stood for a minute or two to collect myself, for I was dazed
with the horror of the thing. Then I began to think of Holmes's own
methods and to try to practise them in reading this tragedy. It was,
alas, only too easy to do. During our conversation we had not gone to
the end of the path, and the Alpine-stock marked the place where we had
stood. The blackish soil is kept forever soft by the incessant drift of
spray, and a bird would leave its tread upon it. Two lines of footmarks
were clearly marked along the farther end of the path, both leading
away from me. There were none returning. A few yards from the end the
soil was all ploughed up into a patch of mud, and the brambles and
ferns which fringed the chasm were torn and bedraggled. I lay upon my
face and peered over with the spray spouting up all around me. It had
darkened since I left, and now I could only see here and there the
glistening of moisture upon the black walls, and far away down at the
end of the shaft the gleam of the broken water. I shouted; but only
that same half-human cry of the fall was borne back to my ears.
But it was destined that I should, after all, have a last word
of greeting from my friend and comrade. I have said that his
Alpine-stock had been left leaning against a rock which jutted on to
the path. From the top of this boulder the gleam of something bright
caught my eye, and raising my hand I found that it came from the silver
cigarette-case which he used to carry. As I took it up a small square
of paper upon which it had lain fluttered down on to the
ground. Unfolding it, I found that it consisted of three pages torn
from his notebook and addressed to me. It was characteristic of the man
that the direction was as precise and the writing as firm and clear, as
though it had been written in his study.
MY DEAR WATSON [it said]:I write these few lines through the courtesy of Mr. Moriarty, who
awaits my convenience for the final discussion of those questions which
lie between us. He has been giving me a sketch of the methods by which
he avoided the
English police and kept himself informed of our movements. They certainly confirm the very high opinion which
I had formed of his abilities.
I am pleased to think that I shall be able to free society from any
further effects of his presence, though I fear that it is at a cost
which will give pain to my friends, and especially, my dear Watson, to
you. I have already explained to you, however, that my career had in
any case reached its crisis, and that no possible conclusion to it
could be more congenial to me than this.
Indeed, if I may make a full confession to you, I was quite convinced that the letter from Meiringen was a hoax, and I
allowed you to depart on that errand under the persuasion that some development of this sort would follow. Tell
Inspector Patterson that the papers which he needs to convict the gang are in pigeonhole M., done up in a blue envelope
and inscribed "Moriarty." I made every disposition of my property before leaving England and handed it to my brother
Mycroft. Pray give my greetings to Mrs. Watson, and believe me to be, my dear fellow Very sincerely yours,
SHERLOCK HOLMES. |