Doyle - His Last Bow, Arthur Conan Doyle
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His Last Bow
Doyle, Arthur Conan
Published:
1917
Type(s):
Short Fiction, Crime/Mystery, Collections
Source:
Wikisource
1
About Doyle:
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle, DL (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930) was a
Scottish author most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock
Holmes, which are generally considered a major innovation in the field
of crime fiction, and the adventures of Professor Challenger. He was a
prolific writer whose other works include science fiction stories, historic-
al novels, plays and romances, poetry, and non-fiction.
Conan was originally a given name, but Doyle used it as part of his
surname in his later years.
Source: Wikipedia
Also available on Feedbooks for Doyle:
•
(1892)
•
(1893)
•
(1923)
•
(1905)
•
(1912)
•
(1902)
•
(1887)
•
(1890)
•
(1915)
•
(1928)
Copyright:
This work is available for countries where copyright is
Life+70.
Cette oeuvre est disponible pour les pays où le droit d'auteur est de 70
ans après mort de l'auteur.
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2
Chapter
1
The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge
1. The Singular Experience of Mr. John Scott Eccles
I find it recorded in my notebook that it was a bleak and windy day to-
wards the end of March in the year 1892. Holmes had received a tele-
gram while we sat at our lunch, and he had scribbled a reply. He made
no remark, but the matter remained in his thoughts, for he stood in front
of the fire afterwards with a thoughtful face, smoking his pipe, and cast-
ing an occasional glance at the message. Suddenly he turned upon me
with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes.
"I suppose, Watson, we must look upon you as a man of letters," said
he. "How do you define the word 'grotesque'?"
"Strange—remarkable," I suggested.
He shook his head at my definition.
"There is surely something more than that," said he; "some underlying
suggestion of the tragic and the terrible. If you cast your mind back to
some of those narratives with which you have afflicted a long-suffering
public, you will recognize how often the grotesque has deepened into
the criminal. Think of that little affair of the red-headed men. That was
grotesque enough in the outset, and yet it ended in a desperate attempt
at robbery. Or, again, there was that most grotesque affair of the five or-
ange pips, which let straight to a murderous conspiracy. The word puts
me on the alert."
"Have you it there?" I asked.
He read the telegram aloud.
"Have just had most incredible and grotesque experience. May I con-
sult you?
"Scott Eccles,
"Post Office, Charing Cross."
"Man or woman?" I asked.
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"Oh, man, of course. No woman would ever send a reply-paid tele-
gram. She would have come."
"Will you see him?"
"My dear Watson, you know how bored I have been since we locked
up Colonel Carruthers. My mind is like a racing engine, tearing itself to
pieces because it is not connected up with the work for which it was
built. Life is commonplace, the papers are sterile; audacity and romance
seem to have passed forever from the criminal world. Can you ask me,
then, whether I am ready to look into any new problem, however trivial
it may prove? But here, unless I am mistaken, is our client."
A measured step was heard upon the stairs, and a moment later a
stout, tall, gray-whiskered and solemnly respectable person was ushered
into the room. His life history was written in his heavy features and
pompous manner. From his spats to his gold-rimmed spectacles he was a
Conservative, a churchman, a good citizen, orthodox and conventional
to the last degree. But some amazing experience had disturbed his native
composure and left its traces in his bristling hair, his flushed, angry
cheeks, and his flurried, excited manner. He plunged instantly into his
business.
"I have had a most singular and unpleasant experience, Mr. Holmes,"
said he. "Never in my life have I been placed in such a situation. It is
most improper—most outrageous. I must insist upon some explanation."
He swelled and puffed in his anger.
"Pray sit down, Mr. Scott Eccles," said Holmes in a soothing voice.
"May I ask, in the first place, why you came to me at all?"
"Well, sir, it did not appear to be a matter which concerned the police,
and yet, when you have heard the facts, you must admit that I could not
leave it where it was. Private detectives are a class with whom I have ab-
solutely no sympathy, but none the less, having heard your name—"
"Quite so. But, in the second place, why did you not come at once?"
Holmes glanced at his watch.
"It is a quarter-past two," he said. "Your telegram was dispatched
about one. But no one can glance at your toilet and attire without seeing
that your disturbance dates from the moment of your waking."
Our client smoothed down his unbrushed hair and felt his unshaven
chin.
"You are right, Mr. Holmes. I never gave a thought to my toilet. I was
only too glad to get out of such a house. But I have been running round
4
making inquiries before I came to you. I went to the house agents, you
know, and they said that Mr. Garcia's rent was paid up all right and that
everything was in order at Wisteria Lodge."
"Come, come, sir," said Holmes, laughing. "You are like my friend, Dr.
Watson, who has a bad habit of telling his stories wrong end foremost.
Please arrange your thoughts and let me know, in their due sequence,
exactly what those events are which have sent you out unbrushed and
unkempt, with dress boots and waistcoat buttoned awry, in search of ad-
vice and assistance."
Our client looked down with a rueful face at his own unconventional
appearance.
"I'm sure it must look very bad, Mr. Holmes, and I am not aware that
in my whole life such a thing has ever happened before. But will tell you
the whole queer business, and when I have done so you will admit, I am
sure, that there has been enough to excuse me."
But his narrative was nipped in the bud. There was a bustle outside,
and Mrs. Hudson opened the door to usher in two robust and official-
looking individuals, one of whom was well known to us as Inspector
Gregson of Scotland Yard, an energetic, gallant, and, within his limita-
tions, a capable officer. He shook hands with Holmes and introduced his
comrade as Inspector Baynes, of the Surrey Constabulary.
"We are hunting together, Mr. Holmes, and our trail lay in this direc-
tion." He turned his bulldog eyes upon our visitor. "Are you Mr. John
Scott Eccles, of Popham House, Lee?"
"I am."
"We have been following you about all the morning."
"You traced him through the telegram, no doubt," said Holmes.
"Exactly, Mr. Holmes. We picked up the scent at Charing Cross Post-
Office and came on here."
"But why do you follow me? What do you want?"
"We wish a statement, Mr. Scott Eccles, as to the events which let up to
the death last night of Mr. Aloysius Garcia, of Wisteria Lodge, near
Esher."
Our client had sat up with staring eyes and every tinge of colour
struck from his astonished face.
"Dead? Did you say he was dead?"
"Yes, sir, he is dead."
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