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THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES by SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE
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ADVENTURE III. A CASE OF IDENTITY
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"My dear fellow," said Sherlock Holmes as we sat on either side of the fire in his
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lodgings at Baker Street, "life is infinitely stranger than anything which the
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mind of man could invent.
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We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of
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existence.
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If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently
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remove the roofs, and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange
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coincidences, the plannings, the cross-
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purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to
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the most outré results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and
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foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable."
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"And yet I am not convinced of it," I answered.
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"The cases which come to light in the papers are, as a rule, bald enough, and
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vulgar enough.
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We have in our police reports realism pushed to its extreme limits, and yet the
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result is, it must be confessed, neither fascinating nor artistic."
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"A certain selection and discretion must be used in producing a realistic effect,"
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remarked Holmes.
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"This is wanting in the police report, where more stress is laid, perhaps, upon
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the platitudes of the magistrate than upon the details, which to an observer contain
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the vital essence of the whole matter.
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Depend upon it, there is nothing so unnatural as the commonplace."
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I smiled and shook my head. "I can quite understand your thinking so,"
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I said.
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"Of course, in your position of unofficial adviser and helper to everybody who is
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absolutely puzzled, throughout three continents, you are brought in contact with
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all that is strange and bizarre.
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But here"--I picked up the morning paper from the ground--"let us put it to a
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practical test. Here is the first heading upon which I
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come.
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'A husband's cruelty to his wife.' There is half a column of print, but I know
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without reading it that it is all perfectly familiar to me.
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There is, of course, the other woman, the drink, the push, the blow, the bruise, the
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sympathetic sister or landlady. The crudest of writers could invent nothing
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more crude."
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"Indeed, your example is an unfortunate one for your argument," said Holmes, taking the
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paper and glancing his eye down it.
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"This is the Dundas separation case, and, as it happens, I was engaged in clearing up
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some small points in connection with it.
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The husband was a teetotaler, there was no other woman, and the conduct complained of
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was that he had drifted into the habit of winding up every meal by taking out his
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false teeth and hurling them at his wife,
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which, you will allow, is not an action likely to occur to the imagination of the
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average story-teller.
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Take a pinch of snuff, Doctor, and acknowledge that I have scored over you in
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your example." He held out his snuffbox of old gold, with
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a great amethyst in the centre of the lid.
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Its splendour was in such contrast to his homely ways and simple life that I could
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not help commenting upon it. "Ah," said he, "I forgot that I had not
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seen you for some weeks.
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It is a little souvenir from the King of Bohemia in return for my assistance in the
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case of the Irene Adler papers." "And the ring?"
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I asked, glancing at a remarkable brilliant which sparkled upon his finger.
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"It was from the reigning family of Holland, though the matter in which I
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served them was of such delicacy that I cannot confide it even to you, who have
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been good enough to chronicle one or two of my little problems."
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"And have you any on hand just now?" I asked with interest.
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"Some ten or twelve, but none which present any feature of interest.
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They are important, you understand, without being interesting.
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Indeed, I have found that it is usually in unimportant matters that there is a field
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for the observation, and for the quick analysis of cause and effect which gives
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the charm to an investigation.
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The larger crimes are apt to be the simpler, for the bigger the crime the more
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obvious, as a rule, is the motive.
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In these cases, save for one rather intricate matter which has been referred to
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me from Marseilles, there is nothing which presents any features of interest.
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It is possible, however, that I may have something better before very many minutes
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are over, for this is one of my clients, or I am much mistaken."
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He had risen from his chair and was standing between the parted blinds gazing
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down into the dull neutral-tinted London street.
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Looking over his shoulder, I saw that on the pavement opposite there stood a large
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woman with a heavy fur boa round her neck, and a large curling red feather in a broad-
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brimmed hat which was tilted in a
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coquettish Duchess of Devonshire fashion over her ear.
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From under this great panoply she peeped up in a nervous, hesitating fashion at our
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windows, while her body oscillated backward and forward, and her fingers fidgeted with
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her glove buttons.
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Suddenly, with a plunge, as of the swimmer who leaves the bank, she hurried across the
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road, and we heard the sharp clang of the bell.
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"I have seen those symptoms before," said Holmes, throwing his cigarette into the
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fire. "Oscillation upon the pavement always means
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an affaire de coeur.
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She would like advice, but is not sure that the matter is not too delicate for
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communication. And yet even here we may discriminate.
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When a woman has been seriously wronged by a man she no longer oscillates, and the
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usual symptom is a broken bell wire.
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Here we may take it that there is a love matter, but that the maiden is not so much
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angry as perplexed, or grieved. But here she comes in person to resolve our
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doubts."
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As he spoke there was a tap at the door, and the boy in buttons entered to announce
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Miss Mary Sutherland, while the lady herself loomed behind his small black
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figure like a full-sailed merchant-man behind a tiny pilot boat.
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Sherlock Holmes welcomed her with the easy courtesy for which he was remarkable, and,
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having closed the door and bowed her into an armchair, he looked her over in the
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minute and yet abstracted fashion which was peculiar to him.
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"Do you not find," he said, "that with your short sight it is a little trying to do so
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much typewriting?"
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"I did at first," she answered, "but now I know where the letters are without
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looking."
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Then, suddenly realising the full purport of his words, she gave a violent start and
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looked up, with fear and astonishment upon her broad, good-humoured face.
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"You've heard about me, Mr. Holmes," she cried, "else how could you know all that?"
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"Never mind," said Holmes, laughing; "it is my business to know things.
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Perhaps I have trained myself to see what others overlook.
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If not, why should you come to consult me?"
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"I came to you, sir, because I heard of you from Mrs. Etherege, whose husband you found
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so easy when the police and everyone had given him up for dead.
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Oh, Mr. Holmes, I wish you would do as much for me.
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I'm not rich, but still I have a hundred a year in my own right, besides the little
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that I make by the machine, and I would give it all to know what has become of Mr.
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Hosmer Angel."
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"Why did you come away to consult me in such a hurry?" asked Sherlock Holmes, with
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his finger-tips together and his eyes to the ceiling.
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Again a startled look came over the somewhat vacuous face of Miss Mary
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Sutherland.
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"Yes, I did bang out of the house," she said, "for it made me angry to see the easy
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way in which Mr. Windibank--that is, my father--took it all.
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He would not go to the police, and he would not go to you, and so at last, as he would
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do nothing and kept on saying that there was no harm done, it made me mad, and I
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just on with my things and came right away to you."
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"Your father," said Holmes, "your stepfather, surely, since the name is
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different."
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"Yes, my stepfather. I call him father, though it sounds funny,
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too, for he is only five years and two months older than myself."
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"And your mother is alive?"
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"Oh, yes, mother is alive and well. I wasn't best pleased, Mr. Holmes, when she
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married again so soon after father's death, and a man who was nearly fifteen years
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younger than herself.
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Father was a plumber in the Tottenham Court Road, and he left a tidy business behind
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him, which mother carried on with Mr. Hardy, the foreman; but when Mr. Windibank
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came he made her sell the business, for he
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was very superior, being a traveller in wines.
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They got 4700 pounds for the goodwill and interest, which wasn't near as much as
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father could have got if he had been alive."
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I had expected to see Sherlock Holmes impatient under this rambling and
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inconsequential narrative, but, on the contrary, he had listened with the greatest
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concentration of attention.
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"Your own little income," he asked, "does it come out of the business?"
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"Oh, no, sir. It is quite separate and was left me by my
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uncle Ned in Auckland.
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It is in New Zealand stock, paying 4 1/2 per cent.
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Two thousand five hundred pounds was the amount, but I can only touch the interest."
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"You interest me extremely," said Holmes.
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"And since you draw so large a sum as a hundred a year, with what you earn into the
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bargain, you no doubt travel a little and indulge yourself in every way.
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I believe that a single lady can get on very nicely upon an income of about 60
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pounds."
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"I could do with much less than that, Mr. Holmes, but you understand that as long as
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I live at home I don't wish to be a burden to them, and so they have the use of the
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money just while I am staying with them.
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Of course, that is only just for the time. Mr. Windibank draws my interest every
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quarter and pays it over to mother, and I find that I can do pretty well with what I
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earn at typewriting.
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It brings me twopence a sheet, and I can often do from fifteen to twenty sheets in a
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day." "You have made your position very clear to
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me," said Holmes.
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"This is my friend, Dr. Watson, before whom you can speak as freely as before myself.
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Kindly tell us now all about your connection with Mr. Hosmer Angel."
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A flush stole over Miss Sutherland's face, and she picked nervously at the fringe of
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her jacket. "I met him first at the gasfitters' ball,"
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she said.
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"They used to send father tickets when he was alive, and then afterwards they
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remembered us, and sent them to mother. Mr. Windibank did not wish us to go.
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He never did wish us to go anywhere.
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He would get quite mad if I wanted so much as to join a Sunday-school treat.
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But this time I was set on going, and I would go; for what right had he to prevent?
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He said the folk were not fit for us to know, when all father's friends were to be
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there.
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And he said that I had nothing fit to wear, when I had my purple plush that I had never
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so much as taken out of the drawer.
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At last, when nothing else would do, he went off to France upon the business of the
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firm, but we went, mother and I, with Mr. Hardy, who used to be our foreman, and it
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was there I met Mr. Hosmer Angel."
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"I suppose," said Holmes, "that when Mr. Windibank came back from France he was very
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annoyed at your having gone to the ball." "Oh, well, he was very good about it.
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He laughed, I remember, and shrugged his shoulders, and said there was no use
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denying anything to a woman, for she would have her way."
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"I see.
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Then at the gasfitters' ball you met, as I understand, a gentleman called Mr. Hosmer
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Angel." "Yes, sir.
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I met him that night, and he called next day to ask if we had got home all safe, and
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after that we met him--that is to say, Mr. Holmes, I met him twice for walks, but
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after that father came back again, and Mr.
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Hosmer Angel could not come to the house any more."
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"No?" "Well, you know father didn't like anything
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of the sort.
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He wouldn't have any visitors if he could help it, and he used to say that a woman
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should be happy in her own family circle.
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But then, as I used to say to mother, a woman wants her own circle to begin with,
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and I had not got mine yet." "But how about Mr. Hosmer Angel?
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Did he make no attempt to see you?"
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"Well, father was going off to France again in a week, and Hosmer wrote and said that
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it would be safer and better not to see each other until he had gone.
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We could write in the meantime, and he used to write every day.
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I took the letters in in the morning, so there was no need for father to know."
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"Were you engaged to the gentleman at this time?"
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"Oh, yes, Mr. Holmes. We were engaged after the first walk that
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we took.
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Hosmer--Mr. Angel--was a cashier in an office in Leadenhall Street--and--"
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"What office?" "That's the worst of it, Mr. Holmes, I
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don't know."
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"Where did he live, then?" "He slept on the premises."
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"And you don't know his address?" "No--except that it was Leadenhall Street."
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"Where did you address your letters, then?"
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"To the Leadenhall Street Post Office, to be left till called for.
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He said that if they were sent to the office he would be chaffed by all the other
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clerks about having letters from a lady, so I offered to typewrite them, like he did
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his, but he wouldn't have that, for he said
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that when I wrote them they seemed to come from me, but when they were typewritten he
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always felt that the machine had come between us.
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That will just show you how fond he was of me, Mr. Holmes, and the little things that
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he would think of." "It was most suggestive," said Holmes.
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"It has long been an axiom of mine that the little things are infinitely the most
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important. Can you remember any other little things
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about Mr. Hosmer Angel?"
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"He was a very shy man, Mr. Holmes. He would rather walk with me in the evening
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than in the daylight, for he said that he hated to be conspicuous.
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Very retiring and gentlemanly he was.
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Even his voice was gentle. He'd had the quinsy and swollen glands when
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he was young, he told me, and it had left him with a weak throat, and a hesitating,
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whispering fashion of speech.
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He was always well dressed, very neat and plain, but his eyes were weak, just as mine
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are, and he wore tinted glasses against the glare."
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"Well, and what happened when Mr. Windibank, your stepfather, returned to
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France?"
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"Mr. Hosmer Angel came to the house again and proposed that we should marry before