"You found something compromising?"
"Absolutely nothing. That was what amazed me. However, you have nowseen the point of the picture. It shows him to be a very wealthy man.How did he acquire wealth? He is unmarried. His younger brother is astation master in the west of England. His chair is worth seven hundreda year. And he owns a Greuze."
"Well?"
"Surely the inference is plain."
"You mean that he has a great income and that he must earn it in anillegal fashion?"
"Exactly. Of course I have other reasons for thinking so--dozens ofexiguous threads which lead vaguely up towards the centre of the webwhere the poisonous, motionless creature is lurking. I only mention theGreuze because it brings the matter within the range of your ownobservation."
"Well, Mr. Holmes, I admit that what you say is interesting: it's morethan interesting--it's just wonderful. But let us have it a littleclearer if you can. Is it forgery, coining, burglary--where does themoney come from?"
"Have you ever read of Jonathan Wild?"
"Well, the name has a familiar sound. Someone in a novel, was he not? Idon't take much stock of detectives in novels--chaps that do things andnever let you see how they do them. That's just inspiration: notbusiness."
"Jonathan Wild wasn't a detective, and he wasn't in a novel.
He was amaster criminal, and he lived last century--1750 or thereabouts."
"Then he's no use to me. I'm a practical man."
"Mr. Mac, the most practical thing that you ever did in your life wouldbe to shut yourself up for three months and read twelve hours a day atthe annals of crime. Everything comes in circles--even ProfessorMoriarty. Jonathan Wild was the hidden force of the London criminals,to whom he sold his brains and his organization on a fifteen per centcommission. The old wheel turns, and the same spoke comes up. It's allbeen done before, and will be again. I'll tell you one or two thingsabout Moriarty which may interest you."
"You'll interest me, right enough."
"I happen to know who is the first link in his chain--a chain with thisNapoleon-gone-wrong at one end, and a hundred broken fighting men,pickpockets, blackmailers, and card sharpers at the other, with everysort of crime in between. His chief of staff is Colonel SebastianMoran, as aloof and guarded and inaccessible to the law as himself.What do you think he pays him?"
"I'd like to hear."
"Six thousand a year. That's paying for brains, you see--the Americanbusiness principle. I learned that detail quite by chance. It's morethan the Prime Minister gets. That gives you an idea of Moriarty'sgains and of the scale on which he works. Another point: I made it mybusiness to hunt down some of Moriarty's checks lately--just commoninnocent checks that he pays his household bills with. They were drawnon six different banks. Does that make any impression on your mind?"
"Queer, certainly! But what do you gather from it?"
"That he wanted no gossip about his wealth. No single man should knowwhat he had. I have no doubt that he has twenty banking accounts; thebulk of his fortune abroad in the Deutsche Bank or the Credit Lyonnaisas likely as not. Sometime when you have a year or two to spare Icommend to you the study of Professor Moriarty."
Inspector MacDonald had grown steadily more impressed as theconversation proceeded. He had lost himself in his interest. Now hispractical Scotch intelligence brought him back with a snap to thematter in hand.
"He can keep, anyhow," said he. "You've got us side-tracked with yourinteresting anecdotes, Mr. Holmes. What really counts is your remarkthat there is some connection between the professor and the crime. Thatyou get from the warning received through the man Porlock. Can we forour present practical needs get any further than that?"
"We may form some conception as to the motives of the crime. It is, asI gather from your original remarks, an inexplicable, or at least anunexplained, murder. Now, presuming that the source of the crime is aswe suspect it to be, there might be two different motives. In the firstplace, I may tell you that Moriarty rules with a rod of iron over hispeople. His discipline is tremendous. There is only one punishment inhis code. It is death. Now we might suppose that this murderedman--this Douglas whose approaching fate was known by one of thearch-criminal's subordinates--had in some way betrayed the chief. Hispunishment followed, and would be known to all--if only to put the fearof death into them."
"Well, that is one suggestion, Mr. Holmes."
"The other is that it has been engineered by Moriarty in the ordinarycourse of business. Was there any robbery?"
"I have not heard."
"If so, it would, of course, be against the first hypothesis and infavour of the second. Moriarty may have been engaged to engineer it ona promise of part spoils, or he may have been paid so much down tomanage it. Either is possible. But whichever it may be, or if it issome third combination, it is down at Birlstone that we must seek thesolution. I know our man too well to suppose that he has left anythingup here which may lead us to him."
"Then to Birlstone we must go!" cried MacDonald, jumping from hischair. "My word! it's later than I thought. I can give you, gentlemen,five minutes for preparation, and that is all."
"And ample for us both," said Holmes, as he sprang up and hastened tochange from his dressing gown to his coat. "While we are on our way,Mr. Mac, I will ask you to be good enough to tell me all about it."
"All about it" proved to be disappointingly little, and yet there wasenough to assure us that the case before us might well be worthy of theexpert's closest attention. He brightened and rubbed his thin handstogether as he listened to the meagre but remarkable details. A longseries of sterile weeks lay behind us, and here at last there was afitting object for those remarkable powers which, like all specialgifts, become irksome to their owner when they are not in use. Thatrazor brain blunted and rusted with inaction.
Sherlock Holmes's eyes glistened, his pale cheeks took a warmer hue,and his whole eager face shone with an inward light when the call forwork reached him. Leaning forward in the cab, he listened intently toMacDonald's short sketch of the problem which awaited us in Sussex. Theinspector was himself dependent, as he explained to us, upon ascribbled account forwarded to him by the milk train in the early hoursof the morning. White Mason, the local officer, was a personal friend,and hence MacDonald had been notified much more promptly than is usualat Scotland Yard when provincials need their assistance. It is a verycold scent upon which the Metropolitan expert is generally asked to run.