The Return of Sherlock Holmes
recover them in order to do the right thing by his father’s
creditors. After his flight he did not dare to approach the hut
again for some time, but at last he forced himself to do so in
order to obtain the information which he needed. Surely that is
all simple and obvious?”
Holmes smiled and shook his head.
“It seems to me to have only one drawback, Hopkins, and that is
that it is intrinsically impossible. Have you tried to drive a
harpoon through a body? No? Tut, tut my dear sir, you must really
pay attention to these details. My friend Watson could tell you
that I spent a whole morning in that exercise. It is no easy
matter, and requires a strong and practised arm. But this blow
was delivered with such violence that the head of the weapon sank
deep into the wall. Do you imagine that this anæmic youth was
capable of so frightful an assault? Is he the man who hobnobbed
in rum and water with Black Peter in the dead of the night? Was
it his profile that was seen on the blind two nights before? No,
no, Hopkins, it is another and more formidable person for whom we
must seek.”
The detective’s face had grown longer and longer during Holmes’s
speech. His hopes and his ambitions were all crumbling about him.
But he would not abandon his position without a struggle.
“You can’t deny that Neligan was present that night, Mr. Holmes.
The book will prove that. I fancy that I have evidence enough to
satisfy a jury, even if you are able to pick a hole in it.
Besides, Mr. Holmes, I have laid my hand upon _my_ man. As to
this terrible person of yours, where is he?”
“I rather fancy that he is on the stair,” said Holmes, serenely.
“I think, Watson, that you would do well to put that revolver
where you can reach it.” He rose and laid a written paper upon a
side-table. “Now we are ready,” said he.
There had been some talking in gruff voices outside, and now Mrs.
Hudson opened the door to say that there were three men inquiring
for Captain Basil.
“Show them in one by one,” said Holmes.
“The first who entered was a little Ribston pippin of a man, with
ruddy cheeks and fluffy white side-whiskers. Holmes had drawn a
letter from his pocket.
“What name?” he asked.
“James Lancaster.”
“I am sorry, Lancaster, but the berth is full. Here is half a
sovereign for your trouble. Just step into this room and wait
there for a few minutes.”
The second man was a long, dried-up creature, with lank hair and
sallow cheeks. His name was Hugh Pattins. He also received his
dismissal, his half-sovereign, and the order to wait.
The third applicant was a man of remarkable appearance. A fierce
bull-dog face was framed in a tangle of hair and beard, and two
bold, dark eyes gleamed behind the cover of thick, tufted,
overhung eyebrows. He saluted and stood sailor-fashion, turning
his cap round in his hands.
“Your name?” asked Holmes.
“Patrick Cairns.”
“Harpooner?”
“Yes, sir. Twenty-six voyages.”
“Dundee, I suppose?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And ready to start with an exploring ship?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What wages?”
“Eight pounds a month.”
“Could you start at once?”
“As soon as I get my kit.”
“Have you your papers?”
“Yes, sir.” He took a sheaf of worn and greasy forms from his
pocket. Holmes glanced over them and returned them.
“You are just the man I want,” said he. “Here’s the agreement on
the side-table. If you sign it the whole matter will be settled.”
The seaman lurched across the room and took up the pen.
“Shall I sign here?” he asked, stooping over the table.
Holmes leaned over his shoulder and passed both hands over his
neck.
“This will do,” said he.
I heard a click of steel and a bellow like an enraged bull. The
next instant Holmes and the seaman were rolling on the ground
together. He was a man of such gigantic strength that, even with
the handcuffs which Holmes had so deftly fastened upon his
wrists, he would have very quickly overpowered my friend had
Hopkins and I not rushed to his rescue. Only when I pressed the
cold muzzle of the revolver to his temple did he at last
understand that resistance was vain. We lashed his ankles with
cord, and rose breathless from the struggle.
“I must really apologize, Hopkins,” said Sherlock Holmes. “I fear
that the scrambled eggs are cold. However, you will enjoy the
rest of your breakfast all the better, will you not, for the
thought that you have brought your case to a triumphant
conclusion.”
Stanley Hopkins was speechless with amazement.
“I don’t know what to say, Mr. Holmes,” he blurted out at last,
with a very red face. “It seems to me that I have been making a
fool of myself from the beginning. I understand now, what I
should never have forgotten, that I am the pupil and you are the
master. Even now I see what you have done, but I don’t know how
you did it or what it signifies.”
“Well, well,” said Holmes, good-humouredly. “We all learn by
experience, and your lesson this time is that you should never
lose sight of the alternative. You were so absorbed in young
Neligan that you could not spare a thought to Patrick Cairns, the
true murderer of Peter Carey.”
The hoarse voice of the seaman broke in on our conversation.
“See here, mister,” said he, “I make no complaint of being
man-handled in this fashion, but I would have you call things by
their right names. You say I murdered Peter Carey, I say I
_killed_ Peter Carey, and there’s all the difference. Maybe you
don’t believe what I say. Maybe you think I am just slinging you
a yarn.”
“Not at all,” said Holmes. “Let us hear what you have to say.”
“It’s soon told, and, by the Lord, every word of it is truth. I
knew Black Peter, and when he pulled out his knife I whipped a
harpoon through him sharp, for I knew that it was him or me.
That’s how he died. You can call it murder. Anyhow, I’d as soon
die with a rope round my neck as with Black Peter’s knife in my
heart.”
“How came you there?” asked Holmes.
“I’ll tell it you from the beginning. Just sit me up a little, so
as I can speak easy. It was in ’83 that it happened—August of
that year. Peter Carey was master of the _Sea Unicorn_, and I was
spare harpooner. We were coming out of the ice-pack on our way
home, with head winds and a week’s southerly gale, when we picked
up a little craft that had been blown north. There was one man on
her—a landsman. The crew had thought she would founder and had
made for the Norwegian coast in the dinghy. I guess they were all
drowned. Well, we took him on board, this man, and he and the
skipper had some long talks in the cabin. All the baggage we took
off with him was one tin box. So far as I know, the man’s name
was never mentioned, and on the second night he disappeared as if
he had never been. It was given out that he had either thrown
himself overboard or fallen overboard in the heavy weather that
we were having. Only one man knew what had happened to him, and
that was me, for, with my own eyes, I saw the skipper tip up his
heels and put him over the rail in the middle watch of a dark
night, two days before we sighted the Shetland Lights. Well, I
kept my knowledge to myself, and waited to see what would come of
it. When we got back to Scotland it was easily hushed up, and
nobody asked any questions. A stranger died by accident and it
was nobody’s business to inquire. Shortly after Peter Carey gave
up the sea, and it was long years before I could find where he
was. I guessed that he had done the deed for the sake of what was
in that tin box, and that he could afford now to pay me well for
keeping my mouth shut. I found out where he was through a sailor
man that had met him in London, and down I went to squeeze him.
The first night he was reasonable enough, and was ready to give
me what would make me free of the sea for life. We were to fix it
all two nights later. When I came, I found him three parts drunk
and in a vile temper. We sat down and we drank and we yarned
about old times, but the more he drank the less I liked the look
on his face. I spotted that harpoon upon the wall, and I thought
I might need it before I was through. Then at last he broke out
at me, spitting and cursing, with murder in his eyes and a great
clasp-knife in his hand. He had not time to get it from the
sheath before I had the harpoon through him. Heavens! what a yell
he gave! and his face gets between me and my sleep. I stood
there, with his blood splashing round me, and I waited for a bit,
but all was quiet, so I took heart once more. I looked round, and
there was the tin box on the shelf. I had as much right to it as
Peter Carey, anyhow, so I took it with me and left the hut. Like
a fool I left my baccy-pouch upon the table.
“Now I’ll tell you the queerest part of the whole story. I had
hardly got outside the hut when I heard someone coming, and I hid
among the bushes. A man came slinking along, went into the hut,
gave a cry as if he had seen a ghost, and legged it as hard as he
could run until he was out of sight. Who he was or what he wanted
is more than I can tell. For my part I walked ten miles, got a
train at Tunbridge Wells, and so reached London, and no one the
wiser.
“Well, when I came to examine the box I found there was no money
in it, and nothing but papers that I would not dare to sell. I
had lost my hold on Black Peter and was stranded in London
without a shilling. There was only my trade left. I saw these
advertisements about harpooners, and high wages, so I went to the
shipping agents, and they sent me here. That’s all I know, and I
say again that if I killed Black Peter, the law should give me
thanks, for I saved them the price of a hempen rope.”
“A very clear statement,” said Holmes, “rising and lighting his
pipe. “I think, Hopkins, that you should lose no time in
conveying your prisoner to a place of safety. This room is not
well adapted for a cell, and Mr. Patrick Cairns occupies too
large a proportion of our carpet.”
“Mr. Holmes,” said Hopkins, “I do not know how to express my
gratitude. Even now I do not understand how you attained this
result.”
“Simply by having the good fortune to get the right clue from the
beginning. It is very possible if I had known about this notebook
it might have led away my thoughts, as it did yours. But all I
heard pointed in the one direction. The amazing strength, the
skill in the use of the harpoon, the rum and water, the sealskin
tobacco-pouch with the coarse tobacco—all these pointed to a
seaman, and one who had been a whaler. I was convinced that the
initials ‘P.C.’ upon the pouch were a coincidence, and not those
of Peter Carey, since he seldom smoked, and no pipe was found in