2 Birlstone Manor

Chapter 2 Birlstone Manor Half an hour later, we reached Pitt Street. As we drew up to number 131, we found a curious crowd gathered by its front steps. "By George!" said Holmes. "Only a murder would draw a throng like this. Look, Watson, the top step has been mopped down while the rest are dry. What does that tell us? Let's see what Lestrade has to say." The policeman greeted us solemnly and showed us into a sitting room where an agitated middle-aged man in a dressing gown was pacing

up and down. Lestrade introduced him as Mr. Horace Harker, a newspaper journalist and the owner of the house. "It's the Napoleon bust business again," said Lestrade, "and the affair has taken a much darker turn." "What kind of turn?" "Murder, Mr. Holmes." He turned to Harker. "Perhaps you could tell these gentlemen exactly what happened, sir." The man in the dressing gown stopped pacing and gazed at us with a sorrowful expression. "It's quite extraordinary," he said. "I've spent my

entire life writing about other people's news, and now that the news has happened to me, I'm too confused and upset to write a word. "Instead, I'm giving away my story for free to every reporter who happens by. I've heard of you, Mr. Holmes, and if you'd only explain this strange business, that would more than compensate me for telling you the story." We sat down and listened. "As a journalist I do a lot of my work at night, writing until the early hours. At about three o'clock, I was in my study upstairs when I heard some sounds coming from down here. I sat listening for a while longer, but they weren't repeated and I figured they'd come from outside. Then, about five minutes later, I heard a horrible scream—the most dreadful sound I ever heard, Mr. Holmes. I sat frozen with horror for a moment, then seized the poker and went downstairs. On entering this room, I found the window wide open and I immediately noticed my bust of Napoleon was missing from the mantelpiece. Why any burglar would take such a

thing I've no idea, for it was only a plaster cast and of no great value." "Where did you obtain the bust?" asked Holmes. "I bought it at Harding Brothers in Kensington High Street about four months ago." Holmes nodded. "Please go on with your story." "I went into the hall and opened the door to see if I could catch sight of the burglar.

"However, as I stepped out into the dark, I nearly fell over the body of a dead man lying there on the front step. The poor fellow had been stabbed. I was in a terrible panic—but somehow, I managed to raise the alarm with my whistle. Then I must have fainted, for the next thing I knew a policeman was standing over me in the hall." "Who was the murdered man?" asked Holmes. "We found nothing to identify him," said Lestrade. "You'll see him at the mortuary. He's

tall, sunburned, very powerful but poorly dressed, and not more than thirty. A horn- handled knife was lying beside him when he was found. Whether or not it was the murder weapon, we don't know. It could have belonged to the victim himself. All we found in his pockets was an apple, some string, a pocket map of London, and a photograph. Here it is." The photograph showed an alert, sharp- featured man with thick eyebrows and a stern expression. "What happened to the bust?" asked Holmes after studying the picture. "It was found just before you arrived in the front garden of a nearby empty house. It was