as long as I live at home I don’t wish to be a burden to them, and so

they have the use of the money just while I am staying with them. Of course,

that is only just for the time. Mr. Windibank draws my interest every quarter

and pays it over to mother, and I find that I can do pretty well with what I

earn at typewriting. It brings me twopence a sheet, and I can often do from

fifteen to twenty sheets in a day.”


“You have made your position very clear to me,” said Holmes.

“This is my friend, Dr. Watson, before whom you can speak as freely as

before myself. Kindly tell us now all about your connection with Mr. Hosmer

Angel.”


A flush stole over Miss Sutherland’s face, and she picked nervously at

the fringe of her jacket. “I met him first at the gasfitters’

ball,” she said. “They used to send father tickets when he was

alive, and then afterwards they remembered us, and sent them to mother. Mr.

Windibank did not wish us to go. He never did wish us to go anywhere. He would

get quite mad if I wanted so much as to join a Sunday-school treat. But this

time I was set on going, and I would go; for what right had he to prevent? He

said the folk were not fit for us to know, when all father’s friends were

to be there. And he said that I had nothing fit to wear, when I had my purple

plush that I had never so much as taken out of the drawer. At last, when

nothing else would do, he went off to France upon the business of the firm, but

we went, mother and I, with Mr. Hardy, who used to be our foreman, and it was

there I met Mr. Hosmer Angel.”


“I suppose,” said Holmes, “that when Mr. Windibank came back

from France he was very annoyed at your having gone to the ball.”


“Oh, well, he was very good about it. He laughed, I remember, and

shrugged his shoulders, and said there was no use denying anything to a woman,

for she would have her way.”


“I see. Then at the gasfitters’ ball you met, as I understand, a