“I have one or two things which I would wish to do now that I am in town.

But I shall return by the twelve o’clock train, so as to be there in time

for your coming.”


“And you may expect us early in the afternoon. I have myself some small

business matters to attend to. Will you not wait and breakfast?”


“No, I must go. My heart is lightened already since I have confided my

trouble to you. I shall look forward to seeing you again this afternoon.”

She dropped her thick black veil over her face and glided from the room.


“And what do you think of it all, Watson?” asked Sherlock Holmes,

leaning back in his chair.


“It seems to me to be a most dark and sinister business.”


“Dark enough and sinister enough.”


“Yet if the lady is correct in saying that the flooring and walls are

sound, and that the door, window, and chimney are impassable, then her sister

must have been undoubtedly alone when she met her mysterious end.”


“What becomes, then, of these nocturnal whistles, and what of the very

peculiar words of the dying woman?”


“I cannot think.”


“When you combine the ideas of whistles at night, the presence of a band

of gipsies who are on intimate terms with this old doctor, the fact that we

have every reason to believe that the doctor has an interest in preventing his

stepdaughter’s marriage, the dying allusion to a band, and, finally, the

fact that Miss Helen Stoner heard a metallic clang, which might have been

caused by one of those metal bars that secured the shutters falling back into

its place, I think that there is good ground to think that the mystery may be

cleared along those lines.”


“But what, then, did the gipsies do?”


“I cannot imagine.”


“I see many objections to any such theory.”


“And so do I. It is precisely for that reason that we are going to Stoke

Moran this day. I want to see whether the objections are fatal, or if they may

be explained away. But what in the name of the devil!”