morose Englishman. Early that morning a peasant had met a cart containing

several people and some very bulky boxes driving rapidly in the direction of

Reading, but there all traces of the fugitives disappeared, and even

Holmes’ ingenuity failed ever to discover the least clue as to their

whereabouts.


The firemen had been much perturbed at the strange arrangements which they had

found within, and still more so by discovering a newly severed human thumb upon

a window-sill of the second floor. About sunset, however, their efforts were at

last successful, and they subdued the flames, but not before the roof had

fallen in, and the whole place been reduced to such absolute ruin that, save

some twisted cylinders and iron piping, not a trace remained of the machinery

which had cost our unfortunate acquaintance so dearly. Large masses of nickel

and of tin were discovered stored in an out-house, but no coins were to be

found, which may have explained the presence of those bulky boxes which have

been already referred to.


How our hydraulic engineer had been conveyed from the garden to the spot where

he recovered his senses might have remained forever a mystery were it not for

the soft mould, which told us a very plain tale. He had evidently been carried

down by two persons, one of whom had remarkably small feet and the other

unusually large ones. On the whole, it was most probable that the silent

Englishman, being less bold or less murderous than his companion, had assisted

the woman to bear the unconscious man out of the way of danger.


“Well,” said our engineer ruefully as we took our seats to return

once more to London, “it has been a pretty business for me! I have lost

my thumb and I have lost a fifty-guinea fee, and what have I gained?”


“Experience,” said Holmes, laughing. “Indirectly it may be of

value, you know; you have only to put it into words to gain the reputation of