The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes (Wisehouse Classics Edition - With Original Illustrations). Arthur Conan Doyle

Чтение книги онлайн.

      “No, no, you are joking, Holmes!”

      “Even my limited sense of humour could evolve a better joke than that. But we may be comfortable in the meantime, may we not? Is alcohol permitted? The gasogene and cigars are in the old place. Let me see you once more in the customary armchair. You have not, I hope, learned to despise my pipe and my lamentable tobacco? It has to take the place of food these days.”

      “But why not eat?”

      “Because the faculties become refined when you starve them. Why, surely, as a doctor, my dear Watson, you must admit that what your digestion gains in the way of blood supply is so much lost to the brain. I am a brain, Watson. The rest of me is a mere appendix. Therefore, it is the brain I must consider.”

      “But this danger, Holmes?”

      “Ah, yes, in case it should come off, it would perhaps be as well that you should burden your memory with the name and address of the murderer. You can give it to Scotland Yard, with my love and a parting blessing. Sylvius is the name—Count Negretto Sylvius. Write it down, man, write it down! 136 Moorside Gardens, N. W. Got it?”

      Watson’s honest face was twitching with anxiety. He knew only too well the immense risks taken by Holmes and was well aware that what he said was more likely to be under-statement than exaggeration. Watson was always the man of action, and he rose to the occasion.

      “Count me in, Holmes. I have nothing to do for a day or two.”

      “Your morals don’t improve, Watson. You have added fibbing to your other vices. You bear every sign of the busy medical man, with calls on him every hour.”

      “Not such important ones. But can’t you have this fellow arrested?”

      “Yes, Watson, I could. That’s what worries him so.”

      “But why don’t you?”

      “Because I don’t know where the diamond is.”

      “Ah! Billy told me—the missing Crown jewel!”