"i have your letter here. you said, 'i desire to possess a

copy of devine's napoleon, and am prepared to pay you ten pounds

for the one which is in your possession.' is that right?"

"certainly."

"i was very much surprised at your letter, for i could not

imagine how you knew that i owned such a thing."

"of course you must have been surprised, but the

explanation is very simple. mr. harding, of harding

brothers, said that they had sold you their last copy,

and he gave me your address."

"oh, that was it, was it? did he tell you what i paid for it?"

"no, he did not."

"well, i am an honest man, though not a very rich one.

i only gave fifteen shillings for the bust, and i think you

ought to know that before i take ten pounds from you."

"i am sure the scruple does you honour, mr. sandeford.

but i have named that price, so i intend to stick to it."

"well, it is very handsome of you, mr. holmes. i brought

the bust up with me, as you asked me to do. here it is!"

he opened his bag, and at last we saw placed upon our table

a complete specimen of that bust which we had already seen

more than once in fragments.

holmes took a paper from his pocket and laid a ten-pound

note upon the table.

"you will kindly sign that paper, mr. sandeford, in the

presence of these witnesses. it is simply to say that you

transfer every possible right that you ever had in the bust

to me. i am a methodical man, you see, and you never know

what turn events might take afterwards. thank you, mr.

sandeford; here is your money, and i wish you a very good

evening."

when our visitor had disappeared sherlock holmes's

movements were such as to rivet our attention. he began by

taking a clean white cloth from a drawer and laying it over

the table. then he placed his newly-acquired bust in the

centre of the cloth. finally, he picked up his

hunting-crop and struck napoleon a sharp blow on the top of

the head. the figure broke into fragments, and holmes bent

eagerly over the shattered remains. next instant, with a

loud shout of triumph, he held up one splinter, in which a

round, dark object was fixed like a plum in a pudding.

"gentlemen," he cried, "let me introduce you to the famous

black pearl of the borgias."

lestrade and i sat silent for a moment, and then, with a

spontaneous impulse, we both broke out clapping as at the

well-wrought crisis of a play. a flush of colour sprang to

holmes's pale cheeks, and he bowed to us like the master

dramatist who receives the homage of his audience. it was

at such moments that for an instant he ceased to be a

reasoning machine, and betrayed his human love for

admiration and applause. the same singularly proud and

reserved nature which turned away with disdain from popular

notoriety was capable of being moved to its depths by

spontaneous wonder and praise from a friend.

"yes, gentlemen," said he, "it is the most famous pearl now

existing in the world, and it has been my good fortune, by

a connected chain of inductive reasoning, to trace it from

the prince of colonna's bedroom at the dacre hotel, where

it was lost, to the interior of this, the last of the six

busts of napoleon which were manufactured by gelder and

co., of stepney. you will remember, lestrade, the

sensation caused by the disappearance of this valuable

jewel, and the vain efforts of the london police to recover

it. i was myself consulted upon the case; but i was unable

to throw any light upon it. suspicion fell upon the maid

of the princess, who was an italian, and it was proved that

she had a brother in london, but we failed to trace any

connection between them. the maid's name was lucretia

venucci, and there is no doubt in my mind that this pietro

who was murdered two nights ago was the brother. i have

been looking up the dates in the old files of the paper,

and i find that the disappearance of the pearl was exactly

two days before the arrest of beppo for some crime of

violence, an event which took place in the factory of

gelder and co., at the very moment when these busts were

being made. now you clearly see the sequence of events,

though you see them, of course, in the inverse order to the

way in which they presented themselves to me. beppo had

the pearl in his possession. he may have stolen it from

pietro, he may have been pietro's confederate, he may have

been the go-between of pietro and his sister. it is of no

consequence to us which is the correct solution.

"the main fact is that he _had_ the pearl, and at that

moment, when it was on his person, he was pursued by the

police. he made for the factory in which he worked, and he

knew that he had only a few minutes in which to conceal

this enormously valuable prize, which would otherwise be

found on him when he was searched. six plaster casts of

napoleon were drying in the passage. o