He took no heed
of any of us, but his eyes were fixed upon Holmes's face with an
expression in which hatred and amazement were equally blended.
"You fiend!" he kept on muttering. "You clever, clever fiend!"
"Ah, Colonel!" said Holmes, arranging his rumpled collar;
"`journeys end in lovers' meetings,' as the old play says.
I don't think I have had the pleasure of seeing you since you
favoured me with those attentions as I lay on the ledge above
the Reichenbach Fall."
The Colonel still stared at my friend like a man in a trance.
"You cunning, cunning fiend!" was all that he could say.
"I have not introduced you yet," said Holmes. "This, gentlemen,
is Colonel Sebastian Moran, once of Her Majesty's Indian Army,
and the best heavy game shot that our Eastern Empire has ever
produced. I believe I am correct, Colonel, in saying that your
bag of tigers still remains unrivalled?"
The fierce old man said nothing, but still glared at my companion;
with his savage eyes and bristling moustache he was wonderfully
like a tiger himself.
"I wonder that my very simple stratagem could deceive so old
a shikari," said Holmes.
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