When we were in Switzerland he followed us
with Moriarty, and it was undoubtedly he who gave me that evil
five minutes on the Reichenbach ledge.
"You may think that I read the papers with some attention during
my sojourn in France, on the look-out for any chance of laying
him by the heels. So long as he was free in London my life
would really not have been worth living. Night and day the
shadow would have been over me, and sooner or later his chance
must have come. What could I do? I could not shoot him at
sight, or I should myself be in the dock. There was no use
appealing to a magistrate. They cannot interfere on the
strength of what would appear to them to be a wild suspicion.
So I could do nothing. But I watched the criminal news, knowing
that sooner or later I should get him. Then came the death of
this Ronald Adair. My chance had come at last! Knowing what I
did, was it not certain that Colonel Moran had done it? He had
played cards with the lad; he had followed him home from the
club; he had shot him through the open window. There was not a
doubt of it. The bullets alone are enough to put his head in a
noose.
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