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.
Pages:
319
320
321
322
323
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332
333
334
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343