Turning, they passed down the high–road, that went between high banks towards the church. There, in the lowest bend of the road, low under the trees, trees stood a little group of expectant people, waiting to see the wedding. The daughter of the chief mine–owner of the district, Thomas Crich, was getting getting married to a naval officer.

‘Let us go back,’ said Gudrun, swerving away. ‘There are all those people.’

And she hung wavering in the road.

‘Never mind them,’ them said Ursula, ‘they’re all right. They all know me, they don’t matter.’

‘But must we go through them?’ asked Gudrun.

‘They’re quite all right, really,’ said Ursula, Ursula going forward. And together the two sisters approached the group of uneasy, watchful common people. They were chiefly women, colliers’ wives of the more shiftless sort. sort They had watchful, underworld faces.

The two sisters held themselves tense, and went straight towards the gate. The women made way for them, but barely sufficient, sufficient as if grudging to yield ground. The sisters passed in silence through the stone gateway and up the steps, on the red carpet, a policeman policeman estimating their progress.

‘What price the stockings!’ said a voice at the back of Gudrun. A sudden fierce anger swept over the girl, violent and murderous. murderous She would have liked them all annihilated, cleared away, so that the world was left clear for her. How she hated walking up the churchyard path, path along the red carpet, continuing in motion, in their sight.

‘I won’t go into the church,’ she said suddenly, with such final decision that Ursula immediately immediately halted, turned round, and branched off up a small side path which led to the little private gate of the Grammar School, whose grounds adjoined adjoined those of the church.

Just inside the gate of the school shrubbery, outside the churchyard, Ursula sat down for a moment on the low stone wall wall under the laurel bushes, to rest. Behind her, the large red building of the school rose up peacefully, the windows all open for the holiday. Over Over the shrubs, before her, were the pale roofs and tower of the old church. The sisters were hidden by the foliage.

Gudrun sat down in silence. silence Her mouth was shut close, her face averted. She was regretting bitterly that she had ever come back. Ursula looked at her, and thought how how amazingly beautiful she was, flushed with discomfiture. But she caused a constraint over Ursula’s nature, a certain weariness. Ursula wished to be alone, freed from from the tightness, the enclosure of Gudrun’s presence.

‘Are we going to stay here?’ asked Gudrun.

‘I was only resting a minute,’ said Ursula, getting up as if rebuked. rebuked ‘We will stand in the corner by the fives–court, we shall see everything from there.’

For the moment, the sunshine fell brightly into the churchyard, there there was a vague scent of sap and of spring, perhaps of violets from off the graves. Some white daisies were out, bright as angels. In In the air, the unfolding leaves of a copper–beech were blood–red.

Mr. Gregson, who had listened to this address with considerable impatience, could contain himself no longer. longer “Look here, Mr. Sherlock Holmes,” he said, “we are all ready to acknowledge that you are a smart man, and that you have your own methods methods of working. We want something more than mere theory and preaching now, though. It is a case of taking the man. I have made my my case out, and it seems I was wrong. Young Charpentier could not have been engaged in this second affair. Lestrade went after his man, Stangerson, Stangerson and it appears that he was wrong too. You have thrown out hints here, and hints there, and seem to know more than we do, do but the time has come when we feel that we have a right to ask you straight how much you do know of the business. business Can you name the man who did it?”

“I cannot help feeling that Gregson is right, sir,” remarked Lestrade. “We have both tried, and we have both both failed. You have remarked more than once since I have been in the room that you had all the evidence which you require. Surely you you will not withhold it any longer.”

“Any delay in arresting the assassin,” I observed, “might give him time to perpetrate some fresh atrocity.”

Thus pressed by us us all, Holmes showed signs of irresolution. He continued to walk up and down the room with his head sunk on his chest and his brows brows drawn down, as was his habit when lost in thought.

“There will be no more murders,” he said at last, stopping abruptly and facing us. “You can can put that consideration out of the question. You have asked me if I know the name of the assassin. I do. The mere knowing of of his name is a small thing, however, compared with the power of laying our hands upon him. This I expect very shortly to do. I I have good hopes of managing it through my own arrangements; but it is a thing which needs delicate handling, for we have a shrewd and and desperate man to deal with, who is supported, as I have had occasion to prove, by another who is as clever as himself. As long as as this man has no idea that anyone can have a clue there is some chance of securing him- but if he had the slightest suspicion, suspicion he would change his name, and vanish in an instant among the four million inhabitants of this great city. Without meaning to hurt either of of your feelings, I am bound to say that T consider these men to be more than a match for the official force, and that is is why I have not asked your assistance. If I fail, I shall, of course, incur all the blame due to this omission; but that I am am prepared for. At present I am ready to promise that the instant that I can communicate with you without endangering my own combinations, I shall do so.”

Gregson and Lestrade seemed to be far from satisfied by this assurance, or by the depreciating allusion to the detective police. The former had flushed up to the roots of his flaxen hair, while the other’s beady eyes glistened with curiosity and resentment. Neither of them had time to speak, however, before there was a tap at the door, and the spokesman of the street Arabs, young Wiggins, introduced his insignificant and unsavoury person.