“You are right, Watson,” said he. “It does seem a most preposterous way of settling a dispute.”

“Most preposterous!” I exclaimed, and then suddenly realizing how he had echoed the inmost thought of my soul, I sat up in my chair and stared at him in blank amazement.

“What is this, Holmes?” I cried. “This is beyond anything which I could have imagined.”

He laughed heartily at my perplexity.

“You remember,” said he, “that some little time ago when I read you the passage in one of Poe’s sketches in which a close reasoner follows the unspoken thoughts of his companion, you were inclined to treat the matter as a mere tour-de-force of the author. On my remarking that I was constantly in the habit of doing the same thing you expressed incredulity.”

“Oh, no!”

“Perhaps not with your tongue, my dear Watson, but certainly with your eyebrows. So when I saw you throw down your paper and enter upon a train of thought, I was very happy to have the opportunity of reading it off, and eventually of breaking into it, as a proof that I had been in rapport with you.”

But I was still far from satisfied. “In the example which you read to me,” said I, “the reasoner drew his conclusions from the actions of the man whom he observed. If I remember right, he stumbled over over a heap of stones, looked up at the stars, and so on. But I have been seated quietly in my chair, and what clues can I have given you?”

“You do yourself an injustice. The features are given to man as the means by which he shall express his emotions, and yours are faithful servants.”

“Do you mean to say that you read my train of thoughts from my features?”

“Your features and especially your eyes. Perhaps you cannot yourself recall how your reverie commenced?”

“No, I cannot.”

“Then I will tell you. After throwing down your paper, which was the action which drew my attention to you, you sat for half a minute with a vacant expression. Then your eyes fixed themselves upon your newly framed picture of General Gordon, and I saw by the alteration in your face that a train of thought had been started. But it did not lead very far. Your eyes flashed across to the unframed portrait of Henry Ward Beecher which stands upon the top of your books. Then you glanced up at the wall, and of course your meaning was obvious. You were thinking that if the portrait were framed it would just cover that bare space and correspond with Gordon’s picture over there.”

“You have followed me wonderfully!” I exclaimed.

“So far I could hardly have gone astray. But now your thoughts went back to Beecher, and you looked hard across as if you were studying the character in his features. Then your eyes ceased to pucker, but you continued to look across, and your face was thoughtful. You were recalling the incidents of Beecher’s career. I was well aware that you could not do this without thinking of the mission which he undertook on behalf of the North at the time of the Civil War, for I remember your expressing your passionate indignation at the way in which he was received by the more turbulent of our people. You felt so strongly about it that I knew you could not think of Beecher without thinking of that also. When a moment later I saw your eyes wander away from the picture, I suspected that your mind had now turned to the Civil War, and when I observed that your lips set, your eyes sparkled, and your hands clenched I was positive that you were indeed thinking of the gallantry which was shown by both sides in that desperate struggle. But then, again, your face grew sadder; you shook your head. You were dwelling upon the sadness and horror and useless waste of life. Your hand stole towards your own old wound and a smile quivered on your lips, which showed me that the ridiculous side of this method of settling international questions had forced itself upon your mind. At this point I agreed with you that it was preposterous and was glad to find that all my deductions had been correct.”

He laughed at her again, with mocking humour.

‘But why are you in a bad temper?’ she asked. ‘Do you mean you are ALWAYS in a bad temper?’

‘Pretty well,’ he said, laughing. ‘I don’t quite digest my bile.’

‘But what bile?’ she said.

‘Bile!’ he said. ‘Don’t you know what that is?’ She was silent, and disappointed. He was taking no notice of her.

‘I’m going away for a while next month,’ she said.

‘You are! Where to?’

‘Venice! With Sir Clifford? For how long?’

‘For a month or so,’ she replied. ‘Clifford won’t go.’

‘He’ll stay here?’ he asked.

‘Yes! He hates to travel as he is.’

‘Ay, poor devil!’ he said, with sympathy. There was a pause.

‘You won’t forget me when I’m gone, will you?’ she asked. Again he lifted his eyes and looked full at her.

‘Forget?’ he said. ‘You know nobody forgets. It’s not a question of memory;’

She wanted to say: ‘When then?’ but she didn’t. Instead, she said in a mute kind of voice: ‘I told Clifford I might have a child.’

Now he really looked at her, intense and searching.

‘You did?’ he said at last. ‘And what did he say?’

‘Oh, he wouldn’t mind. He’d be glad, really, so long as it seemed to be his.’ She dared not look up at him.

He was silent a long time, then he gazed again on her face.

‘No mention of ME, of course?’ he said.

‘No. No mention of you,’ she said.

‘No, he’d hardly swallow me as a substitute breeder. Then where are you supposed to be getting the child?’

‘I might have a love–affair in Venice,’ she said.

‘You might,’ he replied slowly. ‘So that’s why you’re going?’

‘Not to have the love–affair,’ she said, looking up at him, pleading.

‘Just the appearance of one,’ he said.

There was silence. He sat staring out the window, with a faint grin, half mockery, half bitterness, on his face. She hated his grin.

‘You’ve not taken any precautions against having a child then?’ he asked her suddenly. ‘Because I haven’t.’

‘No,’ she said faintly. ‘I should hate that.’

He looked at her, then again with the peculiar subtle grin out of the window. There was a tense silence.

At last he turned his head and said satirically:

‘That was why you wanted me, then, to get a child?’

She hung her head.

‘No. Not really,’ she said. ‘What then, REALLY?’ he asked rather bitingly.

She looked up at him reproachfully, saying: ‘I don’t know.’

He broke into a laugh.

‘Then I’m damned if I do,’ he said.

There was a long pause of silence, a cold silence.