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Mr. Joseph Harrison drove us down to the station, and we were soon whirling up in a Portsmouth train. Holmes was sunk in profound thought, and hardly opened his mouth until we had passed Clapham Junction.

“It’s a very cheery thing to come into London by any of these lines which run high, and allow you to look down upon the houses like this.”

I thought he was joking, for the view was sordid enough, but he soon explained himself.

“Look at those big, isolated clumps of building rising up above the slates, like brick islands in a lead-colored sea.”

“The board-schools.”

“Light-houses, my boy! Beacons of the future! Capsules with hundreds of bright little seeds in each, out of which will spring the wise, better England of the future. I suppose that man Phelps does not drink?”

“I should not think so.”

“Nor should I, but we are bound to take every possibility into account. The poor devil has certainly got himself into very deep water, and it’s a question whether we shall ever be able to get him ashore. What did you think of Miss Harrison?”

“A girl of strong character.”

“Yes, but she is a good sort, or I am mistaken. She and her brother are the only children of an iron-master somewhere up Northumberland way. He got engaged to her when traveling last winter, and she came down to be introduced to his people, with her brother as escort. Then came the smash, and she stayed on to nurse her lover, while brother Joseph, finding himself pretty snug, stayed on too. I’ve been making a few independent inquiries, you see. But to-day must be a day of inquiries.”

“My practice–” I began.

“Oh, if you find your own cases more interesting than mine–” said Holmes, with some asperity.

“I was going to say that my practice could get along very well for a day or two, since it is the slackest time in the year.”

“Excellent,” said he, recovering his good-humor. “Then we’ll look into this matter together. I think that we should begin by seeing Forbes. He can probably tell us all the details we want until we know from what side the case is to be approached.”

“You said you had a clue?”

“Well, we have several, but we can only test their value by further inquiry. The most difficult crime to track is the one which is purposeless. Now this is not purposeless. Who is it who profits by it? There is the French ambassador, there is the Russian, there is whoever might sell it to either of these, and there is Lord Holdhurst.”

“Lord Holdhurst!”

“Well, it is just conceivable that a statesman might find himself in a position where he was not sorry to have such a document accidentally destroyed.”

“Not a statesman with the honorable record of Lord Holdhurst?”

“It is a possibility and we cannot afford to disregard it. We shall see the noble lord to-day and find out if he can tell us anything. Meanwhile I have already set inquiries on foot.”

“Already?”

“Yes, I sent wires from Woking station to every evening paper in London. This advertisement will appear in each of them.”

He handed over a sheet torn from a note-book. On it was scribbled in pencil: “L10 reward. The number of the cab which dropped a fare at or about the door of the Foreign Office in Charles Street at quarter to ten in the evening of May 23d. Apply 221 B, Baker Street.”

“You are confident that the thief came in a cab?”

“If not, there is no harm done. But if Mr. Phelps is correct in stating that there is no hiding-place either in the room or the corridors, then the person must have come from outside. If he came from outside on so wet a night, and yet left no trace of damp upon the linoleum, which was examined within a few minutes of his passing, then it is exceeding probable that he came in a cab. Yes, I think that we may safely deduce a cab.”