The Sign of the Four | Page 4

with which you have been
endowed? Remember that I speak not only as one comrade to another, but as a medical
man to one for whose constitution he is to some extent answerable."
He did not seem offended. On the contrary, he put his finger- tips together and leaned his
elbows on the arms of his chair, like one who has a relish for conversation.
"My mind," he said, "rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me the
most abstruse cryptogram or the most intricate analysis, and I am in my own proper
atmosphere. I can dispense then with artificial stimulants. But I abhor the dull routine of
existence. I crave for mental exaltation. That is why I have chosen my own particular
profession,--or rather created it, for I am the only one in the world."
"The only unofficial detective?" I said, raising my eyebrows.
"The only unofficial consulting detective," he answered. "I am the last and highest court
of appeal in detection. When Gregson or Lestrade or Athelney Jones are out of their
depths--which, by the way, is their normal state--the matter is laid before me. I examine
the data, as an expert, and pronounce a specialist's opinion. I claim no credit in such cases.
My name figures in no newspaper. The work itself, the pleasure of finding a field for my
peculiar powers, is my highest reward. But you have yourself had some experience of my
methods of work in the Jefferson Hope case."
"Yes, indeed," said I, cordially. "I was never so struck by anything in my life. I even
embodied it in a small brochure with the somewhat fantastic title of 'A Study in Scarlet.'"
He shook his head sadly. "I glanced over it," said he. "Honestly, I cannot congratulate
you upon it. Detection is, or ought to be, an exact science, and should be treated in the
same cold and unemotional manner. You have attempted to tinge it with romanticism,
which produces much the same effect as if you worked a love-story or an elopement into
the fifth proposition of Euclid."
"But the romance was there," I remonstrated. "I could not tamper with the facts."

"Some facts should be suppressed, or at least a just sense of proportion should be
observed in treating them. The only point in the case which deserved mention was the
curious analytical reasoning from effects to causes by which I succeeded in unraveling
it."
I was annoyed at this criticism of a work which had been specially designed to please him.
I confess, too, that I was irritated by the egotism which seemed to demand that every line
of my pamphlet should be devoted to his own special doings. More than once during the
years that I had lived with him in Baker Street I had observed that a small vanity underlay
my companion's quiet and didactic manner. I made no remark, however, but sat nursing
my wounded leg. I had a Jezail bullet through it some time before, and, though it did not
prevent me from walking, it ached wearily at every change of the weather.
"My practice has extended recently to the Continent," said Holmes, after a while, filling
up his old brier-root pipe. "I was consulted last week by Francois Le Villard, who, as you
probably know, has come rather to the front lately in the French detective service. He has
all the Celtic power of quick intuition, but he is deficient in the wide range of exact
knowledge which is essential to the higher developments of his art. The case was
concerned with a will, and possessed some features of interest. I was able to refer him to
two parallel cases, the one at Riga in 1857, and the other at St. Louis in 1871, which have
suggested to him the true solution. Here is the letter which I had this morning
acknowledging my assistance." He tossed over, as he spoke, a crumpled sheet of foreign
notepaper. I glanced my eyes down it, catching a profusion of notes of admiration, with
stray "magnifiques," "coup-de-maitres," and "tours-de-force," all testifying to the ardent
admiration of the Frenchman.
"He speaks as a pupil to his master," said I.
"Oh, he rates my assistance too highly," said Sherlock Holmes, lightly. "He has
considerable gifts himself. He possesses two out of the three qualities necessary for the
ideal detective. He has the power of observation and that of deduction. He is only
wanting in knowledge; and that may come in time. He is now translating my small works
into French."
"Your works?"
"Oh, didn't you know?" he cried, laughing. "Yes, I have been guilty of several
monographs. They are all upon technical subjects. Here, for example, is one 'Upon the
Distinction between the Ashes of the Various Tobaccoes.' In