What was I, an army surgeon
with a weak leg and a weaker banking account, that I should
dare to think of such things? She was a unit, a factor -- nothing
more. If my future were black, it was better surely to face it like
a man than to attempt to brighten it by mere will-o'-the-wisps of
the imagination.
Chapter 3
In Quest of a Solution
It was half-past five before Holmes returned. He was bright,
eager, and in excellent spirits, a mood which in his case alter-
nated with fits of the blackest depression.
"There is no great mystery in this matter," he said, taking the
cup of tea which I had poured out for him; "the facts appear to
admit of only one explanation."
"What! you have solved it already?"
"Well, that would be too much to say. I have discovered a
suggestive fact, that is all. It is, however, very suggestive. The
details are still to be added. I have just found, on consulting the
back files of the Times, that Major Sholto, of Upper Norwood,
late of the Thirty-fourth Bombay Infantry, died upon the twenty-
eighth of April, 1882."
"I may be very obtuse, Holmes, but I fail to see what this
suggests."
"No? You surprise me. Look at it in this way, then. Captain
Morstan disappears. The only person in London whom he could
have visited is Major Sholto.
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