[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
could I hope to frighten this man? My heart failed me and I almost fell. He stepped forward to help me,
but I pulled out my gun.
`Back!' I shouted. `Another step and I shall shoot!'
He smiled. `Very well, doctor. I understand.'
My hands shook and I almost dropped the gun. `It's over, Holmes,' I said. `I've been to the empty
house. I know everything.'
He laughed. `Dear fellow! Nobody knows everything!'
I seemed to hear voices coming to me from the water, and I could now see two Holmeses - one on
the path and one standing on air.
`I've found the jars, Holmes, and the papers. I know you killed them.'
`I killed them? Which? The jars or the papers?'
Nothing seemed real. It was getting harder and harder for me to speak. Holmes watched me,
smiling.
`I know you did it, Holmes,' I shouted. `I watched you cut Mary Kelly to pieces. You killed them!
Let me hear you say that you did!'
`What is it you want me to say?'
`Say you killed them!'
`You killed them.'
`I am going to shoot you, Holmes!' I screamed. `Before you die, tell me that you understand what
you have done!'
`You're mad, doctor,' he said. `And you're talking rubbish. Go on, shoot me!'
I shot him. I shot again and again, but still he stood there.
Finally, I fell to the ground. I could not move. It seemed a long time before I could say, `Why
aren't you dead?'
I stared up at him as he stood above me, calmly inhaling snuff from his snuffbox.
`I took the bullets from your gun and put in blanks,' he said conversationally. `Tell me, Moriarty,
when did you kill Watson? You are very clever. You look almost like him, but I know who you are.
When I saw you injecting cocaine three times a day, I knew then for sure that you were not my dear
friend. Dr Watson would never, never take drugs. Your cocaine is finished, isn't it? Poor Moriarty! Did
you not realize that my snuffbox contains cocaine, not snuff?'
I felt sick and weak. Before my eyes Holmes was changing colour - red, then green, then blue. I
shook my head to clear it, but he was still talking.
The Last Story of Sherlock Holmes 15
The Sherlock Holems
`And your letter, telling Lestrade that I was the Whitechapel murderer. What rubbish! How
Scotland Yard would laugh! But I have the letter here - I saw it in your cook's hand and took it from her
while you were calling the cab. You have failed, Moriarty. I have enjoyed making you run around
Europe with me, but now you must die.'
He took out a long knife.
`Holmes!' I cried. `I am Watson, your friend, Watson! I have cried to save you- save you from
yourself and from the police!'
He held up the knife and stepped towards me.
`If you kill me,' I screamed, `Moriarty will win! That is what he wants! Kill your only friend, and
Moriarty has won!'
I closed my eyes and waited for the pain and the darkness.
It did not come. I opened my eyes and saw that Holmes was looking at me. He had put the knife
down. The look in his eyes was sadder than anything that I had ever seen. He seemed to see far into both
the past and the future, and to find them sad beyond words.
`Never fear, old fellow,' he said. `I shall not let him hurt you.'
Then he stepped backwards off the path. I saw his body hit the rocks far below.
Conclusion
Two days later I woke up. I was in bed at the hotel. Someone had found me on the edge of the
path, high above the Reichenbach Falls.
After a week I returned to London. I went immediately to the empty house, where I burned the
papers and destroyed the jars. I wanted to be sure that nobody would ever know the evil things that
Holmes had done. I wanted only the good that was in my friend to live on after his death.
I was lucky. ACD had been busy writing more stories about Holmes. These stories were an
immediate success. ACD became a famous writer, and people who had never met Holmes the man,
knew Holmes the story-book detective. As the years passed, people began to forget that Sherlock
Holmes had ever been a real person.
After Holmes's death my life was difficult for a long time. It was two years before I could live
without cocaine. I could not work, and my wife and I had little money.
My story is at an end. Since Holmes's death I have lived quietly. But sometimes, as I sit by the fire
in the evening, I think of that day at the Reichenbach Falls. I hear again the gentleness of Holmes's last
words, and see the light of understanding in his eyes during those last moments, when he seemed once
again the best and wisest man I have ever known.
eBookZ © 2001
(scanned created by Ifi)
The Last Story of Sherlock Holmes 16
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]