Holmes
Sherlock

Yellow Faces

Grant Munro was waiting on the platform when we stepped out of the train carriage, and we could see in the light of the station lamps that he was very pale, and shivering with agitation.   "They are still there, Mr Holmes", said he. "I saw lights in the cottage as I came down. We shall settle it now, once and for all."   "What is your plan, then?" asked Holmes, as we walked down the dark, tree-lined road.   "I am going to force my way in, and see for myself who is in the house. I wish you both to be there as witnesses."   "You are quite determined to do this, in spite of your wife's warning that it was better that you should not solve the mystery?"   "Yes, I am determined."   "I think you are in the right", said Holmes. "Any truth is better than indefinite doubt."   It was a very dark night and a thin rain began to fall as we turned from the high road into a narrow lane, deeply rutted, with hedges on either side. Mr Grant Munro pushed impatiently forward, however, and we stumbled after him as best we should.   "There are the lights of my house", he murmured, pointing to a glimmer among the trees, "and here is the cottage which I am going to enter."   We turned a corner in the lane as he spoke, and there was the building close beside us. A yellow bar falling across the black foreground showed that the door was not quite closed, and one window in the upper story was brightly illuminated. As we looked we saw a dark blur moving across the blind.   "There is that creature", cried Grant Munro, "you can see for yourselves that someone is there. Now follow me, and we shall soon know all."   We approached the door; but suddenly a woman appeared out of the shadow and stood in the golden track of the lamp light. I could not see her face in the darkness, but her arms were thrown out in an attitude of entreaty.   "For God's sake, don't, Jack!" she cried. "I had a presentiment that you would come this evening. Think better of it, dear! Trust me again, and you will never have cause to regret it."   "I have trusted you too long, Effie!" he cried, sternly. "My friends and I are going to settle this matter once and for ever." He pushed her to one side and we followed closely after him. As he threw the door open, an elderly woman ran in front of him and tried to bar his passage, but he thrust her back, and an instant afterwards we were all upon the stairs. Grant Munro rushed into the lighted room at the top, and we entered it at his heels.   It was a cosy, well-furnished apartment. In the corner, stooping over a desk, there sat what appeared to be a little girl. Her face was turned away from us as we entered, but we could see that her head was covered by a knitted woollen cap. As she whisked around to us I gave a cry of surprise and horror. The face which she turned towards us was of the strangest, livid yellow tint, and the features were absolutely devoid of any expression. An instant later the mystery was explained. Holmes, with a laugh, passed his hand behind the child's ear, a mask peeled off her countenance, and there was a little girl whose bright eyes made it obvious that she was of Elvish blood. Holmes removed the woollen cap, and her very pointed ears, which in an unhindered state reached well above the crown of her head, became manifest as well. The little maid laughed at our amazement, and I joined in out of sympathy with her merriment, but Grant Munro stood staring, with his hand clutched at his throat.   "My God!" he cried, "what can be the meaning of this?"   "I'll tell you the meaning of it", cried the lady, sweeping into the room with a proud, set face. "You have forced me against my own judgment to tell you, and now we must both make the best of it. My husband died in Rivendell. My child survived."   "Your child!"   She drew a large silver locket from her bosom. "You have never seen this open."   "I understood that it did not open."   She touched a spring, and the front hinged back. There was a portrait within of a man, sympathetic of countenance, but with the unmistakably bright eyes and pointed ears of his Elven kind.   "That is Legolas Zelenolistoff of Rivendell", said the lady, "and a nobler person never walked the earth. I cut myself off from my race in order to wed him; but never once while he lived did I for one instant regret it. And there is more of which I must inform you." She drew another silver locket from her bosom and opened it. Inside was a portrait of a Dwarf, apparently handsome and intelligent from what cold bee seen of his face behind his beard, but still a Dwarf. She pulled open a little door at an angle from the one through which we had entered, entered it and returned at once with a second little girl, this one with a huge beard.   "And this is my child by my second husband, Fyorin Duboshchitoff of Moria. I never regretted being married to him either, though it was our misfortune that our only child took after his people rather than mine. It is often so in such matches, and little Lucy is more bearded than ever her father was. But with or without a beard, she and little Penelope over there are my own dear little girlies, and their mother's pets." Both little girls jumped into the lady's arms and nestled against her dress.   "I could not confess this to you", she said, looking straight at her husband, "but neither could I bear to turn down your proposal to marry me. Still, I found that I could not live without seeing them; so I sent for them in secret together with their nurse. Now, what is going to become of me and my little girls?"   It was a long two minutes before Grant Munro broke the silence, and when his answer came it was one of which I love to think. He lifted both the little girls together, kissed them, and then, still carrying them, he held his other hand out to his wife and turned back towards he door.   "We can talk it over more comfortably at home", said he. "I am not a very good man, Effie, but I think that I am a better one than you have given me credit for being."   Holmes and I followed them down to the lane, and my friend plucked at my sleeve as we came out. "I think", said he, "that we shall be of more use in London than in Norbury."   Not another word did he say of the case until late that night when he was turning away, with his lighted candle, for his bedroom.   "Watson", said he, "if it should ever strike you that I am getting a little over-confident in my powers, or giving less pains to a case than it deserves, kindly whisper 'Norbury' in my ear, and I shall be infinitely obliged to you." Öjevind Lång