Again a startled look came over the somewhat vacuous face of Miss Mary
Sutherland. Yes, I did bang out of the house, she said, for it made
me angry to see the easy way in which Mr. Windibank that is, my
father took it all. He would not go to the police, and he would not go
to you, and so at last, as he would do nothing and kept on saying that
there was no harm done, it made me mad, and I just on with my things
and came right away to you.
Your father, said Holmes, your stepfather, surely, since the name is
different.
Yes, my stepfather. I call him father, though it sounds funny, too,
for he is only five years and two months older than myself.
And your mother is alive?
Oh, yes, mother is alive and well. I wasn t best pleased, Mr. Holmes,
when she married again so soon after father s death, and a man who was
nearly fifteen years younger than herself. Father was a plumber in the
Tottenham Court Road, and he left a tidy business behind him, which
mother carried on with Mr. Hardy, the foreman; but when Mr. Windibank
came he made her sell the business, for he was very superior, being a
traveller in wines. They got 4700 for the goodwill and interest,
which wasn t near as much as father could have got if he had been
alive.
I had expected to see Sherlock Holmes impatient under this rambling and
inconsequential narrative, but, on the contrary, he had listened with
the greatest concentration of attention.
Your own little income, he asked, does it come out of the business?
Oh, no, sir. It is quite separate and was left me by my uncle Ned in
Auckland. It is in New Zealand stock, paying 41 2 per cent. Two thousand
five hundred pounds was the amount, but I can only touch the interest.
You interest me extremely, said Holmes. And since you draw so large
a sum as a hundred a year, with what you earn into the bargain, you no
doubt travel a little and indulge yourself in every way. I believe that
58