Adventure of the Speckled Band

The building was of gray, lichen-blotched stone, with a high central portion and two curving wings, like the claws of a crab, thrown out on each side.

In one of these wings the windows were broken and blocked with wooden boards, while the roof was partly caved in, a picture of ruin.

The central portion was in little better repair, but the right-hand block was comparatively modern, and the blinds in the windows, with the blue smoke curling up from the chimneys, showed that this was where the family resided.

Some scaffolding had been erected against the end wall, and the stone-work had been broken into, but there were no signs of any workmen at the moment of our visit.

Holmes walked slowly up and down the ill-trimmed lawn and examined with deep attention the outsides of the windows.

Holmes, after a careful examination through the open window, endeavoured in every way to force the shutter open, but without success.

Then with his lens he tested the hinges, but they were of solid iron, built firmly into the massive masonry.

It was a homely little room, with a low ceiling and a gaping fireplace, after the fashion of old country-houses.

A brown chest of drawers stood in one corner, a narrow white-counterpaned bed in another, and a dressing-table on the left-hand side of the window.

These articles, with two small wicker-work chairs, made up all the furniture in the room save for a square of Wilton carpet in the centre.

The boards round and the panelling of the walls were of brown, worm-eaten oak, so old and discoloured that it may have dated from the original building of the house.

Holmes pointed to a thick bell-rope which hung down beside the bed, the tassel actually lying upon the pillow.

He threw himself down upon his face with his lens in his hand and crawled swiftly backward and forward, examining minutely the cracks between the boards.

Then he did the same with the wood-work with which the chamber was panelled.

Finally he walked over to the bed and spent some time in staring at it and in running his eye up and down the wall.

Dr. Grimesby Roylott's chamber was larger than that of his stepdaughter, but was as plainly furnished.

A camp-bed, a small wooden shelf full of books, mostly of a technical character, an armchair beside the bed, a plain wooden chair against the wall, a round table, and a large iron safe were the principal things which met the eye.

"What's in here?" he asked, tapping the safe.
"My stepfather's business papers."

He took up a small saucer of milk which stood on the top of it.

He squatted down in front of the wooden chair and examined the seat of it with the greatest attention.