صفحة 249 من 657

"Well, yes. Save, perhaps, that. And yet this John Openshaw seems

to me to be walking amid even greater perils than did the

Sholtos."

"But have you," I asked, "formed any definite conception as to

what these perils are?"

"There can be no question as to their nature," he answered.

"Then what are they? Who is this K. K. K., and why does he pursue

this unhappy family?"

Sherlock Holmes closed his eyes and placed his elbows upon the

arms of his chair, with his finger-tips together. "The ideal

reasoner," he remarked, "would, when he had once been shown a

single fact in all its bearings, deduce from it not only all the

chain of events which led up to it but also all the results which

would follow from it. As Cuvier could correctly describe a whole

animal by the contemplation of a single bone, so the observer who

has thoroughly understood one link in a series of incidents

should be able to accurately state all the other ones, both

before and after. We have not yet grasped the results which the

reason alone can attain to. Problems may be solved in the study

which have baffled all those who have sought a solution by the

aid of their senses.