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"Am I such a farcical bungler, Watson, that I should erect an obvious dummy and expect that some of the sharpest men in Europe would be deceived by it? We have been in this room two hours, and Mrs. Hudson has made some change in that figure eight times, or once in every quarter of an hour.

She works it from the front so that her shadow may never be seen.

Ah!" He drew in his breath with a shrill, excited intake.

In the dim light I saw his head thrown forward, his whole attitude rigid with attention.

Outside, the street was absolutely deserted.

Those two men might still be crouching in the doorway, but I could no longer see them.

All was still and dark, save only that brilliant yellow screen in front of us with the black figure outlined upon its centre.

Again in the utter silence I heard that thin, sibilant note which spoke of intense suppressed excitement.

An instant later he pulled me back into the blackest corner of the room, and I felt his warning hand upon my lips.

The fingers which clutched me were quivering.

Never had I known my friend more moved, and yet the dark street still stretched lonely and motionless before us.

But suddenly I was aware of that which his keener senses had already distinguished.

A low, stealthy sound came to my ears, not from the direction of Baker Street, but from the back of the very house in which we lay concealed.

A door opened and shut.

An instant later steps crept down the passage - steps which were meant to be silent, but which reverberated harshly through the empty house.

Holmes crouched back against the wall and I did the same, my hand closing upon the handle of my revolver.

Peering through the gloom, I saw the vague outline of a man, a shade blacker than the blackness of the open door.

He stood for an instant, and then he crept forward, crouching, menacing, into the room.

He was within three yards of us, this sinister figure, and I had braced myself to meet his spring, before I realised that he had no idea of our presence.

He passed close beside us, stole over to the window, and very softly and noiselessly raised it for half a foot.

As he sank to the level of this opening the light of the street, no longer dimmed by the dusty glass, fell full upon his face.

The man seemed to be beside himself with excitement.

His two eyes shone like stars and his features were working convulsively.

He was an elderly man, with a thin, projecting nose, a high, bald forehead, and a huge grizzled moustache.

An opera-hat was pushed to the back of his head, and an evening dress shirt-front gleamed out through his open overcoat.

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