Sherlock Holmes and the Chinese Junk Affair and Other Stories Read Online Free PDF

closed his bedroom door quietly.
    However, I lay awake some considerable time unable to sleep, going over and over again the incredible story Sir Simon had related to us. The facts defied all logic. A magician makes things disappear only by hiding them away somewhere else. This is what Rodger Hardy had caused to happen, but the means had been scientific. How could Holmes prove it, when it had taken those Chinese scientists years to achieve the means of ‘Transposition’.
    I could see why the Prime Minister was so concerned. He had indeed placed upon Holmes’s shoulders a burden of unbearable magnitude. My old friend could find clues that others missed, even the combined force of Scotland Yard, but even he could not perform miracles. Sleep came to me thankfully at last.
    *
    After rising early and enjoying one of Mrs Hudson’s fortifying breakfasts, we took a cab to the station and caught the train with time to spare.
    There were a few workers on the train leaving London for jobs outside the capital but, on the whole, the train ran back almost empty.
    We had been given the key to Halam Hall before leaving No. 10 by Sir Simon and, so prepared, settled down to admire the countryside as it slid by, a wonderful changing diorama of English history. The backs of terraced houses with vegetable plots soon gave way to larger detached ones with ornamental lawns and larger ones with trees and lakes.
    The vista changed to the true countryside, with fields and hedges. What a change from our everyday London scene. At last the train stopped at our destination with hardly any other passengers alighting.
    It was a typical Great Western station, the village however sported a ‘Station Hotel’ where we were able to book a room and leave our cases in the good hands of the rather jovial owner and his buxom wife.
    The good man was able to hire us the only horse and trap the village had, and we were soon on our way to Halam Hall.
    It was a couple of miles out of the village and was exactly as Sir Simon had described it. Shabby, overgrown and even worse now, I suppose, than when he used to visit, having no staff to keep the weeds at bay or mow the lawns. Holmes instructed the driver to return later in the afternoon.
    The key turned in the lock easily enough and the huge oak doors swung open. It was at that moment the elderly gardener, who looked after the place and lived in the quarters once occupied by the ginger-haired lad, appeared. He touched his forelock and quickly Holmes explained our intention of wanting to look around the property.
    We had taken the precaution of bringing with us two lanterns, and with these lit we set out from the entrance hall to examine the much discussed ballroom.
    Firstly though, Holmes requested the elderly caretaker to open up every shutter in every room, so we might later examine the rooms in daylight. Silver changed hands, forelock was once again touched and that worthy man ambled away to do Holmes’s bidding.
    On descending the stairs, our lanterns lit up that vast empty cavern of a ballroom. Again it was exactly as had been described. Walls, floor and ceiling of bare concrete. All that remained was an electric cable, draped around the walls high up, from which every few yards a light fitting hung. How we wished we could have switched them on. However, by concentrating the lights of both lanterns and examining the walls, floor and ceiling in a systematic way, which took us a considerable time, we examined every foot.
    The result was disappointing. We found nothing to give any indication the ballroom had been the site of a most remarkable event. Not a screw, not a nail, not a grain of sawdust remained. Likewise the cloakroom which, we were informed by Sir Simon, had been packed with electrical gear, cables and boards with numerous dials and switches. None of it remained.
    We emerged once again into the now sun-drenched hallway. From there we searched every room, every passage. We removed dustsheets amid clouds