A Grey Glove on the Threshold

Holmes stepped from the wall-shadow. The heavy boots lunged for the iron tray—empty. Die and watch-chain both rested in his palm.

The compositor ducked. Watson drew; Holmes's raised hand stopped him. "Do not fire. He wants not our lives—but that column."

Before the match died Watson saw a grey glove. A thick-set face half buried under a hat brim—not Edmund. The man seized the half-set type instead and swept it toward the river door, hoarse again: "If it will not print, it cannot lie." Lead letters clattered over the threshold; several struck black water. The dead man's line broke open at once.

He vanished into the fog, tearing only a corner of the proof. On the sill one grey glove remained—river mud on the fingertip, no bergamot.

Holmes slipped the die into his coat. "He fears the obituary in print more than he fears us—because the living man must still be delivered before dawn."

❦ To be continued.