The Sign of the Four, Arthur Conan Doyle [best romantic books to read txt] 📗

it into the Thames,” I answered. “I must borrow Mrs. Forrester’s poker.” There was in the front a thick and broad hasp, wrought in the image of a sitting Buddha. Under this I thrust the end of the poker and twisted it outward as a lever. The hasp sprang open with a loud snap. With trembling fingers I flung back the lid. We both stood gazing in astonishment. The box was empty!

No wonder that it was heavy. The ironwork was two-thirds of an inch thick all round. It was massive, well made, and solid, like a chest constructed to carry things of great price, but not one shred or crumb of metal or jewelry lay within it. It was absolutely and completely empty.

“The treasure is lost,” said Miss Morstan, calmly.

As I listened to the words and realized what they meant, a great shadow seemed to pass from my soul. I did not know how this Agra treasure had weighed me down, until now that it was finally removed. It was selfish, no doubt, disloyal, wrong, but I could realize nothing save that the golden barrier was gone from between us. “Thank God!” I ejaculated from my very heart.

She looked at me with a quick, questioning smile. “Why do you say that?” she asked.

“Because you are within my reach again,” I said, taking her hand. She did not withdraw it. “Because I love you, Mary, as truly as ever a man loved a woman. Because this treasure, these riches, sealed my lips. Now that they are gone I can tell you how I love you. That is why I said, ‘Thank God.’ ”

“Then I say, ‘Thank God,’ too,” she whispered, as I drew her to my side. Whoever had lost a treasure, I knew that night that I had gained one.

XII The Strange Story of Jonathan Small

A very patient man was that inspector in the cab, for it was a weary time before I rejoined him. His face clouded over when I showed him the empty box.

“There goes the reward!” said he, gloomily. “Where there is no money there is no pay. This night’s work would have been worth a tenner each to Sam Brown and me if the treasure had been there.”

“Mr. Thaddeus Sholto is a rich man,” I said. “He will see that you are rewarded, treasure or no.”

The inspector shook his head despondently, however. “It’s a bad job,” he repeated; “and so Mr. Athelney Jones will think.”

His forecast proved to be correct, for the detective looked blank enough when I got to Baker Street and showed him the empty box. They had only just arrived, Holmes, the prisoner, and he, for they had changed their plans so far as to report themselves at a station upon the way. My companion lounged in his armchair with his usual listless expression, while Small sat stolidly opposite to him with his wooden leg cocked over his sound one. As I exhibited the empty box he leaned back in his chair and laughed aloud.

“This is your doing, Small,” said Athelney Jones, angrily.

“Yes, I have put it away where you shall never lay hand upon it,” he cried, exultantly. “It is my treasure; and if I can’t have the loot I’ll take darned good care that no one else does. I tell you that no living man has any right to it, unless it is three men who are in the Andaman convict-barracks and myself. I know now that I cannot have the use of it, and I know that they cannot. I have acted all through for them as much as for myself. It’s been the sign of four with us always. Well I know that they would have had me do just what I have done, and throw the treasure into the Thames rather than let it go to kith or kin of Sholto or of Morstan. It was not to make them rich that we did for Achmet. You’ll find the treasure where the key is, and where little Tonga is. When I saw that your launch must catch us, I put the loot away in a safe place. There are no rupees for you this journey.”

“You are deceiving us, Small,” said Athelney Jones, sternly. “If you had wished to throw the treasure into the Thames it would have been easier for you to have thrown box and all.”

“Easier for me to throw, and easier for you to recover,” he answered, with a shrewd, sidelong look. “The man that was clever enough to hunt me down is clever enough to pick an iron box from the bottom of a river. Now that they are scattered over five miles or so, it may be a harder job. It went to my heart to do it, though. I was half mad when you came up with us. However, there’s no good grieving over it. I’ve had ups in my life, and I’ve had downs, but I’ve learned not to cry over spilled milk.”

“This is a very serious matter, Small,” said the detective. “If you had helped justice, instead of thwarting it in this way, you would have had a better chance at your trial.”

“Justice!” snarled the ex-convict. “A pretty justice! Whose loot is this, if it is not ours? Where is the justice that I should give it up to those who have never earned it? Look how I have earned it! Twenty long years in that fever-ridden swamp, all day at work under the mangrove-tree, all night chained up in the filthy convict-huts, bitten by mosquitoes, racked with ague, bullied by every cursed black-faced policeman who loved to take it out of a white man. That was how I earned the Agra treasure; and you talk to me of justice because I cannot bear to feel that I have paid this price only that another may enjoy it! I would rather swing a score of times, or have one of Tonga’s darts in my hide, than live in a