Free Nicholas Meyer by The Seven-Per-Cent Solution (pdf) Page B

face, and on his head he wore a leather cap with its shovel peak turned round, all of which proclaimed to me his former association with the coal industry. I say former, for over his eyes he wore the dark-tinted spectacles of the blind.
    I continued to stare in horror as this apparition drew still nearer and concluded his song. The silence hung in the air between us.
    "Alms? Alms for the blind?" he intoned abruptly, and swept his hat off, holding it crown downwards before me. I fumbled in my pocket for change.
    "Why didn't you answer when I called out?" I demanded of him somewhat irritably, for I was now ashamed of the impulse to which I had almost yielded, to get to my bag on the floor of the cab and fetch the revolver. I was the more irritated, perceiving how foolish such an action would have been; this blind singer held no terror for me and surely harbored no malice, either.
    "I didn't like to stop the song," he answered, as if that were obvious. His accent was faintly Irish."When I stop the song they doesn't pay me," he explained, and shook the hat slightly before me. I dropped a few pennies into it. "Thank-ee, sir."
    "But good heavens, man, how can you ply your trade in this situation?"
    "Sitcheyation, sir? What sitcheyation's that?"
    "Why, this blasted fog!" I retorted with energy. "You can't see your hand before your—" I stopped, suddenly remembering. The minstrel only let out a breath in exclamation.
    "Oh, is that what's doin' it? I wondered why it was all so strange today. I don' believe I've took in a shillin' all mornin'. Fog, is it? Must be a regular corker if I haven't 'ad a shillin' on account of it. Well!"
    He sighed again and appeared to look about him, a ghastly exercise in view of his deficiency.
    "Do you need any help?" I enquired.
    "No, no—bless you, sir, for offerin', but I don't. Why, it's all the same to me, in't? All the same to me.
    Thank-ee, gov'nor." And with this he scooped out the money I had placed in his hat and deposited it in his pocket. I bade him farewell and he shuffled off, using his stick before him to feel his path—no different from any ordinary man in the midst of this cursed fog—except that he was singing again, his voice dying away as he disappeared from view and was swallowed up by folds of smoke.
    I looked round again and shouted once more: "Holmes!"
    "No need to shout, Watson. I'm right here," said a familiar voice at my elbow. I jerked round and found myself nose to nose with the blind singer.
    *6*—Toby Surpasses Himself
    "Holmes!"
    He laughed, tore off the false hair, and peeled away the equally false eyebrows and warts on the singer's chin. Next he removed the dark-tinted spectacles, and in place of the minstrel's dead eyes, I was treated to the sight of Holmes's twinkling ones, alight with silent mirth.
    "Forgive me, my dear fellow. You know I can never resist a touch of the dramatic and the setting was so perfect that I succumbed to temptation."
    It took some moments to reassure the terrified cabbie, whom the entire episode had reduced to near insensibility, but Holmes succeeded at last in calming him.
    "But why the disguise?" I pursued, as he bent down to pet the dog, who, now close enough to sniff him, was happily wagging its tail and licking the paint from his cheeks. He looked up at me sharply.
    "He has bolted, Watson."
    "Bolted? Who has bolted?"
    "The professor." Holmes spoke with an exasperated air as he stood up. "That is his house behind you in the fog. I was keeping watch on the residence myself, last night (usually I have paid Wiggins* to do it), and all was normal until midnight. It was raw and damp, and I went to the public house down the road for some brandy to warm my insides. While I was gone, two men came to see him. What they said I have no way of knowing, but I don't doubt that they were spies in his pay, come to tell him of my nets closing upon him. When I returned they had gone, and all was as I had left it. Then, this morning at eleven, I received