Latest / Sherlock Holmes / Sherlock Holmes Radio The Everblooming Roses Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce, C
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Now, doctor, back to the charming lady who was named
- 0:02Speaker 1: for this verdant man May.
- 0:05Speaker 2: Yes, it was rather late in May, as I remember.
- 0:08Speaker 2: The year was nineteen nine or ten.
- 0:10Speaker 3: I believe Holmes had retired to a small coperty he'd
- 0:14Speaker 3: acquired on the coast of Sussex, and was deep in.
- 0:17Speaker 4: Beea culture, leaving you alone and deserted.
- 0:21Speaker 3: Except for a delightful and devoted little wife. Yes, exactly Well,
- 0:26Speaker 3: at the beginn of the beginning I had I'd gone
- 0:28Speaker 3: down to Sussex for a long weekend of fresh air
- 0:31Speaker 3: and relaxation.
- 0:32Speaker 1: Now you might have known better than to expect relaxation
- 0:35Speaker 1: around Sherlock Holmes.
- 0:36Speaker 3: Doctor, How right you are, mister Harris Wit. It was
- 0:40Speaker 3: Saturday morning. Holmes and I were finishing a leisurely breakfast
- 0:43Speaker 3: which had been served up on the East tennice overlooking
- 0:47Speaker 3: the Channel. I had just filled my pipe and was
- 0:49Speaker 3: offering my tobacco pouch to Holmes. Went to my surprise,
- 0:53Speaker 3: he refused, never touched the stuff. Never touched tobacco homes,
- 1:00Speaker 3: you prevaricator. When I think of the tons I've watched
- 1:03Speaker 3: you consume a regular inferno just the same I've given.
- 1:06Speaker 2: It up or anything wrong with your health.
- 1:08Speaker 4: No, I've given up nicotine because my bees don't like it.
- 1:11Speaker 4: You know, you go out among the hives wreaking of
- 1:13Speaker 4: nicotine and see what happens to you.
- 1:15Speaker 2: Watson, I have no intention of going near the silly things.
- 1:18Speaker 4: Bees, My dear Watson, are not silly. If the human
- 1:21Speaker 4: race conducted its affairs with half the discipline and intelligence,
- 1:24Speaker 4: we'd have fewer fools like the latter day Jihu, who
- 1:27Speaker 4: is at this moment scorching up the cliff road in
- 1:28Speaker 4: this direction.
- 1:30Speaker 2: Oh, you mean the chat driving the automobile. I take
- 1:32Speaker 2: it naturally.
- 1:33Speaker 4: The blithering idiot must be caughting death at close to
- 1:35Speaker 4: forty miles an hour.
- 1:36Speaker 3: Homes is coming in here, make a turn on two wheels.
- 1:40Speaker 3: It's a wonder you misticket close. Who look at the
- 1:42Speaker 3: dust he's picking up? Well, at least he didn't manage
- 1:46Speaker 3: to stop the juggernaut. For a moment I thought he
- 1:49Speaker 3: was going right on through the kitchen.
- 1:51Speaker 5: Well, well, this is a bit of luck. I'd hope
- 1:54Speaker 5: to see homes of Dorsma to find Watson as well.
- 1:56Speaker 4: A dear fellow. The pleasure is mutual, isn't it, Watson?
- 1:59Speaker 2: Eh?
- 2:00Speaker 5: You know Holmes.
- 2:01Speaker 2: I don't believe the old boy remembers me. How can
- 2:04Speaker 2: I tell if I remember, you're not all gone up.
- 2:06Speaker 4: In that cap and goggles. My dear Dilly, you'll have
- 2:09Speaker 4: to forgive Watson. I'd never been able to teach him
- 2:11Speaker 4: to recognize people by their immutable features, the shape of
- 2:14Speaker 4: the ears, the set of the jaw.
- 2:15Speaker 2: Dilly, don't tell me it's old Peter Dillinghurst.
- 2:19Speaker 4: Now the Reverend Doctor Dillinghurst, rector of Basham Church.
- 2:22Speaker 5: I believe, yes, worse luck, That's what I've come to
- 2:25Speaker 5: consult you about, Holmes. Things have been happening at Basham
- 2:28Speaker 5: Church every morning. There are fresh roses on the late
- 2:32Speaker 5: Lady Elfrida's tomb, and the old bell in the tower
- 2:35Speaker 5: started a ring again.
- 2:36Speaker 2: I would look here at Dillinghurst.
- 2:37Speaker 3: People often place flowers on tools, and church bells are
- 2:41Speaker 3: quite frequently wrung, you know.
- 2:42Speaker 5: Yes, But the people didn't place the roses, Watson, and
- 2:44Speaker 5: people didn't ring the bell. Matter of fact, the bell
- 2:47Speaker 5: hasn't been wrung for five years, not since the time
- 2:50Speaker 5: of hit by lightning and bed the craked. The stairs
- 2:53Speaker 5: to the bell tower destroyed by fire at that time
- 2:56Speaker 5: and never replaced no one can reach the robe. Well,
- 3:01Speaker 5: it's those confounded roses that are rarely the most disturbing phenomenon.
- 3:04Speaker 2: Homes.
- 3:05Speaker 5: There's some churches looked up. It's locked up every night
- 3:09Speaker 5: after evensong. I attend to the locking up myself every night.
- 3:13Speaker 5: When I make the rounds to extinguish the candles, I
- 3:16Speaker 5: notice the day's spray of yellow roses on Lady Alfrida's tomb,
- 3:20Speaker 5: and every night they are faded and drooping.
- 3:22Speaker 3: Yellow roses always seem to be particularly perishable.
- 3:25Speaker 4: Homes on it to Rut Watson.
- 3:27Speaker 5: The next morning, when I unlocked the door and ail
- 3:29Speaker 5: out the church, there are the roses as fresh as
- 3:33Speaker 5: though they'd just been plucked, and no one is at
- 3:36Speaker 5: foot inside the church. Amazing homes, My dear Dillinghurst, What
- 3:39Speaker 5: makes you so positive that no one had entered the church?
- 3:42Speaker 4: I'm not a fool.
- 3:43Speaker 5: Homes. On several occasions I have scattered ashes not only
- 3:46Speaker 5: around the doors, but around Lady Elfrida's tomb as well.
- 3:49Speaker 5: There has never been so much as a muss track
- 3:51Speaker 5: through them.
- 3:52Speaker 2: Hey jove.
- 3:53Speaker 5: Furthermore, a group of schoolboys who've joined that new organization
- 3:57Speaker 5: er or what is it they call oh yes, the
- 4:00Speaker 5: boys scouts, Oh, I've heard of them, Homes remarkable lads.
- 4:04Speaker 2: They can up two sticks together and nick a fire.
- 4:06Speaker 2: Don't you know that.
- 4:07Speaker 4: They didn't invent the process? Go on Recturn.
- 4:10Speaker 5: Well, as I was saying, the boys and their scout master,
- 4:14Speaker 5: the local librarian, volunteered to spend the night in Basel
- 4:16Speaker 5: Church to see if they could find out who was
- 4:18Speaker 5: responsible for the blooming roses and the ringing bell.
- 4:20Speaker 4: What did they discover?
- 4:22Speaker 5: Nothing? Homes, absolutely nothing. At exactly midnight, the bell rang
- 4:28Speaker 5: and the roses bloomed afresh. Nobody, absolute clean, nobody was
- 4:32Speaker 5: within arm's reach of either. Why are you so perturbed
- 4:35Speaker 5: about all this today? Because, well, because this occurrence is
- 4:40Speaker 5: killing me. The present lady Danesfield May was the late
- 4:44Speaker 5: rector's daughter Homes. I've known her since she was a child,
- 4:47Speaker 5: and I came to bash them to act as her
- 4:48Speaker 5: father's curing mayors. Of course, much younger than Sir Albert
- 4:52Speaker 5: and Elfrida his first wife. In fact, I think May
- 4:56Speaker 5: was always afraid of Elfrida, who was a strange coal
- 5:00Speaker 5: Crowback to our Danish ancestors, it's on me, the May's account,
- 5:04Speaker 5: that I ask you to investigate the smile homes.
- 5:06Speaker 4: Well, what do you say, Watson, shall we take a
- 5:08Speaker 4: run over to Basham and did his new fangled perambulator, go.
- 5:11Speaker 5: And get my coat and he you you won't need
- 5:13Speaker 5: the Watson. I've brought along caps and dusters for both
- 5:15Speaker 5: of you.
- 5:15Speaker 4: Come along.
- 5:16Speaker 5: We shall have to drive like the devil if we're
- 5:18Speaker 5: going to get back in time for choir practice. Hans,
- 5:31Speaker 5: I never realized that utter imbecility of barnyard foul until
- 5:34Speaker 5: I started to drive a car.
- 5:35Speaker 2: Do you look out, there's a boy on a bicycle.
- 5:38Speaker 5: Never touched him.
- 5:40Speaker 4: Tell me Diddinghurst first, about the church bell. We say
- 5:43Speaker 4: it sounds at midnight? How often has this occurred? Every night?
- 5:46Speaker 5: Since Lady Elfrida's birthday? The day those confounded yellow roses
- 5:49Speaker 5: were placed on our tomb, that's nearly two weeks ago.
- 5:52Speaker 4: Yellow roses? Is there any significance to yellow roses?
- 5:56Speaker 6: Oh?
- 5:56Speaker 5: Yess. Sir Albert Damesfield's first wife, dy Elfrida, came from
- 6:01Speaker 5: Castle Odo, which is famous for its yellow roses. When
- 6:04Speaker 5: the Lady Elfrida married Sir Albert, she brought along a
- 6:07Speaker 5: half dozen of the rose bushes and the family gardener
- 6:09Speaker 5: to plant them.
- 6:09Speaker 4: What happened to him?
- 6:11Speaker 5: Hugo that's his name, still lives at the hall, although
- 6:14Speaker 5: he must be well over eighty by now. But he
- 6:17Speaker 5: was always particularly devoted to Elfrida, and somehow he always managed,
- 6:21Speaker 5: whether the season was early or late, to have those
- 6:24Speaker 5: rose bushes covered with blossoms for Lady Elfrida's birthday. And
- 6:28Speaker 5: every year after his mistress died, on her birthday, he'd
- 6:31Speaker 5: bring a sheaf of yellow roses to Sir Albert would
- 6:34Speaker 5: carry them to Bashm Church and place them on her tomb.
- 6:37Speaker 4: But every year up to now the roses have withered
- 6:39Speaker 4: in due course of time. Well not every year.
- 6:41Speaker 5: Homes, that is, the Lady Elfrida has been dead over
- 6:45Speaker 5: ten years. Three years ago, when Sir Albert decided to
- 6:49Speaker 5: take a young wife, he well, you know how it is,
- 6:53Speaker 5: he sort of neglected to keep up the custom of
- 6:56Speaker 5: decorating his first wife's grave on her birthday.
- 6:58Speaker 2: Thoughtless of their homes.
- 7:00Speaker 5: Possibly well, this year, on Elfrida's birthday, Oh you go,
- 7:04Speaker 5: stop Sir Albert his young wife as they came out
- 7:06Speaker 5: to take the morning stroll in the gardens.
- 7:15Speaker 7: Good morning you go, ohhgo, how beautiful look al but
- 7:20Speaker 7: the lovely yellow roses are there for me.
- 7:22Speaker 6: You go, no, mo'am begging your ladyship's pardon. There for
- 7:26Speaker 6: her whose birthday this is here, for her who loved
- 7:29Speaker 6: intended them, and who lies in her grave and Basham
- 7:32Speaker 6: Church buried there before a time was due.
- 7:34Speaker 2: That you go.
- 7:36Speaker 6: If you take my advice, sir, you'll not forget to
- 7:39Speaker 6: take her the flowers.
- 7:39Speaker 2: He love this day.
- 7:41Speaker 6: The lady Elfrida was not one to take a slight
- 7:43Speaker 6: without getting her own back.
- 7:45Speaker 4: Rubbish. You can't bully Rugby. You go.
- 7:47Speaker 6: Life is for the living, but we all must die
- 7:50Speaker 6: sometimes surround.
- 7:51Speaker 7: Give me the flowers, you go, I'll see their placed
- 7:54Speaker 7: on Lady Elfrida's grave.
- 7:55Speaker 6: Thank your ladyship, and may Heaven protect you better than
- 7:59Speaker 6: it did her.
- 8:01Speaker 7: My dear, this is a bit ridiculous, Albert. I'd like
- 8:04Speaker 7: to put these on Elfrida's grave. They're beautiful, is here
- 8:07Speaker 7: and it means so much to poor old h'll go.
- 8:10Speaker 8: Are you sure that's why you're doing it, my dear?
- 8:13Speaker 9: What do you mean?
- 8:14Speaker 8: Are you sure it's not because you're still a bit
- 8:17Speaker 8: afraid of Elfrida?
- 8:18Speaker 7: Well maybe it's for both reasons.
- 8:21Speaker 4: Albert that's the second time, Dillinghurst that you've mentioned the
- 8:34Speaker 4: lady May was afraid of her predecessor.
- 8:36Speaker 5: That's not as startling as it sounds. Home, Oh confound.
- 8:40Speaker 4: That man with his sheep?
- 8:41Speaker 2: Does he have to take up the entire road?
- 8:47Speaker 10: Oh?
- 8:48Speaker 5: What was I saying?
- 8:50Speaker 9: Oh?
- 8:50Speaker 5: Yes, everyone was terrified of Elfrida. She was a cold
- 8:54Speaker 5: forbidding sort of woman. Even in her fections. She should
- 8:58Speaker 5: have had children. That my made a difference. You see,
- 9:02Speaker 5: she knew how desperately her husband wanted them, and well
- 9:05Speaker 5: when the years went by and there were no heirs
- 9:08Speaker 5: to carry on Albert and Robert Cole towards.
- 9:11Speaker 2: Her and feeling of him hehmes. I have often.
- 9:13Speaker 5: Suspected that Lady Elfrida's drowning and seacrete that runs past
- 9:17Speaker 5: the hall wasn't.
- 9:18Speaker 4: As accidental as we were led to believe.
- 9:20Speaker 2: You mean, do you think it was suicide?
- 9:22Speaker 5: There was no autopsy, I suppose, good lord, No, they
- 9:24Speaker 5: just pulled her out of the weeds. She'd been missing
- 9:27Speaker 5: for three days before the greppling hooks founder. They were
- 9:30Speaker 5: afraid she'd done away with herself when they found the note,
- 9:33Speaker 5: what did it say?
- 9:34Speaker 4: I have gone to answer the call. You say that
- 9:38Speaker 4: May was always afraid of Lady Elfrida. What was the
- 9:41Speaker 4: older woman's attitude toward the girl? Did she suspect her
- 9:44Speaker 4: husband felt an attachment for her? Oh, good heavens.
- 9:46Speaker 6: No.
- 9:46Speaker 5: May was only twelve years old when Lady Elfrida drowned.
- 9:49Speaker 5: She was nineteen monstyle, but asked her to be a
- 9:51Speaker 5: second wife. You say they've been married three years? Are
- 9:53Speaker 5: they happy? I suppose so? Of course Alberts disappointed again
- 9:58Speaker 5: there are no children.
- 9:59Speaker 3: Maybe it wasn't. And then guy of the Lady of
- 10:00Speaker 3: Frieda's fault the first time.
- 10:02Speaker 4: Don't interrupt, Watson. Then Sir Albert's family may die out with.
- 10:06Speaker 5: Him, don't know, Holmes. There's Robert Albert's brother, a half
- 10:10Speaker 5: brother as a matter of fact. He's much younger, but
- 10:13Speaker 5: he's rarely at home, always off hunting big game in India,
- 10:16Speaker 5: Africa or some other Arplandish places. He's just returned from
- 10:19Speaker 5: Canada about six weeks ago. How does he get on
- 10:21Speaker 5: with Sir Albert's new wife. Hardly has a word to
- 10:24Speaker 5: say to her, just keeps looking at her with those strange,
- 10:28Speaker 5: black burning eyes of his. His mother was Spanish, you though,
- 10:32Speaker 5: they do say, he takes after her.
- 10:34Speaker 3: I say, look at that magnificent sunset there over him,
- 10:37Speaker 3: back of that steeple.
- 10:38Speaker 5: That's the steeple of Basam Church. Watson, we're nearly home.
- 10:42Speaker 5: The town begins on the other side of the railroad
- 10:44Speaker 5: tracks to put up the next decline.
- 10:47Speaker 2: Would you care to drive for the church immediately home?
- 10:50Speaker 2: I say, control.
- 10:51Speaker 4: Yourself, Watson, I know you're famished. Suppose we pay a
- 10:54Speaker 4: visit at the local inn, first killing Hurst and postpone
- 10:57Speaker 4: our investigation of Basham Church and till the witching out
- 11:00Speaker 4: of midnight.
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- 11:16Speaker 1: the most for your money if you insist on clipper
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- 11:29Speaker 1: has modernized the fine old craft of clothes making. It
- 11:32Speaker 1: brings you these amazing savings by concentrating the buying power
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- 11:40Speaker 1: from coast to coast. Your own leading local establishment, the
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- 11:46Speaker 1: at only forty and forty seven to fifty, fine tropicals
- 11:50Speaker 1: at only thirty three seventy five to forty dollars, and
- 11:53Speaker 1: sport jackets at only twenty six fifty. Why you'll be
- 11:57Speaker 1: high on clipper Craft for evermore selling expensive clothes at
- 12:01Speaker 1: inexpensive low prices at the nation's finest stores is the great,
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- 12:09Speaker 1: know insist on Clippercraft clothes. So be sure to visit
- 12:13Speaker 1: the clipper Craft store in your city.
- 12:16Speaker 10: These leading stores in the metropolitan area are proud to
- 12:19Speaker 10: add their names to Clippercraft and your suits top coats,
- 12:22Speaker 10: sport jackets and tropicals. In Manhattan Sacks thirty four Broadway
- 12:26Speaker 10: at thirty fourth, John Watermaker Men's Stores Broadway at eighth
- 12:30Speaker 10: and sixty seven Liberty Street. In Brooklyn, Abraham and Strauss
- 12:34Speaker 10: in Newark, New Jersey, Boulevard Men's Shop Presky Ewarck. And
- 12:37Speaker 10: in Jamaica the B and B Clothes Shop one sixty
- 12:40Speaker 10: four oh eight Jamaica Avenue.
- 12:48Speaker 4: And now back to Bash and Churchyard.
- 12:50Speaker 1: It is a few moments before midnight the good Rector,
- 12:53Speaker 1: followed by two silhouettes, one toad and lank. The other,
- 12:56Speaker 1: rather more substantial, is picking his way through the moss
- 12:58Speaker 1: covered tombstones by the light of an old fashioned.
- 13:01Speaker 5: Light, careful watching one of the headstones has fallen over.
- 13:12Speaker 5: Some of the graves are very old, and the families
- 13:14Speaker 5: have died out. The more important families, of course, have
- 13:17Speaker 5: their tombs and vaults inside the church proper, where the
- 13:20Speaker 5: local historical society cares for them.
- 13:22Speaker 2: Dashed the democratic a, Holmes.
- 13:24Speaker 4: What difference does it make when you're dead?
- 13:27Speaker 5: Now up these steps, just a moment to lie. Find
- 13:31Speaker 5: the key to the side door.
- 13:33Speaker 2: I say, listen to the wheel. Sounds like a lost soul.
- 13:38Speaker 5: Here we are. I'll go first and right the way.
- 13:48Speaker 4: A hinge could do with a bit of oil.
- 13:50Speaker 3: Dimminghurst, good lord, whew, simply just swooped past my face.
- 13:55Speaker 4: Probably of bath Watson. Old churches are often inhabited by them. Yes,
- 13:59Speaker 4: there's another hanging from that clear story up there this way.
- 14:02Speaker 3: Holmes, you see the old place looks much bigger and
- 14:05Speaker 3: gloomier from the inside at homes.
- 14:07Speaker 5: Quite now we are standing directly under the beltry. If
- 14:11Speaker 5: you look up you can see the bell and the
- 14:13Speaker 5: rotted end of the bell cord up there, completely out
- 14:15Speaker 5: of reach.
- 14:16Speaker 3: He's right, homes no human hen could ring that bell? Hello,
- 14:22Speaker 3: I slipped on something. Yes, there seemed to be quite
- 14:23Speaker 3: a few pebbles here on the floor. Fit's and masonry
- 14:26Speaker 3: are always coming loose. I'm fraid one of them are
- 14:29Speaker 3: a ruined. The postmistresses to bonnet. The Damesfield bolts up
- 14:33Speaker 3: this way to the left of the chance. Basham Church
- 14:38Speaker 3: is one of the oldest in all England. Here at
- 14:42Speaker 3: the entrance to the choir lies the daughter of Canoe,
- 14:44Speaker 3: folded in her golden hair. It's still growing, they say.
- 14:49Speaker 3: Remember one hundred years or so they opened up the
- 14:51Speaker 3: tomb and cut a link of it off.
- 14:52Speaker 2: I say, do you believe that?
- 14:54Speaker 5: I don't know, Watson, I wasn't here at Basham at
- 14:57Speaker 5: the beginning of the century.
- 14:59Speaker 2: I'll let you know.
- 15:00Speaker 4: Oh, in the year two thousand, at that ancient altar,
- 15:03Speaker 4: Harold knelt before setting sail on his ill fated voyage
- 15:05Speaker 4: to Normanday. Here we are the entrance to the Damesfield Bolt,
- 15:11Speaker 4: one of the oldest family of volts in the entire church.
- 15:14Speaker 4: It was completely filled long ago. The more recent members
- 15:17Speaker 4: have been buried in the floor beside it. This is
- 15:21Speaker 4: lady Elfrida's tomb here with the wilted roses lying against
- 15:25Speaker 4: the wall. Yes, keep it that lantern.
- 15:28Speaker 2: Rector Holmes, what are you doing with your.
- 15:31Speaker 4: Sneak testing the wall behind Elfrida's grave? Yes, quite solid.
- 15:38Speaker 4: And the door leading down into the vault this hasn't
- 15:41Speaker 4: been opened for years, I should say, no rust or
- 15:45Speaker 4: dust on the grating. The grill works sound as the
- 15:47Speaker 4: date was made.
- 15:48Speaker 2: Hmm.
- 15:49Speaker 5: Those old dames could teach us a thing or two
- 15:50Speaker 5: about down working home.
- 15:52Speaker 4: Yes, suppose we take up our places in the first
- 15:54Speaker 4: few over there. It's nearly midnight. We may as well
- 15:57Speaker 4: wait in comfort for this phenomenon of the roses. I
- 16:01Speaker 4: have the strangest feeling that someone is watching us, considering
- 16:06Speaker 4: all the ancestors who lie buried here, Is it any wonder,
- 16:08Speaker 4: oh homes, Really sit down, Watson and stop fidgeting. Let's
- 16:12Speaker 4: see twenty seconds to midnight. This church is, of course
- 16:18Speaker 4: one of the old foundation that's right home. Ten seconds.
- 16:22Speaker 4: The important thing is to watch the roses. Don't take
- 16:24Speaker 4: your eyes off them. Five seconds. I hope this occurs
- 16:30Speaker 4: on time three seconds two one now.
- 16:42Speaker 2: Midnight exactly, hose look at the roses. They're fresh, they
- 16:46Speaker 2: are absoluted, blooming.
- 16:47Speaker 3: So they are let's to brook them.
- 16:50Speaker 4: Did either of you take your eyes off them, just
- 16:52Speaker 4: for a second, perhaps when the bell rang?
- 16:54Speaker 5: I'm afraid I am guilty of that laps.
- 16:55Speaker 4: As well, lucky hours of arm assuring us of at
- 16:57Speaker 4: least one person who can concentrate. Yes, these roses are
- 17:02Speaker 4: as fresh as they look. Remarkable. I think I'll take
- 17:06Speaker 4: this one along for my button hole looks. Tomorrow morning, Director,
- 17:10Speaker 4: I think we shall take a look at the bushes
- 17:11Speaker 4: that are supposed to have produced these very remarkable roses
- 17:14Speaker 4: that can be arranged home excellent, You know, Watson, there's
- 17:17Speaker 4: only one thing more remarkable than the freshness of this rose.
- 17:20Speaker 4: What's then the time it chose to renew itself?
- 17:23Speaker 2: But it was midnight, exactly as Director tell.
- 17:26Speaker 5: That's right, Homes, you yourself said it was midnight, by
- 17:28Speaker 5: your own work.
- 17:28Speaker 4: That's what makes it so remarkable, My director, You see,
- 17:31Speaker 4: my watch is five minutes fast.
- 17:43Speaker 11: It's very good of you, mister Holmes, to take such
- 17:45Speaker 11: an interest in our little problem of the everlasting roses.
- 17:48Speaker 11: But after all, I imagine a person of your reputation
- 17:53Speaker 11: is many more important crimes to investigate.
- 17:56Speaker 4: It's not the importance of a case that interests me primarily. Albert,
- 18:00Speaker 4: the Shah of Persia might be murdered in cold blood
- 18:03Speaker 4: in Trafalgar Square and I should probably pass by without
- 18:05Speaker 4: a glance. But if a well known member of a
- 18:08Speaker 4: county family should, shall we say, go about popping off
- 18:11Speaker 4: his neighbour's top hats with a sling shot, I might
- 18:16Speaker 4: just possibly consider that worth investigating.
- 18:19Speaker 11: What a droll fellow you are, mister Holmes, am I,
- 18:22Speaker 11: Sir Albert, Oh, yes, here we are. These are my
- 18:27Speaker 11: former wife's yellow rose bushes, mister Holmes, now quite bare
- 18:31Speaker 11: of blossoms, as you could see.
- 18:33Speaker 4: I thought they might be. Yes, let me see. It's
- 18:38Speaker 4: basically a rugosa with a later grafting of something. Yes,
- 18:41Speaker 4: I rather imagine the rose these bushes produce resembles that
- 18:45Speaker 4: early flowering yellow rose now called the father Hugo. Yes,
- 18:50Speaker 4: mister Holmes, that's absolutely correct. By the way, Sir Albert,
- 18:53Speaker 4: you have a gardener named Hugo.
- 18:55Speaker 2: Oh, yes, old Hugo. He's feeling first.
- 18:57Speaker 8: I'm afraid this business of the yellow room uses is
- 19:00Speaker 8: preying on his mind almost as much as on my wife's.
- 19:03Speaker 4: And my favorite roads at the fround Rushki, which blooms
- 19:07Speaker 4: about now. It's a pure white rose as you know.
- 19:11Speaker 4: And sudmento, I agree, I great agree. People who have
- 19:17Speaker 4: forever crossed breeding and grafting.
- 19:19Speaker 2: Are you sure?
- 19:21Speaker 9: Are you sure?
- 19:21Speaker 10: You didn't hear it? Last night?
- 19:23Speaker 9: Had called again just shortly before dawn. It was done
- 19:26Speaker 9: by the bend of the sea Creek where they found Elfreda.
- 19:31Speaker 9: It was a woman's voice, and it kept calling my name.
- 19:34Speaker 9: I had an almost irresistible hurge to go to it.
- 19:37Speaker 10: What brought me?
- 19:38Speaker 4: You must have been dreaming.
- 19:39Speaker 9: It wasn't the first time I heard that voice. It
- 19:42Speaker 9: called to me three nights ago, Oh Robert, I was terrified.
- 19:46Speaker 9: I'm not on the Albert's door, but he didn't answer.
- 19:48Speaker 9: Then I not on yours, but you didn't hear me either.
- 19:51Speaker 9: And all the time that that voice kept calling to me.
- 19:55Speaker 4: The men in this household must be remarkably heavy sleepers, Robert,
- 19:59Speaker 4: some confounded dropper on the other side of the head.
- 20:01Speaker 11: May my dear come round the headshirt a moment and
- 20:05Speaker 11: bring Robert.
- 20:07Speaker 2: I want you.
- 20:08Speaker 11: To meet two distinguished guests, mister Sherlock Holmes and doctor Watson,
- 20:13Speaker 11: my wife, and my half brother Robert.
- 20:15Speaker 4: We've come to solve the riddle. Are the yellow roses? No? No,
- 20:20Speaker 4: leave her alone? Leave her alone, all of you.
- 20:31Speaker 3: Why you drag me out here, homes Just sit in
- 20:35Speaker 3: this blasted, insect ridden duck blind in the middle of
- 20:37Speaker 3: the night that racked the blasted things.
- 20:42Speaker 2: It's not even the dut hunting season.
- 20:44Speaker 4: Exactly. Our object, my dear Watson, is to discover who
- 20:47Speaker 4: and why someone's trying to frighten the lady may out
- 20:50Speaker 4: of her wits.
- 20:50Speaker 3: Then you don't agree with her husband and her brother
- 20:52Speaker 3: in law that the voice calling to her from the
- 20:54Speaker 3: water was only a dream.
- 20:56Speaker 4: The ringing bell and the other blooming roses want to dream, Watson.
- 20:59Speaker 2: Very well, then one not solved that mystery first?
- 21:01Speaker 4: Or but it is solved, Watson. It's been solved since
- 21:04Speaker 4: five minutes to midnight last night. How Sir, I was
- 21:07Speaker 4: quite convinced that the trick of the bell and the
- 21:09Speaker 4: roses were not two but one. Any slight of hand
- 21:13Speaker 4: artists knows that the important thing is to divert his
- 21:15Speaker 4: audience's attention at the moment his stunt is pulled. Hence
- 21:18Speaker 4: the bell. I don't understand, my dear Watson. Those smooth pebbles,
- 21:22Speaker 4: one of which unbalanced you. Those were what rang the bell.
- 21:25Speaker 4: They were projected by a noiseless weapon, in short, a
- 21:28Speaker 4: powerful slingshot. Our slight of hand artist aimed his pebble
- 21:32Speaker 4: through the grating of the Danesfield Family vault. A second
- 21:35Speaker 4: later he shoved the fresh roses through with his foot
- 21:37Speaker 4: as he picked up the old ones with his hand,
- 21:39Speaker 4: very quick, very neat.
- 21:41Speaker 3: But how did he get inside of the vault? You
- 21:43Speaker 3: saw the ashes around the entrance, there were no footprints.
- 21:46Speaker 4: But our Vassian churches, I said before, belongs to the
- 21:48Speaker 4: old foundation. The Danesfield vault was undoubtedly used as a
- 21:52Speaker 4: priest's hole during the religious wars. There's another entrance from
- 21:55Speaker 4: the fields directly under the chancel.
- 21:57Speaker 3: And you deliberately ticked the fellow into going off half
- 22:00Speaker 3: hot five minutes ahead of time.
- 22:03Speaker 2: Homes, You are a.
- 22:04Speaker 4: Wonder Yes, I rather imagine will be no further nonsense
- 22:06Speaker 4: in Basham Church. But that doesn't mean that lady May
- 22:09Speaker 4: is out of danger. The roses were meant to telefy her,
- 22:11Speaker 4: you know. The poor woman's on the verge of a
- 22:13Speaker 4: nervous breakdown or worse there. Why not let me take over, No, Watson,
- 22:16Speaker 4: not until we can prove who it is who's threatening her.
- 22:19Speaker 2: Why you, of course the brother.
- 22:21Speaker 3: He wants out of the way, so there could be
- 22:22Speaker 3: no possible air except himself.
- 22:24Speaker 4: The roses by the way were white roses dyed yellow
- 22:27Speaker 4: inasmuch as the yellow rose bushes had ceased to move.
- 22:34Speaker 2: Good Lord home, did you hear that?
- 22:40Speaker 4: Yes? I suspected as much. It's coming from the marshes
- 22:42Speaker 4: on the other side of the stream. The tides high, now,
- 22:44Speaker 4: the stream's deep. He would wait for that.
- 22:48Speaker 2: Here she comes, now, the leady maid.
- 22:50Speaker 4: She's all in white homes. She looks as if she
- 22:53Speaker 4: were sleepwalking.
- 22:55Speaker 2: Look, she's heading for that boot tag to the landing.
- 22:57Speaker 4: Yes, yes, someone's following her into the shadows.
- 23:01Speaker 2: It's Robert, the half brother. He's carrying a gun, Holmes.
- 23:05Speaker 2: We must stop him before he does it any harm.
- 23:07Speaker 4: Even alone, Watson, he knows what he's doing. The lady
- 23:13Speaker 4: May is getting into the rowboat. She's pulling it out
- 23:15Speaker 4: into the stream.
- 23:15Speaker 2: She's in trouble, Holmes.
- 23:16Speaker 4: Yes, there were fresh holes bored just above the water line.
- 23:20Speaker 4: When she stepped into the boat, it started to fill homes.
- 23:24Speaker 4: We must save her, honey, Relax, Watson, Robert's going after her.
- 23:30Speaker 4: The situations were in hand. That's what I was waiting for. Now, Watson,
- 23:36Speaker 4: we can go home. But you heard that scream and
- 23:38Speaker 4: then we shot over there in the marshal plight. It
- 23:40Speaker 4: was Sir Albert who was luring his second wife to
- 23:42Speaker 4: her death by the same means he used to do
- 23:44Speaker 4: her world at his first He was shot by the
- 23:46Speaker 4: one person who suspected that death was not suicide. When
- 23:49Speaker 4: he saw him tried again, he killed him.
- 23:51Speaker 2: But Robert couldn't have sought his brother Holmes. He left
- 23:54Speaker 2: his gun on the bank when he went to rescue
- 23:56Speaker 2: the lady May.
- 23:56Speaker 4: Right, Watson, Yes, I think that when Sara al bodies discoboard,
- 24:01Speaker 4: we found he was shocked by his own fowling piece
- 24:04Speaker 4: at close range. The coronel will probably decide it was
- 24:08Speaker 4: a hunting accident. Well, the lady May was rescued. I
- 24:23Speaker 4: take a doctor.
- 24:23Speaker 2: Oh yes, mister Harris.
- 24:25Speaker 4: But why did her husband want to do away with her?
- 24:27Speaker 3: Because she, like his first wife, had produced no sons,
- 24:31Speaker 3: and because he suspected his brother had fallen in love
- 24:33Speaker 3: with her. As a matter of fact, that lady may
- 24:36Speaker 3: marriage Sir Robin, and in due course of time they
- 24:38Speaker 3: had five bouncing offspring, all boys.
- 24:41Speaker 1: Well good for her, But doctor who did shoot Sir Albery.
- 24:45Speaker 3: Holmes took no interest whatever in solving that mystery. Of course,
- 24:48Speaker 3: I always had nice suspicion.
- 24:50Speaker 1: You mean the old boy who had the same name
- 24:52Speaker 1: as the yellow roses.
- 24:53Speaker 2: Possibly mister Harris. Possibly, I see.
- 24:57Speaker 4: And now, doctor Watson, what story are you going to
- 24:59Speaker 4: tell us next?
- 25:00Speaker 5: Let me see.
- 25:01Speaker 3: Next week, I think I'll tell how Sharlock Holmes outwitted
- 25:04Speaker 3: two of Europe's most famous duel thieves and confidence trixters
- 25:08Speaker 3: by beating them at their own game on the platform
- 25:11Speaker 3: at Waterloo Station. Yes, the story concerns a missing parrot
- 25:15Speaker 3: and a lady who played a nest to click on
- 25:17Speaker 3: me by means of her false teeth. I call it
- 25:21Speaker 3: the case of the Accommodating Valise.