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Sherlock Holmes: The Bruce Partington Plans (EP0925) · Great Detectives of Old Time Radio Volume 2|Mystery Audio Dramas

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Welcome to the Great Detectives of Old Time Radio from Boise, Idaho. This
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is your host, Adam Graham. If you have a comment, email it
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to me U Box thirteen at Great Detectives dot net, Follow us on Twitter
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Now it's time for today's episode of Sherlock Holmes. The Bruce Partington plans the
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Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, the original and immortal stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
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dramatized Daniel, with Sir Ralph Richardson as Doctor Watson and Sir John Gielgud in
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the role of Sherlock Holmes. In the third week of November in the year
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eighteen ninety five, a dense yellow fog settled down upon London from the Monday
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to the Thursday. I doubt if it was ever possible to see the opposite
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houses from our window in Baker Street. The first of these three days,
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Charlock Holmes spent in music and in cross indexing his huge Book of Criminal References.
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But when for the fourth time we saw the greasy, heavy brown swirls
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still drifting past us and condensing in oily drops on the window panes, Holmes
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wholly impatient nature could endure such drab existence no longer. It was fortunate for
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both of us, as there's suddenly arrived for him a telegram, Mycroft,
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Watson, it's from Mycroft. Thank your brother home. Course you will remember
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him from that affair of the Greek interpreter. Of course, Oh, of
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course, yes, even if it's difficult to think of you with a family.
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Oh you're an isolated phenomenon. No, not so long as Mycroft thrives.
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Believe it or not, Watson, Mycroft is an even more remarkable man
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than I am. What does this remarkable brother of yours do in Whitehall?
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I seem to remember he's some kind of post under the government. Under my
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dear Watson, Mycroft is the government, Come come. He draws four hundred
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and fifty pounds a year, remains subordinate, with no ambitions of any kind.
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And yet the same great powers which I have turned to the detection of
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crime make Mycroft the central clearing house of every fragment of vital knowledge in the
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control idea. Everyone consults him from the highest in the land. There's no
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state secret which he does not, yea. And that again is why this
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telegram is so remarkable. And I still don't know what's in it. Yeah,
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read it. Man, must see you about Kadugan West coming at once,
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mycroft. Yes, and perhaps you'll be able to tell me, Watson,
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who this Cadugan West is. You're always buried in the newspapers. The
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name sounds vaguely familiar, I must confess, yea, Yeah, yes,
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of course, Holmes. He's the young fellow who's found dead on the underground
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railway on Tuesday morning. Oh, I found dead and on the underground you
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said, yeah, we're quite literally on his homes, lying just beside the
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track outside Orgut station. I remember it all now. He plainly fallen out
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of the carriage or been thrown out. Eh. Where was he traveling from?
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Nobody knows. He didn't have a ticket, no ticket, Dear me,
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Watson, this is really very singular. What else is known about him?
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Do you remember Trent seventy as of age? I think yes, and
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engaged to be married, and he was a clerk at the Woolidge Arsenal,
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the Naval Office, you know, beautifully stuck sink Watson, government employer.
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So behold the link with brother Mycroft. Ah, and here comes Mycroft himself.
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And I'm not mistaken. I know that heavy step Sherlock, my dear
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fellow. This is a most annoying business. Welcome, my dear Mycroft.
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I'm less straight with you too, the good less straight of Scotland Yard.
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We are honored door servant, mister Holmes. Don't Watson Hello, Less says
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I must sit down shut? Oh yeah, hi, how'd you do?
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Sir? Hi you doctor Watson, or you'll forgive us. I'm shot.
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I never have any secrets from Watson, Mycroft. But this is best.
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But you can count on my discretion, sir, very well. But oh
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let's trade close the door makes certain no one can be listening. Very good,
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mister Holmes. As you know, I dislike all hurring my habit Sherlock
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and the present state of Siam. It's most awkward that I should be away
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from the office. But the powers that b would take no denial. I've
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never seen the Prime Minister so upset. And as to the Admiral Tid it's
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buzzing like an overturned bee hive, really, and all because of a dead
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clerk without a railway to get in his pocket. You know the facts,
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then, my invaluable Watson has just been priming me, ah as much as
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I could only what I've been reading in the papers. What the papers couldn't
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mention, doctor was as if West didn't have a ticket in his pocket,
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he at least had something else, Ah, some technical paper, Sherlock.
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And I need say no more than that they were the strain no one could
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overhear us. The Bruce Partington plans, Sherlock, Well, great heavens man,
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you've heard of them. You must have heard of them. The plans
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of the Bruce Partington submarine. I know the name, of course, and
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of the invention. Hush, Sherlock. You may take it from me that
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naval warfare becomes an impossibility within the radius of a Bruce Partington. Of course,
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the world has heard of the submarine, but the plans themselves have been
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most closely guarded. There isn't a feign power that would give a fortune for
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under no conceivable circumstances where they to be taken from the office at Woolage and
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yet here we find them in the pockets of a dead junior Clark in the
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heart of London. They've been found them, no doctor, But she said
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the ten papers were taken from the safe at Woolage, and there were only
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seven in the pockets of this wretched youth. The three most essential are gone,
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stolen, danished, Charlotte. You must drop everything to find them,
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indeed, but I may be busy. Oh, never mind your petty puzzles
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of the police court. This is vital international. Then why don't you solve
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it yourself? You can see as far as I can. It's a question
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of getting details. Give me a details and I'll solve you anything from an
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arm chair. But to run here and there, and to cross quest and
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railway guards, and to lie on my face with a lens to my eye.
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You know my methods of Sherlock. Now you're the fellow, the only
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one in the world if you were fancy to see your name in the next
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honors list. Really, in my craft, I play the game for the
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game's own sake, and on those terms only. Well, I'll do what
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I can. Thank Heaven, doctor, if you would be good enough to
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pass over the whiskey and soda. Certainly, certainly, of course, Ah,
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thank you, thank you. Now Sherlock, the facts, the facts,
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the facts, and so less trade than I. At first rather silent,
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before those two remarkable brothers came to hear of the events that had led
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up to the theft of the vital plans. We learned that the official guardian
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of the papers had been the famous government ex Sir James Walter, that there
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were two keys to the safe. Sir James had one himself, and that
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he'd spent the fatal night at his home in Berkeley Square, a fact that
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was vouched for by his brother, Colonel Valentine Walter. The other key was
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kept by the Chief Clerk, and he also was at his home that night.
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We argued the strate and I the Cadugan West. The traitor must have
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obtained a third key, Yes, that he presumably traveled to London with the
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papers to sell under some foreign agent, and that perhaps a price had not
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been agreed, and they'd set off back to Woolidge to return the plans to
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the safe. The agent had followed him, murdered him in the train,
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and that the most vital of the papers was taken from his pocket and that
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his body was thrown on to the line. Well that's good, Watson,
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good good, you argue admirably, and you two illustrate. Yes, as
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you describe it, it holds together at least. But if you're right,
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the cases at an end, what is that for us to do? My
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craft to act rnoch to act. Of course the explanation holds together. Yet
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all my instincts are against it, as I can see that yours are.
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There are too many circumstances unresolved. Well, please still serve to break the
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bleak monotony of this fog. Come along, Watson, you two less trade.
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Mycraft owner is no good asking you. Of course, we'll begin our
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investigations. I think by a visit to Olgat station. I get a coat.
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Goodbye, Micraft. You shall have my report in due course. Oh
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before we go, pray, write me the names of the most important foreign
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agents you know to be operating at present here in London. Very well,
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there are only three. There are your names, Thank you, my craft,
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calm Watson to Algate. So so then, m Fortunately the fog has
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lifted a little at last. This is the spotless trade. It is,
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mister Holmes. That's where the young fellow's body lay just there beside the track
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where it comes out of the tunnel. Yes, interesting, most interesting.
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Do you notice the presence of anything, Watson? No, no, nothing,
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nothing at all? Homes Where shall I put it? Then? The
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absence of anything? Oh? There of course of blood just so, And
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yet as I understand it, there was a considerable woundless trade. The bone
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was crashed right into the head the railway carriage. Then if he was murdered
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in the carriage must be covered in blood. No, doctor, Every single
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carriage on this line that night has been examined inside, of course, where
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else nothing nothing, I suppose, Lestrade, that accepted a junction like Oldgate
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here. There are no great numbers of points on a railway system like this,
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No very few, i'd say. Yet here there are so many,
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you see, and all on a curve, just as the lines begin to
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come out of the station. H well, well, well the case grows
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in interest. Watson. I'm studying my Croft's list of spies in the handsome
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Thank you, Lestrade. I shall be in touch with you when Watson and
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I have fade our little visit, our visit home. Yes to Barkley Square,
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that kir dagon West lived at Woolwich. Nevertheless, we visit Barkley Square.
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Come Watson, Our business is with Sir James Walter, the distinguished government
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expert, whose decorations and accomplishments fill at least two whole columns in Bosom and
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Good Days. Yet, in this case of surprises, we still had one
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more. When we arrived at Barcley Square, we were ushered into a dimly
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lit drawing room in the house of the great Statesman scientist, and we were
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joined there by a very tall and handsome gentleman of fifty or so, who
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introduced himself as Sir James brother, Colonel Valentine, And from him we learned
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to our distress that Sir James was dead this morning, mister Holmes, this
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morning. He will forgive me. I've hardly recovered from the blow. I'm
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deeply sorry, Colonel Valentine, deeply sorry. How did he die? Now?
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It was this horrible scandal of the plans. My brother was a man
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of very sensitive honor. The papers were in his charge. Who understand it?
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It broke his heigh her Since Sir Sorry, we had hoped that he
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might give us some indications that would help us to clear the matter up.
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It was as much a mystery to him as to all of us, Doctor
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Watson, he had no doubt. I suppose that dug and West was guilty.
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None, none, sir, Consider the facts. After all, young
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fellow and his fiancee were walking to Woolwiche Theater that night. Suddenly, as
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they were passing the Naval offices, he darted away and left her in the
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fog, and she never saw him again. Dreadful, But why this sudden
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disappearance? Can you explain? It? Obviously gone to steal the papers,
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No doubt some agent had corrupted him. He needed money. He took the
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papers to London and met his death by some form of double crossing, as
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I believe it's known in such circles. Yes, yes, of course,
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that's the only explanation. Indeed, but you can understand, mister Holmes,
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how deeply disturbed I am, naturally, Colonel, forgive me for having taken
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up so much of your time. Already, come, Watson, we must
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take our leave. Goodbye, Colonel, good day, goode, sa,
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goodbye gentlemen, and now Watson to Baker Street. Then I shall leave you
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for a little on business of my own. But we shall meet again later
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to night at gold Don Restaurant in the Gloucester Road in Kensington. You will
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join me there at nine, Watson, and kindly bring a jemmy, a
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dark lantern and a revolver with you. It had to be once more,
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Sherlock Holmes was at his most mysterious. I watched him in Baker Street,
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paw over a map of London, consulting again and again the list of known
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foreign agents which my Craft had given him. There are numerous small fry,
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but only three key men worth considering in connection with the sale of the plans
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to a foreign path at Off Mile in Westminster. Louis La Rossia and notting
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Hill, and Hugo Oberstein of Caulfield Gardens, Kensington. Yet how could Holmes
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tell which of the three was most likely? In the late afternoon he went
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out. The fog was still persistent, although less heavy than in the morning,
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and just before nine I made my own way through it, wrapped heavily
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in a bulging overcoat, and so met him as arranged in Goldoni's Restaurant,
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where he had just finished dinner. Ah Watson, my dear infallible Watson,
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let me offer you a cup of coffee. No, no, no,
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no, no, this is quite a singular adventure, Watson. I fear
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that up to now I've kept you rather in the dark. You always do
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at the tools I mentioned, the burglar's tools. You've got them under my
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coat. That's why I haven't dared to take it off. Excellent, the
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proprietor has been so very kind as to present me with a cigar. Do
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have it, my dear fellow. No, no, thank you that this
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poisonous the mum would expect. Oh, oh, well, thank you.
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I'd rather have an explanation. Well, so you shall. What is it
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exactly that you want me to explain? Whose house is it we're going to
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Burgle? Oh? Yes, of course, the house of mister Hugo Oberstein
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at thirteen Coalfield Gardens. What the third name on your brother's names the same?
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Come Watson? Wait, am I happened? Code? It is time
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for us to go. But how do you know that Oberstein's the one?
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There were three names on the list, by the fact that there was no
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blood beside the railway line at Oldgate Station or in any of the railway carriages
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of the trains that night. But my dear, come, come. It
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isn't such a mystery quite elementary infected all hinges on the fact that this young
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man had no ticket in his pocket, meaning simply that he must have lost
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it once he was in the train, meaning that he was never in the
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train at all. Gorham's consider, Watson, is it a coincidence that the
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body is found at the very point where the train pitches and sways as it
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comes rounder Curbo with the railway points. The body was on the roof,
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Watson, the roof, the roof our core. He had met his death
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elsewhere, And then the body was laid on the roof of a carriage and
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it rolled off onto the line at Olgate, just as the train swung round.
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There was no blood, of course, because the murder had been done
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elsewhere. Couldn't he have been dropped from the bridge? Impossible? The carriage
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roofs are slightly rounded. He was placed, placed, placed, But how
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and where barely a hundred yards from where we are now? Huh. It's
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a simple matter of consulting a map of London, my dear fellow, as
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I did, and I found that if the addresses given to us by Microft,
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the only one adjacent to this particular branch of the Olgate line is number
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thirteen, coal Field Gardens. Overstein's house. Oh, splendid home, splendid
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you've never risen to our greater height. Thank you, my dear fellow.
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And here, if I'm not mistaken, is the house itself. I've been
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able to ascertain that Oberstein left haste over the continent yesterday afternoon. So we
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plainly cannot call upon him in the ordinary way, and so we shall burgle
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his empty house for evidence. There seems to be nobody inside. Are you
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quite ready, Watson? Yes, yes, yes, yes. It's not
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the first time we've gone house breaking, is it. We're almost experts.
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Remember the Middleviton case homes? Oh dash you no, no, Watson,
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control yourself. I thought we were supposed to be experts. Yes, Where
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the Middle Ofton case was thirteen years ago? Ah? Yes, time flies?
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Does it not? Here we are? I fancy this deck room was
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the one way looking for Yes, you were right about the railway homes.
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It's just below the window, I thought, so, one of those places
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where the underground comes to the surface. Noisy house to live in, I
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would say, but a convenient one for the disposing of corpses. Listen,
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there's a train coming. Now do you stay there, Watson? And watch
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how closely beneath the window the carriage roofs pass. What are you doing,
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homes prowling about seeing what I can find the missing papers? Eh? Of
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course not there's someone on the continent by next time. No, didn't.
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I can lay my hands on that might serve as a ah, a box
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here? What's in it? Homes, Attend to your own businessman? The
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train, the train push up in the window only a few feet homes,
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a few feet billows just so? And given the fact that a train pulled
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up outside there that night, as I checked, they sometimes do because of
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an intersection beyond the tunnel, the things seem pleasant to itself. And look,
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look, homes, here are blood stains on the sill. For you're
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becoming quite observant. Might be a fellow. I noticed them the moment we
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came in. However, at this little box, do you see it?
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What's in it? Cuttings from the Personal column of the Globe newspaper. If
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I'm not mistaken, judging by the print and color, As you know,
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I've made a study of such things. All hold the length and Holmes.
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Let me see they're pinned together in consecutive order. It's plainly the way in
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which Overstime communicated with his confederate. There is he. Yes, staff waits
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you when goods delivered, terms agreed, signed Piero. And here's another.
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It's the last one. Look home Monday night after nine two taps, payment
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in hard cash when commissioned, fulfilled, also signed Pierot, and Monday night
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significant Watson. I think that a visit to the Globe offices would not be
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amiss before we retire for the night. Then a lazy day tomorrow perhaps,
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except that you will have a couple of telegrams to send off telegrams to whom,
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one to my brother and the other to less Trade, asking them both
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to meet us in this house here tomorrow evening, just before nine o'clock in
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this household. Yes, just the front room this time, I think,
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Yes, the front room. What I don't understand is why you've brought us
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here the kinsingtonner this time of night, mister Howes, to show you the
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thief my Croft. Have you in the latest message from Pierot show him this
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morning's newspaper? Watson? Yes, they all to night Sam our same place.
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Two taps. Your own safety at stake, my dear Sherlock. If
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he answers that we've got him, That's exactly what I thought myself when I
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put it in the less. It was Cadugan West after all, of course,
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in which casey can't come. Oh, I fancy it wasn't West.
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No, no young man would think to leave his fiancee alone in a foggy
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street while he rushed off to commit a daring robbery. He'd plan more carefully
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so as to be alone at the time. No, no, no,
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no, wait, home's waiting. Footsteps, someone's coming to the front door.
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Excellent. Do you three hide behind this inner one whilst I go and
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let him in? Cummins this way you're expected. Now, what's upon him?
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That god him? What's this? What's this? I say, Colonel
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Walter, Colonel Valentine Walter the same. I wasn't quite sure till now if
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he was the bird we were looking for. Well, my craft, said
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James's brother, I should have known. I demand an explanation. I came
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here to visit mister Obersteine. Of course you did. And we know why,
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sir, We know everything. How any English gentleman could behave in such
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a manner is beyond my comprehensions. Oh, it's true, Before Heaven,
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it's true. Don't think I haven't hated myself every minute of it. Thank
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Heavens, it's over at last. Colonel Water, you must have taken an
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impression of your brother's key. Yes, yes, I was in need of
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cash. I've been gambling. I knew I could get money from Oberstein.
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I went to the woolage office that night night, and young West must have
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seen you and recognized you in the fog as he passed there with his fiancee.
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Yes, he'd been suspicious of you for some time. He left his
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private concerns and followed you like the good citizen he was. And then as
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Percy saw you steal the papers, and he came after you to this house
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and to his debt. Before Heaven, I didn't kill him. Gentlemen,
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it was overstime when he rushed to the door and demanded what WEEO were going
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to do with a plan. It's that you helped to lay him on the
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roof of the chain and it stopped outside. Yes, scarce, I helped
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Oberstein made me. Why did you put the seven papers in his pocket to
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divert suspicion, to make everyone think it was West who was the thief.
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Oberstein kept the important ones, the only ones he needed. Your brother,
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Sir James Walter, suspected your tool. It was death that killed him.
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Yes, he suspected too. He saw me with his keys one day.
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Now you haven't addressed by Oberstein on the continent. I presume yes. You'll
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write to him. Then you'll tell him that you have discovered an important detail
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missing from the plans he has. You will say that you can't leave the
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country yourself, so that he must come back to you. You will meet
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him, say in the smoking room at the cherring Cross Hotel at noon on
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Saturday next Well, that's my craft quite admirably, Sherlock. I could hardly
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have conceived it better myself. I'll be very surprised, indeed, if it
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doesn't fetch our man, and they did, it's a matter of history now
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how Obersteine came to the Lure and was safely engulfed for fifteen years in a
26:04
British prison. In his trunk were the vital papers which he put up for
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auction in all the naval centers of Europe. As to Holmes, I learned
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not long afterwards that he spent a day at Windsor, whence he returned with
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a remarkably fine emerald Tai pin. He told me that it was a present
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from a gracious lady in whose interests he had carried out a small commission.
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Then, as he played his violin that evening, his eyes traveled slowly from
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the pin where it lay on the table, to those famous revolver practice marks
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he once had made on the wall of our sitting room, spelling out the
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R. And it required no great effort of his own deductive methods for me
26:57
to guess the ladies or last name, and to reflect that the emerald pin
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would forever recall to my friend's memory the notable adventure of the Bruce Parsington Plan.
27:48
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, based on the original stories of Sir Arthur
27:52
Conan Doyle, have been dramatized on You, with original music composed by Sydney
27:56
Torch, Sir Ralph Richardson the part of Doctor Watson, and Sir John Gilgud
28:03
that of Sherlock Holmes. The program was produced by Harry Allen Towers, M
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H. M h M. Welcome back. Overall, a very good story
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that stayed close to the spirit of the original and once again gave Holmes a
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chance to practice his breaking and entering skills, which are surprisingly significant in these
29:12
stories that will actually do it for today. We will be back tomorrow with
29:19
the conclusion of the Molly k matter, and the cart will begin first of
29:26
Carter and Brown Mysteries. I do want to mention if you have the app
29:30
or the premium side, we're going to be uploading something that's extra special for
29:33
an app. Extra it's a performance by John Gielgud on Theater Guild on the
29:40
air of a Hamlet. If you have the app, I would encourage you
29:45
to download to download this particular episode if you don't have eighty some minutes to
29:52
enjoy it. But it's definitely well worthless and eat away. All right,
29:56
Well, we will see you tomorrow from Boise, Idaho. This is your
29:57
host, Adam grahams under roll