Signal boosting my favorite Sherlock Holmes story
... because I’m pretty sure most people skip this one. Because it IS called “The Yellow Face.” And it was written by a British dude in 1893. So there are a couple of… very reasonable assumptions you could make about the content. But I’m telling you that humanity can be wholesome and pure, so hang around, it’s story time.
We open with Holmes and Watson, who are just sort of wandering around London in silence, “as befits two men who know each other intimately.” (awww). And when they get back to 221B, they’ve got a new client waiting.
Mr. Grant Munro is one of those mid-thirties guys who looks a lot younger. It turns out he’s married an American widow from Georgia and she’s started acting really REALLY weird.
Like, she’s sneaking out in the middle of the night without saying where she’s going. Withdrawing a lot of money from the joint bank account, not saying why. Pretending *not* to know a strange Scottish woman who’s new in town. One day this guy gives into temptation and follows her. She goes to a random cottage that she’s secretly renting, in a town called Norbury. He has no idea what is going on, but he comes back to visit this cottage a few times after that, and every he walks past it, he sees a strange expressionless yellow-white face at the window. It ducks out of sight whenever he looks too long.
Anyway, Holmes glances over at Watson, says thank you and that he’ll look into it. When the client leaves, he shakes his head, “There’s blackmail in it, or I am much mistaken.”
Holmes’ theory is that the American widow’s first husband is still alive, and he’s blackmailing her. Or (second option) the first husband like, went insane or something, and the mysterious Scottish woman has worked out the situation, and she’s the one doing the blackmailing.
Homes & Watson and Grant Munro “solve” the case by basically just sneaking into the cottage when they’re not expected. And they find -
A little, four-year-old African-American girl. In a mask and long white evening gloves.
Holmes goes and takes off the mask first thing, but the little girl is fine, just laughing and smiling at all the confused people. Watson “burst[s] out laughing, out of sympathy for her merriment.”
But Grant Munro looks at his wife, who’s just run into the room, and says, “My God! What can be the meaning of this!”
His wife’s backstory comes out. See, her first husband was African-American (she’s got his picture in her locket, Watson calls him “strikingly handsome and intelligent looking”) and the little girl is their daughter. (”Dark or fair, she is my own dear girlie and her mother’s pet!”) She didn’t think that a second husband would sign off on a multiracial daughter, so she’s been letting the Scottish nurse raise her - until she just cracked, missed her little girl too much, and had to have her near, even if it meant doing dumb things like giving her a mask and evening gloves so they wouldn’t accidentally start a rumor about an African-American girl living in the neighborhood.
And then - actually, I’m just going to go to Arthur Conan Doyle (and Watson) for this last part:
It was a long ten minutes before Grant Munro broke the silence, and when his answer came it was one of which I love to think. He lifted the little child, kissed her, and then, still carrying her, he held his other hand out to his wife and turned towards the door.
“We can talk it over more comfortably at home,” said he. “I am not a very good man, Effie, but I think that I am a better one than you have given me credit for being.”
Holmes and I followed them down the lane, and my friend plucked at my sleeve as we came out.
“I think,” said he, “that we shall be of more use in London than in Norbury.”
Not another word did he say of the case until late into the night, when he was turning away, with his lighted candle, for his bedroom.
“Watson,” says he. “If it should ever strike you that I am getting a little over-confident in my powers, or giving less pains to a case than it deserves, kindly whisper ‘Norbury’ in my ear, and I shall be infinitely obliged to you.”
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