all kinds of snake bites in this country and know the pattern they leave on the skin. These were lighter, mere nicks and…'
'This is the pattern of the scratches, isn't it?' said Holmes, holding out a slip of paper on which he had made some marks.
'How the Devil…?' Strickland exclaimed, astonished.
'I thought as much,' cried Holmes, snapping his long fingers. 'My case is complete, gentlemen. It is now time to bring matters to a close. Strickland, could I trouble you to escort Mr Carvallo, the desk-clerk, up to this room. I fear that only the majesty of your official presence will succeed in persuading him to come up here again. You will bring him straight up to the bed and make him sit by the side.' Holmes began to arrange a few chairs to face the bed. 'Then you will seat yourself on this chair, if you please; Huree, you here. I'll take the armchair in the middle. I think we will then be sufficiently imposing to strike terror into a guilty breast.'
Strickland left the room and returned shortly with the Portuguese clerk. The fellow shrank back in evident surprise and fear at our judicial appearance, but Strickland firmly propelled him over to the side of the bed.
'Sit down, Mr Carvallo, sit down,' said Sherlock Holmes pleasantly. 'We are sorry to interrupt you in the performance of your duties, but as you will appreciate, the investigation of last night's tragedy must take priority over all other matters. No, no, please, sit in the middle of the bed, the edges are so uncomfortable, you know. You need not stand on ceremony with us.'
The desk clerk was attempting to sidle to the edge of the bed, occasionally casting furtive glances at the brass lamp above him. His nervous face was covered with perspiration, even more than when I last saw him.
'Very good,' said Holmes, leaning back in his armchair. 'Now, Mr Carvallo, will you please tell us the truth about yesterday's incident.'
The man turned white to the root of his hair.
'I do not know what you mean, Sir,' he managed to stammer.
'Come, come. You must not think us so simple-minded.'
'Sir, I am absolutely ignorant of what happened.'
'This is most unfortunate,' said Holmes, shaking his head. 'But I will make some suggestions that may serve to dispel the grievous lapse in your memory. We have every cause to believe that you were the instrument of yesterday's tragedy. We are prepared to make the concession that the dead man was not your intended victim, though I doubt that the point will sufficientiy impress a judge to deter him from sending you to the gallows. Your real victim was myself, was it not, Sir? It was also some mistake on your part – the result of nervousness, maybe – that caused the premature operation of the device. Did you use too littie wax? Maybe you accidentally jolted the thing when setting it up? You will not tell. Dear me, how very unkind of you.'
The blighter licked his thick, dry lips, but said nothing.
'Ah, well. It is a minor point and we can come back to it later when you feel more cooperative.'
'Oh! no, you don't,' said Strickland fiercely, pushing the now terrified clerk firmly back on the bed that he had again surreptitiously tried to vacate.
'No, Mr Carvallo,' said Mr Holmes, shaking an admonitory forefinger. 'You will sit there quietly till I havefinished what I have to say. Now, where was I? Ah, yes. How did the unfortunate hotel servant die? I think in all probability he was passing by this room, and, looking through the open door – that you had in your nervous haste forgotten to close – saw the counterpane on the bed somewhat disarranged. Another act of gross negligence on your part, I am afraid. Being a conscientious employee of this hotel, the man stepped into the room and, bending over the bed, proceeded to straighten the counterpane. That was when it happened, did it not? Well. We can never be sure now. But I think my reasoning is sufficientiy correct, at least to convince a jury. Do you not agree, Strickland?'
'Absolutely,' said Strickland grimly.
'Please! Please!' whispered the clerk hoarsely. The wretched man was now positively shaking with terror, and his large frenzied eyes gazed as if mesmerised at the brass elephant lamp burning above him.
'The elephant interests you?' said Mr Holmes, affecting to examine the lamp with a collector's curiosity. 'It is definitely of a very superior workmanship, Benaras brass, I should say; though this is the first time I have come across one with a lamp under the canopy. Very clever, if you think about it. Very clever indeed.' He managed to inject a hint of menace into his concluding words.
Galvanised by terror, the clerk leaped from the bed and collapsed before Mr Holmes. He clung to Holmes's legs and sobbed: 'I confess. I confess. The thing is in the lamp. It is a trap. Let me out of the room before…'
Just then there was a sharp click from the lamp, and as we looked up a littie hatch swung openfrom the bottom of the elephant and a small, bright object fell on the bed. The clerk screamed with horror. The thing was red and shiny, no longer than six inches and about the thickness and shape of a piece of garden hose. It rose up, one end poised in the air, wiggling from side to side.
'What the deuce is it?' said Strickland.
'Devilry,' answered Holmes, reaching into his pocket.
Just then the thing stopped swaying, stiffened for a moment, then with remarkable speed, began to move towards us. Though the desk-clerk's terror was certainly most contagious, my scientific curiosity compelled me to observe the curious method by which the creature effected locomotion. The moment it dropped its upper end on the ground its rear end rose up and wiggled forward.
The upper end rose again and looped forwards with the rear end following immediately. The creature performed this operation with surprising speed and came rapidly towards us.
The clerk backed away in horror and tumbled backwards over my chair. Strickland and I, though certainly not as frightened as he was, recoiled slightly from the advancing creature, vaguely aware of the menace that lurked in it despite its insignificant size. Only Sherlock Holmes was absolutely unperturbed. He remained calmly seated in his chair, and, as the thing got near his legs, reached into his pocket, pulled out a silver salt-cellar, and bending over poured the contents over the creature. As soon as the salt touched its body it began to squirm and flick about violently, as if in tremendous agony.
'Why, it is a leech!' I exclaimed in surprise.
'But not your common or garden variety,' said Holmes gravely. 'This one is a Giant Red Leech [16] of the Lower Himalayas, Hirudinea Himalayaca Giganticus, of the genus Haemadipsa. We must thank a kindly providence for restricting its existence to the small district of Kaladhungi in the Western Himalayas. Only its extreme rarity-has cloaked its well-deserved reputation as a deadly killer. You may know that the saliva of the common leech contains chemical substances that not only anaesthetises the wound area, but also contain the anti-coagulant hirudin, which is used medically, and which prevents the blood from clotting. My reading this morning at the Natural History Museum informed me that the Giant Red Leech is not only much larger than the common leech, of which about three hundred species are known, but that its saliva contains these chemicals in concentrations many thousands of times stronger’.
'No wonder the poor chap bled as extensively as he did,' I said, in dread awe.
'That is not all,' said Holmes grimly, checking the notes on his cuff. 'Two other complex chemical substances are present in the Giant Leech's saliva. One activates the allergy reaction system in the body tissues to produce histamine, an amine concentrate formed from histidine, which dilates blood vessels and the pores of the skin. The third substance causes massive Paroxysmal tachycardia, a condition in which the heart suddenly commences to beat at an extraordinarily rapid rate – from two hundred and fifty to three hundred beats a minute – for a considerable period of time. So, once the saliva was absorbed into the blood-stream you would have a cumulative situation where a tremendously agitated heart would violently pump all the enervated blood from the body out of every dilated pore in the skin.'
'My God,' said Strickland with a shudder. 'But how did the creature get to him in the first place?'
'It dropped on the back of his neck when he bent over to straighten out the bedclothes.'
'That explains the marks on his neck,' exclaimed Strickland.
'Yes. The leech has three jaws, set with sharp teeth, that make the typical Y-shaped incision that I sketched for you a little while ago. The jaws and suckers on the mouth grip theflesh tenaciously. It is possible that the victim managed to tear the leech off his neck only after he rushed out into the corridor in panic. That is where the blood stains start. He then probably flung the horrible thing on the ground and stamped it to death. Huree, you may remember it as the 'piece of India rubber' that I discovered yesterday in the corridor. But of course the leech had already injected its deadly saliva into the man, and from then on there was nothing any one could have done to
