It is possible, however, that I may have something
better before very many minutes are over, for this is one of my clients,
or I am much mistaken."
He had risen from his chair, and was standing between the parted blinds,
gazing down into the dull, neutral-tinted London street. Looking over his
shoulder, I saw that on the pavement opposite there stood a large woman
with a heavy fur boa round her neck, and a large curling red feather in a
broad-brimmed hat which was tilted in a coquettish Duchess-of-Devonshire
fashion over her ear.
From under this great panoply she peeped up in a nervous, hesitating
fashion at our windows, while her body oscillated backward and forward,
and her fingers fidgeted with her glove buttons. Suddenly, with a plunge,
as of the swimmer who leaves the bank, she hurried across the road, and we
heard the sharp clang of the bell.
"I have seen those symptoms before," said Holmes, throwing his cigarette
into the fire. "Oscillation upon the pavement always means an _affaire de
coeur_. She would like advice, but is not sure that the matter is not too
delicate for communication. And yet even here we may discriminate. When a
woman has been seriously wronged by a man, she no longer oscillates, and
the usual symptom is a broken bell wire. Here we may take it that there is
a love matter, but that the maiden is not so much angry as perplexed or
grieved.
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