Sherlock Holmes - The Beryl Coronet

It is absolutely essential to me that I shall have 50,000 pounds at once.

If I were able, I should be happy to advance it without further parlay from my own private purse.

You have doubtless heard of the very little coronet.

One of the most precious public possessions of the empire.

And here it is.

The burial coronet.

There are 39 enormous burials, and the price of the gold chasing is intracurable.

I am prepared to leave it with it was my security.

Even to my friend Sherlock Holmes, 50,000 pounds was high stakes to play for.

My name is Watson, Dr. Watson, and I was privileged to share the adventures of Sherlock Holmes.

I will tell you about the case of the burial coronet.

My friend Holmes was only called in when the affair was already alarmingly developed.

As you will see.

The public possession funds for a store of credit balance to your account.

I remain your obedient servant, etc., etc., etc.

And I miss Parker, is that all?

Yes, Mr. Holder.

Very well. Please attend to those letters at once.

That'll be all.

Thank you, sir.

Excuse me, sir.

Yes, Robert. What is it?

A gentleman wishes to see you, sir.

By appointment?

The widow in no sir.

Well, then I'm afraid that this is his card, sir.

Now, really, Robert, you know very well that I am.

This is his card.

Well, then show him in at once.

Immediately, Robert.

Well, make hasten.

Yes, that's right, sir.

If you would kindly stick this way, you're...

Mr. Holder.

Yes, very good, Robert. Thank you.

Your grace, may I be allowed to say how deeply honored we are to...

Not at all, Mr. Holder.

I just apologize for the abruptness of his call without an appointment.

Please, say no more, sir.

Will your grace be seated?

Thank you.

With your permission, sir, I will state my business.

It is absolutely essential to me that I should have 50,000 pounds at once.

For how long may I ask your grace, do you want this sum?

Next Monday, I have a love sum due to me.

I should then repay what you advance together with any interest.

But it is essential to me that the money should be paid at once.

If I were able, I should be happy to advance it without further parlay

from my own private press.

On the other hand, if I am to do it in the name of the firm,

then injustice to my partner, I must respectfully insist that,

even in your case, every business like precautions should be taken.

I should must prefer to have it so.

Mr. Holder, you have doubtless heard of the burial covenant

with one of the most precious public possessions of the empire.

Ah, precisely.

And here it is.

The burial covenant.

There are thirty-nine enormous burials,

and the price of the gold chasing is deductible.

The lowest estimate would put the worth of a covenant

to double the sum high above us.

I am prepared to leave it with you as my security.

Well, really, your grace, I don't doubt its value.

Not at all.

I only doubt the propriety of my leaving it.

You may set your mind at rest about that.

I should not dream of doing so,

whether it not absolutely certain that I should be able to reclaim it in four days.

Now, sir, is the security sufficient?

I am, sir.

You understand that I am giving you a strong proof of the confidence which I have formed

upon all that I have heard of you.

I rely upon you not only to be discreet and to refrain from all gossip,

but above all to preserve the covenant with every possible precaution.

Of course.

I need not say that a great public scandal would be caused

if any harm were to before it.

Your grace may rest completely assured.

And now permit me to call my cashier

and arrange for £50,000 in notes to be paid at once.

Oh, that will be all for tonight, Lucy.

You may go to bed now.

Thank you.

Good night, sir.

But what I can't understand, Father,

is why you should have brought the coronet home with you.

Surely the bank would have been the safest place.

Bankers' safes have been forced before now.

Do you let us see the coronet on Caledict?

No, Mary, not even for you, my dear.

Oh, Uncle, please.

Well, perhaps just a peep on Monday,

when I take it with me for the last time.

I hope the goodness the house won't be burbled before then, that's all.

Where have you put it?

In my dressing room.

In the bureau under lock and key?

Oh, no.

Don't you remember?

When I was a youngster, I used to open that bureau

with a key of the box on carbon.

Then I hope you can keep a secret for a day or two.

Oh, honey, I am quite tired tonight.

I think I should be off to my bed.

I too.

Good night, Uncle, dear.

Good night, Arthur. You're turning in.

Yes, soon.

Good night, Mary.

Good night.

Father, I guess I'll have a word.

Well, what is it?

Look here, Dad.

Can you let me have 200 pounds?

200?

Well, you've been very generous in money matters.

And far too generous.

Well, can you once more?

No, I can't.

But I must have it.

Or I'll never be able to show my face inside the club again.

And a very good thing too.

Yes, I know what you feel, but...

You wouldn't have me leave if it was on a man.

I warned you I don't know how many times

not to squander your money on cards in the turf.

You know I've tried.

You run into dangerous company with men like Bernwell and those?

They're habits are expensive.

For their purse is a long.

They can stand it, but you can't.

You've never liked George.

He's been a true friend to me.

Well, we did for there.

As for the rest, I'll break with him.

I promise I will.

But Bernwell will draw you back.

No, Arthur, this is the third amount this month, remember.

It'll mean the space.

I must have that money, Father.

Then you must find it as best you can.

Not another farthing from me.

And now, good night.

Why, Mary?

Taking the night air child?

No, Uncle.

I just thought I'd see to the windows myself tonight.

Extra precautions, you know.

How thoughtful, my dear.

You saved me at house.

Tell me, Uncle.

Did you give Lucy leave to go out tonight?

Of certainly not.

Well, she came in just now by the back door.

Perhaps she's only been to the side gate to see someone.

Still, I think it should be stopped.

It's hardly safe.

Quite right.

You must speak to her in the morning.

Now, are you sure everything is fine?

Quite sure, Uncle.

Then, good night, my dear.

Good night.

Who is it?

Who is it?

Who is it?

Oh, what are you doing with that car?

As father I show you've come to this.

No, no.

Give it me here.

Oh, no.

It's broken.

Listen, father.

Only this instant where this missing corner is.

And the three barrels from it.

Can't be any missing.

There are and you know it.

Because you've stolen them.

Stolen?

Yes, you've picked them.

Because I call you a liar as well.

When I caught you now, you were trying to wrench off another piece.

This is the last door.

You've called me names enough.

I shall leave your house in the morning and make my own way in the world after this.

You shall leave it in the hands of the police of very well.

You choose to call the police.

Let them find what they can.

You shall learn nothing from me.

Arthur, I...

Well, you may as well face the matter.

It's not only my honor, but that of someone far more important than I that is at stake.

Yet I suppose it might still be a message.

Arthur, tell me at once where those barrels are.

Kill me and then.

Well, all shall be forgiven and forgotten.

Now, keep your forgiveness for those who ask for it.

You shall learn nothing from me.

Nothing.

And so I called an inspector and gave him into custody, Mr. Holmes.

A search has made a bunch of his person in his room

and of every portion of the house where he could have concealed the gems.

No place could be found of them.

Mr. Holmes, Doctor Watson, what am I to do?

Do you receive much company for none?

Save my partner with his family and an occasional friend of authors

that I could well do without.

Sir George Bernwell, for instance.

Do you go out much in society?

Arthur does.

My niece, Mary, and I stayed home.

We neither of us care about it.

That is unusual in the younger.

Oh, she's of a very quiet nature.

This matter has been a great shock to her, also.

Terrible.

She heard the noise of my shouting at Arthur and rushed into the room.

She must have read the whole story in his face

and unseeing the coronet.

She screamed.

I do believe she's more affected than I am.

You have neither of you any doubt, just your son's guilt.

How can we have?

When I saw him with my own eyes with the coronet in his hands.

So, was the remainder of the coronet at all injured?

Well, yes, it was twisted.

What did the police say about the disappearance of those gems?

They're still sounding the planking and probing the furniture

in the hope of finding them.

Have they thought of looking outside the house?

Yes, yes, they've shown extraordinary energy.

Very well then.

It is Arthur to find the gems at once Mr. Holmes.

You may go to any expense you think necessary.

I think, first, we'll set off for your home

and to put an eye to glancing a little more closely into the details.

Oh, together with my dear friend Dr. Watson here, of course.

You will come, Russell.

By all means.

Splendid.

Then come along, gentlemen.

The calves go slowly through this snow.

So, I think we'll take the underground.

Oh, this is my dear niece, Mary.

Mary, I brought a gentleman down from London

to inquire more deeply into this dreadful business.

This gentleman?

No, no, his friend.

This is Dr. Watson.

My Mary is the sunbeam in my house, Dr. Watson.

She's lived with us since my brother died

and I don't mind saying she's become my right hand.

Oh, don't listen to its flattery.

But where is this other gentleman?

Mr. Sherlock Holmes.

He wishes to leave him alone.

I think he's rounding the stable in.

The stable in?

What can he hope to find there?

Oh, here he comes.

My niece, Mary, Mr. Holmes.

How do you do, Mr. Howard?

Might I ask your question or two?

Well, yes.

If it may help to clear this horrible affair up.

You heard nothing yourself last night.

Nothing.

Until my uncle began to speak loudly.

I heard that and I came down.

I understand you shut up the windows and door the night before.

Did you fasten all the windows?

Yes.

But they all fasten this morning?

Yes.

Now, about your maid, Lucid Park, the second waiting maid.

She's only been in my service a few months.

She came with an excellent character though

and she's always given me satisfaction.

The only drawback is...

Yes.

Well, she's a very pretty girl and her admirers occasionally hang about the play.

Oh, yes.

I believe, Miss Holder, that you remarked to your uncle last night that she'd been out to see someone.

Yes.

Her sweet heart, I suppose.

She came into the drawing room where my uncle was telling us about the coronate.

He stopped speaking till she'd gone, of course.

But she might not have closed the door after her.

You infer that she may have overheard something that later she went out and told her sweet heart about it.

And that the tool may have planned the robbery.

What is the good of all these vague theories?

I told you I saw Arthur with the coronate in his hand.

Now, wait a little, Mr. Holder.

We must come back to that.

Miss Holder, about this girl.

You saw her return by the kitchen door, I presume.

Yes.

When I went to see if the door was passing for the night, I met her, sipping in.

I saw the man, too, in the gloom.

Do you know him?

Oh, yes, he's the green grocer, who brings our vegetables round.

His name is Francis Prosper.

He stood to the left of the door.

That is to say father up the path and his necessary to reach the door.

Why, yes, he did.

And he's a man with a wooden leg.

Why, Mr. Holmes, you were like a magician.

How do you know that?

I should be very glad now to look upstairs.

I shall probably wish to go over the outside of the house again.

Very well.

But perhaps I'd better take a look at the lower windows before I go out.

Where's my lens?

Ah, here.

Ali.

This is my bedroom and there is the bureau.

Which key was used to open it?

The one my son had mentioned.

The key of the bathroom cupboard.

You go with it?

Yes, here it is.

Oh, thank you.

Now then.

It's a nice, nice block.

It's no wonder that it didn't wake you.

And this case, I presume, contains the coronet.

The burial coronet itself, sir.

Exquisite.

Hmm, I see.

Now, Mr. Felder.

Here is the coroner, which corresponds to that which has been so unfortunate last.

My dad said that he would break it off.

I shouldn't dream of time.

Don't?

Then I will.

Mr. Holmes, I beg you, please don't, Holmes.

I-I doesn't give a little, but...

Though I'm exceptionally strong in the fingers, it'll take me all my...

All my time to break it.

Oh, an ordinary man couldn't do it.

Now, what do you think would happen if I did break it, Mr. Holder?

Well, really, I can't.

There would be a knife out of pistol, sir.

Do you tell me that all this happened with a few yards with your bed

and that you heard nothing of it?

I don't know what to think.

It's all dark to me.

Perhaps it may grow lighter as we go on.

What do you think, Mr. Felder?

I confess, Mr. Holmes,

that I still share my uncle's complexity.

I think you told me at my chamber, Mr. Holder,

that your son had no shoes or slippers on when you saw him.

He had nothing on him, only his trousers and shirts.

Thank you.

I can serve you best now by returning to my room.

Too big a street?

But-but the gyms, Mr. Holmes, where are they?

I cannot tell.

And I shall never see them again, I know.

And my son, my opinion, is in no way old.

But then, for heaven's sake, tell me what was this dark business,

which was acted in my house last night?

If you can call only if my take-a-street room is tomorrow morning,

between 9 and 10, I shall be happy to do what I can to make it clear.

I understand that you give me carte blanche to act for you.

Provide me there only that I get back the gyms,

and that you place no limit on the sarmine they draw.

I would give my fortune to have them back.

Very good.

I shall look into the matter between this and then.

Oh, it's just possible that I need it to come over here again this evening.

Goodbye.

That's my son.

Back.

And, Rick, was it?

No, excuse me.

At the beginning without you, Watson?

As you remember, that our client has rather than earlier,

at point, since he had this morning.

As well, perhaps while you finish your coffee.

You'll favor me with some explanation or extraordinary activity last evening.

I hope we return from Hodor's.

How are you getting on anyway?

Oh, so-so?

Well, there, Holmes, I despair.

You dress yourself up as a commonlifer,

refuse to tell me where you're going or to take me with you.

You'll come back a few hours later with a little parachute

in your hand, drink a cup of tea, change it to your ordinary clothes,

and off you go again.

And all you say is, don't wait up for me, my dear Watson.

I might be late.

I do wait for a little after midnight before I give it over.

Then down I come next morning, and here you are,

with a cup of coffee in one hand on the paper

and the other as fresh and true as it could be.

And ready for our client?

Oh, wait.

It's off to none already.

It's from this place of us, we're here.

Oh, come in, sir.

Good morning.

I don't know what I've done to be so severely tied.

You said that.

Thank you.

My niece, Mary, has deserted me.

Her bed this morning had not been slept in.

I had said to her last night in the sorrow, not in anger,

that if she had married my boy, as had always been my wish and his,

all might have been well with him.

Perhaps that was thoughtless of me.

A note, lay for me upon the whole table.

Is that it?

Yes, yes, this is it.

Oh, Mary, my dearest uncle, I...

I feel that I have brought this trouble upon you

and that if I had acted differently,

this terrible misfortune might have never occurred.

I do not worry about my future, for that is provided for,

and above all, do not search for me,

for it will be fruitless labour and a new service to me.

What could she mean, Mr. Holmes?

Do you think it points to suicide?

Nothing of the kind.

I just returned to the scene of your son's crime, for a moment.

You remarked that the coronet, which he held in his hands,

was somewhat injured, twisted.

Did it not occur to you to think that he might have been trying to straighten it?

You suppose that your son came down from his bed,

went at great risk to your dressing room,

opened your bureau, took out the coronet.

Broke off by main forces, more post novice.

Went off to some other place and concealed three gems out of the 39

with such skill that no one could find them,

and then returned to the dressing room to expose himself

to the greatest danger being discovered.

I asked you now, is such a theory tenable?

But what other is there?

It has been my task to find that out.

Mr. Holder, you owe a very humble apology to your son.

Then it was not other who took the barrels.

No.

Well, for heaven's sake, tell me what you know of this extraordinary mystery.

I will do so, step by step.

Progress to show out about your son.

I had an interview with him this morning.

He would not tell me the story, so I turned it to him.

He had to confess that I was right, and he added the few details I did not know.

Let me say to you first, was it his hardest for me to say and for you to hear?

There has been an understanding between your niece Mary and Sir George Bernwell.

They have fled together.

Mary?

Impossible.

It is impossible.

It is unfortunately more than possible.

It is certain.

George Bernwell is one of the most dangerous men in England.

A rowing gambler, a desperate villain, a man without heart or conscience.

Sure niece knows nothing of such men.

When he breathed his vows to her, as he had to a hundred before her,

she thought that she alone had touched his heart.

But they will learn they know what he said.

But at last she became his tool.

I cannot.

I will not believe it.

One niece was in the habit of seeing Bernwell nearly every evening.

The other night, when you thought she had gone to our room,

she talked to him through the window which leads into the stable end.

She told him of the current.

She had scarced her time to hear his instructions, but she saw you coming.

She closed the window and told you about the maid just compared with her wooden legs sweetheart,

which was all perfect and true.

She is all incredible to me.

Dr. Watts, what do you say?

A very late home's continuum, Mr. Holder.

Thank you, Watson.

Arthur slept badly after his interview with you.

In the night he heard sounds, looked out of his door,

and was astonished to see his cousin emerge stillfully from your dressing room,

carrying the current.

She went straight downstairs into the window.

He was horrified to see her past the current out to someone waiting there,

and then hurried back to her room.

Is he possible?

Only then did he realise what was a foot.

He rushed down in his bare feet, opened the window,

sprang out into the snow and ran down the lane.

He caught up with the dark figure ahead.

It was bonebar.

They struggled.

They tugged at the current net between them, suddenly something snapped.

Your son, finding the current net in his hands, rushed back to the house.

He ascended to your room and had just observed that the current net had been twisted

and was trying to straighten it when you appeared.

But he would explain nothing.

You rose, his anger, by calling him names.

At a moment when he thought he deserved your warmest thanks.

Also, he loved Mary more perhaps than you realised.

He couldn't explain the true state of affairs without portraying her.

On the spur of the moment he decided to preserve her secret.

And that was why she shrieked when she saw the current.

What a blind fool I'd been.

But Holmes, how could you know these things before my son's confession?

When I arrived at your house, I knew that no snow had fallen since the night before

and also that there'd been a strong frost to preserve impressions.

In the stable lane, I found a very long and complex story written in the snow in front of me.

There was a double line of tracks of a booted man.

I thought of my delight that the second double line belonged to a man with naked feet.

Obviously, your son, the first had walked both ways, but the other had run swiftly.

His thread was marked in places over the depressions of the boot, so it is obvious that he passed after the other.

I followed them back and found that they led to the whole window.

With all that you had told me, I was beginning to form an opinion as to what had occurred.

The Merciful.

Yet how could you know who the man was and who it was who had brought him the current?

Ah.

It's a no-mixing of mine that when you have excluded the impossible,

whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

Now I knew that it was not you who had brought the colony down,

so the only revenge on Lisa and the maids.

Yes, but if it were the maids, why should your son keep silent afterwards?

There was excellent reason for him to keep his cousin's secret,

because of the disgrace it could have brought to your name.

When I remembered that you had seen her act that window and that she had cried out on seeing the colony later,

my conjecture began a certain day.

Then her confederate, a lover evidently,

for who else could outweigh the love and gratitude she must feel to you?

I knew that your circle of friends was very limited, but among them was Sir George Bernwell.

I knew his reputation with winning, and even though he knew that author had discovered him,

he could still feel safe.

The lad couldn't say a word against him without compromising his own family.

So what did you do next?

I went in the guise of a loafer to Bernwell's house,

I managed to pick an acquaintance with his family,

and at the expense of six shillings, I made all sure by buying a pair of his monstrous cost of shoes.

With these I returned to your house and saw that they exactly fitted the size of the tracks.

Yes, yes, I saw a new dressed bag of unloitering in the lane yesterday evening.

It was I. Then I came home and changed my clothes.

It was a delicate part which I had to place in.

A prosecution had to be avoided to a birth scramble,

and I knew that so a stutter villain as Bernwell would see that our hands were tied in the matter.

I went and saw it.

At first he denied everything, but then I gave in every particular.

And he became more reasonable.

I told him that we would give him a price of the stones he held, a thousand pounds of peace.

Oh, by the way, Mr. Holger, you would not think that an excessive sum,

I would pay ten. That would be unnecessary.

A three thousand little cover, the matter.

Oh, yes, and there's a little matter of a thousand pounds reward, I believe you mentioned.

I better make it four thousand pounds.

At you, your checkbook?

At what's the benefit, please?

There, Mr. Holger, is your missing piece of the burial card.

I'm saved. I'm saved after all.

Mr. Holger's skill has exceeded all that I have ever heard of it.

You've saved England from a great public scandal this day.

As for myself, I don't know how they say no more.

Ariewa, if Watson, if you please, Mr. Holger's waiting great pain.

The case of the burial coronet was one of the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

My real name is Norman Shelley.

My friend, Carlton Hobbs, plays Sherlock Holmes, and I was Dr. Watson.

Michael Hardwick wrote the script for this BBC production from London.

And of course, I look forward to the pleasure of your company again soon for more of the adventures of Sherlock Holmes.