"All right," said Jones, with a stare and a snigger. "Well, would you
please, sir, march upstairs where we can get a cab to carry your highness
to the police station?"

"That is better," said John Clay serenely. He made a sweeping bow to the
three of us, and walked quietly off in the custody of the detective.

"Really, Mr. Holmes," said Mr. Merryweather, as we followed them from the
cellar, "I do not know how the bank can thank you or repay you. There is
no doubt that you have detected and defeated in the most complete manner
one of the most determined attempts at bank robbery, that have ever come
within my experience."

"I have had one or two little scores of my own to settle with Mr. John
Clay," said Holmes. "I have been at some small expense over this matter,
which I shall expect the bank to refund, but beyond that I am amply repaid
by having had an experience which is in many ways unique, and by hearing
the very remarkable narrative of the Red-headed League."

* * * * *

"You see, Watson," he explained, in the early hours of the morning, as we
sat over a glass of whisky and soda in Baker Street, "it was perfectly
obvious from the first that the only possible object of this rather
fantastic business of the advertisement of the League, and the copying of
the 'Encyclopædia,' must be to get this not over-bright pawnbroker out of
the way for a number of hours every day. It was a curious way of managing
it, but really it would be difficult to suggest a better. The method was
no doubt suggested to Clay's ingenious mind by the color of his