Sherlock Holmes Investigates

"Well, I think Morse Hudson told us all we could expect him to know," said Holmes, as we came out of the shop. "We have this Beppo whose name has appeared twice now, once in Kennington and once in Kensington. That fact alone was worth driving ten miles to discover. Now, Watson, let us go to Gelder & Co., of Stepney, where the busts were made. I shall be surprised if we don't get some help there."

On the way to Stepney were went past the fashionable part of London, then the hotels, then the theatres, then the bookshops, and next the banks, and, finally, we came to the river and the ships. The part of the city by the river was home to a hundred thousand people. These lived in cheap rented houses, and were people from all over Europe who were not wanted anywhere. We found the sculpture works which we were looking for in a broad street. The place had once been the home of wealthy City merchants, now, the outside was a large yard full of monumental stonework.

Inside was a large room in which fifty people were at work. The manager was a big blond German. He welcomed us politely and gave a clear answer to each of Holmes' questions. A check in his books showed that they had made hundreds of copies of a marble statue of a head of Napoleon. The three which had been sent to Morse Hudson a year ago had been half of a group of six. The other half of the group had been sent to Harding Brothers, of Kensington.