The Return of Sherlock Holmes

'Now you can see how the matter begins to get clearer. The other fellow is probably also an Italian, and also a member of the Mafia who has broken the rules in some fashion. Pietro is set to go after him. Probably the photograph we found in his pocket is the man he was following, so that he would not knife the wrong person. So he followed the fellow, he saw him enter a house, he waited outside for him. Then there was a scuffle and he himself was killed instead of the person he meant to kill. How is that, Mr. Sherlock Holmes?'

Holmes clapped his hands approvingly.

'Excellent, Lestrade, excellent!' he cried. 'But I didn't quite follow your explanation of the destruction of the busts.'

'The busts! You never can get those busts out of your head. In the end they do not matter. That crime is petty larceny. Even if we catch the criminal he will get six months at the most. It is the murder that we are really investigating, and I tell you that I am beginning to understand exactly what is going on.'

'And the next stage?'

'Is a very simple one. I and Hill will go to the Italian Quarter, find the man whose photograph we have got, and arrest him for murder. Will you come with us?'

Vocabulary:

Fashion: In a particular way
Scuffle: A short, untidy fight
Petty: Small, not important
Larceny: Theft
Stage: Here it means a part of a project
Quarter:Here it means a part of town