I don't think that any of my adventures with Mr. Sherlock
Holmes opened quite so abruptly, or so dramatically, as that
which I associate with The Three Gables. I had not seen Holmes
for some days and had no idea of the new channel into which his
activities had been directed. He was in a chatty mood that
morning, however, and had just settled me into the well-worn
low armchair on one side of the fire, while he had curled down
with his pipe in his mouth upon the opposite chair, when our
visitor arrived. If I had said that a mad bull had arrived it would
give a clearer impression of what occurred.
  The door had flown open and a huge negro had burst into the
room. He would have been a comic figure if he had not been
terrific, for he was dressed in a very loud gray check suit with a
flowing salmon-coloured tie. His broad face and flattened nose
were thrust forward, as his sullen dark eyes, with a smouldering
gleam of malice in them, turned from one of us to the other.
  "Which of you gen'l'men is Masser Holmes?" he asked.
  Holmes raised his pipe with a languid smile.