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precincts but once. That had been upon the occasion when Mycroft had shifted to his more active brother’s shoulders the curious affair of the Greek Interpreter, which case I had the honour and satisfaction of recording for the pleasure of Holmes’s not inconsiderable body of admirers.
    The Diogenes Club was formed by, and for the benefit of, men who chose to seek solitude in the heart of the clamorous city. It is a luxurious place, with easy-chairs, excellent food, and all the other appurtenances of creature-comfort. The rules are geared to the Club’s basic purpose, and are strictly enforced; rules devised to discourage, nay, to forbid, all sociability. Talking, save in the Stranger’s Room—into which we were soundlessly ushered—is forbidden. In fact, it is forbidden for any member to take the slightest notice of any other. A tale is told—apocryphal, I am sure—of a member succumbing to a heart-attack in his chair and being found to have expired only when a fellow-member noticed that the Times propped before the poor man was three days old.
    Mycroft Holmes awaited us in the Stranger’s Room, having taken time off, I was later informed, from his government post, around the corner in Whitehall. This, I might add, was an unheard-of interruption of his fixed habits.
    Still, neither of the brothers, upon meeting, seemed in any haste to get to the business at hand. Mycroft, a large, comfortable man with thick grey hair and heavy features, bore little resemblance to his younger brother. He extended his hand, and exclaimed, “Sherlock! You’re looking fit. Bouncing all over England and the Continent appears to agree with you.” Shifting the meaty hand to me, Mycroft said, “Dr. Watson. I had heard that you escaped from Sherlock’s clutch into matrimony. Surely Sherlock has not re-captured you?”
    â€œI am most happily married,” I assured him. “My wife is visiting an aunt at the moment.”
    â€œAnd Sherlock’s long arm reaches out instantly!”
    Mycroft’s smile was warm. For an unsocial man, he had a curious talent for making one feel at ease. He had met us at the door, and now he moved towards the bow-window looking out upon one of London’s busiest streets. We followed, and the brothers stood side by side, surveying the passing scene.
    â€œSherlock,” said Mycroft, “I have not been in this room since your last visit, but the faces outside never change. From the look of that street, it could have been yesterday.”
    â€œYet,” murmured Sherlock, “it has changed. Old intrigues have died, new ones have been born.”
    Mycroft pointed. “Those two fellows at the kerb. Are they involved in some dire plot?”
    â€œDo you mean the lamp-lighter and the book-keeper?”
    â€œThe very men.”
    â€œI’d say not. The lamp-lighter is consoling the book-keeper for being recently sacked.”
    â€œI agree. The book-keeper will no doubt find a berth, but he will lose it speedily and find himself again on the street.”
    I was compelled to interrupt. “Come, come,” said I, and heard myself repeating my old objections. “This is too much!”
    â€œWatson, Watson,” chided Mycroft, “after all those years with Sherlock, I should not expect such myopia from you. Even from this distance, surely you observe the smears of ink, both black and red, upon the first man’s fingers? Just as surely, the occupational mark of the book-keeper?”
    â€œObserve also,” added Holmes the younger, “the ink-blot upon his collar, where he touched pen to linen, and the unpressed condition of his otherwise quite respectable suit.”
    â€œFrom which is it too difficult, my dear Watson,” interposed Mycroft, with a kindliness that irritated me, “to project the man’s slovenliness to his work, and thus conjure up an irate employer?”
    â€œAn employer not only