He
was left with good prospects, but he threw away his chances,
lived for some time in poverty with occasional short intervals of
prosperity, and finally, taking to drink, he died. That is all I
can gather."
I sprang from my chair and limped impatiently about the room with
considerable bitterness in my heart.
"This is unworthy of you, Holmes," I said. "I could not have
believed that you would have descended to this. You have made
inquires into the history of my unhappy brother, and you now
pretend to deduce this knowledge in some fanciful way. You
cannot expect me to believe that you have read all this from his
old watch! It is unkind, and, to speak plainly, has a touch of
charlatanism in it."
"My dear doctor," said he, kindly, "pray accept my apologies.
Viewing the matter as an abstract problem, I had forgotten how
personal and painful a thing it might be to you. I assure you,
however, that I never even knew that you had a brother until you
handed me the watch."
"Then how in the name of all that is wonderful did you get these
facts? They are absolutely correct in every particular."
"Ah, that is good luck. I could only say what was the balance of
probability.
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