"
When we returned to Mrs. Warren's rooms, the gloom of a London
winter evening had thickened into one gray curtain, a dead
monotone of colour, broken only by the sharp yellow squares of
the windows and the blurred haloes of the gas-lamps. As we
peered from the darkened sitting-room of the lodging-house, one
more dim light glimmered high up through the obscurity.
"Someone is moving in that room," said Holmes in a whisper, his
gaunt and eager face thrust forward to the window-pane. "Yes, I
can see his shadow. There he is again! He has a candle in his
hand. Now he is peering across. He wants to be sure that she is
on the lookout. Now he begins to flash. Take the message also,
Watson, that we may check each other. A single flash--that is A,
surely. Now, then. How many did you make it? Twenty. Do did
In. That should mean T. AT--that's intelligible enough.
Another T. Surely this is the beginning of a second word. Now,
then--TENTA. Dead stop. That can't be all, Watson? ATTENTA
gives no sense. Nor is it any better as three words AT, TEN, TA,
unless T. A. are a person's initials. There it goes again!
What's that? ATTE--why, it is the same message over again.
Curious, Watson, very curious. Now he is off once more! AT--why
he is repeating it for the third time. ATTENTA three times! How
often will he repeat it? No, that seems to be the finish.
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