Answer:
He wanted to get to the water.
This question is incomplete because the options are missing; here are the options:
Which character trait of Sherlock Holmes does this excerpt from "The Adventure of the Speckled Band" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle illustrate?
A. His ambitious nature
B. His perfectionist nature
C. His tendency to be cautious
D. His powers of observation
The correct answer is D. His power of observation
Explanation:
In this excerpt, the narrator describes how the detective Sherlock Holmes noticed the stains of mud in the jacket of the woman, and based on this evidence Holmes knew this woman had traveled on a train recently. This discovery requires specialized observation and analysis. Indeed, this shows Sherlock Holmes' power of observation because he was keen enough to notice the smears and then reach a valid conclusion as the woman admits Sherlock's conclusion is true "and came in by the first train to Waterloo."
An employs an intricate and piquant irony to develop these themes. Irony
especially surrounds Lindo. An immigrant, Lindo is a proud repository
of traditional Chinese values, which she nostalgically proclaims as
superior to the values of the United States. One of her tenets is that
strong people should remain silent, a behavioral strategy she inherits
from Sunzi’s classic <em>Sunzi Bingfa</em> (probably 475-221 b.c.e.; <em>Sun Tzu: On the Art of War</em>, 1910); as Lindo indicates in another tale in <em>The Joy Luck Club</em>, her maiden name is Sun. Ironically, however, when Waverly is featured on the cover of <em>Life</em> magazine, Lindo cannot keep silent about her daughter’s prowess and pridefully
