According to A Day by Day Chronology of Mr Sherlock Holmes, according to Zeisler and Christ, compiled and edited by William S Dorn, BSI and DWNP, on June 2, 1902, the house agent presented Mrs Maberly terms of sale for Three Gables. [3GAB]
“Yesterday the man arrived with the agreement all drawn out. Luckily I showed it to Mr. Sutro, my lawyer, who lives in Harrow. He said to me, `This is a very strange document. Are you aware that if you sign it you could not legally take anything out of the house – not even your own private possessions?’ When the man came again in the evening I pointed this out, and I said that I meant only to sell the furniture.
” `No, no; everything,’ said he.
” `But my clothes? My jewels?’
” `Well, well, some concession might be made for your personal effects. But nothing shall go out of the house unchecked. My client is a very liberal man, but he has his fads and his own way of doing things. It is everything or nothing with him.’
” `Then it must be nothing,’ said I. And there the matter was left, but the whole thing seemed to me to be so unusual that I thought – ”
Here we had a very extraordinary interruption.