La Liga de los Pelirrojos (The Red-Headed League): free B2 Spanish story
Level B2 (Upper intermediate) · Classics · about 3 minutes
Sherlock Holmes and the strange job that only red-haired men could get.
Adapted from The Red-Headed League by Arthur Conan Doyle (1891).
In the app you can tap any word for its meaning, listen to natural narration with each word highlighted, and switch between Latin American and Spain Spanish. Read it in the app, free.
The story in Spanish
Un día de otoño, un prestamista llamado Jabez Wilson, con el pelo rojo como el fuego, llegó a Baker Street con un problema muy extraño. Su joven ayudante le había mostrado un anuncio en el periódico: una tal Liga de los Pelirrojos buscaba a un hombre con el pelo rojo para un trabajo fácil y muy bien pagado.
Wilson consiguió el puesto: le pagaban cuatro libras a la semana por copiar a mano la Enciclopedia Británica, de diez a dos, sin salir nunca de la oficina. Durante ocho semanas trabajó sin problemas, mientras su ayudante cuidaba la tienda. Pero una mañana encontró la puerta cerrada y un cartel: «La Liga de los Pelirrojos ha sido disuelta».
Holmes escuchó la historia con mucho interés y le hizo una pregunta importante: cómo era ese ayudante que trabajaba por la mitad del sueldo normal. Wilson le contó que era muy listo y que bajaba constantemente al sótano, donde decía que revelaba fotografías. Esa tarde, Holmes fue con Watson a la tienda, golpeó con fuerza la acera con su bastón y miró con atención los pantalones del ayudante, que estaban sucios y gastados a la altura de las rodillas.
Ya lo había entendido todo: la Liga era una trampa para sacar a Wilson de la tienda mientras su ayudante cavaba un túnel desde el sótano hasta el banco de al lado, que guardaba una gran cantidad de oro francés. El sábado por la noche, Holmes, Watson, un policía y el director del banco esperaron a oscuras en la cámara subterránea. Cuando una de las piedras del suelo se levantó y apareció la cabeza del ayudante, Holmes lo estaba esperando: era John Clay, uno de los criminales más buscados de Londres.
Su cómplice intentó escapar por el túnel, pero tres policías lo esperaban en la puerta de la tienda. Clay, sin perder la calma, pidió que lo trataran con respeto, porque, según dijo, por sus venas corría sangre real. Más tarde, Watson le preguntó a Holmes cómo lo había descubierto. Holmes le explicó que, al golpear la acera, había comprobado que el sótano no se extendía hacia la calle, y que el banco estaba justo detrás de la tienda. La Liga había desaparecido porque el túnel ya estaba terminado, y habían elegido el sábado porque así tendrían dos días para escapar.
English translation
One fall day, a pawnbroker called Jabez Wilson, with hair as red as fire, came to Baker Street with a very strange problem. His young assistant had shown him an advertisement in the newspaper: a so-called Red-Headed League was looking for a red-haired man for an easy and very well-paid job.
Wilson got the job: they paid him four pounds a week to copy the Encyclopedia Britannica by hand, from ten to two, without ever leaving the office. For eight weeks he worked without any trouble, while his assistant looked after the store. But one morning he found the door locked and a notice: “The Red-Headed League is dissolved.”
Holmes listened to the story with great interest and asked him an important question: what that assistant, who worked for half the normal wage, was like. Wilson told him he was very clever and that he was always going down to the basement, where he said he developed photographs. That afternoon, Holmes went with Watson to the store, rapped the sidewalk with his cane and looked closely at the assistant's pants, which were dirty and worn at the knees.
He had already understood everything: the League was a trick to get Wilson out of the store while his assistant dug a tunnel from the basement to the bank next door, which held a large amount of French gold. On Saturday night, Holmes, Watson, a policeman and the bank director waited in the dark in the underground vault. When one of the stones in the floor lifted and the assistant’s head appeared, Holmes was waiting for him: he was John Clay, one of the most wanted criminals in London.
His accomplice tried to escape through the tunnel, but three policemen were waiting for him at the door of the store. Clay, without losing his composure, asked to be treated with respect because, he said, royal blood ran in his veins. Later, Watson asked Holmes how he had figured it out. Holmes explained that by rapping the sidewalk he had made sure the basement did not stretch out under the street, and that the bank was right behind the store. The League had vanished because the tunnel was finished, and they had chosen Saturday because that would give them two days to escape.
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