In the story, the brilliant consulting detective Sherlock Holmes receives a request for help from an elderly woman named Mary Maberley who lives in a house called the Three Gables. Holmes only because truly interested in Mrs. Maberley's case after a hired thug, a black man named Steve Dixie, is sent to threaten him not to get involved in it. On arrival at the Three Gables, Holmes finds out that Mrs. Maberley has recently been approached by a man, who gave his name as Haimes-Johnson, who said that he was acting on behalf of someone who wanted to buy her house and all of its contents. Mrs. Maberley turned down the offer when she found out that she would not be allowed to remove anything at all from the house when she left it, not even her own clothes. Holmes suspects that Haimes-Johnson's my