We were seated at breakfast one morning, my
wife and I, when the maid brought in a telegram.
It was from Sherlock Holmes and ran in this
way:
“Have you a couple of days to spare?
Have just been wired for from the west of
England in connection with Boscombe Valley
tragedy.
Shall be glad if you will come with me.
Air and scenery perfect.
Leave Paddington by the 11:15.”
“What do you say, dear?” said my wife,
looking across at me.
“Will you go?”
“I really don’t know what to say.
I have a fairly long list at present.”
“Oh, Anstruther would do your work for you.
You have been looking a little pale lately.
I think that the change would do you good,
and you are always so interested in Mr. Sherlock
Holmes’ cases.”
“I should be ungrateful if I were not, seeing
what I gained through one of them,” I answered.
“But if I am to go, I must pack at once,
for I have only half an hour.”
My experience of camp life in Afghanistan
had at least had the effect of making me a
prompt and ready traveller.
My wants were few and simple, so that in less
than the time stated I was in a cab with my
valise, rattling away to Paddington Station.
Sherlock Holmes was pacing up and down the
platform, his tall, gaunt figure made even
gaunter and taller by his long grey travelling-cloak
and close-fitting cloth cap.
“It is really very good of you to come,
Watson,” said he.
“It makes a considerable difference to me,
having someone with me on whom I can thoroughly
rely.
Local aid is always either worthless or else
biassed.
If you will keep the two corner seats I shall
get the tickets.”
We had the carriage to ourselves save for
an immense litter of papers which Holmes had
brought with him.
Among these he rummaged and read, with intervals
of note-taking and of meditation, until we
were past Reading.
Then he suddenly rolled them all into a gigantic
ball and tossed them up onto the rack.
“Have you heard anything of the case?”
he asked.
“Not a word.
I have not seen a paper for some days.”
“The London press has not had very full
accounts.
I have just been looking through all the recent
papers in order to master the particulars.
It seems, from what I gather, to be one of
those simple cases which are so extremely
difficult.”
“That sounds a little paradoxical.”
“But it is profoundly true.
Singularity is almost invariably a clue.
The more featureless and commonplace a crime
is, the more difficult it is to bring it home.
In this case, however, they have established
a very serious case against the son of the
murdered man.”
“It is a murder, then?”
“Well, it is conjectured to be so.
I shall take nothing for granted until I have
the opportunity of looking personally into
it.
I will explain the state of things to you,
as far as I have been able to understand it,
in a very few words.
“Boscombe Valley is a country district not
very far from Ross, in Herefordshire.
The largest landed proprietor in that part
is a Mr. John Turner, who made his money in
Australia and returned some years ago to the
old country.
One of the farms which he held, that of Hatherley,
was let to Mr. Charles McCarthy, who was also
an ex-Australian.
The men had known each other in the colonies,
so that it was not unnatural that when they
came to settle down they should do so as near
each other as possible.
Turner was apparently the richer man, so McCarthy
became his tenant but still remained, it seems,
upon terms of perfect equality, as they were
frequently together.
McCarthy had one son, a lad of eighteen, and
Turner had an only daughter of the same age,
but neither of them had wives living.
They appear to have avoided the society of
the neighbouring English families and to have
led retired lives, though both the McCarthys
were fond of sport and were frequently seen
at the race-meetings of the neighbourhood.
McCarthy kept two servants—a man and a girl.
Turner had a considerable household, some
half-dozen at the least.
That is as much as I have been able to gather
about the families.
Now for the facts.
“On June 3rd, that is, on Monday last, McCarthy
left his house at Hatherley about three in
the afternoon and walked down to the Boscombe
Pool, which is a small lake formed by the
spreading out of the stream which runs down
the Boscombe Valley.
He had been out with his serving-man in the
morning at Ross, and he had told the man that
he must hurry, as he had an appointment of
importance to keep at three.
From that appointment he never came back alive.
“From Hatherley Farmhouse to the Boscombe
Pool is a quarter of a mile, and two people
saw him as he passed over this ground.
One was an old woman, whose name is not mentioned,
and the other was William Crowder, a game-keeper
in the employ of Mr. Turner.
Both these witnesses depose that Mr. McCarthy
was walking alone.
The game-keeper adds that within a few minutes
of his seeing Mr. McCarthy pass he had seen
his son, Mr. James McCarthy, going the same
way with a gun under his arm.
To the best of his belief, the father was
actually in sight at the time, and the son
was following him.
He thought no more of the matter until he
heard in the evening of the tragedy that had
occurred.
“The two McCarthys were seen after the time
when William Crowder, the game-keeper, lost
sight of them.
The Boscombe Pool is thickly wooded round,
with just a fringe of grass and of reeds round
the edge.
A girl of fourteen, Patience Moran, who is
the daughter of the lodge-keeper of the Boscombe
Valley estate, was in one of the woods picking
flowers.
She states that while she was there she saw,
at the border of the wood and close by the
lake, Mr. McCarthy and his son, and that they
appeared to be having a violent quarrel.
She heard Mr. McCarthy the elder using very
strong language to his son, and she saw the
latter raise up his hand as if to strike his
father.
She was so frightened by their violence that
she ran away and told her mother when she
reached home that she had left the two McCarthys
quarrelling near Boscombe Pool, and that she
was afraid that they were going to fight.
She had hardly said the words when young Mr.
McCarthy came running up to the lodge to say
that he had found his father dead in the wood,
and to ask for the help of the lodge-keeper.
He was much excited, without either his gun
or his hat, and his right hand and sleeve
were observed to be stained with fresh blood.
On following him they found the dead body
stretched out upon the grass beside the pool.
The head had been beaten in by repeated blows
of some heavy and blunt weapon.
The injuries were such as might very well
have been inflicted by the butt-end of his
son’s gun, which was found lying on the
grass within a few paces of the body.
Under these circumstances the young man was
instantly arrested, and a verdict of ‘wilful
murder’ having been returned at the inquest
on Tuesday, he was on Wednesday brought before
the magistrates at Ross, who have referred
the case to the next Assizes.
Those are the main facts of the case as they
came out before the coroner and the police-court.”
“I could hardly imagine a more damning case,”
I remarked.
“If ever circumstantial evidence pointed
to a criminal it does so here.”
“Circumstantial evidence is a very tricky
thing,” answered Holmes thoughtfully.
“It may seem to point very straight to one
thing, but if you shift your own point of
view a little, you may find it pointing in
an equally uncompromising manner to something
entirely different.
It must be confessed, however, that the case
looks exceedingly grave against the young
man, and it is very possible that he is indeed
the culprit.
There are several people in the neighbourhood,
however, and among them Miss Turner, the daughter
of the neighbouring landowner, who believe
in his innocence, and who have retained Lestrade,
whom you may recollect in connection with
the Study in Scarlet, to work out the case
in his interest.
Lestrade, being rather puzzled, has referred
the case to me, and hence it is that two middle-aged
gentlemen are flying westward at fifty miles
an hour instead of quietly digesting their
breakfasts at home.”
“I am afraid,” said I, “that the facts
are so obvious that you will find little credit
to be gained out of this case.”
“There is nothing more deceptive than an
obvious fact,” he answered, laughing.
“Besides, we may chance to hit upon some
other obvious facts which may have been by
no means obvious to Mr. Lestrade.
You know me too well to think that I am boasting
when I say that I shall either confirm or
destroy his theory by means which he is quite
incapable of employing, or even of understanding.
To take the first example to hand, I very
clearly perceive that in your bedroom the
window is upon the right-hand side, and yet
I question whether Mr. Lestrade would have
noted even so self-evident a thing as that.”
“How on earth—”
“My dear fellow, I know you well.
I know the military neatness which characterises
you.
You shave every morning, and in this season
you shave by the sunlight; but since your
shaving is less and less complete as we get
farther back on the left side, until it becomes
positively slovenly as we get round the angle
of the jaw, it is surely very clear that that
side is less illuminated than the other.
I could not imagine a man of your habits looking
at himself in an equal light and being satisfied
with such a result.
I only quote this as a trivial example of
observation and inference.
Therein lies my métier, and it is just possible
that it may be of some service in the investigation
which lies before us.
There are one or two minor points which were
brought out in the inquest, and which are
worth considering.”
“What are they?”
“It appears that his arrest did not take
place at once, but after the return to Hatherley
Farm.
On the inspector of constabulary informing
him that he was a prisoner, he remarked that
he was not surprised to hear it, and that
it was no more than his deserts.
This observation of his had the natural effect
of removing any traces of doubt which might
have remained in the minds of the coroner’s
jury.”
“It was a confession,” I ejaculated.
“No, for it was followed by a protestation
of innocence.”
“Coming on the top of such a damning series
of events, it was at least a most suspicious
remark.”
“On the contrary,” said Holmes, “it
is the brightest rift which I can at present
see in the clouds.
However innocent he might be, he could not
be such an absolute imbecile as not to see
that the circumstances were very black against
him.
Had he appeared surprised at his own arrest,
or feigned indignation at it, I should have
looked upon it as highly suspicious, because
such surprise or anger would not be natural
under the circumstances, and yet might appear
to be the best policy to a scheming man.
His frank acceptance of the situation marks
him as either an innocent man, or else as
a man of considerable self-restraint and firmness.
As to his remark about his deserts, it was
also not unnatural if you consider that he
stood beside the dead body of his father,
and that there is no doubt that he had that
very day so far forgotten his filial duty
as to bandy words with him, and even, according
to the little girl whose evidence is so important,
to raise his hand as if to strike him.
The self-reproach and contrition which are
displayed in his remark appear to me to be
the signs of a healthy mind rather than of
a guilty one.”
I shook my head.
“Many men have been hanged on far slighter
evidence,” I remarked.
“So they have.
And many men have been wrongfully hanged.”
“What is the young man’s own account of
the matter?”
“It is, I am afraid, not very encouraging
to his supporters, though there are one or
two points in it which are suggestive.
You will find it here, and may read it for
yourself.”
He picked out from his bundle a copy of the
local Herefordshire paper, and having turned
down the sheet he pointed out the paragraph
in which the unfortunate young man had given
his own statement of what had occurred.
I settled myself down in the corner of the
carriage and read it very carefully.
It ran in this way:
“Mr. James McCarthy, the only son of the
deceased, was then called and gave evidence
as follows: ‘I had been away from home for
three days at Bristol, and had only just returned
upon the morning of last Monday, the 3rd.
My father was absent from home at the time
of my arrival, and I was informed by the maid
that he had driven over to Ross with John
Cobb, the groom.
Shortly after my return I heard the wheels
of his trap in the yard, and, looking out
of my window, I saw him get out and walk rapidly
out of the yard, though I was not aware in
which direction he was going.
I then took my gun and strolled out in the
direction of the Boscombe Pool, with the intention
of visiting the rabbit warren which is upon
the other side.
On my way I saw William Crowder, the game-keeper,
as he had stated in his evidence; but he is
mistaken in thinking that I was following
my father.
I had no idea that he was in front of me.
When about a hundred yards from the pool I
heard a cry of “Cooee!” which was a usual
signal between my father and myself.
I then hurried forward, and found him standing
by the pool.
He appeared to be much surprised at seeing
me and asked me rather roughly what I was
doing there.
A conversation ensued which led to high words
and almost to blows, for my father was a man
of a very violent temper.
Seeing that his passion was becoming ungovernable,
I left him and returned towards Hatherley
Farm.
I had not gone more than 150 yards, however,
when I heard a hideous outcry behind me, which
caused me to run back again.
I found my father expiring upon the ground,
with his head terribly injured.
I dropped my gun and held him in my arms,
but he almost instantly expired.
I knelt beside him for some minutes, and then
made my way to Mr. Turner’s lodge-keeper,
his house being the nearest, to ask for assistance.
I saw no one near my father when I returned,
and I have no idea how he came by his injuries.
He was not a popular man, being somewhat cold
and forbidding in his manners, but he had,
as far as I know, no active enemies.
I know nothing further of the matter.’
“The Coroner: Did your father make any statement
to you before he died?
“Witness: He mumbled a few words, but I
could only catch some allusion to a rat.
“The Coroner: What did you understand by
that?
“Witness: It conveyed no meaning to me.
I thought that he was delirious.
“The Coroner: What was the point upon which
you and your father had this final quarrel?
“Witness: I should prefer not to answer.
“The Coroner: I am afraid that I must press
it.
“Witness: It is really impossible for me
to tell you.
I can assure you that it has nothing to do
with the sad tragedy which followed.
“The Coroner: That is for the court to decide.
I need not point out to you that your refusal
to answer will prejudice your case considerably
in any future proceedings which may arise.
“Witness: I must still refuse.
“The Coroner: I understand that the cry
of ‘Cooee’ was a common signal between
you and your father?
“Witness: It was.
“The Coroner: How was it, then, that he
uttered it before he saw you, and before he
even knew that you had returned from Bristol?
“Witness (with considerable confusion):
I do not know.
“A Juryman: Did you see nothing which aroused
your suspicions when you returned on hearing
the cry and found your father fatally injured?
“Witness: Nothing definite.
“The Coroner: What do you mean?
“Witness: I was so disturbed and excited
as I rushed out into the open, that I could
think of nothing except of my father.
Yet I have a vague impression that as I ran
forward something lay upon the ground to the
left of me.
It seemed to me to be something grey in colour,
a coat of some sort, or a plaid perhaps.
When I rose from my father I looked round
for it, but it was gone.
“ ‘Do you mean that it disappeared before
you went for help?’
“ ‘Yes, it was gone.’
“ ‘You cannot say what it was?’
“ ‘No, I had a feeling something was there.’
“ ‘How far from the body?’
“ ‘A dozen yards or so.’
“ ‘And how far from the edge of the wood?’
“ ‘About the same.’
“ ‘Then if it was removed it was while
you were within a dozen yards of it?’
“ ‘Yes, but with my back towards it.’
“This concluded the examination of the witness.”
“I see,” said I as I glanced down the
column, “that the coroner in his concluding
remarks was rather severe upon young McCarthy.
He calls attention, and with reason, to the
discrepancy about his father having signalled
to him before seeing him, also to his refusal
to give details of his conversation with his
father, and his singular account of his father’s
dying words.
They are all, as he remarks, very much against
the son.”
Holmes laughed softly to himself and stretched
himself out upon the cushioned seat.
“Both you and the coroner have been at some
pains,” said he, “to single out the very
strongest points in the young man’s favour.
Don’t you see that you alternately give
him credit for having too much imagination
and too little?
Too little, if he could not invent a cause
of quarrel which would give him the sympathy
of the jury; too much, if he evolved from
his own inner consciousness anything so outré
as a dying reference to a rat, and the incident
of the vanishing cloth.
No, sir, I shall approach this case from the
point of view that what this young man says
is true, and we shall see whither that hypothesis
will lead us.
And now here is my pocket Petrarch, and not
another word shall I say of this case until
we are on the scene of action.
We lunch at Swindon, and I see that we shall
be there in twenty minutes.”
It was nearly four o’clock when we at last,
after passing through the beautiful Stroud
Valley, and over the broad gleaming Severn,
found ourselves at the pretty little country-town
of Ross.
A lean, ferret-like man, furtive and sly-looking,
was waiting for us upon the platform.
In spite of the light brown dustcoat and leather-leggings
which he wore in deference to his rustic surroundings,
I had no difficulty in recognising Lestrade,
of Scotland Yard.
With him we drove to the Hereford Arms where
a room had already been engaged for us.
“I have ordered a carriage,” said Lestrade
as we sat over a cup of tea.
“I knew your energetic nature, and that
you would not be happy until you had been
on the scene of the crime.”
“It was very nice and complimentary of you,”
Holmes answered.
“It is entirely a question of barometric
pressure.”
Lestrade looked startled.
“I do not quite follow,” he said.
“How is the glass?
Twenty-nine, I see.
No wind, and not a cloud in the sky.
I have a caseful of cigarettes here which
need smoking, and the sofa is very much superior
to the usual country hotel abomination.
I do not think that it is probable that I
shall use the carriage to-night.”
Lestrade laughed indulgently.
“You have, no doubt, already formed your
conclusions from the newspapers,” he said.
“The case is as plain as a pikestaff, and
the more one goes into it the plainer it becomes.
Still, of course, one can’t refuse a lady,
and such a very positive one, too.
She has heard of you, and would have your
opinion, though I repeatedly told her that
there was nothing which you could do which
I had not already done.
Why, bless my soul! here is her carriage at
the door.”
He had hardly spoken before there rushed into
the room one of the most lovely young women
that I have ever seen in my life.
Her violet eyes shining, her lips parted,
a pink flush upon her cheeks, all thought
of her natural reserve lost in her overpowering
excitement and concern.
“Oh, Mr. Sherlock Holmes!” she cried,
glancing from one to the other of us, and
finally, with a woman’s quick intuition,
fastening upon my companion, “I am so glad
that you have come.
I have driven down to tell you so.
I know that James didn’t do it.
I know it, and I want you to start upon your
work knowing it, too.
Never let yourself doubt upon that point.
We have known each other since we were little
children, and I know his faults as no one
else does; but he is too tender-hearted to
hurt a fly.
Such a charge is absurd to anyone who really
knows him.”
“I hope we may clear him, Miss Turner,”
said Sherlock Holmes.
“You may rely upon my doing all that I can.”
“But you have read the evidence.
You have formed some conclusion?
Do you not see some loophole, some flaw?
Do you not yourself think that he is innocent?”
“I think that it is very probable.”
“There, now!” she cried, throwing back
her head and looking defiantly at Lestrade.
“You hear!
He gives me hopes.”
Lestrade shrugged his shoulders.
“I am afraid that my colleague has been
a little quick in forming his conclusions,”
he said.
“But he is right.
Oh!
I know that he is right.
James never did it.
And about his quarrel with his father, I am
sure that the reason why he would not speak
about it to the coroner was because I was
concerned in it.”
“In what way?” asked Holmes.
“It is no time for me to hide anything.
James and his father had many disagreements
about me.
Mr. McCarthy was very anxious that there should
be a marriage between us.
James and I have always loved each other as
brother and sister; but of course he is young
and has seen very little of life yet, and—and—well,
he naturally did not wish to do anything like
that yet.
So there were quarrels, and this, I am sure,
was one of them.”
“And your father?” asked Holmes.
“Was he in favour of such a union?”
“No, he was averse to it also.
No one but Mr. McCarthy was in favour of it.”
A quick blush passed over her fresh young
face as Holmes shot one of his keen, questioning
glances at her.
“Thank you for this information,” said
he.
“May I see your father if I call to-morrow?”
“I am afraid the doctor won’t allow it.”
“The doctor?”
“Yes, have you not heard?
Poor father has never been strong for years
back, but this has broken him down completely.
He has taken to his bed, and Dr. Willows says
that he is a wreck and that his nervous system
is shattered.
Mr. McCarthy was the only man alive who had
known dad in the old days in Victoria.”
“Ha!
In Victoria!
That is important.”
“Yes, at the mines.”
“Quite so; at the gold-mines, where, as
I understand, Mr. Turner made his money.”
“Yes, certainly.”
“Thank you, Miss Turner.
You have been of material assistance to me.”
“You will tell me if you have any news to-morrow.
No doubt you will go to the prison to see
James.
Oh, if you do, Mr. Holmes, do tell him that
I know him to be innocent.”
“I will, Miss Turner.”
“I must go home now, for dad is very ill,
and he misses me so if I leave him.
Good-bye, and God help you in your undertaking.”
She hurried from the room as impulsively as
she had entered, and we heard the wheels of
her carriage rattle off down the street.
“I am ashamed of you, Holmes,” said Lestrade
with dignity after a few minutes’ silence.
“Why should you raise up hopes which you
are bound to disappoint?
I am not over-tender of heart, but I call
it cruel.”
“I think that I see my way to clearing James
McCarthy,” said Holmes.
“Have you an order to see him in prison?”
“Yes, but only for you and me.”
“Then I shall reconsider my resolution about
going out.
We have still time to take a train to Hereford
and see him to-night?”
“Ample.”
“Then let us do so.
Watson, I fear that you will find it very
slow, but I shall only be away a couple of
hours.”
I walked down to the station with them, and
then wandered through the streets of the little
town, finally returning to the hotel, where
I lay upon the sofa and tried to interest
myself in a yellow-backed novel.
The puny plot of the story was so thin, however,
when compared to the deep mystery through
which we were groping, and I found my attention
wander so continually from the action to the
fact, that I at last flung it across the room
and gave myself up entirely to a consideration
of the events of the day.
Supposing that this unhappy young man’s
story were absolutely true, then what hellish
thing, what absolutely unforeseen and extraordinary
calamity could have occurred between the time
when he parted from his father, and the moment
when, drawn back by his screams, he rushed
into the glade?
It was something terrible and deadly.
What could it be?
Might not the nature of the injuries reveal
something to my medical instincts?
I rang the bell and called for the weekly
county paper, which contained a verbatim account
of the inquest.
In the surgeon’s deposition it was stated
that the posterior third of the left parietal
bone and the left half of the occipital bone
had been shattered by a heavy blow from a
blunt weapon.
I marked the spot upon my own head.
Clearly such a blow must have been struck
from behind.
That was to some extent in favour of the accused,
as when seen quarrelling he was face to face
with his father.
Still, it did not go for very much, for the
older man might have turned his back before
the blow fell.
Still, it might be worth while to call Holmes’
attention to it.
Then there was the peculiar dying reference
to a rat.
What could that mean?
It could not be delirium.
A man dying from a sudden blow does not commonly
become delirious.
No, it was more likely to be an attempt to
explain how he met his fate.
But what could it indicate?
I cudgelled my brains to find some possible
explanation.
And then the incident of the grey cloth seen
by young McCarthy.
If that were true the murderer must have dropped
some part of his dress, presumably his overcoat,
in his flight, and must have had the hardihood
to return and to carry it away at the instant
when the son was kneeling with his back turned
not a dozen paces off.
What a tissue of mysteries and improbabilities
the whole thing was!
I did not wonder at Lestrade’s opinion,
and yet I had so much faith in Sherlock Holmes’
insight that I could not lose hope as long
as every fresh fact seemed to strengthen his
conviction of young McCarthy’s innocence.
It was late before Sherlock Holmes returned.
He came back alone, for Lestrade was staying
in lodgings in the town.
“The glass still keeps very high,” he
remarked as he sat down.
“It is of importance that it should not
rain before we are able to go over the ground.
On the other hand, a man should be at his
very best and keenest for such nice work as
that, and I did not wish to do it when fagged
by a long journey.
I have seen young McCarthy.”
“And what did you learn from him?”
“Nothing.”
“Could he throw no light?”
“None at all.
I was inclined to think at one time that he
knew who had done it and was screening him
or her, but I am convinced now that he is
as puzzled as everyone else.
He is not a very quick-witted youth, though
comely to look at and, I should think, sound
at heart.”
“I cannot admire his taste,” I remarked,
“if it is indeed a fact that he was averse
to a marriage with so charming a young lady
as this Miss Turner.”
“Ah, thereby hangs a rather painful tale.
This fellow is madly, insanely, in love with
her, but some two years ago, when he was only
a lad, and before he really knew her, for
she had been away five years at a boarding-school,
what does the idiot do but get into the clutches
of a barmaid in Bristol and marry her at a
registry office?
No one knows a word of the matter, but you
can imagine how maddening it must be to him
to be upbraided for not doing what he would
give his very eyes to do, but what he knows
to be absolutely impossible.
It was sheer frenzy of this sort which made
him throw his hands up into the air when his
father, at their last interview, was goading
him on to propose to Miss Turner.
On the other hand, he had no means of supporting
himself, and his father, who was by all accounts
a very hard man, would have thrown him over
utterly had he known the truth.
It was with his barmaid wife that he had spent
the last three days in Bristol, and his father
did not know where he was.
Mark that point.
It is of importance.
Good has come out of evil, however, for the
barmaid, finding from the papers that he is
in serious trouble and likely to be hanged,
has thrown him over utterly and has written
to him to say that she has a husband already
in the Bermuda Dockyard, so that there is
really no tie between them.
I think that that bit of news has consoled
young McCarthy for all that he has suffered.”
“But if he is innocent, who has done it?”
“Ah! who?
I would call your attention very particularly
to two points.
One is that the murdered man had an appointment
with someone at the pool, and that the someone
could not have been his son, for his son was
away, and he did not know when he would return.
The second is that the murdered man was heard
to cry ‘Cooee!’ before he knew that his
son had returned.
Those are the crucial points upon which the
case depends.
And now let us talk about George Meredith,
if you please, and we shall leave all minor
matters until to-morrow.”
There was no rain, as Holmes had foretold,
and the morning broke bright and cloudless.
At nine o’clock Lestrade called for us with
the carriage, and we set off for Hatherley
Farm and the Boscombe Pool.
“There is serious news this morning,”
Lestrade observed.
“It is said that Mr. Turner, of the Hall,
is so ill that his life is despaired of.”
“An elderly man, I presume?” said Holmes.
“About sixty; but his constitution has been
shattered by his life abroad, and he has been
in failing health for some time.
This business has had a very bad effect upon
him.
He was an old friend of McCarthy’s, and,
I may add, a great benefactor to him, for
I have learned that he gave him Hatherley
Farm rent free.”
“Indeed!
That is interesting,” said Holmes.
“Oh, yes!
In a hundred other ways he has helped him.
Everybody about here speaks of his kindness
to him.”
“Really!
Does it not strike you as a little singular
that this McCarthy, who appears to have had
little of his own, and to have been under
such obligations to Turner, should still talk
of marrying his son to Turner’s daughter,
who is, presumably, heiress to the estate,
and that in such a very cocksure manner, as
if it were merely a case of a proposal and
all else would follow?
It is the more strange, since we know that
Turner himself was averse to the idea.
The daughter told us as much.
Do you not deduce something from that?”
“We have got to the deductions and the inferences,”
said Lestrade, winking at me.
“I find it hard enough to tackle facts,
Holmes, without flying away after theories
and fancies.”
“You are right,” said Holmes demurely;
“you do find it very hard to tackle the
facts.”
“Anyhow, I have grasped one fact which you
seem to find it difficult to get hold of,”
replied Lestrade with some warmth.
“And that is—”
“That McCarthy senior met his death from
McCarthy junior and that all theories to the
contrary are the merest moonshine.”
“Well, moonshine is a brighter thing than
fog,” said Holmes, laughing.
“But I am very much mistaken if this is
not Hatherley Farm upon the left.”
“Yes, that is it.”
It was a widespread, comfortable-looking building,
two-storied, slate-roofed, with great yellow
blotches of lichen upon the grey walls.
The drawn blinds and the smokeless chimneys,
however, gave it a stricken look, as though
the weight of this horror still lay heavy
upon it.
We called at the door, when the maid, at Holmes’
request, showed us the boots which her master
wore at the time of his death, and also a
pair of the son’s, though not the pair which
he had then had.
Having measured these very carefully from
seven or eight different points, Holmes desired
to be led to the court-yard, from which we
all followed the winding track which led to
Boscombe Pool.
Sherlock Holmes was transformed when he was
hot upon such a scent as this.
Men who had only known the quiet thinker and
logician of Baker Street would have failed
to recognise him.
His face flushed and darkened.
His brows were drawn into two hard black lines,
while his eyes shone out from beneath them
with a steely glitter.
His face was bent downward, his shoulders
bowed, his lips compressed, and the veins
stood out like whipcord in his long, sinewy
neck.
His nostrils seemed to dilate with a purely
animal lust for the chase, and his mind was
so absolutely concentrated upon the matter
before him that a question or remark fell
unheeded upon his ears, or, at the most, only
provoked a quick, impatient snarl in reply.
Swiftly and silently he made his way along
the track which ran through the meadows, and
so by way of the woods to the Boscombe Pool.
It was damp, marshy ground, as is all that
district, and there were marks of many feet,
both upon the path and amid the short grass
which bounded it on either side.
Sometimes Holmes would hurry on, sometimes
stop dead, and once he made quite a little
detour into the meadow.
Lestrade and I walked behind him, the detective
indifferent and contemptuous, while I watched
my friend with the interest which sprang from
the conviction that every one of his actions
was directed towards a definite end.
The Boscombe Pool, which is a little reed-girt
sheet of water some fifty yards across, is
situated at the boundary between the Hatherley
Farm and the private park of the wealthy Mr.
Turner.
Above the woods which lined it upon the farther
side we could see the red, jutting pinnacles
which marked the site of the rich landowner’s
dwelling.
On the Hatherley side of the pool the woods
grew very thick, and there was a narrow belt
of sodden grass twenty paces across between
the edge of the trees and the reeds which
lined the lake.
Lestrade showed us the exact spot at which
the body had been found, and, indeed, so moist
was the ground, that I could plainly see the
traces which had been left by the fall of
the stricken man.
To Holmes, as I could see by his eager face
and peering eyes, very many other things were
to be read upon the trampled grass.
He ran round, like a dog who is picking up
a scent, and then turned upon my companion.
“What did you go into the pool for?” he
asked.
“I fished about with a rake.
I thought there might be some weapon or other
trace.
But how on earth—”
“Oh, tut, tut!
I have no time!
That left foot of yours with its inward twist
is all over the place.
A mole could trace it, and there it vanishes
among the reeds.
Oh, how simple it would all have been had
I been here before they came like a herd of
buffalo and wallowed all over it.
Here is where the party with the lodge-keeper
came, and they have covered all tracks for
six or eight feet round the body.
But here are three separate tracks of the
same feet.”
He drew out a lens and lay down upon his waterproof
to have a better view, talking all the time
rather to himself than to us.
“These are young McCarthy’s feet.
Twice he was walking, and once he ran swiftly,
so that the soles are deeply marked and the
heels hardly visible.
That bears out his story.
He ran when he saw his father on the ground.
Then here are the father’s feet as he paced
up and down.
What is this, then?
It is the butt-end of the gun as the son stood
listening.
And this?
Ha, ha!
What have we here?
Tiptoes! tiptoes!
Square, too, quite unusual boots!
They come, they go, they come again—of course
that was for the cloak.
Now where did they come from?”
He ran up and down, sometimes losing, sometimes
finding the track until we were well within
the edge of the wood and under the shadow
of a great beech, the largest tree in the
neighbourhood.
Holmes traced his way to the farther side
of this and lay down once more upon his face
with a little cry of satisfaction.
For a long time he remained there, turning
over the leaves and dried sticks, gathering
up what seemed to me to be dust into an envelope
and examining with his lens not only the ground
but even the bark of the tree as far as he
could reach.
A jagged stone was lying among the moss, and
this also he carefully examined and retained.
Then he followed a pathway through the wood
until he came to the highroad, where all traces
were lost.
“It has been a case of considerable interest,”
he remarked, returning to his natural manner.
“I fancy that this grey house on the right
must be the lodge.
I think that I will go in and have a word
with Moran, and perhaps write a little note.
Having done that, we may drive back to our
luncheon.
You may walk to the cab, and I shall be with
you presently.”
It was about ten minutes before we regained
our cab and drove back into Ross, Holmes still
carrying with him the stone which he had picked
up in the wood.
“This may interest you, Lestrade,” he
remarked, holding it out.
“The murder was done with it.”
“I see no marks.”
“There are none.”
“How do you know, then?”
“The grass was growing under it.
It had only lain there a few days.
There was no sign of a place whence it had
been taken.
It corresponds with the injuries.
There is no sign of any other weapon.”
“And the murderer?”
“Is a tall man, left-handed, limps with
the right leg, wears thick-soled shooting-boots
and a grey cloak, smokes Indian cigars, uses
a cigar-holder, and carries a blunt pen-knife
in his pocket.
There are several other indications, but these
may be enough to aid us in our search.”
Lestrade laughed.
“I am afraid that I am still a sceptic,”
he said.
“Theories are all very well, but we have
to deal with a hard-headed British jury.”
“Nous verrons,” answered Holmes calmly.
“You work your own method, and I shall work
mine.
I shall be busy this afternoon, and shall
probably return to London by the evening train.”
“And leave your case unfinished?”
“No, finished.”
“But the mystery?”
“It is solved.”
“Who was the criminal, then?”
“The gentleman I describe.”
“But who is he?”
“Surely it would not be difficult to find
out.
This is not such a populous neighbourhood.”
Lestrade shrugged his shoulders.
“I am a practical man,” he said, “and
I really cannot undertake to go about the
country looking for a left-handed gentleman
with a game leg.
I should become the laughing-stock of Scotland
Yard.”
“All right,” said Holmes quietly.
“I have given you the chance.
Here are your lodgings.
Good-bye.
I shall drop you a line before I leave.”
Having left Lestrade at his rooms, we drove
to our hotel, where we found lunch upon the
table.
Holmes was silent and buried in thought with
a pained expression upon his face, as one
who finds himself in a perplexing position.
“Look here, Watson,” he said when the
cloth was cleared “just sit down in this
chair and let me preach to you for a little.
I don’t know quite what to do, and I should
value your advice.
Light a cigar and let me expound.”
“Pray do so.”
“Well, now, in considering this case there
are two points about young McCarthy’s narrative
which struck us both instantly, although they
impressed me in his favour and you against
him.
One was the fact that his father should, according
to his account, cry ‘Cooee!’ before seeing
him.
The other was his singular dying reference
to a rat.
He mumbled several words, you understand,
but that was all that caught the son’s ear.
Now from this double point our research must
commence, and we will begin it by presuming
that what the lad says is absolutely true.”
“What of this ‘Cooee!’ then?”
“Well, obviously it could not have been
meant for the son.
The son, as far as he knew, was in Bristol.
It was mere chance that he was within earshot.
The ‘Cooee!’ was meant to attract the
attention of whoever it was that he had the
appointment with.
But ‘Cooee’ is a distinctly Australian
cry, and one which is used between Australians.
There is a strong presumption that the person
whom McCarthy expected to meet him at Boscombe
Pool was someone who had been in Australia.”
“What of the rat, then?”
Sherlock Holmes took a folded paper from his
pocket and flattened it out on the table.
“This is a map of the Colony of Victoria,”
he said.
“I wired to Bristol for it last night.”
He put his hand over part of the map.
“What do you read?”
“ARAT,” I read.
“And now?”
He raised his hand.
“BALLARAT.”
“Quite so.
That was the word the man uttered, and of
which his son only caught the last two syllables.
He was trying to utter the name of his murderer.
So and so, of Ballarat.”
“It is wonderful!”
I exclaimed.
“It is obvious.
And now, you see, I had narrowed the field
down considerably.
The possession of a grey garment was a third
point which, granting the son’s statement
to be correct, was a certainty.
We have come now out of mere vagueness to
the definite conception of an Australian from
Ballarat with a grey cloak.”
“Certainly.”
“And one who was at home in the district,
for the pool can only be approached by the
farm or by the estate, where strangers could
hardly wander.”
“Quite so.”
“Then comes our expedition of to-day.
By an examination of the ground I gained the
trifling details which I gave to that imbecile
Lestrade, as to the personality of the criminal.”
“But how did you gain them?”
“You know my method.
It is founded upon the observation of trifles.”
“His height I know that you might roughly
judge from the length of his stride.
His boots, too, might be told from their traces.”
“Yes, they were peculiar boots.”
“But his lameness?”
“The impression of his right foot was always
less distinct than his left.
He put less weight upon it.
Why?
Because he limped—he was lame.”
“But his left-handedness.”
“You were yourself struck by the nature
of the injury as recorded by the surgeon at
the inquest.
The blow was struck from immediately behind,
and yet was upon the left side.
Now, how can that be unless it were by a left-handed
man?
He had stood behind that tree during the interview
between the father and son.
He had even smoked there.
I found the ash of a cigar, which my special
knowledge of tobacco ashes enables me to pronounce
as an Indian cigar.
I have, as you know, devoted some attention
to this, and written a little monograph on
the ashes of 140 different varieties of pipe,
cigar, and cigarette tobacco.
Having found the ash, I then looked round
and discovered the stump among the moss where
he had tossed it.
It was an Indian cigar, of the variety which
are rolled in Rotterdam.”
“And the cigar-holder?”
“I could see that the end had not been in
his mouth.
Therefore he used a holder.
The tip had been cut off, not bitten off,
but the cut was not a clean one, so I deduced
a blunt pen-knife.”
“Holmes,” I said, “you have drawn a
net round this man from which he cannot escape,
and you have saved an innocent human life
as truly as if you had cut the cord which
was hanging him.
I see the direction in which all this points.
The culprit is—”
“Mr. John Turner,” cried the hotel waiter,
opening the door of our sitting-room, and
ushering in a visitor.
The man who entered was a strange and impressive
figure.
His slow, limping step and bowed shoulders
gave the appearance of decrepitude, and yet
his hard, deep-lined, craggy features, and
his enormous limbs showed that he was possessed
of unusual strength of body and of character.
His tangled beard, grizzled hair, and outstanding,
drooping eyebrows combined to give an air
of dignity and power to his appearance, but
his face was of an ashen white, while his
lips and the corners of his nostrils were
tinged with a shade of blue.
It was clear to me at a glance that he was
in the grip of some deadly and chronic disease.
“Pray sit down on the sofa,” said Holmes
gently.
“You had my note?”
“Yes, the lodge-keeper brought it up.
You said that you wished to see me here to
avoid scandal.”
“I thought people would talk if I went to
the Hall.”
“And why did you wish to see me?”
He looked across at my companion with despair
in his weary eyes, as though his question
was already answered.
“Yes,” said Holmes, answering the look
rather than the words.
“It is so.
I know all about McCarthy.”
The old man sank his face in his hands.
“God help me!” he cried.
“But I would not have let the young man
come to harm.
I give you my word that I would have spoken
out if it went against him at the Assizes.”
“I am glad to hear you say so,” said Holmes
gravely.
“I would have spoken now had it not been
for my dear girl.
It would break her heart—it will break her
heart when she hears that I am arrested.”
“It may not come to that,” said Holmes.
“What?”
“I am no official agent.
I understand that it was your daughter who
required my presence here, and I am acting
in her interests.
Young McCarthy must be got off, however.”
“I am a dying man,” said old Turner.
“I have had diabetes for years.
My doctor says it is a question whether I
shall live a month.
Yet I would rather die under my own roof than
in a gaol.”
Holmes rose and sat down at the table with
his pen in his hand and a bundle of paper
before him.
“Just tell us the truth,” he said.
“I shall jot down the facts.
You will sign it, and Watson here can witness
it.
Then I could produce your confession at the
last extremity to save young McCarthy.
I promise you that I shall not use it unless
it is absolutely needed.”
“It’s as well,” said the old man; “it’s
a question whether I shall live to the Assizes,
so it matters little to me, but I should wish
to spare Alice the shock.
And now I will make the thing clear to you;
it has been a long time in the acting, but
will not take me long to tell.
“You didn’t know this dead man, McCarthy.
He was a devil incarnate.
I tell you that.
God keep you out of the clutches of such a
man as he.
His grip has been upon me these twenty years,
and he has blasted my life.
I’ll tell you first how I came to be in
his power.
“It was in the early ’60’s at the diggings.
I was a young chap then, hot-blooded and reckless,
ready to turn my hand at anything; I got among
bad companions, took to drink, had no luck
with my claim, took to the bush, and in a
word became what you would call over here
a highway robber.
There were six of us, and we had a wild, free
life of it, sticking up a station from time
to time, or stopping the wagons on the road
to the diggings.
Black Jack of Ballarat was the name I went
under, and our party is still remembered in
the colony as the Ballarat Gang.
“One day a gold convoy came down from Ballarat
to Melbourne, and we lay in wait for it and
attacked it.
There were six troopers and six of us, so
it was a close thing, but we emptied four
of their saddles at the first volley.
Three of our boys were killed, however, before
we got the swag.
I put my pistol to the head of the wagon-driver,
who was this very man McCarthy.
I wish to the Lord that I had shot him then,
but I spared him, though I saw his wicked
little eyes fixed on my face, as though to
remember every feature.
We got away with the gold, became wealthy
men, and made our way over to England without
being suspected.
There I parted from my old pals and determined
to settle down to a quiet and respectable
life.
I bought this estate, which chanced to be
in the market, and I set myself to do a little
good with my money, to make up for the way
in which I had earned it.
I married, too, and though my wife died young
she left me my dear little Alice.
Even when she was just a baby her wee hand
seemed to lead me down the right path as nothing
else had ever done.
In a word, I turned over a new leaf and did
my best to make up for the past.
All was going well when McCarthy laid his
grip upon me.
“I had gone up to town about an investment,
and I met him in Regent Street with hardly
a coat to his back or a boot to his foot.
“ ‘Here we are, Jack,’ says he, touching
me on the arm; ‘we’ll be as good as a
family to you.
There’s two of us, me and my son, and you
can have the keeping of us.
If you don’t—it’s a fine, law-abiding
country is England, and there’s always a
policeman within hail.’
“Well, down they came to the west country,
there was no shaking them off, and there they
have lived rent free on my best land ever
since.
There was no rest for me, no peace, no forgetfulness;
turn where I would, there was his cunning,
grinning face at my elbow.
It grew worse as Alice grew up, for he soon
saw I was more afraid of her knowing my past
than of the police.
Whatever he wanted he must have, and whatever
it was I gave him without question, land,
money, houses, until at last he asked a thing
which I could not give.
He asked for Alice.
“His son, you see, had grown up, and so
had my girl, and as I was known to be in weak
health, it seemed a fine stroke to him that
his lad should step into the whole property.
But there I was firm.
I would not have his cursed stock mixed with
mine; not that I had any dislike to the lad,
but his blood was in him, and that was enough.
I stood firm.
McCarthy threatened.
I braved him to do his worst.
We were to meet at the pool midway between
our houses to talk it over.
“When I went down there I found him talking
with his son, so I smoked a cigar and waited
behind a tree until he should be alone.
But as I listened to his talk all that was
black and bitter in me seemed to come uppermost.
He was urging his son to marry my daughter
with as little regard for what she might think
as if she were a slut from off the streets.
It drove me mad to think that I and all that
I held most dear should be in the power of
such a man as this.
Could I not snap the bond?
I was already a dying and a desperate man.
Though clear of mind and fairly strong of
limb, I knew that my own fate was sealed.
But my memory and my girl!
Both could be saved if I could but silence
that foul tongue.
I did it, Mr. Holmes.
I would do it again.
Deeply as I have sinned, I have led a life
of martyrdom to atone for it.
But that my girl should be entangled in the
same meshes which held me was more than I
could suffer.
I struck him down with no more compunction
than if he had been some foul and venomous
beast.
His cry brought back his son; but I had gained
the cover of the wood, though I was forced
to go back to fetch the cloak which I had
dropped in my flight.
That is the true story, gentlemen, of all
that occurred.”
“Well, it is not for me to judge you,”
said Holmes as the old man signed the statement
which had been drawn out.
“I pray that we may never be exposed to
such a temptation.”
“I pray not, sir.
And what do you intend to do?”
“In view of your health, nothing.
You are yourself aware that you will soon
have to answer for your deed at a higher court
than the Assizes.
I will keep your confession, and if McCarthy
is condemned I shall be forced to use it.
If not, it shall never be seen by mortal eye;
and your secret, whether you be alive or dead,
shall be safe with us.”
“Farewell, then,” said the old man solemnly.
“Your own deathbeds, when they come, will
be the easier for the thought of the peace
which you have given to mine.”
Tottering and shaking in all his giant frame,
he stumbled slowly from the room.
“God help us!” said Holmes after a long
silence.
“Why does fate play such tricks with poor,
helpless worms?
I never hear of such a case as this that I
do not think of Baxter’s words, and say,
‘There, but for the grace of God, goes Sherlock
Holmes.’
”
James McCarthy was acquitted at the Assizes
on the strength of a number of objections
which had been drawn out by Holmes and submitted
to the defending counsel.
Old Turner lived for seven months after our
interview, but he is now dead; and there is
every prospect that the son and daughter may
come to live happily together in ignorance
of the black cloud which rests upon their
past.
