第 13 页

tance 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 undertak-

ing." 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 unfore-

seen 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 hail 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's 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 gray 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's insight that I could not lose

hope as long as every fresh fact seemed to strengthen his convic-

tion 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?" saild 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. Every-

body 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 Lesbiade 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 gray 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's 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 recognize 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 con-

centrated 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 land 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