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Four Noncanonical Sherlock Holmes Short Stories - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle · Four Noncanonical Sherlock Holmes Short Stories

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  Speaker 1: Four non canonical Sherlock Holmes short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle.
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  This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
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  the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
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  visit LibriVox dot org. Dramatis Persona Sherlock Holmes read by
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  Peter Yearsley Dr.
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  Speaker 2: Watson read by David Purdy.
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  Speaker 3: Here Bier de Lernach read by L. G. Peg.
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  Speaker 4: James Bland read by Lewis West Potterhood read by.
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  Speaker 5: James Curry, Inspector Collins read by Our Mapstone.
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  Speaker 6: James McPherson read by Charles Conover.
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  Speaker 7: Saint Helen's Stationmaster read by Rob.
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  Speaker 8: Marland, Manchester Stationmaster read by Lary.
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  Speaker 5: Wilson, Collins Green Stationmaster read by Twinkle.
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  Speaker 9: Earlston station Master read by Adrian Stephens.
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  Speaker 7: Station Master read by Lauren Emma.
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  Speaker 10: Kenyon Junction station Master read by Thomas Peter.
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  Speaker 11: Bart and Moss.
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  Speaker 2: Station Master read by Marvin Bonarescue.
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  Speaker 12: James read by Noel Vox.
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  Speaker 10: Edward read by Thomas Peter.
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  Speaker 9: Sparrow, McCoy read by Adrian Stephens.
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  Speaker 5: John Palmer read by Brent Burgess.
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  Speaker 6: John read by Charles Carnover.
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  Speaker 7: Coroner read by Lauren.
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  Speaker 4: Emma Dude, read by James Curin.
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  Speaker 1: Narrator read by Michelle Eaton. Chapter one of four non
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  canonical Sherlock Holmes short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle. This
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  is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
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  public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
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  LibriVox dot org. Chapter one, The Field Bazaar.
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  Speaker 2: I should certainly do it, said Sherlock Holmes. I started
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  at the end, for my companion had been eating his breakfast,
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  with his attention entirely centered upon the paper, which was
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  propped up by the coffee pot. Now I looked across
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  at him to find his eyes fastened upon me with
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  the half amused, half questioning expression which he usually assumed
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  when he felt he had made an intellectual point. Do
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  what I asked, he smiled, as he took his slipper
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  from the mantelpiece and drew from it enough shagged tobacco
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  to fill the old clay pipe with which he invariably
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  rounded off his breakfast.
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  Speaker 13: A most characteristic question of yours, Watson said, he You
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  will not, I am sure be offended if I say
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  that any reputation for sharpness which I may possess, has
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  been entirely gained by the admirable foil which you have
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  made for me. Have I not heard of debutantes who
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  have insisted upon plainness in their chaperones? There is a
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  certain analogy.
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  Speaker 2: Our long companionship in the Baker Street rooms had left
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  us on those easy terms of intimacy, when much may
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  be said without offense. And yet I acknowledged that I
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  was nettled at his remark. I may be very obtuse,
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  said I, but I confess that I am unable to
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  see how you have managed to know that I was.
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  Speaker 13: I was asked to help in the Edinburgh University Bazaar precisely.
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  Speaker 2: The letter has only just come to hand, and I
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  have not spoken to you since.
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  Speaker 13: In spite of that.
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  Speaker 2: Said Holmes, leaning back in his chair and putting his
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  finger tips together.
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  Speaker 13: I would even venture to suggest that the object of
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  the bazaar is to enlarge the university cricket field.
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  Speaker 2: I looked at him in such bewilderment that he vibrated
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  with silent laughter.
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  Speaker 13: The fact is, my dear Watson, that you are an
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  excellent subject, said he. You are never blase. You respond
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  instantly to any external stimulus. Your mental processes may be slow,
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  but they are never obscure. I found during breakfast that
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  you were easier reading than the leader in the times
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  in front of me.
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  Speaker 2: I should be glad to know how you arrived at
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  your conclusions, said I.
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  Speaker 13: I fear that my good nature in giving explanations has
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  seriously compromised my reputation, said Holmes. But in this case
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  the train of reasoning is based upon such obvious facts
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  that no credit can be claimed for it. You entered
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  the room with a thoughtful expression, the expression of a
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  man who is debating some point in his mind. In
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  your hand you held a solitary letter. Now, last night
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  you retired in the best of spirits, so it was
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  clear that it was this letter in your hand which
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  had caused the change in you.
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  Speaker 2: This is obvious.
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  Speaker 13: It is all obvious when it is explained to you.
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  I naturally asked myself what the letter could contain which
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  might have this effect upon you. As you walked, you
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  held the flap side of the envelope towards me, and
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  I saw upon it the same shield shaped device which
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  I have observed upon your old college cricket cap. It
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  was clear then that the request came from Edinburgh University
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  or from some club connected with the university. When you
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  reached the table, you laid down the letter beside your plate,
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  with the address uppermost, and you walked over to look
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  at the framed photograph upon the left of the mantelpiece.
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  Speaker 2: It amazed me to see the accuracy with which he
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  had observed my movements. What next, I asked.
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  Speaker 13: I began by glancing at the address, and I could tell,
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  even at the distance of six feet, that it was
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  an unofficial communication. This I gathered from the use of
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  the word doctor upon the address, to which, as a
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  bachelor of Medicine, you have no legal claim. I knew
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  that university officials are pedantic in their correct use of titles,
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  and I was thus enabled to say with certainty that
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  your letter was unofficial. When on your return to the table,
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  you turned over your letter and allowed me to perceive
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  that the enclosure was a printed one. The idea of
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  a bazaar first occurred to me. I had already weighed
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  the possibility of its being a political communication, but this
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  seemed improbable in the present stagnant conditions of politics. When
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  you returned to the table, your face still retained its expression,
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  and it was evident that your examination of the photograph
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  had not changed the current of your thoughts. In that case,
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  it must itself bear upon the subject in question. I
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  turned my attention to the photograph therefore, and saw at
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  once that it consisted of yourself as a member of
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  the Edinburgh University eleven, with the pavilion and cricket field
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  in the background. My small experience of cricket clubs has
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  taught me that, next to churches and cavalry ensigns, they
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  are the most debt laden things upon earth. When upon
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  your return to the table, I saw you take out
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  your pencil and draw lines upon the envelope, I was
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  convinced that you were endeavoring to realize some projected improvement
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  which was to be brought about by a bazaar. Your
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  face still showed some indecision, so that I was able
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  to break in upon you with my advice that you
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  should assist in so good an object.
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  Speaker 2: I could not help smiling at the extreme simplicity of
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  his explanation. Of course, it was as easy as possible,
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  said I. My remark appeared to nettle him.
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  Speaker 11: I may add, said he that the particular help which
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  you have been asked to give was that you should
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  write in their album, and that you have already made
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  up your mind that the present incident will be the
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  subject of your article.
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  Speaker 2: But how I cried, it.
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  Speaker 13: Is as easy as possible, said he, and I leave
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  its solution to your own ingenuity.
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  Speaker 2: In the meantime, he added, raising his paper, you.
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  Speaker 13: Will excuse me if I returned to this very resting
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  article upon the trees of Cremona and the exact reasons
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  for the pre eminence in the manufacture of violins. It
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  is one of those small, outlying problems to which I
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  am sometimes tempted to direct my attention.
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  Speaker 1: End of chapter one, Chapter two of four non canonical
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  Sherlock Holmes short Stories by Arthur Conan Doyle. This is
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  a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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  For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
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  Chapter two, the Lost Special the confession of Herbert de Lernac,
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  now lying under sentence of death at Marseilles, has thrown
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  a light upon one of the most inexplicable crimes of
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  the century, an incident which is I believe absolutely unprecedented
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  in the criminal anals of any Although there is a
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  reluctance to discuss the matter in official circles and little
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  information has been given to the press, there are still
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  indications that the statement of this arch criminal is corroborated
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  by the facts, and that we have at last found
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  a solution for a most outstanding business. As the matter
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  is eight years old, and as its importance was somewhat
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  obscured by a political crisis which was engaging the public
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  attention at the time, it may be as well to
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  state the facts as far as we have been able
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  to ascertain them. They are collated from the Liverpool papers
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  of that date, from the proceedings at the inquest upon
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  John Slater, the engine driver, and from the records of
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  the London and West Coast Railway Company, which have been
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  courteously put at my disposal. Briefly, they are as follows.
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  On the third of June eighteen ninety, a gentleman who
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  gave his name as Monsieur Louis Caratal, desired an interview
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  with mister James Bland, the superintendent of the London and
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  West Coast Central Station in Liverpool.
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  Speaker 3: He was a.
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  Speaker 1: Small man, middle aged and dark with a stoop, which
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  was so marked that it suggested some deformity of the spine.
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  He was accompanied by a friend, a man of imposing physique,
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  whose deferential manner and constant attention showed that his position
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  was one of dependence. This friend or companion, whose name
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  did not transpire, was certainly a foreigner, and probably, from
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  his swarthy complexion, either a Spaniard or a South American.
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  One peculiarity was observed in him. He carried in his
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  left hand a small black leather dispatch box, and it
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  was noticed by a sharp eyed clerk in the central
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  office that this box was fastened to his wrist by
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  a strap. No importance was attached to the fact at
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  the time, but subsequent events endowed it with some significickens.
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  Monsieur Caratal was shown up to mister Bland's office, while
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  his companion remained outside. Monsieur Caratal's business was quickly dispatched.
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  He had arrived that afternoon from Central America. Affairs of
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  the utmost importance demanded that he should be in Paris
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  without the loss of an unnecessary hour. He had missed
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  the London Express. A special must be provided. Money was
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  of no importance. Time was everything. If the company would
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  speed him on his way, they might make their own terms.
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  Mister Bland struck the electric bell, summoned mister Potter Hood,
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  the traffic manager, and had the matter arranged in five minutes.
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  The train would start in three quarters of an hour.
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  It would take that time to ensure that the line
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  should be clear. The powerful engine, called Rochdale number two
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  hundred and forty seven on the company's register, was attached
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  to two carriages, with a guard's van behind. The first
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  carriage was solely for the purpose of decreasing the inconvenience
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  arising from the oscillation. The second was divided, as usual
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  into four compartments, a first class, a first class smoking,
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  a second class and a second class smoking. The first compartment,
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  which was nearest to the engine, was the one allotted
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  to the travelers. The other three were empty. The guard
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  of the special train was James Macpherson, who had been
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  some years in the service of the company. The stoker,
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  William Smith, was a new hand. Monsieur Caratel, upon leaving
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  the superintendent's office, rejoined his companion, and both of them
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  manifested extreme impatience to be off. Having paid the money,
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  asked which amounted to fifty pounds five shillings at the
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  usual special rate of five shillings a mile. They demanded
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  to be shown the carriage, and at once took their
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  seats in it, although they were assured that the better
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  part of an hour must elapse before the line could
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  be cleared. In the meantime, a singular coincidence had occurred
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  in the office which Monsieur Caratal had just quitted. A
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  request for especially is not a very uncommon circumstance in
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  a rich commercial center, but that two should be required
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  upon the same afternoon was most unusual. It so happened, however,
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  that mister Bland had hardly dismissed the first traveler before
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  a second entered with a similar request. This was a
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  mister Horace Moore, a gentlemanly man of military appearance, who
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  alleged that the sudden serious illness of his wife in
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  London made it absolutely imperative that he should not lose
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  an instant in starting upon the journey. His distress and
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  anxiety were so evident that mister Bland did all that
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  was possible to meet his wishes. A second special was
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  out of the question, as the ordinary local service was
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  already somewhat deranged by the first. There was the alternative, however,
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  that mister Moore should share the expense of Monsieur Caratal's
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  train and should travel in the other empty first class compartment,
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  if Monsieur Caratal objected to having him in the one
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  which he occupied. It was difficult to see any objection
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  to such an arrangement. And yet Monsieur Caratal, upon the
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  suggestion being made to him by mister Potterhood, absolutely refused
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  to consider it for an instant. The train was his,
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  he said, and he would insist upon the exclusive use
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  of it. All argument failed to overcome his ungracious objections,
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  and finally the plan had to be abandoned. Mister Horace
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  Moore left the station in great distress after learning that
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  his only cause was to take the ordinary slow train
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  which leaves Liverpool at six o'clock. At four thirty one,
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  exactly by the station clock, the special train containing the
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  crippled Monsieur Caratal and his gigantic companion steamed out of
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  the Liverpool station. The line was at that time clear
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  and there should have been no stoppage. Before Manchester. The
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  trains of the London and West Coast railway run over
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  the lines of another company as far as this town,
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  which should have been reached by the special rather before
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  six o'clock. At a quarter after six, considerable surprise and
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  some consternation were caused amongst the officials at Liverpool by
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  the receipt of a telegram from Manchester to say that
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  it had not yet arrived. An inquiry directed to Saint Helens,
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  which is a third of the way between the two cities,
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  elicited the following reply to.
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  Speaker 7: James Bland, Superintendent Central London and West Coast Liverpool. Special
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  past here at four point fifty two, well up to
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  time Dowster Saint Helen's.
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  Speaker 1: This telegram was received at six forty. At six point
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  fifty a second message was received from Manchester.
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  Speaker 8: No sign of special as advised by you.
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  Speaker 1: And then ten minutes later a third.
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  Speaker 8: More presume some mistake is to propose running of special
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  local train from Saint Helen's. Time to follow. It has
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  just arrived and has seen nothing of it. Kindly wire
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  advices Manchester.
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  Speaker 1: The matter was assuming a most amazing aspect, although in
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  some respects the last telegram was a relief to the
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  authorities at Liverpool. If an accident had occurred to the
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  special It seemed hardly possible that the local train could
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  have passed down the same line without observing it. And
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  yet what was the alternative? Where could the train be
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  had it possibly been sidetracked for some reason in order
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  to allow the slower train to go past. Such an
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  explanation was possible if some small repair had to be effected.
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  A telegram was dispatched to each of the stations between
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  Saint Helens and Manchester, and the superintendent and traffic manager
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  waited in the utmost suspense at the instrument for the
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  series of replies which would enable them to say for
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  certain what had been come of the missing train. The
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  answers came back in the order of questions, which was
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  the order of the station's beginning at the Saint Helen's.
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  Speaker 5: End Special Past here five o'clock, Collins Green.
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  Speaker 9: Special Past here six past five, Earlston.
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  Speaker 13: Special Past here five ten, Newton Special Past here five
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  twenty Kenyon Junction.
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  Speaker 2: No special train has passed here, Barton Moss.
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  Speaker 1: The two officials stared at each other in amazement.
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  Speaker 4: This is unique in my thirty years of experience.
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  Speaker 1: Said mister Blande.
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  Speaker 8: Absolutely unprecedented and inexplicable, Sir.
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  Speaker 4: The Special has gone wrong between Kenyon Junction and Martin Moth,
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  and yet there is no sighting, so far as my
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  memory serves me, between the two stations. The Special must
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  have run off the medals. But how could the four
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  to fifty Parliamentary pass over the same line without observing it.
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  There's no old alternative, mister hood. It must be so.
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  Possibly the local train may have observed something which may
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  throw some light upon the matter. We will wire to
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  Manchester for more information and to Kenyon Junction with instructions
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  that the line be examined instantly as far as Barton Moss.
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  Speaker 1: The answer from Manchester came within a few minutes.
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  Speaker 8: No news of missing special, driver and guard of slow
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  train positive. No accident between Kenyon Junction and Barton Moss
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  line quite clear, and no sign of anything unusual. Manchester,
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  that driver and guard will have to go, said mister
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  Bland grimly.
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  Speaker 4: There has been a wreck and they have missed it.
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  The Special is obviously run off the metals without disturbing
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  the line. How it could have done so passes my comprehension.
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  But so it must be, and we shall have a
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  wire from Kenyon or Barton Moss presently to say that
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  they have founder at the bottom of an embankment.
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  Speaker 1: But mister Blund's prophecy was not destined to be fulfilled.
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  Half an hour past and then there arrived the following
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  message from the station master of Kenyon Junction.
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  Speaker 10: There are no traces of the missing Special. It is
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  quite certain that she passed here and that she did
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  not arrive at Barton Moss. We have detached engine from
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  goods train and I have myself ridden down the line.
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  That all is clear and there is no sign of
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  any accident.
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  Speaker 1: Mister Bland tore his hair in his perplexity.
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  Speaker 4: This is rank lunacy hood, he cried, Does a train
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  vanish in a thin air in England in broad daylight?
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  The thing is preposterous. An engine, a tender, two carriages,
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  a van, five human beings and all lost on a
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  straight line of railway. Unless we get something positive within
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  the next hour, all take inspector Collins and go down myself.
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  Speaker 1: And then at last something positive did occur. It took
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  the shape of another telegram from Kenyon Junction.
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  Speaker 10: Regret to report that the dead body of John Slader,
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  driver of the Special train, has just been found among
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  the gorse bushes that appoint two and a quarter miles
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  from the junction, had fallen from his engine, pitched down
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  the embankment, and roiled among the bushes. Injuries to his
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  head from the fall appeared because of death. Ground has
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  now been carefully examined, and there is no trace of
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  the missing train.
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  Speaker 1: The country was, as had already been stated, in the
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  throes of a political crisis, and the attention of the
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  public was further distracted by the important and sensational developments
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  in Paris, where a huge scandal threatened to destroy the
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  government and to wreck the reputations of many of the
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  leading men in France. The papers were full of these events,
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  and the singular disappearance of the special train attracted less
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  attention than would have been the case in more peaceful times.
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  The grotesque nature of the event helped to detract from
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  its importance, for the papers were disinclined to believe the
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  facts as reported to them. More than one of the
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  London journals treated the matter as an ingenious hoax until
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  the coroner's inquest upon the unfortunate driver, an inquest which
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  elicited nothing of importance convinced them of the tragedy of
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  the incident. Mister Bland, accompanied by Inspector Collins, the senior
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  detective officer in the service of the company, went down
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  to Kenyon Junction the same evening, and their research lasted
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  throughout the following day, but was attended with purely negative results.
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  Not only was no trace found of the missing train,
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  but no conjecture could be put forward which could possibly
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  explain the facts. At the same time, Inspector collins official report,
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  which lies before me as I write, served to show
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  that the possibilities were more numerous than might have been expected.
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  Speaker 5: In the stretcher railway between the two points. Sad though
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  country is dotted with ironworks and collieries. Of these, some
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  are being worked and some have been abandoned. There are
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  no fewer than twelve which have small gauge lines which
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  run trolley cars down to the main line. These can
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  of course be disregarded. Besides these, however, there are seven
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  which have or have had proper lines running down and
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  connecting with points to the main line, so as to
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  convey their produce from the mouth of the mine to
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  the great centers of distribution. In every case these lines
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  are only a few miles in length. Out of the seven,
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  four belong to colleries which are worked out, or at
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  least the shafts which are no longer used. These are
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  the Red Gauntlet, Hero, Slough of Despond and Hearts Ease mines,
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  the latter having ten years ago been one of the
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  principal mines in Lancashire. These four side lines may be
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  eliminated from our inquiry, for to prevent possible accidents, the
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  rails nearest to the main line have been taken up
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  and there is no longer any connection. There remain three
• 23:18
  other side lines, leading a to the Carnstock Ironworks, b
• 23:24
  to the big Ben Colliery C to the Perseverance Colliery.
• 23:30
  Of these, the big Ben line is not more than
• 23:32
  a quarter of a mile long and ends at a
• 23:35
  dead wall of coal waiting removal from the mouth of
• 23:38
  the mine. Nothing had been seen or heard there of
• 23:42
  any special. The Camstock Ironworks line was blocked all day
• 23:46
  upon the third of June by sixteen truckloads of hematites.
• 23:51
  It is a single line and nothing could have passed.
• 23:55
  As to the Perseverance line, it is a large double
• 23:59
  line which does a considerable traffic for the output of
• 24:03
  the mine is very large. On the third of June,
• 24:06
  this traffic proceeded as usual. Hundreds of men, including a
• 24:10
  gang of railway plate layers, were working along the two
• 24:14
  miles and a quarter which constitute the total length of
• 24:17
  the line, and it is inconceivable that an unexpected train
• 24:22
  could have come down there without attracting universal attention. It
• 24:26
  may be remarked in conclusion that this branch line is
• 24:30
  nearer to Saint Helen's than the point at which the
• 24:33
  engine driver was discovered, so that we have every reason
• 24:36
  to believe that the train was past that point before
• 24:40
  misfortune overtook her. As to John Slater, there is no
• 24:45
  clue to be gathered from his appearance or injuries. We
• 24:49
  can only say that, so far as we can see,
• 24:52
  he met his end by falling off his engine, though
• 24:55
  why he fell or what became of the engine after
• 24:58
  his fall is a question upon which I do not
• 25:01
  feel qualified to offer an opinion.
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: In conclusion, the inspector offered his resignation to the board,
• 25:09
  being much nettled by an accusation of incompetence in the
• 25:12
  London papers. A month elapsed during which both the police
• 25:17
  and the company prosecuted their enquiries without the slightest success.
• 25:22
  A reward was offered and a pardon promised in case
• 25:25
  of crime, but they were both unclaimed. Every day the
• 25:29
  public opened their papers with the conviction that so grotesque
• 25:33
  a mystery would at last be solved. But week after
• 25:36
  week passed by, and a solution remained as far off
• 25:39
  as ever. In broad daylight upon a June afternoon, in
• 25:43
  the most thickly inhabited portion of England, a train with
• 25:47
  its occupants had disappeared, as completely as if some master
• 25:50
  of subtle chemistry had volatilized it into gas. Indeed, among
• 25:56
  the various conjectures which were put forward in the public presser,
• 26:00
  there were some which seriously asserted that supernatural or at
• 26:05
  least preternatural agencies had been at work, and that the
• 26:09
  deformed Monsieur Caratal was probably a person who was better
• 26:13
  known under a less polite name. Others fixed upon his
• 26:17
  swarthy companion as being the author of the mischief, but
• 26:21
  what it was exactly which he had done could never
• 26:24
  be clearly formulated in words. Amongst the many suggestions put
• 26:28
  forward by various newspapers or private individuals, there were one
• 26:34
  or two which were feasible enough to attract the attention
• 26:37
  of the public. One which appeared in the Times over
• 26:40
  the signature of an amateur reasoner of some celebrity at
• 26:43
  that date, attempted to deal with the matter in a
• 26:46
  critical and semi scientific manner. An extract must suffice, although
• 26:52
  the curious can see the whole letter in the issue
• 26:54
  of the third of July.
• 26:57
  Speaker 13: It is one of the elementary principles of practical reasoning.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: He remarked that when.
• 27:02
  Speaker 13: The impossible has been eliminated, the residuum, however improbable, must
• 27:09
  contain the truth. It is certain that the train left
• 27:12
  Kenyon Junction. It is certain that it did not reach
• 27:17
  Barton Moss. It is in the highest degree unlikely, but
• 27:22
  still possible, that it may have taken one of the
• 27:25
  seven available sidelines. It is obviously impossible for a train
• 27:30
  to run whe there are no rails, and therefore we
• 27:33
  may reduce our improbables to the three open lines, namely
• 27:38
  the Carnstock Iron Works, the Big Ben and the Perseverance.
• 27:44
  Is there a secret society of colliers an English camorra,
• 27:48
  which is capable of destroying both train and passengers. It
• 27:52
  is improbable, but it is not impossible. I confess that
• 27:56
  I am unable to suggest any other solution. I should
• 27:59
  certainly have the company to direct all their energies towards
• 28:03
  the observation of those three lines, and of the workmen
• 28:07
  at the end of them. A careful supervision of the
• 28:10
  pawnbroker's shops of the district might possibly bring some suggestive
• 28:15
  facts to light.
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: The suggestion, coming from a recognized authority upon such matters,
• 28:21
  created considerable interest and a fierce opposition from those who
• 28:26
  considered such a statement to be a preposterous libel upon
• 28:30
  an honest and deserving set of men. The only answer
• 28:34
  to this criticism was a challenge to the objectors to
• 28:37
  lay any more feasible explanations before the public. In reply
• 28:42
  to this, two others were forthcoming Times July seventh and ninth.
• 28:48
  The first suggested that the train might have run off
• 28:51
  the metals and be lying submerged in the Lancashire and
• 28:54
  Staffordshire Canal, which runs parallel to the railway for some
• 28:58
  hundred of yards. This suggestion was thrown out of court
• 29:02
  by the published depth of the canal, which was entirely
• 29:06
  insufficient to conceal so large an object. The second correspondent wrote,
• 29:11
  calling attention to the bag, which appeared to be the
• 29:14
  sole luggage which the travelers had brought with them, and
• 29:17
  suggesting that some novel explosive of immense and pulverizing power
• 29:23
  might have been concealed in it. The obvious absurdity, however,
• 29:27
  of supposing that the whole train might be blown to
• 29:30
  dust while the metals remained uninjured, reduced any such explanation
• 29:35
  to a farce. The investigation had drifted into this hopeless
• 29:40
  position when a new and most unexpected incident occurred. This
• 29:45
  was nothing less than the receipt by Missus Macpherson of
• 29:49
  a letter from her husband, James Macpherson, who had been
• 29:53
  the guard on the missing train. The letter, which was
• 29:56
  dated July fifth, eighteen ninety, was post from New York
• 30:01
  and came to hand upon July the fourteenth. Some doubts
• 30:05
  were expressed as to its genuine character, but Missus Macpherson
• 30:09
  was positive as to the writing, and the fact that
• 30:12
  it contained a remittance of one hundred dollars in five
• 30:16
  dollar notes was enough in itself to discount the idea
• 30:19
  of a hoax. No address was given in the letter,
• 30:23
  which ran in this way.
• 30:25
  Speaker 6: My dear wife. I have been thinking a great deal
• 30:30
  and I find it very hard to give you up.
• 30:33
  The same with Lizzie. I tried to fight against it,
• 30:36
  but it will always come back to me. I send
• 30:39
  you some money which will change into twenty English pounds.
• 30:44
  This should be enough to bring both Lizzie and you
• 30:47
  across the Atlantic, and you will find the Hamburg boats
• 30:51
  which stop at Southampton, very good boats and cheaper than Liverpool.
• 30:57
  If you could come here and start at the Johnstone House,
• 31:01
  I would try and send you word how to meet.
• 31:04
  But things are very difficult with me at present, and
• 31:08
  I am not very happy, finding it hard to give
• 31:12
  you both up. So no more at present, from your
• 31:15
  loving husband, James McPherson.
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: For a time it was confidently anticipated that this letter
• 31:22
  would lead to the clearing up of the whole matter.
• 31:25
  The more so as it was ascertained that a passenger
• 31:28
  who bore a close resemblance to the missing guard had
• 31:31
  traveled from Southampton under the name of Somers In the
• 31:35
  Hamburg and New York liner Vistula, which started upon the
• 31:39
  seventh of June. Missus macpherson and her sister, Lizzied Olton
• 31:44
  went across to New York as directed, and stayed for
• 31:48
  three weeks at the Johnston House without hearing anything from
• 31:52
  the missing man. It is probable that some injudicious comments
• 31:56
  in the press may have warned him that the police
• 31:58
  were using them as a bar. However this may be,
• 32:02
  it is certain that he neither wrote nor came, and
• 32:06
  the women were eventually compelled to return to Liverpool. And
• 32:10
  so the matter stood and has continued to stand up
• 32:13
  to the present year of eighteen ninety eight. Incredible as
• 32:18
  it may seem, nothing has transpired during these eight years
• 32:22
  which has shed the least light upon the extraordinary disappearance
• 32:26
  of the special train which contained Monsieur Caratal and his companion.
• 32:31
  Careful inquiries into the antecedence of the two travelers have
• 32:35
  only established the fact that Monsieur Caratal was well known
• 32:39
  as a financier and political agent in Central America, and
• 32:43
  that during his voyage to Europe he had betrayed extraordinary
• 32:47
  anxiety to reach Paris. His companion, whose name was entered
• 32:52
  upon the passenger lists as Eduardo Gomez, was a man
• 32:56
  whose record was a violent one and whose reputation was
• 33:00
  that of a bravo and a bully. There was evidence
• 33:04
  to show, however, that he was honestly devoted to the
• 33:07
  interests of Monsieur Caratal, and that the latter, being a
• 33:11
  man of puny physique, employed the other as a guard
• 33:15
  and protector. It may be added that no information came
• 33:19
  from Paris as to what the objects of Monsieur Carottel's
• 33:23
  hurried journey may have been. This comprises all the facts
• 33:27
  of the case up to the publication in the Marseille
• 33:30
  papers of the recent confession of Herbert Dulernac, now under
• 33:35
  sentence of death for the murder of a merchant named Bonvelot.
• 33:40
  This statement may be literally translated as follows.
• 33:44
  Speaker 3: It is not dead of mere pride or bois den
• 33:47
  that they give this information. For is that were my object?
• 33:52
  Day goodell a dozen actions of vain which are quite
• 33:56
  dis splendid, But they do it in order. That's sir,
• 33:59
  De gentlemen whom Paris may understand that I am able
• 34:04
  here to tell about the fate of Monsieur Caratal, can
• 34:10
  also tell in whose interest and in whose request the
• 34:14
  deed was done, Unless reprieve which I am awaiting, comes
• 34:18
  to me very quickly, take warning, messieurs, before it is
• 34:24
  too late. You know Rae Albert de Lernach, and you
• 34:29
  are aware that his deeds are as ready as his words.
• 34:33
  Aeson then or you are lost at present, I shall
• 34:38
  mention no names. If you only heard the names, what
• 34:43
  would you not think? But I shall merely tell you
• 34:46
  how cleverly I did it. I was true to my
• 34:50
  employees then, and no doubt they will be true to
• 34:53
  me now, I hope so. And until I am convinced
• 34:58
  that they have betrayed me, these names, which would convulse Europe,
• 35:05
  shall not be divulged. But on that day, well, I
• 35:11
  say no more in a word. Then there was a
• 35:15
  famous trial in party in the year eighteen ninety, in
• 35:20
  connection with a monstrous scandal in politics and finance. How
• 35:27
  monstrous that scandal was can never be known save by
• 35:31
  such confidential agents as myself. The honor and careers of
• 35:37
  many of the chief men in France were at stake.
• 35:42
  You have seen a group of nine pins standing also
• 35:46
  rigid and prim and unbending. Then there comes about from
• 35:51
  far away and pop, pop pop, there are your nine
• 35:56
  pins on the floor. Well, imagine some of the greatest
• 36:00
  men in France as these nine pins. And then this
• 36:04
  Monsieur Caratal was the ball which could be seen coming
• 36:09
  from far away. If he arrived, then it was pop
• 36:14
  pop pop. For all of them. He was determined that
• 36:19
  he should not arrive. I do not accuse them all
• 36:24
  of being conscious of what was to happen. There were,
• 36:28
  as I have said, great financial as well as political
• 36:32
  interests at stake, and as syndicate was formed to manage
• 36:36
  the business. Some subscribed to his indicate, who hardly understood
• 36:42
  what were its objects. But others understood very well, and
• 36:47
  they can rely upon it that I have not forgotten
• 36:50
  their names. They had ample warning that Monsieur Carrettal was coming,
• 36:56
  long before he left South America, and they knew that
• 37:00
  the evidence which he held was certainly in ruin to
• 37:05
  all of them. The Syndicate had the command of an
• 37:09
  unlimited amount of money, absolutely unlimited. You understand. They looked
• 37:17
  round for an augent who was capable of wielding this
• 37:20
  gigantic power. The man chosen must be inventive, resolute, adaptive,
• 37:29
  a man in a million. They chose Albert de Lernac,
• 37:35
  and I admit that they were right. My duties were
• 37:39
  to choose my subordinates to use freely the power which
• 37:44
  money gives and to make certain that Monsieur Caratal should
• 37:49
  never arrive in Pardis. With characteristic energy, I set about
• 37:54
  my commission within an hour of receiving my instructions, and
• 38:00
  the steps which I took were the very breast for
• 38:03
  the purpose which could possibly be devised. A man whom
• 38:08
  I could trust was dispatch'd instantly to South America to
• 38:13
  travel home with Monsieur Caratal. Had he arrived in time,
• 38:19
  the ship would never have reached Liverpool. But alas it
• 38:24
  had already started before my orgent could reach it, I
• 38:29
  fitted out a small arm's brig to intercept it. But
• 38:33
  again I was unfortunate. Like all great organizers, I was, however,
• 38:40
  prepared for failure and had a series of alternatives prepar'd,
• 38:46
  one or the other of which must succeed. You must
• 38:52
  not under rate the difficulties of by undertaking or imagine
• 38:57
  that a mere commonplace assassination would meet the case. We
• 39:02
  must destroy not only Monsieur Carletal, but Monsieur Caratal's documents
• 39:09
  and Monsieur Carretal's companions also, if we had reason to
• 39:14
  believe that he had communicated his secrets to them, and
• 39:18
  you must remember that they were on the alert and
• 39:22
  keenly suspicious of any such attempt. He was a task
• 39:27
  which was in every way worthy of me, for I
• 39:31
  am always most masterful where another would be uphalled. I
• 39:37
  was already for Monsieur Caratal's reception in Liverpool, and I
• 39:43
  was the more eager because I had reason to believe
• 39:46
  that he had made arrangements by which he would have
• 39:49
  a considerable guard from the moment that he arrived in London.
• 39:55
  Anything which was to be done must be done between
• 39:58
  the moment of his sitting foot upon the Liverpool Quay
• 40:03
  and that of his arrival at the London and West
• 40:06
  Coast terminus. In London. We prepared six plans, each more
• 40:11
  elaborate than the last. Which plan would be used would
• 40:16
  depend on his own movements. Do what he would. We
• 40:21
  were ready for him if he had stayed in Liverpool,
• 40:25
  We were ready if he took an ordinary train, an
• 40:29
  express or especial. All was ready, Everything had been foreseen
• 40:37
  and provided for. You may imagine that I could not
• 40:41
  do all this myself. What would I know of the
• 40:46
  English railway lines. But money can procure willing ah gence
• 40:51
  all the world over, and I soon have one of
• 40:54
  the acutest brains in England to assist me. I will
• 40:58
  mention no names, but it would be unjust to claim
• 41:02
  all the credit for myself. My English ally was worthy
• 41:07
  of such an alliance. He knew the London and WestCoast
• 41:11
  line floroughly, and he had the command of a band
• 41:15
  of workers who were trustworthy and intelligent. The idea was his,
• 41:21
  and my own judgment was only required in the details.
• 41:25
  We bought over several officials, amongst whom the most important
• 41:30
  was James Macpherson, whom we had ascertained to be the
• 41:35
  guard most likely to be employed upon a special train.
• 41:40
  Smith the Stoker was also in our employ John Slater,
• 41:46
  the engine driver, had been approached, but had been found
• 41:50
  to be obstinate and dangerous, so we desisted. We had
• 41:56
  no certainty that Monsieur Caratal would take a special but
• 42:00
  we thought it very probable, for it was of the
• 42:03
  utmost importance to him that he should reach Paris without delay.
• 42:08
  It was for this contingency, therefore, that we made special preparations,
• 42:15
  preparations which were complete down to the last detail, long
• 42:20
  before his steamer had sighted the shores of England. You
• 42:25
  will be amused to learn that there was one of
• 42:28
  my agents in the pilot boat which brought that steamer
• 42:31
  to its moorings. The moment that Caratal arrived in Liverpool,
• 42:37
  we knew that he suspected danger and was on his guard.
• 42:42
  He had brought with him as an escort a dangerous
• 42:46
  fellow named Gomez, a man who carried weapons and was
• 42:51
  prepared to use them. This fellow carried Caratal's confidential papers
• 42:56
  for him and was ready to protect either them or
• 43:00
  his master. The probability was that Caratal had taken him
• 43:05
  into his council, and that to remove Caratal without removing
• 43:10
  Gomez would be a mere waste of energy. It was
• 43:15
  necessary that they should be involved in a common fate,
• 43:19
  and our plans to that end were much facilitated by
• 43:22
  their request for a special train. On that special train,
• 43:27
  you will understand that two out of the free servants
• 43:31
  of the company were rarely in our employ at a
• 43:35
  price which would make them independent for a lifetime. I
• 43:40
  do not go so far as to say that the
• 43:43
  English are more honest than any other nation, but I
• 43:47
  have found them more expensive to buy. I have already
• 43:53
  spoken of my English agent, who is a man with
• 43:57
  a considerable future before him. Unless some complaint of the
• 44:01
  throat carries him off before his time. He had charge
• 44:05
  of all arrangements at Liverpool, whilst I was stationed at
• 44:10
  the Inn at Kenyon, where I awaited a cipher signal
• 44:14
  to act. When the special was arranged for, my agent
• 44:19
  instantly telegraphed to me and warned me how soon I
• 44:23
  should have everything ready. He himself, under the name of
• 44:28
  Horace Moore, applied immediately for a special, also in the
• 44:33
  hope that he would be sent down with Monsieur Carretale,
• 44:37
  which might, under certain circumstances, have been helpful to us, if,
• 44:43
  for example, our great who had failed, he would then
• 44:48
  have become the duty of my agent to have shot
• 44:51
  them both and destroyed their papers. Caratal was on his guard, however,
• 44:58
  and refused to admit any other. The traveler, Mayor John Lyn,
• 45:02
  left the station, returned by another entrance, entered the Guard's
• 45:07
  van on the side farthest from the platform, and traveled
• 45:11
  down with Macpherson the Guard. In the meantime, you will
• 45:17
  be interested to know what my movements were. Everything had
• 45:21
  been prepared for days before, and only the finishing touches
• 45:25
  were needed. The side line which we had chosen had
• 45:30
  once joined the main line, but it had been disconnected.
• 45:35
  We had only to replace a few rails to connect
• 45:38
  it once more. These rails had been laid down as
• 45:41
  far as could be done without danger of attracting attention,
• 45:46
  and now it was merely a case of completing a
• 45:49
  juncture with the line and arranging the points as they
• 45:53
  had been before. The sleepers had never been removed, and
• 45:58
  the rails, fish and rivets were already for We had
• 46:03
  taken them from a siding on the abandoned portion of
• 46:06
  the line. With my small but competent band of workers.
• 46:11
  We had everything ready long before the special arrived. When
• 46:16
  it did arrive, it ran off upon the small sidelines
• 46:20
  so easily that the jolty of the points appears to
• 46:23
  have been entirely unnoticed by the two travelers. Our plan
• 46:28
  had been that Smith the stoker should cloriform John Slater,
• 46:33
  the driver, so that he should vanish with the others
• 46:38
  in this respect, And in this respect only our plans miscarried.
• 46:44
  I accept the criminal folly of Macpherson in writing home
• 46:48
  to his wife. Our stoker did his business so clumsily
• 46:52
  that Slater, in his struggles, fell off the engine, And
• 46:56
  though fortune was with us so far that he brought
• 47:00
  his neck in the fall, till he remained as a
• 47:03
  blot upon that which would otherwise have been one of
• 47:07
  those complete masterpieces which are only to be contemplated in
• 47:12
  silent admiration. The criminal expert will find in John Slatter
• 47:18
  the one floor in all her admirable combinations, A man
• 47:22
  who has had as many triumphs as I can afford
• 47:25
  to be frank. And I therefore lay my finger upon
• 47:29
  John Slatter, and I proclaim him to be a floor.
• 47:35
  But now I have got our special train upon the
• 47:38
  small line two kilometers or rather more than one mile
• 47:43
  in length, which leads, or rather used to lead to
• 47:48
  the abandoned Hartseya's mine, once one of the largest coal
• 47:52
  mines in England. You will ask how it is that
• 47:56
  no one saw the train upon this unused line. I
• 48:00
  answer that along its entire length it runs through a
• 48:04
  deep cutting, and that unless some one had been on
• 48:06
  the edge of that cutting, he could not have seen it.
• 48:11
  There was some one on the edge of that cutting.
• 48:14
  I was there, and now I would tell you what
• 48:18
  I saw. My assistant had remained at the points in
• 48:22
  order that he might superintend the switching off of the train.
• 48:26
  He had four armed men with him, so that if
• 48:29
  the train ran off the line, we thought it probable,
• 48:33
  because the points were very rusty, we might still have
• 48:37
  his horses to fall back upon. Having once seen it
• 48:41
  safely on the side line, he handed over the responsibility
• 48:45
  to me. I was waiting at a point which overlooks
• 48:49
  the mouth of the mine, and I was also armed,
• 48:52
  as were my two companions. Come what might you see?
• 48:57
  I was always ready. The moment that the train was
• 49:02
  fairly on the side line, Smith the Stoker slowed down
• 49:06
  the engine, and then, having turned it on to the
• 49:09
  fullest speed again, he and Macpherson with my English lieutenant,
• 49:15
  sprang off before it was too late. It may be
• 49:19
  that it was this slowing down which first attracted the
• 49:22
  attention of the travelers. But the train is running at
• 49:25
  full speed again before their heads appeared at the open window.
• 49:30
  It makes me smile to think how bewildered they must
• 49:33
  have been. Picture to yourself your own feelings. If, on
• 49:38
  looking out of your luxurious carriage, you suddenly perceived that
• 49:43
  the lines upon which you ran were rusted and corroded,
• 49:47
  red and yellow with disuse and decay, What a catch
• 49:51
  must have come in their breath, as in a second
• 49:54
  it flashed upon them that it was not Manchester but
• 49:58
  death which was waiting for them at the end of
• 50:01
  that sinister line. For the train was running with frantic speed,
• 50:07
  rolling and rocking over the rotten line, while the wheels
• 50:10
  made a frightful screaming sound upon the rusted surface. I
• 50:15
  was close to them and could see their faces. Caratal
• 50:19
  was praying. I think there was something like a rosary
• 50:24
  dangling out of his hand. The other roared like a
• 50:27
  bull who smells the blood of the slaughterhouse. He saw
• 50:31
  us standing on the bank, and he beckoned to us
• 50:34
  like a madman. Then he tore at his wrist and
• 50:36
  threw his dispatch box out of the window in our direction.
• 50:41
  Of course, his meaning was obvious. Here was the evidence,
• 50:46
  and they would promised to be silent if their lives
• 50:48
  were spared. It would have been very agreeable if we
• 50:52
  could have done so, but business is business. Besides, the
• 50:58
  train was now as much beyond our controls as theirs.
• 51:03
  He ceased owling when the train rattled round the curve,
• 51:07
  and they saw the black mouth of the mine yawning
• 51:09
  before them. We had removed the boards which had covered it,
• 51:14
  and we had cleared the square entrance. The rails had
• 51:17
  formerly run very close to the shaft for the convenience
• 51:21
  of loading the coal, and we had only to add
• 51:24
  two or three lengths of rail in order to lead
• 51:27
  to the very brink of the shaft. In fact, as
• 51:30
  the length would not quite fit, our line projected about
• 51:34
  three feet over the edge. We saw the two heads
• 51:38
  at the window Caratal below Gomez above, for they had
• 51:43
  both been struck silent by what they saw, and yet
• 51:47
  they could not withdraw their heads. The sight seemed to
• 51:51
  have paralyzed them. I wondered how the train, running at
• 51:56
  a great speed, would take the pit into which I
• 51:58
  had guided it, and I was much interested in watching it.
• 52:03
  One of my colleagues thought that it would actually jump it,
• 52:07
  and indeed it was not very far from doing so. Fortunately, however,
• 52:12
  it fell short and the buffers of the engine struck
• 52:16
  the other lip of the shaft with a tremendous crash.
• 52:20
  The funnel flew off into the air. The tender carriages
• 52:24
  and van were all smashed into one jumble, which, with
• 52:28
  the remains of the engine, choked for a minute or
• 52:32
  so the mouth of the pit. Then something gave way
• 52:36
  in the middle, and the whole mass of green iron,
• 52:39
  smoking holes, brass fittings, wheels, woodwork and cushions all crumbled
• 52:46
  together and crashed down into the mine. We heard the rattle, rattle,
• 52:53
  rattle as a debris struck against the walls, and then
• 52:57
  quite a long time afterwards they came a deep roar
• 53:01
  as the remains of the train struck the bottom. The
• 53:04
  boiler may have burst, for a sharp crash came after
• 53:08
  the roar, and then a dense cloud of steam and
• 53:11
  smoke swelled up out of the black depths, falling in
• 53:15
  a spray as thick as rain all around us. Then
• 53:19
  the vapor shredded off into thin wisps which floated away
• 53:23
  in the summer sunshine, and all was quiet again in
• 53:27
  Heart's Ease mine. And now having carried out our plans
• 53:33
  so successfully, it only remained to leave no trace behind us.
• 53:38
  Our little band of workers at the other end had
• 53:42
  already ripped up the rails and disconnected the side line,
• 53:46
  replacing everything as it had been before. We were equally
• 53:51
  busy at the mine. The funnel and other fragments were
• 53:55
  thrown in. The shaft was blanked over as it used
• 53:58
  to be and the lines which led to it were
• 54:01
  torn up and taken away. Then, without floody, but without delay,
• 54:08
  we all made our way out of the country, most
• 54:11
  of us to Paddy by English colleague to Manchester, and
• 54:15
  Macpherson to Southampton, whence he emigrated to America. Let the
• 54:20
  English papers of that date tell how thoroughly we had
• 54:25
  done our work, and how completely we had thrown the
• 54:28
  cleverest of their detectives of our track. You will remember
• 54:34
  that Gomez threw his bag of papers out of the window,
• 54:38
  and I need not say that I secured that bag
• 54:42
  and brought them to my employers. It may interest my
• 54:46
  employers now, however, to learn that out of that bag
• 54:51
  I took one or two little papers as a souvenir
• 54:55
  of the occasion. I have no wish to publish these papers,
• 55:00
  but still it is every man for himself in this world.
• 55:05
  And what else can I do if my friends do
• 55:08
  not come to my aid when I want them. Monsieurs,
• 55:12
  you may believe that Albert de la al Nach is
• 55:15
  quite as formidable when he is against you as when
• 55:19
  he is with you, and that he is not a
• 55:22
  man to go to the guillotine until he has seen
• 55:25
  that every one of you is en route for New Caledonia.
• 55:30
  For your own sake, if not for mine, make haste,
• 55:34
  Monsieur de and general and a baron. You can feel
• 55:40
  the blanks for yourselves as you read this. I promise
• 55:44
  you that in the next edition there will be no
• 55:47
  blanks to fill. P. S. As I look over my statement,
• 55:54
  there is only one omission which I can see. It
• 55:57
  concerns the unfortunate man McPherson, who was foolish enough to
• 56:03
  write to his wife and to make an appointment with
• 56:06
  her in New York. It can be imagined that when
• 56:10
  interests like ours were at stake, we could not lead
• 56:13
  them to the chance of whether a man in that
• 56:16
  class of life would or would not give away his
• 56:19
  secrets to a woman. Having once broken his oath by
• 56:23
  writing to his wife, we could not trust him anymore.
• 56:28
  We took steps, therefore, to ensure that he should not
• 56:32
  see his wife. I have sometimes thought that it would
• 56:35
  be a kindness to write to her and to assure
• 56:38
  her that there is no impediment to her marrying again.
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: End of chapter two, Chapter three of four non canonical
• 56:55
  Sherlock Holmes short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle this is
• 56:59
  a little recording. All libervox recordings are in the public domain.
• 57:03
  For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
• 57:08
  Chapter three, The Man with the Watches. There are many
• 57:13
  who will still bear in mind the singular circumstances which,
• 57:16
  under the heading of the Rugby Mystery, filled many columns
• 57:20
  of the daily press in the spring of the year
• 57:23
  eighteen ninety two, Coming as it did at a period
• 57:26
  of exceptional dullness. It attracted perhaps rather more attention than
• 57:31
  it deserved, but it offered to the public that mixture
• 57:34
  of the whimsical and the tragic, which is most stimulating
• 57:37
  to the popular imagination. Interest drooped, however, when after weeks
• 57:43
  of fruitless investigation, it was found that no final explanation
• 57:47
  of the facts was forthcoming, and the tragedy seemed, from
• 57:50
  that time to the present to have finally taken its
• 57:53
  place in the dark catalog of inexplicable and unexpiated crimes.
• 57:58
  A recent communication, the authenticity of which appears to be
• 58:02
  above question, has however, thrown some new and clear light
• 58:06
  upon the matter. Before laying it before the public. It
• 58:10
  would be as well, perhaps that I should refresh their
• 58:13
  memories as to the singular facts upon which this commentary
• 58:17
  is founded. These facts were briefly as follows. At five
• 58:21
  o'clock on the evening of the eighteenth of March in
• 58:24
  the year already mentioned, a train left Euston Station for Manchester.
• 58:30
  It was a rainy, squalid day, which grew wilder as
• 58:33
  it progressed. So it was by no means the weather
• 58:37
  in which anyone would travel who was not driven to
• 58:39
  do so by necessity. The train, however, is a favorite
• 58:43
  one among Manchester businessmen who are returning from town, for
• 58:47
  it does the journey in four hours and twenty minutes,
• 58:50
  with only three stoppages upon the way. In spite of
• 58:54
  the inclement evening, it was therefore fairly well filled. Upon
• 58:58
  the occasion of which I speak, the guard of the
• 59:01
  train was a tried servant of the company, a man
• 59:04
  who had worked for twenty two years without a blemish
• 59:07
  or complaint. His name was John Palmer. The station clock
• 59:12
  was upon the stroke of five, and the guard was
• 59:14
  about to give the customary signal to the engine driver
• 59:17
  when he observed two belated passengers hurrying down the platform.
• 59:21
  The one was an exceptionally tall man dressed in a
• 59:25
  long black overcoat with Astrakhan collar and cuffs. I have
• 59:29
  already said that the evening was an inclement one, and
• 59:32
  the tall traveler had the high warm collar turned up
• 59:36
  to protect his throat against the bitter march wind. He appeared,
• 59:40
  as far as the guard could judge by so hurried
• 59:43
  an inspection, to be a man between fifty and sixty
• 59:46
  years of age, who had retained a good deal of
• 59:49
  the vigor and activity of his youth. In one hand,
• 59:52
  he carried a brown leather gladstone bag. His companion was
• 59:56
  a lady, tall and erect, walking with a vigor a
• 1:00:00
  step which outpaced the gentleman beside her. She wore a
• 1:00:04
  long fawn colored dust cloak, a black close fitting toque,
• 1:00:08
  and a dark veil which concealed the greater part of
• 1:00:11
  her face. The two might very well have passed as
• 1:00:14
  father and daughter. They walked swiftly down the line of carriages,
• 1:00:19
  glancing in at the windows until the guard, John Palmer,
• 1:00:22
  overtook them.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 9: Now, then, sir, look sharp the trainer's going, said.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: He first clause, The man answered. The guard turned the
• 1:00:31
  handle of the nearest door in the carriage, which he
• 1:00:34
  had opened. There sat a small man, with a cigar
• 1:00:38
  in his mouth. His appearance seemed to have impressed itself
• 1:00:41
  upon the guard's memory, for he was prepared afterwards to
• 1:00:44
  describe or to identify him. He was a man of
• 1:00:48
  thirty four or thirty five years of age, dressed in
• 1:00:51
  some gray material, sharp nosed, alert, with a ruddy, weather
• 1:00:56
  beaten face, and a small, closely cropped black beard. He
• 1:01:01
  glanced up as the door was opened. The tall man
• 1:01:04
  paused with his foot upon the step.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 9: This is a smoking compartment. The lady disliked smoke.
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: Said he, looking round at the guard. All right, who
• 1:01:14
  you are, sir, said John Palmer. He slammed the door
• 1:01:17
  of the smoking carriage, opened that of the next one,
• 1:01:21
  which was empty, and thrust the two travelers in. At
• 1:01:25
  the same moment, he sounded his whistle, and the wheels
• 1:01:27
  of the train began to move. The man with a
• 1:01:30
  cigar was at the window of his carriage and said
• 1:01:33
  something to the guard as he rolled past him, but
• 1:01:35
  the words were lost in the bustle of the departure.
• 1:01:39
  Palmer stepped into the guards van as it came up
• 1:01:41
  to him, and thought no more of the incident. Twelve
• 1:01:45
  minutes after its departure, the train reached Wilsden Junction, where
• 1:01:50
  it stopped for a very short interval. An examination of
• 1:01:54
  the tickets has made it certain that no one either
• 1:01:56
  joined or left it at this time, and no passenger
• 1:01:59
  was seemed to alight upon the platform. At five point fourteen,
• 1:02:03
  the journey to Manchester was resumed and Rugby was reached
• 1:02:07
  at six point fifty, the express being five minutes late.
• 1:02:11
  At Rugby, the attention of the station officials were drawn
• 1:02:14
  to the fact that the door of one of the
• 1:02:16
  first class carriages was open. An examination of that compartment
• 1:02:21
  and of its neighbor disclosed a remarkable state of affairs.
• 1:02:25
  The smoking carriage in which the short, red faced man
• 1:02:29
  with the black beard had been seen was now empty,
• 1:02:33
  save for a half smoked cigar. There was no trace
• 1:02:35
  whatever of its recent occupant. The door of this carriage
• 1:02:40
  was fastened. In the next compartment to which attention had
• 1:02:44
  been originally drawn, there was no sign either of the
• 1:02:47
  gentlemen with the Astrakhan collar or of the young lady
• 1:02:51
  who accompanied him. All three passengers had disappeared. On the
• 1:02:55
  other hand, there was found upon the floor of this
• 1:02:58
  carriage the one in which the tall traveler and the
• 1:03:00
  lady had been a young man, fashionably dressed and of
• 1:03:04
  elegant appearance. He lay with his knees drawn up and
• 1:03:08
  his head resting against the farther door, an elbow upon
• 1:03:11
  either seat. A bullet had penetrated his heart, and his
• 1:03:15
  death must have been instantaneous. No one had seen such
• 1:03:19
  a man enter the train, and no railway ticket was
• 1:03:22
  found in his pocket. Neither were there any markings upon
• 1:03:26
  his linen, nor papers, nor personal property which might help
• 1:03:30
  to identify him. Who he was, whence he had come,
• 1:03:34
  and how he had met his end were each as
• 1:03:37
  great a mystery as what had occurred to the three
• 1:03:39
  people who had started an hour and a half before
• 1:03:42
  from Wilsden. In those two compartments I have said that
• 1:03:47
  there was no personal property which might help to identify him.
• 1:03:51
  But it is true that there was one peculiarity about
• 1:03:54
  this unknown young man which was much commented upon at
• 1:03:58
  the time. Inckets were found no fewer than six valuable
• 1:04:02
  gold watches, three in the various pockets of his waistcoat,
• 1:04:06
  one in his ticket pocket, one in his breast pocket,
• 1:04:10
  and one small one set in a leather strap and
• 1:04:13
  fastened around his left wrist. The obvious explanation that the
• 1:04:17
  man was a pickpocket and that this was his plunder,
• 1:04:20
  was discounted by the fact that all six were of
• 1:04:23
  American mate, and of a type which is rare in England.
• 1:04:27
  Three of them bore the mark of the Rochester Watchmaking Company,
• 1:04:31
  one was by Mason of el Mira, one was unmarked,
• 1:04:36
  and the small one, which was highly dueled and ornamented,
• 1:04:40
  was from Tiffany of New York. The other contents of
• 1:04:43
  his pocket consisted of an ivory knife with a corkscrew
• 1:04:47
  by Rogers of Sheffield, a small circular mirror one inch
• 1:04:52
  in diameter, a readmission slip to the Lyceum theater, a
• 1:04:56
  silver box full of Vesta matches, and a brown on
• 1:05:00
  leather cigar case containing two shroots, also two pounds fourteen
• 1:05:05
  shillings in money. It was clear then that whatever motives
• 1:05:09
  may have led to his death, robbery was not among them.
• 1:05:13
  As already mentioned, there were no markings upon the man's linen,
• 1:05:17
  which appeared to be new, and no tailor's name upon
• 1:05:20
  his coat. In appearance, he was young, short, smooth cheeked,
• 1:05:25
  and delicately featured. One of his front teeth was conspicuously
• 1:05:29
  stopped with gold. On the discovery of the tragedy, an
• 1:05:33
  examination was instantly made of the tickets of all passengers,
• 1:05:38
  and the number of the passengers themselves was counted. It
• 1:05:41
  was found that only three tickets were unaccounted for, corresponding
• 1:05:46
  to the three travelers who were missing. The express was
• 1:05:50
  then allowed to proceed, but a new guard was sent
• 1:05:53
  with it, and John Palmer was detained as a witness
• 1:05:56
  at Rugby. The carriage, which included the two compartments in question,
• 1:06:01
  was uncoupled and sidetracked. Then, on the arrival of Inspector
• 1:06:05
  Vane of Scotland Yard and of mister Henderson, a detective
• 1:06:09
  in the service of the railway company, an exhaustive inquiry
• 1:06:13
  was made into all the circumstances that crime had been committed.
• 1:06:18
  Was certain the bullet, which appeared to have come from
• 1:06:21
  a small pistol or revolver, had been fired from some
• 1:06:24
  little distance, as there was no scorching of the clothes,
• 1:06:28
  No weapon was found in the compartment, which finally disposed
• 1:06:32
  of the theory of suicide, nor was there any sign
• 1:06:36
  of the brown leather bag which the guard had seen
• 1:06:38
  in the hand of the tall gentleman. A lady's parasol
• 1:06:42
  was found upon the rack, but no other trace was
• 1:06:45
  to be seen of the travelers in either of the sections.
• 1:06:49
  Apart from the crime, the question of how or why
• 1:06:53
  three passengers, one of them a lady, could get out
• 1:06:57
  of the train and one other get in or in
• 1:07:00
  the unbroken run between Wilsden and Rugby was one which
• 1:07:04
  excited the utmost curiosity among the general public, and gave
• 1:07:09
  rise to much speculation in the London press. John Palmer,
• 1:07:13
  the Guard was able at the inquest to give some
• 1:07:16
  evidence which threw a little light upon the matter. There
• 1:07:20
  was a spot between Tring and Cheddington, according to his statement,
• 1:07:25
  where on account of some repairs to the line, the
• 1:07:27
  train had for a few minutes slowed down to a
• 1:07:30
  pace not exceeding eight or ten miles an hour. At
• 1:07:34
  that place it might be possible for a man, or
• 1:07:37
  even for an exceptionally active woman, to have left the
• 1:07:41
  train without serious injury. It was true that a gang
• 1:07:44
  of plate layers was there, and that they had seen nothing,
• 1:07:48
  but it was their custom to stand in the middle
• 1:07:50
  between the metals, and the open carriage door was upon
• 1:07:54
  the far side, so that it was conceivable that someone
• 1:07:58
  might have alighted unseen, as the darkness would by that
• 1:08:02
  time be drawing in a steep embankment would instantly screen
• 1:08:06
  any one who sprang out. From the observation of the navvies.
• 1:08:10
  The guard also deposed that there was a good deal
• 1:08:13
  of movement upon the platform at Wilsden Junction, and that
• 1:08:17
  though it was certain that no one had either joined
• 1:08:20
  or left the train there, it was still quite possible
• 1:08:23
  that some of the passengers might have changed unseen from
• 1:08:27
  one compartment to another. It was by no means uncommon
• 1:08:31
  for a gentleman to finish his cigar in a smoking
• 1:08:33
  carriage and then to change to a clearer atmosphere. Supposing
• 1:08:38
  that the man with the black beard had done so
• 1:08:40
  at Wilsden, and the half smoked cigar upon the floor
• 1:08:43
  seemed to favor the supposition he would naturally go into
• 1:08:47
  the nearest section, which would bring him into the company
• 1:08:50
  of the two other actors in this drama. Thus the
• 1:08:54
  first stage of the affair might be surmised without any
• 1:08:57
  great breach of probability. But what the second stage had been,
• 1:09:02
  or how the final one had been arrived at, neither
• 1:09:05
  the garden nor the experienced detective offices could suggest. A
• 1:09:10
  careful examination of the line between Wilsden and Rugby resulted
• 1:09:14
  in one discovery which mit or might not have a
• 1:09:17
  bearing upon the tragedy. Near Tring, at the very place
• 1:09:21
  where the train slowed down, there was found, at the
• 1:09:24
  bottom of the embankment a small pocket testament, very shabby
• 1:09:29
  and worn. It was printed by the Bible Society of
• 1:09:33
  London and bore an inscription.
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 6: From John to Alice January thirteenth, eighteen fifty six upon.
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 1: The fly leaf.
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 6: Underneath was written James July fourth, eighteen fifty.
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: Nine, and beneath that again.
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 6: Edward November first, eighteen sixty nine, all.
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: The entries being in the same handwriting. This was the
• 1:09:58
  only clue, if it could be called a clue, which
• 1:10:01
  the police obtained, and the coroner's.
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 7: Verdict of murder by a person or person's unknown.
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: Was the unsatisfactory ending of a singular case. Advertisement rewards
• 1:10:15
  and inquiries proved equally fruitless, and nothing could be found
• 1:10:19
  which was solid enough to form the basis for a
• 1:10:22
  profitable investigation. It would be a mistake, however, to suppose
• 1:10:27
  that no theories were formed to account for the facts.
• 1:10:31
  On the contrary, the press, both in England and in America,
• 1:10:35
  teemed with suggestions and suppositions, most of which were obviously absurd.
• 1:10:42
  The fact that the watches were of American make, and
• 1:10:44
  some peculiarities in connection with the goal stopping of his
• 1:10:48
  front tooth appeared to indicate that the deceased was a
• 1:10:51
  citizen of the United States, though his linen clothes and
• 1:10:55
  boots were undoubtedly a British manufacturer. It was surmised by
• 1:11:00
  some that he was concealed under the seat, and that
• 1:11:03
  being discovered, he was for some reason, possibly because he
• 1:11:07
  had overheard their guilty secrets put to death by his
• 1:11:11
  fellow passengers. When coupled with generalities as to the ferocity
• 1:11:15
  and cunning of an article and other secret societies, this
• 1:11:19
  theory sounded as plausible as any. The fact that he
• 1:11:23
  should be without a ticket would be consistent with the
• 1:11:26
  idea of concealment, and it was well known that women
• 1:11:29
  played a prominent part in the nihilistic propaganda. On the
• 1:11:34
  other hand, it was clear from the guard's statement that
• 1:11:37
  the man must have been hidden there before the others arrived,
• 1:11:41
  and how unlikely the coincidence that conspirators should stray exactly
• 1:11:46
  into the very compartment in which a spy was already concealed. Besides,
• 1:11:51
  this explanation ignored the man in the smoking carriage and
• 1:11:55
  gave no reason at all for his simultaneous disappearance. The
• 1:11:59
  police had little difficulty in showing that such a theory
• 1:12:03
  would not cover the facts, but they were unprepared, in
• 1:12:06
  the absence of evidence, to advance any alternative explanation. There
• 1:12:12
  was a letter in the Daily Gazette over the signature
• 1:12:15
  of a well known criminal investigator, which gave rise to
• 1:12:19
  considerable discussion. At the time. He had formed a hypothesis
• 1:12:24
  which had at least ingenuity to recommend it, and I
• 1:12:27
  cannot do better than append it in his own words.
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 13: Whatever may be the truth, said he, it must depend
• 1:12:36
  upon some bizarre and rare combination of events, so we
• 1:12:41
  need have no hesitation in postulating such events in our explanation.
• 1:12:45
  In the absence of data, we must abandon the analytic
• 1:12:48
  or scientific method of investigation and must approach it in
• 1:12:52
  the synthetic fashion. In a word, instead of taking known
• 1:12:56
  events and deducing from them what has occurred, we must
• 1:13:00
  build up a fanciful explanation. If it will only be
• 1:13:04
  consistent with known events. We can then test this explanation
• 1:13:08
  by any fresh facts which may arise. If they all
• 1:13:11
  fit into their places, the probability is that we are
• 1:13:15
  upon the right track, and with each fresh fact this
• 1:13:19
  probability increases in a geometrical progression, until the evidence becomes
• 1:13:23
  final and convincing. Now there is one most remarkable and
• 1:13:27
  suggestive fact which has not met with the attention which
• 1:13:31
  it deserves. There is a local train running through Harrow
• 1:13:35
  and King's Langley, which is timed in such a way
• 1:13:38
  that the express must have overtaken it at or about
• 1:13:42
  the period when it eased down its speed to eight
• 1:13:46
  miles an hour. On account of the repairs of the line.
• 1:13:50
  The two trains would at that time be traveling in
• 1:13:53
  the same direction, at a similar rate of speed, and
• 1:13:56
  upon parallel lines. It is within every one experience how
• 1:14:01
  under such circumstances the occupant of each carriage can see
• 1:14:05
  very plainly the passengers in the other carriages opposite to him.
• 1:14:09
  The lamps of the express had been lit at Willesden,
• 1:14:13
  so that each compartment was brightly illuminated and most visible
• 1:14:17
  to an observer from outside. Now, the sequence of events,
• 1:14:22
  as I reconstruct them, would be after this fashion. This
• 1:14:26
  young man, with the abnormal number of watches was alone
• 1:14:30
  in the carriage of the slow train. His ticket, with
• 1:14:33
  his papers and gloves and other things, was, we will suppose,
• 1:14:37
  on the seat beside him. He was probably an American,
• 1:14:41
  and also probably a man of weak intellect. The excessive
• 1:14:46
  wearing of jewelry is an early symptom in some forms
• 1:14:49
  of mania. As he sat watching the carriages of the express,
• 1:14:54
  which were, on account of the state of the line,
• 1:14:57
  going at the same pace as himself, he saw some
• 1:15:00
  people in it whom he knew. We will suppose for
• 1:15:04
  the sake of our theory that these people were a
• 1:15:07
  woman whom he loved and a man whom he hated,
• 1:15:11
  and who in return hated him. The young man was
• 1:15:15
  excitable and impulsive. He opened the door of his carriage,
• 1:15:19
  stepped from the foot board of the local train to
• 1:15:21
  the foot board of the express, opened the other door,
• 1:15:25
  and made his way into the presence of these two people.
• 1:15:29
  The feat on the supposition that the trains were going
• 1:15:32
  at the same pace, is by no means so perilous
• 1:15:35
  as it might appear. Having now got our young man
• 1:15:40
  without his ticket, into the carriage in which the elder
• 1:15:43
  man and the young woman are traveling, it is not
• 1:15:47
  difficult to imagine that a violen scene ensued. It is
• 1:15:51
  possible that the pair were also Americans, which is the
• 1:15:54
  more probable, as the man carried a weapon, an unusual
• 1:15:58
  thing in England. If if our supposition of incipient mania
• 1:16:02
  is correct, the young man is likely to have assaulted
• 1:16:06
  the other as the upshot of the quarrel. The elder
• 1:16:09
  man shot the intruder and then made his escape from
• 1:16:12
  the carriage, taking the young lady with him. We will
• 1:16:16
  suppose that all this happened very rapidly, and that the
• 1:16:19
  train was still going at so slow a pace that
• 1:16:22
  it was not difficult for them to leave it. A
• 1:16:25
  woman might leave a train going at eight miles an hour.
• 1:16:28
  As a matter of fact, we know that this woman
• 1:16:31
  did do so. And now we have to fit in
• 1:16:35
  the man in the smoking carriage. Presuming that we have
• 1:16:39
  up to this point reconstructed the tragedy correctly, we shall
• 1:16:42
  find nothing in this other man to cause us to
• 1:16:45
  reconsider our conclusions. According to my theory, this man saw
• 1:16:50
  the young fellow cross from one train to the other,
• 1:16:53
  saw him open the door, heard the pistol shot, saw
• 1:16:56
  the two fugitives spring out on to the line, realized
• 1:17:00
  that murder had been done, and sprang out himself in pursuit.
• 1:17:05
  Why he has never been heard of since, whether he
• 1:17:08
  met his own death in the pursuit, or whether, as
• 1:17:12
  is more likely, he was made to realize that it
• 1:17:14
  was not a case for his interference is a detail
• 1:17:18
  which we have at present no means of explaining. I
• 1:17:22
  acknowledge that there are some difficulties in the way. At
• 1:17:25
  first sight, it might seem improbable that at such a
• 1:17:29
  moment a murderer would burden himself in his flight with
• 1:17:33
  a brown leather bag. My answer is that he was
• 1:17:37
  well aware that if the bag were found, his identity
• 1:17:41
  would be established. It was absolutely necessary for him to
• 1:17:44
  take it with him. My theory stands or falls upon
• 1:17:49
  one point, and I call upon the railway company to
• 1:17:52
  make strict inquiry as to whether a ticket was found
• 1:17:56
  unclaimed in the local train through Harrow and King's Language
• 1:18:00
  upon the eighteenth of March. If such a ticket were found,
• 1:18:04
  my case is proved. If not, my theory may still
• 1:18:08
  be the correct one, for it is conceivable either that
• 1:18:11
  he traveled without a ticket, or that his ticket was lost.
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: To this elaborate and plausible hypothesis. The answer of the
• 1:18:20
  police and of the company was first that no such
• 1:18:23
  ticket was found, secondly that the slow train would never
• 1:18:27
  run parallel to the express, and thirdly that the local
• 1:18:31
  train had been stationary in King's Langley station when the express,
• 1:18:35
  going at fifty miles an hour, had flashed past.
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 3: It.
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 1: So perished the only satisfying explanation, and five years have
• 1:18:43
  elapsed without supplying a new one. Now, at last there
• 1:18:47
  comes a statement which covers all the facts, and which
• 1:18:50
  must be regarded as authentic. It took the shape of
• 1:18:54
  a letter dated from New York and addressed to the
• 1:18:57
  same criminal investigator whose theory I have quoted. It is
• 1:19:01
  given here in extent, so with the exception of the
• 1:19:05
  two opening paragraphs, which are personal in their nature.
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 12: You'll excuse me if I'm not very free with names.
• 1:19:12
  There's less reason now than there was five years ago
• 1:19:15
  when mother was still living. But for all that, I'd
• 1:19:17
  rather cover up our tracks all I can. But I
• 1:19:20
  owe you an explanation for if your idea of it
• 1:19:23
  was wrong, it was a mighty ingenious one. All the same,
• 1:19:26
  I'll have to go back a little so as you
• 1:19:28
  may understand all about it. My people came from Bucks,
• 1:19:32
  England and emigrated to the States in the early fifties.
• 1:19:35
  They settled in Rochester, in the state of New York,
• 1:19:37
  where my father ran a large dry goods store. There
• 1:19:40
  were only two sons, myself, James, and my brother Edward.
• 1:19:45
  I was ten years older than my brother, and after
• 1:19:47
  my father died, I took the place of a father
• 1:19:49
  to him, as an older brother would. He was a bright,
• 1:19:53
  spirited boy, and just one of the most beautiful creatures
• 1:19:56
  that ever lived. But there was always a soft spot
• 1:19:58
  in him, and it was mold and cheese, for it
• 1:20:01
  spread and spread, and nothing that you could do would
• 1:20:04
  stop it. Mother saw it just as clearly as I did,
• 1:20:07
  but she went on spoiling him all the same, for
• 1:20:10
  he had such a way with him that you could
• 1:20:12
  refuse him.
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 3: Nothing.
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 12: I did all I could to hold him in, and
• 1:20:15
  he hated me for my pains. At last he fairly
• 1:20:19
  got his head, and nothing that we could do would
• 1:20:21
  stop him. He got off into New York and went
• 1:20:24
  rapidly from bad to worse. At first he was only fast,
• 1:20:27
  and then he was criminal, and then at the end
• 1:20:29
  of a year or two. He was one of the
• 1:20:31
  most notorious young crooks in the city. He had formed
• 1:20:34
  a friendship with Sparrow mc coy, who was at the
• 1:20:37
  head of his profession as a Bunco Steer green goodsman
• 1:20:40
  in general Rascal. They took to card sharping frequented some
• 1:20:44
  of the best hotels in New York. My brother was
• 1:20:46
  an excellent actor. He might have made an honest name
• 1:20:49
  for himself if he had chosen, And he would take
• 1:20:51
  the parts of a young englishman of title, of a
• 1:20:53
  simple lad from the West, or of a college undergraduate,
• 1:20:57
  whichever suited Sparrow mc coy's purpose. And then one day
• 1:21:01
  he dressed himself as a girl, and he carried it
• 1:21:03
  off so well and made himself such a valuable decoy
• 1:21:06
  that it was their favorite game. Afterwards. They had made
• 1:21:10
  it right with Tammany and with the police, so it
• 1:21:12
  seemed as if nothing could ever stop them. For those
• 1:21:14
  were in the days before the Lexile Commission, and if
• 1:21:17
  you only had a pull, you could do pretty nearly
• 1:21:19
  everything you wanted. And nothing would have stopped them if
• 1:21:22
  they had only stuck to cards in New York. But
• 1:21:25
  they must needs come up Rochester Way and forge a
• 1:21:28
  name upon a check. It was my brother that did it,
• 1:21:31
  though everyone knew that it was under the influence of
• 1:21:33
  Sparrow McCoy. I bought up that check and a pretty
• 1:21:36
  sum it cost me. Then I went to my brother,
• 1:21:39
  laid it before him on the table, and swore to
• 1:21:42
  him that I would prosecute if he did not clear
• 1:21:44
  out of the country. At first he simply laughed. I
• 1:21:48
  could not prosecute, he said, without breaking our mother's heart,
• 1:21:51
  and he knew that I would not do that. I
• 1:21:53
  made him understand, however, that our mother's heart was being
• 1:21:56
  broken in any case, and that I had set firm
• 1:21:58
  on the point that I would rather see him in
• 1:22:00
  Rochester jail than in a New York hotel. So at
• 1:22:04
  last he gave in, and he made me a solemn
• 1:22:06
  promise that he would see Sparrow mc coy no more,
• 1:22:09
  that he would go to Europe, and that he would
• 1:22:10
  turn his hand to any honest trade that I helped
• 1:22:13
  him to get. I took him down right away to
• 1:22:15
  an old family friend, Joe Wilson, who was an exporter
• 1:22:18
  of American watches and clocks, and I got him to
• 1:22:21
  give Edward an agency in London with a small salary
• 1:22:24
  and a fifteen percent commission on all business. His manner
• 1:22:27
  and appearance were so good that he won the old
• 1:22:29
  man over at once, and within a week he was
• 1:22:32
  sent off to London with a case full of samples.
• 1:22:35
  It seemed to me that this business of the check
• 1:22:37
  had really given my brother a fright, and that there
• 1:22:40
  was some chance of him settling down into an honest
• 1:22:42
  line of life. My mother had spoken with him, and
• 1:22:45
  what she said had touched him, for she had always
• 1:22:47
  been the best of mothers to him, and he had
• 1:22:49
  been the great sorrow of her life. But he knew
• 1:22:52
  that this man Sparrow mac coy had a great influence
• 1:22:54
  over Edward, and my chance of keeping the lad straight
• 1:22:57
  lay in breaking the connection between them. I had a
• 1:23:00
  friend in the New York Detective Force, and through him
• 1:23:02
  I kept a watch upon McCoy. When within a fortnight
• 1:23:06
  of my brother's sailing, I heard that McCoy had taken
• 1:23:08
  a berth in the Achuria, I was as certain as
• 1:23:10
  if he had told me that he was going over
• 1:23:12
  to England for the purpose of coaxing Edward back again
• 1:23:15
  into the ways that he had left. In an instant
• 1:23:18
  I had resolved to go also, and to pit my
• 1:23:20
  influence against McCoy's. I knew it was a losing fight,
• 1:23:24
  but I thought, and my mother thought, that it was
• 1:23:27
  my duty. We passed the last night together in prayer
• 1:23:30
  for my success, and she gave me her own testament
• 1:23:32
  that my father had given her on the day of
• 1:23:34
  their marriage in the old Country, so that I might
• 1:23:36
  always wear it next my heart. I was a fellow
• 1:23:40
  traveler on the steamship with Sparrow McCoy, and at least
• 1:23:42
  I had the satisfaction of spoiling his little game for
• 1:23:45
  the voyage. The very first night I went into the
• 1:23:48
  smoking room found him at the head of a card
• 1:23:50
  table with a half dozen young fellows who were carrying
• 1:23:53
  their full purses and their empty skulls over to Europe.
• 1:23:57
  He was settling down for his harvest, and a rich
• 1:23:59
  one it would have been, But I soon changed all that. Gentlemen,
• 1:24:04
  said I are you aware whom you are playing with?
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 9: What's that to you? You mind your own business, said.
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 12: He with an oath. Who is it anyway, asked one
• 1:24:13
  of the dudes. He's Sparrow McCoy, the most notorious card
• 1:24:17
  sharper in the States. Up He jumped with a bottle
• 1:24:20
  in his hand, but he remembered that he was under
• 1:24:22
  the flag of the afeat old country where law and
• 1:24:25
  order run and tammany has no pull jail and the
• 1:24:29
  gallows wait for violence and murderer, and there's no slipping
• 1:24:32
  out by the back door on board an ocean liner.
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 9: Prove your words, you.
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 12: Said he I will, said I, if you will turn
• 1:24:40
  up your right sleeve to the shoulder, I will either
• 1:24:42
  prove my words or I will eat them. He turned
• 1:24:45
  white and said not a word. You see, I knew
• 1:24:47
  something of his ways, and I was aware of that
• 1:24:49
  part of the mechanism which he and all such sharpers
• 1:24:52
  use consists of an elastic down the arm with a
• 1:24:55
  clip just above the wrist. It is by means of
• 1:24:57
  this clip that they withdraw from their hands the car
• 1:25:00
  cards which they do not want, while they substitute other
• 1:25:02
  cards from another hiding place. I reckoned on it being there,
• 1:25:06
  and it was. He cursed me, slunk out of the saloon,
• 1:25:10
  and was hardly seen again during the voyage. For once,
• 1:25:13
  at any rate, I got level with mister Sparrow mc coy,
• 1:25:17
  But he soon had his revenge upon me, for when
• 1:25:20
  it came to influencing my brother, he outweighed me every time.
• 1:25:23
  Edward had kept himself straight in London for the first
• 1:25:25
  few weeks and had done some business with his American watches,
• 1:25:29
  until this villain came across his path. Once more. I
• 1:25:32
  did my best, but the best was little enough. The
• 1:25:35
  next thing I heard there had been a scandal at
• 1:25:37
  one of the Northumberland Avenue hotels. A traveler had been
• 1:25:40
  fleeced of a large sum by two Confederate card sharpers,
• 1:25:43
  and the matter was in the hands of Scotland Yard.
• 1:25:46
  The first I learned of it was in the evening paper,
• 1:25:48
  and I was at once certain that my brother and
• 1:25:50
  mc coy were back at their old games. I hurried
• 1:25:53
  at once to Edward's lodgings. They told me that he
• 1:25:56
  and a tall gentleman whom I recognized as mc coy,
• 1:25:59
  had gone off together, and that he had left the
• 1:26:01
  lodgings and taken his things with him. The landlady had
• 1:26:04
  heard them give several directions to the cabman ending with
• 1:26:07
  Euston station, and she had accidentally overheard the tall gentleman
• 1:26:10
  saying something about Manchester. She believed that that was their destination.
• 1:26:15
  A glance at the timetable showed me that the most
• 1:26:17
  likely train was at five, though there was another at
• 1:26:20
  four thirty five, which they might have caught. I had
• 1:26:23
  only time to get the later one, but found no
• 1:26:25
  sign of either of them at the depot or on
• 1:26:27
  the train. They must have gone on by the earlier one,
• 1:26:30
  so I determined to follow them to Manchester and search
• 1:26:33
  for them in the hotels there. One last appeal to
• 1:26:36
  my brother, by all that he owed to my mother,
• 1:26:38
  might even now be the salvation of him. My nerves
• 1:26:41
  were overstrung, and I lit a cigar to study them.
• 1:26:43
  At that moment, just as the train was moving off,
• 1:26:46
  the door of my compartment was flung open, and there
• 1:26:48
  were McCoy and my brother on the platform. They were
• 1:26:51
  both disguised, and with good reason, for they knew that
• 1:26:53
  the London police were after them. McCoy had a great
• 1:26:56
  Astrakhan collar drawn up so that only his eyes and
• 1:26:59
  his nose were showing. My brother was dressed like a woman,
• 1:27:01
  with a black veil half down his face. But of
• 1:27:03
  course it did not deceive me for an instant, nor
• 1:27:06
  would it have done so even if I had not
• 1:27:08
  known that he had often used such a dress before
• 1:27:10
  I started up, and as I did so, McCoy recognized me.
• 1:27:14
  He said something. The conductor slammed the door, and they
• 1:27:16
  were shown into the next compartment. I tried to stop
• 1:27:19
  the train so as to follow them, but the wheels
• 1:27:21
  were already moving and it was too late. When we
• 1:27:24
  stopped at Williston, I instantly changed my carriage. It appears
• 1:27:28
  that I was not seen to do so, which is
• 1:27:30
  not surprising, as the station was crowded with people. McCoy,
• 1:27:33
  of course was expecting me, and he had spent the
• 1:27:36
  time between Euston and Williston in saying all he could
• 1:27:39
  to hiden my brother's heart and set him against me.
• 1:27:42
  That is what I fancy, for I had never found
• 1:27:44
  him so impossible to soften or to move. I tried
• 1:27:47
  this way, and I tried that. I pictured his future
• 1:27:49
  in an English jail, I described the sorrow of his mother.
• 1:27:52
  When I came back with the news, I said everything
• 1:27:55
  to touch his heart, but all to no purpose. He
• 1:27:57
  sat there with a fixed sneer upon his handsome face. Well,
• 1:28:00
  every now and then Sparrow mac cooy would throw in
• 1:28:02
  a taunt at me, or some word of encouragement to
• 1:28:05
  hold my brother to his resolutions.
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 9: Why don't you run a Sunday school.
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 12: He would say to me, And then in the same breath, he.
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 9: Thinks you have no will of your own. He thinks
• 1:28:15
  you're just the baby brother, and that he can lead
• 1:28:18
  you where he likes. He's only just finding out that
• 1:28:21
  you are a man as well as he.
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 12: It was those words of his which set me talking bitterly.
• 1:28:26
  We had left Williston, You understand, for all this took
• 1:28:28
  some time, my temper got the better of me, and
• 1:28:31
  for the first time in my life, I let my
• 1:28:32
  brother see the rough side of me. Perhaps it would
• 1:28:35
  have been better had I done so earlier and more often.
• 1:28:38
  A man said I, well, I'm glad to have your
• 1:28:41
  friend's assurance of it, for no one would suspect it
• 1:28:44
  to see you like a boarding school, missy. I don't
• 1:28:46
  suppose in all this country there is a more contemptible
• 1:28:49
  looking creature than you are, as you sit there with
• 1:28:51
  that Dolly pinafore upon you. He colored up at that,
• 1:28:55
  for he was a vain man, and he winced for ridicule.
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 2: It's only a dust cloak, said he, and he slipped
• 1:29:00
  it off oneice.
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 10: To throw The cop was off one said, and I
• 1:29:04
  had no other way to do it.
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 12: He took his tucoff with a veil attached, and he
• 1:29:08
  put both it and the cloak into his brown bag.
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 10: Anyway, I don't need to wear it until the conductor
• 1:29:13
  comes round.
• 1:29:13
  Speaker 12: Said he, Nor then either, said I, And taking the bag,
• 1:29:17
  I slung it with all my force out of the window. Now,
• 1:29:20
  said I. You'll never make a merry jane of yourself
• 1:29:22
  while I can help it. If nothing but that disguise
• 1:29:25
  stands between you and a jail, then the jail you
• 1:29:28
  shall go. That was the way to manage. I felt
• 1:29:31
  my advantage at once. His supple nature was one which
• 1:29:33
  yielded to roughness far more readily than to intrigue. He
• 1:29:37
  flushed with shame, and his eyes filled with tears. But
• 1:29:40
  McCoy saw my advantage also, and was determined that I
• 1:29:43
  should not pursue it.
• 1:29:44
  Speaker 9: He's my pard, and you shall not bully.
• 1:29:47
  Speaker 12: Him, he cried. He's my brother, and you shall not
• 1:29:50
  ruin him, said I. I believe a spell of prison
• 1:29:53
  is the very best way of keeping you apart, and
• 1:29:55
  you shall have it, or it will be no fault
• 1:29:57
  of mine.
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 9: Oh he would WoT.
• 1:30:00
  Speaker 12: Yet he cried, and In an instant he whipped out
• 1:30:03
  his revolver. I sprang for his hand, but saw that
• 1:30:05
  I was too late, and jumped aside. At the same
• 1:30:08
  instant he fired, and the bullet which would have struck me,
• 1:30:11
  passed through the heart of my unfortunate brother. He dropped
• 1:30:14
  without a groan, upon the floor of the compartment, and
• 1:30:16
  McCoy and I, equally horrified, knelt at each side of him,
• 1:30:20
  trying to bring back some signs of life. McCoy still
• 1:30:23
  held the loaded revolver in his hand, but his anger
• 1:30:26
  against me and my resentment towards him had both for
• 1:30:29
  the moment been swallowed up in this sudden tragedy. It
• 1:30:32
  was he who first realized the situation. The train was
• 1:30:35
  for some reason going very slowly at the moment, and
• 1:30:38
  he saw his opportunity to escape. In an instant he
• 1:30:41
  had the door opened, but I was as quick as he,
• 1:30:43
  and jumping upon him, the two of us fell off
• 1:30:45
  the footboard and rolled in each other's arms down a
• 1:30:48
  steep embankment. At the bottom, I struck my head against
• 1:30:51
  a stone, and I remembered nothing more. When I came
• 1:30:54
  to myself, I was lying among some low bushes not
• 1:30:57
  far from the railroad track, and somebody was bathing my
• 1:31:00
  head with a wet handkerchief. It was Sparrow McCoy.
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 9: I guess I couldn't leave you, said he. I didn't
• 1:31:07
  want to have the blood of two of you on
• 1:31:09
  my hands in one day. You loved your brother, I've
• 1:31:12
  no doubt, but you didn't love him a cent more
• 1:31:15
  than I loved him, So you'll say that I took
• 1:31:18
  a queer way to show it. Anyhow, it seems a
• 1:31:21
  mighty empty world now that he is gone, and I
• 1:31:24
  don't care a continental whether he give me over to
• 1:31:27
  the angman or not.
• 1:31:30
  Speaker 12: He had turned his ankle in the fall, and there
• 1:31:32
  we sat, he with his useless foot, and I with
• 1:31:34
  my throbbing head, and we topped and talked, until gradually
• 1:31:37
  my bitterness began to soften and turn into something like sympathy.
• 1:31:41
  What was the use of revenging his death upon a
• 1:31:43
  man who was as much stricken by that death as
• 1:31:45
  I was? And then, as my wits gradually returned, I
• 1:31:48
  began to realize also that I could do nothing against
• 1:31:50
  McCoy which would not recoil upon my mother and myself.
• 1:31:54
  How could we convict him without a full account of
• 1:31:56
  my brother's career being made public, the very thing which,
• 1:31:59
  of all others we wished to avoid. It was really
• 1:32:02
  as much our interest as his to cover the matter up,
• 1:32:06
  and from being an avenger of crime, I found myself
• 1:32:08
  changed to a conspirator against justice. The place in which
• 1:32:12
  we found ourselves was one of those pheasant preserves which
• 1:32:15
  are so common in the old Country, and as we
• 1:32:17
  groped our way through it, I found myself consulting the
• 1:32:20
  slayer of my brother as to how far it would
• 1:32:22
  be possible to hush it up. I soon realized from
• 1:32:25
  what he said that unless there were some papers of
• 1:32:28
  which we knew nothing in my brother's pockets, there was
• 1:32:31
  really no possible means by which the police could identify
• 1:32:34
  him or learn how he had got there. His ticket
• 1:32:37
  was in McCoy's pocket, and so was the ticket for
• 1:32:39
  some baggage which they had left at the depot. Like
• 1:32:42
  most Americans, he had found it cheaper and easier to
• 1:32:44
  buy an outfit in London than to bring one from
• 1:32:47
  New York, so that all his linen and clothes were
• 1:32:49
  new and unmarked. The bag containing the dust cloak which
• 1:32:53
  I had thrown out of the window, may have fallen
• 1:32:55
  among some bramble patch where it is still concealed, or
• 1:32:58
  may have been carried off by some train, or may
• 1:33:00
  have come into the possession of the police, who kept
• 1:33:02
  the incident to themselves. Anyhow, I have seen nothing about
• 1:33:06
  it in the London papers. As to the watches, they
• 1:33:08
  were a selection from those which had been entrusted to
• 1:33:11
  him for business purposes. It may have been for the
• 1:33:13
  same business purposes that he was taking them to Manchester.
• 1:33:16
  But well, it's too late to enter into that. I
• 1:33:19
  don't blame the police for being at fault. I don't
• 1:33:22
  see how it could have been otherwise. There was just
• 1:33:24
  one little clue that they might have followed up. But
• 1:33:26
  it was a small one. I mean that small circular
• 1:33:29
  mirror which was found in my brother's pocket. It isn't
• 1:33:32
  a very common thing for a young man to carry
• 1:33:34
  about with him, is it. But a gambler might have
• 1:33:36
  told you what such a mirror may mean to a
• 1:33:38
  card sharper. If you sit back a little from the
• 1:33:41
  table and lay the mirror face upwards upon your lap,
• 1:33:44
  you can see as you deal every card that you
• 1:33:46
  give to your adversary. It's not hard to say whether
• 1:33:49
  you see a man, or raise him when you know
• 1:33:51
  his cards as well as your own. It was as
• 1:33:53
  much a part of a sharper's outfit as the elastic
• 1:33:56
  clip upon Sparrow McCoy's arm. Taking that can action. With
• 1:34:00
  the recent frauds at the hotels, the police might have
• 1:34:02
  got hold of one end of the strain. I don't
• 1:34:05
  think there's much more for me to explain. We got
• 1:34:08
  to a village called Amersham that night and the character
• 1:34:10
  of two gentlemen upon a walking to her, and afterwards
• 1:34:13
  we made our way quietly to London, Whence McCoy went
• 1:34:16
  on to Cairo and I returned to New York. My
• 1:34:19
  mother died six months afterwards, and I am glad to
• 1:34:22
  say that to the day of her death she never
• 1:34:24
  knew what happened. She was always under the delusion that
• 1:34:27
  Edward was earning an honest living in London, and I
• 1:34:30
  never had the heart to tell her the truth. He
• 1:34:32
  never wrote, but then he never did write at any time,
• 1:34:35
  so that made no difference. His name was the last
• 1:34:37
  upon her lips. There's just one other thing that I
• 1:34:40
  have to ask you, sir, and I should take it
• 1:34:42
  as a kind return for all this explanation if you
• 1:34:44
  could do it for me. You remember that testament that
• 1:34:47
  was picked up. I always carried it my inside pocket,
• 1:34:50
  and it must have come out in my fall. I
• 1:34:52
  value it highly, for it was the family book with
• 1:34:55
  my birth and my brothers marked by my father at
• 1:34:57
  the beginning of it. I wish you would apply at
• 1:34:59
  the proper place and have it sent to me. It
• 1:35:01
  can be of no possible value to anyone else. If
• 1:35:04
  you address it to x Basano's Library, Broadway, New York,
• 1:35:08
  it is sure to come to hand.
• 1:35:12
  Speaker 1: End of chapter three, Chapter four of four non canonical
• 1:35:22
  Sherlock Holmes short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle. This is
• 1:35:26
  a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
• 1:35:31
  For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
• 1:35:37
  Chapter four, How Watson learned the trick. Watson had been
• 1:35:42
  watching his companion intently ever since he had sat down
• 1:35:46
  to the breakfast table. Holmes happened to look up and
• 1:35:50
  catch his eye.
• 1:35:51
  Speaker 13: Well, Watson, what do you think you are?
• 1:35:53
  Speaker 2: He asked about you.
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 7: Me.
• 1:35:57
  Speaker 2: Yes, Holmes, I was thinking, how superficial are these tricks
• 1:36:01
  of yours? And how wonderful it is that the public
• 1:36:04
  should continue to show interest in them.
• 1:36:06
  Speaker 1: I quite agree, said Holmes.
• 1:36:08
  Speaker 13: In fact, I have a recollection that I have myself
• 1:36:11
  made a similar remark.
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 1: Your methods, said Watson, severely.
• 1:36:16
  Speaker 2: Are really easily acquired, no doubt.
• 1:36:20
  Speaker 1: Holmes answered with a smile.
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 13: Perhaps you will yourself give an example of this method
• 1:36:26
  of reasoning.
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 1: With pleasure, said Watson.
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 2: I am able to say that you were greatly preoccupied
• 1:36:34
  when you got up this morning.
• 1:36:36
  Speaker 1: Excellent, said Holmes.
• 1:36:38
  Speaker 13: How could you possibly know that.
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 2: Because you are usually a very tidy man, and yet
• 1:36:44
  you have forgotten to shave?
• 1:36:46
  Speaker 13: Dear me, how very clever, said Holmes. I had no idea, Watson,
• 1:36:50
  that you are so apt a pupil. Has your eagle
• 1:36:53
  eye detected? Anything more?
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 2: Yes, Holmes, you have a client named Barlow, and you
• 1:36:59
  have not been successful with his case.
• 1:37:02
  Speaker 13: Dear me, how could you know that?
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 2: I saw the name outside his envelope when you opened it.
• 1:37:08
  You gave a groan and thrust it into your pocket
• 1:37:11
  with a frown on your face.
• 1:37:13
  Speaker 13: Admirable, you are indeed observant.
• 1:37:16
  Speaker 2: Any other points, I fear Holmes that you have taken
• 1:37:20
  to financial speculation.
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 13: How could you tell that Watson.
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 2: You opened the paper, turned to the financial page, and
• 1:37:28
  gave a loud exclamation of interest.
• 1:37:31
  Speaker 13: Well, that is very clever of you, Watson.
• 1:37:33
  Speaker 2: Anymore, Yes, Holmes, you have put on your black coat
• 1:37:37
  instead of your dressing gown, which proves that you are
• 1:37:40
  expecting some important visitor at once.
• 1:37:43
  Speaker 13: Anything more, I.
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 2: Have no doubt that I could find other points homes,
• 1:37:49
  but I only give you these few in order to
• 1:37:52
  show you that there are other people in the world
• 1:37:54
  who can be as clever as.
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 13: You, and some not so clever at homes. I admit
• 1:38:01
  that they are few, but I am afraid, dear Watson,
• 1:38:04
  that I must count you among them.
• 1:38:07
  Speaker 2: What do you mean, Holmes.
• 1:38:09
  Speaker 13: Well, my dear fellow, I fear your deductions have not
• 1:38:13
  been so happy as I should have wished.
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 2: You mean that I was mistaken just.
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 13: A little that way, I fear. Let us take the
• 1:38:22
  points in their order. I did not shave because I
• 1:38:25
  have set my razor to be sharpened. I put on
• 1:38:29
  my coat because I have worse luck. An early meeting
• 1:38:33
  with my dentist. His name is Barlow, and the letter
• 1:38:37
  was to confirm the appointment. The cricket page is beside
• 1:38:40
  the financial one, and I turned to it to find
• 1:38:43
  if Surrey was holding its own against Kent. But go on, Watson,
• 1:38:48
  go on. It's a very superficial trick, and no doubt
• 1:38:53
  you will soon acquire it.
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 1: End of Chapter four and of four non canonical Sherlock
• 1:39:01
  Holms short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle