The Measure of Malice Martin Edwards

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Introduction and notes © 2020 by Martin Edwards
Cover and internal design © 2020 by Sourcebooks
Cover image © Mary Evans Picture Library
‘Blood Sport,’ an extract from Fen Country by Edmund Crispin,
reprinted by permission of Peters Fraser & Dunlop
(www.petersfraserdunlop.com) on behalf of the Estate of Edmund
Crispin.
‘The New Cement’ by Freeman Wills Crofts reprinted with the
permission of The Society of Authors on behalf of the Estate of
Freeman Wills Crofts.
‘The Case of the Chemist in the Cupboard’ by Ernest Dudley
reprinted with the permission of Cosmos Literary Agency on behalf
of the Estate of Ernest Dudley.
‘In the Teeth of the Evidence’ by Dorothy L. Sayers reprinted with
the permission of David Higham Associates on behalf of the Estate of
Dorothy L. Sayers, and in the U.S. with the permission of
HarperCollins and Open Road Integrated Media.
‘The Purple Line’ by John Rhode reprinted with the permission of
Aitken Alexander Associates on behalf of the Estate of Cecil Street.
‘The Cyprian Bees’ by Anthony Wynne reprinted with the permission
of the Estate of Robert McNair-Wilson.
Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders and to obtain
their permission for the use of copyright material. The publisher
apologises for any errors or omissions and would be pleased to be
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embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing
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The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are
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 Contents

Front Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Introduction

The Boscombe Valley Mystery

The Horror of Studley Grange

The Tragedy of a Third Smoker

The Man Who Disappeared

The Cyprian Bees

The English Filter

The Contents of a Mare’s Nest

After Death the Doctor

The Broken Toad

In the Teeth of the Evidence

The Case of the Chemist in the Cupboard

The Purple Line

Blood Sport

The New Cement

Back Cover
 Introduction

Long before the days of DNA testing and mobile phone tracking,
science and technology played a crucial part in the detection of
crime, real and fictional. The Measure of Malice gathers together
classic mystery stories united by a common ingredient. The stories
illustrate ways in which a host of writers, some still renowned,
others long forgotten, made use of scientific and technical know-how
(often fresh and exciting at the time the stories were written, even if
now seemingly quaint or obvious) in weaving their puzzles.
The connection between science and the crime genre goes back to
the early days of the genre. Ronald R. Thomas, an American
professor of English, has pointed out in Detective Fiction and the
Rise of Forensic Science (1999) that the nineteenth century saw
authors “sometimes anticipating the actual technologies being
developed by forensic science, sometimes appropriating or
popularising them.”
Thomas describes “the virtually occult power forensic science came
to possess over the human image in modern mass society on both
sides of the Atlantic, a phenomenon which helped to establish the
fingerprint, the mug shot, and the lie detector as central elements in
the sometimes dangerous arsenal of law enforcement devices,” and
argues that: “These features of the nineteenth-century detective
story help to make the modern world of DNA fingerprinting, satellite
surveillance and crime-scene computer simulation imaginable to us.”
One of the earliest and most insightful historians of detective
fiction was Dorothy L. Sayers, an author fascinated by the
implications of scientific advance. In her introduction to Great Short
Stories of Detection, Mystery and Horror (1928), she discussed the
pioneering work of two notable Victorian novelists, J. Sheridan Le
Fanu and Wilkie Collins, in the field of scientific detection. As she
pointed out, the plot of Le Fanu’s Checkmate (1871) “actually turns
on the complete alteration of the criminal’s appearance by a miracle
of plastic surgery.” Sayers expressed surprise that more use had not
been made of this technique (writers soon made up for lost time in
this respect), while highlighting a couple of obscure stories where
“the alterations include the tattooing of the criminal’s eyes from blue
to brown.” Sayers also admired Collins’ use of the effects of opium as
a plot device in The Moonstone (1868); this book and Checkmate
were, in her opinion, “the distinguished forbears of a long succession
of medical and scientific stories which stretches down to the present
day.”
L. T. Meade, who originally made her reputation writing stories for
girls, developed the scientific detective story in conjunction with
collaborators who supplied the necessary technical know-how. As
Sayers said, their stories “dealt with such subjects as hypnotism,
catalepsy…somnambulism, lunacy, murder by the use of X-rays and
hydrocyanic gas.
Crime writers have regularly consulted scientific experts over the
years, and several have followed Meade’s lead in not merely taking
professional advice but collaborating in more formal fashion. Meade’s
most notable co-author was Robert Eustace, a doctor who would
later work with Sayers on a highly ambitious and oddly under-
estimated epistolary novel, The Documents in the Case (1930), as
well as combining with Edgar Jepson to produce a notable mystery
puzzle in the “locked room” vein, “The Tea Leaf,” which was included
in the British Library anthology Capital Crimes (2015).
The New Zealander Ngaio Marsh, one of the so-called “Queens of
Crime” from the Golden Age, collaborated on The Nursing Home
Murder (1935) with Henry Jellett, an Irish-born gynaecologist who
also helped her to adapt the book into a stage play. Coming up to
the present day, crime writer Margaret Murphy has collaborated with
two experts in forensic pathology: after writing with Professor Dave
Barclay as A. D. Garrett, she launched a new series under the name
Ashley Dyer, co-authoring her books with Helen Pepper.
Scientific progress has fuelled the writing of stories about murder
committed by unexpected means. As Sayers observed, “It is
fortunate for the mystery-monger that, whereas, up to the present,
there is only one known way of getting born, there are endless ways
of getting killed. Here is a brief selection of handy short cuts to the
grave: Poisoned tooth-stoppings; licking poisoned stamps; shaving-
brushes inoculated with dread diseases; poisoned boiled eggs…;
poison-gas; a cat with poisoned claws; poisoned mattresses;…
electrocution by telephone…; air-bubbles injected into the arteries…
hypodermic injections shot from air-guns… guns concealed in
cameras; a thermometer which explodes a bomb when the
temperature of the room reaches a certain height…”
Medical men such as Arthur Conan Doyle and Richard Austin
Freeman naturally made use of their expertise in their detective
fiction. Their influence in particular extended beyond crime writers
who followed in their footsteps; at the dawn of the twenty-first
century, Britain’s premier forensic entomologist Dr Zakaria
Erzinclioglu said in his intriguing memoir Maggots, Murder and Men
(2000) that “the Sherlock Holmes stories, which emphasise the
central importance of physical evidence in criminal investigation,
were actually used as instruction manuals by the Chinese and
Egyptian police forces for many years, and the French Sûreté named
their great forensic laboratory at Lyon after him.” Sherlock’s surname
is also referenced in HOLMES 2, the Home Office Large Major
Enquiry System, which at the time of writing remains the principal IT
system used by UK police forces engaged in the investigation of
major crimes such as murder and high-value fraud.
J. J. Connington, a major figure during the Golden Age of Murder
between the two world wars, was not himself a doctor, but rather a
professor of chemistry whose factual publications included Recent
Advances in Inorganic Chemistry. His intricate “fair play” detective
novels gain a good deal of their strength from his plausible
descriptions of scientific and technological developments. Cunningly
plotted books such as The Case with Nine Solutions (1928)
demonstrate his command of scientific techniques, although it is fair
to add that some of the ideas that seemed daring and up-to-the-
minute during the 1920s and 1930s have not aged well.
Five of the authors featured in this book were doctors, two were
engineers, and another was an academic chemist. The stories
collected here display the wide variety of ways in which science
came to the aid of (or, occasionally, helped to bamboozle) fiction’s
detectives, as well as the varied ways in which crime writers of the
past made use of science in their stories. The anthology also
highlights some of the difference between science of the past and of
the present.
Today’s readers can enjoy classic crime stories on more than one
level, appreciating each tale on its own merits whilst also gaining an
insight into vanished ways of life, and having the chance to see how
scientific detection has in some respects over the years changed
beyond all recognition—and how in certain essentials, it has not.
My thanks go to Nigel Moss, Jamie Sturgeon, and John Cooper,
fellow enthusiasts for classic crime whose suggestions for stories to
include in these anthologies are always invaluable. Mike Grost’s
internet page on scientific detection, which also covers many
American stories, was also helpful. And, as ever, I’m grateful to the
publications team at the British Library for their continuing support.
Martin Edwards
martinedwardsbooks.com
The Boscombe Valley Mystery

Arthur Conan Doyle

Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930) made admirable use of his
scientific knowledge in his stories about Sherlock Holmes. The sage
of 221b Baker Street was modelled in part upon the Scottish surgeon
and lecturer Dr Joseph Bell. Doyle studied under Bell, and worked as
his clerk; many years later, he said in a letter to Bell: “It is most
certainly to you that I owe Sherlock Holmes… round the centre of
deduction and inference and observation which I have heard you
inculcate I have tried to build up a man.” Holmes has been
described, by no less an authority than the forensic entomologist
Zakaria Erzinclioglu, as “a pioneer forensic scientist. It was he who
introduced the idea of taking plaster casts of footprints… We owe
him a great debt of gratitude.”
“The Boscombe Valley Mystery,” which first appeared in the Strand
Magazine in October 1891 and was later gathered up in The
Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, was the first short story in the
canon to feature murder, and also the first to feature Inspector
Lestrade. The Scotland Yard man had originally been introduced in
the novel A Study in Scarlet (1887), and ultimately appeared in
fourteen entries in the series. Summoned to Herefordshire by
Lestrade, Holmes solves the puzzle thanks largely to his ability to
analyse footprints. He also makes use of knowledge gained from
compiling his monograph “on the ashes of 140 different varieties of
pipe, cigar and cigarette tobacco.”

***

WE were seated at breakfast one morning, my wife and I, when the

maid brought in a telegram. It was from Sherlock Holmes, and ran in
this way:

“Have you a couple of days to spare? Have just been wired for
from the West of England in connection with Boscombe Valley
tragedy. Shall be glad if you will come with me. Air and scenery
perfect. Leave Paddington by the 11.15.”

“What do you say, dear?” said my wife, looking across at me. “Will
you go?”
“I really don’t know what to say. I have a fairly long list at
present.”
“Oh, Anstruther would do your work for you. You have been
looking a little pale lately. I think that the change would do you
good, and you are always so interested in Mr. Sherlock Holmes’
cases.”
“I should be ungrateful if I were not, seeing what I gained through
one of them,” I answered. “But if I am to go I must pack at once, for
I have only half an hour.”
My experience of camp life in Afghanistan had at least had the
effect of making me a prompt and ready traveller. My wants were
few and simple, so that in less than the time stated I was in a cab
with my valise, rattling away to Paddington Station. Sherlock Holmes
was pacing up and down the platform, his tall, gaunt figure made
even gaunter and taller by his long grey travelling cloak, and close-
fitting cloth cap.
“It is really very good of you to come, Watson,” said he. “It makes
a considerable difference to me, having some one with me on whom
I can thoroughly rely. Local aid is always either worthless or else
biassed. If you will keep the two corner seats I shall get the tickets.”
We had the carriage to ourselves save for an immense litter of
papers which Holmes had brought with him. Among these he
rummaged and read, with intervals of note-taking and of meditation,
until we were past Reading. Then he suddenly rolled them all into a
gigantic ball, and tossed them up on to the rack.
“Have you heard anything of the case?” he asked.
“Not a word. I have not seen a paper for some days.”
“The London press has not had very full accounts. I have just been
looking through all the recent papers in order to master the
particulars. It seems, from what I gather, to be one of those simple
cases which are so extremely difficult.”
“That sounds a little paradoxical.”
“But it is profoundly true. Singularity is almost invariably a clue.
The more featureless and commonplace a crime is, the more difficult
is it to bring it home. In this case, however, they have established a
very serious case against the son of the murdered man.”
“It is a murder, then?”
“Well, it is conjectured to be so. I shall take nothing for granted
until I have the opportunity of looking personally into it. I will explain
the state of things to you, as far as I have been able to understand
it, in a very few words.
“Boscombe Valley is a country district not very far from Ross, in
Herefordshire. The largest landed proprietor in that part is a Mr. John
Turner, who made his money in Australia, and returned some years
ago to the old country. One of the farms which he held, that of
Hatherley, was let to Mr. Charles McCarthy, who was also an ex-
Australian. The men had known each other in the Colonies, so that it
was not unnatural that when they came to settle down they should
do so as near each other as possible. Turner was apparently the
richer man, so McCarthy became his tenant, but still remained, it
seems, upon terms of perfect equality, as they were frequently
together. McCarthy had one son, a lad of eighteen, and Turner had
an only daughter of the same age, but neither of them had wives
living. They appear to have avoided the society of the neighbouring
English families, and to have led retired lives, though both the
McCarthys were fond of sport, and were frequently seen at the race
meetings of the neighbourhood. McCarthy kept two servants—a man
and a girl. Turner had a considerable household, some half-dozen at
the least. That is as much as I have been able to gather about the
families. Now for the facts.
“On June 3, that is, on Monday last, McCarthy left his house at
Hatherley about three in the afternoon, and walked down to the
Boscombe Pool, which is a small lake formed by the spreading out of
the stream which runs down the Boscombe Valley. He had been out
with his serving-man in the morning at Ross, and he had told the
man that he must hurry, as he had an appointment of importance to
keep at three. From that appointment he never came back alive.
“From Hatherley Farmhouse to the Boscombe Pool is a quarter of a
mile, and two people saw him as he passed over this ground. One
was an old woman, whose name is not mentioned, and the other
was William Crowder, a gamekeeper in the employ of Mr. Turner.
Both these witnesses depose that Mr. McCarthy was walking alone.
The gamekeeper adds that within a few minutes of his seeing Mr.
McCarthy pass he had seen his son, Mr. James McCarthy, going the
same way with a gun under his arm. To the best of his belief, the
father was actually in sight at the time, and the son was following
him. He thought no more of the matter until he heard in the evening
of the tragedy that had occurred.
“The two McCarthys were seen after the time when William
Crowder, the gamekeeper, lost sight of them. The Boscombe Pool is
thickly wooded round, with just a fringe of grass and of reeds round
the edge. A girl of fourteen, Patience Moran, who is the daughter of
the lodge-keeper of the Boscombe Valley Estate, was in one of the
woods picking flowers. She states that while she was there she saw,
at the border of the wood and close by the lake, Mr. McCarthy and
his son, and that they appeared to be having a violent quarrel. She
heard Mr. McCarthy the elder using very strong language to his son,
and she saw the latter raise up his hand as if to strike his father. She
was so frightened by their violence that she ran away, and told her
mother when she reached home that she had left the two McCarthys
quarrelling near Boscombe Pool, and that she was afraid that they
were going to fight. She had hardly said the words when young Mr.
McCarthy came running up to the lodge to say that he had found his
father dead in the wood, and to ask for the help of the lodge-keeper.
He was much excited, without either his gun or his hat, and his right
hand and sleeve were observed to be stained with fresh blood. On
following him they found the dead body of his father stretched out
upon the grass beside the Pool. The head had been beaten in by
repeated blows of some heavy and blunt weapon. The injuries were
such as might very well have been inflicted by the butt-end of his
son’s gun, which was found lying on the grass within a few paces of
the body. Under these circumstances the young man was instantly
arrested, and a verdict of ‘Wilful Murder’ having been returned at the
inquest on Tuesday, he was on Wednesday brought before the
magistrates at Ross, who have referred the case to the next assizes.
Those are the main facts of the case as they came out before the
coroner and at the police-court.”
“I could hardly imagine a more damning case,” I remarked. “If ever
circumstantial evidence pointed to a criminal it does so here.”
“Circumstantial evidence is a very tricky thing,” answered Holmes,
thoughtfully, “It may seem to point very straight to one thing, but if
you shift your own point of view a little, you may find it pointing in
an equally uncompromising manner to something entirely different.
It must be confessed, however, that the case looks exceedingly
grave against the young man, and it is very possible that he is
indeed the culprit. There are several people in the neighbourhood,
however, and among them Miss Turner, the daughter of the
neighbouring landowner, who believe in his innocence, and who
have retained Lestrade, whom you may remember in connection
with the Study in Scarlet, to work out the case in his interest.
Lestrade, being rather puzzled, has referred the case to me, and
hence it is that two middle-aged gentlemen are flying westward at
fifty miles an hour, instead of quietly digesting their breakfasts at
home.”
“I am afraid,” said I, “that the facts are so obvious that you will
find little credit to be gained out of this case.”
“There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact,” he
answered, laughing. “Besides, we may chance to hit upon some
other obvious facts which may have been by no means obvious to
Mr. Lestrade. You know me too well to think that I am boasting
when I say that I shall either confirm or destroy his theory by means
which he is quite incapable of employing, or even of understanding.
To take the first example to hand, I very clearly perceive that in your
bedroom the window is upon the right-hand side, and yet I question
whether Mr. Lestrade would have noted even so self-evident a thing
as that.”
“How on earth—!”
“My dear fellow, I know you well. I know the military neatness
which characterises you. You shave every morning, and in this
season you shave by the sunlight, but since your shaving is less and
less complete as we get further back on the left side, until it
becomes positively slovenly as we get round the angle of the jaw, it
is surely very clear that that side is less well illuminated than the
other. I could not imagine a man of your habits looking at himself in
an equal light, and being satisfied with such a result. I only quote
this as a trivial example of observation and inference. Therein lies
my métier, and it is just possible that it may be of some service in
the investigation which lies before us. There are one or two minor
points which were brought out in the inquest, and which are worth
considering.”
“What are they?”
“It appears that his arrest did not take place at once, but after the
return to Hatherley Farm. On the inspector of constabulary informing
him that he was a prisoner, he remarked that he was not surprised
to hear it, and that it was no more than his deserts. This observation
of his had the natural effect of removing any traces of doubt which
might have remained in the minds of the coroner’s jury.”
“It was a confession,” I ejaculated.
“No, for it was followed by a protestation of innocence.”
“Coming on the top of such a damning series of events, it was at
least a most suspicious remark.”
“On the contrary,” said Holmes, “it is the brightest rift which I can
at present see in the clouds. However innocent he might be, he
could not be such an absolute imbecile as not to see that the
circumstances were very black against him. Had he appeared
surprised at his own arrest, or feigned indignation at it, I should
have looked upon it as highly suspicious, because such surprise or
anger would not be natural under the circumstances, and yet might
appear to be the best policy to a scheming man. His frank
acceptance of the situation marks him as either an innocent man, or
else as a man of considerable self-restraint and firmness. As to his
remark about his deserts, it was also not unnatural if you consider
that he stood by the dead body of his father, and that there is no
doubt that he had that very day so far forgotten his filial duty as to
bandy words with him, and even, according to the little girl whose
evidence is so important, to raise his hand as if to strike him. The
self reproach and contrition which are displayed in his remark appear
to me to be the signs of a healthy mind, rather than of a guilty one.”
I shook my head. “Many men have been hanged on far slighter
evidence,” I remarked.
“So they have. And many men have been wrongfully hanged.”
“What is the young man’s own account of the matter?”
“It is, I am afraid, not very encouraging to his supporters, though
there are one or two points in it which are suggestive. You will find it
here, and may read it for yourself.”
He picked out from his bundle a copy of the local Herefordshire
paper, and having turned down the sheet, he pointed out the
paragraph in which the unfortunate young man had given his own
statement of what had occurred. I settled myself down in the corner
of the carriage, and read it very carefully. It ran in this way:—

Mr. James McCarthy, the only son of the deceased, was then
called, and gave evidence as follows:—“I had been away from
home for three days at Bristol, and had only just returned upon
the morning of last Monday, the 3rd. My father was absent from
home at the time of my arrival, and I was informed by the maid
that he had driven over to Ross with John Cobb, the groom.
Shortly after my return I heard the wheels of his trap in the yard,
and, looking out of my window, I saw him get out and walk
rapidly out of the yard, though I was not aware in which direction
he was going. I then took my gun, and strolled out in the
direction of the Boscombe Pool, with the intention of visiting the
rabbit warren which is upon the other side. On my way I saw
William Crowder, the gamekeeper, as he has stated in his
evidence; but he is mistaken in thinking that I was following my
father. I had no idea that he was in front of me. When about a
hundred yards from the Pool I heard a cry of ‘Cooee!’ which was
a usual signal between my father and myself. I then hurried
forward, and found him standing by the Pool. He appeared to be
much surprised at seeing me, and asked me rather roughly what
I was doing there. A conversation ensued, which led to high
words, and almost to blows, for my father was a man of a very
violent temper. Seeing that his passion was becoming
ungovernable, I left him, and returned towards Hatherley Farm. I
had not gone more than one hundred and fifty yards, however,
when I heard a hideous outcry behind me, which caused me to
run back again. I found my father expiring on the ground, with his
head terribly injured. I dropped my gun, and held him in my
arms, but he almost instantly expired. I knelt beside him for
some minutes, and then made my way to Mr. Turner’s lodge-
keeper, his house being the nearest, to ask for assistance. I saw
no one near my father when I returned, and I have no idea how
he came by his injuries. He was not a popular man, being
somewhat cold and forbidding in his manners; but he had, as far
as I know, no active enemies. I know nothing further of the
matter.”

The Coroner: “Did your father make any statement to you before
he died?”
Witness: “He mumbled a few words, but I could only catch some
allusion to a rat.”

The Coroner: “What did you understand by that?”

Witness: “It conveyed no meaning to me. I thought that he was

delirious.”

The Coroner: “What was the point upon which you and your
father had this final quarrel?”

Witness: “I should prefer not to answer.”

The Coroner: “I am afraid that I must press it.”

Witness: “It is really impossible for me to tell you. I can assure

you that it has nothing to do with the sad tragedy which
followed.”

The Coroner: “That is for the Court to decide. I need not point
out to you that your refusal to answer will prejudice your case
considerably in any future proceedings which may arise.”

Witness: “I must still refuse.”

The Coroner: “I understand that the cry of ‘Cooee’ was a

common signal between you and your father?”

Witness: “It was.”

The Coroner: “How was it, then, that he uttered it before he saw
you, and before he even knew that you had returned from
Bristol?”

Witness (with considerable confusion): “I do not know.”

A Juryman: “Did you see nothing which aroused your suspicions

when you returned on hearing the cry, and found your father
fatally injured?”
 Witness: “Nothing definite.”

The Coroner: “What do you mean?”

Witness: “I was so disturbed and excited as I rushed out into the

open, that I could think of nothing except of my father. Yet I have
a vague impression that as I ran forward something lay upon the
ground to the left of me. It seemed to me to be something grey in
colour, a coat of some sort, or a plaid perhaps. When I rose from
my father I looked round for it, but it was gone.”

“Do you mean that it disappeared before you went for help?”

“Yes, it was gone.”

“You cannot say what it was?”

“No, I had a feeling something was there.”

“How far from the body?”

“A dozen yards or so.”

“And how far from the edge of the wood?”

“About the same.”

“Then if it was removed it was while you were within a dozen

yards of it?”

“Yes, but with my back towards it.”

This concluded the examination of the witness.

“I see,” said I, as I glanced down the column, “that the coroner in

his concluding remarks was rather severe upon young McCarthy. He
calls attention, and with reason, to the discrepancy about his father
having signalled to him before seeing him, also to his refusal to give
details of his conversation with his father, and his singular account of
his father’s dying words. They are all, as he remarks, very much
against the son.
Holmes laughed softly to himself, and stretched himself out upon
the cushioned seat. “Both you and the coroner have been at some
pains,” said he, “to single out the very strongest points in the young
man’s favour. Don’t you see that you alternately give him credit for
having too much imagination and too little? Too little, if he could not
invent a cause of quarrel which would give him the sympathy of the
jury; too much, if he evolved from his own inner consciousness
anything so outré as a dying reference to a rat, and the incident of
the vanishing cloth. No, sir, I shall approach this case from the point
of view that what this young man says is true, and we shall see
whither that hypothesis will lead us. And now here is my pocket
Petrarch, and not another word shall I say of this case until we are
on the scene of action. We lunch at Swindon, and I see that we shall
be there in twenty minutes.”
It was nearly four o’clock when we at last, after passing through
the beautiful Stroud Valley, and over the broad gleaming Severn,
found ourselves at the pretty little country town of Ross. A lean,
ferret-like man, furtive and sly-looking, was waiting for us upon the
platform. In spite of the light brown dustcoat and leather leggings
which he wore in deference to his rustic surroundings, I had no
difficulty in recognising Lestrade, of Scotland Yard. With him we
drove to the Hereford Arms, where a room had already been
engaged for us.
“I have ordered a carriage,” said Lestrade, as we sat over a cup of
tea. “I knew your energetic nature, and that you would not be happy
until you had been on the scene of the crime.”
 “It was very nice and complimentary of you,” Holmes answered. “It
is entirely a question of barometric pressure.”
Lestrade looked startled. “I do not quite follow,” he said.
“How is the glass? Twenty-nine, I see. No wind, and not a cloud in
the sky. I have a caseful of cigarettes here which need smoking, and
the sofa is very much superior to the usual country hotel
abomination. I do not think that it is probable that I shall use the
carriage tonight.”
Lestrade laughed indulgently. “You have, no doubt, already formed
your conclusions from the newspapers,” he said. “The case is as
plain as a pikestaff, and the more one goes into it the plainer it
becomes. Still, of course, one can’t refuse a lady, and such a very
positive one, too. She had heard of you, and would have your
opinion, though I repeatedly told her that there was nothing which
you could do which I had not already done. Why, bless my soul!
Here is her carriage at the door.”
He had hardly spoken before there rushed into the room one of
the most lovely young women that I have ever seen in my life. Her
violet eyes shining, her lips parted, a pink flush upon her cheeks, all
thought of her natural reserve lost in her overpowering excitement
and concern.
“Oh, Mr. Sherlock Holmes!” she cried, glancing from one to the
other of us, and finally, with a woman’s quick intuition, fastening
upon my companion, “I am so glad that you have come. I have
driven down to tell you so. I know that James didn’t do it. I know it,
and I want you to start upon your work knowing it, too. Never let
yourself doubt upon that point. We have known each other since we
were little children, and I know his faults as no one else does; but he
is too tender-hearted to hurt a fly. Such a charge is absurd to any
one who really knows him.”
 “I hope we may clear him, Miss Turner,” said Sherlock Holmes.
“You may rely upon my doing all that I can.”
“But you have read the evidence. You have formed some
conclusion? Do you not see some loophole, some flaw? Do you not
yourself think that he is innocent?”
“I think that it is very probable.”
“There now!” she cried, throwing back her head, and looking
defiantly at Lestrade. “You hear! He gives me hopes.”
Lestrade shrugged his shoulders. “I am afraid that my colleague
has been a little quick in forming his conclusions,” he said.
“But he is right. Oh! I know that he is right. James never did it.
And about his quarrel with his father, I am sure that the reason why
he would not speak about it to the coroner was because I was
concerned in it.”
“In what way?” asked Holmes.
“It is no time for me to hide anything. James and his father had
many disagreements about me. Mr. McCarthy was very anxious that
there should be a marriage between us. James and I have always
loved each other as brother and sister, but of course he is young,
and has seen very little of life yet, and—and—well he naturally did
not wish to do anything like that yet. So there were quarrels, and
this, I am sure, was one of them.”
“And your father?” asked Holmes. “Was he in favour of such a
union?”
“No, he was averse to it also. No one but Mr. McCarthy was in
favour of it.” A quick blush passed over her fresh young face as
Holmes shot one of his keen, questioning glances at her.
“Thank you for this information,” said he. “May I see your father if
I call tomorrow?”
“I am afraid the doctor won’t allow it.”
 “The doctor?”
“Yes, have you not heard? Poor father has never been strong for
years back, but this has broken him down completely. He has taken
to his bed, and Dr. Willows says that he is a wreck, and that his
nervous system is shattered. Mr. McCarthy was the only man alive
who had known dad in the old days in Victoria.”
“Ha! In Victoria! That is important.”
“Yes, at the mines.”
“Quite so; at the gold mines, where, as I understand, Mr. Turner
made his money.”
“Yes, certainly.”
“Thank you, Miss Turner. You have been of material assistance to
me.”
“You will tell me if you have any news tomorrow. No doubt you will
go to the prison to see James. Oh, if you do, Mr. Holmes, do tell him
that I know him to be innocent.”
“I will, Miss Turner.”
“I must go home now, for dad is very ill, and he misses me so if I
leave him. Good-bye, and God help you in your undertaking.” She
hurried from the room as impulsively as she had entered, and we
heard the wheels of her carriage rattle off down the street.
“I am ashamed of you, Holmes,” said Lestrade with dignity, after a
few minutes’ silence. “Why should you raise up hopes which you are
bound to disappoint? I am not over-tender of heart, but I call it
cruel.”
“I think that I see my way to clearing James McCarthy,” said
Holmes. “Have you an order to see him in prison.”
“Yes, but only for you and me.”
“Then I shall reconsider my resolution about going out. We have
still time to take a train to Hereford and see him tonight?”
 “Ample.”
“Then let us do so. Watson, I fear that you will find it very slow,
but I shall only be away a couple of hours.”
I walked down to the station with them, and then wandered
through the streets of the little town, finally returning to the hotel,
where I lay upon the sofa and tried to interest myself in a yellow-
backed novel. The puny plot of the story was so thin, however, when
compared to the deep mystery through which we were groping, and
I found my attention wander so constantly from the fiction to the
fact, that I at last flung it across the room, and gave myself up
entirely to a consideration of the events of the day. Supposing that
this unhappy young man’s story was absolutely true, then what
hellish thing, what absolutely unforeseen and extraordinary calamity
could have occurred between the time when he parted from his
father, and the moment when, drawn back by his screams, he
rushed into the glade? It was something terrible and deadly. What
could it be? Might not the nature of the injuries reveal something to
my medical instincts? I rang the bell, and called for the weekly
county paper, which contained a verbatim account of the inquest. In
the surgeon’s deposition it was stated that the posterior third of the
left parietal bone and the left half of the occipital bone had been
shattered by a heavy blow from a blunt weapon. I marked the spot
upon my own head. Clearly such a blow must have been struck from
behind. That was to some extent in favour of the accused, as when
seen quarrelling he was face to face with his father. Still, it did not
go for very much, for the older man might have turned his back
before the blow fell. Still, it might be worth while to call Holmes’
attention to it. Then there was the peculiar dying reference to a rat.
What could that mean? It could not be delirium. A man dying from a
sudden blow does not commonly become delirious. No, it was more
likely to be an attempt to explain how he met his fate. But what
could it indicate? I cudgelled my brains to find some possible
explanation. And then the incident of the grey cloth, seen by young
McCarthy. If that were true, the murderer must have dropped some
part of his dress, presumably his overcoat, in his flight, and must
have had the hardihood to return and carry it away at the instant
when the son was kneeling with his back turned not a dozen paces
off. What a tissue of mysteries and improbabilities the whole thing
was! I did not wonder at Lestrade’s opinion, and yet I had so much
faith in Sherlock Holmes’ insight that I could not lose hope as long
as every fresh fact seemed to strengthen his conviction of young
McCarthy’s innocence.
It was late before Sherlock Holmes returned. He came back alone,
for Lestrade was staying in lodgings in the town.
“The glass still keeps very high,” he remarked, as he sat down. “It
is of importance that it should not rain before we are able to go over
the ground. On the other hand, a man should be at his very best
and keenest for such nice work as that, and I did not wish to do it
when fagged by a long journey. I have seen young McCarthy.”
“And what did you learn from him?”
“Nothing.”
“Could he throw no light?”
“None at all. I was inclined to think at one time that he knew who
had done it, and was screening him or her, but I am convinced now
that he is as puzzled as every one else. He is not a very quick-witted
youth, though comely to look at, and, I should think, sound at
heart.”
“I cannot admire his taste,” I remarked, “if it is indeed a fact that
he was averse to a marriage with so charming a young lady as this
Miss Turner.”
 “Ah, thereby hangs a rather painful tale. This fellow is madly,
insanely in love with her, but some two years ago, when he was only
a lad, and before he really knew her, for she had been away five
years at a boarding-school, what does the idiot do but get into the
clutches of a barmaid in Bristol, and marry her at a registry office?
No one knows a word of the matter, but you can imagine how
maddening it must be to him to be upbraided for not doing what he
would give his very eyes to do, but what he knows to be absolutely
impossible. It was sheer frenzy of this sort which made him throw
his hands up into the air when his father, at their last interview, was
goading him on to propose to Miss Turner. On the other hand, he
had no means of supporting himself, and his father, who was by all
accounts a very hard man, would have thrown him over utterly had
he known the truth. It was with his barmaid wife that he had spent
the last three days in Bristol, and his father did not know where he
was. Mark that point. It is of importance. Good has come out of evil,
however, for the barmaid, finding from the papers that he is in
serious trouble, and likely to be hanged, has thrown him over utterly,
and has written to him to say that she has a husband already in the
Bermuda Dockyard, so that there is really no tie between them. I
think that that bit of news has consoled young McCarthy for all that
he has suffered.”
“But if he is innocent, who has done it?”
“Ah! who? I would call your attention very particularly to two
points. One is that the murdered man had an appointment with
some one at the Pool, and that the some one could not have been
his son, for his son was away, and he did not know when he would
return. The second is that the murdered man was heard to cry
‘Cooee!’ before he knew that his son had returned. Those are the
crucial points upon which the case depends. And now let us talk
about George Meredith, if you please, and we shall leave all minor
matters until tomorrow.”
There was no rain, as Holmes had foretold, and the morning broke
bright and cloudless. At nine o’clock Lestrade called for us with the
carriage, and we set off for Hatherley Farm and the Boscombe Pool.
“There is serious news this morning,” Lestrade observed. “It is said
that Mr. Turner, of the Hall, is so ill that his life is despaired of.”
“An elderly man, I presume?” said Holmes.
“About sixty; but his constitution has been shattered by his life
abroad, and he has been in failing health for some time. This
business has had a very bad effect upon him. He was an old friend
of McCarthy’s, and, I may add, a great benefactor to him, for I have
learned that he gave him Hatherley Farm rent free.”
“Indeed! That is interesting,” said Holmes.
“Oh, yes! In a hundred other ways he has helped him. Everybody
about here speaks of his kindness to him.”
“Really! Does it not strike you as a little singular that this McCarthy,
who appeals to have had little of his own, and to have been under
such obligations to Turner, should still talk of marrying his son to
Turner’s daughter, who is, presumably, heiress to the estate, and
that in such a very cocksure manner, as if it was merely a case of a
proposal and all else would follow? It is the more strange since we
know that Turner himself was averse to the idea. The daughter told
us as much. Do you not deduce something from that?”
“We have got to the deductions and the inferences,” said Lestrade,
winking at me. “I find it hard enough to tackle facts, Holmes,
without flying away after theories and fancies.”
“You are right,” said Holmes, demurely; “you do find it very hard to
tackle the facts.”
 “Anyhow, I have grasped one fact which you seem to find it
difficult to get hold of,” replied Lestrade, with some warmth.
“And that is?”
“That McCarthy, senior, met his death from McCarthy, junior, and
that all theories to the contrary are the merest moonshine.”
“Well, moonshine is a brighter thing than fog,” said Holmes,
laughing. “But I am very much mistaken if this is not Hatherley Farm
upon the left.”
“Yes, that is it.” It was a widespread, comfortable-looking building,
two-storied, slate-roofed, with great yellow blotches of lichen upon
the grey walls. The drawn blinds and the smokeless chimneys,
however, gave it a stricken look, as though the weight of this horror
still lay heavy upon it. We called at the door, when the maid, at
Holmes’ request, showed us the boots which her master wore at the
time of his death, and also a pair of the son’s, though not the pair
which he had then had. Having measured these very carefully from
seven or eight different points, Holmes desired to be led to the
courtyard, from which we all followed the winding track which led to
Boscombe Pool.
Sherlock Holmes was transformed when he was hot upon such a
scent as this. Men who had only known the quiet thinker and
logician of Baker-street would have failed to recognise him. His face
flushed and darkened. His brows were drawn into two hard, black
lines, while his eyes shone out from beneath them with a steely
glitter. His face was bent downwards, his shoulders bowed, his lips
compressed, and the veins stood out like whipcord in his long,
sinewy neck. His nostrils seemed to dilate with a purely animal lust
for the chase, and his mind was so absolutely concentrated upon the
matter before him, that a question or remark fell unheeded upon his
ears, or at the most, only provoked a quick, impatient snarl in reply.
Swiftly and silently he made his way along the track which ran
through the meadows, and so by way of the woods to the Boscombe
Pool. It was damp, marshy ground, as is all that district, and there
were marks of many feet, both upon the path, and amid the short
grass which bounded it on either side. Sometimes Holmes would
hurry on, sometimes stop dead, and once he made quite a little
détour into the meadow. Lestrade and I walked behind him, the
detective indifferent and contemptuous, while I watched my friend
with the interest which sprang from the conviction that every one of
his actions were directed towards a definite end.
The Boscombe Pool, which is a little reed-girt sheet of water some
fifty yards across, is situated at the boundary between the Hatherley
Farm and the private park of the wealthy Mr. Turner. Above the
woods which lined it upon the further side we could see the red
jutting pinnacles which marked the site of the rich landowner’s
dwelling. On the Hatherley side of the Pool the woods grew very
thick, and there was a narrow belt of sodden grass twenty paces
across between the edge of the trees and the reeds which lined the
lake. Lestrade showed us the exact spot at which the body had been
found, and, indeed, so moist was the ground, that I could plainly see
the traces which had been left by the fall of the stricken man. To
Holmes, as I could see by his eager face and peering eyes, very
many other things were to be read upon the trampled grass. He ran
round, like a dog who is picking up a scent, and then turned upon
my companion.
“What did you go into the Pool for?” he asked.
“I fished about with a rake. I thought there might be some weapon
or other trace. But how on earth—?”
“Oh, tut, tut! I have no time! That left foot of yours with its inward
twist is all over the place. A mole could trace it, and there it vanishes
among the reeds. Oh, how simple it would all have been had I been
here before they came like a herd of buffalo, and wallowed all over
it. Here is where the party with the lodge-keeper came, and they
have covered all tracks for six or eight feet round the body. But here
are three separate tracks of the same feet.” He drew out a lens, and
lay down upon his waterproof to have a better view, talking all the
time rather to himself than to us. “These are young McCarthy’s feet.
Twice he was walking, and once he ran swiftly so that the soles are
deeply marked, and the heels hardly visible. That bears out his story.
He ran when he saw his father on the ground. Then here are the
father’s feet as he paced up and down. What is this, then? It is the
butt end of the gun as the son stood listening. And this? Ha, ha!
What have we here? Tip-toes! Tip-toes! Square, too, quite unusual
boots! They come, they go, they come again—of course that was for
the cloak. Now where did they come from?” He ran up and down,
sometimes losing, sometimes finding the track until we were well
within the edge of the wood, and under the shadow of a great
beech, the largest tree in the neighbourhood. Holmes traced his way
to the further side of this, and lay down once more upon his face
with a little cry of satisfaction. For a long time he remained there,
turning over the leaves and dried sticks, gathering up what seemed
to me to be dust into an envelope, and examining with his lens not
only the ground, but even the bark of the tree as far as he could
reach. A jagged stone was lying among the moss, and this also he
carefully examined and retained. Then he followed a pathway
through the wood until he came to the high road, where all traces
were lost.
“It has been a case of considerable interest,” he remarked,
returning to his natural manner. “I fancy that this grey house on the
right must be the lodge. I think that I will go in and have a word
with Moran, and perhaps write a little note. Having done that, we
may drive back to our luncheon. You may walk to the cab, and I
shall be with you presently.”
It was about ten minutes before we regained our cab, and drove
back into Ross, Holmes still carrying with him the stone which he
had picked up in the wood.
“This may interest you, Lestrade,” he remarked, holding it out.
“The murder was done with it.”
“I see no marks.”
“There are none.”
“How do you know, then?”
“The grass was growing under it. It had only lain there a few days.
There was no sign of a place whence it had been taken. It
corresponds with the injuries. There is no sign of any other weapon.”
“And the murderer?”
“Is a tall man, left-handed, limps with the right leg, wears thick-
soled shooting boots and a grey cloak, smokes Indian cigars, uses a
cigar-holder, and carries a blunt penknife in his pocket. There are
several other indications, but these may be enough to aid us in our
search.”
Lestrade laughed. “I am afraid that I am still a sceptic,” he said.
“Theories are all very well, but we have to deal with a hard-headed
British jury.”
“Nous verrons,” answered Holmes, calmly. “You work your own
method, and I shall work mine. I shall be busy this afternoon, and
shall probably return to London by the evening train.”
“And leave your case unfinished?”
“No, finished.”
“But the mystery?”
“It is solved.”
 “Who was the criminal, then?”
“The gentleman I describe.”
“But who is he?”
“Surely it would not be difficult to find out. This is not such a
populous neighbourhood.”
Lestrade shrugged his shoulders. “I am a practical man,” he said,
“and I really cannot undertake to go about the country looking for a
left-handed gentleman with a game leg. I should become the
laughing-stock of Scotland-yard.”
“All right,” said Holmes, quietly. “I have given you the chance. Here
are your lodgings. Good-bye. I shall drop you a line before I leave.”
Having left Lestrade at his rooms we drove to our hotel, where we
found lunch upon the table. Holmes was silent and buried in thought
with a pained expression upon his face, as one who finds himself in
a perplexing position.
“Look here, Watson,” he said, when the cloth was cleared; “just sit
down in this chair and let me preach to you for a little. I don’t quite
know what to do, and I should value your advice. Light a cigar, and
let me expound.”
“Pray do so.”
“Well, now, in considering this case there are two points about
young McCarthy’s narrative which struck us both instantly, although
they impressed me in his favour and you against him. One was the
fact that his father should, according to his account, cry ‘Cooee!’
before seeing him. The other was his singular dying reference to a
rat. He mumbled several words, you understand, but that was all
that caught the son’s ear. Now from this double point our research
must commence, and we will begin it by presuming that what the
lad says is absolutely true.”
“What of this ‘Cooee!’ then?”
 “Well, obviously it could not have been meant for the son. The son,
as far as he knew, was in Bristol. It was mere chance that he was
within earshot. The ‘Cooee!’ was meant to attract the attention of
whoever it was that he had the appointment with. But ‘Cooee’ is a
distinctly Australian cry, and one which is used between Australians.
There is a strong presumption that the person whom McCarthy
expected to meet him at Boscombe Pool was some one who had
been in Australia.”
“What of the rat, then?”
Sherlock Holmes took a folded paper from his pocket and flattened
it out on the table. “This is a map of the Colony of Victoria,” he said.
“I wired to Bristol for it last night.” He put his hand over part of the
map. “What do you read?” he asked.
“ARAT,” I read.
“And now?” He raised his hand.
“BALLARAT.”
“Quite so. That was the word the man uttered, and of which his
son only caught the last two syllables. He was trying to utter the
name of his murderer. So-and-so of Ballarat.”
“It is wonderful!” I exclaimed.
“It is obvious. And now, you see, I had narrowed the field down
considerably. The possession of a grey garment was a third point
which, granting the son’s statement to be correct, was a certainty.
We have come now out of mere vagueness to the definite
conception of an Australian from Ballarat with a grey cloak.”
“Certainly.”
“And one who was at home in the district, for the Pool can only be
approached by the farm or by the estate, where strangers could
hardly wander.”
“Quite so.”
 “Then comes our expedition of today. By an examination of the
ground I gained the trifling details which I gave to that imbecile
Lestrade, as to the personality of the criminal.”
“But how did you gain them?”
“You know my method. It is founded upon the observance of
trifles.”
“His height I know that you might roughly judge from the length of
his stride. His boots, too, might be told from their traces.”
“Yes, they were peculiar boots.”
“But his lameness?”
“The impression of his right foot was always less distinct than his
left. He put less weight upon it. Why? Because he limped—he was
lame.”
“But his left-handedness.”
“You were yourself struck by the nature of the injury as recorded
by the surgeon at the inquest. The blow was struck from
immediately behind, and yet was upon the left side. Now, how can
that be unless it were by a left-handed man? He had stood behind
that tree during the interview between the father and son. He had
even smoked there. I found the ash of a cigar, which my special
knowledge of tobacco ashes enabled me to pronounce as an Indian
cigar. I have, as you know, devoted some attention to this, and
written a little monograph on the ashes of 140 different varieties of
pipe, cigar, and cigarette tobacco. Having found the ash, I then
looked round and discovered the stump among the moss where he
had tossed it. It was an Indian cigar, of the variety which are rolled
in Rotterdam.”
“And the cigar-holder?”
“I could see that the end had not been in his mouth. Therefore he
used a holder. The tip had been cut off, not bitten off, but the cut
was not a clean one, so I deduced a blunt penknife.”
“Holmes,” I said, “you have drawn a net round this man from
which he cannot escape, and you have saved an innocent human life
as truly as if you had cut the cord which was hanging him. I see the
direction in which all this points. The culprit is—”
“Mr. John Turner,” cried the hotel waiter, opening the door of our
sitting-room, and ushering in a visitor.
The man who entered was a strange and impressive figure. His
slow, limping step and bowed shoulders gave the appearance of
decrepitude, and yet his hard, deep-lined, craggy features, and his
enormous limbs showed that he was possessed of unusual strength
of body and of character. His tangled beard, grizzled hair, and
outstanding, drooping eyebrows combined to give an air of dignity
and power to his appearance, but his face was of an ashen white,
while his lips and the corners of his nostrils were tinged with a shade
of blue. It was clear to me at a glance that he was in the grip of
some deadly and chronic disease.
“Pray sit down on the sofa,” said Holmes, gently. “You had my
note?”
“Yes, the lodge-keeper brought it up. You said that you wished to
see me here to avoid scandal.”
“I thought people would talk if I went to the Hall.”
“And why did you wish to see me?” He looked across at my
companion with despair in his weary eyes, as though his question
were already answered.
“Yes,” said Holmes, answering the look rather than the words. “It is
so. I know all about McCarthy.”
The old man sank his face in his hands. “God help me!” he cried.
“But I would not have let the young man come to harm. I give you
my word that I would have spoken out if it went against him at the
Assizes.”
“I am glad to hear you say so,” said Holmes, gravely.
“I would have spoken now had it not been for my dear girl. It
would break her heart—it will break her heart when she hears that I
am arrested.”
“It may not come to that,” said Holmes.
“What!”
“I am no official agent. I understand that it was your daughter who
required my presence here, and I am acting in her interests. Young
McCarthy must be got off, however.”
“I am a dying man,” said old Turner. “I have had diabetes for years.
My doctor says it is a question whether I shall live a month. Yet I
would rather die under my own roof than in a gaol.”
Holmes rose and sat down at the table with his pen in his hand
and a bundle of paper before him. “Just tell us the truth,” he said. “I
shall jot down the facts. You will sign it, and Watson here can
witness it. Then I could produce your confession at the last
extremity to save young McCarthy. I promise you that I shall not use
it unless it is absolutely needed.”
“It’s as well,” said the old man; “it’s a question whether I shall live
to the Assizes, so it matters little to me, but I should wish to spare
Alice the shock. And now I will make the thing clear to you; it has
been a long time in the acting, but will not take me long to tell.
“You didn’t know this dead man, McCarthy. He was a devil
incarnate. I tell you that. God keep you out of the clutches of such a
man as he. His grip has been upon me these twenty years, and he
has blasted my life. I’ll tell you first how I came to be in his power.
“It was in the early sixties at the diggings. I was a young chap
then, hot-blooded and reckless, ready to turn my hand to anything; I
got among bad companions, took to drink, had no luck with my
claim, took to the bush, and, in a word, became what you would call
over here a highway robber. There were six of us, and we had a
wild, free life of it, sticking up a station from time to time, or
stopping the waggons on the road to the diggings. Black Jack of
Ballarat was the name I went under, and our party is still
remembered in the colony as the Ballarat Gang.
“One day a gold convoy came down from Ballarat to Melbourne,
and we lay in wait for it and attacked it. There were six troopers and
six of us, so it was a close thing, but we emptied four of their
saddles at the first volley. Three of our boys were killed, however,
before we got the swag. I put my pistol to the head of the waggon-
driver, who was this very man McCarthy. I wish to the Lord that I
had shot him then, but I spared him, though I saw his wicked little
eyes fixed on my face, as though to remember every feature. We got
away with the gold, became wealthy men, and made our way over
to England without being suspected. There I parted from my old
pals, and determined to settle down to a quiet and respectable life. I
bought this estate which chanced to be in the market, and I set
myself to do a little good with my money, to make up for the way in
which I had earned it. I married, too, and though my wife died
young, she left me my dear little Alice. Even when she was just a
baby her wee hand seemed to lead me down the right path as
nothing else had ever done. In a word, I turned over a new leaf, and
did my best to make up for the past. All was going well when
McCarthy laid his grip upon me.
“I had gone up to town about an investment, and I met him in
Regent Street with hardly a coat to his back or a boot to his foot.
“‘Here we are, Jack,’ says he, touching me on the arm; ‘we’ll be as
good as a family to you. There’s two of us, me and my son, and you
can have the keeping of us. If you don’t—it’s a fine, law-abiding
country is England, and there’s always a policeman within hail.’
“Well, down they came to the West country, there was no shaking
them off, and there they have lived rent free on my best land ever
since. There was no rest for me, no peace, no forgetfulness; turn
where I would, there was his cunning, grinning face at my elbow. It
grew worse as Alice grew up, for he soon saw I was more afraid of
her knowing my past than of the police. Whatever he wanted he
must have, and whatever it was I gave him without question, land,
money, houses, until at last he asked a thing which I could not give.
He asked for Alice.
“His son, you see, had grown up, and so had my girl, and as I was
known to be in weak health, it seemed a fine stroke to him that his
lad should step into the whole property. But there I was firm. I
would not have his cursed stock mixed with mine; not that I had any
dislike to the lad, but his blood was in him, and that was enough. I
stood firm. McCarthy threatened. I braved him to do his worst. We
were to meet at the Pool midway between our houses to talk it over.
“When I went down there I found him talking with his son, so I
smoked a cigar, and waited behind a tree until he should be alone.
But as I listened to his talk all that was black and bitter in me
seemed to come uppermost. He was urging his son to marry my
daughter with as little regard for what she might think as if she were
a slut from off the streets. It drove me mad to think that I and all
that I held most dear should be in the power of such a man as this.
Could I not snap the bond? I was already a dying and a desperate
man. Though clear of mind and fairly strong of limb, I knew that my
own fate was sealed. But my memory and my girl! Both could be
saved, if I could but silence that foul tongue. I did it, Mr. Holmes. I
would do it again. Deeply as I have sinned, I have led a life of
martyrdom to atone for it. But that my girl should be entangled in
the same meshes which held me was more than I could suffer. I
struck him down with no more compunction than if he had been
some foul and venomous beast. His cry brought back his son; but I
had gained the cover of the wood, though I was forced to go back to
fetch the cloak which I had dropped in my flight. That is the true
story, gentlemen, of all that occurred.”
“Well, it is not for me to judge you,” said Holmes, as the old man
signed the statement which had been drawn out. “I pray that we
may never be exposed to such a temptation.”
“I pray not, sir. And what do you intend to do?”
“In view of your health, nothing. You are yourself aware that you
will soon have to answer for your deed at a higher Court than the
Assizes. I will keep your confession, and, if McCarthy is condemned,
I shall be forced to use it. If not, it shall never be seen by mortal
eye; and your secret, whether you be alive or dead, shall be safe
with us.”
“Farewell! then,” said the old man, solemnly. “Your own death-
beds, when they come, will be the easier for the thought of the
peace which you have given to mine.” Tottering and shaking in all his
giant frame, he stumbled slowly from the room.
“God help us!” said Holmes, after a long silence. “Why does fate
play such tricks with poor helpless worms? I never hear of such a
case as this that I do not think of Baxter’s words, and say, ‘There,
but for the grace of God, goes Sherlock Holmes.’”
James McCarthy was acquitted at the Assizes, on the strength of a
number of objections which had been drawn out by Holmes, and
submitted to the defending counsel. Old Turner lived for seven
months after our interview, but he is now dead; and there is every
prospect that the son and daughter may come to live happily
together, in ignorance of the black cloud which rests upon their past.
 The Horror of Studley Grange

L. T. Meade and Clifford Halifax

L. T. Meade was the pseudonym adopted by Elizabeth Thomasina
Meade Smith (1844–1914) after she took up writing at the age of
seventeen. The daughter of an Irish clergyman, and a fluent story-
teller, Meade became an extraordinarily prolific writer of stories for
girls as well as mysteries and tales of adventure. In addition, she
founded and edited Atalanta, a magazine aimed primarily at young
women and which featured such authors as R. L. Stevenson, H.
Rider Haggard, and Frances Hodgson Burnett. A feminist, Meade
was a member of the progressive and egalitarian Pioneer Club for
women.
She co-wrote a number of books with male collaborators. Dr
Clifford Halifax, was also a pen-name, concealing the identity of a
Yorkshire-born medical man, Edgar Beaumont (1860–1921). Their
first joint effort was This Troublesome World (1893), featuring a
doctor who uses psychotropic drugs for his own purposes. The
following year saw the publication of Stories from the Diary of a
Doctor, narrated by Halifax, from which this tale is taken; it dates
from 1894, and originally appeared in the Strand Magazine. “The
Horror of Studley Grange” is a pleasingly atmospheric mystery which
culminates in an experiment with a laryngoscope.

***

I WAS in my consulting-room one morning, and had just said good-

bye to the last of my patients, when my servant came in and told me
that a lady had called who pressed very earnestly for an interview
with me.
“I told her that you were just going out, sir,” said the man, “and
she saw the carriage at the door; but she begged to see you, if only
for two minutes. This is her card.”
I read the words, “Lady Studley.”
“Show her in,” I said, hastily, and the next moment a tall, slightly
made, fair-haired girl entered the room.
She looked very young, scarcely more than twenty, and I could
hardly believe that she was, what her card indicated, a married
woman.
The colour rushed into her cheeks as she held out her hand to me.
I motioned her to a chair, and then asked her what I could do for
her.
“Oh, you can help me,” she said, clasping her hands and speaking
in a slightly theatrical manner. “My husband, Sir Henry Studley, is
very unwell, and I want you to come to see him—can you?—will
you?”
“With pleasure,” I replied. “Where do you live?”
“At Studley Grange, in Wiltshire. Don’t you know our place?”
“I daresay I ought to know it,” I replied, “although at the present
moment I can’t recall the name. You want me to come to see your
husband. I presume you wish me to have a consultation with his
medical attendant?”
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
torto di forzar la consegna.... Più torto ancora avete adesso a
ricorrere a espedienti non degni di voi....
— Quali espedienti?
— Via, non fate l’ingenuo.... La vostra macchia di tè....
— Le dò la mia parola d’uomo d’onore....
— Inezie.... Non vi tengo mica il broncio.... E neppure voi lo terrete a
me, non è vero?... Amici come prima... E arrivederci, Gualberti,
arrivederci di giorno....
E gli tese la mano agitata da un leggero tremito.
Avvezzo a vederla così calma, così serena, così padrona di sè,
Gualberti fu colpito dal turbamento che le si scorgeva nel viso e che
l’insolito abbandono, l’insolita sconnessione del suo discorso tradiva.
— Oh signora Stella, signora Stella — egli esclamò con accento
appassionato — torno a darle la mia parola d’onore che la
fanciullaggine di cui ella m’accusa non l’ho commessa. Ma benedico
l’equivoco se ci aiuta a uscire dal circolo incantato in cui ci aggiriamo
da tanto tempo.
— Non vi capisco. Spiegatevi....
— Mi spiegherò.... Ma la scongiuro, mi lasci dire; non
m’interrompa.... Quando avrò finito andrò via, e se vorrà andrò via
per sempre.... E soprattutto non accolga nemmeno per un istante
l’idea ch’io abbia avuto in animo di offenderla, di compromettere la
sua riputazione.... Non mi giudichi capace di una bassezza simile....
Ho vissuto molto in società, è vero, in quella triste società che
guasta e corrompe; pur credo di non essermici interamente guasto e
corrotto; i suoi idoli non sono i miei idoli, i suoi trionfi non sono i
trionfi a cui miro.
— Lo so, Gualberti, lo so.
— Quand’ero giovine, i miei amici.... amici di club.... avevano la
bontà-di dire che possedevo delle qualità naturali per riuscir nella
galanteria... il grande scopo della loro esistenza... ma che prendevo
le cose troppo sul serio... che talvolta ero troppo schizzinoso nella
scelta della piazza da espugnare... chiamiamola così.... talvolta ero
troppo scrupoloso nei mezzi.... Fatto si è che fui sempre un povero
seduttore.... anche quand’ero giovine.... Si figuri adesso....
— Ebbene, amico mio — soggiunse la signora Marioli — se qualche
mia frase ha potuto farvi supporre ch’io vi mettessi a livello dei don
Giovanni da dozzina, ve ne domando perdono....
— Non è questo, signora Stella; son io in ogni caso che devo
implorare la sua indulgenza.... Sono stato indiscreto, goffo,
petulante.... Gli è che avevo un bisogno immenso di vederla.... di
vederla sola.... E proprio nell’ora che mi vestivo per quello stupido
ballo, questo bisogno diventava prepotente, irresistibile.... Mi son
trovato alla sua porta, sulle sue scale, qui, nel suo salotto, al
cospetto di lei.... Poi un po’ le sue osservazioni, un po’ il timore di
aver realmente commesso una sconvenienza mi hanno sconcertato,
inasprito.... si è sempre inaspriti con gli altri quando si ha qualche
cosa da rimproverare a sè stessi.... e allora ho cominciato a infilare
una serie di paradossi di cui le assicuro che non sono responsabile
che in piccola parte.... essi mi salivano alle labbra, e io non potevo
fermarli.... Mi sembrava di rassomigliare a un pirotecnico inesperto
che veda partire a caso i suoi razzi.... Non importa; mentre la bocca
affastellava frasi su frasi la mia anima acquistava una lucidezza
maggior dell’usato, leggevo dentro di me più chiaro ch’io non avessi
mai letto, mi convincevo ch’era assurdo il voler soffocare, il voler
nasconder sotto un finto nome i miei sentimenti per lei.... Oh non mi
faccia segno di tacere.... Non posso e non debbo.... L’amo, signora
Stella, l’amo da un pezzo. Da un pezzo, ed è la miglior prova ch’io
l’amo, m’è divenuto increscioso ogni altro pensiero; ovunque io sia la
mia mente corre a questa casa, a questo salottino, alla donna gentile
che vi abita.... Perchè ho tardato tanto a parlare?... Temevo una sua
ripulsa, non osavo giocar tutto sopra una carta.... Dacchè la conosco
davvicino, e son quasi tre anni, ho visto ronzargliene intorno dei
vagheggini, e li ho visti pur dileguarsi, scoraggiati da lei, e quelli la
cui corte era un oltraggio e quelli che le offrivano ciò che solo è lecito
offrirle.... Avrò la medesima sorte?... io chiedevo a me stesso.... E
forse volevo esser ben sicuro di me, sicuro contro ogni pentimento,
contro ogni rimpianto delle mie abitudini di scapolo.... Oggi, signora
Stella, di questi dubbi non ne ho più. Oggi sento il pregio
inestimabile d’un’affezione tranquilla, d’una vita raccolta, e
l’affezione a cui aspiro è la sua, e la vita che sogno è al suo fianco....
Siamo liberi entrambi, abbiamo, più che non paia, gusti, opinioni,
ideali comuni; perchè non dobbiamo restare uniti, perchè non vorrà
accettare la mia mano, il mio nome?... Ella è molto più giovine di me,
ma i dolori valgono gli anni e le prove attraverso le quali ella è
passata attenuano la distanza che c’è fra noi.... Non mi respinga,
signora Stella.... non rivolga il viso da un’altra parte.... mi assicuri
che non è andata in collera....
Ella s’era rimessa a sedere col gomito appoggiato al tavolino, con la
fronte appoggiata alla palma, e quella dichiarazione in cui vibrava
l’accento della verità le scendeva nell’anima come una musica
divina. Altre dichiarazioni l’era toccato ascoltare, o bugiarde, o
interessate, o ridicole, e tutte quante le avevano dato il mezzo di
sbarazzarsi con gioia di corteggiatori importuni, di riaffermare la sua
libertà che le pareva un bene così prezioso; oggi per riaffermare
quella libertà una volta di più le sarebbe convenuto perdere il suo
migliore amico;.... oh il prezzo era troppo caro. Della sincerità di
Gualberti era sicura come di esistere.... egli che non aveva mentito
mai, egli che la cingeva da tanto tempo di una tenerezza rispettosa e
discreta, egli ch’era così alieno da ogni artifizio da domandarle di
esser sua moglie, appena mezz’ora dopo averle esposte delle
massime coniugali che avrebbero sgomentato una donna volgare....
La signora Marioli levò verso di lui i suoi occhi dolci e buoni. — Non
vi avrei lasciato parlare dieci minuti di fila se fossi andata in collera....
Che cosa fate adesso?... Alzatevi, Gualberti.... Non siamo due
ragazzi.... Siamo due persone serie, mature.... Su, via....
E si alzò per la prima, sorridendo in mezzo al suo finto corruccio.
Egli non le dava retta e baciava i lembi del suo vestito e balbettava:
— Amor mio, amor mio.
— Su, Gualberti, su.... Non ho mica detto ancora di sì.
— L’ho veduto scritto sulla sua.... sulla tua fronte quel sì.... E poi me
lo dirai, non è vero?
— Ebbene.... tornate.... torna domani.
Ebbro di gioia, egli la strinse un istante fra le sue braccia, e si decise
finalmente a prendere il suo cappello.
L’orologio suonò la mezzanotte.
— Che ora impossibile! — esclamò la signora mentre premeva il
bottone del campanello elettrico. E soggiunse maliziosamente: —
Sarà tardi pel ballo della Vetturi....
— Cattiva!... Il ballo della Vetturi....
Entrò il servo.
— Buona notte, signora Stella.
— Buona notte, Gualberti.... A domani, dunque.... A qualunque
ora.... Resto tutto il giorno in casa.
— Grazie. A domani.
Gualberti fece in quattro salti le scale. E seguitava a dire al
domestico che gli veniva dietro col lume: — Ci vedo, ci vedo
benissimo.
Era buio pesto, ma l’amore, ch’è cieco, ci vede anche al buio.
 L’EREDITÀ DI GIUSEPPINA.

I.

Nel salottino che una lumiera a gaz rischiarava dall’alto e che una
sola stanza divideva dalla camera del malato erano raccolte dieci o
dodici persone, quali sedute, quali in piedi, quali appoggiate al
davanzale d’una finestra aperta per respirare un po’ d’aria libera.
Sulla tavola, in mezzo ad alcuni album di fotografie e strenne e
gingilli, un gran vassoio con parecchi bicchieri d’acqua, un altro più
piccolo con una dozzina di bicchierini da liquori e una bottiglia
smerigliata di Cognac fine Champagne; infine una vaschetta piena di
pezzi di ghiaccio e con un cucchiaio di cristallo.
Di tratto in tratto qualcheduno infilava in silenzio l’uscio a sinistra,
stava fuori del salotto un paio di minuti e poi vi rientrava con aria
contrita.
— Nulla di nuovo? — si chiedeva da più parti.
— Nulla.... sempre nel medesimo stato.... Piuttosto inquieto.
Di quelle dieci o dodici persone sei erano li da poche ore, accorse
alla chiamata telegrafica. Erano i parenti più vicini, i probabili eredi
del cavaliere Achille, nessuno dei quali abitava in Venezia. L’unica
sorella superstite, la baronessa Rudeni, stava ordinariamente a
Firenze, ma il dispaccio l’aveva raggiunta a Livorno ov’ella faceva i
bagni di mare, ed ella, in compagnia del marito barone James e
della cagnetta Darling, aveva preso il primo treno per l’Alta Italia; i
Minucci, venivano da Torino, i Quaglia da Milano. 1 Minucci, padre e
figlio, erano cognato e nipote del cavaliere; così pure i Quaglia.
Tutti, come si vede, avevano risposto all’appello con meravigliosa
sollecitudine. E in vero il tenore del dispaccio spedito dal cugino
Raimondi per consiglio del medico non ammetteva indugi.
Nostro Achille colpito apoplessia. Condizione allarmante.
Desiderabile vostra presenza.
Era stato un fulmine a ciel sereno. Chi poteva immaginarsi che il
cavaliere Achille morisse d’apoplessia a quarant’anni?
Tra il cavaliere e i parenti di lui non c’era mai stata una grande
intimità. Passavano dei mesi, passava un anno intiero senza che si
vedessero, perchè egli non andava a cercarli e preferiva di far i suoi
viaggetti all’estero ed essi capitavano di rado a Venezia. Una volta,
dopo alcune perdite fatte alla Borsa dal barone James, la baronessa
moglie aveva scritto al fratello manifestandogli l’idea di tornare a
stabilirsi in patria, presso di lui, che così non sarebbe rimasto tanto
solo. Il cavaliere l’aveva dissuasa dal suo proposito. Se ne
ricordasse; ella diceva sempre che lo scirocco di Venezia le faceva
male. Di lui non si prendesse pensiero; la solitudine non lo
sgomentava. Coi Minucci e coi Quaglia le relazioni erano ancora più
fredde. A ogni modo i nipoti non mancavano di scrivere allo zio una
toccante lettera pel capo d’anno, a cui egli, che aveva mediocri
disposizioni per lo stile epistolare, rispondeva con poche righe che
principiavano invariabilmente così: — Caro nipote — Gratissimo
fummi tuo foglio, ecc., ecc.

II.

È facile immaginare che questi amorosi parenti, appena giunti,

avevano tempestato di domande il cugino Raimondi. E anche
adesso, ogni momento, egli doveva ripetere per la centesima volta
l’identica storia. — Stava bene, stava benissimo. Avevamo
passeggiato insieme l’altra sera sotto le Procuratie per mezz’ora. E
ieri mattina aveva fatto colazione con eccellente appetito.
— Voi, però, non c’eravate mica? — chiese Annibale Minucci, il
cognato del cavaliere.
— Io no.... Fu un puro caso che mi trovassi qui vicino quando
Battista, il servitore, correva in traccia del medico.
— E siete venuto subito subito?
— Sfido io.... Quelle povere donne non sapevano dove dare il capo.
— Quali donne? — domandò severamente la baronessa Rudeni
agitandosi sulla poltrona.
— Le due donne di casa, la cuoca e la cameriera.
— E vi ha riconosciuto? — seguitò Minucci.
— Senza dubbio.... Riconosce anche adesso.... La coscienza non
l’ha perduta.... ma non può parlare.... non può muovere che il
braccio destro.
— Ma! — sospirò la baronessa. E a questa esclamazione patetica
ne succedette una iraconda accompagnata dal suono secco d’uno
schiaffo: — Maledette bestie!
Darling, ch’era accovacciata sotto il tavolino, credendo che
qualcheduno avesse percosso la sua padrona, le si avvicinò
guaiolando. Ma la baronessa aveva schiaffeggiato sè medesima per
accoppare una zanzara.
— Cara Eleonora, — disse con accento flebile Ippolito Meroni, un
vecchio galante sulla sessantina, tinto e impomatato, — se vi darete
uno schiaffo a ogni zanzara che vi ronza attorno starete fresca.
Meroni assumeva volontieri un tuono confidenziale con le donne alle
quali aveva in illo tempore fatto la corte. E si diceva che la
baronessa Rudeni fosse stata una delle sue fiamme.
— Ad abitar lontana da Venezia m’ero disavvezzata da questa
piaga, — rispose la baronessa. — Quieta, Darling.
— Non c’erano zanzare adesso a Livorno?
— Che!
Ippolito Meroni colse il destro per evocare il ricordo del passato. E
abbassando la voce: — Ve ne rammentate della stagione del 1860
all’Ardenza?
La baronessa aggrottò le ciglia. — Ma che 1860?... Io non c’ero....
— Sarà stato nel 1865.
— Io non fui all’Ardenza prima del 1870, — replicò dispettosamente
la baronessa Eleonora, e alzandosi in piedi lasciò in asso il suo
vetusto adoratore.
Che età avesse la baronessa Rudeni non si poteva sapere con
precisione; certo superava di una decina d’anni il fratello Achille
ch’era il più giovine della famiglia. Non era stata brutta.... nè
inesorabile, — dicevano le male lingue; ma dacchè gli uomini la
trascuravano era divenuta d’una virtù arcigna.
— Ti piace la zia? — susurrò Minucci juniore nell’orecchio del
cugino.
— Non vorrei vederla senza busto, — rispose il contino Quaglia.
L’altro si mise a ridere. — Che sconquasso dev’essere!
Ippolito Meroni, piantato dalla baronessa, si accostò al barone il
quale leggeva la Gazzetta.
— Quel Battemberg, che ve ne pare?
— Io però o non sarei tornato a Sofia o vi sarei rimasto coûte que
coûte.
— Eh son cose presto dette.... Ma contro la Russia....
— Chi non risica non rosica.
— Quel dispaccio dello Czar è d’una prepotenza!
— Non me ne parlate, caro Meroni, non me ne parlate. E l’Europa
che tollera! E noi che tolleriamo!... Siamo liberali o non siamo
liberali?
Un’occhiata della moglie avvertì il barone che quello non era il luogo
di approfondire un tale argomento.
La baronessa s’era riunita al crocchio numeroso che stava accanto
alla finestra: Annibale Minucci, il conte Ercole Quaglia, l’avvocato
Rizzoli e qualche altro amico di famiglia. Così, in via accademica, si
calcolava a quanto potesse ascendere la fortuna del cavaliere
Achille.
— Intanto il padre gli ha lasciato tutta la disponibile, — notò Quaglia.
— Sicuro. Poi ebbe un legato da quello zio che viveva a Londra, —
soggiunse Minucci.
— E le azioni del Canale di Suez che aveva comperate a 350 franchi
e che rivendette a tremila!
Quest’enumerazione fu interrotta dall’arrivo del dottore.

III.

Il dottor Gelsi, un uomo maturo, un po’ curvo, giallo di carnagione,

calvo, miope, salutò a destra, salutò a sinistra, — buona sera, buona
sera, — chiese di volo che novità ci fossero dopo la sua ultima visita
e si diresse verso la camera del cavaliere Achille, preceduto da
Raimondi. La baronessa Eleonora gli tenne dietro, non senza aver
ordinato al marito di custodire la cagnetta Darling, perchè bisognava
assolutamente evitare la ripetizione delle scene spiacevoli avvenute
fra lei e Bibì, la cagnetta di casa. In fatti, quando Darling aveva
voluto accompagnare la baronessa nella stanza del fratello, Bibì,
gelosissima de’ suoi diritti, era uscita digrignando i denti dal suo
nascondiglio sotto il letto del padrone e le si sarebbe slanciata contro
se la pronta intromissione dei presenti non glielo avesse impedito.
Con la testa immobile sprofondata nei guanciali, con una vescica di
ghiaccio sulla fronte, il cavaliere Achille giaceva pressocchè inerte
sul suo letto conservando un resto di vita soltanto nel braccio destro
che si ostinava a uscir fuori dalle coperte, e negli occhi che giravano
lentamente nell’orbita. Vigilavano assidui al suo capezzale la
cameriera, un infermiere dell’ospedale e una terza persona, una
donna giovine, bella, decorosamente vestita, il cui sguardo ansioso,
sollecito, non si staccava mai un istante dall’ammalato.
Il dottore interrogò l’infermiere, interrogò la cameriera, ed essi, nel
rispondergli, si rivolgevano a quella terza persona: — Non è vero,
signora Giuseppina? — Allora Gelsi, non badando agli occhiacci
della baronessa, preferì di far senz’altro le sue domande alla signora
Giuseppina. Ed ella gli rispondeva con una voce dolce, una di quelle
voci che si raccomandano, rispondeva chiara, precisa; non una
parola di più, non una parola di meno del necessario. — Capisco,
capisco, — diceva il medico. Poi si chinò sull’infermo: — Signor
Achille, come va, come si sente? — Il cavaliere mosse
faticosamente il capo. — Ah, — ripigliò Gelsi come discorrendo fra
sè — si è scosso, ha mostrato d’intendere. — Oh, — sospirò la
Giuseppina — intende benissimo.... Se potesse esprimersi!
La baronessa Eleonora s’accostò al letto, dalla parte opposta a
quella ove si trovava la Giuseppina. — Achille, Achille?... M’hai
riconosciuto?... Sono Eleonora.... Eleonora.... Vuoi che resti a farti
un po’ di compagnia io? — E quell’io sottolineato tradiva l’intimo
pensiero della baronessa. Ella si offriva di vegliar qualche ora, nella
certezza che insieme con lei l’altra non avrebbe osato rimanere, o
ch’ella in ogni modo avrebbe saputo mandarla via. Ma il malato
ritorcendo il viso dalla sorella, fissò gli occhi sulla Giuseppina che
tremava come una foglia e spinse verso di lei il braccio non colpito
dalla paralisi. La giovine gli afferrò la mano e la strinse nella sua.
Gelsi intervenne. — Signora baronessa, vedremo domani.... Per
questa notte è meglio che in camera non ci sia gente nuova.
— Ma io....
— Ha ragione.... Ho sbagliato a dir gente nuova. Intendo dire gente
che il signor Achille non abbia visto da un pezzo.... Gli altri, se
credono, possono vegliar nella stanza vicina.... alternativamente....
Lei, signora baronessa, farebbe bene a riposare.... Dev’esser stanca
dal viaggio.... Già, in caso di bisogno la chiamano.... E qui, com’è
disposto il servizio per la notte?
Quest’ultima interrogazione fu rivolta alla Linda, la cameriera.
— Alle undici e mezzo, — rispose questa, — Battista e la cuoca
verranno a dare il cambio all’infermiere ed a me.
— Io non mi muovo, — soggiunse semplicemente la Giuseppina.
Dopo alcune altre ordinazioni e istruzioni, il dottore uscì. — Non c’è
peggioramento, — egli disse ai parenti ed amici. — Siamo
stazionari.... Ma pur troppo la condizione è sempre grave,
gravissima.... Basta, tornerò domattina alle sei. Buona sera, buona
sera.
La baronessa lo accompagnò fuori del salotto. — Converrà meco,
dottore, che la presenza di quella donna è uno scandalo.... Se
avessi potuto immaginarmi una cosa simile le dò la mia parola che
non sarei venuta.... Per ricever quell’accoglienza!... Poichè mio
fratello, al punto a cui è ridotto, trova il modo di farmi capire che lo
secco....
— Non creda.... non creda, — interruppe il medico. — Io mi spiego
lo stato d’animo del cavaliere Achille. I malati, anche i più gravi, e
forse per l’indebolimento stesso delle loro facoltà, non si fermano
sull’idea della morte finchè un incidente qualunque non produca
sopra di loro l’effetto d’una rivelazione improvvisa.... Il cavaliere si è
reso conto del pericolo quando ha visto intorno a sè i parenti che
non ha l’abitudine di vedere, quando ha visto lei che non veniva a
Venezia da un pezzo.... E il pensiero d’esser vicini al gran passo
turba perfino gli eroi....
La dotta disquisizione del dottor Gelsi persuase poco la baronessa.
— No, no, — ella disse — gli è che, tra la sua sorella e la sua ganza,
Achille preferisce la ganza.
Gelsi aveva fretta. — Cara baronessa, — egli concluse, — nella vita
conviene armarsi di pazienza.... E coi vecchi, coi bambini, coi malati
non si può ragionare.... Del resto, quella donna è un’infermiera
preziosa.... Vorrei averne molte all’ospitale.

IV.

I Rudeni, i Quaglia, i Minucci erano, bene o male, alloggiati in casa.

Gli altri, alle undici, si congedarono. Ma la baronessa Eleonora
pregò il cugino Raimondi e l’avvocato Rizzoli di trattenersi ancora un
poco. Indi licenziò il marito, al quale non parve vero di ritirarsi in
camera con la Gazzetta, e consigliò i nipoti Quaglia e Minucci di
andarsene a letto per alcune ore. Se tutti restavano alzati
contemporaneamente sarebbe poi giunto il momento in cui nessuno
avrebbe più avuto la forza di reggersi in piedi. Per ultimo ella disse ai
due cognati: — Voi due mi usate la cortesia di rimanere. Dobbiamo
parlare.
Fu fatto come ella voleva. E allora ella cominciò a sfogarsi con
Raimondi.... Raimondi era stato d’una leggerezza! Egli abitava a
Venezia, egli era in buoni termini con Achille.... Doveva sapere,
doveva avvertire.
Raimondi s’infastidiva. — Sapere che cosa? Avvertire di che cosa?
— Oh bella! Sapere questa tresca.... Avvertirne noi, i parenti.
— Ma scusi, Eleonora. Che ghiribizzi le saltano in testa? Gran che
seppur sapevo che Achille aveva una relazione amorosa!... Un uomo
scapolo, ricco, libero come lui?... O che dovevo mandar una
circolare?
— Ah era dunque conveniente di lasciarci, senza preavviso, trovar
occupato da un’estranea il posto che spetterebbe a noi soli, a noi di
famiglia?... Per me, l’ho detto già al dottor Gelsi, se mi fossi
immaginata che v’era una padrona di casa, nonostante tutto l’affetto
che ho per mio fratello, sarei rimasta a Livorno.
— Non esageriamo — interpose il conte Quaglia ch’era un uomo
calmo.
— Ma che padrona di casa? — replicò vivamente Raimondi. — Se la
Giuseppina non era mai stata in casa?... È venuta ieri.... e chi poteva
impedirglielo?... Era sicuro che Achille, se fosse stato in condizione
di parlare o di scrivere, l’avrebbe mandata a chiamare.... e non
saprei dargli torto quando vedo le cure che quella ragazza ha per
lui.... Da ieri in poi, nè di giorno nè di notte, non s’è allontanata un
minuto da quel letto.... Io non capisco come faccia.... Non mangia,
non dorme....
La baronessa sogghignò. — Credete ai miracoli, voi. Tant’è che
crediate anche al disinteresse della vostra Giuseppina.
— Certo che in caso d’una disgrazia ella perde tutto, — osservò
Minucci.
— Che ingenuità! — esclamò la baronessa Eleonora. — Quelle non
son femmine da lasciarsi cogliere alla sprovveduta.... Per esse
l’amore è un mercato.... Tanto si guadagna, tanto si rischia.... E dei
rischi voglion esser coperte.... Veda, avvocato Rizzoli, se l’ho
pregato di rimanere....
In fatti Rizzoli non sapeva ancora perch’egli fosse lì ad assistere a
questa disputa.
— Se l’ho pregato di rimanere, — proseguì la baronessa, — gli è
perchè, oltre ad essere un amico di famiglia, ella è un valente legale
e può consigliarci.
— Benedette donne! — pensò Rizzoli. — Non sanno ancora che i
consulti agli avvocati si vengono a domandare nello studio. — A ogni
modo, egli si limitò a chinare il capo in silenzio.
— Io metterei la mano nel fuoco che qui sotto c’è un grande
imbroglio, — ripigliò in tuono misterioso la baronessa Eleonora. —
Quando un uomo cade nei lacci d’un intrigante, egli non vede che
per i suoi occhi, è pronto a dimenticare per lei fratelli, sorelle, nipoti,
e, se ne avesse, persino i genitori e i figliuoli.... Alle corte, per me
non c’è dubbio che la signora Giuseppina ha carpito ad Achille un
testamento a suo favore....
Quaglia e Minucci, che fino allora non avevano dato segno di
commuoversi molto alle filippiche della cognata, esclamarono in
coro: — Possibile?
Il cugino Raimondi protestò. — Nemmen per sogno.... La
Giuseppina è una buona diavola, incapace di sotterfugi.... E Achille
era le mille miglia lontano dall’idea di poter morire a quarant’anni....
— Voi, Raimondi, siete un uomo antidiluviano, — interruppe la
baronessa. E continuò con aria contrita: — Mi ripugna, lo sa Iddio se
mi ripugna il toccar questo tasto.... e volesse pure il cielo che mio
fratello campasse ancora cent’anni.... io abborro le questioni
d’interesse.... e infine per me.... non ho figliuoli.... e sarete persuasi
che se parlo, parlo piuttosto per voi altri, — questa dichiarazione era
fatta ai due cognati. — .... Ma le ingiustizie mi offendono, e pur
troppo d’ingiustizie nella nostra famiglia ne furono commesse.... il
povero babbo ha favorito Achille in un modo!... Basta, era l’unico
maschio.... Insomma quello che volevo chiedere a lei, Rizzoli, è
questo. Non sarà, ma supposto che la nuova ingiustizia sia
realmente avvenuta, che i parenti più stretti siano stati sacrificati per
una poco di buono.... la legge non provvede, non dà i mezzi di
difendersi?
— Ecco, signora baronessa, — rispose l’avvocato, — il cavaliere
Achille, non lasciando nè ascendenti nè discendenti, nè moglie, era
in piena facoltà di disporre come meglio gli piacesse di tutta la sua
sostanza.
— Di tutto?
— Eh sì; il Codice è chiaro.... Diritti intangibili non ne hanno appunto
che gli ascendenti, i discendenti e il coniuge superstite.... Certo che
un testamento di cui si potesse provare che fu carpito con la frode o
con la violenza diverrebbe nullo.... Ma qui entriamo in un ginepraio;
non sono cose delle quali si possa discorrere vagamente, a priori....
Bisogna vedere al caso pratico.... Del resto, — soggiunse Rizzoli
guardando l’orologio ch’era posto sulla mensola e che segnava le
undici e tre quarti, — sono anch’io d’opinione, come Raimondi, che il
cavaliere Achille non abbia preso alcuna disposizione.... Un
testamento per atto di notaio, a quanto mi consta, non c’è....
Potrebb’esserci in qualche cassetto un testamento olografo, ma non
lo credo....
Dopo di ciò, l’avvocato chiese licenza. Aveva da discutere una causa
la mattina e voleva esaminare certi documenti. Raimondi uscì con
lui. — Parola d’onore, — egli disse appena giù delle scale, — a
momenti finivo collo schiaffeggiare mia cugina, la baronessa.... Che
cinismo!... Suo fratello non è ancora morto ed ella si è già prese le
chiavi dei cassetti.... l’ho vista io a prendersele.... ed è tutta
trepidante per la sua parte d’eredità.... E quegli scrupoli da
santocchia.... lei!... Col suo passato!... E quella stramba pretesa
ch’io la informassi degli amori d’Achille?... O per chi mi prende?...
Son forse il suo salariato?... È vero, ho sempre avuto il torto di esser
troppo servizievole con questi miei signori parenti.... Ma se si
sognano d’abusarne!... Con quel sugo poi.... Anche in questa
faccenda dell’eredità che c’entro io?... Che ci sia o che non ci sia
testamento io non m’aspetto un centesimo.... Dunque perchè mi
seccano? Sono pentito d’aver mandato io i telegrammi che misero in
movimento questo sciame di corvi.
— Eh, caro mio, — notò Rizzoli con un risolino sardonico, — quando
c’è di mezzo l’interesse, gli uomini, su per giù, sono tutti d’uno
stampo.... Tu pure....
— Ti prego....
— Oh vorresti darmi ad intendere, per quanto bene tu voglia a tuo
cugino Achille, che s’egli ti avesse legato centomila lire, non ti
consoleresti più presto della sua perdita?
— Scettico incorreggibile! — borbottò Raimondi.

V.
Erano le cinque del mattino. Le due fiamme della lumiera a gaz del
salotto erano abbassate. Nella stanza fra il salotto e la camera del
malato ardeva una candela. Alle quattro la baronessa Eleonora, il
conte Quaglia e Annibale Minucci erano andati a coricarsi; da un’ora
vegliavano Minucci e Quaglia juniori. Vegliavano così per dire,
giacchè s’erano addormentati tutti e due, il primo sopra una poltrona
del salotto, il secondo sul canapè della stanza attigua. Destatisi
contemporaneamente allo scoccar delle cinque, i due cugini si
vennero incontro sbadigliando, col piglio annoiato di persone che
adempiono mal volentieri a un ufficio antipatico.
— Se la zia Eleonora sapesse che abbiamo dormito, ci metterebbe
sotto consiglio di guerra, — disse il contino Quaglia.
Minucci si strinse nelle spalle. — Per quello che c’è da fare!... La zia
Eleonora è una visionaria.... A badare a lei, qui dovrebbe essere un
continuo scassinare armadi, trafugar carte, e che so io ancora...
Quasi quasi si correrebbe il pericolo di essere assaliti per le stanze.
— Sciocchezze! A proposito, l’hai vista la terribile Giuseppina?
— Come l’hai vista tu. Da lontano, dalla soglia, poichè confesso che
l’entrar nella camera non mi seduce.... Ci fui ieri appena arrivato, e
sarà stata un’idea mia, ma mi parve che lo zio Achille mi facesse
certi occhiacci.
— Neppur io ci vado volentieri nella camera, — soggiunse Quaglia.
— Ma la donna è bella, sai.
— È parso anche a me.... Briccone d’uno zio!... Ma adesso,
poveretto, anche per lui è finita.... Potrebbe, tutt’al più, durar così
qualche mese.
— Non è probabile.... E non è neanche da augurarglielo.
In quel punto, Battista, il servo che aveva vegliato fino allora presso
il padrone, passò pel salotto ove si trovavano i due giovani.
— E come va? — essi gli chiesero.
Battista tentennò la testa. — Male.... Da mezzanotte in poi è stato
d’un’inquietudine!... E non si può capir che cosa voglia.... È una
pena....
Era giorno fatto e Battista aperse le imposte e spense i lumi. Poi
disse officiosamente: — Di qui a cinque minuti porterò loro il caffè.
E uscì dissimulando con fine arte diplomatica la noia che gli dava in
un momento simile la presenza di sei ospiti in casa.
1 due giovani s’affacciarono alla finestra. Non s’erano più visti dopo
il Carnovalone di Milano, che Minucci aveva passato presso i suoi
parenti Quaglia, e adesso, trovandosi insieme così inopinatamente,
evocavano i ricordi di quei giorni di baldoria.
— Ti rammenti dell’ultimo veglione alla Scala?
— E delle cene in buona compagnia al Rebecchino?
— A proposito, con la Vittoria ti trovi spesso?
— Non è più a Milano.... Ha seguito Angioletti che è di guarnigione a
Napoli.
Battista ricomparve col caffè.

VI.

Era vero. Dalla mezzanotte, anzi da prima di mezzanotte, una strana

inquietudine s’era impadronita del cavaliere Achille. Moveva
continuamente le labbra senza poter mettere che suoni inarticolati,
moveva il braccio smaniando, fissava gli occhi sulla Giuseppina con
un certo sguardo supplichevole come a dirle: — Indovinami.
Povera Giuseppina! Che non avrebbe fatto per indovinarlo? Gli
raccomodava i guanciali sotto la testa, gli porgeva da bere, e alle
sue mute richieste rispondeva con altre interrogazioni: — Vuol
questo? Vuol quello? — No, non c’era verso di coglier nel segno. A
volte ella dimenticava i rispetti umani, non si curava della cuoca e di
Battista ch’erano lì davanti, e gli dava del tu e non lo chiamava più
signor Achille, ma lo chiamava Achille com’egli voleva esser
chiamato da lei. — Achille, dimmi che cosa vuoi, dillo alla tua
Giuseppina.
Nel vederlo ridotto così, le salivano le lacrime agli occhi, ma le
ratteneva, ma si sforzava di sorridergli, di mostrargli una fisonomia
ilare, confidente, piena di speranza.
Era sua da tre anni; però non aveva cominciato ad amarlo davvero
che dopo qualche tempo. Sulle prime aveva ceduto a lui come una
ragazza povera, cresciuta in un ambiente poco scrupoloso, cede a
un uomo ricco che le assicura la pace, l’agiatezza, il modo di giovare
alla famiglia. L’aveva amato più tardi quando s’era accorta che egli
non la trattava con l’aria sprezzante con cui gli uomini trattano le
donne di cui fanno lo strumento dei loro piaceri. L’aveva amato
senza sognarsi nemmeno ch’egli potesse sposarla, godendo del
presente come d’un bene superiore ai suoi meriti, mettendo il suo
orgoglio, la sua dignità nel prevenire ogni desiderio di lui, nel
rallegrargli col suo sorriso la vita. E anch’egli le si era affezionato a
grado a grado. In principio era stata per esso uno svago e nulla più,
poi aveva compreso ch’ella era molto dissimile da tante altre; aveva
sentito, egli scapolo impenitente, che questa donna piena di
abnegazione e di tenerezza riempiva un vuoto nella sua esistenza,
che senza imporgli i legami, a suo modo di vedere, intollerabili del
matrimonio, ella lo salvava dalla prosa delle tresche volgari. Le
aveva ammobigliato un quartierino di poche stanze e veniva a
passar qualche ora ogni giorno in quel nido tranquillo ov’ella, pure
uscita dal popolo, spargeva un profumo d’eleganza e di distinzione
nativa.
Misantropo per indole, disgustato de’ suoi parenti, e, quantunque nè
sciocco nè ignorante, privo di ambizioni letterarie, scientifiche,
politiche, il cavaliere Achille non istava volentieri che con la
Giuseppina e con pochi amici. Ma nemmeno coi pochi amici egli
usava discorrere de’ suoi amori, e poichè la Giuseppina aveva un
uguale riserbo, si può dire che questa relazione rimaneva avvolta in
un’ombra discreta.
Quella che la sapeva più lunga sull’argomento era la cagnetta Bibì,
ordinaria compagna del padrone nelle sue passeggiate, ma Bibì si
limitava a far le sue confidenze ad altri individui della razza canina.
Comunque sia, in quell’istante supremo una cosa era certa. La
persona, che al cavaliere Achille pesava di più di lasciar sulla terra,
era la Giuseppina; e la Giuseppina era quella che sentiva più acerbo
lo strazio della sua morte.

VII.

— Buon giorno, buon giorno — disse il dottor Gelsi entrando in

camera col suo solito dondolamento di testa. — Si fece far dalla
Giuseppina un rapporto particolareggiato della notte, ordinò che si
aprissero meglio le imposte per aver più luce e poi si accinse a un
esame minuzioso dell’infermo, di cui lo colpì la singolare eccitazione
nervosa. — Sarà un affare serio dopo — egli pensò in cuor suo.
— Ah, se potesse indovinar lei ciò ch’egli vuole! — sospirò la
Giuseppina, affranta da tanti tentativi inutili.
Dopo essercisi provato e riprovato senz’alcun frutto, il dottore allargò
le braccia col gesto di chi si dà per vinto. — Scriverò la ricetta per un
calmante.
E s’avviò verso il tavolino.
Ma la Giuseppina lo trattenne chiamandolo con voce soffocata: —
Dottore, dottore.
— Che c’è?
— Guardi.
Gli occhi del malato s’erano dilatati nell’orbita, il suo braccio si
moveva rapido da destra a sinistra, da sinistra a destra.
Il medico fece un gesto interrogativo.
La Giuseppina soggiunse: — Lo sguardo ha assunto
quell’espressione, il movimento del braccio si è fatto così insistente
quand’ella disse che avrebbe scritto una ricetta.
Gelsi si picchiò la fronte. — Scrivere!... Che sia questo ciò ch’egli
vuole?... Non gli si era domandato?
— No, no.
— Presto allora... Non perdiamoci in chiacchiere.... Pur che sia in
grado di scrivere!... Col lapis forse sarà meno difficile.
Si trovò sul tavolino un quinterno di carta da lettere; il lapis lo diede il
dottore.
Il cavaliere Achille seguiva con impazienza angosciosa questi
preparativi. La fissità della pupilla, la tensione dei muscoli tradivano
in lui lo sforzo della mente e della volontà. Quando il lapis fu posto
tra le sue dita, quando il quinterno di carta fu dalla Giuseppina
collocato in modo ch’egli potesse scriverci, egli vi tracciò
faticosamente alcuni segni, poi lasciò ricader la mano spossata sulle
coperte.
— Dunque? — chiese il dottore allorchè la giovine, obbedendo a un
cenno dell’infermo, ebbe preso il foglio.
Sulle prime quei geroglifici riuscirono incomprensibili alla
Giuseppina, ma, avvicinatasi alla finestra, le linee confuse,
aggrovigliate si riordinarono come per incanto sotto i suoi occhi e le
permisero di leggere due parole. Quali parole fossero ella non disse;
piegò il foglio e lo nascose in seno, si precipitò sul letto del
moribondo, ne afferrò la mano e la coperse di baci e di lacrime. Bibì,
sentendola piangere, venne a fregarsele attorno mugolando
sommessamente.
In quel punto s’affacciò sul limitare dell’uscio la baronessa Eleonora
la quale aveva ordinato che la chiamassero al giungere del medico.
Era in vestaglia, molto impreparata, in quelle condizioni nelle quali i
nipoti non avrebbero voluto vederla.