Sherlock Holmes Complete Works 1

Chapter 22 Research on Scarlet Characters 22
"I see." I understood what he meant.

"What we have now is a case in which the conclusion is first and the rest is all reasoning. I will try to explain to you the various steps of my reasoning. I have to start from the beginning. Of course you remember, we walked to the building. of the house, so I have no preconceived ideas in my mind. Naturally, I checked the road first, and as I explained to you, I saw the traces of the carriage quite clearly. After my inquiries and analysis, I am sure that the carriage was there late at night. Yes, and seeing the narrower distance between the wheels of the carriage, I decided again that it was a cab rather than a private carriage, as the cabs which are common in London are much narrower than private carriages.

"That was my first discovery. Then I walked along the garden path, which, as it happens, is especially prone to leaving footprints on clay paths. Of course, the path has been trampled on in your opinion, and it is just a dirt road, But to my trained eyes, every trace on the path was of great importance to the case. Of all the branches of detective science, the most important and more easily overlooked is the science of footprints. .Fortunately, I have always taken this very seriously, and with a lot of practice, it has become second instinct. In the garden path, I saw the deep footprints left by the police, but I also found that the original After the footprints of the two men in the garden, it is not difficult to see that they got there before the others, because some of them have been repeatedly trampled by the people who came after them, and they can't be seen clearly. In this way, I found the second link—— There were two people who came here at night, one was tall (as I could tell from the length of his steps), the other was well dressed (as can be seen from the small and elegant boot-prints he left come out).

"Going inside, this last inference was confirmed. The man in the fine boots lay before me. If there had been a murder, it must have been done by the tall man. The body of the deceased There were no scars, and the excited expression on his face made me deduce that he had foreseen his own fate before he died. People who died of heart disease or other sudden natural causes would never have such an excited expression on their faces .I smelled the lips of the deceased and smelled a faint sour smell, so the conclusion came out: this person was forced to take poison to death. I said that the deceased was forced to take poison because of the hatred and fear on his face Expression. By process of elimination, I came to this logical conclusion, as no other hypothesis could explain the facts. Don't think this is a new idea, forced poisoning is a common occurrence in the history of crime. Any toxicologist would think of it The Dolski case of Odessa and the Letoril case of Montperrier.

"Now comes the big question of 'why'. The murder was clearly not a robbery, because there was nothing missing from the deceased. So, is this a political case, or is it a love affair? I think The latter is more likely. If it is a political case, then the murderer must run away immediately after the murder. But this case is the opposite. The murderer did not rush, and there are footprints of the murderer everywhere in the house. This shows that the murderer I stayed at the scene for a long time after the murder. From this, I judged that this was a vendetta, not a political case. Only the murderer of a vendetta needs to go through such meticulous and thoughtful preparation. When I found the blood on the wall, I was even more sure It turned out to be deduced. The bloody letter was seen by people, and they knew it was suspicious. After the ring was found, the problem was basically solved. I judged that the murderer wanted to use the ring to remind the victim of someone who was not present, or who might die. I asked Gregson about this, and in his telegram to Cleveland he asked Draper if anything special had happened before. You remember, he said he didn't ask.

"Later, I checked the room carefully again. The result not only confirmed that the tall man was the murderer, but also found other problems: such as Indian cigars, the murderer had long nails, etc. Because there was no trace of struggle in the room, so , I deduced that the blood on the floor was the murderer's nosebleed when he was excited. Because wherever there is blood, there are his footprints. It seems that the man has a lot of blood, otherwise he would not have so much nosebleed due to excitement. So , I boldly speculated that the murderer was a strong man with a red complexion. Later results proved my point.

"After leaving the scene, I did what the official detectives hadn't done. I telegraphed the Cleveland Police Chief and asked about John Draper's marriage. The return telegram was clear that Draper had Accusing an old rival, Jefferson Hope, and asking for legal protection, I learned the name of the murderer. At this time, Hope was in Europe. I basically had the clues of this case at that time. It's all about catching the murderer.

"I decided then that it must have been the driver who had entered the house with Draper, and no one else.

"I see from the traces left in the street that the cart-horses have roamed about at will, which they would not have done if they had been driven. Where would the coachman be if he were not in the house? Also, if a man in his right mind No one would commit a well-thought-out criminal activity openly in front of a third party. Finally, if a man wants to follow another man in the city of London, what better than being a coachman? From these I conclude that : Jefferson Hope must be found at a cab driver in the City of London.

"If the murderer is a coachman, he has no reason to change his career suddenly. On the contrary, he is afraid that his sudden resignation will arouse people's suspicion. Therefore, for a certain period of time, he will continue to work. There is no need for him to change his name after committing the crime. Who knows his real name in a foreign country? He doesn’t need to use a pseudonym. Thinking of this, I formed a reconnaissance team of street vagrants, and went to various carriage gangs to inquire about the situation until I found this person. You know this small team How well the team did and how efficient it was. As for Ster Jason, it was really unexpected. But in any case, accidents are inevitable. Later, I found two more pills, and I It has long been speculated that there may be such things. You see, the whole case is connected by a series of clues."

"That's wonderful!" I exclaimed involuntarily. "You should make your work known to all. You should publish the case, and if you don't want that, I'll publish it for you."

"Do as you see fit, doctor," replied Holmes, pointing to a report. "Look at this first!" he said, handing the paper. "Look at this!"

It was a copy of the day's Echo, and the report he was referring to was the case.

The newspaper said: Because of Hou Po's sudden death, people have lost some information for conversation.Did Hou Po murder Yinao Ke?Draper and Joseph?Suspect of Stuart Jackson.According to relevant authorities, this is a long-standing criminal case of sexual disputes involving the issue of Mormonism.The details of this case may not be revealed.According to the investigation, the two deceased were Mormons before their death, and the murderer Hou Po also came from Salt Lake City.If this case has no special significance, it can at least show that the speed with which the police solve the case is enough to make foreigners think it is a warning.It is better for them to resolve all problems within their own country and not bring those disputes to our country.It was an open secret that the success of the case was entirely due to two Scotland Yard detectives, Gregson and Ray Mired.It is reported that the murderer was caught in a home named Sherlock Holmes.Holmes is a private detective, and he has also shown a certain ability in solving cases. It is presumed that he will achieve success under the guidance of the two teachers.It is generally estimated that the two detectives will receive some kind of reward, as a recognition of their achievements and so on.

Sherlock Holmes laughed. "Didn't I tell you at the beginning? The whole result of our study of scarlet is to earn them honors and awards!"

I replied, "Never mind, the facts are all in my notebook, and the truth will come out. And for now, the case has been solved, and you should be satisfied, as the Roman miser said:

Regardless of the length of the world's words, Jiazang Wanguan's heart is calm.

(End of this chapter)