Sherlock Holmes Complete Works 1

Chapter 69 Adventure History 29
"At this moment, in the silence, I suddenly heard a sound that made my heart leap. It was the clang of the lever and the swish of the leaking pipe. He started the machine. The light was still on. On the floor, where I had left it when I checked the iron trough, and in the light I saw the roof slowly, wobbly, coming straight down on me. I knew that the pressure would be enough to knock me down in a minute. Grind to a pulp. I screamed and banged my body on the door and fingered the lock. I begged the colonel to let me out, but to no avail. The roof was only a foot or two from my head when It occurred to me that the degree of pain when a person dies depends largely on the posture when he is dying. If I was lying on my stomach, the weight would be on the spine. Thinking of the terrible crackling sound when the bones are crushed, I couldn't help trembling. Maybe a different posture would be better, but do I have the guts to lie there on my back and watch that deadly black shadow staggering down on me? I I couldn't stand up straight anymore, and suddenly my eyes fell on something, and a light of hope suddenly sprouted in my heart.

"I said that though the roof and floor were iron, the walls were wood. As I cast a desperate glance around, I saw a faint gleam of gold shining between a panel or two. When A small panel was slowly pushed back, and the light grew brighter and brighter, and for a moment I couldn't believe it was an escape door. I rushed out of it in an instant, and lay in a daze. The other side of the wall. Behind me the panel closed again, but the crack of the lamp and the clash of two iron plates showed how I had escaped.

"When I woke up, I found my hands were being pulled frantically. I found myself lying on the floor in a corridor, and a woman with a candle in her hand was pulling me hard.

"'Quick! Quick!' she cried out breathlessly. 'They're going to be here soon. Oh, don't waste this precious time, quick!'

"This time, I didn't ignore her advice. I stood up slowly and ran with her along the corridor and then down the stairs. Below the stairs is another passage, and just as we ran to the passage, we heard I heard running footsteps and two people shouting. One person was on the floor we were on, the other was on the floor below him, and the two echoed each other. My guide stopped to look around, and then she pushed away. A room leading to a bedroom.

"'This is your only chance,' she said, 'and although it is high, you may be able to jump.'

"As I spoke, lights flashed in the passageway. I saw the figure of Colonel Stark scurrying forward, with a lamp in one hand and a butcher's cleaver in the other. I desperately I quickly ran across the bedroom and pushed open the window. I climbed onto the window sill. I hesitated and didn't jump down immediately. Because if she was being bullied, I was determined to go back to rescue her. After a moment of hesitation, he had already reached the door and wanted to push her away. She rushed over, but she hugged him and pushed back hard.

"'Fritz! Fritz!' she cried in English, 'remember your promise to me that you said that this kind of thing would never happen again, and he wouldn't tell what happened here! '

"'You're crazy, Ellis!' growled the colonel, breaking free from her arms, 'he's going to ruin us, he's seen too much, let me pass!' He threw her aside , rushed to the window and slashed at me with a murder weapon. At this time, my body had already left the window sill. When he cut it down, my hands were still holding on to the window sill. I felt a sharp pain and let go, and I fell into the garden.

"I didn't fall, I got up and ran as hard as I could into the bushes. I knew then that I wasn't completely out of danger. However, as I was running like hell, I felt dizzy and nauseous. I watched Glancing at the twitching hand, I realized that my thumb had been cut off by the colonel with a butcher's knife, and the blood was continuously flowing from the wound. I tried my best to bandage the wound with a handkerchief, and then I fainted after a ringing of ears In the flowers.

"When I woke up, the severe pain in the wound immediately reminded me of the danger of last night. I jumped up at the thought that the colonel might still be chasing me. But to my surprise, when I looked around , neither the house nor the garden can be seen. It turned out that I had been lying down in a corner of the hedge next to the road, and there was a building not far in front. When I got closer, it was the one where I got off the car last night That station. If it hadn't been for this terrible wound on my hand, what happened during this terrible time might have been nothing more than a nightmare.

"I went into the station and asked someone about the time of the morning train, and was informed that there was a train for Reading in an hour. I found that the same porter was on duty as I had come. I asked him if he listened. Said Colonel Lysander? Stark, it seems he is not the name; I asked him if he noticed a carriage waiting for me last night, he said no; I asked him if there is a police station nearby , he said there was one three miles away.

"Like me, I am hurt and tired. This distance is not close to me. I decided to go back and call the police. It was only a little after six o'clock when I got back to the city, so I went to bandage the wound first. It was embarrassing. The doctor accompanied me here. I entrust the case to you, and I will do it exactly as you advise."

After listening to the client's unusual narration, we were all silent for a long time.Then Sherlock Holmes took from the shelf a large book in which were clippings.

"I think here's an advertisement that will interest you," said he, "which was in all the papers about a year ago. Listen to me:

'Looking for someone.Jeremiah?Mr. Hai Lin, aged 26, a water conservancy engineer, left home at [-]:[-] p.m. on the [-]th of this month, whereabouts are unknown.wearing...'

etc.Hi!I think the timing justifies the last time the Colonel needed an overhaul of his machinery. "

"My God!" exclaimed my patient, "that explains what the lady said."

"There is no doubt that the Colonel is a ruthless desperado, and he will let nothing get in the way of his petty business. Like the pirates, who will never leave a life aboard a ship they take. Good. Well, every minute counts now, so if you can hold on, we must go to Scotland Yard at once and make a report as our first step in Eyzin."

Three hours later we boarded the train together from Reading to the small Berkshire village.Among them were Holmes, the hydraulic engineer, Inspector Bradstreet of Scotland Yard, an undercover detective, and myself.Bradstreet spread out a military map of the county on his seat, drawing a circle with Eyzin at the center.

"Right here," said he, "the circle is drawn with a radius of ten miles from this station. The place we are looking for is about somewhere near this sideline. Sir, I remember you are Say ten miles."

"The carriage ran for a full hour."

"Do you think they brought you back in your coma?"

"I vaguely remember it being lifted and carried somewhere."

"But what I don't understand," I said, "is why they let you go when they found you unconscious in the garden? Perhaps the villain has relented at the woman's request?"

"I don't think that's likely."

"Oh, we'll figure it all out soon enough," said Bradstreet. "Look, I've drawn the circle, and the only thing I want to know is at what point we'll find this fellow."

"I think I can point it out," said Holmes calmly.

"Really? Now?" cried the inspector. "You've made your judgment? Well, then, let's see who agrees with you. I say south."

"East, I think," said my patient.

"I said west," said the plainclothes detective.

"North, I think," said I, "for there are no hills near there, and our friend said he noticed the wagon hadn't gone uphill."

"Cough!" said the inspector with a smile, "we have great disagreements with each other, and we have gone around in circles. Who do you vote for?"

"You are all wrong."

"impossible!"

"Oh yeah, you're all wrong, you hear my point," he pointed his finger at the center of the circle, which is where we'd be able to find them. "

"But what about the twelve miles?" gasped Hatherley.

"Six miles to go, six miles to come back, it couldn't be easier. You said yourself that when you got into the carriage, the horse was fresh and shiny. If it had run twelve miles as hard , how could it be like that?"

"Indeed, it's quite possible that it was a ruse," said Bradstreet, "and, of course, there can be no doubt as to the nature of the fellow."

"Of course," said Holmes, "they are criminals in counterfeiting money on a large scale, and they use that machine to strike counterfeit money with alloys instead of silver."

"We've found a gang of fellows who've been in the business for a long time," said the inspector. "They've been minting half-crown pieces in great numbers. We've even chased them as far as Reading, but we've gone no further. .Because they employ some method of concealing their tracks, which shows that they are habitual criminals who are good at it. But so far, they have been unable to get away."

But he was wrong, these criminals were destined not to fall into the law.As our train pulled into Eyzen station, a thick puff of smoke was seen rising from behind a neighboring grove.

"Is the house on fire?" asked Bradstreet.

"Yes, sir," replied the station master.

"When is it?

"I think it was night, sir.

"Whose house is that?"

"Dr Beeche's."

"Please tell me," interposed the engineer, "is this Dr. Beeche a German, thin, with a pointed nose?"

"No," said the station master, laughing, "doctor Beeche is not an Englishman, as you say, sir, but he does have a foreigner living with him, one of his patients, I suppose."

Before the station master finished telling what he knew, we hurried towards the direction of the fire.The road led up to the top of a low hill with a tall building behind it, and three fire pumps in the garden in front of it were trying to put out the fire, but with little success.

"Here it is!" cried Hatherley, all the more excited. "Look at the gravel, and the rosebushes, where I was lying, and the second window is where I jumped."

"Then," said Holmes, "at least you have your revenge. The lamp must have been crushed and set alight on the board wall, and they were too busy chasing you to notice. Now Keep your eyes open and look in the crowd for the friends you're looking for, but they're probably hundreds of miles away."

Holmes was right to fear, for from that day to this day we have heard nothing of the pretty woman, the sinister German, or the eccentric Englishman, and no one knows what happened to them.Early that morning, a farmer saw a carriage, with several people in it, and some heavy boxes on it, galloping towards Reading.

This group of desperadoes disappeared after fleeing, so that even the clever Sherlock Holmes failed to find them, although there were only a few clues.

The firefighters were at a loss for the furnishings in the room, and what made them even more disturbed was that a fresh thumb was found on a balcony on the third floor, which made them very troubled.It was around sunset that their efforts paid off modestly, and the fire was brought under control.But the collapse of the house was unavoidable, and the site finally turned into rubble and ruins. Except for the remaining steel pipes and cylinders, there was nothing left.We also found many ingots of nickel and tin stored in an outer room, but no coins, which is also evidence of the heavy chests mentioned above.

Thanks to the clear footprints left in the soil, we know how the hydraulic engineer was transported from the garden to the place where he regained consciousness. Otherwise, no one will probably solve the mystery.Obviously two people carried him out, one with small feet and the other with big feet.Anyway, it might be true that the Brit helped the woman move the unconscious man out of danger.

As we returned to London on the train, the hydraulic engineer was devastated: "Oh, it's all too bad, I lost my thumb, and my £[-] honorarium, and what did I get?"

"Experience!" Holmes smiled. "You need to understand this truth. From another perspective, it may be valuable: as long as this matter is publicized to the public, I can guarantee that your firm will have a good reputation." , and it will always be like this.”

(End of this chapter)