The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, May 7, 1905, Page 1

(Copyright, 19 (Copyright, cludes not only the 1 le d of young Willoughby Smith, but a those subsequent developments which threw so curious a light upon the causes of the crime. It was a wild, tempestuous night, to- ward the close of November. Holmes and I sat together in silence all the evening, he engaged with a powerful lens deciphering the remains of the original inscription upon a palimpsest, I deep in a recent treatise upon sur- gery. Outside the wind howled down Baker street, while the rain beat fierce- ly against the windows. It was strange there, in the very depths of the town, with ten miles of man’s handiwork on every side of us, to feel the iron grip of nature, and to be conscious that to the huge elemental for all London was no more than the molehills that dot the fields.” I walked to the window and looked out on the deserted street. The occasional lamps gleamed on the expanse of muddy road and shining pavement. A single cab was splashing its way from the Oxford street end. “Well, Watson, it’s as well ‘we have not to turn out to-night,” said Holmes, Jaying aside his lens and rolling up the grind of a wheel as nst the curb. The cab seen had pulled up at our And we, my coats and cra- nd every aid that fight the weather. There’s the cab hope vet. He'd t had wanted us to down, my dear fellow, and for all virtuous folk have g bed.” the light of the hall lamp fell r midnight visitor, 1 had no in recognizing him. It was tanley Hopkins, a promising in whose carecer Holmes had s shown a very practical in?” he asked eagerly. up, my dear si said voice from above. “I hope > no designs upon us such a = this.” waterproof. T helped him out of fit, while Holmes knocked a blaze out of the Jogs in the grate. “Now, my dear Hopkins, draw up and warm your toes,” said he. “Here's a cigar, and the doctor has a prescription containing hot water and lemon. which is good medicine on a night like this. Itimust be something important which has brought you out in such a gale.” “It is indeed, Mr. Holmes. I've had a bustling afternoon, I promise you. Did you sée anything of the Yoxley case in the latest editions?” “I've seen nothing later than the fifteenth century to-day.” ‘“Well, it was only a paragraph, and all wrong at. that, so you have not missed anything. I haven’t -let the grass grow under my feet. It's down in Kent, seven miles from Chatham and three from the railway Jline. I was wired for at three-fifteen, reached Yoxley Old Place at five, conducted my investigation, was back at Charing Cross by the last train, and straight to you by cab.”’ - “Which means, I suppose, that you are not quite clear about your case?” “It means that I can make neither head nor tail ‘of it.. So far. as I'can see, it is just as tangled a business as ev I handled, and yet at first: it seemed so simple that one couldn’t o wrong. There’s no motive, Mr. Holmes. Tha what bothers me—I can’t put my hand on a motive. Here's a man dead—there’s no denying that— but, so far as I can see, no reason on earth why any one should wish him harm.” Holmes lit his cigar and leaned back in his chair. " “Let us hear about it,” said he. “I've got my facts pretty clear,” said Stanley Hopkins. “All I want now is to know what they all mean. The story, so far as I can make it out. is like this: Some years ago this country house, Yoxley Old Place, was taken by an elderly man, who gave the name of Professor Coram. He was an invalid. ~ keeping his bed half the time. and the other half hobbling round the house with a stick or being pushed #bout the grounds by the gardener .in a bath- chair. He was well liked by, the few neighbors who called upon. him, and he has the reputation down there of being a very learned man. His - household used to consist . of an elderly house- N wanted. His work consisted in writing all the mogning to the professor’s dic- tation, and he u!\'mlly spent the even- ing in hunting ‘up references and, passages which bore upon .the next May’s work, -‘This Willoughby ‘Smith +has’ nothing‘ against him, either as a boy at Uppingham or as a young man at’Cambridge. I have seen his testi- monials, and from the first he was a decent, quiet, .- hardworking - fellow, with no weak spot in-him at all. And yét thisis the lad who has met his death. “this ‘morning inl the professor’s:study.: undér circumstarices which can point - only to murder.” The wind howled and screamed at the windows., Holmes and I drew. keeper, ‘Mrs. Marker, and of & raid,’ closer to .the fire, - while the young Susan Tarlton. These have both been with _him_since his arrival, and they seem to be women of excellent char- . acter. The professor is writing a ‘learned book, and he found:it neces- inspector slowly and .point by point develop singul. rrative. A re to ch all Eng- 1and,” said he. “I dom't suppose you could find a household more self-con- - D7 WS AT GALNT, AU INE A LS WS TUBNED 7OWAE US, LITH TN G 2T, FyrD, LY ZEEFP SOLLOLS - ONDER OpFRH UM NG TUFTLED BROKS hood and lived very much as his em< ployer did.’ The two women’ had nothing to'take them from the house. Mortimer, the gardener, who wheels the bath-chair, is an army pensioner— an old ‘Crimean man of excellent character. He does not live in the- house, but in a three-roomed “cottage at the other end of the garden. Those are the omly people that you would find within the grounds of Yoxley Old . Place. . ‘At the same time,, the gate of the garden'is:a hundred yards froth: the main London to Chatham road. It opens with a' latch, and there'is nothing to prevent any one from walking in. : “Now I will give you the evidence of Susan Tarlton, who is. the only per- son who can say anything positive ut the matter. It was in the fore- noon, between 11 and 12. She was engaged at ‘the moment in Hanging some curtains in the upstairs front sary, about a year ago, to engage a taiped or freer from outside influences. bedroom.: Professor Coram was still secretary. The first two that he tried Whole weeks would pass and not one in bed, for when the weather is bad were not successes, but the third, Mr. of them .go past. the garden gate, he seldom rises before mildday. The ‘Willoughby ‘Smith, a very“young-man - The professor was buried in his work - housekeeper Was - busied with. some. straight from the university, seems to and existed for nothing eise. Young work ‘n the back of the house. have been just what his employer Smith knew nobody in the neighbor- Willoughby Smith had-been in his. bedroom,” which he uses as a sitting- room, but the maid heard him at that moment pass along the passage and descend to the study immediately be- low her. She did not see him, but she says that she could not be mistaken in his. quick, firm tread. - She did not ‘hear'the study door close, but 2 min- ute or so later there was a dreadful cry in the room below. It wasa wild, hoarse screami, so strange and” un- natural that it might have come either from a man or a woman. . At the same instant there was a heavy thud, which shook the old house, and then all was silence. The maid stood petrified for a moment, and then, recovering her courage. she ran downstairs. The study door. was shut and she opened it. Inside, youmg Mr. Willoughby Smith was stretched upon the floor. " At first she could se® no injury, but as she trted to raise him she saw that blood was pouring from the underside of his neck. It was'pierced by a v small but very deep wound, which had _divided’ the carotid artery. The in- strument with which the injury had been inflicted lay upon the carpet be- side him. It was one of those small sealing-wax knives be found om old-fashioned writing tables, with am tvory handle and a stiff blade. T+ was part of the fittings of the professor’s own desk. “At first the mald thought that .young Smith was already dead, but on pouring out some water from the carafe over his forehead he opened his eyes for an instant. ‘The profes- sor,” he murmured—‘it was she.’ The maid is prepared to’swear that .those were the exact words.’' He tried des- perately to say something else, and he held his right hand up in the air. Then he fell back dead. “In the meantime the housekeeper had also arrived on the sceme, but just too late to catch the young man's dying words. Leaving Susan with the body, she hurried to the professor's room. He was sitting up in bed hor- ribly agitated, for he had heard enough to convince him that some- thing terrible had occurred. Mrs. Marker is prepared to swear that the professor was still in his night clothes, and indeed it was sible for him to dresg without the of Mortimer, whose orders were i