The evening world. Newspaper, February 11, 1905, Page 9

SHERLOCK HOLMES ADVENTURES HONE AIC MAMAS AL As fi A Cancun \ \ . (First Story of the Series.) THE MYSTERY OF THE EMPTY HOUSE. By SIR A. CONAN DOYLE, (COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY A. CONAN DOYLE AND COLLIER’S WEEKLY.) (COPYRIGHT, 1905, BY M'CLURE, PHILLIPS & CO.) 'T was in the spring of the year 1894 that all London was inter- ested, and the fashionable world dismayed, by the murder of the Honorable Ronald Adair under the most unusual and most in- explicable circumstances, The public, has alréady learned those particulars of the crime which came out in the police investi- gation; but a good deal was sup- pressed upon that occasion, since the case for the prosecu- tion was so overwhelmingly strong that it was not necessary to bring forward all the facts, Only now, at the end of nearly ten years, am [ allowed to sup- ply those missing links which make up the whole of that re- markable chain, The crime was of interest in itself; but that in- terest was as nothing to me compared to the inconceivable sequel, which afforded me the greatest shock and surprise of any event in iy adventurous life, Byen now, after this long interval, I find myself thrilling as 1 think of it, and feeling once more that sudden flood of joy, amazement and incredulity which utterly submerged my mind, Let me say to the public, which has shown some inter- est in those glimpses which I have occasionally given them of the thoughts and actions of a very remarkable man, that they are not to blame me if I have not shared my knowledge with them, for I should have considered it my first duty to have done so had I not been barred by a positive prohibition from his own lips, which was only withdrawn upon the third of last month. It can be !magined that my close intimacy with Sherlock Holmes had interested me deeply in érime, and that after his disappear- ance | never failed to read with care the various problems which came before the public, and I even attempted more than once, for my own private satisfaction, to employ his methods in their solu- tion, though with Indifferent success, There was none, however, which appealed to me like the tragedy of Ronald Adair. As | read the evidence at the inquest, which led up to a verdict of wilful murder against some person or persons unknown, I realized more clearly than I had ever done the loss which the community had sustained by the death of Sherlock Holmes, There were points about this strange business which would, | was sure, have specially appealed to him, and the efforts of the police would have been sup- plemented, or more probably anticipated, by the trained observa- tion and the alert mind of the first criminal agent in Europe, All day as I drove upon my round | turned over the case in my mind and found no explanation which appeared to me to be adequate, At risk of telling a twice-told tale, Twill recapitulate the facta as they ‘were | known to the public at the conclusion’ of the inquest, The Honorable Ronald Adair was the second son of the Har! of Maynooth, at that time Governor of one of the Aus- tralian colonies, Adair's mother had re- turned from Australia to undergo the op- eration for cataract, and she and her son Roland and her daughter Hilda were liv- {rig together at No, 427 Park lane, | The youth moved in the best soclety—had, 90 far as was known, no enemies and no particuler vices, He hud been engaged to Miss Edith Woodley, of Carstairs, but the engagement had been broken off by mutual con- Sent some months before, and there was ng sign that it had left any very profound feeling behind it. For the rest, the man’s life moved in a narrow and conventional circle, for his habite were quiet and his nature unemotional. Yet {t was upon this easy-going young aristocrat that death came in most strange and unexpected form between the hours of 10 and 11.20. on the night of March 20, 1894. Konald Adair was fond of cards—playing continually, but never for such stakes as would hurt him, He was a member of the Baldwin, the Cavendish, and the Bagatelle Card clubs, It was shown that, after dinner on the day of his death, he had played a rubber of whist at the latter club, He had also played there in the afternoon, The evidence of those who had played with him— Murray, Sir John Hardy and Cot. Moran—showed that the game was whist, and that there was a fairly equal fall of the cards, Adair might have lost five pounds, but not more, His fortune was a considerable one, and such a loss could not in any way affect him, He had played nearly every day at one club or other, but he was a cautious player and usually rose a winner. It came out in evi- dence that, in partnership with Col. Moran, he had actually won as much as £425 in a sitting, some weeks before, from Godfrey Milner and Lord Balmoral. So much for his recent history as it came out at the inquest On the evening of the crime he returaed from the club exactly TO THE EVENING WORLD, ee a FEB. 117# 19058. at 10, His mother and sister were out spending the evening wi a relative. The servant deposed that she heard him enter the fro) room on the second floor, generally used as his sitting-room. had lit a fire there, and as it smoked she had opened the window, | No sound was heard from the room until 11.20, the hour of the | return of Lady Maynooth and her daughter. Desiring to say. 000 night, ehe attempted to enter her son’s room, The door Wa locked on the inside, and no answer could be got to their cries nd fi knocking. Help was obtained, and the door forced, The’ unfor tunate young man was found lying near the table, His head had been horribly mutilated by an expanding revolver bullet, but weapon of any sort was to be found in the room, On the table lay two bank notes for ten pounds each and seventeen pounds ten ih silver and gold, the money arranged in little piles of varying: amount, There were some figures also upon a sheet of paper, with the names of some club frientis opposite to them, from which (t was conjectured that before his death he was endeavoring to. make out his loases or winnings at cards. A minute examination of the circumstances served only to” make the case more complex. In the first ‘place, no reason could” be given why the young man ehould have fastened the door upon, the inside. There was the possibility that the murderer had dom this and had afterward escaped by the window. The drop was at, least twenty feet, however, and a bed of crocuses in full bloom lay” beneath. Neither the flowers nor the earth showed any signs of being disturbed, for were there any marks upon the narrow atrip | of grass which separated the house from the road. Apparently, ‘therefore, it was the young man himself who had fastened the door, But how did he come by his death? No one could have climbed up to the window without leaving traces. Suppose @ man | had fired through the window, it would indeod be a remarkablé shot who could with a revolver inflict \so deadly a wound, Again, Park lane Is a frequented thoroughfare; there is a cabstand within § @ hundred yards:of the house, No one had heard a shot, And yet 4 there was the dead man, and there the revolver bullet, which had: mushroomed out, as soft-nosed bullets will, and so inflicted a wound: which must have caused instantaneous death, Such were the clroums stances of the Park Lane Mystery, which were further cated iby entire absence of motive, since, as I have said, yt