The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Part 17 (2/2)

”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 rip 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 '60's at the diggings I was a young chap then, hot-blooded and reckless, ready to turnbad companions, took to drink, had no luck with my claim, took to the bush, and in a word becahway robber There were six of us, and we had a wild, free life of it, sticking up a station froings

Black Jack of Ballarat was the name I went under, and our party is still re

”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 on-driver, as this very man McCarthy I wish to the Lord that I had shot hih I saw his wicked little eyes fixed on ot aith the gold, beca suspected There I parted from my old pals and deterht this estate, which chanced to be in the ood with my money, to make up for the way in which I had earned it Ishe left me my dear little Alice

Even when she was just a baby her wee hand see else had ever done In a word, I turned over a new leaf and didhen McCarthy laid his grip upon one up to town about an investent Street with hardly a coat to his back or a boot to his foot

”'Here we are, Jack,' says he, touching ood as a family to you There's two of us,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 ca them off, and there they have lived rent free on my best land ever since There was no rest for etfulness; turn where I would, there was his cunning, grinning face at rew up, for he soon saasmy past than of the police Whatever he wanted he ave him without question, land,which I could not give He asked for Alice

”His son, you see, had grown up, and so had irl, 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 hih 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 hiar and waited behind a tree until he should be alone

But as I listened to his talk all that was black and bitter inhis son to ht 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 aand a desperateof liirl!

Both could be saved if I could but silence that foul tongue I did it, Mr Holain Deeply as I have sinned, I have led a life of led in the same meshes which held me was more than I could suffer I struck him doith no more compunction than if he had been soht 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 entlemen, of all that occurred”

”Well, it is not for ned 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 deathbeds, when they coht of the peace which you have given to iant frame, he stumbled slowly fro 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'”

Jath of a number of objections which had been drawn out by Hol 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 norance of the black cloud which rests upon their past

ADVENTURE V THE FIVE ORANGE PIPS

When I glance over my notes and records of the Sherlock Holmes cases between the years '82 and '90, I a features that it is no easy matter to knohich to choose and which to leave Soh the papers, and others have not offered a field for those peculiar qualities which ree, and which it is the object of these papers to illustrate Some, too, have baffled his analytical skill, and would be, as narratives, beginnings without an ending, while others have been but partially cleared up, and have their explanations founded rather upon conjecture and surical proof which was so dear to him There is, however, one of these last which was so re in its results that I aive some account of it in spite of the fact that there are points in connection with it which never have been, and probably never will be, entirely cleared up

The year '87 furnished us with a long series of cases of greater or less interest, of which I retain the records As under this one twelve months I find an account of the adventure of the Paradol Chamber, of the Amateur Mendicant Society, who held a luxurious club in the lower vault of a furniture warehouse, of the facts connected with the loss of the British barque ”Sophy Anderson”, of the singular adventures of the Grice Patersons in the island of Uffa, and finally of the Ca case In the latter, asup the dead man's watch, to prove that it had been wound up two hours before, and that therefore the deceased had gone to bed within that tireatest i up the case All these I may sketch out at soular features as the strange train of circumstances which I have now taken up my pen to describe

It was in the latter days of Septeales had set in with exceptional violence All day the wind had screaainst the s, so that even here in the heart of great, hand-made London ere forced to raise our nise the presence of those great eleh the bars of his civilisation, like untaher and louder, and the wind cried and sobbed like a child in the chimney Sherlock Hol his records of crime, while I at the other was deep in one of Clark Russell's fine sea-stories until the howl of the gale from without seethen out into the long swash of the sea waves My as on a visit to her mother's, and for a few days I was a dweller once more in my old quarters at Baker Street