The Hudson Valley Mystery: A New Sherlock Holmes Story by Craig Stephen Copland

Author:Craig Stephen Copland [Copland, Craig Stephen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781500792374
Amazon: 1500792373
Barnesnoble: 1500792373
Publisher: CreateSpace Publishing
Published: 2014-08-08T21:00:00+00:00

7 The Non-Confession

“Mr. John Turner,” announced the hotel bell boy, opening the door of our sitting room and ushering in our visitor.

The man entered slowly, limping. His body still gave evidence of unusual strength, but his face was an ashen white, and his lips tinged with a shade of blue. His deadly chronic disease had diminished him even in the brief time since we had last seen him.

He sat heavily in the sofa, his energy spent on his travel from his home to the hotel.

“Your note said you wished to see me. You said that there could be terrible criminal consequences for my daughter Alice, and young James McCarthy. You knew that such a note would force me to leave my home and endure the pain of even the short distance into town. So what is it you have to tell me Mr. Holmes? Please get on with it.”

“I see you also have little patience for idle chit-chat,” said Holmes. “Very well, Mr. Turner. Your daughter and her dear friend, James McCarthy, risk being charged with being accomplices to murder and sent to prison. I will have no choice but to turn them over to the police along with the evidence that clearly points to you as the murderer of Charles McCarthy.”

The old man slouched and dropped his powerful shoulders until he looked a decrepit and sunken figure, despair in his weary eyes. For a minute he lowered his head and leaned upon his walking stock. Then he lifted his head and in what I saw was a force of sheer will and determination, smiled cunningly back at Sherlock Holmes. “And what evidence beyond your conjecture do you have to give the police, Mr. Holmes?”

“By your own account, sir, you had more than sufficient motive to get rid of your friend, or should I say your former friend. The two of you were long past the warm closeness of your youth. You stood to gain a very great deal in wealth and property from your right of first refusal to his property, taken, as you have yourself admitted, at a time when McCarthy was at a pecuniary disadvantage. For years you harbored a jealousy towards him because of your affection for his wife, made particularly poisonous after your own wife’s passing, as you saw him continuing in married bliss while you lived alone. You knew he had cut his son out of his inheritance, and you managed somehow to convince your daughter and son to be part of your conspiracy, and perhaps even their college friends. Young James pretended to be mad so that he could draw all attention away from you. He will soon be brought to trial, declared to have been only temporarily insane and allowed to walk free. He and your daughter will end up wealthy and secure, as will the grandchildren who you will never live to see. So perhaps sir you would like to confess your foul deed now or your daughter and James will spend their youth in prison instead of enjoying their family estates.

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