Thank Heaven that I had the sense to turn away from him and
to marry a better, if a poorer, man. I was engaged to him,
Mr. Holmes, when I heard a shocking story of how he had turned
a cat loose in an aviary, and I was so horrified at his brutal
cruelty that I would have nothing more to do with him.'
She rummaged in a bureau, and presently she produced a photograph
of a woman, shamefully defaced and mutilated with a knife.
`That is my own photograph,' she said. `He sent it to me in
that state, with his curse, upon my wedding morning.'
"`Well,' said I, `at least he has forgiven you now, since he has
left all his property to your son.'
"`Neither my son nor I want anything from Jonas Oldacre, dead
or alive,' she cried, with a proper spirit. `There is a God
in Heaven, Mr. Holmes, and that same God who has punished that
wicked man will show in His own good time that my son's hands
are guiltless of his blood.'
"Well, I tried one or two leads, but could get at nothing which
would help our hypothesis, and several points which would make
against it. I gave it up at last and off I went to Norwood.
"This place, Deep Dene House, is a big modern villa of staring
brick, standing back in its own grounds, with a laurel-clumped
lawn in front of it.
Pages:
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84