Title: The Crooked Man
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Storyline/Synopsis:
Holmes calls on Watson late one evening to tell him about a case that he has been working on, and also to invite him to be a witness to the final stage of the investigation. Colonel James Barclay, of The Royal Mallows based at Aldershot Camp, is dead, apparently by violence, and his wife Nancy is the prime suspect.
Holmes believes that the case is not what it at first appears to be. Although the staff are quite sure that they only heard the Colonel’s and his wife’s voices, Holmes is convinced that a third person came into the room at the time of the Colonel’s death, and rather oddly, made off with the key. This Holmes deduces from footmarks found in the road, on the lawn, and in the morning room. Odder still, the mystery man seems to have brought an animal with him. Judging from the footmarks, it is long like a weasel or a stoat, with short stumpy legs, but bigger than either of those animals. It left claw marks on the curtain, too, leading Holmes to deduce that it was a carnivore, for there was a bird cage near the curtain.
Holmes is sure that Miss Morrison holds the key to the mystery, and he is right. She claimed to know nothing of the reason for the argument between her neighbours, but once told by Holmes that Nancy could easily face a murder charge, she feels that she can betray her promise to her and tells all.
This breaks the case wide open for Holmes. He knows that there cannot be many men of this description in the area. Holmes soon identifies him as Henry Wood, and goes with Watson to visit him the next day in his room in the very same street where the two women met him. Wood explains all. He had been a corporal in the same regiment as the Colonel, who was still a sergeant at that time, at the time of the Indian Mutiny. He and Barclay were both vying for Nancy’s hand. Henry was not deformed, and much better looking in those days. The regiment was confined to its cantonment by the turmoil in India, and water had run out, among other problems. A volunteer was asked for, to go out and summon help, and it was Henry. Sergeant James Barclay — later the Colonel — instructed Henry on the safest route. It took him straight into an ambush, and he gathered from what little he knew of the local language that Barclay had betrayed him to the enemy by planning the whole business, simply to remove him from contention for Nancy's affection. He was tortured repeatedly, which is how he became deformed, spent years as a slave, or wandering, learnt how to be a conjurer, and when he was getting old, he longed to come back to England. He sought out soldiers because he was familiar with the milieu; likewise Doyle's account hints that another reason that Wood came back is that he has not long to live: his yellow eyes hint at Jaundice or Hepatitis B virus and his need for a fire in the summertime also hint at malaria.
Then, quite by chance, he met Nancy that evening. Unknown to her, however, he followed her home and witnessed the argument, for the blinds were up and the glass door open. He climbed over the low wall and entered the room. An apoplectic fit caused by the sight of him killed the Colonel instantly, and Mrs. Barclay fainted. His guilty secret was at last laid bare. His first thought then was to open the inside door and summon help, and he took the key from the now-unconscious Mrs. Barclay to do so, but realising that the situation looked very bad for him, he chose instead to flee, stopping long enough to retrieve his mongoose, used in his conjuring acts, which had escaped from the wooden box. However, he did drop his stick, the odd weapon that was later found, and he inadvertently carried off the key with him.
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