It was a country of rolling moors, lonely and dun-colored, withan occasional church tower to mark the site of some old-worldvillage. In every direction upon these moors there were traces ofsome vanished race which had passed utterly away, and left as itssole record strange monuments of stone, irregular mounds whichcontained the burned ashes of the dead, and curious earthworkswhich hinted at prehistoric strife. The glamour and mystery of theplace, with its sinister atmosphere of forgotten nations, appealedto the imagination of my friend, and he spent much of his time inlong walks and solitary meditations upon the moor. The ancientCornish language had also arrested his attention, and he had, Iremember, conceived the idea that it was akin to the Chaldean,and had been largely derived from the Phoenician traders in tin.
He had received a consignment of books upon philology andwas settling down to develop this thesis when suddenly, to mysorrow and to his unfeigned delight, we found ourselves, even inthat land of dreams, plunged into a problem at our very doorswhich was more intense, more engrossing, and infinitely moremysterious than any of those which had driven us from London.
Our simple life and peaceful, healthy routine were violentlyinterrupted, and we were precipitated into the midst of a series ofevents which caused the utmost excitement not only in Cornwallbut throughout the whole west of England. Many of my readersmay retain some recollection of what was called at the time “TheCornish Horror,” though a most imperfect account of the matterreached the London press. Now, after thirteen years, I will givethe true details of this inconceivable affair to the public.
I have said that scattered towers marked the villages whichdotted this part of Cornwall. The nearest of these was the hamletof Tredannick Wollas, where the cottages of a couple of hundredinhabitants clustered round an ancient, moss-grown church.
The vicar of the parish, Mr. Roundhay, was something of anarchaeologist, and as such Holmes had made his acquaintance. Hewas a middle-aged man, portly and affable, with a considerablefund of local lore. At his invitation we had taken tea at thevicarage and had come to know, also, Mr. Mortimer Tregennis,an independent gentleman, who increased the clergyman’s scantyresources by taking rooms in his large, straggling house. Thevicar, being a bachelor, was glad to come to such an arrangement,though he had little in common with his lodger, who was a thin,dark, spectacled man, with a stoop which gave the impression ofactual, physical deformity. I remember that during our short visitwe found the vicar garrulous, but his lodger strangely reticent, asad-faced, introspective man, sitting with averted eyes, broodingapparently upon his own affairs.
These were the two men who entered abruptly into our littlesitting-room on Tuesday, March the 16th, shortly after ourbreakfast hour, as we were smoking together, preparatory to ourdaily excursion upon the moors.
“Mr. Holmes,” said the vicar in an agitated voice, “the mostextraordinary and tragic affair has occurred during the night. It isthe most unheard-of business. We can only regard it as a specialProvidence that you should chance to be here at the time, for inall England you are the one man we need.”
I glared at the intrusive vicar with no very friendly eyes; butHolmes took his pipe from his lips and sat up in his chair likean old hound who hears the view-halloa. He waved his hand tothe sofa, and our palpitating visitor with his agitated companionsat side by side upon it. Mr. Mortimer Tregennis was more selfcontainedthan the clergyman, but the twitching of his thin handsand the brightness of his dark eyes showed that they shared acommon emotion.
“Shall I speak or you?” he asked of the vicar.
“Well, as you seem to have made the discovery, whatever it maybe, and the vicar to have had it second-hand, perhaps you hadbetter do the speaking,” said Holmes.
I glanced at the hastily clad clergyman, with the formallydressed lodger seated beside him, and was amused at the surprisewhich Holmes’s simple deduction had brought to their faces.
“Perhaps I had best say a few words first,” said the vicar, “andthen you can judge if you will listen to the details from Mr.
Tregennis, or whether we should not hasten at once to the sceneof this mysterious affair. I may explain, then, that our friend herespent last evening in the company of his two brothers, Owen andGeorge, and of his sister Brenda, at their house of TredannickWartha, which is near the old stone cross upon the moor. He leftthem shortly after ten o’clock, playing cards round the diningroomtable, in excellent health and spirits. This morning, beingan early riser, he walked in that direction before breakfast andwas overtaken by the carriage of Dr. Richards, who explainedthat he had just been sent for on a most urgent call to TredannickWartha. Mr. Mortimer Tregennis naturally went with him. Whenhe arrived at Tredannick Wartha he found an extraordinary stateof things. His two brothers and his sister were seated round thetable exactly as he had left them, the cards still spread in front ofthem and the candles burned down to their sockets. The sister layback stone-dead in her chair, while the two brothers sat on eachside of her laughing, shouting, and singing, the senses strickenclean out of them. All three of them, the dead woman and thetwo demented men, retained upon their faces an expression of theutmost horror—a convulsion of terror which was dreadful to lookupon. There was no sign of the presence of anyone in the house,except Mrs. Porter, the old cook and housekeeper, who declaredthat she had slept deeply and heard no sound during the night.