Detective Bennet [Comprehensive novel]

"Pastor Abuli's hometown?"

The old man, Bob, was taken aback for a while, and after thinking for a while, he said uncertainly, "Maybe it's in the Mediterranean area? Sir, what are you asking for?"

Kelsey replied naturally, "Pastor Abuli's letter to his father seems to have mentioned that he has no close relatives in the world. In his later years, he hopes to go back and see the flowers in his hometown again."

"Unfortunately, he failed to fulfill his wish."

With a sad face, Kelsey picked up a seal from the drawer, "I have seen such a seal before, and it was sent to my father with the letter. Pastor Abuli said that the pattern on it is the logo of his hometown. If I can find out where his hometown is, and I want to go there for him."

"Oh! Good sir, Pastor Abuli is really lucky to have met you and your father."

Bob and the villagers never wanted to contact Abuli's relatives.In the past ten years, I have never heard or seen him interacting with his relatives.

While talking, Bob remembered something, "Do you have any other suggestions about the pastor's funeral?"

Kelsey nodded, and took out a handful of gold coins from the purse. "I wanted to request a rest for a few days. I immediately wrote to my father and asked them to see each other one last time.

My father knew Pastor Abuli, and maybe he had talked about the arrangements for going to heaven in the future.The matter of burial is delayed, and the coffin is first prepared.In the past few days, I trouble you to find some people to take care of Pastor Abuli's body. "

This is not an unreasonable request.

At the current temperature, the corpse is well preserved and it is not easy to rot.

"it is good."

Bob agreed, and he was rewarded with generous gold coins, not to mention that he could not find a helper.

In the absence of close relatives, with the consent of the villagers, he can almost take over Abuli's funeral.

Because of Abuli's status as a pastor, there is at most one more procedure, and a report must be made to the church later.

Given the respect that Gelfin villagers have for Abuli, they bluntly stated that he was involved in the murder case, which would be unfavorable to the investigation and may arouse dissatisfaction and resistance from the villagers.

Kelsey called off the burial as the son of an old friend, so he had more time to thoroughly investigate and collect evidence.

Spend some gold coins to take over Abuli's affairs, search his room openly, and take the opportunity to further examine his body.

Immediately, he wrote a letter to the so-called father, asking Bob to send the letter to Hansford village immediately.

Bob glanced at the addressee on the envelope, "Mr. Holmes, don't worry, I will find someone to deliver the letter to old Mr. Holmes as quickly as possible."

Kelsey pursed her lips slightly, and it was inconvenient to say her real name now.

It's just that this temporary role-playing, with Sherlock Holmes' real name, sounds a little awkward no matter what.

The next round of cooperation between the two, they should make an appointment in advance with a pronoun who will stay outside.

There is no need to worry about the letter being delivered to the hotel, and Sherlock is not present, and the letter will be sent back the same way because Tom Smith was found missing.

This time I can only admit it.

As for whether she will reveal her name because of the signature on the envelope because of Sherlock's letter?From the perspective of time and distance, it should not be.

The two headed north and south in different directions, but it took a day and a half less to get to the church than to go to the burning hotel.

Even if Sherlock had just arrived at the destination, there were clues. When he wanted to send the letter, he should have received the letter from the church here.

The matter of addressing is just for fun, even if there is a mistake, I will justify it later.

The immediate purpose is to investigate Abuli in detail.

Kelsey made a preliminary autopsy on the body on the pretext of sorting out the remains.

Even though she has not studied forensic science systematically, she can still judge Abuli's state before his death based on years of on-site experience.

Abuli had convulsions before his death, leaving related marks on his face and limbs.

Especially the fingers and toes curled inwards tightly, and the metallic taste in his mouth, all of which indicated that he died from an overdose of fan wood/turtle/alkaline.

Then inspected Abuli's bedroom and study in detail.

Although the scene was somewhat damaged due to the entry and exit of the villagers before, there were no obvious signs of movement of medicine bottles, wine bottles, books and other objects.

In other words, the villagers have never touched the personal items in the house. If there are fingerprints other than Abuli on them, then the source of the fingerprints is suspected.

For the time being, Kelsey lives in the inner church guest room.It is said to be for close-range vigil, but in fact it is convenient to complete a series of surveys.

The reason why he wanted to investigate Abuli in detail, and asked where his hometown was, was inseparable from the seals in the drawer.

A similar stamp had been seen in the hallway of Franklin's burning tenement.

That clay seal was distorted and deformed by the fire, making it impossible to see the engravings on the surface of the seal, and one could only tell that the clay used in the seal came from the United States.

The four seals in Abuli's drawer were so well preserved that Kelsey recognized their origin—things that should have been in the curio cabinet.

A custom of eating soil began in the Mediterranean region before BC.

At that time, people collected a kind of red clay, cleaned and refined it into small pieces.The priest will take out the corresponding clay seal letter and stamp the soil block, and the stamped small soil block is called Yintu.

Since this kind of seal belongs to the priest, it has magical power in itself, and a piece of seal soil is equal to the blessing of the priest.Pieces of India soil were given out to the common people to take and cure various diseases.

Medicinal Indian soil was widely spread in ancient Greece and ancient Rome, and then fell silent for a long time with the decline of the classical world.

Until the Renaissance, it made a comeback.

Throughout the European continent, small soil tablets for healing diseases can be seen almost everywhere.

At that time, people believed that being close to Indo would give them a special power.The pharmacist took the lead in recommending that even if you don't take Yintu, just wearing it will make you healthy.

In the final analysis, its magical power comes from the seal.

The world pursues profits.

Seals are no longer the private property of priests. Merchants in various cities and towns began to collect clay, make various seals and engrave various Indian medicine tablets for sale.

With the passage of time, medicine is always advancing, and eating soil to treat diseases is gradually being abandoned.

By the time of the Victorian period, both seals and seals were very rare, and only existed in the hands of wealthy antique collectors.

In her previous life, Kelsey was lucky enough to see one or two of these small clay objects, which looked ordinary and belonged to a very unpopular collection.

However, they testify to the development of medicine.Eating soil to cure diseases does not only happen in Europe, but also has the same custom in the southern United States.

This made Franklin and Abuli have a relationship, and both have seals representing magical healing power.

In an era when mysterious medicinal seals were rare, was it just a coincidence that the two died one after the other?

Following in-depth investigation, no suspicious fingerprints were found in the house.

Including the "refreshing water" glass bottle that caused Abuli to be poisoned to death, no clues were found that could be matched with half of Franklin's fingerprints at the scene of death.

However, Kelsey found something at the bottom of the box, which was out of place among Abuli's items.

The brown beard patch and a brown curly hair set, they were hidden at the bottom of the storage box and have not been used for some years.

For Abuli, who has blond hair and no beard, this is obviously a set of disguise props.

What would a benevolent priest with few hobbies other than preaching do with this set?

**

Heading north, Hansford Village.

Sherlock found the rumored abandoned hotel.

It is understood that this piece of land belongs to a wealthy businessman in London who built a hotel more than ten years ago and hired local Laurie to manage it.

Seven years ago, one night at the end of October, a fire broke out in the hotel.

The fire destroyed most of the houses and killed one person.Since the business of the hotel was not prosperous at all, the rich merchants did not invest in rebuilding it, so the place has been left unused.

"Actually, it is one thing for the turnover to fail to meet the standard, but there are special reasons for not simply changing it to other uses."

The former owner, Laurie, charged Sherlock a question-and-answer fee.

Under the lure of gold coins, Laurie recounted the past events of the hotel.

"It was the fire of the devil that burned the hotel. The fear of strange powers made this place deserted. Mr. Holmes, don't think it is a random fabrication."

Laurie led the way, stepped over the ashes and broken stones, and stopped in front of a room.

"This room is where the fire started, and it is also the only room of the deceased who died in the fire."

The door to the room was obviously rebuilt after the disaster, which made it stand out among the row of ruins.

"Rebuilding a door is to prevent the evil breath from spreading out easily."

Laurie opened the reinforced lock, and the house was dark.The noon sun did not shine in, and the windows of the house were sealed from the inside.

Laurie lit the lamp that had been prepared beforehand, held it up high, and signaled Sherlock to look up at the ceiling.

Two feet from the door beam, there is a black mark that looks like an eyeball on the mud wall of the ceiling.

"Until the fire broke out, I ran the store for eight years and made sure that there was no such weird pattern on the top of my head."

Laurie took a quick glance and then lowered his head. If it wasn't at noon, he really wouldn't have the courage to return to the scene of the fire. "The devil's eye appeared after the fire, and it is a sign of the devil's way here."

Sherlock looked up and stared for a moment, the black imprint was round in shape, indeed it looked like an eye.

"It's impossible to judge that fire as a devil's fire based on just one pattern, right? What happened after the disaster?"

"cough!"

Laurie's throat tightened when he thought of those, and he lowered his voice, as if afraid of alarming the invisible existence. "There is also singing. A woman, a middle-aged woman's singing in the middle of the night. It sounds on the anniversary of her death every year."

Laurie was a little incoherent.

Sherlock quickly clarified, "You mean that the fire broke out in the night at the end of October, and then every year, at the end of October, a woman's singing sounded here. The age of the singer coincided with the age of the lady who died in the fire? Do you suspect that The dead are singing?"

Laurie nodded vigorously, but saw Sherlock looked suspicious. "Believe it or not, it really exists. In the past two days, the singing is coming again."

"Okay, I'll stay and hear it for myself."

Sherlock showed no fear, "Since she comes every year, Mr. Laurie, do you understand the lyrics?"

Laurie's eyes widened, who would have the guts to listen to the lyrics of the undead!

"Mr. Holmes, do you really want to spend the night here?"

Laurie looked at Sherlock like a madman, "It's not necessary! I can't take responsibility for something wrong."

Sherlock waved his hand, "You don't need to be responsible. Just get all the things I need for me, and restore the arrangement at that time."

According to the investigation results of Hansford Village that year, the hotel fire was an accident.

The passenger was unconscious due to drunkenness, the oil lamp in the room was overturned, sparks fell on the flammable carpet, and gradually burned into a big fire, spreading from the inside to the outside.

At that time, it was nearly midnight, and the hotel was basically asleep.People hurriedly evacuated after discovering the fire, and it was impossible to judge the fire point at the first time.

When the fire brigade came to put out the fire, they found the drunk woman's room one by one, and found that the door was locked.Brute in with violence and find the drunk lady burned to death.

To be precise, she inhaled thick smoke while drunk, completely comatose and had no chance to escape.

——This is a death in a secret room.

Sherlock will not easily believe the conclusions of the year.

The devil's fire, the sole death, and the midnight singing in the years that followed all suggest that the fire was not an accident as it appeared.

"Do you know the dead?"

Sherlock looked at Laurie, "Her age, appearance, identity, etc., what about the funeral after the fire?"

Asked about this, Laurie was half-sighed and tinged with disdain, "Helen, no man can forget a woman like that with a tear mole at the corner of her eye.

At that time, she should have been 35 or [-] years old. Compared with a young girl, she was very charming.But not from a good family. "

Helen came to the hotel alone, and her clothes showed that she was not short of money.

Which serious lady would not wait for the servants to go out, but also secretly meet with a man?

"I guess Helen is somebody's mistress. She came to Hansford every year for the three years before the fire.

There was always a bearded man in a hat who came to her room three days later.The two stayed in the room together for four or five days, about four or five times a year. "

Laurie guessed what Sherlock was going to ask, "Neither the guys nor I have seen the man's full face. His hat is pulled down very low, and only the lower half of his beard and curly brown hair reaching to the head and neck can be seen." .

At that time, we all guessed who the man was?He didn't speak a word, but he probably wasn't from the village.There was no match for him in the village who was thin and of medium height. "

Sherlock asked Laurie to draw a specific figure, which did not match Viscount Peterson. "Didn't this man show up the year the fire started?"

Laurie shook his head, "Generally, the bearded man will appear three days after Helen arrives. The night of the fire was Helen's first night in the hotel, and I haven't seen the bearded man since then. Not only him, but actually neither Others come to collect Helen's body."

Perhaps because it was an affair, no one knew that Helen had come to Hansford Village.

After the accident, her relatives and friends, who hadn't seen her for a long time, came to her door, and the village helped her bury her body.

"Until Helen was buried, no one came to mourn."

Laurie shrugged, "The only one who prayed for her was the priest who read the requiem."

It is not uncommon for funerals to invite priests to pray for blessings.

Sherlock still asked, "Which priest? Is there any resemblance to the bearded man?"

"Hahaha!" Laurie laughed loudly, "Do you doubt Pastor Abuli? Impossible, absolutely impossible. That is a clean priest. In this parish, no one doubts Pastor Abuli. .”

Laurie also said, "Yongdou Cerberus, have you heard the rumor? Pastor Abuli lives in the church in Gelfin Village, and he is also in charge of the educational affairs of Hansford Village. We all know that one will spend his whole life Dedicated to God."

Golfin's Church?

When Sherlock heard this address, instead of reducing his doubts, his doubts deepened.

However, Lowry obviously doesn't think so.He briefly described Pastor Abuli, without giving any extra clues.

into the night.

The burning house has been largely restored.

Sherlock lay where the victim Helen had been, staring at the black mark on the ceiling above his head.

In the afternoon, I surveyed the entire hotel, and most of the rooms here have the same layout.

If someone intentionally wants to create a fire in a secret room, he can stay in one of them first and do corresponding simulation experiments.

that's it!

Sherlock jumped up, rolled the newspaper into a long strip, and glued it together section by section.

Step on the bench and carefully pass the long paper stick over the door frame.Fold the paper stick again and again to make a suitable angle, and fix one end of it behind the oil lamp.

After closing the door, Sherlock pulled out the paper stick vigorously, and indeed there was a clanging sound of the lamp holder falling to the ground inside the room.

So-called ceiling black eyes.It is just the ink marks left by the leverage points when the paper sticks were fixed, and then smoked and roasted after burning in a big fire.

Seven years ago, Helen's death was not a fire accident, but a well-arranged secret room murder.

At this point, midnight is approaching.

There was actually a singing sound outside the hotel. The indistinct a cappella could be heard to be the slightly hoarse voice of a middle-aged woman.

Sherlock blew out the kerosene lamp, listened intently, and walked out with low steps.

I asked Laurie before, is the midnight singing voice similar to Helen's voice?Why is it identified as the singing of the dead?

Laurie said that he hadn't listened carefully, but the voices were similar in age.If Helen is alive, it doesn't happen to be in her 40s.Although Helen's voice was not hoarse when she was alive, she was burned to death, so her throat was hoarse.

With such logic, Sherlock was also speechless, and now he just wanted to catch the current situation.

"April is in my lover's face, July is shining in her eyes, September is hidden in her breasts, and December is cold in her heart."

The singing is fluttering in the wind. This is a love poem that has been sung from the sixteenth century to the present.

Sherlock had just left the hotel, but heard a young man screaming.

"Ah—" cried Collins, "who, who is singing somewhere! Stay away from me, God, God bless me!"

The singing stopped abruptly.

Sherlock ran out in a hurry, but there was no sign of the woman in the wild grass.

"Ah!" Collins was startled by the singing in the middle of the night just now, turned around and fled a few steps, just in time to bump into Sherlock. "You you you, what the hell are you!"

Sherlock threw off Collins and chased further by the moonlight.

Surprisingly, although the singing sounded like a middle-aged female voice, the speed of that escape was far beyond that of an ordinary middle-aged female.She has completely disappeared.

"Did you bump into her?"

Sherlock turned back to find Collins again, "Have you seen what she looks like?"

"See what?"

Collins was still in shock. He heard that Abuli was dead, and he wanted to seek the post of parish priest.It's good to think about doing meritorious deeds, such as trying to eliminate demons in an abandoned hotel, who would have thought that he would actually bump into a demon.

Sherlock asked again patiently, "That singing woman, you screamed when you saw her, didn't you?"

Collins nodded and shook his head, "No, no, I saw a figure, but in the situation just now - black lights, wilderness, land of demon legends, who would go and see what happened when they encountered a terrifying ghost? Remember what she looked like?"

Who said no?

Sherlock didn't give an example himself, and his first reaction was that Jerry could.In a similar scene, the two had a fight for this.

Facing the frightened Collins, Sherlock realizes that he really hopes Kelsey is here.