The Boschum Valley Mystery Part 2

There was no rain as homes had foretold, and the morning broke bright and claveless.

At nine o'clock, Lestrade called for us with the carriage, and we sat off for hathorly

farm and the Boschum pool.

There is serious news this morning, Lestrade observed.

It is said that Mr. Turner of the hall is so ill that his life is despaired of.

An elderly man I presume said homes.

About sixty, but his constitution has been shattered by his life abroad and he has been

in failing health for some time.

This business has had a very bad effect upon him.

He was an old friend of McCarthy's, and I may add, a great benefactor to him, for

I have learned that he gave him hathorly farm rent-free.

Indeed, that is interesting, said homes.

Oh yes, in a hundred other ways he has helped him.

Everybody about here speaks of his kindness to him.

Really?

Does it not strike you as a little singular that this McCarthy, who appears to have had

little of his own and have been under such obligations to Turner, should still talk of

marrying his son, to Turner's daughter, who is presumably heirous to the estate, and

then in such a very cocksure manner as if it were merely a case of a proposal and all

else would follow.

It is the more strange, since we know that Turner himself was averse to the idea.

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