The Hound of the Baskervilles: Death on the Moor

Holmes explained that he had been on the moor for days, with only the boy Cartwright to bring him food.He had let Watson think he was in London, because the enemy would never suspect a man who was not there.Watson felt hurt at first, but he was pleased when Holmes said that his reports had been very useful.

Then Holmes told him the truth: the lady was not Stapleton’s sister but his wife.Stapleton had also made Laura Lyons believe that he would marry her once she was free of her husband.Holmes was sure that Stapleton was the man behind everything, but he did not yet have the proof he needed.

Suddenly a terrible scream came across the dark moor, followed by the deep sound of a hound.They ran towards it and found a man lying face down at the bottom of a cliff, his head broken.He was wearing Sir Henry’s tweed suit, and for a moment they believed that they had failed to save him.

But when Holmes lit a match, they saw a beard, and they knew that the dead man was Selden.Sir Henry had given his old clothes to Barrymore, who had passed them on to the convict.The hound had followed the smell of Sir Henry’s clothes, and the poor man had fallen while running for his life.

Just then Stapleton appeared out of the darkness, smoking a cigar, and stopped when he saw them.When he looked at the body, his face showed both surprise and disappointment that it was not Sir Henry.

Holmes calmly said that the convict had fallen in the dark, and that he himself would return to London the next day.Stapleton went home, and Holmes told Watson that they had never faced a more dangerous enemy.