Mrs Brockelby’s cache of records, to Holmes’ delight, contained deeds that Mrs Brockelby’s deceased father, a gentleman farmer named Randolph Parker, had only one child, Sarah, and his wife having pre-deceased him, all his holdings, incomes, and properties were left to Sarah Parker, now Sarah Brockelby, and other papers showed that Ralph Senior had no issue, the property passed back into Sarah’s hands and she was the proper and rightful owner. There never had been any male issue waiting to benefit from his father’s death. There was only a young man of criminal disposition that saw an opportunity to enter the ranks of the wealthy by dispossessing an honourable widow in her later years, but Holmes discovered his plot in good time and was now