HBWnovel Chapter 575 Characteristics of the Murderer
Chapter 575 Characteristics of the Murderer
On the way to the scene, Holmes made a rough conclusion about the murderer based on the details he had found in the newspaper.
The first thing that can be confirmed is that the other person is left-handed, which can be easily judged from the direction of the wound on the body.
Secondly, and most importantly, the other person is definitely not short.
"Probably about the same size as me, but probably a little shorter than me."
(A clarification here is that Jack's official height is 247 cm, which is a bit exaggerated, so the author modified Jack's height as a man to 1 meters, and his height as a woman to 1 meters, which is also considered very tall.
Although there is no exact description of Holmes' height in the original work, there are many chapters that describe his height in detail. So, after combining all the information, we can roughly conclude that his height should be around 1 meters to 83 meters.
So Holmes would say here that Jack should be about the same height as himself, and he is a slovenly person anyway, and he probably really would describe a murderer like this.)
"What the hell?! How did you figure this out?"
This surprised Inspector Lestrade a little, because Jack the Ripper had committed many crimes, but they had never found any footprints or fingerprints at the scene, so they had never been able to determine the suspect's height, weight, build, and appearance.
Just at this moment, they had arrived at the scene of the first prostitute being killed while chatting. In order to prevent the scene from being disturbed, Holmes stopped the carriage at a distance and walked directly over with Sheriff Lestrade.
Holmes stopped suddenly when he reached the door, then he suddenly grabbed Inspector Lestrade's hair and forced him to look up.
"Do you see clearly?"
(England developed rapidly during the industrial period, but due to environmental pollution and heavy work, most people were not very tall, about 1 meters for women and 1 meters for men. In order to build more rooms and accommodate more workers, the ceiling height would not be very high. After all, it was enough to have a place to live. Who would ask for so much?)
Seeing that Inspector Lestrade had not noticed that thing yet, Holmes had no choice but to point his finger at the mark.
After looking for a long time, Sheriff Lestrade finally found a fresh knife mark on a beam on the ceiling.
It was obviously not a mark caused by a nail, but more like a mark caused by a knife accidentally hitting it.
Moreover, if you look forward along the location of the knife mark, and walk two or three steps forward, you will find the place where the victim fell. It is obvious that the knife mark must have been left there accidentally by the murderer, and he may not even have noticed it himself.
"Now you understand why I said the suspect's height is about the same as mine, because only someone of my height can... do this!"
As Holmes spoke, he raised his cane high in the air, as if he was about to chop down. It was obvious that with Holmes' height and the length of his cane, he easily touched the new knife mark, and even went beyond that distance.
But if it was Sheriff Lestrade, even with the help of Holmes' long cane, he would still be some distance away from the knife mark. Besides, what idiot would use a knife as long as a cane to kill someone?
How could a serial killer make such a stupid mistake? If he wanted to kill someone, he would definitely use a tool that was convenient for him, at least not something that was so long that he couldn't swing it easily, so the tool he used must have been shorter than Holmes' cane, which meant that he must have been taller.
"So the basic characteristics of this serial killer are that he is left-handed and about your height."
Although there are few clues, it is better than no clues, because there may be very few men who meet both requirements at the same time. But if you look at the whole of England, the range is still very large.
"No, the important point is that his tools are also very unique. At least they are custom-made. To be honest, I have never seen such an elegant killer."
Hearing what Holmes said, Sheriff Lestrade couldn't help but roll his eyes at him.
"How do you say this?"
"If you look carefully at the autopsy report, you will understand that the knife wounds on these victims are almost all parallel. In other words, you can try with a knife to see how difficult it is to make five parallel wounds. Do you think a murderer would care about such details when killing people? Even if he cared, he couldn't achieve such an effect with a ruler. So these five wounds were made at the same time."
After saying that, Holmes waved his left hand vigorously, as if he wanted to simulate how the murderer killed the victims at that time?
"You mean he made an oversized knife claw on his left hand, just like those vampires and werewolves in fairy tales, monsters with very long nails that can slit the throats of their prey with one blow? Then, he kept waving his left hand to cut the victims into pieces?!"
"Yes, so we can conclude that his left hand muscles are very developed. After all, if he doesn't have much strength, he definitely can't swing such a heavy metal tool."
That's not the point! (ノ=Д=)ノ┻━┻
Sheriff Lestrade was going crazy. Once Holmes got caught up in his reasoning vortex, he would not stop easily, and he would not care how shocking his words were.
"At the same time, we can also conclude that he is a rich man or that there are rich people around him who can support him. After all, if you want to customize a weapon like that, you absolutely cannot do it without money. What's more, not only does he need to customize it, but he also has to silence the person who helped him customize it, which is a considerable expense."
"Well, do you have anything to add, Holmes?"
Sheriff Lestrade looked like his brain was about to explode.
After determining that Holmes could only deduce this temporarily based on the existing clues, Inspector Lestrade came up with a rough outline of the murderer.
He is tall and slender, about 1 to 8 meters tall, very strong, left-handed, and either has money or has people around him who have money.
.................................................. ........................
It was still a good harvest. After all, this was just the appetizer. The real main course was the crime scene of the nobleman. To be honest, many police officers vomited after entering.
The nobleman and the dozen or so servants in his mansion at the time were all cut into pieces. Some of the body parts could not be put back together and had to be transported out directly.
Inspector Lestrade originally thought that after investigating the scene, Holmes would be able to give some clues about the murderer, but he did not expect Holmes to say something.
“Where are the children?”
"what?!"
Holmes pointed in the direction of the basement and said,
"Look carefully at the footprints on the ground. They are very messy. I believe some of them are from those idiots and police officers under your command. But look carefully at this one."
Holmes touched the mark with the toe of his shoe.
"I noticed this when I entered the basement just now. This footprint went in and out of the basement at least seven times. I believe that even the forensic doctors and police officers investigating the scene don't need to run back and forth so many times."
What Holmes said was indeed correct. The owner of the shoe prints ran back and forth so many times, which really made people feel that something was wrong.
"The most important thing is that if you look closely at this shoe print, the biggest difference from the shoe prints left by the police officers nearby is that it is complete.
If I'm not mistaken, the servants who returned to the mansion the next morning discovered the tragic situation and called the police.
Well, a night has passed, and most of the blood has dried up. So even if the police officers under your command stepped on the blood and left footprints here, their shoe prints would be incomplete because most of the shoes have solidified. But this shoe print is different, it is very complete and very neat. In other words, that is to say......"
"It was left before the blood coagulated. In other words, this is the murderer's shoe print!!!"
"You finally came to your senses."
But after the initial surprise, Sheriff Lestrade still couldn't understand what Holmes meant by the child?
"There are only two reasons why a noble would dig a basement in his home.
One is to build a wine cellar, but this place obviously does not meet the requirements of a wine cellar. It is too warm and humid, and we did not see any wine barrels.
Then the other possibility is nothing more than wanting to hide some treasures, or some unknown secrets. And for that guy who has long been dead, what is his most important 'treasure and secret'? "
"He hid some of the kids in this basement!!!!"
If there were a dozen children hiding in this basement and now they are missing, coupled with the footprints of the murderer going in and out outside the basement, Inspector Lestrade felt that these children must be in great danger.
But what he didn't expect was that Holmes, after thinking for a while with his chin on his hand, added,
"I think there may be one more feature of the murderer. He could be a woman or a man without fertility."
"What?"
Looking at Sheriff Lestrade's expression, Holmes really didn't want to continue wondering what this idiot was thinking.
After once again marveling at Scotland Yard's ability to silence people, Holmes stated his reasoning directly and concisely.
"If Jack the Ripper wanted to kill all the children in the basement, he could just go in and out once, kill the children, and then leave.
But he didn't do that. Instead, he went in and out about seven times.
Don't tell me that he might have wanted to move the children's bodies out. If he really did that, then why did he only move the bodies to the basement and not the bodies outside? Wouldn't that be a waste of effort?
The only possible explanation is that he rescued the children here, and he went in and out of the basement back and forth just to take all the children out.
But use your brain and think about it carefully. If you have children at home, would you choose to bring a dozen children who may be infected with diseases and incomplete into your home? Definitely not.
But at the same time, it was impossible for Jack the Ripper to send them to an orphanage. There were only a few orphanages in London. If he sent so many children there at once, they would definitely be discovered by others.
And we can't rule out the possibility that some of those children remembered what he looked like.
These children were like hot potatoes to him, so he had no choice but to raise them by himself.
But you can imagine how troublesome this would be. Killing them directly would be a permanent solution, but Jack the Ripper did not do that.
So what do you think is the only reason that could allow a serial killer to raise a child who has no blood relationship with him, a child who has seen his crimes, seen his face, and may expose his crimes at any time?
He is either a woman with overflowing maternal love or a man who is completely infertile. He can only provide himself with some comfort by raising other people's children. "
Here Holmes was silent for a moment, and then he said something that made Inspector Lestrade want to beat him up.
"Elegant, emotional, compassionate, and extremely intelligent. To be honest, I really want to meet him and have a chat with him. I might have a lot of fun chatting with him."
Rather than a joke, it was more like a like-minded sigh. What should the killer say? It was very much in line with Holmes's appetite. If there was really a chance, he really wanted to find a place to sit down and chat with him.
They are likely to have unique insights on some things.
"Holmes, I seriously doubt whether you have had a brain injury this morning."
Is this still the Sherlock Holmes that Inspector Lestrade knew, who hated criminals? Why does it seem like he has been treating these cases with a playful attitude since this morning?
"I respect life, so I want to seek justice for the victim, but at the same time, Sheriff Lestrade, you have to find out who the victim is."
Everything is like a coin, with two sides.
But Sheriff Lestrade only saw one side. He only thought that Jack the Ripper was a serial killer and he had to catch him.
But he didn't think about it.
What if he is one of the relatives of these murdered children, and he is doing this just for revenge?
Or is he just a good person who couldn't stand what these people did, so he used the wrong way to uphold justice?
Although the method was wrong, the result was good. At least the children escaped from the clutches of the devil, and those who really made mistakes paid the due price.
And if Jack the Ripper had a way to collect all the evidence of these people's crimes, then it at least proves that his reasoning and case-handling abilities were also very strong.
At this point, Holmes even felt a little sympathy for Jack the Ripper. If the other party could use the right method, Holmes felt that he might become good friends with him.
But unfortunately now......