The Adventure of the Speckled Band that of Dr Roylott. Holmes and Watson arrange to spend the night in Helen's room. In darkness they wait; suddenly, a slight metallic noise and a dim light through the ventilator prompt Holmes to action. Quickly lighting a candle, he discovers on the bell cord the "speckled band"—a venomous snake. He strikes the snake with a stick, driving it back through the ventilator. Agitated, it attacks Roylott, who had been waiting for it to return after killing Helen. Holmes identifies the snake as a "swamp adder" and reveals to Watson the motive: the late wife's will had provided an annual
Short story Calaveras County" was the title story of Mark Twain's first book one year later. In 1884, Brander Matthews, the first American professor of dramatic literature, published "The Philosophy of the Short-Story". At that same year, Matthews was the first one to name the emerging genre "short story". Another theorist of narrative fiction was Henry James. James wrote a lot of short stories himself, including "The Real Thing" (1892), "Maud-Evelyn" and "The Beast in the Jungle" (1903). In the 1890s Kate Chopin published short stories in several magazines. The most prolific French author of short stories was Guy de Maupassant. Stories