Lord Arthur Saviles crime
The story Lord Arthur Savile crimes (org. Lord Arthur Savile's Crime ) of the English writer Oscar Wilde is the most famous work from the collection of short stories , Lord Arthur Savile Crime and Other Stories , published 1887th This also includes:
- The Canterville Ghost ( The Canterville Ghost )
- The Sphinx without a Secret ( The Sphinx Without a Secret )
- The Model Millionaire ( The Model Millionaire )
- The portrait of Mr. WH ( The Portrait of Mr. WH )
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The eponymous hero of the story meets Septimus R. Podgers at Lady Windermere's, who claims to be able to read the future out of his hand . After the initial analysis, Podgers is shocked and refuses to share his discovery. After Lord Arthur writes him a major check, he announces that Savile will commit murder .
The usually very down-to-earth lord is appalled, but does not doubt the truth of these words for a moment. Since he does not want to endanger the life of his future wife Sybil under any circumstances, he postpones the upcoming wedding in order to carry out the murder beforehand.
After some pre-selection, the victim is said to be his aunt Clementina, who suffers from heartburn . Under a pretext, Savile procures poison and gives it to his aunt as medicine. In order not to be suspected, he instructs her to only take the pill if she is in acute pain and leaves the city immediately. When he learns of her death days later, he returns full of exuberant joy and arranges the second date for the wedding.
Sybil happens to find the deadly pill in a can of her aunt. So she died of natural causes. Deeply disappointed, Lord Arthur postpones the wedding one more time and, via detours, procures a bomb in a travel clock from a German anarchist , which he anonymously sends to a distant relative, the Dean of Chichester. The assassination turns out to be a flop because instead of the fatal explosion, the clock only pops and smokes from time to time. The dean thinks the bomb is a joke.
Now completely desperate, Savile sees no way of fulfilling the prophecy, and his life with his future wife seems to be forever denied him. So he strolls along the Thames late at night until he accidentally discovers Podger's palm reader on a bridge. Without further ado, he decides to surprise the man from behind and throw him off the bridge, which he succeeds. The police found Podger's body in the water days later and concluded that he was suicide . A few years later, Lady Windermere visits the now married couple and casually notices that Podgers was not a real palm reader, just a fraud.