這故事是從弗吉尼亞鄉下開的頭，時間是1880年。一個傢境貧寒的英俊小生和一位富傢妙齡女子正在舉行婚禮——這是一樁一見鐘情、馬上結合的婚姻，可姑娘的鰥夫爸爸說什麽也不答應這樁婚事。

　　A Double Barrelled Detective Story is a novel by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens), in which Sherlock Holmes finds himself in the American west.
　　
　　At a mining camp in California, Fetlock Jones, a nephew of Sherlock Holmes, kills his master, a silver-miner, by blowing up his cabin. Since this occurs when Holmes happens to be visiting, he brings his skills to bear upon the case and arrives at logically worked conclusions that are proved to be abysmally wrong by an amateur detective with an extremely keen sense of smell, which he employs in solving the case. This could be seen as yet another piece where Twain tries to prove that life does not quite follow logic.