Write a drama based on the story The Adventure of Engineer's Thumb by Arthur Conan Doyle
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Answer:
The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb'' was first published in The Strand magazine in 1892. It was also one of the twelve stories published in the collection The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. The story is about a young engineer who comes to Dr. Watson to have his thumb--or the place where his thumb used to be--bandaged. He says something very strange happened leading up to this injury and Watson brings him to talk to Holmes.
The engineer tells the men his story; he had been struggling to start his own business when a man called to offer him a job to work on a hydraulic press, so long as he kept it an absolute secret. He offered him triple the amount of money he would have charged, provided that he come out to his house in the middle of the night to work on the job. The man said that he was trying to press the fuller's earth, a valuable mineral, into bricks to sell. He wanted to buy the properties around him that also contained this mineral before his neighbors realize how valuable the land is.
The engineer felt it was suspicious but did as he was told because he wanted the money. Once he took the train out into the country, he was brought to the house by horse and carriage. Soon after being shown how powerful the hydraulic press was, he knew the man had been lying about the fuller's earth and that this press was being used for something else that was more valuable, and probably more illegal, than fuller's earth. The man sensed the engineer's suspicion, so he turned on the hydraulic press (so huge that the engineer was actually standing inside it and the ceiling began closing down) threatening to press the engineer to death.
The engineer escaped through a crack in the wooden wall and, with the help of a mysterious woman in the house, climbed to a window. He jumped, but not before the man cut off his thumb with a cleaver. The engineer fainted and when he awoke, he was laying on the ground, not far from the train station where he arrived . He did not know how he got there and remembered that his thumb was missing. He took the train back to London to have Dr. Watson bandage him.
Holmes figures out the house's location but can not actually solve the crime because, in the midst of the engineer's escape he dropped his lantern, which set the house on fire. The criminals fled the house and were long gone by the time Holmes arrived. Holmes guesses that they were using the press to make counterfeit money. The story ends with the engineer lamenting that he had lost his thumb and had no money to show for it. Holmes reminds him that he at least has a great story to tell.