"The Valley of Fear" by Arthur Conan Doyle is a novel first published in 1915. When Sherlock Holmes receives a coded warning about danger to a country gentleman named Douglas, he arrives too late—Douglas has been murdered at his moated manor house. As Holmes investigates the puzzling crime scene, he uncovers connections to a secret society and a dangerous past in America's coal mining valleys, where violent men pursued deadly vengeance under the shadow of Professor Moriarty.
Wikipedia page about this book: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Valley_of_Fear